M'Kyuun

I'm familiar with Tiago. He was a former set designer who reluctantly quit the job for family reasons. Concerning the interview, until now, I wasn't familiar with Jae but I think it's cool that as a new designer he got to work on a project of this level. I appreciate his passion as he walks Tiago through the features and functions. Alas, knowing the background has done little to change my feelings about the model on the whole. There are a few things I like but it's just not quite what I was hoping for or expecting, especially after the excellent 10497 Galaxy Explorer set the bar so very high for these Classic Space revival sets.

I haven't been on social today as I was busy making soup earlier and then working on a MOC. I decided to check my messages and this thing popped up. Needless to say, curiosity piqued so I put the MOC on hold to do some internet recon. I got the Renegade for Christmas as a kid, probably in '87 the year it came out. I loved the Blacktron I figs with their all-black suits, that cool white-printed harness, and that awesome black visor. I was a big Robocop fan and I loved putting those guys' visors halfway down so only their mouths could be seen. Decades later, they're still one of LEGO's most striking original minifig designs. Concerning the update, like others, it's a mixed bag for me as well, especially as someone who grew up with the original theme and still has a copy of the original Renegade on his Classic Space shelf. The OG Renegade First the negatives: I wish they'd produced a new version of that windshield that tapered towards the front, even if only by two studs, i.e. 6 studs wide in the back- 4 in the front, or even 2 in the front. I think it would have helped the look of the cockpit considerably. However, the OG set had a similar shaped canopy, albeit only 4 wide, with a printed wedge brick to serve as the nose. Lacking a proper piece at 6 studs' width to represent said wedge brick, the designer used a large polyhedral flag which looks ok. It's not the best and one would think a company making a couple billion dollars a year would spring for a new mold or two, but apparently not. I also wish the winglets on the sides of that cockpit were larger to scale better, as the original's did. The little scooter craft on the wings employ yellow triangular road signs in a pattern invocative of the Blacktron trifoil, but honestly, I'd rather they had used a printed slope on the front of those scooters and also found a way to reuse those old tri-directional thruster pieces. I think the OG did it better. The proverbial elephant in the room is the lack of a removable cargo container and opening back doors a la the Galaxy Explorer to facilitate its loading and unloading. Instead, there's a functional air-drop mechanism built in to simply let the vehicle fall out of the ship. Lacking a crane and being confined to its alcove on all sides, there seems to be no other way of disgorging the vehicle when landed. IDK about all of you guys, but opening the cargo doors on those old ships to remove whatever sufficed as cargo was a huge part of the fun and they've engineered that salient feature right out of this design. Moreover, the vehicle doesn't even get a cargo box with a lid to nest in, which was also part of the fun of the original. That nesting box was also a modular component which could be attached to combos of the other bits and bobs to form smaller craft in the OG set. Wasted opportunity, IMHO. Also lost is another opportunity to build in a folding ramp to load the vehicle. The area behind the cockpit tapered down to a nice gooseneck on the OG ship; this one has a bulky section instead to house the retractable landing gear. While I LOVE retractable gear in a model, I can't understand why the gear couldn't have been more compact allowing at least a little of the original's taper to remain intact on this update. It seems that many of the salient features were ignored or rebuilt in such a way as to remove any flavor of the original set. The positives. Retractable landing gear! As I said, I absolutely love it when LEGO includes this feature in a set, as it's a rarity. I think the housings are oddly too bulky , but I'm glad the feature's there. The asymmetry is also preserved even if the cockpit section doesn't extend out as much as it did on the original. It looks a little stubby on this model which isn't helped by the bulky gear housing. However, the designer seems to tried to mitigate that bulkiness and give the impression of a thinner "neck" by using these girder support bricks which also add a nice heavy industrial feel to the ship. The modularity is also preserved, although the lack of a central cargo box erodes the playability compared to the original set. It comes with an additional minifig and a little buildable robot that looks identical to the one that came with the FX Star Patroller, another excellent CS set. Arguably the best updated part of this set is the ground vehicle, a much larger and more heavy-duty take on the OG. Alas, there doesn't seem to be a single printed tile or brick with the Blacktron trifoil, but all the signature colors are there, and it looks downright lovely. Again, it's a shame that the main ship doesn't feature a ramp enabling it to drive into its alcove. A storage box with drop-down sides with tools and accessories would have been glorious and would have really gone a long way towards redeeming some of the set's other misses. I'm not certain if any background details behind this set's development are in the public domain just yet but given the differences in approaches between this and the Galaxy Explorer update, it seems like there were two very different goals or two different designers behind them. As 10497 was an improvement in virtually every facet of the original's design (baseplates and little satellite station notwithstanding), this takes too many liberties thus eliminating much of what made the original's set design appealing. IMHO, they were going for a heavy-duty industrial feel as opposed to the original ship's minimalistic and more streamlined design. Personally, I wish this was more streamlined with more interior spaces for the figs to work/live in, like a small area behind the cockpit with a bed or a small galley with snacks, built into a tapered cowl to match the original enabling all three minifigs to ride in the cockpit section. I love the ground vehicle and to have had a cargo box that accommodated the vehicle along with a small workbench area with tools and accessories that can be offloaded as a total unit out the back of the ship while landed would have added a great deal more playability to the set than the air-drop function. LEGO has been doing a pretty good job over the last few years giving us the occasional Classic Space era homages so perhaps they were due for a dud. I don't outright hate this version, but it's admittedly not what I was hoping for either. I'm still going to get it, and with luck, like 10497, it'll get early price reductions like 10497 did at Wally back when it came out. Even at $100 MSRP for 1151 pieces, it's a pretty good deal, but I wouldn't mind picking up a second copy perhaps to mod at a reduced price.

