mikeszekely

Firage was also made of worse plastic, had a fiddly, PITA transformation, still had a backpack, and started coming untabbed in robot mode if you sneezed at him. I also wouldn't say Firage had better proportions; his shoulder pads were smaller, and his hips were as far apart, but his pelvis was too big, his arms were kind of far from his torso, and his chest kind of sat over his abs, leaving him with a gaping collar and a weird beer belly. His blades were bigger, but maybe too big. I gotta give Firage the alt mode, though.

I'm not sure if Studio Series figures are being released in regular waves now, or if SS86 messed with them, or if they're just slowing because they're running out of movie characters. Either way, after B-127 and Starscream we've got just the one more, Deluxe-class Dino. Sometimes it seems like the movie team makes up a name, and Hasbro doesn't like it. Per the subtitles, Brawl in the first movie was called Devastator, but Hasbro slapped "Brawl" on all the toys because no way was the guy who turns into a tank and died in the first movie getting named after their most popular combiner. And when the third movie came along we get a red Ferrari named Dino, but because Hasbro didn't have a trademark for it the game and book tie-ins and all the toys were called Mirage. But, maybe because they said his name out loud and not just with a subtitle, we get to the Studio series and suddenly Hasbro's like, "OK, he can be Dino as long as we stick 'Autobot' in front of it." Anyway... here's Dino with some other Autobot cars. I guess that's about right, height-wise. My first thought with all that red was that he must surely be missing a ton of paint apps, but as near as I can tell he's not as off as I'd feared. If anything, he's missing some red in the gunmetal details on his abs. Where Dino deviates the most from his on-screen model is more in the proportions. His hips are a bit too wide, and his shoulder pads are too big, and a lot of that might be due to the fact that his tires don't just disappear the way they did in the movie. There is, of course, the backpack, which is pretty common among cars in the Studio Series. Stuff can't just movie magic it's way into the svelte figures you see in the film when we're talking about a $20 Deluxe-class toy, I suppose. Dino comes with his two signature arm blades. Nothing else. Dino's articulation is... not great. His head seems to be on a ball joint, and although he can look up a bit and swivel his head there's no room to look down or tilt his head sideways. Shoulders are ball joints that allow for rotation when his shoulder pads aren't getting caught on his backpack, and under 90 degrees of lateral movement. Transformation hinges do give him a bit of a shrug. His biceps can swivel, but only to turn his arms inward, as they're blocked from turning the other way. His elbows are double-jointed and can curl nearly 180 degrees. His wrists swivel, but his waist does not. His hips are on ball joints, which allows them to go over 90 degrees forward, under 90 degrees backward, and only about 60 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel just above the knees, which bend 90 degrees. His feet can tilt up for transformation, nothing really down, and no ankle pivots. At this point, is a bit disappointing that the Studio Series still is so far behind the War for Cybertron line in engineering; they're still using way too many ball joints and and still not providing basic ankle articulation. Technically his hands are 5mm compatible and he could hold the pegs on his blades, but they're meant to plug into the backs of his forearms. Dino's transformation is almost entirely in the backpack. I started transforming him, then stopped here to show you that his arms are in place, as his shoulder pads form the front headlights, fenders, and wheels, but that's pretty much it. The rest of the 80% complete car is his backpack. His hips and thighs will contribute the rear fenders and wheels, while his shins look for some empty space to hide in. And there's the completed car, with some other Studio Serires cars. I think he looks alright there. But, you might have noticed that he's not a Ferrari 458 Italia. His nose is a little tall and not as curvy. The grill is broken up. The tail is complete different with a large red band running through the rear window. I'm obligated to say that he's not movie accurate in alt mode. But I'll add that Maisto apparently has the exclusive rights to make toy Ferraris, so it's not simply a case of Hasbro not going for it. And it's at least more Ferrari-esque than the repainted Sideways not-Audis we got in the past. Dino's blades do store in alt mode, but you kind of have to make the decision to do so or not mid transformation. There are peg holes on the inside of his roof, and you plug them in before you stuff his torso and legs into place. I gotta tell you, after handling so may Kingdom figures, even the more disappointing ones like Magnus, it's kind of tough to go back to the Studio Series. Dino is probably the best version of the character we've gotten, and I'm including Alien Attack's Firage. But he's also another example of everything I don't like about the line; robots that don't look like they could actually transform carrying big backpacks, shellforming alt modes, limited paint, and none of the articulation improvements that have become standard in the War for Cybertron lines. If you like the Bayverse characters and want a Dino you can display with your other Studio Series figures then by all means, pick him up. But if you just wanted the important characters and don't think the red sports car who appeared briefly in one out of six movies makes the cut you're not missing out if you leave Dino on the shelf.

I mean, you like what you like and I'm not going to tell you you're wrong for it. I just don't agree; recent MPs have been like cartoon-style Action Masters with wrap-around alt modes in my book. Yes, that's given figures like Prime and Bee great articulation and bot modes that are extremely similar to the animation models... too much so, in my opinion, as I'm not a fan of things like Prime's thin arms, large pelvis, and short torso. I also don't see a need to swap the truck mode windows for more squarish ones just because that's how they looked in the animation. To me, the Sunbow animation wasn't that great and I prefer a robot that looks realistic, like it actually transforms using parts from the alt mode. I strongly prefer, wide chests, protruding bellies, gaps and all, the Hasui-era MPs. I prefer MP-10 to MP-44. That doesn't necessarily mean that I think the old way was ideal; there's probably a middle ground that keeps what I like about the older MPs but brings in elements of the newer ones- I think both Magic Square and Transform Element delivered better Primes than either MP-10 or MP-44. But Skids is definitely the most interested I've been in an official MP in a long time.

