GU-11

In MP-3's case, I can't say the means justifies the ends. Sure, Kawamori's version covers up the fuselage somewhat better, but the included stand doesn't really expose the jet's mode's underside all that much for it to matter, unless you're looking at it from eye level.

Thanks, Graham! Looking forward to bringing mine home and displaying it!

As the reviews and pics of the VF-25F start popping up, it seems like the head lasers actually DON'T angle out. What, did ff95gj just photoshop them to do that? So do the head lasers angle out or not? Still haven't collected mine from the hobby store, but I'm just itching to find out.

The problem here is that there are plenty of worse directors than Bay. Another thing to worry about is the fact that the style of any film that pioneers a concept or franchise [Tim Burton's Batman], will usually be aped by a new director who takes over. In Batman's case, the whole quirky Gothic gig was replicated in the third and fourth Batman movies, which went from bad to worse. I'm just worried that the new guy will try to do Bay's MTV thing--dorky jokes, crass humor, obnoxious explosions, annoying characters etc. And the military worship...let's not even go there.

If the pre-Kawamori Screamer is actually an improvement, it makes me wonder just why Takara even asked him to tinker around with the MP line in the first place. Star power, perhaps? I know the hip kibble was his idea, as was that weird "zombie green" color scheme. As for MP-11 itself, it's just not enough of an improvement to me to add this to my must-buy list. I mean, come on; it's just a remold! They could have done something about the neck . The way it rises above the two chest turbines makes it look weird. Although I still wonder why Kawamori would associate a traitorous, sneaky robot like Starscream with a samurai, I don't hate the hip kibble/pseudo samurai swords as much as I expected. G1 inaccuracy aside, I actually think it looks okay. That said, I'm still tempted. The face looks like a nice improvement, and the chest area seems to come together a lot better than the original.

Warning: long post. To be fair, I think DOTM got several things right, but also screwed up in places that were good in ROTF. First off, much of the dorky humor is gone for the most part, along with less-annoying parents and a plot that, at least in the beginning, made sense. The parents are fine this time around, and actually act like normal people. What I like the most is that the military isn't ridiculously portrayed as this invincible force that is able to solve every problem with carpet bombing. Ever heard of the Vietnam war, Mike? The "guerrilla" tactics employed in DOTM should have been used in all three movies, because it's realistic and makes sense. I think I've already ranted enough times about how Megs or Starscream could have easily taken down human air bombers, so I'll just leave it at that. On the down side, the bot-vs-bot fight scenes seem less "energetic" here than in ROTF. That part where Optimus flies down the street and takes down the enemy just isn't as cool as the forest fight scene, or when he jumps off a plane and transforms in midair. The final fight between Optimus, Sentinel and Megs was a disappointment. I won't start about how it doesn't make sense, but the action was erratic and the sparks from the explosions obscured some of the details...or maybe that as the point, to save on CG? Micheal Bay also seems to have a problem with scale, ande I'm not talking about mass-shifting. This is a movie about an army of giant robots invading Earth, but it seems more like a minor skirmish than a massive war. No more than a handful of tanks and jets appear in any one scene, and the Con's are depicted as a pitiful band of bots who keep missing thier shots, but seem to get nailed every single time. I haven't seen a single scene in all three movies where a Decepticon single-handedly takes down several tanks and jets at once. And no, the scene with the Fallen at the pyramid doesn't count. With his kind of powers, he should have obliterated the whole navy by himself, using that anti-gravity trick of his. I've seen movies with pretty bad plot holes, but DOTM has got to have the biggest one in existence. The Decepticons plan to use humans as slave labor to rebuild their planet. And just how are we supposed to do that? Humans are far more fragile, smaller, weaker, and CANNOT survive without an oxygen-rich atmosphere. Last time I checked, Cybertron doesn't even have an atmosphere. Manual labor has always favored strength, size and durability, things in which humans are inferior to compared to Cybertronians. Makes about as much sense as getting trained gerbils to build your house. They should have just stuck to the original idea of depleting the Earth's resources. All in all, it's a much better effort than ROTF. Pretty good in my book, but with a little more effort, it could have been great. DISCLAIMER: I'm not asking for an Oscar-winning script here, but at least give us something that's NOT ridiculous. Iron Man had a pretty simple plot, but it works well in its simplicity.

