mikeszekely

I went to my local Ross over the weekend and all I could find was a Walmart reissue BW Scorponok.

There should be some coming in the Studio Series line still, but this should be the penultimate Repaint Roundup of 2023. OK, so up first we have Generation Selects Voyager-class Antagony. This one's kind of a weird one. Way, way back in 1998 I graduated high school. That's not really relevant, except after I graduated Botcon occurred, and the original Antagony was one of the two convention exclusives. Near as I can tell, she was a straight repaint of Inferno, but the way they painted her face made her mouth look a lot smaller. Meanwhile, the comic book 3H made for the convention featured a very different design, with a totally different head and a very feminine figure. Gen Selects Antagony keeps the spirit of the original Antagony toy by being a straight repaint of Legacy Inferno, down to the same accessories. Out of the box she comes with a head that's the same as Inferno's, down to the hinged jaws, except purple instead of blue. However, she comes packaged with an alternate head, which I swapped to because I like a bit of visual distinction beyond colors. I wish I could say that the alternate head was based on her 3H appearance, but no. See, back in the day, when Beast Wars starting doing the Transmetals thing a toy was designed for a Transmetal version of Inferno... except he never appeared in the cartoon, and the toy was eventually released as Scavenger (although he was still Inferno when Takara released the toy in Japan). Legacy Inferno already acknowledges the connection; if you leave the ant head on his torso open the molded detail inside is based on Scavenger's chest. I guess Hasbro wanted to leave open the option of making your own Scavenger, because the alternate head that comes with Antagony is Scavenger's head. Transformation is the same; the Scavenger head does fit inside the ant head during transformation. The pink markings on Antagony's back and abdomen are a lot brighter but otherwise accurate to the original toy. Probably not true of everywhere in the world, but where I live black ants (mostly carpenter ants and pavement ants) are far more common than reddish-colored ones, so a black ant repaint of Inferno makes a lot of sense. Antagony is a pretty obscure character, though, existing mostly as a toy that was limited to 600 pieces and an accompanying convention-exclusive comic book. You're not really missing much beyond the alternate Scavenger head if you skip her. Up next we have Voyager-class Thundercracker. Ok, ok, actually this guy is listed as "Decepticon Seeker," and he's from the Target-exclusive Buzzworthy Bumblebee Troop Builder pack. In hand, side-by-side with actual Earthrise Thundercracker, you can see that he's a different shade of blue, with darker translucent plastic on the cockpit and black paint on his chest intakes instead of Thundercracker's gunmetal, but really he's blue where Thundercracker is, black where Thundercracker is, silver where Thundercracker is, and has the same markings on his wings as Thundercracker. If you don't already have Thundercracker, Decepticon Seeker is a passable substitute. That said, I heard it was Hasbro's intention that Decepticon Seeker be Bitstream, one of the only two named G1 Seekers that the Siege Tetrajet mold hasn't covered (the other being Sunstorm). To properly represent Bitstream, though, the silver on his chest and pelvis should be blue, his forearms should be blue, and his biceps, thighs, and null rays should be white or silver. Perhaps I'll try to paint mine. Of course, even if I make those changes to the robot mode, the jet modes are still going to be mostly identical. Which is kind of a bummer. I think I'd have strongly preferred a Sunstorm deco. Actually, considering I've got something like 11 or 12 versions of the Siege mold, Hasbro's shown remarkable restraint with the Earthrise mold because I'd have also preferred a proper G2 Starscream, G2 Blackout, or a black-and-white deco based on the Robot Masters toy. While the Seeker is just the Seeker, the rest of the figures in the set have two heads, and with the point of this set being troop-building I actually bought two sets so I can use both heads. Which takes us to the Quintesson Trooper. Out of the box, he's the Quintesson Bailiff from the Pulsecon Pit of Judgemet set, complete with the mold changes (new head and chest, new shoulder pads, and new weapon), but he trades the brown and pea soup colors of that figure for greens and grays that are actually more accurate to the Bailiff's on-screen appearance. The alternate head is standard Allicon head, but the metallic blue around the face is also more screen accurate, so I might end up swapping it over to the standard Allicon body. Regardless, recall that the Bailiff's weapon is actually made from two parts. By giving one of them the top part he's got an axe, while the bottom gives the other a mace. With the original Bailiff figure having the combined weapon and the Allicon using a spear, you've effectively got four slightly different versions of the same character with four different weapons. Not bad! The novelty is a bit reduced in alt mode, though. With the bot-mode heads hidden, there's really no visual difference between the two troopers. Oh well, I could probably put a little paint on one of them. Or maybe Toyhax will make a sticker set that has different options. Anyway, there were plenty of Allicons in the movie, so a few extra are definitely worth picking up. But now the pair of Studio Series Gnaws I picked up seem like an inadequate representation of the Sharkticons. Maybe Hasbro can release another troop pack, or a Gen Selects pack with another Quintesson Judge (I only have the regular one and the Pit of Judgement one, after all) with a pair of Sharkticons. And if they don't, well, Hasbro's planning to do a package refresh of SS86 Gnaw in the spring. Next up, we have the G2 Universe Cybertronian Troopers. The while skull head is the default head, and the one with the teal helmet is the alternate, and they're both based off of a panel from the Marvel G2 comic. These guys are basically Jhiaxus's minions, and they're redecos of Legacy Skullgrin. In addition to new head options, they feature a remolded chest to be more accurate to the comics, which is cool. With the new head and the new chest they do a passable job of representing the guys seen in the G2 comics. Plus, despite coming with the same accessories as Skullgrin, the fact that there's four total weapons means that simply by mixing up which ones are being used in the hands and which ones are stored on the bodies (and even where on the bodies) you can give them a little more distinction between them (although, again, I wouldn't be adverse to Toyhax creating a set with multiple options to make them a little more distinct from each other. Best of all, number of ports on them means you have a lot of options for their alt modes, too, which also helps them to remain visually distinct. Heck, I was messing around with them after I took these pictures and I found that by plugging the sword handles into ports on the treads and the bigger cannons into the ports under his toes on the front of the alt mode or the other ports on the treads you can even pass one of them off as a jet and one off as a tank, which encompasses both of the vehicles seen in the comics (although not very accurately). I think the versatility of these guys makes them my favorites in the set. Of course, we have one figure left in the set to look at, and that's the Animated Universe Autotrooper, a repaint of Siege Ironhide. Out of the box, he has the head on the left figure, with blue eyes. This head is indeed based on the head of the Autotroopers seen in a public service announcement on Cybertron in the Animated episode "This is Why I Hate Machines." And it makes sense that Autotrooper would share Siege Ironhide's body, because in Animated the Autotroopers were also based on Ironhide/Cybertronian Ratchet. In fact, if you went to Botcon in 2011 you could have bought a multipack of Autotroopers made from the Cybertronian Ratchet figure. The Autotrooper didn't originate from Animated, though. Autoroopers actually came from the Japanese Kiss Players fiction, where they're artificial Transformers used by the Earth Defense Command, and the Autorooper figure was the Mazda RX-7 mold used for Alternators/Binaltech Meister and Shockblast. Naturally, the alternate red-eyed head is based on the Kiss Players toy. On the plus side, the simple black and white deco looks pretty sharp, and the leg panels on the Autotroopers don't seem to pop off nearly as easily as they did on Ironhide. However, the weapon that they come with is one of the worst weapons to come with a Transformer in recent times, there's not a lot of realistic options for storing it in alt mode, so it's difficult to make the Autotroopers very distinct from the other. Overall, unless you missed Thundercracker and you're really desperate for a "close enough" sort of figure, nothing in this set is particularly "must-have." That said, an extra Allicon helps bolster the Quintesson ranks, and if you picked up Jhiaxus the Cybertronian Trooper (or two) gives him some Marvel G2 minions. Even the Autotrooper has a place in Transformers lore (and is a better use of the mold than the Netflix Deseeus Army Drone). Given that the pack is three Deluxes and a Voyager for the price of three Deluxes, the Buzzworthy Bumblebee Troop Builder pack is a decent value for, well, troop-building.

