A cautionary tale:

[Ken Davis]

Well, I got bitten.
I wasn't paying enough attention.........oh, I was alert enough to see the figures on the pegs--the 6" Avengers series--and grabbed them hungrily and put them in my cart. But I didn;t take a close look at them, and truth be told I had seen or paid attention to the packaging photos.
I got Sentry, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, Machine Man and Scarlet Witch. Wanda came with the blue cape.

That's all that was in the package.........I just discovered/realized that Odin's head wasn't in the package.

It had been pinched, and I did not catch it until 2 days after. I can't take it back, the staff at the Walmart I got it at are savvy about swap-artists and pinchers, and taking it back to say it's missing that piece would get me accused of doing the pinching.

So the moral of this story: keep your eyes open, know what's supposed to be in the package and don't just grab it and run. I did, and I got bitten by it.

(post-script: Ebay has several of the BAF parts for this series on offer, and I capitulated and bought the parts I needed. I cost just under the price of one of the figures themselves.....but that'll teach me to pay more attention next time)

[packerbacker180]

You're not the first person I've heard buy her with the Odin head gone. Surprising because I'd think she'd be just as in demand to replace the awful Wanda ToyBiz gave us. Having worked at Walmart toys it never surprises me the depths people will sink to to steal a toy or part. Sad, really. Losers. as much as I hated the old clamshells, they at least made partswapping/stealing tougher.

[Ken Davis]

You're not the first person I've heard buy her with the Odin head gone. Surprising because I'd think she'd be just as in demand to replace the awful Wanda ToyBiz gave us. Having worked at Walmart toys it never surprises me the depths people will sink to to steal a toy or part. Sad, really. Losers. as much as I hated the old clamshells, they at least made partswapping/stealing tougher.

What takes me a bit aback is that I'm usually hard to dupe like this. I found all the figures except for Thor and Captain Marvel on the pegs, and thought I had everything that came with those figures. Wanda TWO of the BAF parts I recognized--the cape, and the Odin-spear--and I thought I was good to go. This morning I was looking over the figures to try and see what I had left to get and saw that Captain Marvel has the King Thor head. But I couldn't figure out who had the Odin head part.

Then it dawned on me that Wanda was the counterpart to the Capt. Marvel set, and was supposed to have the Odin piece.

Swappers are not common in my city, I've seen their handiwork only a couple of times since I've moved here, and only once before at this Walmart. The retailers--especially the toy retailers in my city are largely on the ball when it comes to the stock and what's supposed to be in it it.
My step-son has worked at TRU here and told me of several instances where swappers were caught in the act of trying to get refunds or exchanges for swapped goods, and denied.
I'm usually up to speed on toy stuff, and was expecting my LCS to get the figures in instead, but their appearance at Walmart caught me by surprise.

[AcidDragon]

Coincidentally, a friend of mine recently bought some of the ML and didn't need the Odin head and asked if I wanted it for free. I don't do ML so I didn't need it but I would have happily sent it out to you. Thankfully you found one in the end, though, Ken.

[AcidDragon]

Oh and congrats on Sidekick.

[1987olds442]

Another thing to look out for is stores putting damaged figures back on the shelf. I just experienced it this week with a defective Thor that I bought and returned. The figure in question had a defective lower left leg it actually looked melted, and I pointed it out to the clerk when I returned it to the local Wal-Mart. The next day I stopped back at that store to see if they had any new stock to replace that Thor, and they did but they also put the damaged one that I returned back on the shelf.

[Idiot Savant]

Another thing to look out for is stores putting damaged figures back on the shelf. I just experienced it this week with a defective Thor that I bought and returned. The figure in question had a defective lower left leg it actually looked melted, and I pointed it out to the clerk when I returned it to the local Wal-Mart. The next day I stopped back at that store to see if they had any new stock to replace that Thor, and they did but they also put the damaged one that I returned back on the shelf.

I saw this same scenario happening fairly often around the middle-to-the-tail end of DCUC; haven't seen this lately though but sorry to hear that this is happening again

[Webslinger]

I have seen this happening all too often, those filthy little scammers trying to get the BaF without buying the figure like the rest of us normal human beings do. I have seen them on the pegs most likely bough then returned with a different BaF part in there. I recently saw a ML Black Widow with the Ultimate Goblin torso in it's place at a Target. It's really sad to see the lengths that some people will go through just to get these parts.

[Ken Davis]

A post-script:
The night I posted on this, I went a huntin' on Ebay and found a "reasonable" offering for the BAF parts from the Scarlet Witch set--so I ordered that. A day or so later, after pondering some more, I looked at Amazon and found Thor ( with the needed right leg part) and ordered him along with a NECA Rambo 2 figure I've been eyeing for a while.
Both arrived in the mail yesterday, and I now have a complete Odin holding court over my 1/12th pantheons.
The sour is now turning into semi-sweet and I'm good.

[Idiot Savant]

That's awesome...send pics pf the court when you can..glad it worked out for you!