The Transformers Thread (licensed) Next

[Negotiator]

Blaster PO on usual online retailers.  Bbts dorkside etc.  Still waiting on Amazon to list it.

[sh9000]

I’ll order Blaster from Dorkside.  Free shipping after a $39+ order and no tax.

[M'Kyuun]

Seems like all the other e-tailers have Blaster and the other new figs, but it's nowhere to be found on Pulse.  Apparently, with Hasbro, membership doesn't have its privileges. 

 

[mikeszekely]

When Hasbro announced Blaster they said it was going to retail with no preorders. While places like EE, Dorkside, BBTS, etc will offer them for their stock I don't think Pulse, Amazon, or the big box stores are going to take preorders.

[M'Kyuun]

1 hour ago, mikeszekely said:

When Hasbro announced Blaster they said it was going to retail with no preorders. While places like EE, Dorkside, BBTS, etc will offer them for their stock I don't think Pulse, Amazon, or the big box stores are going to take preorders.

Well, that sucks, especially given the market for these things and the relative scarcity of actual toys in stores. I really don't fancy paying the e-tailer markup; Blaster's never really been a must-have character to me, although I love the cassettes, and this is a good-looking Blaster that finally fits in with the rest of the recent main line. Pipes is another character that I can take or leave; I like the Huffer mold, and this is a nice recolor, so I'd get him for that reason. I wish they'd changed the transformation so his arms go to the center of the back of his cab letting his weapons form the smoke stacks.  They look weird pegged to his hitch deck, with white arms forming the stacks.  Oh well, IIWII.

Just a poor situation on Hasbro's part; they should offer everything on their site, especially to paying members, otherwise, what's the point?

[David Hingtgen]

I'm a big Pipes fan, but I think the new mold isn't very good for his character.

I mean, his name is PIPES.  His original toy was notable for having BIG CHROME PIPES.  

And here we have white plastic arms in truck mode, that really don't look very exhaust pipe-ish.   And his skinny guns stick on his big white deck-plate-feet?  Eh.  

But I couldn't really find a good 3P version either   It's amazing that he seems so hard to do well.  So many go to ludicrous backpacks (worse than G1 sometimes!) and also, like Hasbro, seem to miss the point, and not give him big chrome PIPES.

Everyone's trying too hard to base him off the toon, when the toon itself kinda missed the point, and gave him white arms that aren't made from his PIPES.

White thighs are fine, but he really needs to have silver/chrome arms so that truck mode is right.  Or transform such that he has big silver pipes as a truck while retaining white arms as a bot, if you want it as toon-based as possible.     

 

[mikeszekely]

I know I usually wait until I have more than one repaint to do any kind of write up, but with SG Starscream delayed to February I'm not sure that I have any other repaints coming out any time soon.  So... I got Gen Selects Galvatron in.

There are no mold differences from the regular Kingdom release, just differences in color.  I'll be honest, I'm not entirely sure what exactly Hasbro was going for.  From the description, it sounds like they're saying that this is supposed to be the toy-colored Galvatron... until they start talking about the Marvel comics.

And sure, there's definitely elements of the toy here.  The gray they used for most of his body is indeed quite similar to the gray used on the G1 toy's plastic.  They painted a section of his pelvis black to mimic the toy's button, and they pylons on his shoulders are red like the G1 toy.  His knees have silver paint where the G1 toy had chrome, and they used a darker gray for the armor around it and down his shin to point at his black feet which, again, matches the G1 toy.

There's no red on GS Galvatron's chest, though, just a Decepticon emblem.  His forearms are purple, like his biceps, instead of matching his hands.  There's no gray on his purple thighs.  And, sure enough, in all those ways he's colored more like the old Marvel Comics... which didn't have the red shoulder pylons, the silver kneecaps, the darker gray running down the shins, or the black feet.

So, y'know, maybe they were trying to split the difference and try to appeal to both toy and Marvel Comics fans.  But then there are the other just baffling decisions.  GS Galvatron has a purple crest on his head, neither the toy nor the comics did.  He's also got purple around his collar that should be silver or chrome.  The G1 toy had a red belt with a yellow sticker, in the comics they just colored the whole thing red, but Hasbro couldn't even manage that.  Both G1 toy and Marvel comics had yellow eyes, but GS Galvatron has red.

Some of this, it seems, Hasbro meant for you to address yourself with a sticker sheet.  My G1 Galvatron is missing a lot of its original stickers, but I can see that some of the stickers on the sheet match details that were supposed to be stickers on the G1 toy.  I can also see some stickers that look like they're meant to go over parts of Galvatron's chest to add the red, and stickers that go on his forehead crest that I have to assume will do a terrible job of covering the purple.  And after all that he'd still have red eyes instead of yellow.

Anyway... Galvatron comes with the exact same accessories as the Kingdom release, just in different colors.  The base of the cannon is purple now (side note, I really wish they'd used this shade of purple for the regular Kingdom version), and the translucent orange barrel lacks the paint of the Kingdom version but has more sparkles à la the G1 toy.  The "chain" is the same, but the Matrix on it is painted a metallic lime color.  Again, this is presumably a reference to the Marvel comics...

The Revenge guns, which I didn't exactly care for the first time around, are a gunmetal color instead of gray.  And that's it.  Now, with the Kingdom release, I was more or less fine with that.  After all, that's more than he actually had in the 86 movie, the third Sunbow season, or the Japanese Headmasters series.  But this time, the inclusion of those stupid spaceship guns and the exclusion of a gun that looks like the G1 toy's really stings because this one is supposed to be based on that toy.  Fortunately, Nonnef makes a Galvatron kit that includes his G1 rifle.

Transformation is exactly the same as the Kingdom version.  The result honestly isn't terrible.  There's a bit extra purple on the back of the cannon (but the arm cannon's base actually blends in better, I think), and the red and gray is flipped on the shoulders, but I like that they put a rubsign in the same spot as the G1 toy.  There is a coat of a light pearlescent paint near the front, where the G1 toy has chrome, but it's not super noticeable and I wish they'd used something a bit more obvious.  Funny enough, I'd ordered the Reprolables for Kingdom Galvatron to add a little more black to his feet and to fill in the missing red on his belt and the tops of his shoulder pylons.  As that's all I used on a $20 set with WAY too many stickers I didn't really need I wouldn't actually recommend it, but some of those stickers I didn't use are chrome-looking bits to go around that part of the cannon (and the robot collar).  I didn't use them on Kingdom Galvatron, but I might just use them on GS Galvatron.