Done with Legacy Evolution and Earthspark, so we're dipping into Studio Series with a look at Deluxe-class Mirage. So... ah... oof. Credit where it's due, they tried to get him skinnier; if you ignore how far apart his shoulders and hips are, his chest actually compresses in and his midsection is very thin. It just looks thicker than it is due to the car kibble on his back. Likewise, there's a lot of molded details that are pretty accurate to the film, like the faux lights on his shoulders, the turbine in his tummy, the vents around his collar, the pistons on his feet, and the lights and and vents on the front of his thighs. His head also accurately captures the slightly asymmetric design of the film. However, either Hasbro was working off of an older model or they really cheaped out on the paint. For one, he's entirely lacking gold paint, when the CGI had little gold accents in his biceps, forearms, and tummy plus large patches on his shins. Two, while he does have some blue paint, there's not enough. They got his head, biceps, and a little of his forearms (which are actually mostly clear), but none of the blue on his chest or the tops of his thighs. While we're on his thighs, although the marker lights on his chest got painted the taillights on his thighs did not. But really, more than missing paint, what's really working against Mirage is the sheer volume of kibble. The CGI has small panels on the outside of his legs near the knees, tires in his calves, lights on his shoulders, and wheels on his back. To be fair, so does the figure... although, as mentioned, the lights on his shoulders are fake, because the real ones are sitting on his back, visible behind his head, about where the wheels should be. And I'll forgive you for not even noticing the faux lights, because they're molded in dark gray plastic and not painted in any way that makes them obvious as lights. The wheels are, instead, pushed further back and farther apart because they're stuck on the the hood, which is folded up with most of the top of his alt mode in a big ol' backpack. The roof is double-hinged over the rear window in a manner that's uncomfortable to do with the translucent plastic and isn't particularly CGI-accurate anyway. His toes do look like the the front of his CGI feet, but they're attached to large chunks of the rear of the vehicle that he wears like shoes. Meanwhile, his doors dangle from his hips like a Kawamori design. Mirage's sole accessory is this blaster. It's fine, I guess. No paint, but some molded details. Mirage's head is on a ball joint that can swivel, but he has more sideways tilt range than he does up/down. His shoulders rotate and can move laterally about 90 degrees on hinged ball joints. His biceps swivel, his elbows bend 90 degrees, and his wrists swivel. Now, here's where things start getting messy. He does have a waist swivel, but his backpack gets caught up on the door kibble on his hips. His hips, more ball joints, are technically capable of more than 90 degrees forward and backward, and nearly 90 degrees laterally, but again because of his backpack and hip kibble it's more like 45 degree backward and 30 degrees laterally. His thighs have swivels, but fender kibble on his knees can't get past the door kibble on his hips, which pretty much negates the thigh swivel entirely. His knees should be able to bend 90 degrees, but the combination of fender kibble on the knees, door kibble on the hips, and wheels poking out of his calves basically halves his actual knee range. His ankle are ball joints and his toes are hinged for transformation, so you can tilt his toes up or his entire foot down, plus you've got slightly-shallow ankle pivots and ankle swivels. Mirage's blaster has a 5mm port under the barrel that fits into his fist, with the bulk of the blaster covering his forearm. This is very much like how they did Bumblebee in the line, but unlike Bumblebee (who's blaster was molded for his right arm only) Mirage's blaster can fit on either arm. When not using his blaster... well, I really don't know. Even though the roof turns over for robot mode there's no slots or anything on the other side, so I can't find any place to store his blaster in bot mode. Mirage's transformation isn't particularly complicated; you get the chest up over his head, spin his waist 180, tuck his arms behind his back, unfold his backpack, turn his feet around, then start lining everything up so it makes sense. The problem is that "lining up" part. Again, there's tolerance issues with some of thing hinges in his backpack that make it uncomfortable to unfold, there's clearance issues turning his waist and getting his arms behind around the door kibble, and even when everything is basically in the right place then you have to massage all the various bits into place so they actually lock in. Fortunately, the alt mode is kind of worth it. I mean, the Porsche 911 has been a fantastic car since it debuted in the '60s, but the 964 (Mirage's model) was a dream car of mine as a young teen (and while a modern 911 is totally impractical as a 40-something parent owning a Porsche is still on my bucket list, it'll probably just be something like a Taycan), and I wish Porsche let Transformers use the license more often. Sure, Mirage is broken up by a lot of seems and hinges, but (especially in hand) they can't take away from the car's tantalizing curves. And being a licensed alt, there are plenty of realistic details like the orange turn signals along the unpainted marker lights, the grill on the front bumper and vents on the rear over the engine, the wraparound taillights, dual exhausts, molded door handles, and the fuel door on the left side, plus the screen-accurate silver paint with blue stripes and the "Porsche" name plastered on the sides. My one real criticism of the alt mode is that they didn't paint the rims, but I can always do that myself. Really, a part of me kind of wonders if so much of the kibble issues in the robot mode was because Porsche had Hasbro prioritize this mode as a condition to use the license. If so, I still can't be mad, because I like the 964 a lot more than I like robo Pete Davidson. Mirage does have storage for his blaster in alt mode. There are tabs on the sides that fit into notches on the backs of his thighs, allowing the blaster to be tucked neatly under the car (with the business end pointed at his own crotch... watch those bumps, Pete). Overall, Mirage is kind of a mixed bag. The robot mode is lacking some details and has far too much kibble. I might have overlooked some of the kibble; Mirage's slim, very human proportions in the movie were never going to translate well into a transforming Deluxe-class toy, but they placement of the kibble really hampers the articulation (and if you're going to have doors just hanging off him, why not give him door wings so we can all go back to pretending that he was supposed to be Jazz?). But, licensed 911 (964) alt mode, so yeah, I kind of recommend him anyway.

If they're like the Page Punchers McFarlane does for DC, they're 3" mini figures. And, since Hasbro only grants licenses to non-transforming toys to third parties, you expect (as @Wolf-1 already said) two-pack minifigs that don't transform packaged with comics. The new Image run, likely, as it's current, being heavily marketed, and avoids any licensing headaches from reprinting Marvel or IDW stories. Speaking of the new Image run, I kind of don't care how good it may or may not ultimately end up being, I just find it really irritating that Image scooped up Transformers and G.I. Joe and immediately started using them as a gimmick to hawk whatever new sci-fi crap Robert Kirkman came up with.

