mikeszekely

I bought a new family car over the weekend, so when my wife was all, "we're out of bananas" and my daughter's going, "I want chocolate ice cream!" a late run to Walmart seemed like a perfectly reasonable excuse to play with my new toy. And while I was there I found some other toys, namely Rise of the Beasts (non-Studio Series) Voyager-class figures. So let's have a look, starting with Optimus Prime. So, I wonder what qualifies a toy for Studio Series or not. After looking at a few Deluxes, my best guess would be budget... that is, despite being labeled as the same classes, and despite those classes having the same price points, that the ROTB (and Earthspark) toys are cheaper for Hasbro than a Studio Series (or Legacy) figure. And Optimus Prime might be the most obvious proof of that being the case. We'd been able to see in the CGI of the trailer and other early promotional materials that Optimus in Rise of the Beasts is like 95% the same as Optimus in Bumblebee. So here's ROTB Prime with Studio Series BB Prime, and just, man. I mean, ROTB Prime is significantly smaller. There's clearly less paint overall on the ROTB toy, too, but so much of what isn't painted (and some of what is) is like the cheapest, ugliest gray plastic. It looks cheaper. The engineering is a lot simpler too, which leaves the steps dangling from his forearms (two more hinges would have broke the bank?), gaps in the shoulders, less mechanical details on his back, and wheels on his back that don't hide away. The gray plastic is more dominant from the rear, as you realize that his lower legs and feet are made from it and Hasbro just threw a little blue paint on his shins and toes. The cheapness even extends to his rifle, which is supposed to the the same one from the first movie and not the arm cannon from the trailer. Not only is it (top) smaller than the Studio Series one (bottom), it's more hollow and has far fewer and simpler details molded onto it. Prime's head can swivel, no tilt. His shoulders rotate and can extend laterally over 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and although his elbows are single hinges they bend well beyond 90 degrees. His wrists are ball joints. It's tight, but they do swivel, and they bend inward for transformation. The molded details on his abs get caught on a hinge in his waist, so he has only a very limited waist swivel, but due to transformation he has a swivel below the chest, too. The aforementioned hinge is for transformation, but it can be used as an ab crunch. His hips can go about 90 degrees forward, 45 degrees backward, and 90 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet have good up and down tilt in addition to about 45 degrees of ankle pivot. Prime can hold his rifle in either hand. The rifle can also be stored in a 5mm port on Prime's back, although you have to open the tires a bit to make room for the barrel. Transforming ROTB Prime has a lot of similar notes to the Studio series toy. He still rotates 180 degrees at the chest, his arms still tuck into the sides, kibble on his arms fills in the sides of the cab while kibble from his back fills in the front, fuel tanks fold out of his thighs etc. The reduced budget makes ROTB Prime's transformation smoother and less finnicky, though. Things tuck into place and panels tab down solidly. He is still smaller, though. One would imagine that an eventual Studio Series toy of ROTB Prime will be more film accurate. Like, he's got the new metal bars on the front of the cab, but the lights should be on the red part of the cab, not the bumper. The naked gray plastic "silver" stripe on the front of the cab should wrap around to the sides and then angle upward, and they don't. The fuel tanks should be round, not square. And, y'know, there's those big gray feet running along the back. With their hollowed-out soles Prime almost looks like a dump truck! More hinges to fold the flaps on the smokestacks over would be nice, too, but they are at least on the actual truck. Prime does have a hitch inside his follow feet, and you use it to store the rifle. There's notches on both sides for the magazine to sit in, too, so the rifle can either face backward like he's shooting 'Cons chasing him, or you can turn it around so the barrel's pointing into the cab for a more stowed look. What the hitch doesn't do, at least not well, is pull a trailer. The simple fact is that putting the hitch on the bottom of his feet, and folding his feet on top of his shins for truck mode, simply makes the back of the truck too tall. I'm not going to lie, the downright cheap appearance of this figure out of the package left a pretty negative impression on me. But after handling him for awhile, credit where it's due, ROTB Prime has good articulation, better proportions than the Studio Series Bumblebee Prime, and a more pleasant transformation. The truck mode isn't the most-accurate, but it's in the ballpark and recognizably Optimus Prime. And, I think we're getting to the real difference between the main ROTB line and Studio Series. It's not (exactly) budget, it's the audience. Studio Series is aimed at adult collectors, so it needs to look a little more premium. It can afford a little more complex engineering. And the ROTB line is the action figures for the kids. Can't comment on the "for kids" part, but I can confirm, ROTB Prime is a great action figure. He's just fun to put into dynamic poses. He's the kind of figure you can quickly flip back and forth between modes. Sure, he's not going to be the prettiest Prime in a display, but he's a Prime that's good for playing with, and I think that ultimately earns him a recommend from me (with the caveat that I'd like to see a good Studio Series version later).

Are you referring to the earth-mode retool of Siege Hound? It seems like Target delayed it, but it's on Hasbro's schedule for 2023 store exclusives.

Word on the street was correct, and Prime is live now on Pulse.

Word on the street is that preorders for Armada Optimus will go up on Tuesday the 18th.

It's a huge install, but at least the CPU/GPU requirements aren't insane like some recent releases.