And there we have it, folks.  Some head-scratching decisions made here, but the base figure is still pretty good (and didn't have the misassembled shoulders that the Kingdom version did).  If you wanted a gray Galvatron to look more like the G1 toy or the Marvel Comics (or both, I guess) then it's worth picking up, but it's probably a pass if you're good with Sunbow purple.

EDIT: I was messing with Galvatron a bit more... the stickers for his belt aren't great.  They're not even included in the instructions (that is, his instructions include directions for the stickers but the sheet shown doesn't have the belt), which makes me think that they're a last minute addition.  They do the sides, but the central rectangle has a yellow sticker for the edges (which should be red) and nothing for the middle (where the yellow actually goes).  Thank Primus for the Reprolabels, which included a yellow belt buckle option.  I'll have to paint around it, though.  Speaking of paint, I found that while many modern TFs glue the heads Galvatron's is actually held together with a screw.  If you remove it, you pull the front half of his face off, and the crest comes off of that.  That means it's really easy to paint the eyes (just waiting on them to dry).  The crest should be easy to paint, too, but I don't have any light gray paint, just silver.  While the stickers (which, I checked, definitely don't cover all the purple well, appearing more like chrome accents) are that mirror-chrome kind already I think I want to try to find something that matches the plastic a bit better.  Oh, and yeah, while the Galvatron Reprolabels might not be wroth it for the maybe five I actually used on the Kingdom figure they're proving to be quite the boon for the GS figure; might be worth considering if and only if you're getting BOTH Kingdom and GS Galvatron.

Edited November 22, 2021 by mikeszekely

[M'Kyuun]

23 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

I know I usually wait until I have more than one repaint to do any kind of write up, but with SG Starscream delayed to February I'm not sure that I have any other repaints coming out any time soon.  So... I got Gen Selects Galvatron in.

There are no mold differences from the regular Kingdom release, just differences in color.  I'll be honest, I'm not entirely sure what exactly Hasbro was going for.  From the description, it sounds like they're saying that this is supposed to be the toy-colored Galvatron... until they start talking about the Marvel comics.

And sure, there's definitely elements of the toy here.  The gray they used for most of his body is indeed quite similar to the gray used on the G1 toy's plastic.  They painted a section of his pelvis black to mimic the toy's button, and they pylons on his shoulders are red like the G1 toy.  His knees have silver paint where the G1 toy had chrome, and they used a darker gray for the armor around it and down his shin to point at his black feet which, again, matches the G1 toy.

There's no red on GS Galvatron's chest, though, just a Decepticon emblem.  His forearms are purple, like his biceps, instead of matching his hands.  There's no gray on his purple thighs.  And, sure enough, in all those ways he's colored more like the old Marvel Comics... which didn't have the red shoulder pylons, the silver kneecaps, the darker gray running down the shins, or the black feet.

So, y'know, maybe they were trying to split the difference and try to appeal to both toy and Marvel Comics fans.  But then there are the other just baffling decisions.  GS Galvatron has a purple crest on his head, neither the toy nor the comics did.  He's also got purple around his collar that should be silver or chrome.  The G1 toy had a red belt with a yellow sticker, in the comics they just colored the whole thing red, but Hasbro couldn't even manage that.  Both G1 toy and Marvel comics had yellow eyes, but GS Galvatron has red.

Some of this, it seems, Hasbro meant for you to address yourself with a sticker sheet.  My G1 Galvatron is missing a lot of its original stickers, but I can see that some of the stickers on the sheet match details that were supposed to be stickers on the G1 toy.  I can also see some stickers that look like they're meant to go over parts of Galvatron's chest to add the red, and stickers that go on his forehead crest that I have to assume will do a terrible job of covering the purple.  And after all that he'd still have red eyes instead of yellow.

Anyway... Galvatron comes with the exact same accessories as the Kingdom release, just in different colors.  The base of the cannon is purple now (side note, I really wish they'd used this shade of purple for the regular Kingdom version), and the translucent orange barrel lacks the paint of the Kingdom version but has more sparkles à la the G1 toy.  The "chain" is the same, but the Matrix on it is painted a metallic lime color.  Again, this is presumably a reference to the Marvel comics...

The Revenge guns, which I didn't exactly care for the first time around, are a gunmetal color instead of gray.  And that's it.  Now, with the Kingdom release, I was more or less fine with that.  After all, that's more than he actually had in the 86 movie, the third Sunbow season, or the Japanese Headmasters series.  But this time, the inclusion of those stupid spaceship guns and the exclusion of a gun that looks like the G1 toy's really stings because this one is supposed to be based on that toy.  Fortunately, Nonnef makes a Galvatron kit that includes his G1 rifle.

Transformation is exactly the same as the Kingdom version.  The result honestly isn't terrible.  There's a bit extra purple on the back of the cannon (but the arm cannon's base actually blends in better, I think), and the red and gray is flipped on the shoulders, but I like that they put a rubsign in the same spot as the G1 toy.  There is a coat of a light pearlescent paint near the front, where the G1 toy has chrome, but it's not super noticeable and I wish they'd used something a bit more obvious.  Funny enough, I'd ordered the Reprolables for Kingdom Galvatron to add a little more black to his feet and to fill in the missing red on his belt and the tops of his shoulder pylons.  As that's all I used on a $20 set with WAY too many stickers I didn't really need I wouldn't actually recommend it, but some of those stickers I didn't use are chrome-looking bits to go around that part of the cannon (and the robot collar).  I didn't use them on Kingdom Galvatron, but I might just use them on GS Galvatron.

And there we have it, folks.  Some head-scratching decisions made here, but the base figure is still pretty good (and didn't have the misassembled shoulders that the Kingdom version did).  If you wanted a gray Galvatron to look more like the G1 toy or the Marvel Comics (or both, I guess) then it's worth picking up, but it's probably a pass if you're good with Sunbow purple.

EDIT: I was messing with Galvatron a bit more... the stickers for his belt aren't great.  They're not even included in the instructions (that is, his instructions include directions for the stickers but the sheet shown doesn't have the belt), which makes me think that they're a last minute addition.  They do the sides, but the central rectangle has a yellow sticker for the edges (which should be red) and nothing for the middle (where the yellow actually goes).  Thank Primus for the Reprolabels, which included a yellow belt buckle option.  I'll have to paint around it, though.  Speaking of paint, I found that while many modern TFs glue the heads Galvatron's is actually held together with a screw.  If you remove it, you pull the front half of his face off, and the crest comes off of that.  That means it's really easy to paint the eyes (just waiting on them to dry).  The crest should be easy to paint, too, but I don't have any light gray paint, just silver.  While the stickers (which, I checked, definitely don't cover all the purple well, appearing more like chrome accents) are that mirror-chrome kind already I think I want to try to find something that matches the plastic a bit better.  Oh, and yeah, while the Galvatron Reprolabels might not be wroth it for the maybe five I actually used on the Kingdom figure they're proving to be quite the boon for the GS figure; might be worth considering if and only if you're getting BOTH Kingdom and GS Galvatron.