I wonder if the more expensive post MP-44 figures haven't sold as well? Regardless, like you, I tend to think the more articulation the better, but I'd say I'm fine with a certain standard level. What I'm not fine with is how Takara had been achieving their articulation; make an articulated robot out of faux parts, make most of the alt mode a shell, and crumple that shell into a backpack, which I don't feel leads to Frankly, I find figures like MP-44 and MP-45 to be ugly and tedious, and MP Skids looks like a much-needed course correction. Now, are they swinging too far in the other direction? Maybe. But there's a reason I haven't bought any MPs after Ironhide but suddenly I'm looking at picking up Skids despite having a perfectly good X-Transbots Savant.

There's a Hallmark store near where I buy my groceries. If you're cool paying for shipping from the US (and whatever customs/duties your country may add) I could look into buying one here and sending it to you for just whatever it costs.

Heads up, Pulse has the third wave of Retro Headmasters up for preorder. They also have Hardhead, which is good for those of you who still want him with the maskless cartoon face and haven't found him yet, but I'm miffed they don't have Mindwipe up (who's really the only one I still wanted). MP Skids and Reboost are also up for preorder on Pulse. I think I'd definitey buy Skids, if I hadn't already bought X-Transbots Savant. Maybe I'll get Reboost just to check out the mold, but one wonders why they didn't make Crosscut instead. My sources have told me that Swoop is a for sure thing, and may even be out by the end of the year. Sludge will probably happen in the Studio Series 86 line, and then if Hasbro can't sneak Snarl into that line because he wasn't in the movie then I'm sure he'll be in the trilogy after War for Cybertron. Anyway.... yesterday's Repaint Roundup transitioned from War for Cybertron to Studio Series (of the non-86 variety), and Studio Series is where we're going to finish out the week. Today, we're taking a look at Voyager-class Starscream from the Bumblebee movie. Is it another Repaint Roundup? After all, Starscream looks an awful lot like Studio Series Blitzwing. They've got similar heads, they've both got the broken cockpit collar and chest laying over the cockpit tummy, they've both got the intakes for pecs with secondary intake shoulders. They've both got armatures on their sides reaching toward their waists, and 3mm peg holes on their crotches. They've both got wings on their backs with hinges that angle the ends and stuff pegged into them. They've both got narrow biceps tapered forearms, rounded thighs, and feet that appear to have molded lights and wheels. But, no, the similarities between Starscream and Blitzwing are likely artifacts of the Bumblebee movie's production. I'm not necessarily saying that Blitzwing was supposed to be Starscream, given his demise early in the film, but if you look at the trailers vs the finished movie (or just compare stills on the internet, like I did) you'll notice that the trailer had a Seeker in one of the Cybertron scenes that was colored exactly the same as Blitzwing- more whites, no blue, some gray), but that very same model in that very same scene in the actual film was recolored as Starscream. So Studio Series Starscream is actually an entirely new mold of a robot that happens to look like a Cybertronian mode for Studio Series Blitzwing. It's hard to tell from his very brief appearance on screen and the lighting choices used in those scenes, but Starscream does appear to be fairly screen accurate in they way most Studio series figures are. By and large, the details in the mold are all right (maybe his wings could have a few more protrusions), but he's lacking a few color details like a white stripe over the blue on his forearms, too much blue on his shins, some red on his thigh that should actually be white, etc. It's instantly recognizable as Starscream, and with a lot less kibble folded onto his back than many other SS figures, so I'm pretty content with how it turned out. Starscream trades Blitzwing's fuel tanks and stabby hand for guns cast in black from a rubbery plastic. He does have the main gun that Blitzwing does, with the longer ribbed main barrel supported by two secondary barrels, and they have similar mechanical details molded into the part that fits over their forearms, but again if you look closely you'll see that Starscream's is actually a different mold. Starscream's head is on a ball joint, but due to the shape of his neck, collar, and head he functionally has no tilt. