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I mean, if they do eventually do another combiner (I'm hearing it's a big if, but IF they do the second one will probably be Defensor) I don't think using the same connectors as Menasor (and possibly, but not necessarily, Combiner Wars) is out of the question. And honestly, on mainline figures it doesn't really bother me if they use the waists for bicep swivels and the hips/knees for an elbow joint (although if they can engineer them to smush in and hide the gap like MMC did with their Bruticus, so much the better), so I think Scramble City is still doable in the long run. But absolutely I want them to focus on one team at a time, and getting them right in a way that says something like "This is the best Hot Spot we can make" and not "here's a design we can use for Hot Spot and then retool in Onslaught later." If that means Leader-class torsos and Voyager-class limbs I'm in. If that means mixing Leaders, Voyagers, and Deluxes I'm in. If that means gestalt hands, feet, weapons, and chest plates that don't do anything except be parts for a gestalt that's fine. Less cute gimmicks and more G1 accuracy, please. Same. Scrapper is my favorite Constructicon, and it kills me that he didn't even have elbows on the Hasbro release. Aside from Long Haul, though, they were very good likenesses. Give me more of that, but with articulation! And then, in line with what I said above, I'm ok with partsforming if it'll improve the overall set. Make Long Haul a Voyager-sized Leader-class and throw in some pants! The G1 toy technically did. And while I do prefer a more creative engineering solution on something MP-scaled I'm cool taking off parts and setting them aside on a $20-$50 mass-market retail toy. I'm with you on that; Astrotrain has a great robot mode but an unfinished shuttle mode and a WTF train mode. Magnus has a passable combined robot mode but the inner robot leaves much to be desired and his alt mode is a very inaccurate Earth cab pulling the Siege trailer. I don't see Hasbro doing it any time soon, though; my source told me specifically that the design team wanted to do a totally new Magnus figure but the bean counters nixed it. The fact that many of Hasbro's WfC releases have been excellent figures that borderline on mini MPs makes the missteps more glaring and, I think, leaves more demand than ever for a 3P to get back into CHUG and both fix Hasbro's mistakes and fill in the missing gaps (Gears! Skids!). I know Newage made some great Vanettes, Magic Square did a pretty great Ultra Magnus (no inner robot, though), and MFT/Mechanic Studio made an awesome Astrotrain; just upscale those! If NA/MS/MFT don't want to do it themselves, maybe KBB can get on it? They already upscaled Newage's Bumblebee and it's exactly the right size for WfC.

Ok, big rumor so take this with a grain of salt (but this is the source that told me about Deep Cover plus the Quintesson drone (black Siege Ironhide), Sparkless Siege Datsun, and the purple Paleotrex that have leaked more thoroughly with pictures), but supposedly Hasbro is planning to redo Menasor. Motormaster will be a Leader-class figure this time, but we don't have any more info than that. We don't know if Motormaster will have a trailer, we don't know if he'll be be CW-compatible and the other four Stunticons will be reissues or if all the Stunticons are getting a do-over. If it's a do-over, we don't know if they'll be Scramble City or if they'll be locked into a Sunbow configuration. We do know that this shouldn't be considered a do-over of Combiner Wars, where every Deluxe in a line is meant to combine. For now it's just Menasor, and IF Hasbro decided to do another combiner it won't be until after Menasor is done, and we're talking one, maybe two combiners a year.