Great review, Mike. I appreciate it, as I have G1 Galvatron from childhood, and although I have Movie colored Kingdom Galvy, I was sorely tempted to get this out of pure nostalgia. I didn't, but I still like how it turned out, flaws notwithstanding, and really wanted to see a side-by-side like this for comparison.  I like it. I just really don't have need for another copy, especially with all the other crap I've got POed that I don't have room for, a fact my wife brings up with exasperation anytime I let slip that I ordered yet another toy. 😇

[mikeszekely]

41 minutes ago, M'Kyuun said:

Great review, Mike. I appreciate it, as I have G1 Galvatron from childhood, and although I have Movie colored Kingdom Galvy, I was sorely tempted to get this out of pure nostalgia. I didn't, but I still like how it turned out, flaws notwithstanding, and really wanted to see a side-by-side like this for comparison.  I like it. I just really don't have need for another copy, especially with all the other crap I've got POed that I don't have room for, a fact my wife brings up with exasperation anytime I let slip that I ordered yet another toy. 😇

I'm going to look for paint for his crest tomorrow, and I ordered Rerpolabels to G1 Galvatron. Once I have G1 Galvatron stickered I'll see how much I want to sticker GS Galvatron. I'll try to remember to post another comparison later, but Toyhax is VERY slow getting stuff to me.

[mikeszekely]

Walmart's got some Transformers in their Black Friday sale.

If you ask me, the Ark for $120 is the big draw, but if you're into G1 reissues they have Blaster for $19, Astrotrain for $30, and a trailer-less Optimus for $38.

All the Beast Wars reissues are on sale, too.  I'm occasionally tempted to pick up Primal and/or Megatron, but I really don't have any attachment to the original Beast Wars toys and they just look so bad compared to the modern ones...

The rest of the sale is Cyberverse and RED stuff.  And not even the good ones.

[mikeszekely]

Still waiting for some Reprolabels for the G1 toy before I decide how much more I want to sticker up the Gen Selects, but...

I painted the outer red rectangle on Galvatron's belt buckle, then used some of the red stickers that came with him and the yellow sticker that came with the Reprolabels for Kingdom Galvatron to do his belt.  I painted his eyes yellow  That all came out pretty well, but I had a bit less luck painting his crest.  For one, the gray is actually a bit too light.  For two, I suspect that purple plastic might be the unpaintable kind, as the paint I used (a Rustoleum paint + primer spray I picked up at my local hardware store, since there aren't any local hobby stores) didn't stick well.  I wound up doing three coats, plus I sprayed a little puddle that I dipped a brush in to do some touch up, and there's still hints of purple peaking through at some of the edges and places where the paint pooled a bit too thick as it was drying.  At a casual glance, though, I prefer it to the original purple.  I used stickers that came with the figure to put the red over the top of his chest.  Note that stickers are for the bottom of the indented area, around the indented area, and the two triangular edges, but not the walls of the indented area.  I thought that looked kind of bad, so I cut the border out from the sheet and used it to fill in the walls.  I thought about using alcohol or something to try to remove the tampoed insignia from his chest and then putting a Reprolabel badge on top of the red, but with the shape of his chest I decided that it wouldn't look right and left it alone.  Lastly, I used mirror-esque Reprolables on his abs, on the purple collar, and over the pearlescent paint in cannon mode to better mimic the original toy's chrome.  Oh, and I gave him a Nonnef rifle.  Like I said, I'll  probably do a bit more stickering once I have repros for the original toy to better compare with, but for now I'm a lot happier with how GS Galvatron looks.

[sh9000]

What are the chances of the Generations Netflix WFC Soundwave 3 pack to get rereleased?

[mikeszekely]

1 hour ago, sh9000 said:

What are the chances of the Generations Netflix WFC Soundwave 3 pack to get rereleased?

I'm not an expert, but I'd guess not great.  I don't think any of the other Netflix packs were reissued; frankly, aside from Soundwave and Bee (and maybe Elita-1) I don't think they did super hot in the first place.  That said, Walmart's distribution is the worst.  I think a lot of people missed Netflix Soundwave, I think the demand for a Voyager-class Earth-mode Soundwave is still there (especially with Blaster coming out).  And I know that Hasbro's aware of that demand; they were asked about it point blank.  So while don't expect the Netflix 3 pack to get reissued, I definitely think another Soundwave is coming, either a new mold, a retool of Blaster, or a redeco of Netflix Soundwave sans tapes.  Question is when, not if.

[Scyla]

Flame Toys showed an armor pack for their Kuro Kara Kuri MTMTE Rodimus that makes him look more like the Don Figueora design:

Images courtesy of TFW2005 (https://www.tfw2005.com/boards/threads/flame-toys-products-kuro-kara-kuri-furai-model-furai-action-no-tangential-fembot-topics.1197307/page-108#post-19772671)

Base design:

Edited November 28, 2021 by Scyla

[M'Kyuun]

Both of those designs scream Gundam to me more than Transformers, especially that top pic.  Cool for those who dig this approach, but it's just not for me.

For those who ordered MP Skids, here's an early look at what we're getting with this fig.  I'm liking it, as it harkens back to the earlier MP days when toon 'accuracy' wasn't the end all-be-all of the bot design. He doesn't have the same level of uber-articulation of the more recent releases, but there's still plenty, and I'm looking forward to getting him in hand. I hope they continue to make more MP figs in this vein, as it hits the sweet spot for me aesthetically.

 

[vlenhoff]

Special shout out to tf_lab @ Ebay. USPS lost Jazz' filler parts on the mail, and then they failed to follow up on it. tf_lab quickly responded to emails, and they even sent a replacement at no cost to me. I'm not sure this is the proper space to communicate this, but he sells filler parts for the Licensed transformers we explore here. In any case, a super nice ebayer with a heart of gold needs exposure. 