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees, his biceps swivel, and his elbows bend about 130 degrees. He doesn't have any wrist swivel, but due to his transformation they can bend downward. His waist actually does swivel, but maybe only about 30 degrees to either side before his hips run into back kibble. His hips move 90 degrees forward, maybe 30 degrees backward before running into back kibble, and just under 90 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet have some up/down tilt, but the "cuffs" at the bottom of his legs greatly restrict how much you can actually use. What they don't restrict, though, are his over 90 degrees of ankle pivot. Like Blitzwing, Starscream's main gun has a concave hollow space with a 5mm peg inside. The peg fits into his hand, while the concave underside allows it wrap over half his forearm. The gun is more or less symmetrical, so you can use it on either hand/arm. Whichever arm you choose, the forearm details don't allow the gun to lie totally flat, so the barrel is always pointed downward a bit. The black guns technically have shallow 5mm pegs and he could hold them, too, but they're properly supposed to fit onto his wings the way Blitzwing's fuel tanks do. Too bad there's no place for them on his arms; they could have been null rays. The fit into his wings is a tad loose on my copy. I think any notion that Starscream was a retool of Blitzwing went out the window with the alt mode. The transformation isn't particularly difficult and it's occasionally inventive, like how some panels fold out of Starscream's shins to lay over gaps and make the jet's spine appear more seamless. But the unconventional nature of the Cybertronian jet mode can make it occasionally unintuitive; if you don't remember the exact steps to turn something like Studio Series Sideswipe into his car mode you can easily figure out that some parts need to go in some places because that's the only way things fit to get a proper-looking Corvette, but Starscream has some flaps and bits that, even in their proper configuration, don't quite seem right. It doesn't help that his instructions have steps indicating things like tabbing his forearms together when no tabs or slots exist for that purpose. And that alt mode... yeah, it's kind of weird. I assume the designers were going for something in the spirit of the G1 tetrajets, and the way the spine flows up toward the tail, the delta-ish shape of the wings, and their extreme downward bend do lend themselves to something evocative of that. Where things get really weird, though, is the chunk hanging down from the belly. In the movie this piece is depicted as much thinner, more like a wing, but it's like the toys designers collectively shrugged and figured that his arms and quite a bit of his torso had to go somewhere. Aside from that, is it accurate? It's hard to say. You can find clean ILM concept art, and you can find blurry movie stills of things that are moving fast and on screen for just a few seconds to compare to. It's easier to make out details on the former, but what details you I can make out on the latter don't entirely match and suggest that the former wasn't he finalized design. Going by the former, no, the colors are all off. The ILM artwork has some red and white on the tail, some red on the nose, and a lot more blue on the fuselage and wings, and the engines on the back are totally different. Going by the latter, the colors might or might not be off, but the engines are accurate. In more general terms, I'd say that the toy captures important details; the exposed machinery on top of the nose, the large engines around the tail, the guns on the wings, etc, with colors that are recognizably Starscream. It's just packing a ton of kibble on the underside that should definitely be less chunky. Although the little black guns end up on the same side of the wings, you actually do want to remove them for transformation. Not only are they pointed the other way, but they don't use the same pegs and holes. Instead, there's a little tab on each one that fits into a slot a little forward and a little more toward the edge from the holes. This ensures that they stick out far enough and are lined up with the right "spikes" on the wings' leading edges. As for his main gun, it has two slots and a square hole. The slots grab tabs on the insides of his robot elbows, while the square plugs around the bottom of two dangling flaps to help secure the underside. I like this figure. I actually liked it more than I thought I would; I wasn't totally sold on the alt mode and Blitzwing was kind of a mixed bag. In hand, though, the robot mode looks and feels pretty good (aside from one loose wing swivel on my copy). Plus, the alt-mode isn't as immediately wrong as Blitzwing's definitely-not-an-F-4, and I can excuse many of the quirks of it's designs as "it's Cybertronian." Even when it's not totally in agreement with what was actually on screen, what was on screen was so fast and short that I'm not particularly bothered. Ultimately, Starscream isn't the greatest Transformers toy ever or anything, but he's interesting. If they repaint him as the other Seekers I can't say I'd be hunting them all down the way I did with the WfC ones, but for the novelty I'd recommend picking up at least one of them.