One last recent purchase. Well, not so recent; I guess I've owned it for three or four weeks, but I was hoping something else would come in so I could save on shipping, gave up, and finally just paid something like $12 to ship it by itself. "It" being Fans Toys Smokey, their MP-style Dragstrip. With all three Dragstrips in hand I can finally do the ol' compare-em-all (note, it's XTB left, Fans Toys middle, and DX9 on your right). And... yeah, Smokey looks pretty great. Like the other two he's got two different yellow tones, but the difference is a bit more subtle than XTB or DX9's, but I think XTB's colors are closer to the Sunbow art. I think I prefer the head sculpt on Smokey, and Fans Toys did the boxes on the sides of his legs better, but aside from that FT and XTB are really close for cartoon accuracy. It might come down to whether you prefer your Stunticons to be be Seeker-sized or carbot-sized. DX9 isn't awful, and I appreciate that of the three he's the only one that actually uses his spoiler for feet, but his short thighs, long shins, thin arms, and the engine in his chest more than his belly doesn't do him any favors aesthetically. Some side and back views. Surprisingly, FT has the least backpack, but his back is significantly wider. DX9 has a little back kibble, but he's not too bad. XTB's is kind of mess from behind, with the front of the car sticking out of the back of his shoulders, the butt flap, and the halves of the safety bar dangling from his butt cheeks. Both FT and XTB have the actual spoiler on their back sides, but I prefer how it's serving as Smokey's heels vs dangling from XTB's calves. On aesthetics alone, I'd rank them as FT, XTB, and DX9 bringing up the rear. Now, unless there's a problem I don't usually talk much about materials, but since we're directly comparing these three let me say that FT as usual is the heaviest, with solid plastic and a fair amount of metal. Interestingly, some of the metal in his joints has a gold color. While all that metal can give Fans Toys figures a heft that many find satisfying I have serious concerns about the weight of the Stunticons and how that's going to impact the combined mode. DX9 is much lighter, but the plastic has a solid fee that makes you feel like you can mess with it without worrying about breaking it. XTB's isn't bad and I'm not even seeing signs of the shoulder cracks many users seemed to have (perhaps because I took steps to file down some of the parts when I first got him?), but he definitely feels like the most fragile of the three. Smokey comes an alternate face with more of a smirk than his stoic default face, and a little half a driver for alt mode like XTB did. He also comes with two guns instead of just one like every other Stunticon from every company. It's a bit interesting that all three companies were copying off the same Sunbow source and they all got the same basic details; round, three-segmented barrel, rectangular stock with the back upper corner cut in, rectangular detail near the barrel, and a scope on top. But all three managed to have little differences in the handle placement, the extra molded detail, the proportions of the scope, and the overall size of the gun. They're all fine, so I don't have a strong opinion about which is better than which. Smokey's articulation is a little bit lackluster. Not as bad as Fans Toys' Aerialbots, mind you, and fairly on par with the competition (minus the ab crunch), but not as good as their Wildrider (double-jointed elbows and knees) or Breakdown (double-jointed elbows and knees plus and ab crunch). His head is on a ball joint but he doesn't have much of a neck, so his up/down range is a little limited and his sideways tilt is almost non-existent. That's slightly worse than DX9, much worse than XTB. Shoulders rotate and can extend laterally 90 degrees, which is slightly less than DX9 and XTB but you can employ a transformation hinge to make up the difference, so tie. Note, though, that the hinge for lateral movement is on the wrong side of the rotation, so like Studio Series Hot Rod he's stuck without lateral movement should he happen to raise his arm first. While I think that's totally unacceptable on an MP-style toy in 2021, the fact is that's basically the same boat for XTB (he's got a bit of a butterfly due to his weird shoulder transformation), which gives DX9 the clear advantage there. Biceps swivel, tie. Elbows bend 90 degrees, tied with DX9 but far behind XTB's (which curl almost 180 degrees). Wrists swivel, ties all around. On Smokey the thumb is a ball joint with no additional hinges, and the fingers are all separate with a hinge at the base and a hinge mid-knuckle. That's well beyond XTB, whose thumb is fixed and whose fingers are a single part pinned only at the base, or DX9, whose hands are the same as XTB's except the index finger is separate from the other three. Smokey has a waist swivel, same as the other two, but he does not have an ab crunch like the other two. Hips go 90 degrees forward and laterally, and a little short of that backward. That's roughly the same as DX9, while XTB matches for the forward and lateral motion but has a bit less backward range. All three have thigh swivels, but only Smokey's works by moving the thigh around the hip joint. XTB's is cut right under the hip, and DX9's is cut mid-thigh. Smokey's knees are ratcheted and can bend 90 degrees. That's the same as XTB, and the same range as DX9 but DX9's knees are friction. Smokey has no up/down foot tilt, something XTB and DX9 have at least a little of, but all three have (at least) 90 degrees of ankle pivot. Smokey holds his guns using the usual tab on the handle into the slot on the palm. The fit is very tight; perhaps FT didn't account for the paint on the handle. Swapping faces is fairly easy. First you pull the purple part of his head off, then you can slide one face out and slide the other on before replacing the top of his head. Normally I prefer a stoic face and I think the default one for Smokey looks fine- I'd have been happy if it were the only one in the box. But I must admit that I do like this smug little smirk, so I'll probably keep that face on for awhile. Yeah, yeah, three pictures in a row before more words. I mean... yeesh. I think Fans Toys kind of dropped the ball on alt mode. I mean, XTB's is by far the most realistic depiction of a Tyrrell P34, and is therefore automatically the alt-mode winner because I prefer realistic alt modes. DX9 gets a little shade for having a head instead of a steering wheel in his cockpit and his kneepads chilling behind his engine, but the proportions are still pretty good and he's still got details like the safety bar behind the cockpit and the black port holes on the sides of the cockpit. Not only did Fans Toys omit both of the those details (the port holes are technically present, but very small and they're yellow), but the proportions of the car are seriously out of whack. Like, any reasoning human can see that DX9's is just bigger all around than XTB's, but Fans Toys gave us something slightly wider than DX9's but a tad shorter than XTB's. You'll notice the tires are about the same size as XTB's, when they should be closer to DX9's based on the width and the size of of the cockpit. It look likes like someone took a model Tyrell 34 in one scale from the cockpit forward and a smaller scale from the engine back, stuck them together, and filled in the sides to try to cover it up. Aesthetically, then, XTB has the best alt mode, then DX9. FT's coming in dead last on this one. It's worth mentioning, though, that the transformation on Smokey is fairly straightforward and smooth, something you don't often associate with Fans Toys. He's not quite as fun to transform as DX9's, but I found the experience to be much more enjoyable than transforming XTB's. The drive can sit in the cockpit, but he doesn't seem to lock in place in any meaningful way. Oh well, he's going to wind up in a box, like XTBs. The rubber tires roll just fine. As for his guns, there are little rectangular notches under the stock in front of the handles. These notches plug onto small tabs in behind and to the sides of his engine, with the handles tucking down in front of the spoiler. As the worst of Fans Toys' Stunticons it's tempting to say that Smokey's a little disappointing, but the reality is that FT's Stunticons, Smokey included, are better than almost every other Fans Toys figure I've bought, and being the worst of the best is still very good. He gets a recommend from me, but I'm pretty sure that I've recommended all 14 so far. That said, after 14 of these things patterns are starting to emerge. -Do you like to transform and play with your figures? Buy DX9. -Do you want the set with the least height difference between Motormaster and the other four? Buy DX9. -Do you want the Stunticons to be the same size as the Autobot cars? Buy XTB. -Do you want the best alt-mode Stunticons? Buy XTB. -Do you want the best robot-mode Stunticons? Buy Fans Toys. -Do you even think you might want Fans Toys? Just buy them before the aftermarket prices get any more crazy (I paid a preorder price of $120 for Smokey, but most stores have already marked him up to $200 if they still have stock). -Do you want all three? Buy all three! -Do you want all three, but you don't want three cartoon sets? Buy Fans Toys for your G1 cartoon, buy XTB's "Youth" versions for G1 toy, and DX9's G2 versions. -Do you want the least-expensive option? Buy DX9. -Do you want the best combined mode, regardless of price? Jury's still out on that one. At this point, though, while aesthetics are subjective, I do feel like you're better off with DX9 than XTB. The transformation of XTB's overpriced trailer into Menasor's frame is unpleasant, stuff starts to come undone while you're manipulating him, and he's got some balance issues that may or may not be resolved by leaving Motormaster out of the equation. While Wildrider and Breakdown could probably use a more solid connection to the back of the calves DX9's Mensor is still exceedingly solid and exceedingly stable. I think it'll take a lot for Fans Toys to beat it, especially with the concerns I have about their overuse of diecast, but that's purely for a Sunbow Menasor. DX9 doesn't offer any options for a more toy/OX style, which I strongly prefer. Fans Toys will supposedly offer parts for both Sunbow and OX with their Wildrider, while XTB will eventually sell a "Youth" trailer for a more toy-inspired Menasor. While I would NOT recommend XTB's regular trailer there's still a very good chance I'll buy the Youth version. The decision I have to make in the meantime is whether I'll stick the Stunticons I already have onto it of if I need to sell them and buy all the Youth versions.

I really haven't been impressed with the Super 7 stuff. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't curious to see Tarn, Bludgeon, and G2 Megatron.