Edit in: I sold all my transformers except for my MP editions. Earthrise Jazz looks spot on to me, and I had to get it. I am not sure I will continue the line, but I had to have him. He isn't perfect, but it screams proper G1 to me. The rest of the line has gone up in price, so Jazz might be the end of the line for me. What a fun little bot he is.

Edited November 28, 2021 by vlenhoff

[sh9000]

On 11/26/2021 at 10:25 AM, mikeszekely said:

I'm not an expert, but I'd guess not great.  I don't think any of the other Netflix packs were reissued; frankly, aside from Soundwave and Bee (and maybe Elita-1) I don't think they did super hot in the first place.  That said, Walmart's distribution is the worst.  I think a lot of people missed Netflix Soundwave, I think the demand for a Voyager-class Earth-mode Soundwave is still there (especially with Blaster coming out).  And I know that Hasbro's aware of that demand; they were asked about it point blank.  So while don't expect the Netflix 3 pack to get reissued, I definitely think another Soundwave is coming, either a new mold, a retool of Blaster, or a redeco of Netflix Soundwave sans tapes.  Question is when, not if.

Thanks for the info @mikeszekely.

[mikeszekely]

Kingdom Rodimus is just $57 as part of Amazon's Cyber Monday deals.

[Scyla]

On 11/28/2021 at 7:16 PM, M'Kyuun said:

Both of those designs scream Gundam to me more than Transformers, especially that top pic.  Cool for those who dig this approach, but it's just not for me.

For those who ordered MP Skids, here's an early look at what we're getting with this fig.  I'm liking it, as it harkens back to the earlier MP days when toon 'accuracy' wasn't the end all-be-all of the bot design. He doesn't have the same level of uber-articulation of the more recent releases, but there's still plenty, and I'm looking forward to getting him in hand. I hope they continue to make more MP figs in this vein, as it hits the sweet spot for me aesthetically.

 

I can’t argue that Rodimus shares some design characteristics with Gundams especially in the Don Figueroa mode with the wide shoulders. However I stylized doesn’t automatically mean Gundam. For example he is missing the slim, well defined legs of a Gundam and the hip skirts. He is also not colored white.

As for Skids it seems they continued with where they left off with the Datsuns. I like that, compared to the Datsun mold his legs aren’t hollow and the joint in the thighs. However it’s been 8 years since MP Prowl so he also feels a bit like an anachronism since the design has evolved since then.

[tekering]

2 hours ago, Scyla said:

stylized doesn’t automatically mean Gundam. For example he is missing the slim, well defined legs of a Gundam and the hip skirts. He is also not colored white.

M'Kyuun was referencing the Gundam franchise (hence the italics) in terms of overall design aesthetic, recognizing elements in Figueroa's design common to several Mobile Suits -- particularly from the later U.C. era -- and wasn't referring to Gundam types in particular.

13 hours ago, M'Kyuun said:

For those who ordered MP Skids, here's an early look at what we're getting with this fig.  I'm liking it, as it harkens back to the earlier MP days when toon 'accuracy' wasn't the end all-be-all of the bot design.

And thank Primus for it!  The shoulders, in particular, harken back to the original G1 toy design...

...not Floro Dery's lame animation model (clearly based on a mistransformed toy).

[pengbuzz]

On 11/26/2021 at 10:26 AM, mikeszekely said:

Still waiting for some Reprolabels for the G1 toy before I decide how much more I want to sticker up the Gen Selects, but...

I painted the outer red rectangle on Galvatron's belt buckle, then used some of the red stickers that came with him and the yellow sticker that came with the Reprolabels for Kingdom Galvatron to do his belt.  I painted his eyes yellow  That all came out pretty well, but I had a bit less luck painting his crest.  For one, the gray is actually a bit too light.  For two, I suspect that purple plastic might be the unpaintable kind, as the paint I used (a Rustoleum paint + primer spray I picked up at my local hardware store, since there aren't any local hobby stores) didn't stick well.  I wound up doing three coats, plus I sprayed a little puddle that I dipped a brush in to do some touch up, and there's still hints of purple peaking through at some of the edges and places where the paint pooled a bit too thick as it was drying.  At a casual glance, though, I prefer it to the original purple.  I used stickers that came with the figure to put the red over the top of his chest.  Note that stickers are for the bottom of the indented area, around the indented area, and the two triangular edges, but not the walls of the indented area.  I thought that looked kind of bad, so I cut the border out from the sheet and used it to fill in the walls.  I thought about using alcohol or something to try to remove the tampoed insignia from his chest and then putting a Reprolabel badge on top of the red, but with the shape of his chest I decided that it wouldn't look right and left it alone.  Lastly, I used mirror-esque Reprolables on his abs, on the purple collar, and over the pearlescent paint in cannon mode to better mimic the original toy's chrome.  Oh, and I gave him a Nonnef rifle.  Like I said, I'll  probably do a bit more stickering once I have repros for the original toy to better compare with, but for now I'm a lot happier with how GS Galvatron looks.

I gave up on Reprolabels stickers after the cost of them threatened to sink my collection! Instead, I found that by printing them in Photoshop onto clear decal paper, then clearcoating them and applying them to HVAC aluminum tape with Microsol and one more clearcoat, I got a pretty good result!

 

[sh9000]

 

 

 

[M'Kyuun]

8 hours ago, tekering said:

M'Kyuun was referencing the Gundam franchise (hence the italics) in terms of overall design aesthetic, recognizing elements in Figueroa's design common to several Mobile Suits -- particularly from the later U.C. era -- and wasn't referring to Gundam types in particular.

Thank you very much, Sir!  Not that I'm a fan of over-man-splaining things, but sometimes clarity is necessary.😉

8 hours ago, tekering said:

And thank Primus for it!  The shoulders, in particular, harken back to the original G1 toy design...

...not Floro Dery's lame animation model (clearly based on a mistransformed toy).

We're on the same wavelength.  I can't wrap my head around a preference for that oversimplified toon art over even the G1 toy- just look at all that detail and character on that toy! TBF, for the MP version, Takara could have borrowed more detail from the G1 toy's legs, as I like the black shapes in the shins better, the silver or chrome thighs, and more of the sticker detail, especially the red buttons at the knees, and some color in the side vents on the lower legs. The MP's legs are entirely too monochromatic, but overall, I'm digging the fig. If I truly had my druthers, MP Skids would have the windows in the shins with underlying bot bits like in the G1 box art:

Can't express enough how much I LOVE the windows-with-visible-bot-bit details on a number of G1 toys' designs and box art. I really wish Takara had used this as inspiration or made the shin bits removable and included a set that look like this that could be swapped in as extras.  Be a nice kit for someone like Dr. Wu, or Perfect Effect to try.

