mikeszekely

Super Mario Galaxy and Galaxy 2 hit for the Switch/Switch 2 tomorrow. Anyone hear if the Switch version of Galaxy is different/better enough to warrant purchasing the whole collection if I already have the 3D All Stars collection? Or should I save some cash and just get Galaxy 2?

I'm not going to judge the MPG line based on a repaint of a decade-plus old MP... I mean, with the old MP line dead where else does it go? And with SS86 and Missing Link Soundwaves hitting in 2026 I don't blame Takara packing Soundwave into every line while he's fresh on people's minds. I will, however, judge MPG based on their original molds. Granted, so far the only one I've picked up was Super Ginrai, and he was rather underwhelming. He was, in my opinion, a premium price for a toy that could have been in Generations if they dumped some of the accessories and chrome, and he suffered from a number of tolerance issues (the Super head liked to pop loose, the truck panels on the legs wouldn't stay tabbed in, too much wiggle in between ratchet clicks, etc). But these days you haven't really Ginrai-ed until you God Ginrai, so now I also picked up MPG Godbomber. My first impressions aren't too bad. He's a lighter figure, but you kind of expect that on a figure with a largely hollow torso who breaks down into components that have to be supported by another toy's joints. His joint tolerances seem better, too, and whether that's actually from Takara paying more attention and tightening him up or simply because the joints don't have to work as hard to support the weight, who can say. The colors are pretty on-point (his pelvis could maybe stand to be a little darker). Cartoon accuracy does seem to be a little less pressing in MPG than the original MP line, though. His proportions are definitely a bit more heroic, with more of a tapered waist, higher wings, and massive forearms that put the fins closer to his shoulders than his elbows. But perhaps the oddest choice is how is shoulder cannon sits. There's a black part with a 5mm port attached to the top of his torso. The instructions would have you fold it back, then the 5mm peg on the cannon is on an elaborate hinge system to angle the peg so it's pointing forward, allowing it to plug into the black piece. There's even a support piece that folds out from the front of the cannon to help brace it. But the thing is, there's a 5mm port on to the top of his back you could use without all the extra hinges on the cannon or the black part on his torso. I guess that segues into accessories. Well, you've got the aforementioned cannon, which is the only thing I think Godbomber really needs. The missile can be removed, but it's not spring-loaded or anything. Takara also gives you some more of the blast effect parts that came with Super Ginrai, little unarticulated slugs for the Headmaster Juniors, a trailer adapter, two stand adapters, and a big ol' sword because of that one time in that one episode. At first I thought Godbomber's head might be a ball joint, because he can't look down much but he's got fantastic upward tilt and good sideways tilt in addition to swiveling, but closer inspection reveals a rivet swivel and separate hinges for sideways and upward tilt. His shoulders swivel on a ratchet and they ratchet nearly 90 degrees laterally; make sure you're using the actual shoulder joint and not the transformation joint. He's also got some butterfly hinges that bring his shoulders foreward 90 degrees. He's got bicep swivels above his elbows, which bend just under 90 degrees, then another swivel below the elbow. His wrists swivel, and his hands can bend backward. His thumbs have a hinge at the base for pinching. His other fingers are pinned at the base and mid-knuckle, with the index fingers being separate from the other fingers. His waist can swivel 45 degrees to the left or right, but that's good enough for most poses. His hip skirts move so his hips can ratchet about 90 degrees forward, just under 90 degrees laterally, and about 45 degrees backward. His thighs swivel, and his knees ratchet a little more than 90 degrees. No toe tilts, but his ankles pivot nearly 90 degrees on ratchets. If you mount his shoulder cannon the official way, it can tilt down a bit or back so that it's straight up in the air, though you'll likely need to fold the support back in and you'll expose another handle if you bend it back too far. If you just plugged it into the port on his back it can't tilt down, but it can still tilt up about 45 degrees. The blast effects can plug into the guns on his forearms, as well as the blue details on the left side of his chest. Godbomber can also hold the sword by plugging a tab on the handle into a slot on fingers. His hands are too small to really close around the handle, though. The transformation for Godbomber's not bad! They didn't totally try to avoid partsforming like the Legends toy (which left it with needlessly complicated hinges to move the chest without disconnecting it, but they also didn't design him to totally come apart then get pieced back together like the G1 toy. Instead, the front of his torso splits from the back half, taking his arms, head, and wings with it. The crotch opens, allowing his hips to slide forward, then his legs come up and over his crotch and tab together. Some flaps fold out of his back, and the unpainted, unchromed gray bits fold and tuck down so that tabs on them are pointing toward what will become the back of the vehicle. Meanwhile, on the other part, the head folds in, the wings move out of the way, and the shoulders drop. Things need to turn so that inside of the shoulder joint is now facing outside and the arms can swing and tab together. Joints in the wings tuck into the spaces his shoulder joints were occupying, then they fold upward. This bit uses some tabs to plug into his shins on the other part, then panels swing out from the sides of his legs to fill in the sides of the vehicle, tabbing into his bumper and the unpainted gray flaps. The fins on the arms can tilt inward, giving you the clearance to plug the cannon into the black part. For this mode, the cannon's peg is folded up so it goes straight down into the black part, but it seems like now would have been a better time to use those hinges to position the cannon so that the fins wouldn't have been in the