Zob's Thoughts on Power of the Primes Voyager-Class Grimlock

[Zobovor]

I worked almost 12 hours yesterday. It's time for the semi-annual reset in the toy department, which usually means a lot of labor. The problems were compounded this year by the fact that somebody decided that they needed to push all the overstock they could find out to the salesfloor, so the extra space where I normally put my clearance toys is jam-packed full of overstock that doesn't need to be there. Got to love retail bureaucracy. Anyway, I scraped together the cash for Grimlock because I felt like I had earned him (and I didn't know that Grotusque had also come in the mail).

Starscream doesn't appeal to me nearly as much. His proportions and design are just so unappealing. I'll probably end up getting him later, but right now, given a choice between Grimlock and Starscream, Grimlock was so much more appealing.

So, while the Combiner Wars limbs each came with a component that could double as a fist or a foot for the combined form, they're doing things differently for Power of the Primes. Now, every limb comes with a fist only, and it's the Voyager-class toys, the ones that form the body of the combined mode, who come with the feet. So, we're inching closer to the way the accessories were packaged during G1 (the team leaders always came with the combiner parts).

When the Transformers: Classics toy line made its debut in 2006, arguably the beginning of the modern-era G1 updates, Grimlock was among the first toys available. The slavish adherence to the G1 look was not yet in place, however, and it was a radically-redesigned Grimlock that only vaguely resembled the original version of the character. Besides sporting an alternate look, he had a completely different transformation sequence that resulted in some really fidgety arms in robot mode. I was glad that Grimlock had been addressed again, but it wasn't a fantastic toy.

This version of Grimlock is an attempt to remain much more faithful to his G1 incarnation, but it also incorporates Combiner Wars technology to enable him to combine with the remaining Dinobots (or other toys). In some ways, he's great, and in some ways he really bothers me.

His robot mode is nearly six and a half inches tall, bigger than his 1984 toy (and taller than all the other Dinobots in this toy line). His colors are nicely in synch with his original look. Stock photos of him bothered me at first, what with the noticeable seam down the center of his chest, but actually you can close the chest halves together closely enough that the seam is almost invisible. His entire robot chest is made of clear plastic that's painted on the inside, to produce the same visual effect as the other Dinobot toys. On the G1 toy, Grimlock's entire chest actually wasn't covered in clear plastic (only the dinosaur neck and the center panel on his chest were) but it still looks okay. He's got the dinosaur head and shell halves hanging off his back in the correct way, and they even managed to tuck his dinosaur tail halves away so they're not hanging off the sides of his legs. His head sculpt, in particular, is really good. (He's decorated with red eyes, as per the G1 toy, and not blue eyes as seen in the Sunbow cartoon.)

The only accessories he comes with are the two combiner feet, which can be used as Prime Armor, and a power source referred to as the Dinobot Enigma, not quite a Matrix of Leadership (no handles or frame for it to sit in) and not quite a Prime Master (it doesn't transform). It can plug into one of the Prime Armor parts (unlike the Deluxe toys, there are no engine covers this time to cover up the gap when it's not being used) as an ostensible power boost for Grimlock. You can also use it as the head of a Titans Return toy; my ten-year-old son said it looked like the Eye of Sauron. The armor parts are designed to attach to Grimlock's forearms in robot mode. It's disappointing that he doesn't come with any guns or swords or anything, though. (I imagine Nonnef Productions will come up with weapons for him eventually.)

His legs are also decorated with great, big stickers that are designed to resemble the consumer-applied labels on the G1 toy. Grimlock's animation model had extremely simplified versions of these (basically, he had great, big blue blocks on his knees, then red, then green, then black) but this is the styling that those colors were based on.

Transforming him is similar to the G1 toy in some respects. The arms shift down to form the dinosaur legs, but the chest splits in half to accomplish this instead of folding down as a single piece. The dinosaur upper body halves and head close up from behind his back as you might expect. The legs don't fold up at all; they remain in the same position, with the tips of the tail unfolding from the bottom of the feet.