[mikeszekely]

For the most part, I think I like the look of Takara's Skids.  Just not enough (or think he's an important enough character) to bother replacing the XTB version.

[Scyla]

10 hours ago, tekering said:

M'Kyuun was referencing the Gundam franchise (hence the italics) in terms of overall design aesthetic, recognizing elements in Figueroa's design common to several Mobile Suits -- particularly from the later U.C. era -- and wasn't referring to Gundam types in particular.

*snip*

Would you mind elaborating that point in more detail since I want to know more about Japanese mecha design.
I’m a layman with regards to the Gundam franchise but I always found it curious when someone compares other mecha designs to it; it seems to be the default one to compare it to. 🙂

When you say the whole Gundam franchise isn’t that too broad of a spectrum to evaluate Rodimus‘ design? Zeon suits follow a different language than the „hero“ units and given the longevity of the franchise the designers iterated through a lot of designs sometimes refining it, sometimes reinventing it but still keeping core design elements in place. 

So to what are we comparing the K3 design to?

[edit:] Looking at the concept art I don’t know if I see more or less Gundam in it. 😅

Edited November 30, 2021 by Scyla

[mikeszekely]

To me, speaking solely of the K3, the large forehead crest is reminiscent of a number of mobile suits.  I'm reminded of the Tallgeese III.  The forearm weapons recall to me the Blitz Gundam, and the shape of the front of the foot is very Gundam-esque.  Even the forearm pipes on the unarmored version is less Milne and more Full Armor Gundam with three narrower barrels instead of two.

That said, Gundam was hugely influential on the real robot genre in Japan, to the point where saying something looks like Gundam is practically shorthand for "looks influenced by Japanese mechanical design."  And, as you've noted, within the Gundam franchise different mobile suits can have wildly different designs, from the basic RX-78 to the mono-eyed Zeon suits to the dragon-esque Vagans to... well...

As far as the originals go... I'm honestly not sure what Milne was going for.  It's got shades of G1 Hot Rod with shades of Don Figueroa's.  Figueroa seemed to be at least somewhat influenced by the Bayverse films, drawing far more seems and moving parts and giving the underlying robot more organic designs.

7 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

I gave up on Reprolabels stickers after the cost of them threatened to sink my collection! Instead, I found that by printing them in Photoshop onto clear decal paper, then clearcoating them and applying them to HVAC aluminum tape with Microsol and one more clearcoat, I got a pretty good result!

 

I don't buy nearly as many Reprolabels as I used to, because yeah, they got expensive.  And a lot of the price seems to be their pathological need to sticker every flat surface they can instead of just providing the handful of missing details you really wanted.  I mean, I bought that Galvatron set, I used stickers from it on both the Kingdom AND the Gen Selects, and I still probably used less than a tenth of what they included.

That said, I ordered the Galvatron stickers with their set for SS86 Jazz, and Jazz's set was totally worth it.

But... isn't Photoshop a lot more than the occasional Reprolabel set?  I consider myself to be fairly tech savvy, but I never got too much into image editing.

[tekering]

16 hours ago, Scyla said:

So to what are we comparing the K3 design to?

The most immediately obvious elements are the elbow and knee joint covers, which have been Gundam staples for four decades now...

...both with the GM/Gundam designs and all the Zaku variants...

16 hours ago, Scyla said:

Looking at the concept art I don’t know if I see more or less Gundam in it. 😅

Less, I'd say... unless you consider outliers like the Testament Gundam.

[Mechapilot77]

i have probably said it before and while its probably good for the Tranformers franchise, i personally think FLAME toys desings try too hard to be "i'm a cool mecha!!".  its just not very "TF".  i don't like most of them as TF characters.

as far as that don Figuera concept art.  its legs looks just like one of his other designs  basically....

 

oh and yeah takara MP skids looks great!  i do hope somebody makes a nice sticker set for even more toy details though.  the XTB one is good too but more in line with the toon uber alles aesthetic although there is enough there to make it still look way better than some of the uber toon takara designs in recent years.  also wish he came with a toy head or that somebody will make one.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Mechapilot77

[mikeszekely]

Been awhile since I hit the Cyberverse well, but I hear they're doing more Dinobots now?  I'm not in for all the various classes so maybe I'll never have a complete set of Cyberverse Dinobots, but I'm in for any Deluxes.  Unfortunately I haven't seen any, but I did find a Deluxe-class Cheetor.

My gut reaction is that I dig Cyberverse Cheetor's beefier proportions.  I also like how his wings are closer to the original Cheetor's than the Kingdom version.  Not exactly loving the popped collar, though it seems to be Cyberverse-accurate.  He's missing a lot of detail, like most Cyberverse figures, though.  There's no blue on his hands, biceps, shoulders, or wings, and the black stripes on his forearms are molded but not painted.  The blue on his shins should come all the way down to his ankle guards, with yellow spikes sticking up through the blue, and the blue on his pelvis should be the whole pelvis, not just a splash of blue on his crotch.  You can see that they kind of molded a tail belt around his waist, but his actual tail is still hanging from his back.

Speaking of backs, it's not the cleanest.  His calves are super hollow, and there's really no engineering reason for it.

He comes with a lot of accessories, though.  I'm not sure how much of this is cartoon accurate, as I only ever watched the first season of Cyberverse, but you get a pair of scimitars in green translucent plastic with some yellow paint, a saber-tooth cat helmet, again green translucent plastic with yellow paint, and some translucent green claws with blue paint.

Cheetor's head is on a ball joint with some up/down/sideways tilt in addition to swiveling, although the collar makes his head a little tricky to manipulate.  His shoulders are ball joints for rotation and about 90 degrees of lateral motion.  His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees.  His wrists are actually ball joints, and they can swivel and bend inward.  His waist swivels.  His hips are ball joints that go over 90 degrees forward, a little less than 90 backward do to some kibble, and about 60 degrees of lateral spread.  His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees.  His feet have some up/down tilt, as well as 45 degrees of ankle pivot.

He can hold his scimitars with no problems by sliding the handles into his 5mm fists.  But all of his accessories can be used in bot mode; the cat head can tab into either forearm (facing toward his elbow) as a shield, and the claws can tab into his shoulders like armor.  Note that having the claws on his shoulders does limit their range of articulation a bit, as the claws get caught up in his wings.  The claws can't attach to his forearms, sadly.  The tab they have is too small for the slots on his arm.

