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Zob's Thoughts on Power of the Primes Blackwing (Darkwing), Moonracer, Rippersnapper, Sludge, and Snarl
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21 lut 2018, 23:57:0721.02.2018
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Found a bunch of toys today. Bought them all on sight! Case assortment for wave two is Sludge (x2), Snarl (x2), Rippersnapper (x2), Moonracer (x1) and Blackwing (x1). The other three that I didn't buy were gone before the end of the day!
BLACKWING
Called Darkwing in 1988, the character has been renamed Blackwing. Darkwing Duck was a heavily merchandised Disney property in the early 1990's, and while it's faded into obscurity, Funko has recently been producing toys under the license. Funny thing is, Blackwing doesn't actually have black wings (they're purple). I am going to continue to refer to him as Darkwing and I expect all of you to follow along.
The way my toy was jammed into the bubble resulted in the stabilizer fins on his legs being a little warped. Guess he's getting a bath later in some hot water.
Just as Dreadwind recycles some Skydive/Air Raid parts, Darkwing reuses some of the same assets. Both Dreadwind and Darkwing share the same robot leg design (which means they have identical tail rudders in jet mode); Darkwing uses Air Raid's forearms. Darkwing doesn't just reuse Air Raid's jet mode; Air Raid was an F-15 and Darkwing was a Panavia Tornado, so he got a new nosecone and wings and a different fuselage to help him more closely resemble the G1 toy.
Robot mode has a blue chest and forearms with grey lower legs and head and teal shoulders and upper legs and feet. The shade of blue is a little light and pale compared to the G1 color map, but it still reads correctly as the character. He's got the Batman mask and everything. I like that he got newly-sculpted shoulders and a new robot chest. One of the things I disliked about the last Darkwing toy we got (the Universe Silverbolt redeco from 2008) was that he didn't get any remolding, so he just looked like a wrong-colored Silverbolt to me. What is it about Darkwing being forever cursed to share parts with Aerialbots?
He comes with two tiny little grey pistols. They're certainly not as large and impressive as the one that came with Dreadwind, which was also styled like his G1 weapons. But, Darkwing also gets two of them. I guess if the trade-off is that we can only get one big G1-inspiured weapon or we can get two puny little peashooters... well, I think I'd prefer the bigger gun, because then I could get another one on eBay if I wanted to! (His package artwork shows him with bigger guns that look more closely styled after his G1 weapons.)
Jet mode is dark grey with purple wings and teal cockpit and vertical stabilizers. He includes the yellow lightning bolt designs on his wings, and his air intakes are painted silver and red to mirror the design of the consumer-applied stickers on the G1 toy. He retains the variable-sweep wing design of the G1 toy, allowing him to achieve a delta wing configuration.
Although Dreadwind's instructions don't mention anything about combining with Darkwing, the instructions for Darkwing refer to the combined form as "Duocon Dreadwing" and do include instructions on how to transform the Darkwing component to form the superjet. I suppose Hasbro expects us to guess how we're supposed to transform Dreadwind.
It's not quite as clean as the fusion of the two G1 toys. Mostly, it involves folding back the nosecone on Darkwing (including his robot head, which kinda gets in the way a little) and flipping out a single connector peg (which is attached to the Combiner Wars tumbler). Not much to do with Dreadwind except swing his wings back and plug him in. You can attach Dreadwing's faux Powermaster engine in this mode, but not Darkwing's. I think the G1 assembly worked better because Dreadwind's tail section connected to Darkwing's jet nose to form this massive turbine. If Dreadwind came with two guns, you could plug them into Darkwing's guns and build double guns for each wing similar to the way the G1 toy functioned. The fact that there's only a single connector peg holding the two jets together makes the assembled form rather unstable. I've played around with ways of trying to create additional connection points but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. I appreciate that Hasbro tried.
The collector card I got was Onyx Blackwing, who "toys with his prey like an apex predator."
I hit the redeco fatigue really hard during Combiner Wars, so I was a little afraid I'd start to feel that way again after Darkwing and Dreadwind came out. Actually, though, they feel different enough that I don't just feel like I'm buying more Aerialbots over and over. So, there's that.
MOONRACER
The character of Moonracer was introduced in "The Search for Alpha Trion" from 1985, technically predating the introduction of Arcee, even though the Arcee character was created first. She was the girlfriend of Powerglide, purported to be the "best sharpshooter in the galaxy" (or the Universe, depending on who you asked). The episode was the only appearance for Elita One and the other female Autobots introduced in the story; this is Moonracer's very first toy, 33 years after she first appeared!