OK, now we can build Mandroid. Because we picked up Earthspark Deluxe-class Nightshade. As is usually the case with the the Earthspark line, which seems to lack the budget of Generations stuff despite costing the same, Nightshade's biggest weakness is the deco. All of the shoulder pads, not just the top, should have that green paint. All of the thighs should be painted, not just part. The pelvis should be the same darker green as the shins, and so should the feet. What's kind of weird is that there are places where Hasbro did put paint, like the circles on the ankles, in front of the feet, and the star on the chest, but they used black when silver would have been a better a better choice. Likewise, Nightshade's face should be silver, too, instead of the gunmetal color that Hasbro chose. Color issues aside, the sculpt of the figure is pretty good! I mean, the calves are hollow, but that's pretty common even on Transformers with a higher budget. Nightshade doesn't actually have wings in robot mode in the cartoon, but c'mon, in the cartoon they just kind of appear out of nowhere, and this is just a Deluxe. Plus, if they really bother you in bot mode, you can always pop them off the ball joints. I'm more bothered by the bird feet hanging off the backs of the forearms. As I alluded to in the beginning, Nightshade comes with Mandroid's torso, finally completing the build-a-figure. Nightshade also comes with a pair of knives. Nightshade's head is on a ball joint. They can look up ever so slightly, with better range down, and a very slight sideways tilt. Shoulders are ball joints that rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. Biceps swivel, and elbows bend 90 degrees, but there's no wrist swivels. Due to their transformation Nightshade can arch their back, but they don't have a waist swivel. Hips are ball joints that can go 90 degrees forward or backward, but only about 45 degrees laterally. There are dedicated thigh swivels just above the knees, which bend 180 degrees. The front of Nightshade's feet can tilt down, but nothing up, and they've got around 60 degrees of ankle pivot. Nightshade's knives plug into their hands via 5mm handles and 5mm port fists. When not wielding the knives, Nightshade can store them in grooves on the top of their wings. Nightshade's engineering is pretty simple. Their torso flips around so their face goes into their tummy and the back comes up to form the owl's head. The arms un-tab from the sides and fold over so the forearms tab together on the underside of the bird, and the bird feet on the backs of the arms are now facing forward. The entire pelvis shifts back 90 degrees, then the legs swing back, turn, and fold so that the lower legs cover the thighs. Everything is secured via tabs near the robot knees that lock into slots in the back, while another set of tabs near the ankles tab into the robot forearms. Despite the simplicity, it's honestly a decent bird mode, better I think than recent ones like Kingdom Airazor, or Studio Series... Airazor. Well, I guess there's not a lot of Transformers that turn into birds. I guess you could point out that the colors are, again, not totally right, but again Nightshade's transformation in the cartoon is pure anime magic, with an egg-shaped body that has no discernable robot parts and wings that sprout out of nowhere. My only real gripe is that they couldn't find enough budget to at least put a flap on their back that could hide the owl's face on the robot back and the robot face on the owl's back. Articulation is kind of limited in owl mode. Nightshade's head swivels, but it can't tilt. The bird feet have some up/down movement at the digitigrade ankles, but that's it for the legs. That makes flying poses less than ideal. The wings do have ball joints for swiveling and hinges that can flap the wings back or forward, which allows you to spread them out and flap them or tuck them in for a resting pose. And, of course, the knives can still be stored in the wings in owl mode. Coming back to Mandroid, as I said before with the included torso we can finally put him together. It's just a matter of popping the head, arms, and pegs into their corresponding ball sockets. And remember, if you've bought all the Deluxes so far you'll actually have two left arms, a human arm that came with Megatron and a yellow-and-black arm that came with Shockwave. That's kind of nice, since Shockwave is a straight repaint of the Cyberverse figure with no mold changes, allowing you to skip that figure and still make a complete BAF. Once you've put Mandroid together you can attach his backpack. The easiest way to do it seems to be the pull the "straps" off the backpack itself and put those on first by wrapping the them around Mandroid's body and using tabs on them to lock them into his shoulder blades. Tabs on the other side go into slots on the inside of the backpack, and a peg goes into a hole on Mandroid's back, so that that the mechanical arms go under his own arms. And... yeah... he's ok-ish. Granted, I haven't seen every episode yet, but I don't recall him wearing googles and I do recall him wearing a lab coat. So I kind of wish they'd made the head without googles and the body with a labcoat. Other than that, he's really lacking articulation. Despite having a ball joint for neck he doesn't have much neck tilt. The ball joints at the shoulders can swivel and they have hinges for 90 degrees of lateral movement, but he's got no bicep swivels, no elbow articulation, no wrist articulation, and no waist articulation. Likewise, his ball-jointed hips can go forward and laterally 90 degrees, but only about 45 degrees backward, and while he does have thigh swivels he has no knee or ankle articulation. Quite frankly, I'd rather Hasbro stop including the BAF parts and just spend the extra money on more accurate decos (which is exactly what Takara is doing with the Japanese Earthspark releases). If you're a fan of the show or the character, Nightshade's a pretty easy recommend, as I think he's one of if not the best of the Earthspark Deluxes. And with major Terran characters like Thrash, Jawbreaker, and Hashtag still missing I sincerely hope that Hasbro keeps the Earthspark Deluxes coming... which apparently they are doing, except the next one is Starscream, who (like Shockwave) appears to be a straight repaint of the Cyberverse figure. Kind of a bummer, although my sources say that Thrash and Jawbreaker are coming... along with Prowl, weirdly enough, who hasn't even been in the show (aside from a G1-style flashback). I'm guessing it'll be another case of Hasbro repainting the Cyberverse toy, which I'd be madder about if Cyberverse Prowl wasn't one of the best of the Cyberverse Deluxes.

If if scales with the pair of SOC Voltrons (and it sounds like it might) then I'm in.

Review or repaint? You be the judge, but the figure is Earthspark Deluxe-class Grimlock. So you might look at this guy and go, oh, it's a remold of the Cyberverse Deluxe class. And you're not wrong, but it's a pretty extensive remold. They share similar proportions and basically the same engineering, but most of his parts are new. His head is new, his shoulders are new, the front of his torso is new, his dino claws are new, his pelvis is new, his lower legs are new, and his feet are new. From this angle, the only reused parts are the neck, thighs, shoulder joints, and forearms, and hands. The story is pretty much the same from other angles. The heels, the knee joints, the back of his torso, and the inner edge of his lower legs are reused, but the tail, wings, and dino head and neck are all new parts. Aesthetically, as near as I can tell he's pretty close to cartoon-accurate. I think Hasbro even did a better job painting him, as you'll note the accurate red on his shins where Hasbro left the shins on the Cyberverse toy inaccurately unpainted. I think my biggest complaint would be the one part that they didn't remold, his forearms. In the cartoon, Earthspark Grimlock's forearms have a different shape, with the dino claws on the front and back of the forearms instead of the sides. If I'm being really nitpicky, I might have liked bigger wings, too. Earthspark Grimlock ditches the crown and fire breath accessories of the Cyberverse toy and instead sports a new rifle. I dig it- it's recognizably inspired by his G1 rifle, with lots of molded details. The colors are a little weird... maybe cartoon accurate? I dunno, I haven't actually watched the Earthspark episode with Grimlock. And, oh yeah, I forgot to photograph it but he also comes with a leg to make Mandroid. It's the same as the leg that came with Optimus, just for the other side. Which means we still don't have a torso, although that should be coming with the next Earthspark Deluxe. Articulation should be the same as Cyberverse Grimlock, but I'll go over it again in case some remolded bit affected something. Head is on a ball joint that swivels, looks up about 30 degrees, down a little, minimal sideways tilt. Shoulders are also ball joints, they swivel and can move laterally about 45 degrees. No dedicated bicep swivels, but his elbows are ball joints that bend 90 degrees and act as bicep swivels. No wrist swivels. He does have a waist swivel. His hips are ball joints that go about 90 degrees forward and backward and just a hair shy of that laterally. He's got dedicated thigh swivels, and his knees bend a little under 90 degrees. His feet can tilt down, his right foot can kind of tilt up due to transformation, and his ankles pivot 90 degrees. And he naturally can hold his gun just fine in either hand. Due to their shared engineering, Earthspark Grimlock has essentially the exact same transformation as Cybverse Grimlock. The only real differences are that you flip the claws down instead of up, and his dino jaw isn't dislocated in robot mode which kind of simplified the transformation. I think, more than the robot mode, the dino mode suffers a bit more from the shared engineering. His back isn't really smooth enough because he's got the same launcher on it that the Cybververse toy does, and he's got the same kibble tummy. Again, his legs wind up having the wrong shape, and they do the same thing where the fist folds back and becomes the heel, and the forearm turns in 90 degrees for dino mode. If they folded they remolded the arms with the claws in the right spot his fists could have folded entirely in and he'd have knees in dino mode. Still, it's nice to see that Hasbro was a bit more liberal with the paint, and as such the colors are a bit better than the Cyberverse toy. Just a note, but his tail is asymmetric. This is because the right side of his tail is formed from the parts reused from Cyberverse Grimlock, while the left side of his tail is made from new parts that are more cartoon-accurate. Articulation isn't great in dino mode. His hips rotate and his jaws open, but the forearms and tail are fixed. Plus, due to the way he transforms, he can't really bend his knees. The foot that ends up on Grimlock's back has a 5mm port on it, so you can store his rifle on his back. Despite his head being new he does still have the little nub inside, so you can attach effect parts to make him look like he's breathing fire... including the one that came with Cyberverse Grimlock! I like Earthspark Grimlock. Subjectively, because I prefer his aesthetic and the extra paint really helps, I like him better than the Cyberverse version, and I'd recommend him if you're collecting any Earthspark toys as I think he's one of the better Deluxes in the line. However, the usual caveat that the Earthspark Deluxes clearly don't get the budget that Legacy or Studio Series does still applies- too many ball joints, joints looser than I'd like, etc. Too, while it made a certain sense for all the Cybverse figures to be Deluxes because they were all basically the same size in the show, that doesn't seem to be the case with Earthspark. Not only would a Voyager-class Grimlock probably have scaled better, but the extra budget a Voyager gets could have lead to better engineering and made for a more-accurate figure all-around. If you're not collecting Earthspark, there's really nothing going on with Grimlock for me to say that he's the one you should start with.