The resulting T. rex mode is about five and a half inches at the head, depending on how you pose him. He looks really good from the waist up. The colors are right, and his dinosaur head in particular is quite excellent. It's articulated at the neck and jaw, just like the G1 toy. He's also got articulated forearms on ball joints, and they're posed more naturally than the arms on the G1 toy, which poke out awkwardly. He's also got more foil stickers for his chest and sides that look like the stickers on the G1 toy, so he has a real air of authenticity to him.

There's a lot about the toy's design that I dislike, though. His dinosaur hips poke out way too far. He's built like Deanna Troi. Also, his dinosaur claws are so puny. Finally, the lines of his dinosaur mode are so hideous. His tail is this brick-shaped rectangular thing that juts out awkwardly at an angle. The robot knee joints allow you to pose the tail, but it doesn't even look like it's part of him. It just hangs there.

I was to say something about the aesthetics of the G1 Grimlock toy. Robot dinosaurs were a really cool idea, but the styling for the Dinobots was also a big part of the draw. They all had dinosaur modes whose lines flowed perfectly. The craftsmanship was excellent. The shapes of the dinosaur modes also informed the robot modes to some degree; the reason G1 Grimlock had big, chunky boots, for example, was because of the way the dinosaur tail was thick at the base but got progressively smaller. There was an elegance and grace to those designs. There was real craftsmanship in evidence. Also, most of the hinges on the toy were hidden. Power of the Primes Grimlock has none of that.

In dinosaur mode, you can attach the Prime Armor to the same place, which is now his dinosaur legs. He's got a couple of spots for a Titan Master or a Prime Master to stand, either on his back or on his tail. Also, I was messing around last night and wanted to be silly and put his Dinobot Enigma in his mouth... and the toy is actually designed for this. Seriously, his jaw is the absolute perfect shape to hold it, and there's a little rectangular spot inside his mouth for the locking tab. This means he can hold transformed Headmaster toys in his mouth, too.

Transforming him to his combiner configuration involves folding the robot arms and locking them into position so that the combiner connector peg slots in his forearms are accessible. The pelvis armor for his combiner form is hidden on the back of his pelvis, like G1 Razorclaw. The Volcanicus head is tucked away inside the black block to which his dinosaur head and body halves are attached, and it resembles Grimlock in a superficial way (it's black with a mask and red eyes, and wears a gold crown).

When you combine toys together for Power of the Primes, it's a little different than Combiner Wars. Since all four toys who turn into limbs will come with fists, but only two of them will become arms, you end up with two extra fists. The extra fists connect to the back of the feet that came with Grimlock to extend the foot module. This makes for a more stable combined form. The foot pegs are each on a hinge, so every Prime Wars combiner has rocker ankles.

I tried out the combiner mode using Grimlock, Slag, Swoop, Jazz, and Dreadwind. I alternated between using Slag and Swoop as both legs and as arms, just to see how they worked out. The combined forms were stable and pretty solid, assuming I remembered to lock everything in place (like Slag's robot arms). I've noticed there's already some intercompatibility issues with some of the parts, though. Dreadwind's fist didn't want to plug into the back of the foot plate that came with Grimlock, for example, and Jazz's fist component was too loose to use for Swoop. You'd think they would measure these things exactly, so that every part could be used with every toy.

I know some concessions had to be made in order to make this toy able to combine. He wasn't going to be identical to the G1 toy in every way while adding all-new functionality. The things that bother me the most, though, don't seem to have anything to do with his ability to combine. There seems to be room for longer dinosaur claws in every mode, even the combiner form where his robot arms are folded in half (the inside of his shoulders are hollow, which is where the claws end up). Changing the shape of the tail would have changed the shape of his robot legs, but again, that has no bearing on his combiner configuration. Maybe this is just one of those designs that looked better on paper (and by paper, I mean a computer screen)?

So, this is definitely a more Geewuntastic version of Grimlock than the oft-maligned Classics toy, but it's still got design issues. The aesthetics of the dinosaur mode are what bother me the most, honestly. They're just so unappealing. Something more closely approaching the lines of the G1 toy would really have been a better way to go.

I really want to love this toy line the way I loved Combiner Wars and Titans Return, but Hasbro is making it so hard.