So while I liked yesterday's Optimus a number of QC issues really damped my enthusiasm. But you know what could cheer me up? Another Optimus! This time it's MMC's Optus Pexus. Ok, so technically Pexus is supposed to be IDW Orion Pax, and based on the details I'd say that Alex Milne's work on the More Than Meets the Eye story "Shadowplay" is the prime inspiration (pardon the pun), but the design was also used in Transformers Vol. 2 #22-23, also by Milne (with some subtle differences like straight pipes on the legs and more silver on his ribs, and smokestacks on his biceps) and as Optimus Prime in Livio Ramodelli's Autocracy/Monstrosity/Primacy series (with smokestacks, different shoulders, and a different head), and all of it ultimately goes back to Don Figueroa's design for Optimus in Stormbringer (with yellow eyes and windows, blue biceps, and silver forearms), which he based on his earlier work on Dreamwave's War Within. Basically, this is established to be Pax/Prime's body (with minor modifications based on the artist/and isssue) in pre-reboot IDW from at least the time Pax became a cop on Cybertron all the way until he got his first Earth mode. So Pexus still counts as Optimus. Regardless of the details, Pexus does a great job capturing most of the details from Milne's art. The only major contention people seem to have is that the large tires sit on his backpack, rather than in his torso with his shoulders sprouting from them. Let's say that while they probably could have designed a figure with the wheels in the shoulders deliberate engineering choices were made that necessitated getting them out of the way. The question is, where is he supposed to fit in? He's part of MMC's Reformatted line, which implies CHUG. However, previous Reformatted figures of characters that appeared in MTMTE have scaled best with stuff like Thrilling 30 Brainstorm and Combiner Wars Ultra Magnus, which are significantly larger than the scale established by Hasbro in the War for Cybertron Trilogy. If you have many of those figures he should fit in with them perfectly (I made the somewhat unfortunate decision to sell off almost all of my Reformatted stuff), but as Pexus stands even taller than stuff like Maketoys' Striker Manus or Planet X's Jupiter you're probably going to find him too big fit in with your WfC stuff. On the other hand, he's only a little more than a head shorter than MP-10/MP-44/MS-01/TE-01. If you consider that Orion Pax could have been smaller before he became Optimus, like Hot Rod is smaller than Rodimus Prime, then perhaps Pexus could be an MP Orion Pax. Or, you know, maybe scale doesn't have to be the be-all-end-all of collecting Transformers, and maybe you just want a cool robot toy. Whatever the case, Pexus comes with a few accessories. You get a "core", which is obviously the Matrix. You get a pair of arm blasters, which I'd love to say you can just stick on his arms and forget about since they stay in the same place in both modes, but you kind of need to remove them for transformation because they get in the way of opening up his legs. You get a pair of replacement fingers. And you get a pair of black collapsible rifles. Now, I also got a second pair of rifles in gray instead of black, but this is apparently the first-run gift for some stores (I'm not clear on if it's just for North American stores, if it's for non-Asian stores, or if it's for non-Chinese stores). If you bought it from Planet Steel Express the first run gift is instead an alternate head based on their original design, before MMC tweaked it based on fan feedback. By now, I can't promise you'd get any special extras. Remember when I mentioned "deliberate engineering choices" a bit ago? Yeah, those choices were about giving Pexus an insane level of articulation. I mean, articulation was supposed to be a selling point for Striker Manus, but Pexus makes that figure seem like a brick. Seriously, Pexus has so much articulation his manual has a whole section on it. But I'll do my best to cover it here- his head is on a hinged ball joint plus a second transformation hinge, so he can look almost straight up, he can look 45 degrees down, he can tilt his head sideways, and he can rotate at the neck. His shoulders rotate, and there's a hinge inside his shoulder armor that allows for 90 degrees of lateral movement. He's also got two more hinges for shrugging, plus a hinge for a bit of forward and backward butterfly joints. His biceps swivel. His elbows are double-jointed for a bit short of 180 degrees of bend, revealing some nice piston details in the process. His wrists swivel, and they're hinged so they can bend up and down. His thumb is on a ball joint at the base, with two additional knuckles. Each finger is pinned at the base from the palm to the back of his hand, allowing his fingers to splay apart, with three knuckles on each individual finger, giving his hands the kind of articulation you don't normally see on anything smaller than a combiner. His upper torso has a double hinge that runs from his chest to a ball joint behind his grill, giving him a back bend, ab crunch, swivel, and sideways tilt, but if that wasn't enough he seems to have another ball joint at the bottom of his torso for extra sideways tilt and extra ab crunch, plus another swivel at the waist. At first it might seem like his hip skirts will get in the way of his hips, except the entire joint can swing down and forward (the designer tells me this Gundam-inspired trick was something that the factory wanted to nix, but he insisted they retain), so he can actually kick forward well over 90 degrees (the hips themselves are ratcheted), backward a little under 90 degrees, and laterally (still ratcheted) a little over 90 degrees. Molded details on the backs of his thighs prevent them from swiveling 360 degrees, but the range they have feels natural. His knees are single hinge that can bend something like 160 degrees, but that's not even the cool part. He has a double-hinge with piston details that's folded behind his knee pad. When his leg is straight it folds up and pushes the knee pad out, but when you bend his knee it unfurls and wraps over the joint, bending the knee pad back with the joint in the process that reminds me of the armor moving over the frame of some Real Grade Gundam kits. Meanwhile, panels at the top of his calves slide down into his legs to get out of the way when his leg his bent but keep the gaps covered when his leg is straight. His feet have some hinges for very good up and down tilt, plus his toes can tilt up further. Finally, his ankles can pivot about 45 degrees, but both to the inside and the outside. All this articulation makes Pexus incredibly fun to play and pose with since with just a few exceptions (I could use more ankle pivot) you're limited more by your imagination than the range of the joints. As far as his accessories go he can hold his rifles just fine using a system that's actually a bit backward from the norm. It's his palms that have tabs on them, and they fit into slots through the handles of his guns. My guess is that there isn't really room for slots in the palms between the screw that holds his hands onto the wrist hinge and the pins that allow his fingers to splay. The guns can also be stored on his back, in one of two ways. The first is that there are small tabs on the sides of his backpack that fit into the second and smaller slots on the sides of the barrel. On my copy that fit is really loose, though. The other way is to use the larger tab on the back/underside of the backpack, which fits into the notch of the rifles' sights. Since that part of his backpack moves either way the guns can either chill on his back or swivel over his shoulders. Makes me glad for that second set of rifles so he can carry them while having back cannons. As for the "core", there are slots in the handles that theoretically fit the tabs on his palms. In practice his hands are too wide to fit his fingers inside the handles. Also, while you can get his hands close enough together to hold the core over his head you're not going to be able to his arms over his chest and get his hands close enough for both to reach. His chest can open so you can insert the core, but here's another catch- there's only room inside for the sphere. You have to remove the handles. There are tabs on his hips that allow you to store the handles there, and you don't even have to remove them for transformation. I'm still worried about losing them, though, so they're staying in the box with his spare fingers. While his articulation makes Pexus an excellent action figure, he does still transform. Here's how he looks with Earthrise Prime and Striker Manus. The transformation isn't terribly complicated, although the way his legs transform is pretty interesting. Is it comic book accurate? Kind of. For starters, I should point out that he didn't transform in Stormbringer or Transformers Vol. 2 (in this form). This makes Ramondelli's art in Autocracy #1 the first official appearance of this alt mode. Now, Ramondelli's art can be a bit indistinct at times, but I don't think it really looked like this. Then again, while he didn't transform Figueroa did do concept art for Prime's Stormbringer alt mode, and Ramondelli was a bit off from that. He appears briefly in alt mode during MTMTE, and Milne's art is closer to Figueroa's concept. Now, Pexus is certainly the ballpark of that art, with the ridged chest and blue chest windows front and center, a cockpit on tip, vents behind the cockpit, legs at the back, etc. But there are some differences, too. Pexus has visible joints flanking the cockpit, smaller front tires and finders that the art didn't, and he's not as sleek and flat, because his arms tuck into his shins instead of angling down so that the arm guns can run into the pipes on his legs. Again, though, I suspect that many of the alt mode compromises are concessions to the robot mode and its articulation. I'm not saying that such concessions are always worth it- I expect a recognizable Earth mode to be a bit closer, but for a character with a seldom-seen Cybertronian alt mode like Pexus the tradeoff is more than worth it. As I alluded to, the core handles can still store on his robot hips and removal is unnecessary for transformation (but I'll still be putting them back in the box). The arm blasters don't run into the pipes on his legs, but they do go back onto his arms. His rifles have longer slots near the tip of the barrels. First you fold the handle into the magazine, then the bottom of the magazine has both a tab and a slot that allow the two rifles to connect to each other. The connected rifles then use the slots to grab onto tabs on his robot arms. He rolls well enough, I'll note that the tires are plastic. Pexus' biggest flaw is his mediocre alt mode, but he's not the kind of figure you're going to have it alt mode often. He's the kind of figure you keep on your desk, posing and fiddling with, because his robot mode is so amazingly good and fun. Honestly, this was never my favorite Optimus design. It always reeked of being Figueroa's attempt to rehash his War Within design while being just different enough to acknowledge that IDW isn't Dreamwave. As for Milne, I suppose he could have given Pax a different design, as there's plenty of time for him to change into the Optimus we see in Stormbringer, but he didn't and then Ramondelli was kind of stuck with it. I decided to get Pexus mostly because I have a collection of Primes, but I was more excited for Naval Commander and MMC's upcoming Star Convoy. But everyone was talking about Pexus like it's going to be the figure of 2021, and after getting him in hand I'd say those people are probably right. Optus Pexus isn't just one of the best transforming toys I've owned, it's one of the best toys of any kind I've owned. Don't worry about how Pexus fits into your collection, where you're going to display him, or if you have the space for him. Just buy him, you won't be sorry. Highest recommendation from me.