Someone was joking on Twitter that Legacy Bee has a more Animated-style head than Legacy Prowl got, because if you G1-ify Animated Bee you get G1 Bee. I laughed... and then I started thinking. Y'know, I don't hate that. And the VW Walmart Bee is my mainline G1 Bumblebee, but I also have the Cliffjumper repaint that came in that Target set with Fangry, Nemesis Primal, and toy-colored Blackarachnia. Been thinking about converting that one to Bumper, so I'll have a spare head...

They could have done Bombshell's legs the way they did JP12's; have the shin open up, then fold the leg over the thigh, close the shin back over the thigh. Then his feet (which the G1 toy didn't have) could fold against his shins on the underside of the beetle. Just sayin'.

I hope it comes with a stand. Or is at least compatible with with one that can't with the TOS Enterprise. Pretty sure the TOS Enterprise was cheaper at Walmart than Amazon. Might wait a bit to see if it turns up there, but I'm probably going to bite. As iconic as the TOS Enterprise is I grew up with TNG, but I had the old Galoob action figures for Riker, Picard, Data, Geordi, and Word (back when Geordi and Word wore red uniforms).

One Core, one Deluxe, one Voyager, and that's it. And here's the proof... remember we already covered Bludgeon, who was simply Tarn with a new head and sword. This is the entire rest of the wave. Let's start with the wave's sole Leader, Dreadwing. I'm sure that even those of you who don't follow leaks knew this was coming and expected pretty much exactly this. There's no change from the Skyquake mold on the figure itself, aside from colors. On the one hand, that's true for Skyquake and Dreadwing in Prime, too. However, Skyquake's Legacy design was a mix of Prime and Euro G1 Skyquake, and I think that worked as a nice homage then. Dreadwing, however, doesn't have that same G1 connection to fall back on (and he definitely doesn't bear any resemblance to the G2 stealth bomber). It's a shame they didn't remold the head to tone down the G1 Skyquake references. Or, better yet, modify the arms so you can transform him like this and he'd have a stronger resemblance to Prime with wings that point down and a cockpit chest. The one thing that is difference is his weapon, or at least half of it. Transformation is the same, and as with the robot mode seems to homage G1 Skyquake more than Prime Dreadwing, which was a neat homage on Skyquake and just a swing and a miss on Dreadwing. So it's kind of weird, given that Dreadwing was the much more prominent character, but based strictly on this mold it's better as Skyquake. I think I'd have almost preferred a Machine Wars Starscream. Next up we have Detritus... because Evolution is all about Junkions, and Detritus the Junkion was the hastily-conceived backstory they came up with when Takara decided to do an e-HOBBY desert tan redeco of G1 Hound in 2004. And the Big Brains™ at Hasbro decided that Detritus belongs in the mainline instead of Hound, who's Target-exclusive earth mode figure is stuck in limbo. Detritus isn't a new mold, but a remold of the Siege figure. And it's pretty interesting to see what carried over and what's new. Detritus has a brand new head and new accessories, but the same arms. The very front of of his chest is new, but the rest of his torso carried over. He got a new front half of his pelvis, but his thighs are the same. His feet are also the same, but the rest of his lower leg is new. His wheels are new. And he ditches the Siege toy's backpack, replacing it with a simple windscreen. And the result is pretty dang good. There's a bit of gap on the back... Siege Hound has it, too, but it's covered by his backpack. The wheels are thinner because the fenders are thinner. He's still got the feet on the sides. Ultimately, no, he's not a totally accurate Jeep Willys, but I think it's close enough for most collectors. So my only real complaint about Detritus is that he's not Hound, and I want my earth mode Hound. Strongarm's a pretty extensive redeco of Elita-1. In fact, while they're nearly the same figure from the waist down and they share most of the same engineering, she's basically a new figure from the waist up, and she comes with a new pistol and lightbar. The lightbar uses a 5mm peg to connect, so you can put it on her arm in robot mode like in the cartoon. Speaking of the cartoon, due to sharing parts and engineering with Elita her shins aren't exactly cartoon-accurate, her pelvis is different, and her shoulder pads are very different. However, her new torso is spot on, and the only real change they made to her head is that they gave her a nose. One of the more notable changes from Elita is that the alt mode fenders are attached to Strongarm's shoulders, not her backpack. The backpack itself has been extensively redesigned so that the doors can kinda almost represent the door wings she had in the cartoon. You can really see how much retooling they did on Strongarm when you convert her to her alt mode. Only the wheels, the feet on the back bumper, and the rear fenders carried over from Elita-1. 75-80% of her alt mode is new, and it honestly does a pretty good job of replicating the SUV you see in the cartoon. I've said before that I get irritated when they gender-swap G1 characters to try get more female Transformers, and I prefer when they create memorable new female characters instead. Strongarm is exactly that, but as RID 15 didn't have anything better than Warrior-class Strongarm's never had a good toy... until now. I'm very pleased with her introduction into Legacy, and I feel like she's the first figure in this wave that I can give an unequivocal recommend to. And that just leaves Bombshell, the figure I think most of us old Geewunners were looking forward to. Bombshell has a new head, torso, and shoulders, but his arms from the biceps down and his body from the waist down are Shrapnel. And therein lies a lot of my frustration with him. His thighs, surprisingly, do have the circles that the G1 toy does, and I get that his legs didn't have a ton of detail on the animation model, but the shape is still wrong. Shrapnel's legs are simply too angular for Bombshell, and they have the bump outs on the shins. Using Shrapnel's arms don't make as big a difference, except that his bug legs wind up on the backs of his forearms instead of the sides. Oh, and then there's the weird color choices, namely, that Bombshell has black hips, gray biceps, and gray hands. Ironically, Shrapnel has black biceps and hands... I wonder if I can just get a second Shrapnel and swap parts. Of course, those black parts on Shrapnel should have been purple, and I feel like this mess could have been avoided if they'd just put all the arm parts on the same sprue int he first place. Anyway... Bombshell's got a new gun, and his bug legs are different than Shrapnel's. They still connect via 5mm ports, though, can still be removed, and can still be used as guns on their own. Actually, Bombshell's main gun has ports on the sides of it so you can plug his legs onto it. Tweak a few colors and Bombshell's bot mode really isn't that bad, but his alt mode definitely suffers for having Shrapnel's lower body. Again, they're too angular, and they stick up so much higher than his torso. It throws off the rounded, flatter shape Bombshell should have. And that's before we even bring up the toes sticking off the rear. I think they kind of dropped the ball a little even on the new parts, though. There's no black on the hinges in the bug eyes. At first I thought that maybe that was just a toy detail, but I went back and checked the animation, and sure enough he should have black in that yellow. Plus his proboscis doesn't totally cover his head, leaving his face visible when viewed from the sides. While I'm complaining, there's a part that's on a hinge on the back of his neck... why is it there? The instructions don't mention it. It serves no purpose. And despite having lots of room between his arms on the underside, Bombshell's back doesn't have a 5mm port on it the way Shrapnel's does, so he can't store his gun on his underside. There's 5mm ports on his bug back you can use, sure, but I'd have preferred a more hidden place to put it while he's in bug mode. Man... Breakdown's my favorite Stunticon, and he's the one that was gimped by being a retool of another Stunticon. Bombshell is my favorite Insecticon, he's the one that got gimped by being a retool of another Insecticon. I'm starting to see a pattern here, Hasbro. Honestly, though, while I am disappointed, Bombshell's not that bad and still worth picking up if you're looking to finish the Legacy Insecticons. And yeah, that's it for Evolution. I think we have some Studio Series stuff coming, but otherwise I'll be back in a bit with the first wave of United.

In case you were bummed about the Legacy Junkions and wanted more movie ones....

Plus they can milk that one. Use the same mold, but with a different head, but paint him half white with a yellow scanner, and you you can do KARR, too. I'm hearing rumblings, but nothing concrete, that the Constructicons may release at some point in the SS86 line in a fashion similar to how the Stunticons released in Legacy. Frankly, however they do it, I wouldn't mind if they did more-accurate, Deluxe-sized Constructicons with proper articulation (like elbows) and whatever partsforming is necessary to make a similarly accurate, articulated Devastator that scales better with the other combiners. I wound up buying a downsized KO of Titan Devy just because the original is too big, and even though the quality is kind of meh I wish they'd have done Predaking, too.