The dialog is pure stereotypical over-the-top tripe, but the gameplay and visuals look solid. I wonder if everything is piloted, or if the animalistic bots are A.I. partners to the anthropomorphic mecha? While it'd be fun to pilot a creature mech for a change of pace, having it as a partner to send out on various commands or errands would be interesting, too.

Age is potentially a factor; I was thirteen when Transformers came out, so a very different outlook and set of expectations. Compared with Gobots, and many other cartoons, I appreciated the more mature tone and story of the first season. Alas, they round filed that direction and devolved into silliness and whimsy for the remainder of the series and I pretty much stopped watching it with any regularity during second season. To this day, the first season is the only one I own and the only one I've seen in its entirety. So far as the toys were concerned, after picking up Prowl, I really wanted that fig in the box to look like that box art so my disappointment was profound from the very beginning. MP Prowl was the realization of what I wanted in a Prowl toy; I only had to wait about thirty years for it. I also love the WFC and Earthrise Datsun bros toys, especially Prowl (I just love his overall livery and look) and Newage's Harry. I missed the boat on Magic Square's version as I was just starting to dip my toes into the legends stuff and didn't want to get sucked in. Shoulda known that was an effort born in futility. 😄 So far as articulation, that was always my greatest source of disappointment with the og toys, so that's a personally subjective focus for my criticism. I liked the deco of the G1 toys, stickers didn't really bother me, nor the sometimes-wonky proportions as there was nothing else better to compare with at the time, at least known to me. Had the OG toys been what Missing Link is, I'd have had a completely different view of those toys and a far deeper appreciation for them. But, by and large, they were pretty statues and I found them too limited to be much fun, especially with the really well-articulated GI Joe figures and even better articulated Microman figures existing concurrently with Transformers. I constantly questioned why the Transformers toys couldn't have the same levels of articulation. That was my constant complaint about the toys until the 90s when ball joints started to be introduced and figures finally started to be fully poseable, with limitations of course. But it was a step in the right direction, and I was happy to see improvements in that area, as well as sculpting, paint apps, and complexity as the years, and new toylines, came and went. Complexity was another area I was hawkish about until Bayformers took it to the far extreme. As I get older, I find I'm more easily frustrated by really complex transformations and I tend to be more heavy-handed as well which doesn't always bode well. Patience was never an easy virtue for me. But back in the early 2000s, I welcomed increased complexity with gusto. Just shows how our perspectives can change over time. I can't say that age is really a primary factor for appreciating G1. There are fans who were born after the millennium who are discovering G1 and have a passion for it- everything from the toys, the show, the comics, and they pursue collecting those things the same as the folks who grew up with G1. Like anything, it comes down to personal tastes and biases, personalities, and influences. At the end of the day, we like what we like for whatever reasons and so be it. I don't know why big robots that turn into other things (with lots of articulation!) ignites a passion within me; it just does and I suspect it's the same for other fans of whatever they're fans of.