Yeah, I'm not sure where I'm landing on this one. It's more G1 than T30 Metroplex, but still borrows some of T30’s design cues. And it's going to be smaller than T30. From the pictures they put up of the prototype with Magic Square's Devastator it doesn't look much bigger than Maketoys Utopia. Can't really say I need another Utopia-sized Metroplex, but if it's at least as big as the Titan Ark I might bite. I think they were saying 789 yuan, a little under $110 before retailer markups and international shipping. TFSource has it up for preorder at $220, which already didn't strike me as too bad considering it's cheaper than most Fans Toys releases, but the final price from a store line ShowZ could be closer to $150-180. Now, sure, $200 is still $200, and depending on their financial situation that might be a significant amount to spend on a toy robot for some people. But it's pretty close to what Hasbro charges for their Titans. For a 3P figure that size that's relatively cheap.

This may never apply to Transforms, and even if it does you can bet that it won't be until after Legacy Evolution. It's an encouraging sign, though. Personally, I don't actually mind the cardboard inserts, paper ties, or the accessories wrapped in tissue paper taped to the cardboard insert, but I utterly loathe the lack of a plastic window on everything smaller than Leader, so fingers crossed.

The third figure in the pack is Deluxe-class Wheeljack. More than any of the other Rise of the Beasts designs, I think Wheeljack's has the fandom extra riled up. In one camp, you have the fans arguing that different Transformers continuities have characters with radically different designs as other same-named characters, it's unreasonable to expect ROTB Wheeljack to look more like G1 Wheeljack, and that ROTB Wheeljack is perfectly good design on his own. In the other camp, you have the people pointing out that this isn't a different continuity, that Bumblebee had an established Wheeljack design and it wouldn't have the VFX team on ROTB to use the Bumblebee head and trade in the brown for green and red. I guess you could say I was leaning toward the second group... I don't mind if he's a van instead of a sports car, and I didn't feel like the sky was falling just because they didn't stick with a design closer to Bumblebee, but I definitely would have preferred if they kept it closer to Bumblebee. That was before I got this figure in hand. Now, I haven't seen Wheeljack's CGI model, so I don't know how accurate this toy is or not. And going in, sure, I knew he had the big goggles and no ears. But now I see that those aren't goggles, they're glasses. And he's got suspenders, for crying out loud! No, what happened is someone working on this movie though, "Wheeljack's an engineer, how do I portray visually that he's smart? Oh, I know! I'll make him look like an offensive nerd stereotype!" At least the toy is a fairly cohesive robot, which is a step up from Nightbird. But something tells me that, once we do see the CGI model, that paint is going to turn out to be an issue on this figure. I mean, take a look at his hands. I assume that they're going to be black/gunmetal in the film, so what does Hasbro do? Airbrush a little gunmetal on top of his fist... while leaving the entire rest of the fist unpainted. Wheeljack's sole accessory is this gun. I have no idea if it'll turn out to be movie accurate or not, but there it is. Wheeljack's head is on a ball joint, and it can swivel. In theory it can look down, but on my copy it pops right back up, and there doesn't seem to be any upward or sideways tilt. His shoulders are ball joints, and they can rotate and move laterally 90 degrees. Technically the ball joint's stem is hinged for transformation and he could have some butterfly, but his shoulder pads don't have much clearance around his chest. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend a little under 90 degrees. No wrist articulation. His waist swivels. Hips are more ball joints, and they get 90 degrees backward, fall short of 90 forward, and get 45 degrees laterally if I'm being generous. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet are on hinged ball joints that will get a little upward tilt, plenty of downward tilt, a swivel, but a pretty minimal ankle pivot. His gun can plug into either fist. And, this not being a WFC/Legacy figure, you're not going to find an abundance of 5mm ports to store his gun that isn't a fist. That said, there is one 5mm port on his back. Like Nightbird, Wheeljack's alt mode feels a little smallish. Getting there isn't too difficult. It's pretty obvious what you need to do, the trick is that there are some steps like rotating his door wings, which are made of translucent plastic, and folding them in or jamming his toes under the front of his roof that don't leave you a lot of clearance while you're working. Well, I might not have seen Wheeljack's CGI model for his bot mode, but I've seen the actual Volkswagen Type 2 they used, and like Nightbird they kind of messed it up becasue they didn't license it from Volkswagen. So instead of the VW logo you've got a small Autobot insignia and a pair of grills that the actual bus doesn't. They squared off the headlights and the marker lights on the roof, made the turn signals blue instead of orange, and lowered the lights on the bumper. The mix of brown and white is mostly fine, and they molded some junk on the roof that could be the actual bus' roof rack, but they left it white instead of a dirty silver, and the rims are unpainted. The rear is missing the window and much of the white, due to being made from the robot shins. And weirdly, while "T.V. Pablo" is printed on both sides, it's missing the "Reparacion de" before it, and the whole "Reparacion de T.V. Pablo" should stretch all the way from the rear to the side windows. The list of services is also missing from the sides. All that said, I don't actually hate this alt mode. Indeed, I like the idea of a transforming VW Bus, I just wish they would have got the license. Maybe in the future he'll get a Studio Series toy... There's nowhere to hide Wheeljack's gun, but at least he can carry it. You can use the same port that was on his back to have the gun facing forward. Or, if he's being chased and you want the gun mounted to fire behind him there's a second 5mm port amidst his roof rack. Wheeljack is... ok. I mean, I have issues with the design, but I'm not going to ding the toy for being faithful to a bad design. What we have here is relatively clean robot mode, a fairly straightforward transformation, and an alt mode that I kind of like but would have liked more if they licensed the actual real vehicle and got a few more details right. While it's definitely my hope that a more accurate Studio Series figure could come at a later time, unlike Nightbird I think ROTB Wheeljack is good enough if you don't want to wait or risk that a SS figure might never come.