Rawr! When Mark showed off "Junkasaurus" on his Instagram there were two problems with it. The big one is that it used a repaint of Crashbar that never happened, so unless you wanted to double up on him you're short a Junkion. The smaller problem, but one that still kind of rubbed people the wrong way, is that while you had Scraphook as one leg, you needed either Axlegrease (canonically a Junkion, despite not matching, but a Decepticon when the other three are with the Autobots) or Towline (an Autobot, but also not matching because he's not actually a Junkion). Well, I was screwing around on The App Formerly Known as Twitter and came across some alternative ideas. Turns out you can make a pretty good Robo Rex with just the three Autobot-aligned rust-colored ones (Scraphook, Crashbar, and Trashmaster). The configuration I went with isn't using Crashbar's torso, his rear wheel, Scraphook's spare tire, or the bits from the front of Trashmaster's cab. Mind you, I've seen people incorporate them. In fact, you can find homes for the wheels pretty easily. But there isn't really a good spot for Crashbar; the best-looking one I'd seen had him sitting on Junkasaurus' back, but he wasn't actually attached. Likewise, while you can find places to but Trashmaster's cab the way I'd seen that looked the best doesn't allow the dinosaur legs to be pegged in all the way, and the joints are loose enough as it is. But, there's a reason I left the wheels off the dinosaur. It ain't pretty, but the leftover but plugging the cab into Crashbar's thighs, folding out the shoulders, and plugging the wheels into them sort of makes for a little rover. As for the dinosaur, start with Trashmaster in truck mode. Pull off his legs, his cab, the arms for lifting dumpsters, and his claw, then turn him upside-down. Grab Scraphook and pull off his front end and hook. Now, plug the orange pipes that come with Crashbar into Trashmaster where his cab was, with the pipes curving down toward the top of his cab. Those pipes basically turned the 5mm ports on Trashmaster into pegs that'll allow you to plug most of Scraphook onto them. Take Crashbar's left leg, the one made from the front of his alt mode, and plug it into the port on the back of Scraphook, then plug Scraphook's hook (with the actual hook part swapped to the top of the boom) into Crashbar's toe to make a tail. Take the front end from Scraphook and split it into two legs with the feet folded out. Use the pegs on knees to plug them into Trashmaster's feet, which are still folded up in their alt mode position. Plug Trashmaster's own knee pegs into the barrels of Crashbar's gun-ish accessories, arrange the joints until they look like dinosaur legs, then use pegs on the sides of Crashbar's accessories to plug them into Scraphook's doors. Take Crashbar's arms and use the 5mm ports on them to plug into Trashmaster's thighs so that the spikes on the shoulders are pointing outward and the elbows are curled up opposite Trashmaster's thighs. Take Crashbar's other leg, and plug the 5mm port at the knee into a hole on the gray top of the claw. Plug Trashmaster's hydraulic arms into the 5mm ports on either side of the seat on Crashbar's leg, so that they make a U on either side and leave 5mm pegs near Crashbar's ankle. Plug those pegs into Crashbar's hands to attach the head and neck of the dino to the body. Finally, you can give him little T-Rex arms by plugging Scraphook's exhaust pipes into the 5mm ports on Trashmaster's forearms, just behind his wrists, then I plugged Scraphook's engine parts into the 5mm ports on the inside edges of the exhaust pipes. I think the dino mode looks pretty good. It can open it's jaws, has a little up/down tilt on the head, shoulder swivels, hip swivels, thigh swivels, digitigrade knee and ankle bends, and even a little side-to-side swishing on the tail. But be advised, on my copy the joints in the legs are a bit weak for supporting that much weight, and using the hydraulic arms to connect it's head to it's torso by way of what's really just Crashbar's curled elbows and and the connection between Trashmaster and Scraphook, just a pair of pipes, are a bit precarious. That makes this dino mode ok for display, but it'll fall apart if you play with it.

So I'm looking at this picture... And I kind of don't know what to think. I mean, like Evan said, this isn't the completed artwork because they were deliberately hiding some future reveals and most of what we see here is what we saw today- Windblade, Magneous, Bouldercrash, two other rock dudes (one of which looks like a straight repaint of Magneous), Tigerhawk, Tasmania Kid, Thundertron, Optimus, Bumblebee, and Chase. What we didn't get announced today but are clearly in the picture is Magmatron, the guy made out of dinosaurs in the middle and big bad from Beast Wars Neo, and up in the upper right we have Tidal Wave from Armada. Now, full disclosure, I was told that Tidal Wave was coming, but I wasn't told what class. What I was told is that he'd work with Legacy Megatron (and United Galvatron, whom you can expect in the third wave, some time next summer), so the assumption was that he'd be Commander-class. Magmatron, though, that's a surprise to me. Now, I didn't watch Beast Wars Neo, I have no idea how big Magmatron is supposed to be, but my gut reaction is that he can't be that big, so he must be the Commander. And a lot of people have be asking for a Titan Tidal Wave, so maybe he's the Titan after all? Except, if you look next to him in the picture you can see Megatron. And if you look closely, that's a chunk of Tidal Wave on his arm. And Magmatron is made of three dinosaurs. Maybe he's the Titan and Tidal Wave is the Commander after all? Or maybe they're taking my advice and doing two Commander and ditching the Titan class? I dunno. EDIT: Yeah, you can pretty much disregard like that whole paragraph. Talked to my source, and he's now confirming that Magmatron is the Commander-class, and Tidal Wave is the Titan. From what I was told Magmatron will be able to do the three separate beast modes, the combined "magmasaurus" alt mode, and the combined robot mode. As for Tidal Wave, parts of him will come off and can be attached to Megatron (or Galvatron, who should be hitting around the same time), but unlike the original you won't attach to the whole figure to him. Anywho... The way I understood it is that there isn't a new Transformers Haslab this year because they want to do one for the 40th anniversary (which is fine with me, because I'd rather have the previous one I paid for in-hand before I back another). And yeah, they definitely said "Omega" when they talked about it. It's just that... well, an Animated Haslab for the franchise's 40th anniversary seems kind of odd to me. It really feels like it should be something G1... but what? I mean, as much as I gripe about the G1 characters that still haven't been done, there aren't really that many left, and short of combiner nothing that really jumps out at me as needed a Haslab to get made. Then there's that "Omega" reference. We already got G1 Omega Supreme, plus the Omega Guardian repaint. Only two other Omegas really jump out at me- Animated Omega, as we've already discussed, and Omega Prime, the fusion of Optimus Prime and Ultra Magnus in RID 2001, which still isn't G1. That said, between those two, I really hope it's Omega Prime. I know how much you love Animated Omega, but RID Optimus/Car Robots Fire Convoy has been super high on my wishlist since I started collecting again in 2006. Like I said, he never appeared in the cartoon. I remember his original toy coming out and me skipping it for that very reason. At some point there were plans for a 4th season of Prime that would have been about the Star Seekers, a group of pirates from Cybertron's 13 colonies, of which Thundertron is the leader, but it never happened. He did appear in the novel Transformers: Retribution, but that's about it. Here's the original toy: Yes... and technically that's cartoon-accurate on Starscream. No. You actually can expect Silverbolt in the second wave, but he'll be a new Voyager, not a repaint Leader. When Kilauea erupted a few years ago I remember watching a Youtube video of slowly engulfing a 4th-gen Mustang. To me, those Infernac dudes remind me of that Mustang, like if instead of catching fire and melting it somehow busted out with cooled lava still stuck to it. And boo, if you're going to bring back Rock Lords, man up and bring back actual Rock Lords. Nuggit's my boy. In any case, I keep hearing people (like you two) expressing interest in these Infernac guys, so while I stand by my belief that Hasbro should stop doing these gimmicky original characters you gave me FOMO and I wound up preordering both Bouldercrash and Magneous.😩

Ugh, I fell asleep (you try getting your crap done while taking care of an 8yo who's mom left the country for a month), and by the time I got on Pulse Windblade sold out. (EDIT: Got a preorder on Amazon) I wound up preordering everything else United except both rock guys. If I'm being honest they do look cooler than I imagined, but I think I'm morally opposed to giving Hasbro any more money on these original characters that exist entirely as gimmicks. And, frankly, I might cancel Tigerhawk. I just wasn't that into Beast Wars (good story when I eventually watched it as an adult, but robots turning into animals never grabbed me like robots turning into trucks and planes), and I'm loathe to open my wallet for Leader money on such a minor character. Also while being tighter with my wallet I passed on Powerlinx Hot Shot. I know, with G1 I throw money at all sorts of obscure repaints, but I dunno, regular yellow Hotshot is enough representation of that character for me. If they do Energon Hotshot, or when they do Cybertron Hot Shot, sure, but I don't need the one I have with his colors inverted (even if I do kind of want Jolt).