When I first grabbed Cheetor I wondered if he might be a retool of Thunderhowl; they both go from robots with animal heads on their chests to animals, after all.  But no.  I mean, both their legs have a joint in the shin that helps their robot legs become their rear legs, but that's about it.  Cheetor doesn't have any of the gimmicks where Thunderhowl's body folds in on itself.  Instead, his robot arms fold up and go into the void left by his cat head on his chest, and his wings fold over and bring his cat legs with it.

The resulting cat is... not the best.  I mean, it's kind of messy.  His jaws open, but he has no other head articulation.  The cat shoulders are on ball joints for rotation but they have limited lateral movement.  The cat elbows can bend, but there's no bicep swivel or any kind of paw articulation.  His rear legs, at least, retain the articulation they had in robot mode, plus the extra bend mid-robo-shin.  His tail has a hinge for up/down movement at the base, but that's it.

As with robot mode, he can use all his accessories in cat mode.  This time, the cat helmet is obvious as it clips just under his ears around his head, and the claws fit onto tabs that allow them to cover his front paws.  The scimitars are a bit more interesting.  They have little pegs on their hilts.  These pegs fit into small peg holes on the inside of the robot shoulders, and the result is that they look like wings.

Cheetor is kind of par for the Cyberverse course... needlessly hollow spots, a lack of paint decos that reduces the overall accuracy of the figure, and ball joints in a lot of places I'd rather have universals, and the end result is a figure that feels cheap compared to the Deluxes in the War for Cybertron line.  There's no build-a-figure anymore, but if I had to guess a lot of the budget on this guy still went to accessories.  I'm not sure how much of his accessories are from the show, but I'd have traded the claws and helmet for more paint, personally.  That said, he's not the worst figure in the line, and as long as you know you're getting Cyberverse and not WfC he's a decently fun little toy that's worth picking up IF AND ONLY IF you're into Cyberverse.

[M'Kyuun]

 

1 hour ago, mikeszekely said:

Been awhile since I hit the Cyberverse well, but I hear they're doing more Dinobots now?  I'm not in for all the various classes so maybe I'll never have a complete set of Cyberverse Dinobots, but I'm in for any Deluxes.  Unfortunately I haven't seen any, but I did find a Deluxe-class Cheetor.

My gut reaction is that I dig Cyberverse Cheetor's beefier proportions.  I also like how his wings are closer to the original Cheetor's than the Kingdom version.  Not exactly loving the popped collar, though it seems to be Cyberverse-accurate.  He's missing a lot of detail, like most Cyberverse figures, though.  There's no blue on his hands, biceps, shoulders, or wings, and the black stripes on his forearms are molded but not painted.  The blue on his shins should come all the way down to his ankle guards, with yellow spikes sticking up through the blue, and the blue on his pelvis should be the whole pelvis, not just a splash of blue on his crotch.  You can see that they kind of molded a tail belt around his waist, but his actual tail is still hanging from his back.

Speaking of backs, it's not the cleanest.  His calves are super hollow, and there's really no engineering reason for it.

He comes with a lot of accessories, though.  I'm not sure how much of this is cartoon accurate, as I only ever watched the first season of Cyberverse, but you get a pair of scimitars in green translucent plastic with some yellow paint, a saber-tooth cat helmet, again green translucent plastic with yellow paint, and some translucent green claws with blue paint.

Cheetor's head is on a ball joint with some up/down/sideways tilt in addition to swiveling, although the collar makes his head a little tricky to manipulate.  His shoulders are ball joints for rotation and about 90 degrees of lateral motion.  His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees.  His wrists are actually ball joints, and they can swivel and bend inward.  His waist swivels.  His hips are ball joints that go over 90 degrees forward, a little less than 90 backward do to some kibble, and about 60 degrees of lateral spread.  His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees.  His feet have some up/down tilt, as well as 45 degrees of ankle pivot.

He can hold his scimitars with no problems by sliding the handles into his 5mm fists.  But all of his accessories can be used in bot mode; the cat head can tab into either forearm (facing toward his elbow) as a shield, and the claws can tab into his shoulders like armor.  Note that having the claws on his shoulders does limit their range of articulation a bit, as the claws get caught up in his wings.  The claws can't attach to his forearms, sadly.  The tab they have is too small for the slots on his arm.

When I first grabbed Cheetor I wondered if he might be a retool of Thunderhowl; they both go from robots with animal heads on their chests to animals, after all.  But no.  I mean, both their legs have a joint in the shin that helps their robot legs become their rear legs, but that's about it.  Cheetor doesn't have any of the gimmicks where Thunderhowl's body folds in on itself.  Instead, his robot arms fold up and go into the void left by his cat head on his chest, and his wings fold over and bring his cat legs with it.

The resulting cat is... not the best.  I mean, it's kind of messy.  His jaws open, but he has no other head articulation.  The cat shoulders are on ball joints for rotation but they have limited lateral movement.  The cat elbows can bend, but there's no bicep swivel or any kind of paw articulation.  His rear legs, at least, retain the articulation they had in robot mode, plus the extra bend mid-robo-shin.  His tail has a hinge for up/down movement at the base, but that's it.

As with robot mode, he can use all his accessories in cat mode.  This time, the cat helmet is obvious as it clips just under his ears around his head, and the claws fit onto tabs that allow them to cover his front paws.  The scimitars are a bit more interesting.  They have little pegs on their hilts.  These pegs fit into small peg holes on the inside of the robot shoulders, and the result is that they look like wings.

Cheetor is kind of par for the Cyberverse course... needlessly hollow spots, a lack of paint decos that reduces the overall accuracy of the figure, and ball joints in a lot of places I'd rather have universals, and the end result is a figure that feels cheap compared to the Deluxes in the War for Cybertron line.  There's no build-a-figure anymore, but if I had to guess a lot of the budget on this guy still went to accessories.  I'm not sure how much of his accessories are from the show, but I'd have traded the claws and helmet for more paint, personally.  That said, he's not the worst figure in the line, and as long as you know you're getting Cyberverse and not WfC he's a decently fun little toy that's worth picking up IF AND ONLY IF you're into Cyberverse.

I dig the proportions and the stylish takes on a number of the Cyberverse figs; Cheetor and Thunderhowl are no exceptions- both look good to me. Alas, I'm cramped for space even for the Generations stuff; I need more shelves, but somehow never seem motivated enough to buy the stuff and hang them.  Too, I don't have an expansive collection of the Cyberverse toys, and at this point, I'm happy enjoying them vicariously through reviews and the like. To that end, thanks for the review, Mike.