The problem with a toy like this is twofold. For one, she was created for animation, with little regard for how it might be engineered in three-dimensional space. Also, female characters pose a particular challenge, since they're impossibly lithe and feminine-shaped as robots despite them all allegedly folding up into boxy vehicles.
So, Moonracer is actually styled after the humanoid proportions demonstrated in the cartoon, but the design concession is that she's carrying around a huge backpack. It's absolutely necessary, partly to create much-needed mass for her vehicle mode (so she's not just a floppy Windblade mess of folded-up body parts) but also to conceal the Combiner Wars tumbler, since there's just not enough room in her torso for it.
This is a rare toy that's based directly on an animation model, and within the confines of the toy's parameters, they captured her look reasonably well. The popped "collar," the oversized kneepads, and even her little bracelets are all there. The head sculpt, in particular, is a slam-dunk effort. Just about the only distinctive feature she's missing are the pylons that protruded from her shoulders in the cartoon. Her gun is approximately the animated weapon, or one that was run through a Hasbroification filter. (Incidentally, her package art doesn't even begin to serve as an illustration of the toy. It's just... a painting of her cartoon model. How is that okay?!)
Transformation involves folding up the feet to form the front of the vehicle (the windshield is actually the bottom of her feet and is destined to get badly scratched). Part of the backpack folds down to conceal the upper legs, her head tucks away, and the rest of the backpack forms the back of the vehicle. The only parts of her robot body that contribute to the vehicle are the armor panels on her forearms and part of her upper torso. Everything else just gets hidden.
Her vehicle mode has nothing to do with the squared-off, compact Cybertron vehicle she changed into in the cartoon. This is, like, the limousine version of it. Still, what can you do. The green Prime Armor can mount to the back of the vehicle to add a couple of gigantic rocket thrusters. Her gun can mount to either side (the panels attached to her forearms).
I got Alchemist Moonracer, who "becomes a mass of raw protons to travel between worlds."
This toy is on the slab for a Firestar redeco (called Novastar), which will have a different robot head but will otherwise be unchanged. It won't be a great representation of Firestar, but it's progress. Really, in a day and age where Girl Power is so prominent in media, with action heroes like Katniss Everdeen and Wonder Woman and Rey of Jakku taking center stage, it's about damn time that we finally got us some female Autobots from the show. They really can't improve significantly upon Generations Arcee (except maybe releasing her again so people can actually find her in stores), but my suspicion is that this is only the first step for Moonracer and friends. These toys are stepping stones on the way to better toys, eventually.
TERRORCON RIPPERSNAPPER
I seriously doubt that Hasbro has lost the rights to the name "Rippersnapper," but I suspect they're consistently using the Terrorcon prefix in conjunction with other dictionary-word names like Blot and Cutthroat to make them safer to use.
Rippersnapper is, hands down, my favorite Terrorcon. I got him for my birthday in 1987 and even though I was aging out of the target audience for the toys (which were themselves getting progressively dumbed down), I loved his cute little shark-monster mode. It was just such a shame that his robot mode was so stubby, with useless arms and a tree stump for legs. He sure didn't look that way in the cartoon! The new toy does not disappoint.
As a robot, he's instantly recognizable as the character, but he actually has proper humanoid proportions... and he's no longer a Scramble City midget, so he can easily take on normal-sized Autobots finally. Mostly light grey with some deep cerulean blue, he's decorated with red and yellow highlights meant to evoke the stickers on the G1 toy. He comes packaged with his twin guns mounted to his back, but you can pop them off and use them as handheld weapons if you prefer. Not that he needs them, since he's got Wolverine claws.
To transform him, you rotate his waist around so that the creature legs mounted to his robot legs can face the right way. The creature-mode tail halves are embedded within his lower robot legs. The creature head unfolds and covers up his robot head, and his arms serve double-duty as the creature claws.
On the G1 toy, his dorsal shark fin was connected to his double-barreled blaster, so he lost his fin when you removed the weapon. This time, the fin is actually attached to the toy. Unlike the G1 toy, whose creature mode only had four points of articulation, the new version has fully-articulated creature limbs at the hips, shoulders, knees, and elbows. Plus, his jaw opens! He's got cute, adorable little silver shark teeth!
In a fit of cuteness, they actually included a tampograph on the top of his head that looks just like the heat-sensitive rub symbol on the G1 toy. This in itself is kind of ironic, since the Terrorcons were among the toys resold in 1988 who actually had their rub symbol intents removed. (A lot of fans seem to hate this for some reason, even though I don't recall anybody loudly complaining when they did this just a few years ago for Reveal the Shield...)
His Prime Armor can attach to his chest for robot mode in the same manner as Dreadwind (hidden flip-out panel in his chest) or to the base of his tail in shark mode (which isn't a bad look for him, actually).