Maybe don't get too excited. I was hearing that Tidal Wave was going to have compatibility with Armada Megatron and expected him to be the Commander-class. But the reveal of Magmatron on the poster and the subtle "you know Thundertron's ship" comment makes me think Tidal Wave might be the Titan after all. Magmatron is actually a surprise for me, I'd heard nothing about him, but I have a feeling he's the Commander.

Pulsecon's started. I'm expecting the following in United (EDIT: Nailed it) Core-class Energon Megatron: Looks good, wish it was Voyager. Core-class Tasmanian Kid: Meh. I mean, I appreciate that they're trying to do ALL the continuities, but Beast Wars II is pretty obscure, and we already got Leo Prime. But it's also just a Core-class, so I can't be mad. Core-class Bouldercrash: So the rock guys don't even turn into rocks? Yeah, I'm out. Deluxe-class Animated Bumblebee: He looks OK-ish. Head's still to Animated to be G1-ish, body's too G1-ish to be Animated. Deluxe-class Cyberverse Windlblade: This one I want. Cyberverse is my favorite Windblade, and there hasn't been a really good Windblade yet. Deluxe-class Rescue Bots Chase: I was a bit nervous about Rescue Bots joining Generations, but he looks surprisingly great. I wonder what remold they're hinting at, though... I'm not aware of any mainline figures that'd fit, but like I said I'm not clear on what Gen Selects are coming next year. I kind of hope it's a version of Barricade. Deluxe-class Magneous: Re-read what I wrote about Bouldercrash, except worse because he's wasting a Deluxe spot. Voyager-class Animated Optimus Prime: Looks surprisingly good, still not loving the Animated revival though. Voyager-class Prime Thundertron: On the one hand he looks kind of good. But on the other hand, like I complaibed about earlier, we're wasting a mainline Voyager slot on a Prime character that never appeared on the cartoon. At least they're hinting at Tidal Wave. Leader-class Beast Wars Tigerhawk: Cool for people who are really into Beast Wars, but Tigerhawk appeared in all of three episodes and I can't help but feel like there are other, better characters that could fill the slot. Leader-class Optimus Prime: Turned out to be Laser Optimus. Not sure what's getting revealed in Studio Series. Turned out to be none! The rest is older, known stuff. Robosen Grimlock and Powerlinx Hot Shot.

I'm not counting on it. I don't think there's anything left for Gen Selects this year, although I suppose they could announce something for early next year. But as far as regular retail goes I was already let in on almost everything that's coming out in 2024. I mean, there's a few that I need clarification on, like I know there's a Leader-class Optimus Prime in the first wave of Unite but I don't know which Optimus Prime. And I don't know what what the Titan will be (but if I were a betting man I'd say Animated Omega Supreme).

Life's been a bit hectic, but I've got our third new Legacy Evolution figure after Shadow Striker and Core Snarl. This one is Voyager-class Trashmaster. My initial impression out of the gate was a bit underwhelmed. He's pretty short for a Voyager, roughly around the height of a Seeker or slightly taller than the Deluxe-class Siege or Earthrise Vanettes. His colors are a bit muted, too. I mean, sure, the Junkion in general are a lot of browns, grays, and orangy-reds, but I can't help but notice there's a lot of molded detail that's just the color of the part it was molded onto that was actually colored on Mark Maher's concept art, like big silver pistons on his shins, red ears, and red on his feet. Hasbro wasn't just skimping on size and paint, but plastic as well. You can't really see because his backpack is covering it, but his entire midsection is hollow. Look around that dangling hunk of kibble and the backs of his thighs are hollow, too, as is the back of his head. Weirdly, it's the front of his hands that are hollow. Most of that hollowness doesn't really bother me as much as the lazy kibble flap, though. To be fair, it does have a purpose, but when you see what it is you'll likely still wonder why they couldn't have folded it away better. If I had to guess, I'd reckon that a lot of Trashmaster's budget is his accessories. You've got a big claw, but you also have some hydraulic arms and two parts that look like the front end of a truck. Trashmaster's head swivels fine, but it has very minimal tilt. His shoulders rotate and move laterally a little over 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend about 120 degrees. His wrists and waist swivel. His hips move 90 degrees forward and laterally, but his butt kibble means he can only realistically get about 45 degrees backward. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet have excellent up/down tilts, and his ankles pivot about 45 degrees. Trashmaster can hold the claw in either hand. His instructions indicate that the hydraulic arms should plug into his hip skirts, where they just get in the way, and the truck nose parts tab together then plug into the kibble flap on his butt, making it even bigger and more obnoxious. Well, at least the hydraulic arms and truck nose do not have to be removed for transformation. As far as ports go, Trashmaster has one on the back of each shoulder, two on the back of each forearm, one on the side of each forearm, two on his backpack, two on his butt kibble (that are mostly likely occupied by the truck nose), one on each hip skirt (that are probably being used by the hydraulic arms, but the arms also have a 5mm port each, so it's a wash), on the outside of each leg between the tires, and under each foot. Additionally, the rims on every tire have hexagonal ports in the middle. Oh, and as a Junkion Trashmaster's lower legs are 5mm pegged into his thighs and can be removed and replaced with another Junkion's leg (or a Core Volcanicus leg). Unlike the Deluxes, though, his arms do not come off. If the massive kibble flap on his butt wasn't indication enough, transforming Trashmaster will clue you to the fact that engineering is also not where Hasbro allocated his budget. The transformation is simple bordering on Core-class... head tucks in, backpack covers over, arms fold back behind him, waist rotates 180, legs lock together, chest untabs so his lower body folds back and his arms tab into his legs, then the kibble flap with the front of the truck tucks in under the chest. Arrange the hydraulic arms and tab his claw into his hands and you're done. At least the resulting truck does seem to scale nicely with Junkions like Scraphook and Axlegrease. Garbage trucks are one of those alt modes that are criminally underutilized, so I want to be in Trashmaster's corner. That said, there's a real lack of cohesion here. Half of the cab made from his chest is orange, but the half made from the kibble is brown and the tiny portion that's actually the flap it's connected to is yet another shade of brown. His smokestacks have silver paint on the top, they gray from a randomly gray part it's attached to in the middle, then orange on the bottom. And, this last bit's subjective, but frankly I could do without the rust-tones and spikes. I don't want a garbage truck that looks like it rolled off the set of a Mad Max movie, I want a green and white Waste Management truck. All of Trashmaster's accessories are integral to his alt mode. His claw covers his robot arms and acts like the top of the trash container. The claw itself can even open while attached, and you can imagine garbagemen tossing trash into the rear. But wait, is he supposed to be a rear-loader or a front-loader? The fact that the rear is covered and the claw opens at the back suggests rear, but the hood over the cab and the hydraulic arms suggest that he should be a front-loader. Although they lack the spokes that allow it to actually grip a Dumpster, that's the only purpose those arms serve. But, if they did pick up a dumpster, trash would roll off the closed back of the truck and back into the street. Of course, the Junkion gimmick hasn't been full executed if it's only a robot-mode thing. So yes, you can pull the truck kibble off, and yes, you can swap it with another Junkion's. What you can't do, though, is make the gestalt Junkasaurus that Mark showed off on his Instagram account. I'll say that's partly because Trashmaster's joints are a little loose and a lot of the connections are just 5mm ports. But the main reason is because, as shown on Mark's Instagram, you need two Crashbars. Hmm... I wonder if we'll see a Crashbar repaint? I kind of hope so, frankly, he was the best of the Legacy Junkions. As for Trashmaster, he's just ok. I mean, his articulation is fine, and I do appreciate that he's a garbage truck. I'm just not entirely sure I'm getting my money's worth, and I can't help but feel that a bit more paint might have gotten him where I needed him to be. At the very least, I can say I like him better than Scraphook, and I do appreciate some extra Junkion's to round out Wreck-Gar's squad, but at the same time there's a lot of characters I could use new Voyager toys for that I'd rather have than an original character Junkion. If you liked the other Legacy Junkions then Trashmaster is worth a look, but if you passed on the previous ones there's nothing here that's going to make you change your mind. With Trashmaster out of the way... what if I told you that we've covered all the new molds for this wave?