Here's some food for thought... in 2006, when Hasbro launched the Classics line, G1 was 22 years old. That was enough time for those of us who watched the G1 cartoon and had the G1 toys to grow up, get jobs, and start spending our disposable income on nostalgia. However, years have passed since then, and there were plenty of kids who grew up with different Transformers. Transformers Armada turns 19 this year, which is just three years shy of G1's age when Classics hit. Are there enough adult Armada fans willing to spend like the "geewunners" to support a market for MP Unicron Trilogy figures? It seems that Fans Hobby is willing to test those waters with the release of Naval Commander, their MP-style Armada Optimus Prime. I'm not really up on Armada; I watched it once, probably 15 years ago, and I didn't collect the toys. A couple of things jumped out at me, though. The first was that Naval Commander seems to lack some of the bulk Armada Prime had. This seems to be largely due to transformation; his legs are on a slider that makes his thighs a bit longer, and some of the front of the truck that filled in Prime's sides just gets folded up and hangs out behind Naval Commander's head. He's definitely too big to be CHUG, as he's more than a head taller than ER Prime and nearly twice as tall as my old Cybertron-edition Bendimus Prime, but he's also shorter than the core robot for Power Baser (who's similar in size to MP-10/MP-44/MS-01/TE-01). After talking to some people who are way more into Armada than me, though, that size might be correct, as Armada Prime is supposed to be shorter than G1 Prime. Naval Commander has a lot details you'd expect on an Armada Optimus, but I find the colors a bit of an odd choice. Like why are his thighs, feet, and biceps mostly white? Fans Hobby seems to have been working from an old piece of Dreamwave-era sourcebook art (that was also used for one of the DVD covers), and that art was probably based on the Deluxe-class toy often referred to as Bendimus Prime for the unusually high (for the time) amount of articulation it had. That'd also explain the gold hands. But, that art and the toy actually had silver thighs and silver feet, plus red biceps. The Super Base toy also had silver thighs and red biceps, but blue hands and feet (which is, IIRC, what the PlayStation 2 game used). But with many sources to choose from and Takara setting the "cartoon or bust" trend I think the best choice would have been to copy the Armada cartoon- blue feet with gold tips, silver thighs, gold biceps, and silver hands. Naval Commander comes with a ton of accessories. You get a trailer, like the old Super Base toy, with two detachable containers. You get a blaster. You get a Matrix. You get six missiles. You get a mini car. And you get a set of clear eyes and different "ears" for the super mode head. The missiles can fit into one of two launchers on the front of the trailer. There's a row of buttons on top to fire the missiles. A missile can also got into the barrel of the blaster. The button to fire it is molded into the ribbing on the barrel. The containers nominally fit onto the sides of the trailer. There's a flap on the bottom that reveals some molded details painted to look like missiles, but that'll come into play more later. A flap on the side opens to reveal a hollow space you can store the mini car in. You could also put a Micromaster, Siege or G1, or some original Armada Minicons inside, because in car mode the mini car is about the same size as those toys. It transforms into a mini robot that's supposed to be the Minicon Sparkplug. He games some size as a robot, standing over a third taller than a Siege Micromaster. The engineering would be kind of interesting for a figure that size, if the build of the figure weren't so bad. The struts his arms are on don't stay tabbed in, and his arms constantly pop off at his ball-jointed shoulders. As for Naval Commander himself, his head is on a ball joint with the ball in the torso instead of the head, so he can look up and down a fair bit as well as tilt his head sideways much more than you'd actually need. His shoulders are also essentially big ball joints. They rotate fine and even give him a bit of a butterfly joint, but lateral range is fairly limited. You can use the transformation hinges in his torso to get a little extra range, but we're falling into the Studio Series Hot Rot/Warbotron trap of arms that can't move laterally if they're raised. His biceps swivel. His ratcheted elbow bends 90 degrees. However, if you pull on his arm it'll stretch out and click into place for alt mode, but that also reveals a second joint that you can use to get an additional 45 degrees of bend. His wrists swivel. His fingers are molded into a curl, but they are pinned at the base so he can open his hands and his index finger is separate from the other three. He does have a waist swivel, but you have to pull out some white pieces on his hips to unlock it. His hips are ratcheted and can go laterally 90 degrees and forward or backward a little less than that. He's got swivels above and below his knees. Note that for robot mode you're instructed to pull his legs out, like you do with his arms for alt mode, but I think he looks better if you don't. It makes him look slightly stockier, hides the thin part of his knee, helps keep the lower swivel in place (which you mostly wouldn't use for this mode anyway), and it doesn't affect his slightly-under-90-degree ratcheted knee bend. His feet don't tilt up, but his toes can bend down, and his ankles can pivot about 30 degrees. His gun works like most Fans Hobby weapons. There's a groove in his palm and a rail on the back of the gun's handle that slides into that groove. Although I don't have it shown in the above picture the barrel of the gun does collapse, but it still looks too big for him. As far as other accessories go, the Matrix does fit into his chest. And the trailer turns into a base. It's got ramps and decks for smaller figures like Micromasters and or Minicons, and Naval Commander's gun does mount onto the upper deck in a spot that lets him use it like a turret. The containers can either plug into the ramps, or they can clip onto the struts that hold the upper deck up. I can't remember if the base mode turned up in the cartoon, but I do know that the original toy's base mode was a bit different. That's typical for Fans Hobby, though; they tend to go for more stylized designs. Naval Commander turns into a truck. Again, it seems big compared to CHUG figures and small compared to MP stuff, but it's not like I'm an expert on Armada scale. The truck itself seems a little off to me. Like, it does have the arms barely-hidden along the sides, and the silver swooshes on the hood. But the headlights are vertical next to the grill, rather than horizontal and more on the fenders. There's no taillights, even though the spot where they could have easily been molded painted is totally covered in every other mode. And the white feet are really working against him in this mode, as they stick out like sore thumbs. You might have also noted that the smokestacks are on the back of the cab instead of the sides. They're actually on sliders that cover his elbows; in robot mode they keep his arms from bending the wrong way, then move so they can bend backward for transformation but block his normal elbow bend. The slider moves the smokestacks from the outside of his forearms (the sides of the truck) to the front of his forearms (the back of the cab). Also, maybe they thought it was more like a real truck to have smokestacks on the back? Regardless, if you don't like it you can move them; just pop them off and plug them into a second pair of tabs on the backs of his forearms/sides of the truck. Naval Commander can, of course, pull his trailer. There's a multi-hinged armature underneath. Folded one way and it acts like a foot to hold the front of the trailer up when it's not connected. Folded another way and it becomes a hitch, with a pair of slots that fit into tabs on