Onyx Rippersnapper is an "unrivaled hunter in any terrain."
With the proper remolding, this toy could be reused as Skalor or Overbite, or possibly both. (We already know we're getting Seacons, so I'm just thinking ahead...)
DINOBOT SLUDGE
Okay, I freely admit that I'm a little more excited about the new Dinobots now that I've got a full set. (Really, they should have released Grimlock, Sludge, and Slag first, and then sold Swoop and Snarl in a later wave, to mirror their introductions from the cartoon.)
So, Sludge recycles some of the Slag design elements. He's got the same robot legs, the same pelvis, the same robot upper arms (the lower arms are different), and the same robot fists. They have the same guns, too. The robot shoulders are designed to look like the consumer-applied stickers on Slag, but the recycled parts aren't terrible on Sludge, and I didn't even notice it until I got him out of the packaging.
As a robot, Sludge is partly inspired by his animated design. This is particularly evident in the shape of his head, in which the sides of his helmet reach all the way to his body, with no neck in evidence. His eyes are yellow, like the Diaclone toy, rather than the blue of the cartoon. Unlike Slag, he's got grand, majestic, sweeping wings in this form. Unlike some toys that were released so far apart that Hasbro forgot what colors they used, there's a uniformity with these Dinobots, and Sludge shares the same tone of grey and red with Grimlock, Slag, etc. Just about the only feature of his robot design that I dislike is the large, obvious peg hole right in the center of his chest. Reminds me of Targetmaster Blurr.
Transforming him is very close to the G1 toy, but there isn't all that complicated business with having to arrange his robot arms just so, in order to fold up his wings to form the dinosaur shell. A couple of new tricks is that his dinosaur neck rotates at mid-neck (so it can tuck away better for robot mode, I guess) and that his fists tuck into his forearms instead of his forearms just folding up under the dinosaur belly and ask you to please not notice that they're there.
As a brontosaurus (the original toy was released in 1984; so, yes, he's a brontosaurus), he's only slightly smaller than the G1 toy. For some reason, they made his rear legs out of clear plastic and then painted the insides silver. On the upside, he's actually got eyes this time. His lines are pretty graceful this time, coming close to matching the sexy curvature of the Diaclone toy. His front legs seem like they're just too long, though. If I bend them at the knees, though, the architecture of his body interferes with the bolts on the insides of his knees. The rear legs are very heavily inspired by the G1 toy, but his ankles can't move. Overall, though, I really like the new Sludge.
Prima Sludge "grants allies courage equal in strength to his stomping," because why the hell not.
DINOBOT SNARL
I do believe Snarl is my favorite G1 Dinobot toy. I'm not super fond of their characterizations in the cartoon (they're all pretty much idiots) but as far as the actual G1 toys went, Snarl had the most shiny gold parts and was therefore the prettiest. Also, I like stegosauruseses.
As a robot, Snarl is arguably better-proportioned than the G1 toy, which had massive legs but tiny forearms and a ridiculously small head. His colors are a little weird in places (he's got gold forearms and the panel to which his robot head is attached is gold as well) but generally speaking, he looks good. He comes armed with a sword that is very similar in shape and size to his G1 sword, but it's molded entirely in clear plastic. Uh, did they forget to paint it or something? It looks really weird. Like it's made of glass.
All of his stegosaurus plates, along with the tip of his tail, are made of soft, rubbery plastic.
To transform him, it's more or less like G1, except that his robot torso faces the other way 'round. His tail halves are connected to an armature, and each other, rather than being attached to his body. His front stegonsaurus legs no longer fit into a recessed cavity (which would necessitate the inclusion of a costly spring, no doubt). Also, he's got panels to cover the holes in the backs of his robot legs, so there's that extra step to deal with.
In stegosaurus mode, he resembles a slightly undersized version of the G1 toy. His sword and Prime Armor can mount to either of his hips. (The Prime Armor is identical to the ones that come packaged with the other Dinobots, except that Snarl's has a gold connector peg instead of black.) There is an unused rectangular tab behind his head in dino mode; samples at Toy Fair showed him wearing a Bristleback style dual gun, so it's likely we can expect a redeco as the Pretender Monster in question at some point.
Solus Snarl "forges armor that can withstand infinite battles." Really, that just sounds ridiculous.
VOLCANICUS
So, now that I've got all five Dinobots, I can finally form Volcanicus. I went with the official positioning of the limbs, in which Swoop and Slag function as arms and Sludge and Snarl serve as legs.
