"We have unfinished business. Attack me with all your strength."
The first wave of Star Wars Black Series figures from The Acolyte hit stores in September 2024 a couple of months after the show had aired on Disney+. The Galaxy Collection Wave 17 was entirely made up of Acolyte characters including four Jedi as well as the key characters of Mae and Osha.
The Acolyte series within the Galaxy Collection features a new red-shaded accent colour and the figures are packed in the new squared-off box style with the numbering now included on both the front and the back of the box. Mae is number 06 in the Acolyte series, following on from Jedi Master Indara and concluding the collection and completing the side art montage at this point in time. The rear of the box features a cropped version of the same side illustration as well as a short piece of background text that is the same on all 6 Acolyte releases from Wave 17 giving us just a synopsis about the show - most likely to avoid spoilers had these figures arrived early.
The new box design also now features a colour-coordinated backing card for the figure with the deep red Acolyte colour scheme. Rather than being a plain colour backing, there is an illustration within the backing card. For Mae this is the shadowy forest from Khofar and is the same background as is also used on the side artwork.
Mae is presented in the assassin gear she wears for most of The Acolyte and as first seen when she battles Master Indara on Ueda. This is a base figure wearing a chainmail of sorts on either arm and over this, we have a softer plastic sleeve of armour with a hammered finish and roughly painted yellow sections on the top and on the base. The lower skirt piece is deep red, almost brown, with more chainmail textures on one piece. It sits around the waist by way of a black decorated belt but without any paintwork, and with an interesting overhang of material out of the top of the belt which does come in handy later as you will see either by design or by accident. Mae’s outfit is finished off with a simple pair of black trousers and black boots.
Mae comes with a sleeveless purple soft goods robe that uses a similar material to that of the Jedi Knights and featuring similar tailoring to keep its shape around the hood in particular. The hood can be pulled up over Mae’s head and it sits pretty well considering the usual issues associated with soft goods of this material and scale. Being sleeveless, I found the robes difficult to position naturally with them wanting to slip off the shoulders and down the arm without a tailored sleeve to hold them in situ. They are of course removable.
The head sculpt is either the same as Osha’s or at least a minor variation of it considering they are twins and played by the same actor Amandla Stenberg. The likeness is good with facial printing used to enhance on what is a good base sculpt. The hairpiece is specific to Mae and as seen in the show is much longer than Osha’s with a red-brown base colour and highlighted ends in lighter brown on each braided piece of her fringe. The braids continue down the back with the hair reaching all the way down to Mae’s waste. The head sculpts of Mae and Osha are interchangeable but there is some difference in the way the neck is sat in the torso so when swapped one looks to have too long a neck, and the other too squat.
Mae also features a facial mask accessory which can vary her look and to have her displayed masked. It is necessary to pop the head off to engage the mask - removing the smaller ringlet that represents the mask in a folded positon with the fully expanded mask. Once the head is replaced the mask covers the bottom half of the face up to and over the nose and is engineered neatly enough to not look oversized or out of place.
Mae is articulated in full with pinless joints across 17 points of articulation. This gives her a broad range of motion in the upper body with arms that can extend up and outward in fighting stances or wielding her weaponry. The legs are more restricted by the long skirt and while the right side is split to allow the right leg to move more extensively, the left section has been left intact and therefore this blocks the left leg from following suit.
Mae comes with perhaps the smallest weapon accessories every seen in the Black Series with four tiny throwing knives as employed on Ueda. These are black with silver blades but with no other substantial detail considering how tiny they are. Mae’s hands are not quite shaped to hold them securely and there is no real way of holstering them - apart from that overflow of cloth at the top of her belt. Whether it is intentional or not, I found that these knives can be tucked into here and therefore down into the joint between the waist and hips. The fit is not as secure as a purpose-made holster, and they are at risk of being damaged if you were to bend the waist joint too far.
I suspect like many others, I very nearly lost at least two of these during the opening and posing of Mae and have sadly decided to keep them off display and in a secure box with my other Black Series spare accessories. I think considering the size a hand sculpted with a throwing knife in place would have been a better option, or to go down the more dynamic route and have the hand and knife in a throwing positon using clear plastic between hand and knife as was done with the Marvel Legends Death Dealer release.
Mae, like Osha, is a very visually different figure within a wave dominated by similar-looking Jedi. She has the most complex outfit of the two sisters with plenty of varying textures and layers, but lacks the accessories and variation of Osha provided by the latter's PIP droid, holster and backpack - although the mask accessory is a neat touch negating the need for alternative heads. While Mae works on display facing off against any of the Jedi she does look great alongside Master Indara. I do hope that despite the issues with The Acoloyte and its reception with fans we do still get a Stranger to also display alongside Mae.
Keep Track of all the Star Wars Black Series figures from Hasbro at our comprehensive
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About Me : As a child of the 70's and 80's I grew up in a golden age for action figures and in my youth bought and sold myself through collections of Star Wars, G.I. Joe (Action Force) and M.A.S.K. while also dabbling in He-Man, Transformers and Ghostbusters. Roll forward and I am now reliving that Youth with the action figures of today and am a collector and fan of the larger 6-8 inch figures from my favourite movie and TV licences - including the ones mentioned above, but also the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Doctor Who and the Aliens. I launched The Mephitsu Archives in 2015 with a view of creating a UK focused site or these figures where fans can pick up the latest action figure news, read reviews and get information on where to buy their figures and what is currently on store shelves. I hope I am delivering that to you guys...
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