Naval Commander's feet. The combined truck mode looks pretty good. The trailer is a bit taller than Power Baser's, but also a bit shorter. Since Power Baser's trailer wasn't tall enough and Naval Commander looks like a smaller-scale a shorter trailer works for him. The missile launchers on the front of the trailer are a bit different, and the top of the trailer isn't as hollow as the original Super Base toy. But with the containers plugged into the sides and blue stripe it looks pretty close to my eye. The handle on Naval Commander's gun can plug into either of the 5mm ports on the top of the trailer. Alternatively, you can fold the handle in and then fold out two ball-jointed arms on the side. Each of those arms plugs into one of the two ports, which allows the gun to be more centered on top of the trailer. Or, you can fold everything in and use some tabs on the side of the gun to attach it to the underside of the trailer. And yes, those treads are rubber, and they do work. One more thing about those peg holes... there's more than just two on top of the trailer, and they're for more than plugging his gun into his alt mode. There's also a pair on the back of Naval Commander's hip skirts, just in front of where he connects to the trailer in truck mode, as well as one on either side of the trailer hidden behind the removable containers. The 5mm peg holes can be used to attach Siege Micromasters. You'll notice that there's also a fold-out peg behind each of those peg holes. That peg has a hole with a tinier peg in it, and it's the connection for the mini robot. It also happens to be the connection for original Armada Minicons; I don't have any Armada Minicons, but I did stick Naval Commander's mini robot onto one of Bendimus Prime's minicon ports. Now, I don't know if this was a thing from the cartoon or the original Super Base toy, but Fans Hobby insists that this is a mode, with some ramps folded out from the trailer and the missile launchers moving on their struts. The instructions even show a container at the end of a ramp, like I have it here, but I can't find any way to physically connect the container to the end of the ramp. While I'd be totally content with just the core robot, Prime often combined with his trailer into a super mode in the cartoon, and Naval Commander replicates that, too. He bulks up quite a bit in this mode, as he's now ever so slightly taller than Power Baser in his combined mode. Aside from the use of white instead of silver for his thighs and biceps, I think the super mode looks pretty good. He's got the gold hands, and gold details on his shoulders, pelvis, and knees. His feet are black. The cartoon kind of cheated a little by more or less making panels on the sides of the trailer just disappear or perhaps blend into his thighs; Naval Commander has his as hip skirts, and that's fine. He retains the butt flap of both the cartoon and original toy, but it's split into two tails The containers on the outsides of his legs aren't accurate, but they're removable if they bother you plus they serve a purpose should you keep them. I guess the biggest departure is that the top of the cab-chest opens up to both fill in some gaps but also to reveal a large gold spot. In super mode, Naval Commander's head is again a ball joint. The instructions helpfully remind you that you can pull on his head to extend his neck, giving him decent enough forward, backward, and sideways tilt. His shoulders rotate on ratchets, and can move laterally on another ratchet (how far depends on how his arm is turned; in theory up to 90 degrees but his wheels often collide with his shoulder pads before that). His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend a little short of 90 degrees. His wrists swivel. In this mode his fingers are more articulated; the thumb is on a ball joint at the base with one additional hinge. Each finger is pinned at the base with two additional pinned knuckles, and each finger is separate from the others. His waist swivels. His hips ratchet forward and backward about 90 degrees. They also move laterally on ratchets, but here's the weird thing- they go to about 45 degrees, then they just stop. There doesn't appear to be anything about the way they're molded or any kibble in the way. They look like they could go all the way to 90 degrees. But there's resistance, and I don't want to break anything by forcing it. So we move on. Thighs swivel, and ratcheted knees bend 90 degrees. At first I thought his feet seemed a bit limited, but they actually drop down a bit. This allows you to get some up/down tilt on a soft ratchet, plus the toes bend up, and 45 degrees of ratcheted ankle tilt. The super mode holds the gun exactly the same way as the core robot. Now here's something I don't think the original toy did. The butt flaps can rotate to the sides, and the missile launchers on them can move around on their armatures to face forward. Meanwhile, if you left the containers on his legs you can open the flaps to show off the faux missiles. To top of the look, the Minicon ports on his knees can telescope outward, making it look like Naval Commander has guns on his knees, while you can use the ports on his shoulder pads to mount actual Minicons or Siege Micromasters. Alternatively, you can move the containers from his legs to his shoulders if you prefer. Speaking of preferences, you'll recall from the accessories that we have some options. You have to first remove the super mode head by moving the flap it's on and unscrewing it from the bottom. Then, you have to remove three more screws to pull the head apart. With the head disassembled the eyes just fall out, and you can slide the ears off. The default ones are kind like flat wings. I prefer the alternate ones, which are more like pipes. I think that they're more accurate. The clear eyes are for if you want to use the light up gimmick. Despite having a drawer full of button cell batteries I don't have the right kind for the battery box that fits in his head. Besides, even if I did the amount of time I'd have the lights on vs off doesn't make clear eyes worth it, and the metallic red paint on the default eyes looks fantastic. Ok, you guys know I love Fans Hobby. I've bought their Monsterbots, Power Baser, their Godbomber, their Overlord, Scourge, Laser Prime, both of their trailers, and Minerva. I've praised them for making solid figures that are sturdy and fun to actually mess around with and transform. And I want so badly to tell you that this is more of the same. I want to recommend it. But I can't. Almost as soon as Naval Commander left the factory reports of cracks started popping up on Weibo. Fans Hobby acknowledged this, blaming the factory on using the wrong size pins for some of the hinges. They said it would be corrected on the next batch (due in April), but offered to replace any broken parts. But here's the thing, I don't think the problem is the pins. The problem is the red plastic. It feels a lot like the plastic Fans Toys used on Tesla, which itself was notorious for developing little cracks. It feels very brittle. I noticed cracks on some of the hinges right out of the box, and some after handling it. There's cracks on the roof hinges, the hinge under the window, and on the white plastic where his chest flips up. There's stress marks and the beginnings of cracks where his shoulders tab into the nose of the cab, and in other places where parts were screwed or pinned at the factory. I'll be contacting Fans Hobby to see what they say, but I almost feel like the entire core robot needs to be replaced from the waist up. I'll note that I have transformed the core robot, both to truck mode and to super mode, a couple of times now and none of the cracks seem to be getting any worse, but "not getting any worse" isn't really giving me the warm and fuzzies. Right now, I'd say if you're interested in Naval Commander that you wait a few months and see if the QC is better on later batches. As it stands, $200+ is too much to spend on a figure that comes cracked in the box.