way in the first place. Aside from having to tilt the fins in to give the cannon room, I don't have any complaints about Godbomber's alt mode. The mechanical detail on the inside of the shoulder joint is cartoon accurate, and a blue panel rotates up from the leg panels to help fill in the area around Godbomber's hands. The proportions are about what you'd expect, and the whole thing holds together pretty solidly once everything is tabbed together right. Godbomber's wings can fold down, and the boosters on them can rotate 180 degrees. This allows you to plug the effect parts into them for a flying trailer mode. Alt mode is also where most of the other accessories we haven't talked about come into play. For example, the front opens to reveal and nicely-painted interior. The Headmaster Junior slugs can sit inside, but here's where things get weird. There are little slots at the bottom of the brown-painted seats, and tabs on the bases of the Juniors. The tabs are on their front sides, so they can plug into the slots in the seats but they're facing backward. Another alt mode accessory is the trailer adapter. See, Godbomber's bumper but has a bit that flips out with a peg on the underside. But there isn't clearance under Godbomber for Ginrai's legs, so you can plug the adapter into the trailer port on Ginrai and it adds a new port behind his feet, so he can tow Godbomber. I'd expect that most people who bought Godbomber bought MPG Super Ginrai, not MP non-Super Ginrai, though. Super Ginrai's trailer already has a port that can fold out from the rear, allowing Godbomer to attach without any adapter needed. Of course, most people who bought Godbomber weren't doing it for the double trailer, they were doing it to form God Ginrai. Sadly, this is where things kind of fall apart for me. First, Godbomber needs to be disassembled, because this time he's back to totally partsforming. In fact, my first complaint is that there are actually more parts than before. See, you remember how I was just saying that Godbomber's forearms seemed to big? Well, you have to open them up, and flip around Godbomber's hands to reveal another set of slightly larger hands. Bigger forearms and bigger hands make God Ginrai's arms look a little small, so red parts are removed from inside Godbomber's waist to peg into his Ginrai's shoudlers, making them also look bigger... from some angles. From other angles now they're horribly hollow, and to add insult to injury they don't stay pegged in particularly well. The forearms don't fare much better, eschewing the Combiner Wars-style sliding connector on Godbomber for a 5mm peg into Ginrai's forearms. Which brings me to my second big complaint, one of Godbomber's forearms was misassembled. It had no bearing on Godbomber's robot or alt modes, but the flap with the peg was installed backward, so I had to take part the arm (five screws) and turn it around before I was able to connect it to Ginrai at all. Godbomber's legs side off his hips, again, Combiner Wars-style. The toe folds out, the thigh folds in, and the red detail on Godbomber's shins have to fold out, spin 180, and fold back in the reveal the connectors for Ginrai's feet. The front of Godbomber's torso splits again, so the pelvis detatches, which seems kind of unnecessary since it reattaches to the same part, just by folding the hips back, lifting the hip skirts, and plugging the skirts into Godbomber's waist. That whole contraption will fit, loosely, onto Ginrai's back, with tabs on the trailer hitch plugging into slots under Godbomber's neck to help secure it into place. Finally, Godbomber's back and butt slide over Ginrai's cab and tab into two places on each side... IF you have Ginrai's cab seated exactly right. If it's off even a little Godbomber won't fit over properly and can't tab into place. Aside from the new fists (which are articulated exactly the same as the smaller Godbomber fists), all of God Ginrai's joints are the same as his Super Ginrai ones and he has the same articulation as before. The cannon plugs into ports where the top sides of the trailer folded up onto his back, using the same folded-in configuration as Godbomber's alt mode. You can also fold out a handle from the cannon and have God Ginrai hold it in his hands using a slots that plug into the fingers, just like the sword (which, despite being held in larger hands, is still too big to really close the fingers around). And he does look pretty good... assuming you can keep him together. Again, I had the head popping up from the cab, the shoulder armor popping off, and the truck panels not staying folded against his legs. Plus, there are joints that extend Ginrai's shoulders to outward a bit for God Ginrai mode that help make him look proportional with all the extra kibble, but using those joints made his shoulders kind of droopy. On it's own, I kind of like MPG Godbomber. I think it's one of the better Godbomber toys around, with decent articulation and all-around solid robot and alt modes. But again, most people want Godbomer to complete God Ginrai. Putting together God Ginrai was frustrating, and keeping him together is nearly as frustrating. To be fair, a lot of the issues are still issues with Super Ginrai; poor tolerances, and the need to have little Ginrai's knees bend just right to line up his legs just so to seat him properly in Super mode. But some of it is still on Godbomber. He commands a premium price because he comes with accessories I don't actually want or need, plus a few things like the hinges in his cannon mount and the fact that you have to open is over-sized forearms to fold in his hands and fold out slightly larger hands when one pair of hands for both Godbomber and God Ginrai would have sufficed are over-engineered in ways that do nothing except inflate the parts count and price. I think, if for some reason Godbomber is like your favorite character and you really want a good toy of him and don't care about Ginrai or combinations, then yeah, MPG Godbomber is probably the best Godbomber toy ever released. Go pick one up! But I don't otherwise recommend him... as an accessory for Ginrai he's just ok, but the real issue is that Super Ginrai isn't good enough to recommend in the first place. Which, I suppose, is a really long-winded way of saying I agree with @lechuck— MPG does feel subpar.

