I've been patiently waiting for a 3 3/4" Bala-Tik ever since adding the Guavian Enforcer to my collection back in 2016. Unfortunately, when he finally did turn up, it was as a pack-in with the Force Link rathtar. I don't really have any interest in this creature, and with an MSRP of $39.99NZ, it was a purchase I simply couldn't justify. I made a deal with myself, however: if I ever found the set retailing for less than I'd pay for the single-carded figure, I'd pick it up. Recently, that deal paid off when Amazon dropped their stock of rathtars down to the incredibly low price of $6.91US ($9.59NZ).
Bala-Tik comes with his screen-used blaster rifle, and is a fairly unassuming figure. But that's fine with me. His main job is to fill a character gap in my Force Awakens display, and he performs that role satisfactorily. One complaint with my particular figure is that he suffers from some severe bowing in his legs, though hopefully this is something that a little hot / cold water treatment will be able to fix.
It might seem that, at this price, the rathtar is just a nice added extra - but as my fiancée so eloquently put it, "that thing's not a bonus, it's a burden". The rathtar takes up an enormous amount of display space for very little aesthetic return. It might look passable from a distance, but up close it's a complete disaster. I thought the tentacles would be molded from some sort of bendable rubber-covered wire, but instead they're hard plastic fixed in a single pose. Further, each tentacle plugs into one specific hole - making assembly and reassembly a real pain. You might wonder why you'd need to be reassembling the rathtar, but that's just the thing: the slightest amount of movement or play will see at least one of the tentacles ejecting itself from its mount. The body itself is a completely hollow rubber orb that very much resembles the kind of thing you'd see in the dog chew-toy aisle. Even the Force Link chip has been added without any real consideration for design - being placed behind a glaringly obvious square flap on the very top of the creature instead of subtly tucked away on its underbelly as you might expect.
Don't get me wrong. I'm perfectly happy with my seven dollar Bala-Tik. I just believe the less that's said about his pack-in companion, the better.
Don't get me wrong. I'm perfectly happy with my seven dollar Bala-Tik. I just believe the less that's said about his pack-in companion, the better.
