Arturo Fuente Añejo No. 77 "The Shark" Review

2026-08-23  Box Buy · 4/4 My Money · by Eric

Filed under: Cigar Bands · CT Broadleaf · Dominican Republic · Figurados · Limited Editions · Origins Compared · The Ash · Retrohale

Verdict: Box Buy (4/4). Complex, layered, and phenomenal start to finish... at $23 a stick I'll be setting money aside and buying a box at the next drop. The only question I'm still chewing on is which vitola that box ends up being.

This is the Añejo people hunt: a Connecticut Broadleaf maduro wrapper aged in cognac barrels over Dominican binder and filler, made by Fuente in the Dominican Republic, and only dropped twice a year... right around Father's Day and Christmas. The No. 77 is the one they call the Shark: 5 7/8 with a box-pressed foot that tapers up to a rounded torpedo head, running about a 64 ring at the foot down to corona territory by the time you're at the nub. It comes in boxes of 20 and people talk about it like a unicorn. As I write this, I found it at several shops at retail, so it's not as unfindable as the hype says... if you catch the drop.

The Setup

• Cigar: Arturo Fuente Añejo No. 77 "The Shark" (5 7/8, box-pressed foot tapering to a torpedo head). Connecticut Broadleaf maduro wrapper aged in cognac barrels, Dominican binder and filler. Made in the Dominican Republic.
• Street price: ~$23 a single at multiple online shops right now, and $23 a stick whether you buy one or a box of 20... so a box is about $460. One place wanted basically double MSRP. Do not pay $50 for this cigar.
• What I paid: ~$23, retail both times, my own money. A local B&M called me when they landed and I picked up a few, then I found them online at retail and grabbed more, plus some other Añejo vitolas.
• Storage: main humidor at 69% RH since it landed.
• When/where: on my back deck, started right around 5:32 in the evening going by the first photo. About an hour and 45 minutes of smoke time. 80°F with a feels-like of 82 and 52% humidity, sunny with a couple of clouds, shaded where I sit. A great relaxing cigar after doing work around the house and outside earlier.
• Food beforehand: a deli ham and turkey sandwich on whole wheat with mayo and some fresh mozzarella on the side, about five hours before, with water.
• First cigar of the day, paired with water only.

Light Up and First Third

Pre-light, this is a beautiful wrapper... very dark brown, a little rustic with visible veining, and a tiny bit toothy, like there are little teeth scattered around here and there rather than the whole thing. Square-pressed foot, well packed. Straight cut with the Xikar XO double guillotine, maybe a quarter inch off the tapered head, and the cold draw was great: a mild tobacco sweetness. Lit it with my Guevara Lux single torch, my usual go-to.

While lighting I noticed one corner looked slightly less packed than the rest, and sure enough the burn was a little wonky for the first quarter inch or so. I decided to give it its own fair shake instead of jumping in with a touch-up.

The initial light-up gave me milk chocolate, light nuttiness, leather, medium-roast black coffee, and a touch of earthiness. Smoke production was excellent from the first draw... very smoky, and a creamy smoke texture. Not cream in flavor, cream in how the smoke feels.

On the retro: no spice at all. Just slightly more enhanced versions of the same flavors, with a bitter dark chocolate that sits on your palate. There was also a note I kept hunting for and finally pinned down as woody... not a food flavor, almost a mesquite, but not that strong. Maybe some black licorice in there too.

Here's the thing about this cigar: it's not in my typical lane. I usually go for something much sweeter, and this is not a sweet cigar. But there is a lot going on. It's not three or four flavors you instantly pick out... there are layers, and if you don't sit down and focus on it you're going to miss them. I was out there alone with a water, actively hunting for flavors as I rolled the smoke around. I really enjoy that in a cigar.

Two-thirds of the way through the first third, a dark chocolate finish showed up... that bitter baker's chocolate thing... and it lingers on the palate with a nice leather between draws. On a full double-draw retro there's a tiny bit of baking spice, more dark chocolate, leather, nuttiness, and cream starting to come out. That retro was phenomenal... and that was the entire draw through my nose. Normally when I retro I only push about a third of the smoke through, maybe half at the most, and blow the rest out of my mouth. This cigar had me retroing full draws... and it may be the one that finally gets me to retrohale a whole cigar, every draw, start to finish. Not during a review, but the next one I smoke, I may seriously just see what happens.