Sorry this one's going up kind of late- busy day. But the second figure in the set is Deluxe-class Nightbird. Nightbird feels a bit insubstantial. I reckon that has a lot to do with her slim limbs. Combined with her large chest and copious hip kibble her proportions strike me as being kind of off. Overall I thought she's a bit small, but with TLK Drift and Dropkick for scale I guess, no, she's about the same height. Well, I have seen a render of Nightbird's robot mode, and the thin limbs and overall head sculpt are fairly accurate. I think one of her problems comes down to where and how they arranged her kibble. Like, the shoulder armor... she has some in the movie, but it's curved and less like what you'd see on a samurai. The toy has a ridiculously long crotch, but the rest of her skirt is absent. The film version has some hip kibble, but not nearly as much as the toy. They probably should have moved some of the kibble that's on her hips to her back, as she's missing wings that the CGI model has. Lifting her chest up and pushing it back a bit would also show more of her midsection instead of allowing the front of her alt mode to dominate her torso. Mind you, that's just the issues I have with the sculpt. Only the outside edges of her lower legs, part of her forearm, and some of the underside of her chest should be that brownish color- there's way too much of it here, and not enough dark gray/black. She's missing some purple, too, mostly in her midriff. Ironically, the purple knee pads shouldn't be purple. Onto accessories. She has two. There's a claw, done in that ugly caramel color when it should be black/gunmetal. She also comes with a sword. I like the purple paint on it, even it I don't think it's movie accurate. Nightbird's head is on a ball joint, but the shape of it limits her up/down/sideways tilt, and even interferes with her ability to swivel her head. Her shoulders are on ball joints that can rotate and move 90 degrees laterally, although the post itself is hinged for transformation which gives her a little extra slump/shrug. Her biceps swivel, and her elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist articulation. Her waist swivels, but now we're going to start running into issues where her hip kibble gets in the way- in this case, her backpack catches on it so she can swivel a little under 90 degrees in either direction. The hips are ball joints, and she can get over 90 degrees forward but the kibble keeps her from getting 90 degrees backward, and the cut of the ball socket limits her lateral movement to 45 degrees. Her thighs swivel, and her knees bend a little under 90 degrees. You can kind of argue that he's got a double knee joint and that the upper knee joint actually gets 90 degrees on it's own, but here's the thing... the upper joint, used for transformation, is in the middle of her thigh, well above the purple knee pad. And the actual knee is just below the knee pad. Using the upper joint as a knee looks extremely unnatural. Finishing up, the black part of her foot collapses but I don't think that really works as foot articulation, and her ankle can pivot about 180 degrees. All-in-all, I could probably excuse the fairly limited range on a lot of her joints if she were a big bruiser sort of character, but on a ninja? It's pretty disappointing. She can hold her sword, which is rather short, in either hand. There's also a 5mm port on the outside of both forearms, just above the wrist, where you can plug in the claw. Nightbird's robot mode might not be small, but her alt mode definitely is, as she's now noticeably out-of-scale with Dropkick and Drift. Transforming her is 75% super simple with out her hood lifts over her head with a flap to fill in the neck, arms tucking into her sides so the front wheels are in the right spot, and the backpack unfurls to form the entire top and tail of the car. The other 25% is kind of a pain, as you have to fold up her legs in just the right way (which the instructions do NOT illustrate properly) to get the sides of the car to line up. Hasbro really did Nightbird's alt mode dirty. I'm a big fan of the Nissan GTR/Skyline family, but Hasbro apparently didn't think it was worth licensing Nightbird's R33 alt mode. The too-tall grill separated into two segments looks more like a Pontiac G8 than an R33. The hood scoop is centered when it should be over the left edge. The purple on the mirrors and rims is accurate, although the shape of the rims isn't, and the purples don't match when they should. They slathered yellow around the headlights, which shouldn't have that copper color around the housing but the lenses should probably be silver (or, they're recessed enough on that actual car that they could be black, as they're usually in shadow). Speaking of copper, Hasbro has copper paint running around the skirts (accurate!) but misses the rear bumper (not accurate). The rest of the car should be gray. Here, it's mostly gray, but there are unsightly tan hinges in the door and the back of the roof. Worse, for some reason I can't fathom, almost the entire hood is tan. It's wrong, and it's ugly. Oh, and the R33 in the movie has a big wing on the back. It's not exactly missing from the toy, though. Rather, this is where her accessories come into play. The claw splits in half, and the halves tab into spots on the rear of the car, on the taillights. Tabs on the end fit into holes in the sword, and... well, that's not what the spoiler looks like on the actual car. The sword and claws can stay on her back for robot mode, too, but it's an all or nothing sort of thing. Can't store the sword without storing the claw. This non-Studio Series toy has way too much copper/brown, poor articulation, poor accessories, and an ugly too-small alt mode. I guess the question is, which is the anomaly here? Cheetor or Nightbird? Much like the Earthspark Deluxes feel a bit cheaper than a Legacy Deluxe despite sporting the same price, is the Rise of the Beasts line going to be cheap compared to Studio Series? Or will other releases be good like Cheetor, and Nightbird just happens to be a swing and a miss? Maybe the third figure in the set will give us some answers, but for now avoid this Nightbird figure and hope she gets justice in a later Studio Series release.