Well, I picked up Missing Link Sunstreaker... Unlike Bee and Optimus I never owed a G1 Sunstreaker, so the entire mold is new to me. I was surprised to see that he's taller than Sideswipe. Being that I'm not familiar with G1 toy, I can't really say how many changes Takara actually made. I think it safe to say that he's got some paint and tampographs that were probably stickers on the G1 toy. His forearms also open to reveal some flip-out fists... I think that's new? He's also got some accessories that he original didn't have. The fists, the yellow boosters, and the three rockets came with the original toy, but ML Sunstreaker also comes with a chromed rifle that is, best I can tell, a straight copy of the one that came with G1 Sideswipe, and a Dianaut. The Dianaut has yellow legs and a khaki button shirt with a collar and pocket that makes me think they were going for something like Spike, but then why the silver head? Sunstreaker's head can swivel. His shoulders are a bit weird. The entire arm hinge can move laterally about 45 degrees, and the hinge works like a forward/backward butterfly joint. The arm behind the tire swivels laterally on a soft ratchet, which combined gives you 180 degrees of lateral movement. However, his shoulders don't swivel forward/backward at all.* His bicep swivels, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. His wrists swivel, and his fingers are hinged so he can open his hands. No waist swivel. His hips can go 90 degrees forward, and over 90 degrees laterally, but just a little bit backward. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet can tilt downward on a ratchet, due to his transformation, but not upward. He's got about 45 degrees of ankle pivot, with his heels on a separate pivot. *Technically I guess you could hinge the shoulders forward on the transformation/butterfly joint and turn the biceps. That'd make the lateral swivel a forward/backward swivel... but it'd look weird, and come at the cost of any lateral shoulder movement. Sunstreaker's new articulated hands can hold his Sideswipe rifle, and the boosters plug into his shoulders same as they ever did. If you want a more "classic" look, you can fold the new hands into the forearms to reveal a port on the other side. You can plug the rockets in them, or even the shoulder boosters, as well as the larger G1-style fists. The G1 fists didn't have holes, though, so neither do these, and cannot hold the Sideswipe rifle. I imagine that the transformation is about the same as the G1 toy. His head folds down into the engine. The feet fold down, the legs collapse and tab together. His chest opens and a bunch of hinges move his canopy down/forward and lift his engine up and into place, then a flap opens on his back and his arms kind of bend and tuck, one behind the other, underneath before closing his back flap back up. For a simple G1 transformation it seems to make a bit of finagling to get everything lined up right, especially going back to bot mode. What's not to like about Sunsteaker's design? It's a fictional supercharged Countach with massive intakes on top of the engine. Again, not really sure what's different here between this version and the original G1 toy, aside from some tampoed details (like on top of the intakes) that were probably stickers on the G1 toy, but otherwise I think it should be the same. As most of us know by now much of the original Transformers line came from Takara's Diaclone line, so if you open Sunstreaker's canopy there is a seat in there for the Dianaut he comes with. The boosters can stay in place on his shoulders, which are now on the back of the car. But that's about it for storage. No place for the rockets or the rifle, or the big fists. I can't really complain; the G1 toys rarely had storage for accessories, either. But that sort of leads into my conclusion... I'm still not sure how I feel about Missing Link. Like, yeah, I have nostalgia for the toys I grew up with. And yeah, those toys had awful articulation. I remember wanting more even at the time. But something else I remember wanting more of at the time was cartoon accuracy. And in that sense, Generations, Masterpiece, and a variety of third party lines are doing a great job of delivering cartoon-accurate toys with even more accuracy than Missing Link. In a way, all Missing Link is doing is giving me the toys I had when I was a kid in a way that's clearly NOT the toys I had as a kid, which kind of makes me want an original G1 toy or even a straight G1 reissue instead, especially when the ML figures cost nearly as dang much. Honestly, I bought Sunstreaker because I never had the original. I think if I did, I'd have probably skipped this one. I'm not sure how many more of these ML figures I'll buy.

