Rebel Commando (Endor - Deluxe) — Star Wars The Black Series 40th Anniversary
The Black Series Endor Rebel Commando — ROTJ 40th Anniversary Deluxe release, June 2023 single-boxed figure. 19 joints with butterfly shoulders, 8 accessories including two photo-real faces, vest, backpack, and bandolier. Light on weathering paint. MSRP $33.99.
Overview
The Endor Rebel Commando at the ROTJ 40th Anniversary lineup is the Black Series tribute release of the Rebel Alliance’s elite ground-assault forces — the camouflage-uniformed strike team who infiltrate the Imperial shield generator bunker on Endor’s sanctuary moon during Return of the Jedi’s climactic ground battle. Released June 2023 single-boxed in the Black Series Deluxe assortment in Hasbro’s celebration of the 40th anniversary of Return Of The Jedi. Mainline Deluxe (single-boxed, not single-carded) at MSRP $33.99, premium pricing reflecting the loaded accessory configuration and the army-builder face-swap engineering. Year imprint 2020 despite the 2023 release, indicating the figure’s source-tooling origin from a pre-anniversary Hasbro production cycle. 19 joints including butterfly shoulders. Eight accessories: a blaster rifle, a blaster, two different faces, a plastic vest, a backpack, a belt, and a bandolier. Note: the Hasbro packaging name is “Rebel Commando” while galacticfigures lists the figure as “Endor Rebel Soldier” — both refer to the same character class.
The Two-Face Army-Builder Engineering
The figure ships with two different faces. It’s easy to exchange the faces — just pull one off and plug the other one on. This way, if you were to purchase multiple, you could display differently-looking Rebels in the collection. Specific army-builder engineering commitment worth flagging — the two-face configuration is purpose-engineered for collectors who buy multiple Rebel Commandos to build the canonical Endor strike team diorama with visually distinct individual soldiers rather than identical clone figures.
The face-swap engineering supports the canonical Endor strike team display where each Rebel Commando reads as a distinct character rather than a generic identical-soldier army-builder configuration. For collectors building the Endor ground assault diorama (typically 4-6 Rebel Commandos supporting Han Solo, Princess Leia, and Chewbacca), the dual-face approach lets multiple purchases generate visual variation across the squad.
The two faces turned out very well and look great in person. Hasbro’s done a great job with the photo-real print on them especially when you hold the figure in your hands. Same photo-real face printing technology that distinguishes the better contemporary Black Series releases applied here to two distinct Rebel character faces. The detail commitment captures appropriate facial feature variation between the two interchangeable head sculpts.
The Compatibility Critique — Hoth Rebel Trooper Faces
A specific compatibility critique worth flagging prominently: both faces are unfortunately not compatible with the one from the Hoth Rebel Trooper and you can’t exchange them. For collectors who own the Hoth Rebel Trooper at #P4-40A-RS4 and hoped to cross-pollinate the face configurations across both Rebel character classes for maximum army-builder visual variation, the engineering is structurally restrictive — Hasbro used different face-mount geometries between the Hoth and Endor Rebel figures, preventing cross-figure face swapping.
This is a meaningful design oversight — the two figures share narrative character class (Rebel infantry across different operations) and both ship with photo-real face-swap accessories, so cross-compatibility would have multiplied the army-builder face-variation possibilities significantly. Hasbro’s choice to use incompatible face-mount geometries limits each figure’s variation pool to its own included faces only.
The Backpack Storage Critique
The backpack straps well around the arms (there is no hole in the back of the figure). Specific backpack engineering note worth flagging — unlike many Black Series tactical figures where the backpack plugs into a back-mounted hole on the figure body, the Rebel Commando’s backpack uses arm-strap mounting instead. This affects mounting reliability and removal flexibility differently than the standard plug-mounted approach.
A specific accessory limitation worth flagging: the backpack can’t be opened, which is unfortunate because it would have been a great storage solution for the second included face. The Hoth Rebel Trooper at #P4-40A-RS4 specifically supports opening the backpack and placing the additional face inside for clean accessory storage — the Endor Rebel Commando omits this functional storage feature, leaving the second face as a loose component rather than a stowable accessory.
This compounds with the face-incompatibility critique noted above — Hasbro could have improved this Rebel Commando significantly by either (a) making the faces compatible with the Hoth Rebel Trooper’s face-mount geometry, or (b) adding the openable-backpack storage capability that the Hoth release demonstrated. The figure ships without either improvement.
The Removable Vest and Permanent Helmet
The vest comes off easily — just pull the arms back and pull it off the figure. Standard removable plastic vest engineering supports both the with-vest (canonical) and without-vest (alternative) display configurations. The hard-plastic-vs-soft-goods choice is appropriate to the character — the Endor Rebel Commando’s screen-accurate vest has a specific structured silhouette that depends on the rigid form.
The figure’s helmet is not removable. Standard Black Series Imperial-trooper-equivalent design choice for the Rebel-side equivalent — single equipped configuration without an unmasked head sculpt for reveal-state display. The face-swap accessory provides facial variation rather than helmet removal supporting it.
The Two-Blaster Loadout
Both blasters fit well into the Rebel Commando’s hands. The figure ships with two blasters — a primary blaster rifle and a secondary blaster sidearm — supporting the screen-accurate Endor strike team weapon configurations. Standard blaster-grip engineering supports two-handed rifle-deployed and single-handed sidearm-deployed display states.
For collectors building Endor strike team dioramas with multiple Rebel Commandos, the dual-weapon approach supports visual variation across the squad — different individual Commandos can be displayed with different weapons deployed, capturing the canonical mixed-loadout strike team configuration.
