Sinister doesn’t have just villains and heroes--it has at least one villain who has crossed over to become a hero. Abner Jenkins had a (from the perspective of comics fans) decades-long criminal career as the Beetle--fighting Spider-Man and Daredevil to the Fantastic Four--before he became a member of the Thunderbolts as MACH-1 and slowly began traveling the road to redemption. Nearly ten years later, Jenkins is on the fourth iteration of that armor as MACH-4 and has found himself not only recognized as a hero but also as the occasional leader of the Thunderbolts.

That’s a lot of history, and the only way to do it justice was making the rare decision to grant Abe not only two sculpts but two full REV sets (and an LE) in Sinister.

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The Beetle REV set marks his time in both the Sinister Syndicate (on the Rookie and Veteran versions) and in the Masters of Evil (on the Experienced version.) The Rookie comes with the basic abilities Jenkins built into his battlesuit: flight, Super Strength, and Toughness granted by his hard armored carapace. His Experienced version demonstrates the work Jenkins put into his armor over the year--including the specialized systems that allowed him to predict and evade the actions of his opponents, granting him some mid-dial Probability Control. All three versions have the ranged attack granted by the Beetle’s “electro-bite”, but the later versions gain some late-dial Psychic Blast that allows him to discharge his system in a last-ditch assault. While Running Shot grants him some additional mobility, the Beetle’s combat values remain average across all three versions--to be expected for someone who often charged into battle and was just as often defeated when he lacked the assistance of his teammates.


The MACH set of dials represent the abilities of the new and different sets of armor Jenkins has worn as a member of the Thunderbolts, granting him better speed and ranged damage (via Ranged Combat Expert) while maintaining many of the abilities he possessed as the Beetle. While he loses his Probability Control, he does gain Incapacitate on his Experienced MACH-3 dial. His Veteran MACH-4 dial best represents the period shortly after he first began wearing that armor and was maintaining it without the assistance of Techno--and with a limited degree of success; in the latter half of his dial, he loses some of his ability to be a ranged attacker as he falls back on the Super Strength granted by his armor and his Running Shot turns to Charge (and eventually even Earthbound as his flight harness fails completely.)

Those looking for Abner Jenkins to step up and take the role of a leader on the battlefield will find Leadership on the LE dial with his name--probably best suited to setting up opponents with Incapacitate and Force Blast and then leaving the full assault to his teammates, even if he can back them up with late-dial Energy Explosion.

Come back next week for another Sinister preview!

I'm stoked for about all of these bad boys, Vet Beetle in particular. I've always had a special place in my heart for Beetle, ever since he both appeared in my first Spider-Man comic and the first episode of Spider-Man and his amazing friends.

Ah, sweet naustalgia.

WOW
Finally the Beetle

These are both great figures. And who cares if it is the same guy in all 6 versions, like we really need another Hulk/Wolverine/Spider-Man. Give the villians some love, man!!!

cheers

7 versions of one character in a single set. A first!

very nice couple of figures we have here. Love E/V Beetle and all versions of Mach (though the vet with mini-XP Iron Man stats is pretty neat, and a huge improvement!). Seth continues to impress me with almost every dial he creates.

The sculpts are both great, as well. Really capture the characters.

Does this mean we wont be getting a Wednesday preview?

They look SWEET!

...I guess this iS our Wednesday preview. It iS technically after midnight so...


...still hope there's something else this afternoon, but I'm just greedy like that
I guess.

Nice job on the Beetle versions, not my favorite character...but I'm happy for the fans who have been waiting a long time.

Quite the royal treatment too wow (7 figs!)

wait wait. ALL the flight stands will be broken in this set?!

I just don't get the prob or psy. blast.

I like the Vets of both Beetle and MACH, but am a little iffy on MACH's end dial... rear-loaded Super-Strength, by the time you get to it, you may not have any objects left to use with it.. and Charge comboed with ES/D... well not the best thing together, but at least you have some protection from getting shot down before you can Charge...

Iron Man had also 7 versions in Armor Wars, right?

REV + grey Iron Man + golden Iron Man + LE + pog

Mach I don't know about, but I really like Beetle... and more figs with the coolest combination of powers, Super Strength and Running Shot, is always needed...