A thousand thanks for the pics, ff95gj and Graham! I salivate over that gorgeous GERWALK mode. Still waiting for it to arrive at my local hobby store. One question, though. Any fragile painted parts we should look out for? BTW, nice to see that the head lasers do angle out some. Hope it's the same case with the Ozma.

I've been re-watching the first few episodes of MF on DVD these past few days. Now I can't recall ever seeing a VF-25 without boosters or armor, except for that one scene when Alto uses Gilliam's VF to save Ranka. Just out of curiosity, did the VF-25 EVER not use boosters or armor throughout the series? Just thought maybe Bandai should have given us some boosters to go with the figs, since the Valks were never shown "unarmored."

Took the plunge and pre-ordered the Ozma. I'd rather face the risk of possibly buying two identical Valks for the armor parts, than to buy a single one from FleeceBay at highly inflated prices. This way, at least I get more value for my money. Of course, the idea situation would be for Bandai to release separate armor parts.

He did? Damn, talk about humble beginnings.

Sure beats Rattner, Boll and McG, but not by much, given his latest works. Well, at least we won't be subjected to titanium testicles and robo pee anymore. I second that. He did great with Ironman. If they could get Goyer to write the script, problem solved. I agree. I personally like how in DOTM the humans used subterfuge, covert tactics and ingenuity while working with the Autobots to bring down the Cons. They exploited weaknesses and used ambushes [sniping the bots' eyes and planting bombs on their feet] to take down a physically superior foe. But one thing that gets to me is how the first two movies seemed to irrationally worship and kiss military ass. I know all the explosions and fireworks from a bombing raid looks cool, but to me it just feels empty and fake. I totally hated how the first movie and ROTF resorted to Godzilla-style carpet bombing to save the day. Honestly, the script literally forced the situations to enable the humans to win. Starscream could have easily wiped out those fighter jets in the first movie. When he ambushed the Raptors in mid-air, he could have easily used his Gatling gun and missiles to take the whole squadron down in mere seconds, because the fact that he's firing from his hands makes his aim far more flexible than the Raptor pilots who have to move the whole plane to aim. And where the f@#k was he in ROTF when the bombers came in? At least in DOTM, he was long dead when the cruise missiles came in, and Megatron had lost his flight mode. Either way, it was far more palatable than watching an army of battle hardened giant robots get their ass handed to them by a pitiful group of tanks and jets. And don't get me started with the humans being able to hold Brawl off by hiding in a building armed with a few grenade launchers. All he had to do was convert to tank mode and fire a shell into the damn place. Bye-bye squishies. I'm not against humans fighting back and winning, but it has to be done in a believable manner like in DOTM.

I'm just concerned about who's going to be directing the sequels. Bay's just proven that cutting-edge CG and Transformers alone will sell tickets, which means the higher ups will not concern themselves with getting a good director. Pretty sure they won't stoop to Uwe Boll, but even Rattner and McG are enough to make me shudder in fear.

Waiting for reviews is always a good idea, but I'm afraid I don't have that luxury where I'm at. While there's always HLJ and AmiAmi to order from, it's much cheaper to get non-discounted stuff from my local hobby store, due to shipping costs and import taxes. The stores don't always bring in a lot of stuff, so pre-ordering is always the best option to make sure the item doesn't get sold out. Thanks for the suggestion, David and Lowviz. I just hope there are buyers willing to pay shipping all the way to Asia.