The Light Paint Critique
Unfortunately this figure is very light on paint — there is no weathering or dirt to be found anywhere on it. Specific paint critique worth flagging — the Endor Rebel Commando ships with a very clean paint application that doesn’t capture the screen-accurate forest-moon environmental weathering. The canonical Endor strike team carries appropriate ground-combat dirt accumulation, mud splatter from forest-moon undergrowth, and battle-damage weathering that the 2023 release doesn’t deliver.
For collectors who care about screen-accurate environmental weathering, the figure under-delivers significantly. This is structurally inappropriate for a Deluxe pricing tier release — the $33.99 MSRP positions the figure above standard mainline ROTJ 40th releases (which sit at $24.99), and collectors paying the deluxe premium reasonably expect commensurate paint commitment that the clean unweathered application doesn’t justify.
Articulation
19 joints with butterfly shoulders. Ball-jointed top neck, ball-jointed lower neck, butterfly joints in the shoulders, ball-jointed shoulders, ball-jointed elbows, ball-jointed wrists, ball-jointed waist, ball-jointed hips, swivel thighs, ball-jointed knees, ball-jointed ankles. High joint count for a Phase 4-tooled deluxe release — substantially above the 17-joint baseline. The butterfly shoulder articulation specifically supports two-handed weapon-bracing poses where both arms come together at the figure’s centerline.
The figure stands well on display without falling over — appropriate Phase 4 standing-stability engineering across the figure’s standing-position display configurations.
Distribution and the Endor Strike Team Lineup
Mainline deluxe ROTJ 40th Anniversary release at $33.99 through wide retail channels — Target, Walmart, Amazon, hobby shops. The deluxe pricing positioning is structurally above the standard mainline $24.99 ROTJ 40th baseline. Aftermarket pricing on the secondary market has remained reasonable due to broad initial availability.
For collectors building the complete ROTJ 40th Anniversary Endor ground assault diorama, this Rebel Commando pairs specifically with Han Solo (Endor) at #P4-40A-HE5 (strike team commander), Princess Leia (Endor) at #P4-40A-LE5, the broader Endor sequence Wicket the Ewok at #P4-40A-WK5 and Paploo at #P4-40A-PP6 ensemble, and opposing the Imperial ground forces (Biker Scout at #P4-40A-BS5, Stormtrooper ROTJ at #P4-40A-ST6). Multiple Rebel Commando copies provide the foundation for proper-scale strike team deployments.
Other Endor Rebel Soldier Figures
The Endor Rebel Soldier has been a recurring Hasbro release subject across multiple lines. Other notable releases include the Saga Collection Battle Of Endor white-suit version (figure id=95), the Vintage Collection ROTJ release (figure id=570), the Vintage Collection black-suit variant (figure id=878), the Power of the Force 2 Battle Of Endor release (figure id=1310), and two Saga Collection ROTJ releases (figures id=1477 and id=1478). The ROTJ 40th Anniversary release joins this multi-decade catalogue as the dedicated 6-inch Black Series anniversary-tribute version with the dual-face army-builder engineering.
Secondary Market
Single-boxed mainline deluxe release on Kenner-style commemorative ROTJ 40th packaging, June 2023. Available at MSRP through standard retail and the secondary market with broad availability. Verify the blaster rifle, the secondary blaster, both faces, the plastic vest, the backpack, the belt, and the bandolier are all included. The smaller second face accessory is the most easily lost component during transit due to the missing openable-backpack storage feature.
Verdict
The Endor Rebel Commando at the 2023 ROTJ 40th Anniversary line is a structurally mixed deluxe release — the dual-face army-builder engineering supports clean visual variation across multiple-purchase squad-building configurations, the photo-real face printing on both heads delivers contemporary Black Series standards, the dual-blaster loadout supports two-handed and single-handed weapon deployment configurations, the easy-removal plastic vest enables costume modification flexibility, the butterfly shoulder articulation supports two-handed weapon-bracing poses, and the figure stands reliably across multiple combat configurations.
The very light paint with no weathering or dirt is the figure’s most defensible structural negative — the clean paint application doesn’t justify the deluxe pricing tier and doesn’t capture the screen-accurate Endor environmental weathering. The non-openable backpack omits the storage feature the Hoth Rebel Trooper at #P4-40A-RS4 demonstrated, leaving the second face as a loose loss-prone component. The face-incompatibility with the Hoth Rebel Trooper limits cross-figure army-builder variation. The Hasbro packaging name “Rebel Commando” doesn’t match the galacticfigures catalogue name “Endor Rebel Soldier” — minor cataloguing inconsistency.
All in all this Rebel Commando turned out okay — but considering that it’s a deluxe offering, a slight wash on the outfit, a storage solution inside the backpack for the second face, and face-compatibility with the Hoth Rebel Trooper would have improved the trooper significantly. The deluxe pricing tier suggests Hasbro had room to commit to all three improvements but chose not to.
Buy this figure if you collect the ROTJ 40th Anniversary line as a complete set, if you build Endor ground assault dioramas requiring Rebel strike team army-builder configurations (multiple copies recommended), if you appreciate the dual-face army-builder approach for visual squad variation, or if you can accept the deluxe-pricing-without-weathering paint compromise. Skip if the missing backpack storage and face-incompatibility limitations meaningfully affect your army-builder configuration plans.
The Rebel strike team infantry with the dual-face army-builder engineering. The deluxe figure with the dual-blaster loadout and the easily-removable plastic vest. The Rebel Commando that anchors Endor ground assault dioramas alongside the broader Endor character class roster. Mainline deluxe distribution, June 2023.
Part of Star Wars The Black Series | Phase 4 40th Anniversary Collection. Related: Han Solo (Endor) P4-40A-HE5 | Princess Leia (Endor) P4-40A-LE5 | Hoth Rebel Trooper P4-40A-RS4.