Zob (all that chocolate went right to Grimlock's hips)

[Gustavo Wombat, of the Seattle Wombats]

On Saturday, January 13, 2018 at 4:13:06 PM UTC-8, Zobovor wrote:
> I worked almost 12 hours yesterday. It's time for the semi-annual reset in the toy department, which usually means a lot of labor.

And overtime?

> Starscream doesn't appeal to me nearly as much. His proportions and design are just so unappealing. I'll probably end up getting him later, but right now, given a choice between Grimlock and Starscream, Grimlock was so much more appealing.

Good choice.

> So, while the Combiner Wars limbs each came with a component that could double as a fist or a foot for the combined form, they're doing things differently for Power of the Primes. Now, every limb comes with a fist only, and it's the Voyager-class toys, the ones that form the body of the combined mode, who come with the feet. So, we're inching closer to the way the accessories were packaged during G1 (the team leaders always came with the combiner parts).

I really think they could do something better.

Just looking at the mass, each hand is about two guns worth of plastic, and if the fingers could extend all the way out, they could be gun barrels. I'm thinking every toy in the line could have two double barrelled shotguns which then combine into a hand.

The feet are more problematic, but have a lot more plastic to work with.

Anyway, I dislike the PotP hands and feet, and figure I should look for replacements online. Someone is bound to have made better looking hands and feet. I like the HFGs, but would accept something cribbing from the later CW dedicated hands and feet -- If I I have something that I'm going to leave in the toy box until I combine them, it should at least look good combined.

> When the Transformers: Classics toy line made its debut in 2006, arguably the beginning of the modern-era G1 updates, Grimlock was among the first toys available. The slavish adherence to the G1 look was not yet in place, however, and it was a radically-redesigned Grimlock that only vaguely resembled the original version of the character. Besides sporting an alternate look, he had a completely different transformation sequence that resulted in some really fidgety arms in robot mode. I was glad that Grimlock had been addressed again, but it wasn't a fantastic toy.

Didn't that version take after the Pretender Grimlock inner robot? Or am I just misremembering/hallucinating?

> This version of Grimlock is an attempt to remain much more faithful to his G1 incarnation, but it also incorporates Combiner Wars technology to enable him to combine with the remaining Dinobots (or other toys). In some ways, he's great, and in some ways he really bothers me.

Yup, that's our Grimlock. And if you got Starscream, you wouldn't have the great parts...

> The only accessories he comes with are the two combiner feet, which can be used as Prime Armor, and a power source referred to as the Dinobot Enigma, not quite a Matrix of Leadership (no handles or frame for it to sit in) and not quite a Prime Master (it doesn't transform).

I really wish they had sculpted thrusters on the backs of the feet -- the way they mount onto the dinosaur mode, they could have been jet boots.

I also wish that the enigmatic block was replaced with a Prime Master, or since they already have plans for all 12 Primes, and Enigma Master. I don't find a small block to be fun at all.

(Bonus points would have been given for making the Enigma Master fit inside a shell that resembles Grimlock's pretender shell)

My idea of a fun toy would be $5 more expensive, I suppose.

> It can plug into one of the Prime Armor parts (unlike the Deluxe toys, there are no engine covers this time to cover up the gap when it's not being used) as an ostensible power boost for Grimlock. You can also use it as the head of a Titans Return toy; my ten-year-old son said it looked like the Eye of Sauron.

I kind of enjoy the Prime Masters replacing various Headmasters, to give us completely ridiculous, and very robotic heads. I suppose we might get a black Prime Master with a single yellow dot and find Headmaster Shockwave.

> The armor parts are designed to attach to Grimlock's forearms in robot mode. It's disappointing that he doesn't come with any guns or swords or anything, though. (I imagine Nonnef Productions will come up with weapons for him eventually.)

When I opened him, I looked in the box to see if I hadn't taken them out, and then looked at the back of the box and discovered he had none. This was a disappointment.

> His legs are also decorated with great, big stickers that are designed to resemble the consumer-applied labels on the G1 toy. Grimlock's animation model had extremely simplified versions of these (basically, he had great, big blue blocks on his knees, then red, then green, then black) but this is the styling that those colors were based on.

I really hate the foil stickers on every other toy, but it fits Grimlock.