😄 For me, that's the point. The original toys sucked. Edit. After thinking about it for a minute, let me amend that. I think the OG toys, many of them anyway, like Jazz, Prowl, Sideswipe, etc, presented very well. I liked the way they looked but deeply lamented their lack of pose ability which greatly reduced their value and enjoyment as a toy. They were more knick-knack than toy due to those limitations. While I'm not collecting them (yet), I think Takara struck gold with the Missing Link line. Had they done this ten, fifteen years ago I'd have been over the moon and likely would have bought them all without hesitation. But, IMHO, better toys exist, and have existed for some time now, which capture a good marriage of both toon and toy aesthetics along with a goodly range of articulation, all the things the OG toys lacked. I think they should have released this line years ago before alternatives existed. That said, seeing as how they're moving into the carbots with Sunstreaker, I'm hoping for Prowl to receive the ML treatment. He was my first G1 toy and I ruined my copy trying to jimmy-rig some articulation into the hips when I was a kid. Still regret it, and if I have the opportunity to get an improved version, I will.

Likewise. I have a reissue of G1 OP (I don't think I ever opened it. It's tucked away somewhere in storage), I have the deluxe Legacy United OP, which makes some improvements over the Missing Link at a fraction of the cost (I can live without chrome and die cast), and I have both Earthrise and SS86 Optimus Primes, either of which can fill the void in my mainline collection. SS86 is great, but I still love the Earthrise fig. IMHO, with Missing Link a reality, I'm not sure why one would want the original toy. Well yeah, nostalgia. Nostalgia only carries me so far. At least the Missing Link toys offer a close facsimile to the OG toy while delivering much improved articulation and other features. Even as a kid collecting the odd G1 bot, due to their many limitations my disenchantment with those toys grew with every acquisition (except the cassettes, which are still pretty cool and far superior to the crappy cassettes in Legacy). I would much prefer modern takes with all the articulation and complexity they offer. However, to each their own.

I'm playing some serious catch-up. I completely missed this back when it was new and I regret it greatly, as I'm sure I would've been in for a kit. This is on a shortlist of valks that I wish would get official toys. I just started working on a LEGO version, but the shortcomings of that particular medium along with my own as a designer mean that any final product will still fall short of the finesse, craftsmanship, and beauty of yours, Xigfrid. This is brilliant work.