I'm likewise not particularly into the Bayverse design, but I've picked up a few, notably Unique Toys, because the engineering they use to translate movie-accurate ricotta with minimal kibble into their vehicle modes is really impressive.

The thing with the Studio Series Dinobots is that, at the end of the day, they're still a mass-market Hasbro release. I'm tuning my expectations accordingly; they're not meant to replace my Gigasaurs (or the Dibots, if you prefer) on an MP shelf. But they fit fine with the other WFC and Studio Series 86 releases, and are light years better than Power of the Primes. Oh, btw, I was checking out an interview with a Hasbro employee that I might talk about more later. But for now, one question asked was something like "if you release one member of a team, how likely are the other team members." The response was something like "not releasing all the team is leaving money on the table." I'm reading into it, but that's close to confirmation that the other 3 Dinobots are happening as far as I'm concerned.

I got my second COVID shot yesterday, so naturally I'm up after just three hours of sleep with teeth-chattering chills. I popped two aspirin and within an hour I'm feeling totally fine and normal, but I'm up now. I'll probably fall asleep watching TV later, but for now how about a Repaint Roundup? This one serves as a nice segue between the War for Cybertron stuff I've been reviewing and the stuff that's coming the rest of the week. So first up we have Deep Cover and... Deep Cover, both based on Siege Sideswipe, apparently the Autobot version of the Seeker mold at this point. The one on the left is Generations Selects Deep Cover. In the early '80s Takara released a black version of their Diaclone Countach, then in 2003 it was reissued with an Autobot badge and some gold shields with stars on them as Autobot Deep Cover, and that's the toy that Gen Selects Deep Cover is based on. GS Deep Cover trades's Sideswipe's black parts for blue his red parts for black, and sure enough he's got the shield from the 2003 toy. Netflix Deep Cover on the other hand, wouldn't even be recognizable as Deep Cover if it weren't for the name on the box. Sideswipe's black parts stay black on him, so at first glance he really looks like if Sideswipe were blue instead of red. Upon closer examination you'll see that his feet are an unpainted black, like Tigertrack, and the white parts on Sideswipe are a silvery gray. As part of the Netflix line he's got the painted scratch and scorch marks that they tend to carry. I'll note that while all the other versions of the mold (that I own) use red/yellow/black/white plastic, the blue parts on Netflix Deep Cover seem to be cast in the same silvery gray as his arms and thighs, then painted blue. Perhaps Deep Cover will have a role in the Kingdom arc of the Netflix show, but I suspect he's meant to be one of the many nameless background uses of the Sideswipe model that have appeared in the first two arcs, so for my headcanon only the Gen Selects figure is Deep Cover. The Netflix one will be a separate character, I just need to come up with a name for him. Both Deep Covers come with the same tube and gun that can either plug into the tube to emulate Sideswipe's shoulder launcher and missile or be held as separate weapons that every other version of the except Red Alert has come with. The Gen Selects version additionally comes with the rifle that Tigertrack and Red Alert got. Both will do in a pinch, but I'd picked up Nonnef's weapon kit for the Siege Lambo in anticipation of the Gen Selects Deep Cover, and I'm sure I'll pick up another set for the Netflix one soon. Alt mode is pretty much what you'd expect, since there's no change to the actual mold. Since GS Deep Cover uses blue for the black parts on the other versions he's got spots of blue unpaintable plastic on the sides, and the clear plastic for his windows isn't doing him any favors. But you can see he's got the shields on the sides, and some red under his headlights where the Diaclone and the 2003 Deep Cover had stickers. I know that the 2003 release didn't have a light bar, but I have an extra from a second Siege Prowl I bought for parts and I might give it to him. Netflix Deep Cover, meanwhile, has paint on his translucent plastic so he can have more faux scratches. He's otherwise, again, Sideswipe if he were blue instead of red. I grabbed a Nonnef spoiler set for GS Deep Cover when I grabbed the weapons. I want one for Netflix Deep Cover, but I'm holding out to see if he'll issue them in blue as I already slapped black ones on Tigertrack and I don't want black to be a generic "use when matching spoilers aren't available" sort of thing. Anyway, I've covered this mold plenty by now, and chances are if you're reading this you probably own at least one copy yourself. There's no surprises here, you know what you're getting into, you just have to decide for yourself if you want these colors. Me, I'll take this mold in any colors they care to give me. I'd actually love it if they released an official Clampdown, though for now my customized Red Alert will do. The other figure we're looking at today is Studio Series B-127, aka Bumblebee from the Bumblebee movie in his Cybertronian form. He's Studio Series Cliffjumper (already a heavy retool of SS Jeep Bumblebee) with new head and all his red parts cans in yellow. Which, as far as I can tell, is the same thing the GCI models did in the film, so accurate, I guess. I covered Cliffjumper here, if you need more detailed thoughts on the mold. B-127 comes with the same accessory (middle) that Jeep Bee (left) and Cliffjumper (right) did, just painted slightly differently. Transformation is the same as Cliffjumper, and without the new head he really does just look like Cliffjumper with the red swapped to yellow, although you might notice the translucent plastic is tinted much darker on B-127. It's fine; it's mostly movie-accurate, and it looks pretty cool. B-127 has the same strengths (interesting transformation, cool alt mode) and weaknesses (kibble backpack, leg kibble that doesn't tab in securely, weapon that doesn't tab securely into the alt mode) as Cliffjumper, so if you liked that mold you'll probably still like it now, but if you didn't like it there's nothing here to change your mind. The questions here are, one, if you already have Cliffjumper do you want another copy of the mold, and/or two, how many Studio Series Bumblebees do you need? I guess for me the answer to two is "all of them," so here I am. I guess, with TLK Premier Bumblebee standing in for a Studio Series TLK Bumblebee now I just need them to release both AoE Bumblebees. Although, if they released another '07/RotF Bee without the battle mask I'd be all for it (I'm disappointed that SS RotF Bee didn't get a maskless head already), and I suppose I'd be obligated to buy the minor retool that was DotM Bee if they did one.

New pics of Slag. You can better see his back, now.

Ok, see, I noticed that, but I've noticed it a bit on Huff and the Final Victory Huffer, too. I didn't mention it because, frankly, at this point I was starting to think it's a deliberate thing. To my knowledge, Huffer isn't based on an actual, specific truck, but if you look at images of smaller yard trucks some of them do seem to have some tilt to the cab. A lot of weird toy details made it into the cartoon, like Astrotrain having wheels for the train mode flanking his head. I wouldn't mind those pylons if that were the case with Huffer, but they're definitely absent from the animation model. So it's a "Huffer is good, Airazor is better" thing. Your previous comment read a bit ominously; I was worried you were actually really dissatisfied with Huffer in hand. For what it's worth, I prefer Huffer to Airazor. I don't find Airazor's transformation (stretch waist, tuck hands into gap, and squat) to be any better, and in fact I think of all the Beast Wars characters to turn up in Kingdom so far she's got the least cohesive beast mode with the most robot kibble showing. But, I also have a lot more nostalgic attachment to Huffer, while I had to spend some time on the TFWiki to remind myself who Airazor even is, so I was primed to be less enthusiastic about her pretty much from the start.

