brouken

Wow, NY is already selling Arad for 68,000. That's quite a markup. Everybody loves an armored valk leader, I guess. 

Awww man! Another SEED Gundam release? I'm not excited for this at all. 

Anyway, happy hunting for those who are fans. 

NY also has the stands for sale. Price is cheap, but the shipping I don't know. 

https://www.nippon-yasan.com/figures/27709-macross-do-you-remember-love-variable-stand.html

My current wishlist for Bandai is: 1) DX YF-21, 2) DX Kairos Arad Custom, and 3) A recolor of the DX VF-31S into a Skull Leader variant (like what they did with the YF-29). Oh, and release Chuck's and Arad's supers soon please. 

Thanks again Noel! They look awesome!

Agreed with Mommar. The red ammo drums do make for a good contrast. I wonder why Kawamori-san didn’t color it this way. It looks so much better than the orange. 

Now I’m wondering what color Chuck’s armor is going to be. Will it be olive green as in the movie? Or will it be the same color as his valk like in the BD cover?

Whoa, what’s this? A new Metal Build line? I can’t make out the silhoutte at the end. Hope it’s another UC era Gundam. 

 

Hey Brouken. Sorry for the delay. Here you go.

 

Wow! Nice! Thanks Noel! IMHO, this is how it should have been colored in the first place! Looks a lot more uniform with Arad's color scheme. Think you can do gerwalk and valkyrie in these colors Noel? Pretty please? 

I just had a thought. Once I get Chuck’s valk and Arad’s armor pack, I’m going to try and put Chuck’s radome on Arad while he wears the armor pack, to see what that looks like. 

I realized that with the release of Chuck and the armor parts are two new container pods for the VF-31. This will be the first time we can try to swap out the standard gunpod and recharger pod for other types. At least using the Bandai official parts.

Maybe Bandai will officially release the speaker pod packaged with Arad’s supers? One can hope...

Nice! The orange color in those twitter photos don't look as bright and blown out in the earlier pics. It looks more red orange like in the show (Though it could be the lighting.)

We also get to see more of the rear. The clear support adapter for the stand allows for three arms to support the weight of the backpack more evenly.

Man, I'm getting giddy with excitement for this! I hope Chuck's supers are not far behind. I can't wait to display a fully dressed up Delta platoon! 

 

Hollywood... so you meant Robotech, right?

 

Ah, were you referring to this: https://comicbook.com/anime/2018/03/26/robotech-anime-live-action-wonder-woman-writer-tease/

If that movie will cover the SDF Macross segment of Robotech, then I guess it would count as shudder worthy from a Macross fan. Make that a double shudder considering HG's involvement...

 

But it didn't have enough impact on the overall MSRP, right? So bah humbag to that two words. 

Cost cutting for Bandai, not for the customers. But you already knew that didn’t you, kabayan? hehe!

BTW, did you read my request in the VF-31 thread? About doing another re-color of the armor parts, with teal as the color for the missile covers, and red for the stripes on the twin cannons and the sides of the missle pods on the boosters? I would really like to see what that looks like since it would follow the color patern of Arad’s super pack more closely IMHO.

Two words: cost cutting. 

Hang on Shizuka, Spacemanoeuvres was referring to the Transformers movies directed by Michael Bay, not the Pearl Harbor movie (which I liked myself).

You have to understand, the Bayformers movies are quite a touchy subject for fans. Best to let sleeping dogs lie lest you find yourself in a flame war. Hehe!

 

(looks up name in IMDB)  Oh, he did Pearl Harbor!  I loved that movie!  Hmmm... since he directed such a good movie, now I wonder if his Transformers movies are good too?

I...am...going to let the other members share their thoughts on this one. 

 

Bumblebee?  That's the Hailee Steinfeld movie, right?  I liked her from the Pitch Perfect movies.

I remember the ads for that movie looking not too bad.  

There was an original animated series for Bumblebee?  Japanese anime? American cartoon?  At least it is not Transformers.

That's the one. Bumblebee (which was directed by Travis Knight) was supposed to be a direct prequel to the Bayformers movies, but apparently, the former introduced a lot of changes that messed up with the timeline of the latter. I'm inhibiting myself from learning about these changes in order not to spoil the movie until I get to watch it.

I don't think there was an animated Bumblebee series. AFAIK, all the animated transformers were titled as "Transformers" along with a secondary title denoting the series' focus (i.e. Transformers Beast Wars, et al). I know that animation from the G1 Series, as well as the Animated Movie (confused much? ) were Japanese animated. Some of the later series were either computer animated, or done by non-Japanese. There's been quite a lot of Transformers series since G1 and before the Bayformers movies that you need to talk to a real hard core Transformers fan to learn more about them. 

Haha! You're really making my day Shizuka! A girl collector who spends loads of cash on transformable toy planes/robots, but is apparently clueless about Transformers. Quite amusing! (Again, no offense meant. Just being playful okay? )

Bayformers is the term used to refer to the live-action Transformers directed by Michael Bay (surely, you must have heard about him? On second thought, you might have not, given that most of the movies he's known for are a) guy flicks, and b) released mostly in the 90s. Hehe!)

Funny this should come out now. I had posted the same question around two years ago when I also considered getting the Gallia 4 set as well. I eventually did get the Gallia 4 set from Jungle but never really had the time to see if the speaker pods could mount on the wings of a renewal VF-25. All of my Renewal Frontier Valks, along with the Gallia 4 set are currently boxed away with a good majority of my collection for safekeeping from my two-year old son (who, God-willing, will inherit all of this stuff eventually). 

Glad to see that I didn't waste my money, and that the speaker pods do mount on the renewals.