> The resulting T. rex mode is about five and a half inches at the head, depending on how you pose him. He looks really good from the waist up. The colors are right, and his dinosaur head in particular is quite excellent. It's articulated at the neck and jaw, just like the G1 toy. He's also got articulated forearms on ball joints, and they're posed more naturally than the arms on the G1 toy, which poke out awkwardly. He's also got more foil stickers for his chest and sides that look like the stickers on the G1 toy, so he has a real air of authenticity to him.
>
> There's a lot about the toy's design that I dislike, though. His dinosaur hips poke out way too far. He's built like Deanna Troi.

Those are child-birthin' hips. Which is odd on the male of an egg-laying species, but I suppose Wheeljack may have been more misinformed about T-Rex physiology than we expected.

> Also, his dinosaur claws are so puny. Finally, the lines of his dinosaur mode are so hideous. His tail is this brick-shaped rectangular thing that juts out awkwardly at an angle. The robot knee joints allow you to pose the tail, but it doesn't even look like it's part of him. It just hangs there.

The back view also has some gaps, which are ugly as can be.

> I was to say something about the aesthetics of the G1 Grimlock toy. Robot dinosaurs were a really cool idea, but the styling for the Dinobots was also a big part of the draw. They all had dinosaur modes whose lines flowed perfectly. The craftsmanship was excellent. The shapes of the dinosaur modes also informed the robot modes to some degree; the reason G1 Grimlock had big, chunky boots, for example, was because of the way the dinosaur tail was thick at the base but got progressively smaller. There was an elegance and grace to those designs. There was real craftsmanship in evidence. Also, most of the hinges on the toy were hidden. Power of the Primes Grimlock has none of that.

I kind of like the exposed hinges and obvious transformation bits on the Dinobots. They are supposed to be crudely crafted machine dinosaurs that transform into robots, and that should be obvious.

The tail here, and those hips, are a disappointment.

> In dinosaur mode, you can attach the Prime Armor to the same place, which is now his dinosaur legs.

Wouldn't rockets attached to the sides of his legs be better than pointless armor? Yes, of course they would.

> He's got a couple of spots for a Titan Master or a Prime Master to stand, either on his back or on his tail. Also, I was messing around last night and wanted to be silly and put his Dinobot Enigma in his mouth... and the toy is actually designed for this. Seriously, his jaw is the absolute perfect shape to hold it, and there's a little rectangular spot inside his mouth for the locking tab. This means he can hold transformed Headmaster toys in his mouth, too.

And Grimlock holding Megatron's head in his mouth is just great.

> Transforming him to his combiner configuration involves folding the robot arms and locking them into position so that the combiner connector peg slots in his forearms are accessible. The pelvis armor for his combiner form is hidden on the back of his pelvis, like G1 Razorclaw. The Volcanicus head is tucked away inside the black block to which his dinosaur head and body halves are attached, and it resembles Grimlock in a superficial way (it's black with a mask and red eyes, and wears a gold crown).

I get an insect vibe from that head. The crown just looks like short gold antennas to me.

> I tried out the combiner mode using Grimlock, Slag, Swoop, Jazz, and Dreadwind. I alternated between using Slag and Swoop as both legs and as arms, just to see how they worked out. The combined forms were stable and pretty solid, assuming I remembered to lock everything in place (like Slag's robot arms). I've noticed there's already some intercompatibility issues with some of the parts, though. Dreadwind's fist didn't want to plug into the back of the foot plate that came with Grimlock, for example, and Jazz's fist component was too loose to use for Swoop. You'd think they would measure these things exactly, so that every part could be used with every toy.

I think it is a variety of different plastics. But they should get the engineering right.

> I know some concessions had to be made in order to make this toy able to combine. He wasn't going to be identical to the G1 toy in every way while adding all-new functionality. The things that bother me the most, though, don't seem to have anything to do with his ability to combine. There seems to be room for longer dinosaur claws in every mode, even the combiner form where his robot arms are folded in half (the inside of his shoulders are hollow, which is where the claws end up). Changing the shape of the tail would have changed the shape of his robot legs, but again, that has no bearing on his combiner configuration. Maybe this is just one of those designs that looked better on paper (and by paper, I mean a computer screen)?

