Monopoly’s Reviews: 8103 Sky Guardian and 8105 Iron Condor

Sorry for the wait, but the Exo-Force reviews are continuing now with our first 2007 sets, the mid-range airborne mechs Sky Guardian and Iron Condor! I know these aren’t the two I implied last time but I just wanted to do the air mechs first okay

As with the 2006 reviews, we’ll start with a look at the included figures.

The Sky Guardian includes Hikaru again, this time sporting a dark blue suit with gold armour plated on top. The head and hair of the figure is completely unchanged. Meanwhile, the Iron Condor includes another Heavy Weapons Devastator, previously seen only in 2006’s Thunder Fury. This marks the final appearance of this particular robot in the entire theme. Oddly, certain releases of the set wrongly included a plain silver Devastator, with the chances of this happening being strangely high.

The main structure of the mid-range mechs has been completely overhauled since last year, with only the leg builds remaining somewhat similar. The torso is entirely reworked, with the light brick feature gutted in favour of improved durability. Meanwhile, the arms are now ball-jointed, providing smoother posing options. Additionally, the feet are almost twice as large, allowing for much greater stability. It is now commonplace for mechs to have actual forearms and hands for holding melee weapons as opposed to the blade attaching directly to the elbow.

The silhouette of the Sky Guardian is an odd one. With an extremely boxy torso, long legs, giant feet and scrawny arms with stick thin ‘feathers’ sprouting from them, it doesn’t look all too aerodynamic. It certainly has enough thrust, though, sporting at least 6 jet engines for propulsion.

The legs remain the closest to the 2006 Battle Machine frame, with the thighs completely identical to the Stealth Hunter and the shins looking fairly similar save for the yellow jet engines. Hikaru’s symbol is now gold to match his new armour, while the Japanese text now reads ‘Speed of Sound’. The feet, however, have doubled on size, making the model much more stable. Some could argue they’re a bit too big, but they look a lot worse without the extensions.

The torso shows off the new standard mid-range torso, which now allows the pilot to sit in the cockpit rather than uncomfortably stand. The interior in general is a lot more spacious, with more than enough room for the figures to move their arms, unlike the pilots of 2006 who generally had to stay flat as a pancake or risk having their arms collide with the mech’s windscreen. A pair of huge turbines reside on either side of the cockpit glass, below some headlights. The Air Force symbol adorns the left shoulder, while an ‘A.10’ appears on the right, as the counting system from last year was reset to start a ‘10’ in all categories this year, rather than continuing where the previous year left off. While the left side carries only a grille above this, the right side sports the new line-wide gimmick: Exo-Codes. These printed 1x2 tiles were all completely randomised and unique, though this aspect of them was somewhat pointless as they all unlocked the same content depending on which set you bought.

The arms are a somewhat janky affair, with no downward movement in the biceps past the point shown above thanks to the sideways ball sockets used in the shoulders, as well as Metru hips, of all things, being used to make said biceps. The hip on the left side carries a single missile and a long, angled fin with the word ‘supersonic’ applied on top, with this fin being able to swivel and hinge up and down. The elbow leads to a forearm decorated with the Air Force logo, ending in a hand gripping an exclusive dual-molded sword. This weapon’s centre has a sticker depicting electricity applied to it, which should, in theory, look cool, but rarely does because this sticker is very difficult to apply straight fir some reason. Truthfully, I have never seen a single copy of this set where the charged edge of the electrical beam actually lines up with or touches the edge of the translucent centre.

The other arm has a Zamor launcher attached to it, with an additional staircase gun barrel and ammo disk attached to it. This works just like any other Zamor launcher, firing a vibrant green ball.

The shoulders feature a further two fins, as well as four tiny missiles on a technic construction tin the centre.

The set poses fairly well, but generally never looks good in any of them due to its somewhat goofy appearance.

On the other hand, the Iron Condor looks extremely cool in practically any pose you can get it into, except for, ironically, the one used on the box art.

The silhouette of this mech is impressive. While, proportionally, it’s almost identical to the Sky Guardian, it looks much less comical due to the way the bulk is distributed. The legs, while just as long as the Sky Guardian’s, look shorter since the shins are far bulkier, which in turn also makes the huge feet less obtrusive. Similarly, the arms look less pathetic simply by adding some bulk to the biceps and lengthening the fingers. But, of course, the most obvious visual impact comes from the enormous draping wings protruding from the mech’s back. And yes, I called them wings, not ‘fins’ or ‘feathers’, because these truly are majestic, gargantuan wings unlike any Battle Machine before or since.

The legs, as previously mentioned, share the same structure as the Sky Guardian’s, differing only in the far bulkier armouring of the shins, utilising the robot’s signature spiky, angular armour piece, a carryover from the previous year, alongside some jet engines and adjustable flaps for aerodynamics. The feet are also slightly spikier.