You got me curious now, so I guess I better hurry up and give my review of Kingdom Deluxe-class Huffer. Does Huffer qualify as a "short" Deluxe the way Bumblebee and Cliffjumper did? I mean, he's shorter than Sideswipe, sure, but he's definitely taller than Bumblebee. But I have him on my desk right now with a few Studio Series figures (spoilers for later in the week), and he's as tall or taller than the two Deluxes I'm looking at. Well, I'd say I'm still OK with this size. I think Huffer was portrayed a little taller than Bee, and Kingdom Huffer scales with Netflix Bee and Siege Sideswipe rather similarly to the way BadCube's Huff scales with MP-21 Bumblebee and MP-12 Sideswipe. But how's he doing on that G1 accuracy we've all grown to love? Kind of a mixed bag, really, and it's noticeable when I put him with the Mechanic Studio version. The head seems a little off, not quite rounded enough and with the helmet coming in too close to his eyes. He's got those big chunks on his collar, and some extra silver on his crotch he doesn't need. The silver plastic on his thighs and midriff should match the light blue paint on his torso. As for the darker blue, in hand it's a bit more purplish than he's showing up in my photos, so I don't really have a problem with that. I do, however, really dislike his black hands- they should be the same silver as the rest of his arm. He's a bit stocky, especially his arms, which are lacking the points on top. His feet almost have that blocky shape with the squarish cutouts, but they're marred by a hinge in his toes. Could I be nitpicking, though? I mean, he's got the basics; blurple torso with a light blue "window", round, silver arms, bucket head with a cab hood, and orange legs. It's the first official Huffer figure that isn't a repaint of some decidedly-not-Huffer truck since the original G1 toy. Huffer comes with two accessories, and they're fairly big since they gotta push Huffer up to that Deluxe budget. The first is a shield, which I'm just not a fan of. The second is a gun. Since G1 Huffer didn't have a gun, and I don't recall him using one in the cartoon, Hasbro seems to have looked elsewhere for inspiration. And it seems they might have been inspired by Halo, because the top half of the gun looks an awful lot like a Spartan Laser. Huffer's head is on a ball joint, with minimal tilt in any given direction. If you might find his hood gets in the way, but it's on a double hinge which gives you a lot of freedom in how you want to move or position it. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel and his elbows bend a touch under 90 degrees. His wrists can bend inward due to his transformation, but they don't swivel. His waist does, though. His hips can go 90 degrees forward or backward, but only about 60 degrees or so laterally which is disappointing but honestly enough for most poses. His knees can bend something like 130 degrees, or more if you move his heel flap. His feet do not tilt up or down, but they do offer around 45 degrees of ankle pivot. Huffer's gun slides into either fist. His should can be mounted onto a peg hole on either his forearm or his bicep if he's wielding it, or on his backpack if you want to store it out of the the way. He's also got 5mm ports on the sides of his legs, where the bump out for his taillights are, and under his feet. With Cliffjumper (and his related repaints and remolds) and Warpath you got the sense that some of their budget went to their fairly inventive transformations. That's not really the case with Huffer. You kind of just move the cab out of the way, pull his arms out and down, bend him at the waist so you can fold out his front wheels (and hope they don't fall off), orient his arms so that his shoulder can tab into his hips and his fists are pointing out behind him, open his heels and flip is lower legs over his thighs, and push everything into place until it looks like a truck. Well... the truck at least looks to scale decently enough. And the truck is pretty Huffer-esque. He's got the silver grill flanked by four lights, although Hasbro chose to give him a silver bumper and marker lights, too, plus translucent windows and painted wipers. His heels fold around over his shins to form a silvery skid plate. I wish it was orange, but I don't hate it. And I do like that Hasbro gave him painted rims and taillights, and how they molded the area around his wrists to kind of resemble the G1 toy's forks. My biggest complaints, though, both revolve around those arms. As with robot mode, they just look too thick here. But worse than that, Hasbro really made no effort to hide his hands. As thick as his arms are you'd have thought that they could have folded into his forearms, or the forearm could have slid up over them. But no, they just bend down so you don't see them from the front, but from the back it looks like he's fist-bumping himself. If you're set on using all his accessories, they do have a way to integrate into his truck mode. First, you peg the shield over his skid plate, with the "claws' hanging over the back. Then you actually split his gun in half longways. There's a groove on each half under the barrel, and these grooves fit over long tabs on the sides of the shield, with the orange insides of the gun facing out. The result is kind of like giving him a truck bed. On the other hand, if you're like me you don't think Huffer really needed a shield and the alt mode setup looks less G1 than the skid plate. So if you're tossing it in a drawer and not planning on using it, Huffer's still got a 5mm port on his roof, on the sides of his arm/smokestacks, behind his rear tires, and four on his skid plate. Not to mention both of his fists are technically available. Speaking of ports on his skid plate, since Huffer pulled Prime's trailer in one out of 98 episodes it's very important that Kingdom Huffer can pull Earthrise/Kingdom Prime's trailer, right? Well, good news! He can! If you've got some of the aftermarket kits like Nonnef's that move the hitch peg forward it might not work, but if you remove them the original peg fits fine. I dare say the trailer actually looks better scaled to got with Huffer. Cliffjumper and Warpath set something of a precedent, that given the budget of a Deluxe smaller figures could pull of some clever engineering that'd make them worth the Deluxe price despite their smaller stature. Huffer doesn't totally live up to that. His mundane transformation was practically begging for Hasbro to do more to cover the exposed hands on the back of the cab, and some additional paint could have alleviated the fact that some of his colors are off. Instead it feels like Hasbro just dumped the extra budget into more plastic- a huge gun when a little pistol would have done, a massive shield no one asked for, and more robot bulk than the scrawny whiner needed. However, it'd be unfair to call Huffer a bad figure, because he's really not. While there are definitely things Hasbro could have done better he's still unmistakably Huffer in both modes, appropriately scaled, with adequate articulation and the ability to pull Prime's trailer. He's like that kid in school who put in just enough effort pass the class but you know could do better if he applied himself more. Huffer's a solid enough effort that I recommend for your WfC/CHUG collection, just don't expect him to be a highlight for the line.