Just perused the Cybertron Con pics over on TFW2005 and I realized that the pic with the opened shins was the Superion combiner frame and not Silverbolt. I think it's a shame that they resorted to another frame system instead of figuring out a way to just let the bots themselves form the limbs. Perhaps they couldn't stabilize them hence the wobbly instability issues inherent of the Combiner Wars gestalts. Granted, Menasor proved a frame system is effective, but I reiterate my constant mantra that this company has forty years' experience designing these things and finding a solution to solidify a bunch of bots connecting together to form a solid larger bot should not be beyond their capabilities. Looking through the pics, I realized there was very little on display that interested me. I'm curious to see what the new Rescue Bots crossovers look like in toy form, as I thought they did a great job with Chase. I like Animated, but I'm not sure if I'll pick up a copy of Wasp or not. Who am I kidding, I probably will. I don't own a copy of Wasp from the original line so this would fill that void. I still really, really wish they'd made a way to rotate his feet so that the actual front sections of his car formed his toes. As to Wingtail and his tails, I know extremely little about the Sonic Universe as I never played the games and have no interest in the character or associated media. I realize I'm likely in the minority of people my age who grew up with it, but I didn't and so I never formed associations with it. To that end, this is the first time I ever heard of Wingtail or Blue Rooster, so I didn't know what Wingtail looked like until @mikeszekely posted the above pic. Regarding the figure, you can't even squint and imagine that those empennage sections look like fox tails, as it seems they didn't incorporate any plastic origami to attempt to make them look somewhat fox-like. I suppose it's enough that they split in two. For me, it's moot as I don't intend to get the set. I still think Blue Rooster needs a retool/repaint into a Batmobile/Batman mech; I'd be down for that.

Ms. Lofting left an indelible impression. Baroness is the role that I know best, a voice I heard nearly every weekday afternoon as I did my homework or just chilled in front of my small CRT tv in my room after school. Good memories. RIP.

Amazing how all three Aerialbots are inaccurate misshapen messes in alt modes but this Sonic biplane, though somewhat cartoony, is fairly accurate and smooth betraying little of its transformative nature. It looks great, one of their better plane alts. I'm not into Sonic or I'd consider getting it. However, Wingtail's bot mode suffers the indignity of having the empennage halves just hanging awkwardly off his back. Is it just me, or does the car mode give off a Fisher Price Batmobile vibe? I wish it was Batman instead of Sonic as I'd likely get a copy. Blue Rooster looks like he fared better in bot mode than Wingtail. I'm trying to imagine that fig with a Batman head. 😄 The whole set is just begging for a Batman recolor with Joker replacing Wingtail. If you're reading this Hasbro, repaint potential all over this set with only minor retooling! Someone forgot to close Silverbolt's shin panels, or at least I'm assuming so.

I suppose I should have expected them to skew far more towards the toon than the G1 toys, which actually, blocky bot undercarriages notwithstanding, resembled the real-world aircraft they were meant to represent fairly well, at least from a top-down perspective. Anyway, I've about given up on ever having a set of Aerialbots that I like, especially when companies are chasing the toon look and they can't even be bothered to integrate the robot arms or tuck them in flush to the aircraft's fuselage. That sort of thing almost never happens with ground vehicle alts, but for some reason, they just don't seem to care how much robot sticks out of the alt mode when the alt mode is a plane. Well, on the bright side, with my shelf space dwindling, I can save both money and space by passing on these guys. I don't even think it's a matter of their not understanding, but more an absence of care. Takara has demonstrated said lack of care when it comes to aircraft alt modes since the Diaclone era. The only reason the Diaclone seeker was even close was because Kawamori, an aircraft enthusiast, designed it, and the VF-1 which would be repackaged as Jetfire. That's not to say that every aircraft alt has been a total fail- they seem to do a great job with helicopters, and there are a handful of jetformers that have been decent. On the whole, however, looking at the totality of forty years of these things, most Transformers with jet alt modes are executed poorly to egregiously poorly on the alt mode end. Unfortunately, that same defective approach seems to affect third parties as well, so it's not just Takara. I think the Machine Robo toys had some of the most accurate jet modes in the 80s, and unfortunately, the care died with that line of toys. I'll mention Chinese company Touch Toys as a notable exception: to wit, they stand alone as the only company currently producing transforming jets with remarkably realistic and accurate jet modes. I don't own any of them, but that doesn't prevent my vicarious enjoyment of them via pics and vids. I wish Takara had even a fraction of their investment.