I mean, from Nintendo's POV, with their financial reserves and corporate culture, I get why they would find such a merger/acquisition, especially with an American company, completely out of the question. You have to admit, though, that it made (and honestly, still makes) a ton of sense from Microsoft's position. They were coming off the 360, which was quite popular everywhere except Japan. Meanwhile while the Wii sold gangbusters the Wii U was struggling, and at least some of the perception was because Nintendo was focused on gimmicky, underpowered hardware. If Microsoft bought Nintendo, or they merged, the result would be a library of strong 1st party titles on Microsoft's hardware, hardware that would have better parity with Sony's, and hardware that could be marketed as a Nintendo console and potentially finally allow Microsoft to crack the Japanese market.

*sigh* I'm not going to kid myself, I'm probably buying both because you can never have too many Bumblebees and Primes. But I haven't been this unenthusiastic for new figures since before Siege when I was thinking about quitting entirely. EDIT: Bee and Prime are pretty much confirmation that the leaks are spot on. So you can expect the other three Deluxes to be Cyberverse Windblade, Rescue Bots Chase, and Magneous, the first of Unite's rock guys that are replacing Junkions as the line's gimmick. The other Voyager should be Prime Thunderhawk, and the Leaders will be Beast Wars Thunderhawk and some kind of Optimus Prime. So, yeah, I'll reserve judgement until I see the figures (likely at Pulsecon on Thursday). But the only figure I'm sure I'm going to want is Windblade, and I'm questioning why Hasbro (who still has pegs full of Animated Prowl and Crosscut clogging up shelves) thinks we want a G1-ified version of a Prime character who was never in the cartoon. Tigerhawk's not much better; I think BW fans will probably be into him, but for most people we're talking about spending Leader money on a character that was only in three episodes. As for Leader Optimus, I think it really depends on what Leader Optimus. Is it a package refresh of Earthrise or Legacy Optimus? Is it a new mold? If it's a new mold, which Optimus is it? And I really think that, no matter what, I'm out on the rock dudes. Bad enough that Hasbro wasted three Deluxe slots and a Voyager on original character Junkions (plus released a repaint of Hound while the actual Hound languishes in limbo as a store-exclusive that's on indefinite hold so said store can get more movie toys out), at least they helped bulk out Wreck-Gar's crew. No way am I rewarding Hasbro for filling slots with guys that turn into rocks (that aren't even based on Rock Lords) when characters like Gears and Windcharger need doing.

Continuing with the final wave of Legacy Evolution we have another new mold... albeit a Core-class. This one is Snarl. Despite his small size, Snarl is a pretty decent, cartoon-style representation of the character. Granted, he's not perfect. You can see the dino legs on the sides of his robot legs, and his largely-hollow tail is kind of backward. From the back and sides, we can also see that he's lacking some of the plates higher on his back, and instead he's got a big gray lump. Concessions are definitely being made to the fact that he has to combine. Still, compared to some of the other Core-class Dinobots (especially Sludge) he's got one of the best bot modes. The good times continue to his accessories. While the rest of the team have accessories that have to double as their dino tails or gestalt hands, Snarl gets his sword. And it's just a nice, little sword. The good news keeps coming! For a Core-class figure his articulation is also pretty good. His head swivels. His shoulders are ball joints that swivel and move laterally just under 90 degrees. Plus, due to his transformation, he can butterfly his arms across his chest. His elbows bend past 90 degrees, until his wrist gets to his shoulders. Sadly, there's no bicep or wrist swivels, but hey, he does have a waist swivel. His hips are ball joints that can go 90 degrees forward and backward, and nearly 90 degrees laterally. His thighs don't have swivels, just what you can manage around the ball joints. His knees bend over 90 degrees, and he has no foot articulation. He can hold his sword just fine in either hand. One side has a tab on the hilt, and it can plug into a slot on his back for storage... although the tolerance isn't that great. I have a hard time getting it plugged in so it'll stay. Transforming Snarl is pretty easy. His arms curl up, his legs fold over with the dino head flipping out, and you just close his tail over his head. As with the robot mode, it's heavily cartoon-influenced. That being said, the dino mode is definitely a bit weaker than the bot mode. From some angles it's not too bad, but from the side or back you can see that his tail is way too small, his rear hips are too low on his body, his robot fists are still very visible, and his rear dino feet are just molded in place and not colored. Oh, and he's still got that gray lump, now on his butt. And he's basically a brick in this mode. His arms/rear legs actually tab into his sides, so they have no articulation. And his front legs are basically molded details on his robot legs; that is' the entire lower leg is a single part, so his dino legs don't move. And his head? Yeah, it doesn't move either. His jaws don't even open. At least he has a place to put his sword. There's a slot on his robot chest so the sword can hang out under the Stegosaurus, just like the Leader-class Studio Series figure. As with the slot on his back, though, I find the tolerance a bit off and the sword doesn't like to stay attached. And finally we have Snarl's leg mode. There's a bit of partsforming involved here. You have to pull his back off. This will allow you to flip out the 5mm combiner peg. Plus, the slots where his back was tabbed into now serve as connection points for tabs on his heels, as the dino head stays inside his legs and his hips move back so that his legs don't fold entirely over. His shoulders butterfly over his chest, tab together, then tab into his crotch, then his back reattaches to his forearms serve as the toes of the foot. The instructions indicate that you should store is sword by plugging it into his back, but it's kind of out-of-place on Volcanicus' foot. Speaking of Volcanicus, with all six Dinobots we can finally complete him! He's pretty tiny, at slightly taller than the Deluxe-class Power of the Primes Dinobots. That makes the entire combiner smaller than a single Studio Series Dinobot! Aesthetically, I do like some of the things they've done. Like, the combined Slag/sludge torso looks a lot better than the stock POTP Volcanicus, who I had to modify with an upgrade kit. But little Volcanicus could probably use an upgrade kit of his own. His legs have kind of weird proportions; I'd almost suggest mistransforming him so that Snarl and Grimlock's legs are straightened out to make his legs longer, but it turns out that Grimlock winds up being a bit taller than Snarl that way. I think he's also hurt by the lack of proper feet. I guess he's not too bad from the back, ignoring that Snarl's butt sticks out from his back and Sludge's head is just kind of there (assuming it didn't fall off). His lower legs are too-thick front-to-back, and somewhat gappy. The worst thing might be his arms, though. Although both Swoop and Snarl theoretically have waist swivels that could be bicep swivels in their arm modes, their own robot arms are in the way. Combine that with a lack of wrist swivels and you wind up with a permanently gorilla-armed Volcanicus. Which, you know, figures into his articulation. So, his head is on a swivel, no tilt. His shoulders swivel on their 5mm pegs, and hinges allow them to move laterally a bit under 90 degrees. As I said, he might have bicep swivels, but they're blocked by the armbots's own arms. Their hips and knees act kind of like elbows, but they're only going to curl inward, and he's got no wrist articulation. He does have a waist swivel, though. His hips can go 90 degrees forward and backward, and about 60 degrees laterally. His knees bend 90 degrees, and since they're attached via 5mm pegs they also serve as this thigh swivels. I don't think it's fair to say that he has no foot articulation, it's more accurate to say that he lacks feet entirely. A few other things to note... while manipulating him you can expect two things. First, Sludge's head is bound to pop off his back. Second, Grimlock's dino head isn't locked in place at all, and it has a tendency to get shifted upward and reveal his robot head. The other thing I'll point out is that the gestalt's hands, poor as they are, have 5mm ports. So if you want a weapon for him, turns out he works great with the sword that came with the old Fall of Cybertron Grimlock. Which is great for me, since I still have the sword despite giving away the figure itself. Now that we've looked at the whole set, was it worth it? Honestly, probably not. I mean, I'm not opposed to Core-class Dinobots per se, even knowing that Hasbro's Core-class figures are pretty basic. But the reality is that Snarl is probably the least-compromised by the combining gimmick, and he's still suffering from some compromises. Guys like Sludge were seriously boned by the gimmick. That might be ok if the gestalt itself was good, but it too seems compromised with a lack of arm articulation and chunky, short legs with no feet. And what is this even supposed to be displayed with? I suppose if you put him with a Titan-class figure it makes the Titan look huge, but we don't have any other Core-class combiners for him to pair with. So I guess I don't really recommend Volcanicus, or buying all the Dinobots to make Volcanicus. That said, Snarl's really not a bad little Snarl, and I actually do recommend him if you've already been buying the Core-class Dinobots and are just looking to complete the set, since he's probably the best one. One final elephant I want to address in the room... I've been saying pretty much since it was revealed that Slag and Sludge were announced as the torso parts of version of Volcanicus that would use six Dinobots that this is pretty obviously a pretool for Monstructor/Dinoking. If/when that happens I may do a deeper look at how the individual guys stack up, but for now just looking at Volcanicus I feel like Hasbro's doing him dirty if this is the only version we ever get. I mean, yes, I know the original G1 Monstuctor was the smallest combiner. But with compromised engineering, no feet, and molds that seem to be Dinobots first despite the obvious repaint I don't feel like this is going to be an adequate Monstructor/Dinoking. I think the Pretender Monsters/Dinoforce deserve to be done at the very least as six Deluxes that combine to make a Monstructor/Dinoking around the same height as the Combiner Wars/PotP gestalts, designed to be a more accurate Monstructor/Dinoking with better engineering and fewer compromises and Dinobot repaints as more compromised repaints, if necessary.