Looks pretty good, especially since I signed up for six months of half-price HBO Max around Christmas.

Takara announced they're unveiling MPM-12 on February 25th. I'm telling you now it's gonna be Optimus from the Bumblebee movie.

Fair enough. But... I'd say Attack of the Clones was better than the Phantom Menance.

You guys are making my point for me. Sequels aren't always worse, ESB isn't the rate exception.

Terminator 2? The Dark Knight? Spider-man 2 (the Raimi one)? Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan? Star Trek: First Contact? Hot Tub Time Machine 2? ...ok, maybe not that last one.

I hope it's not just Newage. I've had Fans Toys Smokey languishing in my stash while I've waited for something else to avoid paying $12 in shipping. EDIT: it's just Newage.

I've been waiting and waiting for my usual store to get him in stock. They changed their date for Pexus and Naval Commander to April, so I canceled my preorders and just ordered both from The Chosen Prime. Really looking forward to reviewing both of those.

It's Transformers-adjacent enough for me, I don't have a problem with it being discussed here.

I mean Utopia is one of my favorites. For some reason, maybe because we've been talking about it, when you wrote "Guardia" my brain was like, "They're reissuing Utopia? Awesome!" Guardia seems a bit riskier. It's got it's fans (I love the combined mode), but the market for combiners that size seems to have dwindled. If a reissue doesn't perform and they're already having financial difficulties it could break them. But I'd love to be wrong; Maketoys is one of my favorites 3Ps.

I suspect Maketoys ran into some financial trouble. If reissues are what it takes for them to get back on even footing so that they can do new molds I'm fine with it. Besides, it'll give people who didn't get Utopia the first time a second chance to own one of my favorite 3P figures of all time.

I took my daughter to visit my dad today for lunch, since she doesn't have either in-person or Zoom lessons today, just worksheets. While I was out I hit two Walmarts and a Target looking for Studio Series 86 Grimlock. No dice, but I did see the first wave of Walmart Retro Headmasters. Of the four, I didn't pick up Brainstorm or Mindwipe. In the case of Mindwipe, well, it's frankly because I didn't think it was that good of a toy in the first place. The designers tried to get clever, with a more organic-looking body and wings that unfurled from the legs and wound up with a bat mode that missed crucial details like the arms that tucked into the sides to make speakers on the bat. I couldn't bring myself to buy another one, even if the head is different. As for Brainstorm, here's some images I found, Retro on the left and Titans Return on the right. While there are some differences in color, the biggest difference in my opinion is the head. The Titans Return toy has the G1 toy/Sunbow style head with the mask, while the Retro version has the Takara face with the mouth from The Headmasters anime. Brainstorm with a mouth is a no-go for me. Even then, this Blurr remold is not as good as the Thrilling 30 toy, scale and Titan Master compatibility be damned. Of course, Brainstorm was a Walgreen's exclusive the first time around, and I wouldn't blame people for picking up the Retro one if they missed Blurr the first time just to complete the set. I did wind up grabbing Chromedome and Hardhead, for basically the same reason I didn't get Brainstorm. Retro Chromedome uses the Takara head, which is the head used by both the G1 toy and The Headmasters anime. If you wanted Sunbow, you're out of luck. Now I liked the head on Titans Return Chromedome, but it was very clearly based on the popular More Than Meets the Eye comic book from IDW, even with G1 blue eyes. I like the bolder reds and extra silver on Titans Return Chromedome, but the lighter feet, monochrome arms, and brown shins are more G1 accurate (Sunbow, toy, and Headmasters). Weirdly, the lighter thighs are not, and it's not something Takara missed when they came out with the Legends version. Accessories are the same, just the duller red. No G1-accurate double rifles. Stylor is looking a bit better, with a lighter brow for his torso (still not gray, though) and some paint on his face. In alt mode you can see that the lighter brown is a really a different shade on both versions. The Retro version has less exaggerated, more accurate stripes on hood, plus the red spot the TR toy was missing. There's no red mark on the side, nor the darker brown breaking up the light brown on the side, plus the rims are painted. The taillights, however, are still unpainted. Titans Return Hardhead had a face based on the G1 toy, with a mask that has those little whisker lines on the sides. They just gave him a blue visor instead of gold. Maybe that was cool if you had the G1 toy as a kid and you associate Hardhead with a mask. I didn't have him, though (Brainstorm and Scorponok where the only Headmasters I had as a kid), and in both the Sunbow cartoon and The Headmasters Hardhead has a mouth. The Takara Legends toy had a head based on The Headmasters anime, and that's what the Retro figure uses. It's got a mouth, so it's good enough for me! Other changes involve copying the Takara Legends toy almost beat-for-beat, including tweaked paint on the chest and pelvis to better reflect the G1 toy/anime and the use of brown joints instead of black at the hips, bicep/elbows, and wrists. That said, instead of an Autobot insignia in the middle of the chest like the Legends figure the Retro one puts a black symbol in the same spot on his belly that the TR figure did, plus there's some added tampos on the thighs meant to look like the G1 toy's stickers. Again, the accessories are the same. I can't even really say that Duros is painted any better, since Hasbro actually painted his face the first time. The only real difference is in the slightly different shades of brown/gray and green plastics. The different colored joints come through in tank mode. The only other big differences are that there's some extra red and silver painted details on the sides of the Retro toy, to mimic some stickers from the G1 toy, and they painted some extra green on the roof of the canopy because said canopy didn't sit so far back on the G1 toy. None of that extra paint was on the Takara Legends version. The only other real differences are the packaging. The original Titans Return figures came on blister packs, but the Retro versions come in G1-style boxes, complete with the character art used on the original G1 boxes and the battle scene and tech specs on the back. I don't have room to keep boxes, so they're just pretty trash to me. The instructions, though, are also done up to look more like the G1 instructions. I'll hang onto those at least. And that'll do it. At some point I may or may not go back and get Mindwipe, because he also has the Takara Legends head, but the rest of the figure doesn't look like a huge upgrade to me. I'll play the second wave by ear; I think I like the Takara-style heads on Weirdwolf and Skullcruncher, and one of the propellor's broke on my TR Highbrow during a move, so all three are a possibility. But honestly, while I think Titans Return was the best of the Power of the Primes Trilogy the lack of ankles and the overuse of loose ball joints feels so dated after WfC. I don't see them doing it, but I wish Hasbro would just do a second G1 trilogy focusing on the trio of Japanese G1 animes and just give us proper updates of the Headmasters, Targetmasters, Power/Godmasters, the Brainmasters, and the Breastmasters.

Real? Fake? Time will tell... EDIT: My big leaker source says it's real. But now the Glyph and Tap-out two-pack isn't real. So *shrugs*.

Is that Shockwave an OSKO of the Studio Series one? Newage Mista has been on my radar, but I've got too many other priorities ahead of it.

Assuming you mean the Metroplex and not the dog, that's Maketoys Utopia. Your chances of finding a new copy are slim, but complete used ones pop up for sale from time to time. I love my copy. Transforming him is a bit of work, but he's probably the only Metroplex you can buy that looks like a carrier in that mode instead of a robot sitting down with his arms behind his back. City mode similarly looks like a base and not a robot doing the splits. He's a lot smaller than Hasbro's Titans, but he's a lot better.