The mech’s torso is very unusual, and is entirely unique to this set. The pilot now has actual controls placed on either side of the cockpit, protected by an asymmetrical assortment of firearms, including four blasters and a single missile, as well as an Exo-Code. This torso also features an excellent waist swivel, allowing for much greater posing options compared to other mechs.

Seriously, you can get it to do things like this…

…Or this…

…Or maybe even this! Unlike the White Lightning, this extra articulation is a help, not a hindrance, a feature that truly improves the model.

The left arm includes a vicious claw for ripping into other Battle Machines, accompanied by some stickered detailing on the forearm.

The other arm sports a huge competition cannon, probably the most reliable Lego projectile shooter ever made. This massive launcher probably explains the need for a Heavy Weapons specialist as the pilot.

That’s not it though, as we end with the previously mentioned wings, both large and imposing as well as lightweight thanks to their panel-based design. They’re fully posable, attached to the body with ball joints that allow for you to even fold them up on the mech’s back. The smaller segment is attached on a large assortment of hinges that allow for back and forth motion as well as a swivel for an impressive range of mobility.

Now, onto the prices. These both retailed for the same price as last years mid-range offerings, £9.99. This still represents great value, providing a suitably fun experience. On the secondary market, however, these sets are now worth £18 each, ruining the previous price-per-piece ratio. £18 for the Sky Guardian? Pass. Conversely, I’d say £18 for the Iron Condor is still a good price, due to its impressive design and functionality. In fact, the Iron Condor is, without a doubt, my favourite Exo-Force set of the entire series. Not the best, that honour goes to Sentai Fortress, but my personal favourite. It’s so fun to mess with, and the waist swivel gives way to a whole new world of posing options. It looks suitably menacing, it’s durable, it’s stable, it’s playable, it’s displayable, it’s functional, it’s poseable, it’s basically everything you could want from what’s essentially a Lego action figure. In fact, here’s a bunch of poses I came up with simply because I just couldn’t put it down:

Sky Guardian gets a 6/10. It’s nice enough, but it’s weird, janky design makes it not one I’m really crazy about.

Iron Condor, on the other hand, gets a full 10/10. Easily the best mid-range mech of 2007, and possibly even of the whole line, both visually stunning and a joy to handle.

Next time, we’ll do the thing I advertised last time! But I’ll actually do it and not something else!

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great review!
The Iron Condor really looks good with the imposing wing design.
The Sky Guardian looks pretty cool too.

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Now we’re entering sets that I’m less familiar with.

I think it would be a really good set if the arms were approved. In addition to not being easy to pose, the missiles look kind of tacked on, like the pilot can’t actually aim and fire them. Overall the mech looks pretty good to me, though.

I like the iron condor. To me, it seems like the kind of enemy that would be reoccurring boss in a video game that you need to defeat several times (Like Ridley or Vile from Mega Man X). As you said, it has a cool design, though I’d give it an 8 or 9 out of 10, as opposed to a perfect score.

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i thought this was the one you hinted at last time for a minute
also nice review

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Oddly enough, the weird design of the Sky Guardian has always been one of my personal favorites from the Exo Force line. There’s just something about it that really stands out to me.
And of course, that glorious exclusive sword mold. I have no idea why that was the only mech in the entire line to include and entirely new exclusive weapon mold, but I am really glad about that. That sword piece is easily one of my favorite pre-fab weapon pieces, that almost looks like it was made to be used in Bionicle MOCs.

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Ah, the nostalgia…

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These are fun to read, it’s nice to go back and see what these sets I never got to see in person were like. Are you just not doing Supernova or Ryo’s tank?

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I don’t own those sets. I’ll only do reviews of sets that I have, so in this case I skipped those two in 2006, along with the Gate Assault. I only have 5/11 of the 2007 sets, so don’t expect a full year here either.

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Part of this might be nostalgia, but 2006 was the perfect year of Exo-Force for me. The battle machines had a very industrial aesthetic. Starting in 2007, they seemed to get more fanciful and less grounded, often with weirder proportions (the Sky Guardian being a good example here). At least, that’s how I remember it; I had no money then and only ever got a few sets.

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You’re not alone, a lot of the charm of '06 came from how thicc the BMs were. They looked like actual vehicles, if impractical ones, with tank-like geometry and those bright Mata colors the line seemingly forgot about in '07. Also, they didn’t have goofy features like the Sky Guardian here, at least not to the same degree.

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I’ve umed and ered over buying the iron condor for quite some time now but after reading this I think I must buy it

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Classic set and good review :slight_smile:

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