The writers have gone on record saying they weren't trying to make a blockbuster film or the tentpole of a new cinematic universe, they just wanted to tell a good story first and foremost. It's got a way to go yet before earning back it's budget, currently around $72 million worldwide this weekend (on a $150 million budget), but $72 million actually beats their projections ($65 million) and they seem pleased enough with the reception so far that a sequel is being discussed.

Well, not to diminish from today's excitement, but I found some non-Studio Series toys from Rise of the Beasts. Now, I found them as a three-pack in the Buzzworthy Bumblebee packaging at Target, but AFAIK they're set to be released individually under the regular Rise of the Beasts packing, so I'll be taking a look at them individually and giving them a recommend or not based on the assumption that you can pick and choose. Going left-to-right in the box, first up will be Deluxe-class Cheetor. Cheetor's kind of fascinating, since we already got the Voyager-class SS version, and we can see that the Deluxe-class toy is a very different figure. Ostensibly they're supposed to be representing the same version of the same character, but the Deluxe-class toy bears a much stronger resemblance to Kingdom or even the original Beast Wars Cheetor. He's got the cheetah chest, the blue, catlike face and the blue accents, the spikey helmet, etc. The cat shoulders behind his back are even more accurate than the Kingdom toy. And yet, despite the similarities, ROTB Cheetor isn't really a retool of the Kingdom toy, either. He shares no parts with that figure, and the parts he's made of include some of the browns, some of the mechanical details, and the clawed toes of the Studio Series toy. Assuming that the Studio Series toy is more screen accurate, it's like an amalgamation of original Cheetor and the ROTB design. I don't hate it, but I weirdly find myself wishing he didn't have the toe claws, that his pelvis and shins were blue, that his calves and hands were yellow. I wish this looked more like OG Cheetor than ROTB Cheetor. Cheetor comes with not one, but two accessories. Like the Kingdom toy, ROTB Cheetor's tail turns into a weapon, but where the Kingdom toy was meant to be held by the tip of the tail and sported an awkward pickaxe that curved back too far to really be useful, ROTB Cheetor's tail is meant to be held by the same peg that plugs it into his cat butt, and the tip of the tail folds back to reveal a dagger-like blade, making it a pretty satisfying improvement. But if that weren't enough, also included is a small gut-gun. Could use some pink intestinal details, but I'm not complaining. Not included is the spear that the Voyager toy sports. Cheetor's head is on a ball joint, and he can swivel and look almost straight up, but he lacks any real downward or sideways tilt. Shoulders rotate and can move laterally just a little short of 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbow bends again just short of 90 degrees. His wrists are ball joints so they can swivel, but they can also fold inward which is odd since it's not a transformation thing. His waist can swivel, although it's limited to about 45 degrees to either side. His hips can go forward just under 90 degrees, a little bit backward, and about 60 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend just under 90 degrees. His shin armor prevents his feet from tilting upward, but he's got good downward tilt and 45 degrees of ankle pivot. Cheetor can hold his accessories by plugging the 5mm pegs into his fists. This not being a WFC/Legacy figure, he's not sporting any other 5mm pegs. Which isn't to say that he can't store his gun. There's a tab on one side, and you can use it to fit into a slot on his hip, or onto his back. Unfortunately, there are no such options for storing his tail. In fact, it's too long to even plug into his butt, since it's keyed so you can't even turn it to curve out of the way. Although he shares no parts with the Kingdom toy, the engineering of ROTB Cheetor is pretty similar. His robot head turns around so his cheetah head can come up off his chest and cover over it. The rear legs fold out of his robot legs. His arms fold into the chest, and the front legs fold from the back to his sides. You have to plug the tail into his butt, with his robot thighs filling in the back of the cat. There are differences, though. His robot tummy moves with the cheetah head to form part of the cheetah chest, and his robot collar opens up to make part of his cheetah neck. Panels on the sides of his forearms spin around to cover his biceps and help fill in the chest, but the forearms themselves are left fairly as they are on the cheetah's tummy. And rather than fold out of the shins, his calves open up to leg the can legs out, while his thighs actually lock into place. So, the elephant in the room is his very obvious robot hands. They definitely don't make for as clean a cat tummy as the Kingdom toy's, although it might have been a bit less in-your-face if they'd made his hands yellow. And he's sporting some of the techno-organic detail we saw on the Studio Series toy. Again, I kind of find myself wishing it were more OG Cheetor in appearance, but robo-hands aside I actually like what I see here. He's got a leaner, more cheetah-like shape than the Kingdom toy. Articulation's a bit worse. His mouth can open, but he's got no neck articulation. His shoulders are ball joints so they can rotate and move laterally a bit. His elbows can forward, but he doesn't have any paw articulation. In the rear his robo-knees allow the cat hip to go backward 90 degrees, and his cat knee can bend slightly backward and a little forward, but again no swivels, no paw articulation, and this time no lateral movement. We covered already that his tail simply plugs into his butt to become part of the alt mode, but I'm delighted to report that his gut gun actually folds up and plugs into a peg inside his tummy, forming his actual cat guts. Honestly, of the three figures in this jungle three-pack Cheetor is the figure I was the least interested in. After all, I have the Studio Series toy, which is presumably the more accurate figure, right? You might have noticed, though, that a running theme in this review is that I wish this Cheetor toy was even more like OG Cheetor and less like ROTB Cheetor. This is simply because I honestly like this figure better than the Kingdom toy. It's tough to actually recommend this figure- Kingdom is aesthetically more OG accurate, and (again, presumably) the Studio Series toy is a more accurate representation of the design in the actual film- it doesn't necessarily make sense to replace either of those figures for display purposes. And yet, of the three this is the Cheetor toy I actually like the best. Make of that what you will.