So Star Convoy was bad. From that I assume that PotP Leader Optimus was bad, too. And while I didn't review it directly I referenced Power of the Primes Rodimus awhile back while looking for a Hot Rod and Rodimus Prime that fit with WfC, and I found it to be a compromised figure that was worse as Hot Rod than the Titans Return toy, and too big with shoulders compromised by the Evolutions gimmick when combined into Rodimus Prime. Now, with Kingdom getting me into Beast Wars figures, I decided against my better judgement to pick up a discounted Power of the Primes Leader-class Optimal Optimus. As an Evolutions figure we can't go straight to Optimal Optimus. We have to start with the character he evolved from, Optimus Primal. This is actually an interesting figure. You'll notice that there's no gorilla elements. The designers confirmed that this figure is meant to represent Primal in his Cybertronian form, before he got a beast mode. I actually like seeing Primal with a more conventional robotic body. I do wish it matched Kingdom a bit better, though; PotP Primal's chest and feet seem to be modeled less on the Beast Wars cartoon and more on the original toy. That said, he does have the cartoon head, and he's still missing the red hips. Oh, and he's got one other major issues that I'll get to after accessories. Those accessories are a pair of guns, and a Matrix with a blue removable core that can be replaced with a Prime Master or Titan Master. Oh, and a big gorilla. Ok, so that Matrix can be stored on Primal. It goes in that issue I said I'd get to- his huge honking backpack. Seriously, it's nearly as big as he is! But that backpack will play a role in more than Matrix carrying. And there may be a fix for it. So Primal's head is on a swivel, no tilt in any direction. His shoulders rotate, and can extend laterally a hair over 90 degrees. His elbows are ball joints, allowing him to bend them 90 degrees and doubling as the bicep swivel. No wrist or waist swivel. His hips are ball joints that can go 90 degrees forward and just a little less than that backward or laterally. His thighs swivel, and his double-jointed knees can bend 180 degrees. As this was the dark days before War for Cybertron he lacks any foot articulation. Primal can hold the guns, no issues. The guns have pegs on the backs, too, so they could be wielded as clubs, too. Primal has an alt mode, although it's a big less polished than Prime/Star Convoy's cab or Hot Rod's car. I guess it's like a transport, with Kingdom Cylconus to give you a sense of scale. The front looks ok, but it's entirely his backpack. The rear that's made from Primal just looks like Primal awkwardly folded up. Some wings or some boosters would have helped, I think. Primal's guns can mount onto his alt mode. Or, you can put the gun's on the gorilla's legs. Then, using slots on the gorilla's feet and tabs on Primal's alt mode the gorilla can ride on Primal like a hoverboard. This is a nod to Optimus Primal's Transmetal form, and a way for this toy to acknowledge the evolutionary step between regular Optimus Primal and Optimal Optimus. On that subject, the gorilla is of course Optimal Optimus's beast mode. I'm going to be honest, I wasn't super into Beast Wars and it's been a long time since I've watched it, so it's a bit difficult for me to pick apart the design of this toy the way I do G1 characters. That said, orange body, hands, and feet, blue legs and face, purple shoulders with wings hanging off, blast shields on his arms... looks like Optimal Optimus to me. I like that the gorilla face is more stoic, evoking the cartoon, and not the fanged snarl of the original toy. While surfing on Primal his back is hollow and empty. But, Primal can dock into the void, which fills it up nicely and provides a place to mount his guns in a way that's nice and cartoon-accurate. The guns can mount in either the same spot as they do in Primal's alt mode, or you can use the pegs on the backs of the guns on the edge where the cockpit was if you want them to stick out a bit farther. While we're back there, you'll see what's becoming a running theme with this toy, and that's a rather obnoxious backpack with Primal himself dangling well below Optimal Optimus' butt. A backpack can't be totally avoided, but perhaps it can be mitigated... Like regular Optimus Primal, Optimal Optimus has his beast mode, but he also has his robot mode. Optimal Optimus scales well with Kingdom Primal, but fun fact, in the Beast Wars cartoon the Maximals are much smaller than the Autobots, and while Optimal Optimus was huge compared to other Maximals he was actually around the same size as Optimus Prime. That said, as someone who isn't a big Beast Wars fan I'm less into the whole "great upgrade made smaller robots at some point in the future and then they went back in time to crash on Earth" story from the cartoon and more into the IDW story of the beast formers being long-lost colonists who exist as contemporaries with and a similar size to the Autobots and Decepticons. That approach lets me rationalize the Kingdom Beast Wars figures as scaled with the other WfC toys, and by extension so is PotP Primal. Again, not super huge on Beast Wars, but I think Optimal Optimus looks pretty good. The blast shields can be removed from his forearms and tabbed into the top of his shoulders, which I think is cartoon-accurate. He's missing some colored markings on his thighs and some gold under the silver bits on his knees. Maybe some of the molded details on his shoulders are a bit different. But the biggest difference seems to be that the Matrix-carrying cockpit on his chest is mostly silver, but it was more the same orange as his torso in the cartoon. Optimal Optimus' head, like Primal's, is swivel only, no tilt. His shoulders rotate and, using the double-hinges, can move laterally about 60 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend a bit over 90 degrees. His wrists can swivel. His fingers are molded as one curved piece, but they're pinned at the base so they can open. His thumb is also hinged, but more so it can bend around so that it's oriented properly for robot or gorilla mode. His waist swivels. HIs hips can bend forward or backward 90 degrees, and laterally even more than that. His thighs swivel. His knees technically are single-jointed and bend a little over 90 degrees. However, if you move the folded wings on his calves and unlock the transformation joint you can effectively give him double-jointed knees. His feet can tilt up and down quite a bit, and he's got 45 degrees of ankle pivot. So in his combined Optimal Optimus mode this figure's articulation is definitely on par with the newer WfC toys. The two guns can plug into each other to make a larger rifle. However, the peg hole on Optimal Optimus' hand is basically in the middle of his thumb, so it looks extremely awkward. Also, this combined gun is the only one Optimal Optimus has. He's missing the big orange rifle the original toy had. A better option might be to put the cannons on his shoulders. Is that cartoon-accurate? I'm not sure. But a third option is to use the hinges to lower the cockpit chest, revealing some peg holes. Then you can use the pegs on the backs of the guns to plug them into his chest. That, at least, is toy-accurate. My biggest complaint with Optimal Optimus' robot mode is, you guessed it, an obnoxious backpack. This time the backpack is just Primal. Heck, you can even put him in robot mode, making it look like Primal and Optimal Optimus had some kind of cartoonish accident with glue. But I think I can fix this... Before I fix anything, Primal has one* more mode. It's his jet mode, although I use the term "jet" loosely. It's basically the gorilla mode lying down in a Superman pose, with the wings extended and the cockpit out instead of his head. Well, I suppose that's mostly accurate. This time Primal is a bit more necessary, as the connection that holds him in place is on Primal himself. Without Primal, the Optimal's feet wouldn't tab in and the cockpit wouldn't actually be attached. That said, as big slab on top of the jet with guns sticking off of it seems to be accurate to at least the original toy. *Yes, just one. PotP Optimal Optimus doesn't have any wheels, and he can't do the car/truck/tank mode of the original toy. DNA does make a kit to give him some wheels so you can his ground vehicle mode. It also gives him the missing orange rifle. I'll see if I can get a hold of it. Ok, so I've been mentioning a solution to the backpack problem. And it's honestly pretty simple. On the smaller Primal figure a double hinge connects Primal to his cockpit backpack. Simply get a tool and push out the pin on the backpack side, disconnecting Primal from the backpack. Now Primal is backpack-less. That said, the backpack still tabs into Primal's back, should you need it. And folded-up Primal still tabs onto the back to make the transport/hoverboard mode. The hoverboard mode will still hold together Optimal Optimus' jet mode. But only the front half is needed for gorilla mode, greatly reducing the gorilla's backpack. And only the front half is needed for Optimal Optimus' robot mode, leaving you with two mostly clean, backpack-less robots. Y'know, DNA made two or three kits for Optimal Optimus, but not one that I'd really want; something that could hold hold Optimal Optimus together in jet mode without Primal, and parts to give Primal and alt mode (even if a pretty weak one) without the backpack parts needed for Optimal Optimus. Y'know, something to totally divorce the two figures from each other. Anyway, backpacks aside, Optimal Optimus is a surprisingly good figure, fairly accurate in three out of four modes the original had and with perfectly fine articulation on the larger figure. The smaller figure is better than the other two PotP Leaders, and can largely be removed from the larger figure entirely. It's easily the best of the PotP leaders, and I actually would recommend this one.