It's a shame that Hasbro takes an even cheaper approach to these guys than the main line stuff, which itself manifests the sure signs of budgetary restraint. There's certainly potential for these to be better. The difference is really apparent when I look at my small TF: Prime Robots in Disguise collection, of which Cyberverse is the spiritual successor, sharing a similar aesthetic and aimed at a younger audience. But the difference in the toys is notable, with the RID being remarkably superior in quality. 

 

[mikeszekely]

2 hours ago, M'Kyuun said:

Alas, I'm cramped for space even for the Generations stuff; I need more shelves, but somehow never seem motivated enough to buy the stuff and hang them.

I feel you.  Honestly, a lot of this stuff gets reviewed and then goes into storage.  Right now all my Titans are under the bed in the guest room, and most of the WfC stuff is either in boxes in my closet or on my desk.

3 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

you get a pair of scimitars

Just a suggestion, if you're reading this, Hasbro- Transformers Collaborative x D&D.  Take one of the recent cats, maybe Tigatron.  Heavily retool the robot bits.  Make a Drizzt Do'Urden that transforms into Guenhwyvar.  Bonus- Hasbro already owns Wizards (and therefore D&D).

[mikeszekely]

Some stuff came in this week, so I've got a big Repaint Roundup for you guys.

First up, we have Transformers Collaborative Dracula X Transformers Draculus.  He's a retool of Titans Return Mindwipe, which, frankly, wasn't that great of a toy to begin with.  He's got new forearms (and Studio Series Scourge/Sweep hands), a new front half of his torso, a new collar area, and a new head.  The remolded parts actually look kind of good, and definitely convey a sort of "what if Dracula was a robot complete with a body shaped like a tuxedo?" vibe.

Draculus comes with the same gun and claw/shield that Mindwipe came with, in black with some red paint.  But, I can't say I really see even mecha-Dracula running around with a gun.  New for Draculus is a cloth-goods cape.  There's holes in it that fit over the wings on his back, and a small hole that wraps around a peg on the back of his collar.  I think you can get some better Dracula-type poses if you ignore his weapons and just put the cape on him.  Articulation is the same as Mindwipe, which means he's missing modern amenities like ankle pivots and wrist swivels.  His joints, especially his feet, are pretty loose.  To be fair, this is a problem that goes all the way back to TR Mindwipe.

What you don't get is a Titan Master, which is a huge missed opportunity if you ask me.  Why not have a little Dracula Titan Master that turns into Draculus' head?

Worse, as you can see, it means that Draculus' collar flips around and his head stays attached in bat mode, just stuffing his face up his bat butthole.  A peg hole under the collar replaces the one on Mindwipe's chest, so you can still attach his combined weapon like a sort of tail.  And if I'm being honest, I think the black and red looks a bit nicer than the purple and browns on Mindwipe.

In addition to the slits for his little robot wings, there's slits near the edges of the cape, too, for his bat-mode wing tips to poke through.  So, Draculus can wear his cap in bat mode, too, and it does help cover up his robot head.  But the bat chest still opens!  It looks like they added some structural plastic inside, so a Titan Master wouldn't fit anymore, but still!  Missed opportunity, I tell you.

So, I don't know what they were thinking with this one.  The other Collaboratives have made at least some sense; take an iconic vehicle from some '80s/'90s franchise and use that nostalgia to sell it as a Transformer.  Tyrannocon gets a pass because she did come with a vehicle, and because Beast Wars Megatron was a pretty notable T-Rex to borrow a mold from.  But are even the oldest TF fans among us really this nostalgic for the 1931 version of Dracula?  And like I said, Mindwipe was one of the worse Titans Return figures and well below the modern WfC standards.  Draculus retains too many problems with the mold like loose joints and limited articulation, and loses the Titan Master gimmick on the one Collaborative figure where I think I'd appreciate it.  I'm going to suggest passing on it.

Originally listed for March, I'm a bit surprised to see some of the Golden Disk collection hitting now (but, of course, not the one with Terrorsaur that we really want).  First we have Jackpot, a retool of SS86 Jazz.  So... on the one hand, if you're going to make a modern toy of Jackpot Jazz is probably the figure to start with.  While G1 Jackpot was an Action Master, he was molded with elements that suggested a car for a vehicle mode including wheels on his shoulders and ankles and a prominent car front end for a chest.  And GD Jackpot's certainly got the car chest, although it'd have been nice if they'd remolded his shoulders to have the wheels.  GD's forearms, which are 100% Jazz's, are shaped a bit differently than G1 Jackpot's which were like a slimmer yellow arm with some black armor just on the outside.  GD Jackpot also has big yellow fenders on the outsides of his legs where the G1 toy was simply black with molded wheels.  I might have preferred they left the fenders black.  Otherwise, Hasbro did a good job getting the yellows, blacks, and oranges in the right spots and they did provide a remolded head that accurately portrays the G1 version (if a little on the smallish side to fit through the space in Jazz's chest).  The head is the only remolded part.

So, G1 Jackpot came with a little blue gun and a bird buddy named Sights.  The bird and gun could combine into something like a sniper rifle.  GD Jackpot also comes with a little blue gun, although it's just the same one that came with SS86 Jazz, and a pterodactyl buddy named Sights.  Sights is actually a recolor of the Siege Battlemaster Pteraxadon, but the colors do allow him to pass reasonably well for G1 Sights.  You also get the blast effect that originally came with Pteraxadon.

Being a retool of Pteraxadon, Sights turns into an axe, and you can use the blast effect with his axe mode.  However, their is a peg on the underside of Sights' head, and his tail/handle is molded with a little nib on the end so that it's compatible with WfC blast effects, so you can turn Sights into his gun mode.  It's just a shame they didn't give him a new gun or at least add a hole to the back of Jazz's so that you could combine Sights and the gun.

Jackpot turns into the same Porsche as Jazz.  Without the G1 toy having a proper alt mode to compare it too, I guess it's fine.  I think I could have done without the yellow, but YMMV.  Since the only remolded part on Sights is his head he just has the single 5mm port on his roof.  That means you can plug in his gun, or you can plug in Sights, but not both.