Rise of the Beasts. Sorry to get your hopes up.

I completely forgot that it was Transformers Tuesday. Maybe I'll put pictures up later. Anyway... I preordered everything except Dirge, because I'm a glutton for punishment and because Dirge is just the one from the Dirge/Ramjet Amazon set on his own in Legacy Evolution packaging. And if you were counting the Deluxes and thought to yourself "shouldn't there be one more?"* I told you guys back at the beginning of the year that Wave 3 would include a reissue of Tarantulas in an Evolution box. He's not up for preorder because Pulse still has inventory from the first go. *Or they already mentioned that in the livestream. Like I said, I missed it. Anyway, some quick thoughts... this is such a lazy wave. Beachcomber and Megatron both look great, but they're the only new molds (plus Beachcomber is one of my least favorite Autobots- I'd rather see Powerglide, Seaspray, Windcharger, Brawn, or Gears, to be honest). Tarantulas and Dirge are package refreshes, Nemesis Leo is a repaint of Leo Prime with slightly tweaked accessories, Axlegrease is a moderate retool of Scraphook, and Devcon is an extensive retool of Studio Series Blurr. And sure, Hasbro's gotta milk those molds, but do we really need obscure characters like Devcon and OCs like Axlegrease when there's all those above minibots, Octane, the other non-Menasor Prime Wars combiners, etc that need doing? (Maybe, since as of this post Devcon is the only one that sold out on Pulse.) Heck, even outside G1, we could use Demolisher, Cyclonus, and Red Alert to finish off the main Armada cast. Also, while it's nice that I was able to preorder wave 3, where's the preorders for Commander Prime, Titan Nemesis, and the War Dawn pack? For that matter, how about the Studio Series Mirage that was shown way back during the Super Bowl? EDIT: Nevermind, I saw they did announce SS86 Brawn, and preorders for most of the stuff that didn't go up today will come next month.

Speaking of older games we bought on sale for $30, I finally got around to picking up and playing Ghostwire: Tokyo. It's a difficult game to quantify. I mean, it often presents as a horror game, but once you get used to the creepy-looking enemies it's rarely scary. The first person combat is honestly a bit clunky, with attacks beyond your starting wind element having limited utility. Although there's decent variety of enemies they all tend to have a few limited, similar attacks. The main plot is, once you actually figure out what's going on, kind of predictable and not super interesting. By those counts it should be a mediocre game at best. Despite its flaws, though, I'm genuinely having a hard time putting it down. It's atmospheric, and where the main plot fails the side quests are much more interesting, often tapping more into Japanese myths and urban legends. And with a few upgrades into your transversal powers it can be fun simply running around the city, looking for hidden items and spirits. Ultimately, I think it's definitely worth checking this one out. EDIT: If you have Game Pass it'll be extra worth checking it out, as Ghostwire is apparently coming soon to Game Pass for both PC and Xbox.