You haven't missed anything.😒

In the words of one James Pumphrey, "Minivans are cool." When I brought my parents with us when I took my wife and daughter to Presque Isle I rented a Chrysler Pacifica and I genuinely enjoyed it. Years later wife got a Kia EV9 when her parents were staying with us, and I dunno. I think more people should consider minivans instead of 3-row SUVs. It's like the Kia is nearly as big as the Pacifica, but the Pacifica's sliding door made it easier to get in and out of, and I swear it had more cargo room to boot. If we still needed a big people mover I'd consider swapping the EV9 for an ID.Buzz, but wife's parents went back to China so it's just the three of us at home these days, and wife kind of wants to downsize. Her next car might be BMW's new iX3 or an Audi Q6 e-Tron.

I'm happy for anyone that's into these He-Man crossovers, but He-Man looks like he's wearing a kid's Optimus costume he got at Walmart.

Well, like I said, MPG-19 is Soundwave, but it's just a repaint of MP-13. But I'm hearing that MPG-20 is a brand new mold for Hot Rod, and @sh9000 already mentioned that MPG-21 is Blaster. Working back from 19, 18 is Roadhauler ( a green repaint of Inferno), 17 is Style-Gen Optimus Prime, and 16 is the black Nucleon Quest repaint of Super Ginrai, so that's all G1 or G1-adjacent. The problem is, as @Scyla noted, the old MP line evolved a bit from more realistic robots to slavishly Sunbow, but that evolution was gradual and part of a pretty consistent design language and scale. MPG is pretty much anything Takara thinks is a more high-end toy, giving it a more scattershot lineup where you have to pay attention and cherry pick what you actually want.

FYI, Hasbro decided to quit Pulsecon, and I expect the Pulsecon exclusives like Armada Nemesis Prime will turn up here.

If SS86 Soundwave isn't for you, Takara announced MPG-19 will also be Soundwave. Before you guys get too excited, though, it looks like a repaint of MP-13. EDIT: If SS86 and MPG-19 aren't enough Soundwave for you, I'm also hearing that Missing Link Soundwave is coming next year as well.