By the end of the first third: leather, medium black coffee, dark chocolate, light nuttiness, some black licorice on the draw... and on the retro a sweet dark chocolate, leather, and coffee. The woodiness from earlier was gone. The chocolate kept moving the whole third: there at the light-up, gone, back as bitter chocolate in the middle, then a sweet dark chocolate by the end.

The ash looked flaky in the photos, and it is a little flaky, but it held on great... it took a couple of purposeful taps to actually knock it off. Looks fragile, has structure. After ashing I touched up the burn to let this thing shine, and it rewarded me for it: the leather toned way down, the chocolate moved to the forefront, and more chocolate showed up on the finish. Still zero spice on the retro... sweet dark chocolate, leather, black coffee, a very light black licorice in the background, and a light sweet cream that's also creamy on the palate.

One more thing from the first half that says a lot: I realized I hadn't taken a single sip of water since lighting it. The flavor profile sounds like it would dry your palate out, and it does not at all... my mouth was salivating the whole time.

Second Third

About halfway through, the retro was still just phenomenal. Sweet dark chocolate... it kept getting sweeter, less bitter, edging toward milk-chocolate sweetness while still being dark chocolate... plus leather, medium-roast black coffee, and some black licorice. Strength to this point felt like a medium. I didn't look anything up beforehand on purpose, and based on how dark the wrapper is I'd have guessed it would hit much harder... I was five-plus hours past food with no problem at all.

Nearing the end of the third, the profile shifted again: more leather up front, the dark chocolate leaning less sweet, medium-roast coffee, light nuttiness behind it, black licorice before that... and a new one, a light minerality on the finish that wasn't there before. That dark-chocolate coating feeling still sits on your palate between draws. And the retro stayed its own separate experience: sweeter, creamier dark chocolate, light leather, coffee, faint licorice, still zero spice off a full double draw. This is really good. It's complex, and I'm sure there's more in there I just can't place.

Tapped the ash just before the end of the third... again it looked fragile and again it took about four taps to drop. Right after, the ash left that nice point from the ligero in the center, the woodiness came back alongside the leather, dark chocolate, coffee, and late-arriving black licorice... and the retro, freshly ashed, was so good: rich sweet dark chocolate, leather, coffee, cream, and that creamy leather sweetness hanging on the palate. Zero spice. I kind of wanted a touch of spice, and it just wasn't there.

If you've never retrohaled, or spice stings your nose and you've been scared off it... this may be the perfect cigar to learn on. There is no spice to punish you, it doesn't burn your nose at all (didn't burn mine, anyways), and the retro is where this cigar does its best work.

The burn went noticeably crooked after that ash, so I touched it up. I notice this a lot: the ash protects the whole ember, and when you knock it off, part of the ember loses that protection and dies back a little while the stronger side keeps going. Not making excuses for it... flavor-wise I don't think the crooked stretch made any difference. Maybe I should have let it ride.

Final Third

The band came off completely clean... and it was definitely glued to the cigar. I took it off very carefully once the burn line got close, and this is a perfect example of why you wait: let the wrapper heat up and help that glue release. I'm pretty confident it would have torn the wrapper if I'd pulled it early.

Start of the final third, off the draw: very leather-forward with dark coffee, then black licorice and a bitter-leaning dark chocolate fighting for third place, both lingering between draws. The retro stayed a totally different experience: sweet dark chocolate, leather, dark coffee... and then a new flavor showed up, a lightly roasted cashew, along with a creaminess that coats your palate on the retro. Thinking back, that cashew may have been hiding in the background for a while and I was just filing it under creamy.

Midway through the third I caught myself smoking too fast because it's really good, and with the taper you're down around corona ring gauge... two full double draws back to back and I could feel heat on my lips, so I slowed down and switched to single draws. First touch of earthiness of the entire cigar showed up on one draw... and then vanished on the next. A single draw here puts that roasted cashew right up front, which is really good... I probably should have played with single versus double draws more the whole way, but the double draws were so good I never thought about it.

