Bonecrusher hates that it’s taken this long to get a review done for him. He also hates that he probably won’t get a new toy for the Revenge of the Fallen toyline.
In vehicle mode, the first thing that jumps out about Bonecrusher is that they made him tiny. For such a big guy, he got stuck with a puny toy. Brawl got an upgrade, but no such luck for the guy that went toe to toe with Prime himself. He didn’t make out too poorly, though - there’s a ton of molded details, and the little tampographed Bonecrusher logo on the side is a nice touch. His vehicle mode is a little light on paint otherwise, though - just painted windows and a couple of painted lights (signal lights? on a minesweeper?) and spare tyres. He’s still fun, though - he’s got a good roll, and his big claw is articulated for plenty of car flipping action (admittedly, he’d be flipping Legends sized cars, but still). He’s concealed most of his obvious robot parts, excepting the toes sitting over his rear wheels. Read the rest…
By virtue of sitting at the top of my big bin o’ loose transformers, it’s Ultra Magnus’s turn to get a review. This time, it’s a Titanium series Ultra Magnus (G1 Ultra Magnus will have to wait until another day!)
In his vehicle mode, Ultra Magnus is about what you’d expect from a Titanium figure, which is to say, lots of visible robot parts, an inability to roll smoothly, and generally just not that fun. That’s okay, though, because Titanium figures aren’t really meant to be played with. It’s very similar structurally to the G1 toy, except the trailer doesn’t come off, all of the red parts are gone except the missile tips, and the proportions just seem… off. When did Ultramag lose his red? He seems to be stuck as the white and blue guy these days. There’s not much else to say about this mode, other than it doesn’t fit nicely on the base provided (it’s not intended to) and doesn’t have anywhere suitable for storing his rifle. Read the rest…
Soundwave: superior. Lack of reappearances in later episodes of the show: inferior.
Yeah, I love Soundwave. I don’t know why (probably the voice), but he was the character that stuck in my head the most from G1. I never had a G1 Soundwave, or any of the homages in later series. I picked up the Classics Soundwave when it was at Toys R Us, which is close enough for me. But this review isn’t about that, it’s about Animated Soundwave! Unlike his previous incarnations, Soundwave turns into a station wagon rather than a tape deck or whatever else he’s been over the years. He’s a pretty solid little car, and rolls well despite the low clearance (although I find that he’s not always rolling on all four wheels). I think it’s fair to break out the dreaded descriptor neon for his paint job, with electric blue detailing against a dark blue body. Actually, maybe argon is a better choice for that, but I don’t think it’ll catch on. He’s got a pattern of electric blue creating a vaguely cassette spool-like design on the doors, a power symbol (IEC 5009, to be precise) on the roof, and in gold on the front bumper he’s got a duplicate of the original Soundwave’s control buttons. All he really needs is an eject button. There is also unpainted detail molded into the back window of two more cassette spools with a bar graph in between. Read the rest…
OK, now for another xmas gift, this time from my lovely wife. It’s time to rock out with… Laserbeak?! Yeah, I’m reviewing Laserbeak separately from his packagemate Soundwave. This’ll be a quick one, for a simple toy.
His guitar mode is pretty straightforward. It’s molded entirely in black plastic, with a splash of red. There’s not a whole lot of features here, although you can adjust where the headstock sits on the neck (yes, I had to look those names up, I’m not a musician). There are a couple of pegs on the body that fit into Soundwave’s arms, and he can also be mounted on Soundwave’s roof in vehicle mode, which looks silly. Read the rest…
Hey! It’s one of my very, very few Transformer toys that doesn’t have bi/trilingual packaging. That’s because this one was a lovely xmas gift from my wife’s relatives in the US. It’s interesting that you guys get the character bio on the card, rather than on the instruction sheet down there (I really wish it was on the instruction sheet for all of them, because it’s easier to hang on to that than on to the card or box). But hey, enough about the packaging, it’s time to talk about the TickSentinel Prime! (Feel free to hum the Tick’s theme song while you read this. I’m humming it while I type.)
Scale is not Sentinel’s friend here. He’s about the same size as all the wheeled deluxes, which means he’s either really small or everyone else is really big. Still, it’s a nice vehicle design, and at this time of year, a suitable one around here (I have yet to find a way to convince him to clear the road in front of my apartment - Hasbro, this would make a great gimmick for a future toy!). It captures the Animated design quite well, feels fairly solid, and has nearly no robot kibble showing. It’s a fun altmode, with a good roll to it, a plow that can be angled like a real snowplow would, and a mounting point so that you can store his weapons on the roof (which, admittedly, doesn’t really look very good). You can even sort-of kind-of get a V shaped plow by splitting the plow, if that’s your kind of thing. Read the rest…
Now that I’m starting to update again, I’m rethinking that “badassery” category in the ratings. It hurts characters that aren’t, well, badasses. Maybe that slot should go to something that evaluates how well the toy captures the character, but for figures that have little to know representation in the fiction (or, at least, the fiction that I am interested in and have access to). An interesting idea, at any rate.
What the heck, I’ve opened a few new toys this month, so I might as well start reviewing again. Since he’s closest at hand, Starscream gets the honors.
I opened the box months ago, but never took him off the tray until today (loose toys are harder to store, and I don’t have any shelves). I took him out, after a minute or so of fiddling with him I figured out what the rattling noise in the box was - his head came off. It popped back on easy enough. Some of the flaps move around, and you can lower the landing gear and roll him around the desk. His missile launchers can be swung around to fire forward, but they don’t do his ground clearance any favours. Clearly, he shouldn’t be firing those things on the runway. I was a bit skeptical of the blue and red Starscream colour scheme, but honestly, I think it works well on this mold. Something more show-accurate would be nice, and I’d like to see some of the (inevitable) redecos that are happening for it, but I just can’t picture it looking as good in G1 colours. There’s nowhere on here wanting for another paint application, although the mauve paint behind the cockpit on mine is a bit sloppy. Overall, it’s a solid jet, with less undercarriage kibble than I’d expected, and I love the forward swept wings.
Uh, yeah. So, I’ve got the hang of it, more or less, and I took a few dozen pictures tonight since the wee gal went to bed early. Some for shmax.com, some for here (turns out I don’t have many that they need over there). Check the stuff out there, and check the new pictures as they appear down below (and on new posts, when I get caught up).
I decided to bring another Movie Scout with me this week to work, so this today’s review is going to be Warpath. Shockingly enough, he’s an Autobot, but I guess he’s a libertarian or something.
Out of the box, you’ve got an odd little red and black humvee thing, but with huge tyres that make me want to say “dune buggy”. Overall, it’s a nice colour scheme, and thankfully the Allspark blue is toned down enough that I can tolerate it. He rolls nice, there’s plenty of detailing, and he’s even got a spare tyre. It’s just over half the size of his actual tyres, but who’s counting? He’s got a very solid feel to him, and definitely feels like he’d be plenty fun just as is. This is a good thing, as he’s got no play features in this mode other than rolling around, keyport in the back be darned. Read the rest…
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