Me: I love a good "white Optimus" Ultra Magnus... too bad the only one Hasbro gave us is the one that makes up the core of Earthrise Ultra Magnus. And at least that was Earthrise... I don't think we've had a Nemesis Prime since Siege! Hasbro: Ok... we'll repaint that toy-style Deluxe Optimus as Magnus, and we'll pack him with a Nemesis repaint of Animated Optimus. As a Target exclusive with two other guys. Me, looking at SS86 Optimus: "Not exactly what I had in mind..." Some guy in China, whispering: "Oh, I got you, bro..." I'll be honest, I have no idea who's making these. They come in a plain brown box with "MD-005" A, B, and C written on it, with check boxes that ostensibly should indicate what variant is inside but none of which were checked on either of the copies I got. As you can see, they're knock-offs of SS86 Optimus, but in Ultra Magnus white and Nemesis black. Note that Shattered Glass purple also exists, as well as regular red-and-blue Optimus. I haven't decided if I want the SG version or not, and the regular Optimus version is sold out at my usual stores. Now, again, this is MD-005. There's another KO going around as AS-08. By all reports, AS-08 is an inferior KO that's uses shoddy materials. MD-005 does seem to use a different plastic than the official figure, but it's solid and feels good in the hands. The joints are all solid, some tighter than the official figure. In short, MD-005 feels like a quality figure. These two versions (and the SG version) come with the rifle, Matrix, axe, and blast effects that SS86 Optimus came with, but not the trailer, repair drone, Roller, or the other effect parts. Instead, they come with some alternate heads, a battle damage part, and some filler for the truck mode. Regular Optimus comes with even more stuff, which I'll bring up if I can manage to get my hands on one. The heads are probably the most interesting bit. A lot of people seemed to not like the original SS86 head (left), though I thought it was fine. But here you also get a season 1 head (middle) and 86 movie head (right), plus a battle damaged version of the movie head. Personally I kinda like the SS86 head on Magnus, but the movie head for Nemesis. Swapping them is as simple as yanking one head off the ball joint and popping another one on. There's a notch in the panels on the sides you have to flip up when you spin the upper body for transformation. The battle damage part takes advantage of that by using a small tab to plug into it. Undoubtedly this part was created for the regular version of Prime, to recreate his iconic wound from his battle with Megatron, and whoever's making these figured they already had the part might as well stuff it in with all the colors. As a (nearly) 1:1 copy of SS86, the transformation is the same. They did replace the plastic wheels with rubber tires, though. I didn't test the Season 1 head, but the movie head transforms just fine. Which brings me to that last filler piece. It's filler for the back of the cab, designed to look like an AC unit. One side is flat, the other sloped, so you'll know which way it fits in. And it just wedges in place, it doesn't tab or lock in. It's a nice idea, and I don't even mind partsforming it, but there's no place to store it on the robot mode, so I doubt I'll ever really use them. At roughly $40, these are high-quality figures that deliver the repaints that Hasbro can't/won't. The extra heads are an especially nice touch. My only real complaint is that I wish they painted the tops of their crotches, the way the official figure did. If you're a fan of Magnus, SG Optimus, or Nemesis (@Scyla) then I can comfortably recommend them. Heck, I'd be in for Delta Magnus, Shining Magnus, or Pepsi Optimus repaints, too.

I've heard stories about Nissan's CVT issues, but I had a 2017 Maxima I drove (hard) until this year. Had absolutely no issues with it, it remains one of the best cars I've owned.

Correct. Stellantis killed it, and the only engine for the Ram 1500 was the Hurricane, a turbocharged straight six. People complained, loudly, and (after replacing the CEO) Stellantis is bringing the HEMI back, and one of the first vehicles it's going back into is the Ram 1500. Edmund's tested the new 1500 HEMI, and the conclusion was more or less "it's slower, it tows less, it gets worse mileage, it's more expensive, but it sounds cool," which is kind of what I was getting at... the Hurricane is a better engine in a lot of ways, and if I was in the market for a Ram 1500 (which I can promise I will never be, trucks just aren't my thing) I'd definitely go with the Hurricane. But not everyone is as into raw performance as I am, and a lot of people just prefer the way a V8 feels and sounds, and they were mad that they weren't being given the option. And that's how I feel about the Charger, too. Few more weeks with it and the more I drive it the more I like it. It's actually a little faster than my Porsche, gets better range, and even though it's not as agile I don't feel like I have to baby it, I don't have to take it nearly all the way to the Point if/when there's a service recall, and (hopefully) maintenance will be cheaper. I'm totally content with the electric version... it's silly and stupid in all the right ways. But I'm definitely in the minority there, and with the Challenger off the market along with the previous Challenger gasoline versions need to happen, and fast. While the Hurricane-equipped Charger SIXPACKs are due to arrive next year I think Stellantis should go one further and put out a HEMI version