Yeah, MS-20 is cartoon colors, MS-20B is Japanese toy colors (white shuttle with black nose and trim, black locomotive). MS-18 is supposed to be US toy colors (white shuttle with the entire cockpit and nose purple, purple trim, and a mostly purple loco with some black). However, I think MS-18 still has the cartoon purple head. What finally pushed me over the edge was that it looks like Iron Sky is around the same size as the G1 toy. So if I like MS-20 I may pick up MS-18, too.

Well, I don't think I'll go all in on an MFT movie cast, but I did break down and order Iron Sky. Should arrive some time next week.

I don't personally own one, but from everything I've seen, yes. Maybe I'll grab one and review it here.

I agree. I'd even take some if they were just upscaled without any modifications to scale with War For Cybertron to fill in some gaps or even replace what Hasbro gave us. Like right now, if a genie granted me three wishes I'm pretty sure one of them would be MFT's Iron Sky scaled up to a Voyager.

Good, then I think I'll finish up the second wave of Kingdom with Huffer tomorrow. And today I'll do Deluxe-class Airazor. Airazor is venturing into "I didn't collect Beast Wars and only watched the show once as an adult" territory. I don't remember much about her, aside from her relationship with Tigatron. She's not what I'd consider to be part of the "core" cast of the show. But, from what I can tell, she's a mix of the original toy and the Beast Wars cartoon. She's got more cartoon-style, feminine proportions. While she could, perhaps, use a few more gold accents, she's got both the gold and orange of the cartoon instead of yellowish of the original toy. However, she's also got a lot of a lightish gray-brown for her "feathered" parts that's similar to the original toy instead of the cartoon's charcoal color. For size, here she is with fellow Maximal Cheetor and Sideswipe, the standard-bearer for the Deluxe Class. Airazor comes with two of these missile things. They're not accurate to the original toy, so I presume she had something like it in the cartoon? I can't recall. Airazor's head is on a ball joint. She can look up a decent amount, down a small amount, and she can tilt her head to the side slightly less than that. Her shoulders rotate and can extend laterally 90 degrees. Her biceps swivel, and her elbows bend just over 90 degrees. Her waist can swivel. Her hips can go forward way over 90 degrees, as long as she moves her hip laterally enough for her thigh to clear her pelvis. Her hip only goes backward a little, though, but again far beyond 90 degrees laterally. Her thigh swivels, and her knees bend something like 150 degrees despite only having a single hinge. Her ankles are ball joints, so they can swivel, tilt up and down, and pivot, though the pivot is a lot shallower than I'd prefer. Her wings are pegged into her back, keeping them from unfurling as they would in beast mode, but she does have one hinge that can flap them back and one swivel that can raise the ends up. Based on what I can tell, her missiles are mean to plug into the 5mm ports on her forearms like a Seeker's null rays. I kind of like that symmetry, like Airazor is the Seeker form applied to a bird instead of a plane (Gen Selects T-Beast Starscream, please?). She can also hold them in her hands, if you want to use them more like the original toy's blaster. Alternatively, she's got 5mm ports on the outside of her thighs and below her calves on the backs of her legs. Surprisingly, there's none under he feet. Airazor's transformation isn't terribly complicated, but it does involve shifting her upper body and some double hinges and jamming her fists into the resulting cavities on her sides. The resulting beast mode is... ok, I guess. It's a bit better than the original toy, but it's still a far cry from the cartoon as her underside looks very much like a squatting robot with her arms tucked into her sides. Even from other angles her thighs are still pretty visible as her tail doesn't even quite come down and out far enough to cover everything. Her face has some of the lighter coloring around her beak and the darker beak of the cartoon, but again most of her "feathers" are closer to the toy than the cartoon. An interesting artifact of her transformation is that you can swing her robot head into her torso and bring up her falcon head, but then simply stop, resulting in a bird-headed robot. In bird mode she can look up or down, and her neck swivels. Her beak does open (although it can be difficult to get it open). Her legs, which are actually anatomically accurate for a digitigrade bird, have her hips locked as her robot thighs are actually tabbed in place. She still can bend at her knee, and she's got an extra hinge to serve as her digitigrade ankle. Plus, despite being turned around, her feet still use the same ball joints to tilt, swivel, and pivot. As for her wings, she's got the swivel for extending her pinions and four total hinges for flapping. Her instructions don't leave much advice for storing her weapons in this mode. Your best bet is probably the 5mm ports on her thighs, although you also have access to the ones on the backs of her legs, just above her feet. I'd prefer a darker gray for her feathers, and some more paint on her talons. For me, she's also the sort of character that I don't really have any attachment to, either from the cartoon or from nostalgia. However, I think she's a pretty decent figure overall, and I expect one that bigger fans of Beast Wars than I will definitely appreciate. So, I guess pass if you're strictly G1, but recommended if you were excited to see Beast Wars included in Kingdom.

So it has English subs, then? It's still not available to watch in the States, but I've been meaning to pick up a VPN.

Well... This could be very good... or very bad.