After a gap of over a month, the last of the Studio Series figures from Rise of the Beasts I had preordered finally showed up. This one is Leader-class Scourge. Scourge joins that Evil Optimus Counterpart Truck Club, here with his Velocitron namesake and Dark of the Moon Megatron. He fits right in, doesn't he? With naught but snippets of trailer and box art that may or may not even be accurate at this point I can't say how accurate this figure is, but I'm generally digging the aesthetic. Not real sure what's up with the mask and cowl, but it's certainly different and interesting. His legs are a tad thin, but the relative lack of bulk combined with the absence of a slouching, digitigrade posture delineates him from Megatron. He does have a bit of a backpack, complete with a quartet of massive smokestacks. Some have theorized that between the smokestacks and the shape of the feet/lower legs that Rise of the Beasts could be a multiverse movie that ties The Last Knight to the Bumblebee Universe, that Scourge is a reformatted Optimus Prime, sent to the Bumblebee Universe after Unicron woke up and trashed the Bayverse. I don't buy it, especially because the backpack and smokestacks don't seem to be present in the trailer. Note the asymmetric hands. I don't mind that his right hand is normal but his left is a kind of claw, but I'm not loving the blade permanently attached to his right arm. I'd rather it were removable, but it's possible that it's always present in the film. Still, even in that case it would have been good to have it fold in back and closer to his forearm. In case comparisons to the EOCTC weren't good enough, here he is with fellow Terrorcon Battletrap and Studio Series Bumblebee Optimus Prime, whom ROTB Prime seems to be based on. This works pretty well for me, but I'll note here that the non-SS ROTB Voyager-class Prime appears to be a head smaller or so than SS Bumblebee Prime. Moving along... Scourge comes with a blaster. That's it, but that's probably all you need. Scourge's head has a ball joint at the base of his head that can swivel a little and look up/down, then a second ball joint at the base of the neck that can also swivel and tilt forward, which combined with his upper neck joint allows him to crane his head forward. His shoulders rotate, and there are two joints that move laterally, one outside the shoulder swivel and one inside. The outer one, which I consider proper, can move 90 degrees, but if you choose to use it the other one also goes 90 degrees, or it could simply be used to shrug or slump his shoulders. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. Neither hand has a wrist swivel. The fingers on his normal hand have a fixed thumb and a single hinged knuckle in the middle of his freakishly long fingers, which are molded together (note that a potential future MPM Scourge with fully-articulated fingers would have four knuckles on each finger!). His waist swivels. His his can go a little over 90 degrees forward, 90 degrees backward, and 90 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet tilt forward 90 degrees, due to transformation, and slightly downward, plus his ankles pivot 90 degrees. Scourge's arm blade uses a few hinges to unfold from under his forearm to sit in his right hand. To use his blaster his left arm gets yanked off just below the elbow, revealing a keyed peg. The blaster uses a port on the back to slide onto that peg. When not using his arm blade there his a 5mm port carved into the palm of his right hand, and he can use it to hold Core-class Freezer. I mean, it's not a great look, and given that Scourge comes with a blaster I still question why Freezer is meant as an accessory for Scourge and not Battletrap, who didn't come with a blaster. Speaking of no blasters, if you leave his regular left arm attached the base of his claws are hinged, so he can open them up, but there are sadly no additional hinges (even though it looks like, again, each digit should have four total). Regardless of whether he's got his forearm or his blaster attached to his left arm, Scourge can store the limb he's not currently using. They both have slots that fit onto a tab on the bottom of his backpack. One you know how it's supposed to work, Scourge's transformation is fairly simple; the trickiest part is making sure you have the hinges in the back of the cab set right, because if you don't the top of the cab and nose will sit right but the sides will end up crooked. Scourge was a pretty tall fellow, and his truck mode seems pretty big in hand, but comparing cab-to-cab he seems to scale reasonably well with Velocitron Scourge and DOTM Megatron. And this is how he looks and scales with Bumblebee Prime and Battletrap. Aesthetically, Scourge's truck mode has the gray colors and Mad Max-esque chains and mods that DOTM Megatron sported, but with an underlying truck that's much closer to pre AoE Optimus' alt mode- as far as I'm aware, Scourge is a Peterbilt 359, Prime a 379... which makes sense, because the 379 is the newer model, and ROTB takes place well before Transformers '07. Unlike the robot mode, there are more pictures available of Scourge's truck, and the toy seems pretty accurate if a bit more gray than dirty brown. There's the usual bits, where the back of the truck looks more like robot legs than a truck, and there's a gab in front of the air cleaner on the hood. I've included his blaster, unfurled and attached, as part of his alt mode because that's how it looks in the movie, minus chains that stretch from the smokestack to the back. Overall I like the truck mode, aside from the dirty scratches that look less like dirt and scratches and more like someone scribbled on him with a tan crayon. If you're curious, you can leave it off... you'll just have more visible hands. Also, notice how the front of Scourge's thighs were molded to look like the trailer hitch, but don't actually form the trailer hitch. As near as I can tell, Scourge isn't compatible with any trailers that I own. He is compatible with Freezer, though. For this, you need the blaster attached. Bend Freezer's arms around, and tabs on the sides will plug into slots inside the open blaster. And... Yeah, it's not really worth buying Freezer over. Speaking of Freezer, between him and Battletrap the Terrorcons haven't had the best track record. Fortunately, Scourge is a big improvement over those two, as he should be with the Leader-class price tag. He still has his issues, like the permanent arm blade, fingers that could use more joints, and a terrible job scuffing him up, plus on my copy one of the smokestacks is very loose. But, and maybe I just have a soft spot for the EOCTC, on the whole I like this figure, and he'll be my first Terrorcon recommend.

Just came back from seeing it. Was it a masterpiece of cinema? One of the greatest films I ever saw? Not at all. But it was an entertaining film, set in the Forgotten Realms with recognizable names and factions, with D&D monsters and races, and not just a generic fantasy film with the Dungeons & Dragons brand slapped on (looking at you, 2000 D&D movie). It was clearly written by someone or (someones) who have played the game. Indeed, the film played out a lot like a mini campaign, with the characters in the film often joking or making the kind of decisions that real players do that make real DM's shake their heads. TL:DR: It's a good movie that actually looks and feels like D&D, worth seeing but doubly so if you've actually played the game.

One assumes this will be set in or near the 3190s, and the whole bit about Tilly leaving Discovery was some kind of backdoor pilot. Can't say I'm too interested.

I bough minet from JRC before he closed up shop. I can't vouch for the quality, but TFSafari has some from 115 Workshop you could try.

I have the original. It's quite good, although getting the cab situated in super robot mode is a bit fiddly. The only other issue I had was that after Fans Hobby released their Godbomber the hip joints on Power Baser were a little too weak to support anything but a basic, stoic pose. Fans Hobby addressed that with the version 2 release, though, so you should be set.

So, I'm looking at my Switch library. There's a lot of good exclusives, especially Nintendo's first party stuff... but pretty much everything else I've bought since launch is also on PC. I'm excited for Tears of the Kingdom, and I still hope Nintendo ports Metroid Prime 2 and 3 to Switch (which I can't imagine them not doing after Prime Remaster sold way beyond expectations), but for gaming on the go I've kind of moved on to Steam Deck. I guess Nintendo's in no hurry if the current hardware is still doing well, but I think I'm ready for a Switch 2... as long as it's backwards compatible. Which it probably won't be.