Nate from the Transformers team put out a pic of Soundwave with a tape measure. I took a picture of Netflix Soundwave with a tape measure and tried to line it up. Not exact, but it looks like Soundwave might be bigger-er than I first guessed.

Personally I was fine assuming that the Transformers on Earth transformed into vehicles because Teletraan-1 mistakenly thought those vehicles were the dominant life forms on Earth, and beastformers were just what happens when Transformers scan some other life form for their alt mode. Though, I suppose that does raise the question of how they came up with their alt modes on Cybertron... I digress. The point is, Minicons came from Micronus, and Beastformers come from Onyx Prime. Onyx Prime's first appearance, to the best of my knowledge, was the Covenant of Primus. And again, to my knowledge, he's really only appeared in two other places, IDW comics and a design for Transformers One. The latter two sources obviously drew on the Covenant for inspiration, so they all have certainly design similarities like wings, digitigrade legs, and head that looks like he's wearing an animal skull for a helmet. The brown colors are pure Covenant, as IDW and TFOne both depicted him as primarily blue (I assume TFOne was based more on the IDW design, while there was an in-universe reason for the shift in Onyx's design...). I think it's fair to say that Age of the Primes Leader-class Onyx Prime is still sporting a somewhat original design, though. Here he's a bit more organic than other depictions, with faux fur on his shins, the insides of his elbows, and the joints of his wings. He's also sporting a tail, which I'm not entirely sure he had in other versions. In any case, I quite like the design. The wings, digitigrade legs, and hooves give off devilish vibes (even if Onyx was actually described as being a good friend and loyal ally to the other Primes). Onyx's relic is called the Triptych Mask, an artifact that supposedly gave Onyx the ability to travel the spiritual world and appear in dreams. It's heavily implied that the brown thing on the left is supposed to be the Mask, but I would think the mask is actually the aforementioned animal skull helmet... that is to say, his head. He also comes with a pole and his tail. Onyx's head is a hinged ball joint. He lacks much downward tilt, though he's got adequate sideways tilt, and he can look up quite a bit but the further up he looks the more his head sinks into his chest. His shoulders swivel and move 90 degrees laterally. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. His wrists swivel, and his fingers (molded as a single, curved piece) are hinged to open and close. His waist swivels, though his butt flap and loin cloth are attached to his upper body. His hips can go 90 degrees forward and backward, and over 90 degrees laterally, and his thighs swivel. His knees, due to being digitigrade, are a bit different. His knees bend 90 degrees, but they don't straighten all the way. Even if they did, his true ankle range from about 90 degrees forward to just shy of straight. Down from his ankle, at his foot, there's no up/down tilt but he does have around 75 degrees of pivot. The "Mask" fits onto the end of the pole to make a spear that he can wield in either hand. I forgot to grab a pic of it, but those tabs on the spear can plug into slots on his wings to store the spear on his back. His tail can either be plugged directly into his butt, or flipped 180 degrees and plugged into his butt flap. Now, the thing about Onyx is, in the Covenant, he's built like a centaur. That is, he has four legs and a horse-like lower body with two arms on a humanoid upper body. The clearest picture of Onyx has him rearing up on his hind legs, though, and IDW artists missed that detail and wound up drawing him as bipedal (though again, this is retroactively explained), and since TFOne copied IDW that version was also bipedal. So AOTP is bipedal, because that's easiest, right? Nope. Centaur mode is included. Officially, you push his face up into his mask, lift his loin cloth, and uncoil the front legs from his chest. His upper torso rocks back so the front legs can reach the ground. This is my favorite mode, and (aside from keeping the mask open) how I'll likely display him. My only real complaint is that his shoulder pads didn't shift in some way to cover the shoulder joints that were previously hidden under the front legs. Articulation in this mode is mostly the same. I didn't mention the wings before, but they have a limited up/down range where they connect to his