Any faith I had that Has/Tak might actually produce Aerialbots with decent somewhat accurate alt modes has dissipated entirely. The Combiner Wars bots and planes looked better, IMHO. These are just beyond terrible. I will say I think this version of Silverbolt looks better than CW Silverbolt, but that doesn't erase the fact that he's still a giant block of bot under a plane, with none of that long fuselage used to form the robot. SMH. Pretty f'n shitty for a company with 40 years' experience making these things, and yet, not unexpected. And yet still, rather disappointing given the overall quality we've come to expect from the main line of late. I'm equal parts sad and mad.

😄 I also took advantage of the sale and scored a Hoopty! I was hoping they'd mark the similarly ludicrously overpriced X-Men Blackbird down too, but not yet. At $85 for 342 pieces, I can't imagine it's flying off shelves when there are so many other more reasonably priced sets with more to offer. I'll bide my time and hope it comes down. If not, I still have the original Blackbird from 2014 which was priced much fairer and came with a small buildable Sentinel. (And a better Magneto, IMHO) After building the Hoopty, a pleasant build, too, I might add, I fail to see what drove the $85 price tag. There are some larger parts in there, but ultimately nothing that would drive the price to double what a set this size would typically command. According to the Bricklink inventory, there were no new molds although there may have been some recolored parts that are new, which LEGO considers new parts. There were no new prints, either, beyond the minifig torsos. It's a headscratcher that only the bean counters at LEGO understand. Anyway, I paid $54 for it before tax, and while still a little overpriced, it was far better than the MSRP. Anyway, it's a unique and lovely looking ship, and I'm glad I have it now.

NP. Always happy to help! Man, I wish. The best thing they've given us for larger mecha are these relatively new bits which work with , this brand-new Technic joint and . Unfortunately, these joints are still fairly small scale, although they do impart far more strength and stability to medium sized mecha than the old Exo-Force joints could handle. Look no further than Cole's Titan Dragon Mech, set 71821 as a perfect official example of a good scale for use of these joints. This mech is nearly 15" tall and those shoulders are hefty. Both shoulders and hips utilize a combination of the first two parts I posted as well as those Exo-Force ratcheting connectors. Cole's Titan Drago Mech, designed by Niek van Slagmaat (Toothdominoes), a mecha enthusiast and LEGO designer, was an attempt to make the most articulated mech possible as a final set since Niek got a promotion and will no longer be directly designing the Ninjago sets. It's a very impressive set and really shows what LEGO can and should do as a matter of course regarding articulation and complexity. i

Nah, they made it an expresso bar. LEGO have put nods to alcohol in other sets, and these are aimed at the adult collector, so it wouldn't be totally unexpected. That said, clearly emphasizing the expresso machine dispels the notion of more 'spirited' imbibing. I like that they've included a hat store, something they haven't done before, and the clockmaker's flat is brilliant, and also a first. As usual, design and detail are on point and its anachronistic look contrasts nicely against the usual 1940s-50sish look they tend towards with the line. I love it.

For mechs this scale, the builder is most likely using these Technic turntables controlled by worm gears to effect rotation. They can handle a far greater load than the smaller purpose-made ratcheting joints which makes them ideal for large scale builds. The UCS AT-AT, for example, uses them in the hips and knees. Very effective. The only drawback is that they are not quickly or easily poseable relying on the manual rotation of a knob or a special tool, like the AT-AT, to effect rotation, a slow process.

Those models are exemplary. This is mastery of a rare level, which I've only seen in person once by a different builder. I so wish LEGO would hire people who can do mecha at this level and create some sets targeted at adults. I'm sure I could learn a few things by building one of these. That Gundam Aerial looks splendid and would look even moreso on one of my shelves.

Didn't mean to steal your thunder, Renegadeleader1. I saw this this pop up on the Classic Space group page on FB this morning and got pretty excited. No one had posted it yet, so I went ahead and did so as I know there are other LEGO Space enthusiasts here and I wanted to share the pics (and the excitement!). Must buy for me too, obviously. I'm hoping there are more to come, and that I can afford them should all this tariff talk come to fruition.