Voyager-class Perceptor. But I digress. So, yeah, there's been a lot of buzz here about Kingdom, but we really only focus on the Deluxe-and-up set. Core Rattrap was... ok... ish. I mean, I did buy an almost 10 year-old figure to replace it. I've gotta say, the Core-class Optimus looks... similarly ok-ish. Megatron might actually look better than the Voyager. But having smaller versions of stuff I recently bought bigger ones for on the off-chance I want to make my Titans look bigger (they're not even on display because they're too big!), nah. Plus, between what Hasbro can do with a Deluxe and third parties are doing with Legends, the Core-class stuff feels kind of half-hearted. And yet, something compelled me to pick up Kingdom Core Class Vertebreak. Like Paleotrex and Ractonite, Vertebreak is a Predacon made up of dinosaur bones. Given how much I didn't really care for the Fossilizers you might really be wondering what possessed me to grab Vertebreak, but there's something sort of charming to me about a squad of villainous undead dinosaurs. When Wingfinger comes out I might try to remove any Maximal symbols he's got and stick him with rest of the skeletal squad. I'll note, though, that Vertebreak is not a Fossilizer. With one exception she doesn't come apart. She actually transforms. And, while her limbs are on the thin side (as you'd expect from a skeleton), she's reasonably proportional compared to the other two. That one exception I mentioned? That's her lone accessory. It's her dino-mode tail. Vertebreak's head is on a ball joint. She can't look down, but she can look up a fair amount and tilt her head sideways a bit. Swiveling can be done at her neck, but it's limited by her collar. Her shoulders, also ball joints, rotate and extend laterally a little under 90 degrees. Her elbows are yet more ball joints, giving her 90 degrees of elbow bend and doubling as her bicep swivel. No wrist or waist articulation. Her hips? If you guess ball joints, give yourself a cookie. They can go forward and backward well over 90 degrees, and laterally slightly over 90. Plus they're acting as limited thigh swivels. Her knees are actually hinges, and they can bend 90 degrees. Her ankles are, surprise, ball joints. They can swivel tilt up and down, and provide some pivot. One thing she has in common with her larger pals is that her tail is supposed to be her weapon. She actually has two hands, though, with fingers molded into open-ended 5mm ports. While her bigger buddies are much to small to go toe-to-toe with the likes of Grimlock and Slag, I do find Vertebreak to be an interesting foil for Power of the Primes Slash. As mentioned, Vertebreak actually transforms instead of coming apart then going back together into a different configuration. She turns into a Dracorex, which may be a juvenile pachycephalosaurus or it may be a distinct, related species. Regardless, she looks pretty good; her arms are a bit visible from the underside, but she mostly does a good job hiding her robot bits. She fits nicely with the larger Fossilizers. In alt mode, her jaw can open and she can look up, but not down, and she's got no swivel. Her arms are fixed. Her hips and legs are the same as her robot mode, though, which is pretty decent. Her tail can rotate around where it's plugged it, but has no other articulation. Still... better than Slash. Vertebreak certainly isn't the greatest Transformer Hasbro's made, and if you passed on the Fossilizers you should probably pass on her, too. That said, if you do have the other Fossilizers for her to hang out with, she's a surprisingly decent little figure that helps round out the fossil faction and might be worth checking out.

Not real happy about PS3- mine's actually still hooked up in the living room (I don't have my old PSX, my PS2 is in the closet, my PS4 is at my dad's, and my PS5 is in my bedroom). But PPSSPP covers my PSP needs. As for the Vita, well, Persona 4 Golden is on Steam, Wipeout 2048 is part of the Omega Collection on PS4, and... actually, I think that's it for me and the Vita. Meanwhile, the Xbox Series X plays sone games going back to the original Xbox, with a handful (and a lot of 360 games) even available on Game Pass, and games for all four generations are still available in the digital store. Heck, I just bought the first Mercenaries game.

I'm not sure if it's removable or not. But I think it's supposed to be this. The dino legs, yes. The tail is on his back, though. Overall, is this a perfect, mini MP Slag? No. Is it as good or better than Kingdom Grimlock? I'm thinking yes.

