[Den-O]

"Looks like you could use a little help."

Both of Trent Fernandez's parents were lost in an archaeological dig accident, while working for Anton Mercer. The man who would be Mesogog. And the man who would also become Trent's adoptive father. Not knowing his new guardians' alter ego, Trent unwittingly stumbled into one of Mesogog's invisportals and discovered the White Dino Gem. Fused with it's power, and taken control of by it's evil intent, Trent savagely attacked the Power Rangers many times. That is until his father, able to briefly suppress Mesogog, freed Trent of the gem's influence. Finally in control of his own power and ready to defend the world against Mesogog's army of monsters, Trent Mercer joined the Power Rangers as the Dino Thunder White Ranger!

Packaging
As we are all pretty familiar with the line by now, I'm sure I probably don't need to go through my usual list of reasons why it's awesome. Hasbro was keen to make sure these appealed to collectors and fans of the franchise from throughout it's various eras. And they also really pop thanks in no small part to some wonderful box art, lovingly crafted by artist Tom Whalen aka @strongstufftom on twitter. His artwork is breathtaking, and makes these figure's feel like just a bit more of a passion project from the folks at Hasbro.

Main Figure
As the first figure released from Dino Thunder (aside from the Fighting Spirit Green Ranger) Trent needed to set a good standard. And some issues with the head aside, which I'll get into at the end, it's a pretty fantastic release. Most of the time it's a bit hard for me to tell some of the more basic ranger molds apart, strip away the extra bits like armor and boot cuffs and such and they all tend to function in generally the same manner. So in that regard this mold feels very familiar to me, reminding me of many other releases.

The entire body is white plastic, essentially anything that's gold red or black, is a paint app. So that leaves plenty of room for paint error as well. Starting with the boots they've got a really nice gold sculpted cuff below the shin swivel and some raise black stripes on the outward sides of the boot. The figure features full rotating rocker ankles as well as a clicking swivel joint for them to go back and forth. Above this is the shin swivel, allowing you to rotate that portion of the leg 360 degrees below the knee. Then we get a very playful double jointed knee which lets you fully bend the leg back in on itself. This is already great but there's also a 360 thigh swivel as well as full hips with back/forth and outward motion. No matter what when posing the legs, you're obviously going to wind up breaking up the black paint apps along the exterior of the legs. All of these cuts are executed in the standard Lightning Collection styling, doing their best to not be obtrusive to the design when possible.

Dino Thunder White features the signature gold Dino Thunder buckle and belt around his waist, with a left side hip holster for his included Drago Sword. The rest of the torso is totally standard stuff for the line. The lower half has a satisfying if extremely tight ratchet ab joint, while the upper body sits on a ball joint. The combination of the two gives you quite a bit to work with when posing. There are black paint apps running the length of the torso and posing will break those up, but that really can't be helped. The big draw of the torso though is the chest shield. This large chunk of plastic would seem to hamper the way the figure can pose, in reality though it's made of a pretty flexible plastic that's been painted, and has some decently crisp paint applications as well. The nice thing about it, unlike the rest of the shields in the line like MMPR Green & White or Zeo Gold, is that it's intentionally removeable. The shield is held to the torso by a small plug in the back. So if you wanna toss it onto another Ranger, you totally can.

The arms hit the sweet spot with that classic butterfly style shoulder joint. As you angle the shoulder back, the body slides out to fill the gap and vice versa. There's a full 360 rotating bicep swivel, double jointed elbows, and the same peg style hands as the rest of the line. But, in the same way that a handful of other LC releases have thus far, DT White's arms are oddly positioned. They can't really rest against the figure's torso naturally and instead angle outward somewhat. They also features black dino paint apps down the their full length. The left arm of course features the Drago Morpher as well. The drawback here is the total lack of any paint apps on the Morpher, and I'm bummed about it. I can only assume they spent most of the paint app cost on the black lines running the length of the body, or the apps for the shield. But it doesn't kill my interest in the figure or appreciation for it necessarily. Lack of paint apps aside the sculpted details are well defined.

So of course this figure is not without some controversy. Since it originally leaked out to retail, long before it was ever even actually announced, it had one big issue. That helmet. It took months before the problem was even addressed, once Hasbro actually got around to publicly announced the figure and long after it was being found in Walgreen's stores. The head as it was originally released features all the appropriate sculpting for the correct visor, but none of the paint apps were applied aside from a measly thing red stripe applied across. It took months of the figure being on the market before it was addressed. And even now it boils down to having to buy a figure that still doesn't have the correct helmet then go through a set of complicated customer service interactions to get the correct head. At this point I don't believe you can actually find this figure at retail with the proper head, which given how long this has gone on, is very unfortunate. And more unfortunately the corrected heads being sent out are still not perfect. Largely because while the paint apps are present, many are not applied evenly, like mine. But worse than that, the red eyes on the drago fin are now sculpted at different heights, and this is documented to varying degrees among the replacement heads that collectors have received. The new head is an improvement but still doesn't quite hit the mark in terms of QC.

Accessories
This figure strikes a better balance than many in the line for accessories:

1 - Drago Sword. The well known weapon of the White Dino Thunder Ranger. This unique sword gives Trent the ability to create flying energy arrows when he flips it around and "writes" in the air with the grip. Alternatively it can be used as a normal sword. The only real issue with it in toy form is that Hasbro has sculpted it with the tip already extended, when it should be collapsible. It's not as egregious an error as what they did with the Zeo Pod Swords, but one that's bothersome none the less.

2 - alternate hands. Between the pair already attached and the extras we get one matching set that can hold the Drago Sword, as well as an open left hand, and a really odd right. I'm not totally sure what the point of the extra right hand is though. It's sculpted closed with the index finger and thumb molded together, and the interior of the hand has a square opening. But it's not wide enough to allow the Drago Sword to fit in it, and it doesn't appear to useful for anything specific that I can find.

1 - Laser Arrow effect part. This really is a wonderful effect part. A brilliant sculpt that works in a similar way to some of the previous sword effects in the line like what Dino Charge Red came with. It's just a really dynamic and lively part that plugs on nice and securely over the Drago Sword. It's very effective, if just a tiny bit heavy for the wrist joint.

1 - Trent Mercer head. Like nearly all Lightning Collection rangers, Dino Thunder White comes with a civilian head based on the likeness of his actor Jeff Parazzo. And while it isn't a perfect likeness, I think it gets the broad strokes just fine. It's a pretty subdued expression on the face, but not a lifeless one. The head looks good and proportional on the body as well. I'd say my favorite thing about it is honestly is the hair though. A lot of these civilian heads tend to look rather odd or blocky, but the sculpt for Trents hair is really nice? Oddly that's the detail I like best about it.

And really that's pretty great. I wish we'd gotten two versions of the sword, or some better hands. But overall this is really great.

Final Thoughts
So the Lightning Collection Dino Thunder White Ranger is really good. Really good. Despite it's faults it may be my favorite entry in the line this year. But it has to be said that Hasbro seriously bungled the helmet issue. Particularly in taking as long as they did to even acknowledge there was a problem, a problem that existed well before they'd even announced the figure. The process to get the head was a bit convoluted and still resulted in an imperfect sample, but at least it was there. If you happen to find this figure at retail please be sure to contact Hasbro customer service directly and explain the issue with the head. You'll have to take some photos of the figure as well as the serial number on it's foot to submit with the request. With correct head in hand, you'll appreciate this figure much more, like I do.