Glad to see this theme continuing. Hoping the rumored Blacktron set will be revealed soon.

The Tumbler set 76239 from 2021 is larger and more accurate, an excellent set IMHO, and one that was long awaited. It also did a far better job of integrating its stud shooters, placing its gold stud projectiles where they might be mistaken for suspension or steering details. This new set is downsized, which seems to be a trend with LEGO, and while pretty well-executed for its size (compare to MOCs across the internet) leaves a little to be desired when compared to its predecessor. Nonetheless, I like the Tumbler, and this set offers what the original did not: Aaron Eckhart's Two-Face in minifig form for the first time. 76239 gave us Dr. Crane in his Scarecrow mask and Batman came with both a double-sided Bruce Wayne head and a second head printed to resemble his terrifying visage from Scarecrow's fear toxin induced POV. I'm pleasantly surprised that LEGO's releasing another minifig scaled version of the Tumbler, especially after only three years since the last. I had hoped for a set of The Bat back in 2021, but alas, it wasn't forthcoming. Perhaps they'll release a Bat set later in 2025. It's long overdue, as LEGO's only release of his odd flying contraption from Dark Knight Rises was in 2013 and left somewhat to be desired so far as accuracy is concerned. See pic below. I'll admit, though, I found it and the very simplistic tan Tumbler from that set to be fun to mess with, as toys should be.

Ooh, that's neat.

Due to release in March. Preorders up on the LEGO Shop. Interesting note: Joe Kyde, who designed LEGO Optimus Prime, designed this set. Compared to the previous excellent Tallneck, this set is geared for younger builders and yet still retains enough detail to make the machines easily recognizable. Looks like fun! Parts hounds and MOC builders like me will likely be excited for this new clip piece. I've been wanting something like this for a very long time, so I'm excited. I POed two copies just to have the second set for its lovely new parts.

FWIW, I tried a number of finger/thumb configurations and nothing was working. Every time I tried closing the panel with the rotating bit, it would push the hand such that it blocked the panel from closing. I know the hands were tucked in there when I first transformed it, so obviously they fit somehow, but I just wasn't having any luck, so I just removed them both and everything went together as advertised. I didn't plan on keeping it in fighter; I just wanted to go through the exercise of transforming it. I definitely wish they'd done some things differently, as the YF-21 doesn't really have that complicated a setup. Bandai needlessly complicated the backpack with that repositionable grey panel, the blue chunk of aircraft spine that needs to tuck through, the lack of natural stops or soft locking points for the shelf/intakes, and of course the need for an external brace to bear the weight of all that backpack in lieu of good engineering. I sound salty, and perhaps I am a little--disappointed more so. However, I do like the look of both modes, but especially battroid. I just never liked the look of Yamato's battroid with those skinny legs, so, despite its numerous warts, I'm satisfied with how the DX looks and the fact that it's stable. That said, I'd still love to see, in light of Bandai's release, what Arcadia would do with a new take. Given their demonstrable passion for Macross, and the lessons learned from the 1/60 and now Bandai's DX, I think it's safe to assume it would be an impressive release.

I wasn't aware of that; if anything, I always thought Europe and the UK would benefit from their proximity to Denmark, not to mention personal and professional ties to the Kirk Christiansen family in Billund. I know there were a number of airplane sets exclusive to European countries in the 80s and 90s, and I always just assumed that our neighbors across the pond enjoyed not only the range of sets available here in the Western Hemisphere, but additional sets as well in both themes and as exclusives. I'm sorry to have been so wrong and puzzled that the opposite seems to be the case. Anyway, I hope the rumor proves true and we get a minty fresh version of the Renegade to display next to our 10497 Galaxy Explorers, and it's available globally.

I very much appreciate the compliment. I have thoughts about doing a small excavator at some point.