Repaint Roundup! Actually, I got this stuff in awhile ago, but I was busy and forgot about them. Didn't even take them out of the box until I took my pictures. It's... the rest of the Galactic Odyssey stuff! First up, Micron. This set contains six Micromasters. From left to right, we've got Windstorm, Stingracer, Runner, Motorhead, Fireguard, and Roadburner. These guys are all repaints of existing Micromasters. Windstorm and Stingracer are repaints of Daddy-O and Trip-Up of the Hot Rod Patrol. Weirdly, while the Hot Rod Patrol were Autobots only Windstorm is here. Stingracer is a Decepticon. As near as I can tell, they're both new characters and they're actually references to M.A.S.K. vehicles Hurricane and Stinger. Next we have Runner and Motorhead. They're repaints Roller Force and Ground Hog, the Decepticon Race Patrol. Motorhead is also supposed to be from the G1 Race Patrol, and while his colors are accurate his alt mode is not (because he's got Ground Hog's. Runner's got the closed cockpit of Roller Force, but his colors suggest that he's actually Barricade. Not the pseudo-G1, make-movie-Barricade-a-Prowl-repaint; Barricade the 4th member of the Race Patrol. Last up, Fireguard and Roadburner are repaints of Direct Hit and Power Punch. They're meant to be member of the G1 Metro Squad, with Fireguard replacing Wheel Blaze (because Wheel Blaze was already included in that Target-exlcusive Micromaster pack from awhile back). Not a lot to say about these guys, really. They're Micromasters. Super simple transformation, limited articulation, no accessories, 5mm ports to stick them onto larger figures. Generally-speaking, I'm not a fan of Micromasters, so I don't recommend this set. I think I only bought it because I liked the first three Galactic Odyssey packs and simply decided to get all five. Speaking of the fifth set, this is the Botropolis set. This time we've got a mix of Modulators and Micromasters. Fuzer and Blast Master are a repaint of Fuzer (aka Phaser) and Blast Master. Yep, despite the different colors they're supposed to be the same Micromasters that combine into a shuttle that were already released in Earthrise. During G1 they were part of the six-pack Astro Squad in the US. In Japan, the G1 toys were released during the Return of Convoy period as part of the Shuttle Rocket W Team. The rest of the G1 Shuttle Rocket W team (and two of the other four Astro Squad were Moonrock and Missile Master. They're yet another retool of Direct Hit and Power Punch, but with a retooled part. Instead of the gun, he's got a flattish piece. It works, because in G1 Moonrock formed the front of a missile truck, and Missile Master formed the back. And that flattish piece? Yeah, there's a missile that can fit onto it's peg, completing the look. As for the Modulators, first up we have Overair, a repaint of Airwave. There's a story here... in the US we got a Micromaster Air Base with a magenta Decepticon F-14 Micromaster named Airwave. In Japan, the same set was released as an Autobot and named Overair. That said, the Japanese release was still the same colors as the US release, so I'm not sure where Hasbro got this scheme at. While Overair can do all the stuff Airwave can, this is the specific alt mode you're gonna want. The other Modulator is a repaint of Ironworks, and it's... Ironworks. Yeah, like Fuzer and Blast Master it's the same character, just in different colors. I'm told that Hasbro was trying to match him to Sky Lynx. As with Overair, Ironworks can do all the same stuff that the regular colors can do, but you're going to want this configuration. The last bit you get in this set is a white and silver repaint of Doubledealer's missile. Despite not really looking like it, it's supposed to be the rocket from the Micrmomaster rocket base. So what you're supposed to do is take the combined shuttle mode of Fuzer and Blast Master, and use one of their flipout pegs to attach him to the missile. Then, flipping up a peg on Overair, you can plug the whole missile onto... well, onto the airport terminal. Not exactly the best place to launch a shuttle from, eh? Ironworks clips onto Overair using the linkage devised for War for Cybertron (that totally isn't compatible with the one used for Prime Wars). Then the combined Missile Master and Moonrock just sort of drive along on the runway. The whole thing is supposed to be the the Micromaster rocket base. Y'know, the one that came with Countdown? Except now Countdown comes with Omega Supreme? It's... passable, I suppose. It's also nothing you can't do already if you already bought the retail releases of the Modulators, Doubledealer, and a handful of Micromasters. In fact, if you have them all, you can link them together to make one really big rocket base. And yeah, I don't really recommend this set either. Aside from not being huge fans of Micromasters I'm not a huge fan of the Modulators. While I appreciate that they're supposed to be G1 Micromaster bases, they're simply not as fun as the Weaponizers or even the Fossilizers.

Ironically, I do have Kingdom Rattrap. And I'm replacing him with Thrilling 30. I'm sure I'll review and compare when it comes in, but it just looks like an all-around better figure than the little Core Class one. Yeah, I have Thrilling 30 Rhinox and Waspinator, and I think both are very good. If Hasbro wasn't doing new ones for Kingdom I'd probably be content continuing with the T30 figures. But, I think for the most part Hasbro's making better figures today than they were back then, and it's not like I can't find areas that could be improved like better articulation, more solidity, sturdier joints, and in Waspinator's case wings that can be posed without the flapping gimmick. I preordered Rhinox, and I'm sure I'll pick up Waspinator when he hits (which, if my source is to be believed, he's coming). Thanks for the heads up. The process is a bit convoluted; you can't find regular product pages, just wishlist links. But once you add them to your wishlist you can then preorder. I grabbed all six, but I'll probably cancel Shadow Panther. For anyone else, here are the links Tigatron Shadow Panther Pipes Slag Wreck-Gar Gnaw I thought Pulse's preorder dates for the third wave of Kingdom seemed a bit far out, especially as sources have told me that Galvatron was manufactured, boxed, and shipped to the States already. And Amazon's dates for these 4th wave figures are only a month later. While it's possible that Hasbro is giving themselves some wiggle room, especially with the Ever Giving having blocked a ton of ship traffic for a week, I'm betting on the Pulsecon reveals releasing much sooner, just like the July wave of Studio Series figures hitting stores right now. I'm thinking probably June or July for everyone but the Ark, and probably August/September for him. Oh, and speaking of Slag...

I know. Believe me, I want it. But not as much as I want to stay married. EDIT: On an unrelated note... Rattrap is decent for a Core class, but I'm not sure he's actually supposed to be that small. I mean... I think... I think I'm going to have to track down a Thrilling 30 Rattrap, huh? DOUBLE EDIT: Yeah, I Ebayed Rattrap. Also, after doing some shopping, taking some pictures, and rearranging my schedule I can provide a review a day for another week, and @M'Kyuun you can feel free to read without skipping because I'm pushing Huffer to at least Thursday, but more likely Friday.