Thanks, LowViz Lurker, that's a good idea. Honestly, I hate to sell or buy stuff on Ebay [i've heard WAY too many horror stories about cheating buyers and dishonest sellers], but I'll probably get the Ozma anyways. In the event that Bandai DOES go with the bundle set route, I'll just keep the "naked" Ozma VF in its beautiful fighter mode as a centerpiece on my workstation. And yeah, Bandai's unpredictability is scary. Their penchant for web exclusives makes it even worse.

No problem, man. I wasn't much of a fan of TF Prime's rather derivative designs either, but I guess the show slowly endeared me to the designs as I got acquainted with the characters. Arcee and Knockout are at the top of my to-buy list as far as deluxe figs are concerned. Voyager Bulkhead is surprisingly CG-accurate.

I need an opinion here, guys. The Ozma's up for pre order at my local hobby store, but I'm not sure if I should buy it right now. First off, my budget's severely stretched recently, as I need to reserve some funds for the Alto VF-25 renewal version I pre ordered; I'd rather not use too much money for the time being. Secondly, I don't know if Bandai would release a separate armor set for the Ozma or do a bundle set with Ozma's VF. In short, would it be wise to buy the Ozma now, or wait for a possible armor bundle?

I just saw the pics of the voyager fig at Seibertron--quite a while ago, I might add. Not a bad figure, quite CG-accurate in fact, but the faux chest-plates was a deal breaker for me. If memory serves, VC OP is part of the wave 1 voyager class releases, and should be out around December '11 at the earliest, or Q1 '12 at the latest.

Thanks, I'll try Amazon, but I'm not a fan of Ebay. What with some of the stories I've heard, it's generally easier to deal with big companies after you've bought something rather than individuals.

Great news! I hate the faux windscreen kibble on TF Prime voyager class OP's chest, and the scale was wrong, too. Hopefully, like his other leader class incarnation, his alt mode windscreen will actually convert into his chest plates. I dunno, I just have a peeve against faux kibble.

Fall of Cybertron? Hasn't it already fallen in WFC? Either way, I'm really psyched that Grimlock is in there, and hopefully some other Dinobots. Just hope it lasts longer than the mere 12 hours WFC took to complete. And more unlockables.

Thanks for replying, guys. Yeah, I had a false alarm a year ago when I mistook an ear infection for something far more serious. I try not to take chances with toxic materials if I can help it. I figured an exhaust fan is easier to hunt down than a respirator, so I'm saving up for one I saw in a hobby store. Using this outdoors should make up for the lack of a proper respirator. I'll still be wearing a mask just to be doubly safe.

My bad. Yeah, I actually bypassed David Sarif and went straight down to the Hyron Project. Retried it again, and there it was. The self-destruct option now requires Jensen to enter a passageway to destroy some generators.

What?! But I only counted three buttons on the consoles to push: How to you get the fourth ending? Or did you mean the epilogue after the credits?

Just finished Deus Ex - HR. Awesome gameplay and fun sidequests, but rather annoying boss fights and three WTF endings [i only watched one of the three, to be fair]. Thankfully, the gameplay saved the day. For every mission there are around two-to three routes and ways to go about something. Go Rambo on the enemy, do it Splinter Cell style or a combination of both...it's all fun. That said, I get the feeling the game designers seem to try to COAX you into sneaking around. Stealth adds bonus points to your overall results, which means quicker Praxis points. Why can't they do the same if you had a high kill rate or took down all enemies in the level? Still, it's not quite as bad as Hitman, where all the weapons you unlock might as well have been useless, as game will give you with a Thug or Psycho rating if kill you kill non-targets and/or blow your cover. To be fair, though, Hitman was designed exclusively around stealth, which is only fitting for game starring a contract killer. All in all, a great game that will probably warrant at least as many repeat playthroughs as RE 4 and 5 [gotta love The Mercenaries]. Seriously one of the best games I've bought this year.

That is awesome news. Been hoping for a leader class DOTM Megs ever since I saw him on screen.