Pulsecon is this week, and with the final wave of Legacy Evolution I expect that they'll start showing off the new trilogy. And with that in mind, apparently Legacy UNI(verse? cron?) Animated Bumblebee has leaked. Kind of interesting that they toned down Prowl's chin to make him aesthetically more homogenous with the other WfC/Legacy releases, but Bee keeps his Animated head but gets a more generic body. I can't help but notice that the nose of the car is on his heels, not his toes. Maybe tell me who this is a pretool for, and I'll skip to that one. I'm not feeling this one.

Getting back to the final wave of Legacy Evolution figures, we have our first totally new mold, Deluxe-class Shadow Striker. Right out of the gate, two things jump at me. One, she's thinner but basically the same height as your average Deluxe-class car. Two, aside from her head and predominantly purple color, she really doesn't resemble the character who was one of the more prominent Decepticons in Transformers Cyberverse. I actually had to double check her packaging, but no, it says right there that this is the Cyberverse character. Then why isn't her chest made from the car hood? Where are her big boots with the wheels in the heels and the pair of toes? Where's the windows on her forearms? Instead she's got an engine block for a chest, wheels on her thighs, narrow shins with v-shaped bands wrapped around them, and long, thin feet with big heels on the back. And the reason for all of this becomes clear when you look into the history of Shadow Striker. Sure, she had an original design and was a main character for Cyberverse, but the first use of a character named Shadow Striker seems to be in 3H's Universe comics that were made to support the 2003 Official Transformers Collector's Club set, which invented sisters named Shadow Striker and Roulette who were both repaints of the 2001 Robots In Disguise Sideburn toy with new heads. And with that information handy, you can see that yeah, they used her Cyberverse head, and yeah, they used her Cyberverse black and purple colors instead of the black, blue, and gold colors used on the 2003 Universe toy, but from the neck down that's definitely Sideburn (and wouldn't you know it, according to the leakers Sideburn's coming in 2024, so...). I guess I should be thankful that they cleaned up Sideburns design, eh? There's still a fair amount of kibble on the back, but Legacy Shadow Striker at least folds it into something like a cape or wings instead of just hanging out there, plus she's got wheels on her back like she does in Cyberverse instead of one on her right forearm and the other Primus knows where (seriously, look at the 2001 RID toy and find that forth wheel). Shadow Striker comes with a few accessories, and unfortunately most of them seem to be bits of her alt mode. The largest piece is her entire roof, but there's also her rear end. Her final accessory is a gun with blade-like edges that are somewhat evocative of the original Sideburn/2003 Shadow Striker's, but with a bigger 5mm port for a barrel. Shadow Striker's head is on a ball joint with the ball in her torso instead of her head. She can look down very well and swivel, but she lacks any real upward or sideways tilt. Her shoulders are just weird. You might notice that they're back a bit far, ad it's because they're not attached to the sides of her torso. Rather, they're attached to the front of her backpack. So the shoulders are actually turned sideways and the hinge that's usually for lateral movement is her up/down swivel, and the swivel is her lateral movement (well over 90 degrees). She has bicep swivels, which you'll need to use if you want to pose her with her arms raise and moved laterally, and 90 degrees of elbow bend. Her wrists swivel, as does her waist. Her hips can go 90 degrees forward, backward, or laterally. Her thighs swivel, and her knees bend 90 degrees. Her feet can't tilt down, but they can tilt all the way up to her shins for transformation, and she's got 90 degrees of ankle pivot. She can hold her gun in either hand. Additionally, she has 5mm ports on either forearm, in the middle of her back, one on top of her backpack behind her head, one on each of her calves, and one in each heel. If you take her roof kibble and peg it into her forearm the resemblance to Sideburn becomes even more unmistakable, even if Sideburn's kibble was actually on his shoulder. Which leaves her rear end. The roof kibble actually has its own 5mm port, so you could just stick it there. The instructions tell you to stick it into the barrel of her gun, apparently to kind of mimic a missile accessory from the original Sideburn toy. Shadow Striker's gun has a 5mm peg on the back, so she can also hold it like a club or a... sword? And the rear of the car can also fit on her forearms; I personally like sticking it on the opposite arm as the roof. Alternatively, if you'd rather just store it all away you can lift one of her wings to find a 3mm hole. A 3mm peg allows her gun to be stored there, then you can plug the rear of the car onto her roof and the roof into the 5mm port on her back. Fair warning, the gun will be tucked away just fine but the roof sticks off her back pretty far. Shadow Striker's transformation is definitely different. That chunk of the car's nose with the red pentagon is her crotch. Her chest opens up and unfurls the rest of the hood which covers her waist and hips. Her backpack and shoulders fold out on an armature that stretches her shoulders all the way to the rear of the car, and her legs bend 180 degrees backward to form the bottom, and her arms fold down so that they tab into her calves. Her wings fold in to make the sides of the car, and then the roof goes into place, either because you're just plugging it on now or because she can actually transform without removing it from her forearm. The rear of the car does need to be partsformed into place, though; there isn't enough room behind her head in robot mode for it to stay in place. Her alt mode is a bit of a weird one. I mean, I know Hasbro's probably too cheap to license a Sideburn's Dodge Viper alt mode, and from the front windshield back she looks passably like a less angular version of her Cyberverse alt mode. Her rear is weirdly gappy, though. Aside from the engine block, which isn't part of her Cyberverse alt mode, her front end has no resemblance to a Viper whatsoever. The headlights look a bit like her Cyberverse car but the overall shape is inverted. Instead of having angular sides that sit higher and extend further than the midsection they're lower and shorter. Ultimately, it's neither the aggressive, angular appearance of her Cyberverse alt nor does it look much like the rounded front end of Sideburn's. With her roof and rear attached, that just leaves you looking for a place to store her gun. Realistically, the only place you can put it is the 5mm port on her roof. That said, her rear still has a 5mm port on it. A small tab on the back means you're not really going to able to plug the gun into it, but you could grab an effect part from another figure and make it look like flames are coming out of her exhaust like the Batmobile. I think it's fair to say that I have mixed feelings about Shadow Striker. Aside from her odd shoulders, she does have pretty good articulation and she's got one of the more interesting transformations I've seen lately. On the other hand, her robot mode is far more Sideburn than Cyberverse Shadow Striker, and her car mode is kind of an ugly neither. And the problem that I'm starting to run into with Transformers is that Hasbro seems more keen than ever to reuse molds, but as they branch out from G1 I'm less interesting in owning the same mold again and again. Give me multiple Datsuns and Seekers? Sure. Give me a Sideburn pretool that doesn't really resemble the character she's supposed to be, though, and now I'm wondering if I really wanted this figure or if I'd rather have Sideburn, because I kind of don't want both. I suppose, with the limited knowledge that I have now, I think I'd rather have Shadow Striker, since Cyberverse was pretty good but Robots in Disguise (2001) honestly wasn't. That said, if I knew for 100% certain that Hasbro was also planning on rounding out the core RID cast with Prowl, X-Brawn, and Optimus Prime I'd probably go with Sideburn over Shadow Striker. Make of that what you will.