back, and a hinge to spread them wider. There's also a hinge to move them front-to-back for flapping. I think a swivel would have been nice, but not having one isn't the end of the world. Without the front legs blocking them, those new exposed shoulder hinges give him some front/back butterfly joints. He loses his waist swivel. His front legs can swivel 360 degrees, as long as you move them out laterally enough to have the clearance. And they move nearly 180 degree laterally before his arms start getting in the way. They also have thigh swivels, knees that don't quite straighten but get 90 degrees of backward bend, and digitigrade ankles that can go from nearly 90 degrees forward to 90 degrees backward. His hooves don't pivot, but they can fold downward. And guess what? You can remove his tail, and split it open. One of the tabs that holds it closed actually fits into slots on the insides of his fingers, allowing him to hold it like a bow. Using the same tabs on the spear's shaft that attached it to his back, you can attach the spear to the tail like an arrow. I think I'd honestly be happy enough if they'd stopped there. Bipedal robot with a centaur alt mode works for me. But Onyx is actually a triple changer. From the centaur mode, lift his head up so it tucks into his chest, then hinge his chest armor up and over it. Fold the beast head from his back over his head so it tabs into his chest. Straighten his torso back out, then use the butterfly hinges to bring his shoulders forward, rotating at the biceps and wrists so that his arms still make some sort of anatomical sense. And her we have Onyx's real alt/beast mode... some kind of six-legged horse-dragon chimera. I don't hate it... but I don't know that I love it, either. In my mind, it's an interesting concept, but probably the weakest of his modes on a figure where I was already content without it. The only new articulation to bring up is the beast head. It's on a ball joint, with some limited ability to tilt up, down, left, right, and swivel into a sideways tilt. The jaws can also open. The instructions have you store the spear by removing the "mask" and plugging it onto the side of the pole, then plugging the pole onto his butt. Why not just plug it into the wing? Because, fully unfurled, the wings actually don't leave enough clearance. You can only store the spear there if you keep the wings tucked in. Speaking of options, what if you don't want a six-legged alt mode? I mean, it was good enough for Odin's horse, but maybe Liege Maximo is the only Prime you want having a Norse influence. Hasbro's got you covered. You can shift his shoulders back out into their regular robot position, then wrap the middle legs back around his torso. Still works! As one of the newer, less-developed Primes, and one with a bestial robot mode, a bestial alt mode, and a bestial in-between mode, I think Onyx might not appeal to the "just give me the G1 cartoon" crowd, especially as his Leader price tag makes him less of an impulse buy than a Deluxe like Alchemist or Micronus. That said, the winged centaur of the Covenant was always kind of an out-there design, and I love the way the team brought that design to life. I think he's a pretty cool figure, definitely one of my favorite Primes* so far, and I'd recommend checking him out. *And for those who haven't been keeping track, we're up to nine of the Thirteen now. Deluxe-class Quintus Prime and Voyager-class Amalgamous Prime were announced for the first 2026 wave at SDCC. While not officially announced, I'm hearing that the remainder, Voyager-class Nexus Prime and Leader-class Liege Maximo, should be out by summer 2026.

Target's Geek Out site launched their Transformers stuff. For me, it's a lot of nothing. There's Earthrise Sunstreaker (the original release, not the one with painted windows from the box set), and there's Gigawatt if you missed him the first two times he was released. Of more interested might be Earthrise Thrust, since he was a Target exclusive before and sold out pretty fast. Still a Target exclusive, but here's your second chance... Also did a little digging into Soundwave. Can confirm he's still compatible with the previous Siege Micromaster/Studio Series Core-class/Dr Wu tapes, and he's got the room to store just one at a time. Really hard to say for sure until I have him in hand, or until someone posts a clean direct comparison instead of guessing from shots with Alchemist or rulers, but it does look like SS86 Soundwave is about a quarter of an inch/0.6cm taller than the Siege/Earthrise/Netflix/Legacy version.