A single draw plus a full retro got me the first real spice of the whole cigar, with about half an inch left in it: a really nice baking spice, cashew, sweet dark chocolate, medium-to-dark roast black coffee, and leather. One quarter of the burn line stopped keeping up near the end, so I touched that up too... and apparently it needed it, because the earthiness that had crept back went away completely. Late-cigar retro: a good amount of baking spice, but a sweet baking spice, cream, coffee up front, regular dark chocolate, leather behind.

The last inch was almost a highlight reel. One draw: all roasted cashew and sweet cream with a leathery coffee finish. Next draw: leather first, then cream, then light cashew. Then a draw that was just a mouthful of dark chocolate. I don't know how a cigar changes this much draw to draw... my best guess is the aggressive taper, since the ring keeps shrinking the whole way down. I smoked it until it was physically hard to hold and draw at the same time, past where I normally put a cigar down, and I would have kept going if I could. Smoke production was still above average at three-quarters of an inch.

Strength ended up around medium-plus for me... and then I looked it up afterward and this is supposed to be a full-strength cigar. If it is, it doesn't feel like it. Six-plus hours past food and it never came close to knocking me over.

Construction

• Wrapper: very dark brown, rustic, visible veining, a bit of scattered tooth. Beautiful in a rugged way.
• Draw: darn near perfect the entire way. If I'm nitpicking, a hair tighter than ideal... we're talking fractions.
• Burn: the one knock. Wavy the whole smoke and wonky early from a corner that was packed slightly looser than the rest. Three touch-ups start to finish, mostly after ashes, no relights. The burn line was never razor sharp, but outside of those moments it never needed babysitting either.
• Ash: deceiving. Looked flaky and fragile the entire cigar and never once fell on its own... every ash took multiple purposeful taps except the last, and every ash left that nice point from the ligero in the center.
• Smoke output: beyond excellent the whole way... very smoky, which I really enjoy, with a creamy texture to the smoke itself.
• Band: glued to the wrapper, and still came off completely clean because I waited until the burn line got close and let the heat release the glue. Take that as the lesson.

Bottom Line

This cigar is not in my usual sweeter lane, and it won me over anyway. It's one of the most complex cigars I've smoked: chocolate that moves from milk to bitter to sweet dark and back, leather and medium-roast coffee as the spine, black licorice and woodiness that come and go, cashew and sweet cream arriving late, a light minerality for a stretch... and a retrohale that is its own separate, better experience than the draw, with zero spice until a sweet baking spice finally shows up at the very end. It demands your attention and rewards it. The fundamentals held up their end too: near-perfect draw, huge creamy smoke, an ash that looks fragile and isn't... with a wavy burn line as the only complaint, and it never cost the cigar any flavor.

And the price conversation has to happen, because I sat there wrestling with it in real time. $23 a stick, boxes of 20, about $460 a box. That is a lot of money for cigars. I have boxes of really good $18 cigars, and the question I kept asking was: would I trade one of those boxes for this? They're just different experiences... and this one earns it.

Would I smoke it again? Box Buy, at full retail. I'll put my money where my mouth is: I'm setting money aside and buying a box at the next drop. My only decision is the vitola... I've got the No. 55, No. 46, and 888 resting in the humidor plus more Sharks, and I'm going to smoke through those before the next release and pick my favorite. For reference at today's retail: the 55 is $20.50 in boxes of 25, the 888 is $18 in boxes of 24, the 46 is $16 in boxes of 25. Whatever you do, don't chase this over retail... it drops twice a year, and several shops had it at retail while I was doing this review. One place wanted double. Please don't do it. If you can stack a first-order discount code on a box at retail, even better. I also think this will age phenomenally well over the next few years... one more argument for a box. Singles at your local B&M to find your vitola first is exactly the right move.

Best for: a sit-down-and-pay-attention smoke... alone, unhurried, with water, when you can actually hunt the layers. It may be the perfect cigar to learn to retrohale on, since there's no spice to sting your nose and the retro is where it shines. And it's a phenomenal cigar to hand to a good friend who already loves cigars... that's half the point of buying a box. Just don't hand a $23 Shark to someone who doesn't know if they even like cigars yet.

My rating scale, one question only... would I spend my own money on this again? 4 Box Buy (box on hand, always) / 3 Five-Pack (yes, a few live in the humidor) / 2 Hand-Me-One (wouldn't buy it, wouldn't turn one down) / 1 Not Even Free (I'd rather smoke nothing).

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