Fantastic news. Strange New Worlds is easily the best Trek show since DS9.

Speaking of wrapping up wave 2 of Legacy Evolution, here's a quick Repaint Roundup for the figures I didn't fully review from this wave. I actually got Core-Class Thundercracker some time ago, back when Core-class Grimlock came out and before any of the other figures in this wave. I've just been sitting on this one, waiting for more repaints to review with him. Anyway, with our third time around on this mold you kind of know what to expect... a decent robot mode marred by a few questionable deco choices (no silver pelvis, no black on the shins, no stripes on the forward-facing side of his wings). He at least comes with null rays, unlike Skywarp, so you don't have to go looking for aftermarket ones. There are no mold changes, so the transformation is still that one I kind of admire for being so different than the Classic and Earthrise Seekers, but also makes for kind of chibi-looking jets with visible robot arms underneath. So, yeah, we know that these Core figures are meant to be sort of like accessories that make your Titans look bigger, and by now Dr. Wu has done a better job with even smaller Seekers with more accurate decos. If you want little Transformers to go with your Titans I'd suggest those instead, but if you've already got Starscream and Skywarp then you might as well get Thundercracker and complete the trio. Next up, we have Deluxe-class Crosscut, a minor retool of Skids. If you've skipped or missed the store-exclusives you'll find that Crosscut has a new head, however that head actually debuted last year on Burn Out (who, now that he's getting an MP of his own, seems like he should actually have the non-masked face that was on Skids, so...). Going by Crosscut's own MP, his biceps should be silver and part of his pelvis should be black, but I'm guessing that Hasbro simply took a sprue with black parts on it from the others and ran it in red. It's not a huge problem, I guess (I have half a mind to buy a second Crosscut just to take the hands and give them to Skids), at least not in bot mode. However, the tires are on that sprue. So Crosscut winds up having bright red tires with unpainted rims. And the rear ones are riveted on, so repainting them will be difficult. I know that Hasbro's gotta milk their molds, but Crosscut strikes me as an exceptionally lazy repaint. And, since he's not an OG G1 character with screen time in the cartoon (Crosscut didn't exist until a 2002 repaint of the G1 Skids reissue), you can safely skip this one. (Although I kind of want them to finish the set and give me Reboost now). Despite being one of the first figures of this wave to turn up in stores, Voyager-class Twincast was the last figure of the wave to arrive on my porch. Twincast is a very minor retool of Blaster- all they did was replace his stoic face with a smiling one then change the colors (I'm not sure if his goofy non-symmetric eyes are normal for the mold or just a crappy paint job on my copy). And, too be frank, I've always found Twincast's colors to be a bit garish. Credit where it's due, Hasbro didn't just run a sprue of black parts from Blaster in red and call it a day, they actually painted Twincast's feet and handle black to maintain accuracy with his G1 appearance... which, BTW, yes the G1 Twincast toy had light gray thighs that matched his shins, but the black thighs used on this figure match his appearance in The Headmasters. Which reminds me, unlike Crosscut Twincast was actually in a (Japanese) G1 cartoon. Still, of the three uses of this mold, Twincast is my least favorite, and I might suggest you pass on him as largely unnecessary. Except... ...Twincast comes with Rewind, arguably the most popular of Blaster's tapes since his prominent role in the IDW comics. Like Eject, he's still made from an awful lot of translucent plastic, which I'm not a fan of. But Eject's mold is still one of the better tapes Hasbro has done. As a character who appeared in the '86 movie and the third season of G1, not to mention the popularity of his IDW self, Rewind's pretty essential, even if Twincast isn't. But since you have to get Twincast to get Rewind, I'm reluctantly forced to recommend Twincast. All I have to say is Hasbro better make it up to me by releasing Steeljaw and Ramhorn.

I had to figure this was coming soon. With wave 2 out they have to show off and open preorders for wave 3. Probably Commander-class Prime, maybe Titan Nemesis. I was even thinking it's Transformers Tuesday, but the only new preorder today was Shattered Glass Grimlock.

My family is half Chinese, and I suspect it might hit differently depending on your cultural context for example, there's a part fairly early in when Michelle Yeoh's character tells her daughter that she's getting fat. The daughter, who was raised in America, is offended, and I suspect that most Western viewers will be a bit shocked and perhaps even a bit disapproving at the bluntness of the delivery. To older Chinese, though, who weren't raised to be so open with their feelings, it's understood that this expression of concern for her daughter's health is a roundabout way of saying she loves her. With that out of the way, I'll say that it didn't grab me right away. I was a little bored, honestly, until Ke Huy Quan's fight with the security guards. As the movie goes on, it gets progressively more and more ridiculous, which it turn had me more and more entertained. By the end I'd say I really enjoyed it and I'd recommend seeing it if you haven't, but I'm not sure I'd want to watch it again. One final thought... now, I don't usually care about the Academy Awards. And I have a lot of respect for Jamie Lee Curtis. She's a great actress and she probably deserves more Oscars than she actually has. She played her role in EEAaO competently. But I'd say that whoever gave her Best Supporting Actress for it over Stephanie Hsu (who was also nominated) had to have been thinking of Curtis' entire career and throwing her a bone.