I wonder if someone at Hasbro is an Action Master fan?  I mean, we had Krok in Titans Return, Lionizer (who was Rad's weapon buddy) in Siege, Mainframe not long ago with the Ark, and now Jackpot.  And if I'm being totally fair, Jazz was a pretty good choice of molds to make Jackpot out of, and Pteraxadon makes a surprisingly good Sights.  Still, if Hasbro wanted to sell a repaint of Jazz with a bundled Action Master, one can't help but wonder why they didn't go for the more obvious and, dare I say, more desirable Ricochet/Stepper?  I mean, SS86 Jazz was already a good figure, and Pteraxadon was one of the better Battle Masters, so Jackpot and Sights aren't bad, just obscure.  So I'd say get it if you're into Action Masters, but you're not missing much if you pass, whereas if they'd been Ricochet and his Target Master buddy I'd have probably recommended them outright.

Arriving in the same shipment as Jackpot was the two-pack of Road Ranger and Puffer.  Road Ranger's kind of an interesting character; he's actually meant to be the Gobot Road Ranger, who (like Bug Bite) crossed from the Gobot's universe into the Transformers universe.  This fiction was created for a set of e-Hobby-exclusive repaints of some G1 minibots, where Road Ranger was an orange and black repaint of Huffer (despite the original Gobot being colored more like Optimus Prime, whom I indeed pretended he was since I was too poor to have a G1 Optimus back in the day), and that's basically what Golden Disk Road Ranger is, too.  Aside from color, the only real difference is his head sculpt, which (like e-Hobby Road Ranger) is basically Huffer's G1 toy head.

Puffer's a bit weirder.  While most of the world got the regular Pipes toy in G1, some parts of Europe instead got a "Pipes" toy that was actually a blue-and-white repaint of Huffer instead.  Collectors started calling the variant "Puffer", a combination of Pipes and Huffer.  I think this is the first new toy based of that variant, and Hasbro is running with the notion  of a Pipes/Huffer combination by giving him a biography that has "quantum surge" create a "time vortex" that fuses Huffer and Pipes together.  Despite the Puffer variant being a repaint of Huffer, GD Puffer appears to be a repaint of Kingdom Pipes.  I say "appears" because, ironically, Puffer seems to have beaten Pipes to retail.  So, the lighter blue and white torso & head do indeed give him the colors of that old Puffer variant, but this time to the toy is based on the one it was supposed to be the first time.

Fun fact, for those of you that didn't know, while G1 Pipes definitely shared some elements of G1 Huffer they were actually fairly different.  Huffer's chest was the bottom of the truck, but Pipe's back was the bottom, Pipes had different arms, and the way the truck cab folded meant the front was pointing up on Huffer but backwards on Pipes.  Puffer/Pipes seems to borrow a bit more from Kingdom Huffer, but there are some changes.  The new head, chest, and pelvis are the most immediate differences between them, while the legs and back are mostly the same.  Puffer/Pipes actually have new arms, without the molding around the wrists, on the outside of the biceps, or on top of the shoulders.  The cab is the same cab, but there's an added swivel on the hinges to attach it to his back so you can spin it 180 degrees.  For Pipes you'd probably want it jutting straight off his back, but I like to collapse it down like this for Puffer to give him a little identity of his own.

Road Ranger comes with the same gun and shield that Huffer did.  I think the difference here for me is that I didn't feel that the shield felt out of place on Huffer, but on Road Ranger it becomes something that helps him be more than just a Huffer repaint.  Puffer comes with a pair of black pipes, pipes I believe Kingdom Pipes comes with.  The instructions suggest putting the pipes onto his arms, something you'd do for actual Pipes to achieve cartoon accuracy, but you can certainly plug them into fists instead, which I prefer doing for again to give him a bit of his own identity.

They both turn into trucks, and aside from rotating Puffer's cab around it's the same process as Huffer.  While I strongly prefer to leave Huffer's shield in a box somewhere and just plug is rifle into the hitch or roof, I actually like using the shield and gun to make the dump truck-style bed for Road Ranger.  It's variety.  As for Puffer, the instructions suggest plugging his pipes onto his hitch.  Fine for Puffer, I guess, but when they were remolding the arms for this mold it feels like they missed a trick by not relocating the 5mm ports on his shoulders so the pipes could still be smokestacks for the truck mode.  Then again, I suppose that there are people out there that would have preferred they go the toy route when remolding Huffer and actually made the pipes his forearms.

I liked Huffer, and I like the colors of these repaints, but as is the case with Jackpot they're kind of obscure, very non-essential characters.  If you think you'd like them get them, you'll probably be happy with them, but you're not missing anything if you pass (although I'm kind of hoping for a Legacy-class Gears that they can repaint into Small Foot, and a Treds repaint of Warpath.  It's probably too late for Bad Boy and Pathfinder repaints of the old Legends-class Powerglide and Cosmos, though.

[mikeszekely]

Heads up, some new Bumblebee movie Studio Series figures went up for preorder on Pulse- Voyager Soundwave, and Deluxes Brawn, Wheeljack, and Ratchet.

[sh9000]

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-deluxe-class-brawn-action-figure-pre-order

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-deluxe-class-ratchet-action-figure-pre-order

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-deluxe-class-wheeljack-action-figure-pre-order

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-voyager-class-soundwave-action-figure-pre-order

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-core-class-ravage-action-figure-pre-order

https://dorksidetoys.com/collections/new-pre-orders/products/transformers-studio-series-bumblebee-movie-core-class-shockwave-action-figure-pre-order

I might get Soundwave.

[M'Kyuun]

19 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

Heads up, some new Bumblebee movie Studio Series figures went up for preorder on Pulse- Voyager Soundwave, and Deluxes Brawn, Wheeljack, and Ratchet.

I appreciate the heads up. I haven't checked in since early yesterday, and figured at this point they were all sold out, but happily, no. Got Brawn, Wheeljack, and Ratchet. Just not feeling the 'what-is-it?' alt mode for Soundwave. I watched a Soundwave review, and I think Has/Tak did a great job with the bot mode- love all the details and the paint work looks good. But that alt mode is beyond abstract; it's just Soundwave in a rather uncomfortable yoga pose, and really is unrelatable to anything. Sad pass.  I daresay, Ravage fared even worse for his alt mode, which looks like a crushed car.  Two of my favorite characters, and unfortunately the poor alts turn me off to these toys completely.

Having these figs available on Pulse just grates for the omission of Blaster, who I haven't POed anywhere in my hopes that I'll come across it at retail once it's out. I just don't feel like paying the markup or shipping that comes with going through one of the regular e-tailers. I hope Pulse will carry it then, but chances are he'll sell out quickly and I'll likely miss it. Man, I miss the days when shelves and pegs were full and getting the toy you want was just a matter of going to the store. Sigh.