Still no word if Arcadia is going to re-release the VT-1 Super Ostrich?

 

??????   Uhhh..... ooookay....  If you say so.

Transformer?  Ahh, that's why...  I never saw any of those Mark Wahlberg movies. 

Haha! I'm just messing with you Shizuka. Don't mind me. I'm just geeking out and (playfully) emphasizing our age gap. No offense meant.

The Jetfire toy holds a very special place in the hearts of old Macross fans (like me). In the Philippines, the original SDF Macross and the G1 Animated Transformers series both came out at around the same time, and were quite popular among the kids of that generation (of which I'm from). (Though, they have not achieved the cult following of Voltes V and the other super robot anime of the 70's, but that's another story.)

LOL again at your comment about the "Mark Wahlberg movies." Yeah, even for some hardcore Transformers fans, the Bayformers movie series were essentially trash. We watched them nevertheless because a) we're fans of the original animated transformers, and b) these were the first live-action Hollywood blockbuster level movies of Transformers. (I shudder to think what Hollywood would do to a live-action adaptation of Macross).

I heard that the Bumblebee movie was much better than all the Bayformers movies combined, and really paid homage to the fans of the original animated series. (I'm still waiting for my blu-ray copy to arrive from Amazon. Was not able to see the movie in the theater, because its incredibly difficult to get a movie ticket to the movies here in Riyadh).

Anyway, enough OT. Let's get back to Macross toy collecting shall we? 

 

Is that a DYRL chunky monkey on the right side... with yellowing plastic?

Blasphemy! That's Jetfire (Skyfire in the Generation 1 TV series), former Decepticon turned Autobot, whose Generation 1 toy has quite a colored history. Per Wikipedia:

The first two years of Transformers toys were figures taken from older Japanese toylines, primarily Takara's Diaclone and Microman lines. 1985, however, saw several figures reused from lines created by Takatoku Toys, of which Jetfire was one — that of the VF-1S Super Valkyrie Fighter from the Macross series. This figure was one of the most articulated of the early Transformer toys, featuring fully poseable shoulder, hip, elbow and knee joints, and even poseable sacroiliac joints.^[8] The instruction manual for the toy even included the GERWALK mode designed for the Macross version of the toy, which was used in that animated series, and seen briefly in the Transformers season 2 episode "The Day of the Machines".

Problems over the Jetfire toy began when Bandai absorbed Takatoku Toys, and Macross regained popularity, leading to Bandai's desire to reproduce the Valkyrie toy themselves. This led to problems for Takara when they imported the Transformers toyline — although Hasbro was able to market the Jetfire toy in their markets, Takara was not, nor could they promote it via the animated series, since the mold was owned by their main competitor, and therefore, it was viewed as potential free advertising for Takatoku (this issue also prevented the Deluxe Vehicles, Deluxe Insecticons, Omega Supreme, and Sky Lynx from being released in Japan, though after Takara merged with Tomy, the latter two were finally released in Japan). Although an animation model had been created for Jetfire based on the appearance of the toy (which could be seen in the original toy commercial advertising the figure), this was quickly abandoned and completely redesigned so as to no longer resemble the Valkyrie. This was the design that went on to feature in the comics and cartoons.

Jetfire only saw a few American production runs, as the show the original toy was based upon, The Super Dimension Fortress Macross, was exported to America to become the first third of Robotech. Ironically, since Hasbro released Jetfire first, there was never a U.S. release of an authentic transforming version of the toy for Robotech, even though the design was the series' most recognizable and popular mecha. As with other pre-Robotech borrowings from Macross (for instance, Battletech), the licensing situation for the toy became murky with two different companies (Big West and Tatsunoko Production) asserting exclusive rights to license Macross merchandise outside Japan. Due to these legal issues, Jetfire has not been among the Transformers toys reissued in the 21st century, instead being offered as part of the War For Cybertron: Siege toyline in his cartoon/comic design.^[9]

This toy is patented in the U.S. as patent number D287037.

Jetfire was one of my most sought after toys during childhood, being both a Macross and Transformers fan. I was never able to fulfill my childhood dream of owning one, as a good condition Jetfire is pretty rare where I live. More pics of the actual toy can be found here: https://web.archive.org/web/20110614054405/http://www.toybin.org/search.php?q=1985+Autobot+Jetfire

That's a great custom paint job @Rogueload! And I agree that Arad's supers have a better color scheme than the armor pack. Makes me hope that Bandai will eventually choose to release Arad's super pack as well. 

 

As always, I did some coloring studies since I can't wait for @Saburo's.

RED

 

TEAL

 

Thanks for this Noel! Its nice to see what the armor pack would look like if it were colored after Arad's scheme.

Looking at the screen caps of Arad's super pack below, it seems that the major color is teal, with some red highlights on the chest, shields and leg armors.

As an additional request Noel, could you try another variant of your recolor, with teal as the color of all the missile covers and gatling guns, and red for the stripes on the twin cannons, booster packs, and the big stripe on the missile pack attached on the booster pack?

Locked and loaded at NY! Been eagerly waiting for this as I'm a huge armored fan. Hopefully this baby will see more action in the next Delta movie. 

Wow, that's the first time I've seen the backside of the armored pack.

One thing you can't fault Bandai is the lack of tampo printing on their DX toys. IIRC not even Ozma's renewal armor pack was tampoed so generously.

Yeah, I see the transparent adapter where the valk is connected to the stand. Looks like a special adapter meant for the armored seigfried.

The clip and arm holding the cannon pod does indeed do a more elegant way of supporting that heavy back. Much better that the multiple arms used the hold up the prototype at tamashii nations 2018.