The tail really bothers me.

> So, this is definitely a more Geewuntastic version of Grimlock than the oft-maligned Classics toy, but it's still got design issues. The aesthetics of the dinosaur mode are what bother me the most, honestly. They're just so unappealing. Something more closely approaching the lines of the G1 toy would really have been a better way to go.
>
> I really want to love this toy line the way I loved Combiner Wars and Titans Return, but Hasbro is making it so hard.

I love 3/4ths of the deluxes so far, and the Prime Masters. And Grimlock is not terrible.

[Zobovor]

On Saturday, January 13, 2018 at 7:31:20 PM UTC-7, Gustavo Wombat, of the Seattle Wombats wrote:

> And overtime?

Actually, yes. I won't deny that wasn't appealing.

> Just looking at the mass, each hand is about two guns worth of plastic, and
> if the fingers could extend all the way out, they could be gun barrels. I'm
> thinking every toy in the line could have two double barrelled shotguns which
> then combine into a hand. The feet are more problematic, but have a lot more
> plastic to work with.

Seems like the feet could have been designed like G1 Predaking feet, which could double as gigantic double-barreled cannons for the Predacons.

> Anyway, I dislike the PotP hands and feet, and figure I should look for
> replacements online.

How many combining Voyagers do you suppose we'll get for this toy line? That could end up being a lot of replacement parts.

> Didn't that version take after the Pretender Grimlock inner robot? Or am I
> just misremembering/hallucinating?

The idea of a combined sword/gun was taken from the Pretender, and you could argue that the dinosaur styling was modeled after the Pretender. The Pretender toy was still an attempt at updating the 1984 toy, though. Classics Grimlock was not.

> I really wish they had sculpted thrusters on the backs of the feet -- the way
> they mount onto the dinosaur mode, they could have been jet boots.

See, that would have at least made the Prime Armor functional, and give you a reason to attach the parts to the toy, instead of just being an intermediary piece that you have to plug in so that you can attach this other piece to him.

> I also wish that the enigmatic block was replaced with a Prime Master, or
> since they already have plans for all 12 Primes, and Enigma Master. I don't
> find a small block to be fun at all.

It's so lame. If it could light up with a tiny LED bulb, or if it sparked, or if it were glittery, or if it did SOMETHING...

> (Bonus points would have been given for making the Enigma Master fit inside a

> shell that resembles Grimlock's pretender shell.) My idea of a fun toy would

> be $5 more expensive, I suppose.

You mean a decoy suit like the ones that come with Micronus, Liege Maximo, etc.? Wow. That would have been awesome.

> I really hate the foil stickers on every other toy, but it fits Grimlock.

I hate to say it, but I think it all goes back to my theory about lack of modern-day craftsmanship. Used to be that they would put stickers on the toys, but only on flat surfaces where there was enough real estate to make it stick. Now they're slapping stickers over top of hinges and sculpted detail and it's just terrible. It's like they've learned nothing in the last 34 years... but it's not the same people designing the toys that it was back then, so in point of fact, they really haven't learned anything.

> I kind of like the exposed hinges and obvious transformation bits on the
> Dinobots. They are supposed to be crudely crafted machine dinosaurs that
> transform into robots, and that should be obvious.

The fact that they all look like base metal (mostly grey, instead of the brightly-painted colors on the Autobots) helps to convey that. Presumably, though, Wheeljack and Ratchet had some experience building robots. I mean, they're not supposed to look like B.O.T. or anything.

> I get an insect vibe from that head. The crown just looks like short gold
> antennas to me.

I can see that.

> I think it is a variety of different plastics. But they should get the
> engineering right.

I won't say that this never happened with G1, because that would be a lie. But, really, when the big gimmick of the toys is supposed to be interchangeability...

> The tail really bothers me.

I did figure out that if you unfold the combiner pelvis and lay it over the gap between the body and tail, he looks a little better. Marginally.

> I love 3/4ths of the deluxes so far, and the Prime Masters. And Grimlock is
> not terrible.

I've got the Prime Masters coming in the mail. I'm kind of excited about them.


Zob (along with some wireless controllers for the SNES Classic)