And now things are winding down, as we come to the last new mold in Wave 2 of Legacy Evolution... Deluxe-class Shrapnel. Shrapnel is pretty much what you'd expect after Legacy Kickback... start with the Sunbow model, add a few greebles to better match the post-Siege aesthetic, and round it off with a few paint apps inspired by the G1 toy's stickers. I dig him, he's a noticeable improvement IMHO over the aging Legends-class toy. My only real complaints are that his torso is a tad thick, his chest doesn't open, and for some reason his hands and biceps were on the sprue with his black parts instead of his purple parts. And about that... couldn't they have put his biceps and hands on the part of the sprue here they put the back of his torso? His biceps and hands should be purple instead of black, and on his back we find a purple part that actually needed to be black! I suppose, though, in the grand scheme of things that these are fairly minor complaints. One other thing, I'm not sure how I actually feel about, is his thighs. See, on the G1 toy, Shrapnel's face is painted silver, but his mandibles and thighs were chrome. In the cartoon, his face, thighs, and mandibles are colored the same off-white. Here, his face is still silver, his mandibles and hips are a silvery gray plastic, then his thighs are painted gray. It's similar enough under some lights that at first I didn't notice it, but when I did I wondered why they didn't paint it silver? I'd have liked his mandibles to be silver, too, but what can you do? You might also point out that he didn't have the bug legs on his forearms. Those aren't just a toy detail- they're on the Sunbow model as well. They're not missing, though, Hasbro simply opted to make them separate accessories. Also included is a fairly G1-accurate gun, painted in silver. That's more akin to the chrome of the G1 toy's gun, but you may know that his gun was purple in the cartoon. The underlying plastic is purple, so I suppose if silver bothers you that you could try stripping the paint. Shrapnel's head is on a swivel, no tilt. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend a little over 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, but his waist can. His hips go forward and backward a little over 90 degrees, and they move laterally on soft detents 90 degrees. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet can't really tilt up, but due to transformation that can tilt 90 straight down, and his ankles pivot 45-ish degrees. Shrapnel's silver gun or his purple bug legs can be held in either hand as weapons. His instructions also show that you can plug one bug leg into a 5mm port on the underside of the silver gun's barrel, and then the barrel of the other bug leg into the butt of the silver gun for a super rifle. In practice it doesn't work so well. The port under the silver gun is tight enough, but the tip of the bug leg is too small or the butt of the silver gun too large, and the connection is tenuous at best. Fortunately, that's not your only option. You can plug the bug legs into the 5mm ports under his forearms for a more traditional Shrapnel look. Well, mostly more traditional. They're a bit chonky for my tastes. If DNA or anyone considers doing upgrade kits for the Insecticons smaller, thinner bug legs for Shrapnel would top my wish list. Chonky or not, though, know that once you plug them into his arms you never have to remove them, even for transformation. So that's something. As for his silver gun, you can store it in bot mode by plugging it into the 5mm port in the center of his back. Aside from his back and forearms, Shrapnel has a 5mm port on the back of each shoulder, on each of his calves, and under each foot. Much like Kickback, Shrapnel's transformation is basically the same as the G1 toy- close the mandibles, spin the waist 180, collapse the legs, fold down the robot feet, fold out the bug legs from his back, robot arms at the sides. The differences are a few concessions to modern engineering. His hands fold in instead of staying exposed, and his robot arms tab in place instead of relying on friction. And instead of sliding up over his thighs, his shins open and his legs collapse Combiner Wars-style. Shrapnel's insect mode largely shares the same pros and cons as the robot mode. By and large, it's a mostly-accurate mix of Sunbow and toy details, and I greatly prefer it over the Legends toy again. But he does still have the chonky bug legs on his arms, the chest still can't open, he's still a little too wide, and he's still showing the black biceps that should be purple. I won't fault the other bug legs for being that silvery gray plastic that matches his mandibles- that's cartoon accurate. But I do kind of wish they were yellow like the G1 toy. You kind of need the purple bug legs attached to the backs of his forearms for insect mode, otherwise he sits at an angle. That just leaves his silver gun, which the instructions suggest you plug into one of the two 5mm ports on his abdomen. Technically, the ones under his robot shoulders and feet are also available in this mode. Or, as large as it is, you can plug his silver gun into the 5mm port on his robot back/bug tummy, and it should just barely fit with enough clearance that he's still sitting on his bug legs. Unlike the G1 toy, the parts that cover his robot face are separate pieces from the rest of his mandibles. This allows you to cover over his face and still articulate the mandibles in insect mode. The tips of his mandibles, like the tips of his gun and purple bug legs, have the little nubs for blast effect parts (not included). It feels crazy to me that Kickback was part of the first wave of Legacy, and we've had to wait until the second wave of Evolution to get another Insecticon. That said, that was only about 11 months ago, and with Bombshell scheduled for the fourth wave of Evolution the Insecticons will be finished in far less time than the SS86 Dinobots, who are only 3/5 after two years. Anyway, despite a few minor quibbles I really like Shrapnel, he's my favorite figure of the wave and I'd go so far as to say that I dig him more than Legacy Kickback, although I dig Shrapnel more than Kickback in general so I may be biased. Easy recommend from me, and I'm really looking forward to Bombshell. Although, the last time Hasbro has a strong track record releasing a team but saved my favorite for last they really screwed up that last one (Breakdown). Fingers crossed that Bombshell gets a proper release and doesn't wind up being Shrapnel with a new head and mandibles.😒