I don't know if you've changed your thoughts on Tyrant, but GT is reissuing it with an improved arm gun.

Generation Toy Tyrant.

Well, it seem Tformers.com is reporting on some leaked product numbers for upcoming Transformers. While some include the oft-reported Commander-class Rodimus Prime and Titan-Class Ark I noticed T-Wrecks, Wreck-Gar, and Sweep were among the leaked product numbers. You'll recall that they were on the list of leaks I reported a few weeks back.

There seemed to be some curiosity about this set, and it was cheap enough, so I went ahead and bought the TT Hongli Apocalypse Battle Armor set. The set consists of two figures, HF01 White Patrol and HF02 Red Speed. White Patrol is an homage to Prowl. And Red Speed is Smokescreen. Both are obviously quite stylized with anime-esque proportions that make their Earthrise counterparts look a bit frumpy, at least in a stoic pose. That said, they're definitely not G1, and if that's what you're after you might be a bit disappointed. Actually, the designs appear to be totally new; I've read the entire pre-reboot run of IDW Transformers comic books, and this isn't IDW. Stylized or not, their height to the head is pretty close to their Earthrise counterparts. So if you're looking for an alternative to go with your WfC figures these guys will do. I'm mostly good with White Patrol, but Smokescreen's always been my least favorite of the Datsuns, and I think it's a bit lazy that they used the same head for Red Speed that they did for White Patrol. Even Hasbro remolded that part. You get a few accessories in the box. There are two rifles, and they're identical. There's two sets of different shoulder cannons; the ones on the left, with the barrels, are for Red Speed. The black ones with silver missiles (that can be removed) are meant for White Patrol. That said, they use the same connectors to sit in their shoulders, so they're interchangeable. Finally, you get a pair of clips. They don't seem to have any purpose in robot mode, but they do have a use in alt mode. They work in a similar fashion, but they're not identical; the thicker one is for for Red Speed specifically, and the other is for White Patrol. Now for the bad news... the articulation on these guys is terrible. Their heads are on ball joints that can't look up; in fact, with the transformation hinge they're on being angled a bit they're practically forced to look down slightly. They can tilt their heads down a bit more, and their sideways tilt is more than adequate. Their shoulders can rotate, by they can only extend laterally on a transformation hinge that gives them slightly under 45 degrees due to the car kibble on their shoulders, and then only if their arms are at their sides. If they raise their arms their lateral movement doesn't work, like SS86 Hot Rod. I'll also note that their wings aren't connected to their backs. They're instead attached to the kibble on their shoulders, so they move with the shoulder rotation. Their biceps swivel, and their elbows bend a little under 90 degrees. No wrist swivel, and no waist swivel. Hips are ball joints that can go forward or backward only about 45 degrees because of back kibble and non-moving hip skirts, and even less than 45 degrees laterally just because they didn't cut the ball sockets to allow for more. They did cut the ball sockets to allow for an adequate amount of thigh swivel, I suppose. The knees bend 90 degrees. The feet are on ball joints, so they can swivel, tilt down a bit, tilt up a lot due to a transformation hinge, and pivot a little under 45 degrees (but I guess you don't need a ton of ankle pivot if you can't spread your legs too much). They hold the rifles using your bog standard 5mm pegs. As mentioned, the cannons clip into the shoulders. The clips have hinges and ball joints so they can aim up and down or even swivel a little. Transformation is fairly basic and not at all unlike what Hasbro themselves might use. The cars are about the same size as the Earthrise versions and look pretty good with them. Maybe too good, as the paint on Red Speed especially is more vibrant and cleaner, with fewer scuffs, than Earthrise Smokescreen. Smokescreen has the correct number, and while I'd prefer a bit more detailed police deco it's the same black and white pattern with the simple white "POLICE" on the side that Earthrise Prowl used. Interestingly enough, despite the similarities in robot mode and their traditional sharing of alt modes, White Patrol and Red Speed don't have the same alt modes. What's more, while the Earthrise figures get up close to the Datsun line but don't cross it to avoid paying licensing fees, TT Hongli gave these guys real world alt modes. White Patrol is one of my personal favorites, a Nissan GTR, while Red Speed appears to be an Audi TT with a body kit. Aside from a little paint drip on White Patrol's rear bumper both cars look extremely good. It makes me wonder if TT Hongli would decide to do Bluestreak and Barricade if they'd change the alt modes again. Maybe a 370Z and, dare I hope, a Mustang? The clean alt modes lack 5mm ports, and this is were the clips come in. They grab onto the spoilers (Red Speed has a thicker spoiler, hence the thicker clip) and have a port on top that you can plug in their rifles. As for the cannons, Red Speed's have rails that slide onto the ends of his spoilers, while White Patrol has a pair of smaller holes behind his rear fenders. Small pegs on the sides of his cannons plug into them. Interestingly, Red Speed's cannons also have the pegs, despite Red Speed not having any holes, so Red Speed's cannons can plug into White Patrol. White Patrol's cannons have rails, and although the fit is much looser they can also slot over the ends of Red Speed's spoiler, so interchangeability is maintained. Let me be perfectly clear about this- both Hasbro's Siege and Earthrise versions of Prowl and Smokescreen are better figures than TT Hongli's. White Patrol and Red Speed look great in alt mode or just standing casually, but their articulation is far to limiting for action poses. Worse, I feel like some of their issues could have been avoided. Universals could have been used instead of ball joints for the hips, and that would have greatly improved their range. The shoulders could have been fixed if they didn't split off parts for the hood onto the shoulders and instead opted for a transformation closer to what Hasbro used. That also would have kept their wings on their backs. And there's no structural reason they couldn't have had waist swivels; it seems the only reason they didn't was to keep the parts count down. Even if it drove up the price of the figures, heck, even if it doubled the price, I'd have gladly paid it to have better articulation that put these guys more on par with Hasbro's offerings. As it stands, though, they're actually pretty cheap. The set can be had for a mere $40, which prices them evenly with Hasbro's $20 Deluxes. And something to remember is that while Prowl and Barricade had regular retail releases with Siege and Smokescreen got one in Earthrise, Earthrise Prowl and Barricade plus both versions of Bluestreak were store-exclusives. Assuming you missed one of them (and assuming TT Hongli does release a second set with Bluestreak and Barricade) the scale used here does make TT Hongli's figures viable alternatives. So no, I don't recommend these guys and I'd still encourage you to get the Siege and/or Earthrise figures instead. But they're not totally terrible, especially for the price, and they could be worth picking up if you missed your chance at Earthrise Prowl, if you're a fan of the characters, or a fan of the alt modes.