Well, the combined form isn't terrible. The Dinobots having a uniform color scheme helps, since Volcanicus isn't a mish-mash of seemingly random colors like some other combiners I could mention (coughMenasorcough). Considering that this is an original design, and not an attempt to copy something Sunbow did 30 years ago, it's a pretty decent effort. It doesn't trigger any nostalgic memory cells in my brain, but it's also not supposed to. If I had any major complaints, it's that he doesn't really have any weapons. I can't just put Swoop's sword in his hand, because at his size, it looks like he's carrying a butter knife.
And, frankly, I always wanted to see the Dinobots combine. I get that their toys were never designed to do so, but they're pretty much the only five-member Transformers sub-group that can't do it, so their inability to do so, up until now, was fairly conspicuous. Even if you don't ever combine them, though, the individual toys aren't half bad on their own.
Zob (spent all night reviewing toys, yay!)
BLACKWING
Called Darkwing in 1988, the character has been renamed Blackwing. Darkwing Duck was a heavily merchandised Disney property in the early 1990's, and while it's faded into obscurity, Funko has recently been producing toys under the license. Funny thing is, Blackwing doesn't actually have black wings (they're purple). I am going to continue to refer to him as Darkwing and I expect all of you to follow along.
The way my toy was jammed into the bubble resulted in the stabilizer fins on his legs being a little warped. Guess he's getting a bath later in some hot water.
Just as Dreadwind recycles some Skydive/Air Raid parts, Darkwing reuses some of the same assets. Both Dreadwind and Darkwing share the same robot leg design (which means they have identical tail rudders in jet mode); Darkwing uses Air Raid's forearms. Darkwing doesn't just reuse Air Raid's jet mode; Air Raid was an F-15 and Darkwing was a Panavia Tornado, so he got a new nosecone and wings and a different fuselage to help him more closely resemble the G1 toy.
Robot mode has a blue chest and forearms with grey lower legs and head and teal shoulders and upper legs and feet. The shade of blue is a little light and pale compared to the G1 color map, but it still reads correctly as the character. He's got the Batman mask and everything. I like that he got newly-sculpted shoulders and a new robot chest. One of the things I disliked about the last Darkwing toy we got (the Universe Silverbolt redeco from 2008) was that he didn't get any remolding, so he just looked like a wrong-colored Silverbolt to me. What is it about Darkwing being forever cursed to share parts with Aerialbots?
He comes with two tiny little grey pistols. They're certainly not as large and impressive as the one that came with Dreadwind, which was also styled like his G1 weapons. But, Darkwing also gets two of them. I guess if the trade-off is that we can only get one big G1-inspiured weapon or we can get two puny little peashooters... well, I think I'd prefer the bigger gun, because then I could get another one on eBay if I wanted to! (His package artwork shows him with bigger guns that look more closely styled after his G1 weapons.)
Jet mode is dark grey with purple wings and teal cockpit and vertical stabilizers. He includes the yellow lightning bolt designs on his wings, and his air intakes are painted silver and red to mirror the design of the consumer-applied stickers on the G1 toy. He retains the variable-sweep wing design of the G1 toy, allowing him to achieve a delta wing configuration.
Although Dreadwind's instructions don't mention anything about combining with Darkwing, the instructions for Darkwing refer to the combined form as "Duocon Dreadwing" and do include instructions on how to transform the Darkwing component to form the superjet. I suppose Hasbro expects us to guess how we're supposed to transform Dreadwind.
It's not quite as clean as the fusion of the two G1 toys. Mostly, it involves folding back the nosecone on Darkwing (including his robot head, which kinda gets in the way a little) and flipping out a single connector peg (which is attached to the Combiner Wars tumbler). Not much to do with Dreadwind except swing his wings back and plug him in. You can attach Dreadwing's faux Powermaster engine in this mode, but not Darkwing's. I think the G1 assembly worked better because Dreadwind's tail section connected to Darkwing's jet nose to form this massive turbine. If Dreadwind came with two guns, you could plug them into Darkwing's guns and build double guns for each wing similar to the way the G1 toy functioned. The fact that there's only a single connector peg holding the two jets together makes the assembled form rather unstable. I've played around with ways of trying to create additional connection points but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. I appreciate that Hasbro tried.
The collector card I got was Onyx Blackwing, who "toys with his prey like an apex predator."
I hit the redeco fatigue really hard during Combiner Wars, so I was a little afraid I'd start to feel that way again after Darkwing and Dreadwind came out. Actually, though, they feel different enough that I don't just feel like I'm buying more Aerialbots over and over. So, there's that.
MOONRACER
The character of Moonracer was introduced in "The Search for Alpha Trion" from 1985, technically predating the introduction of Arcee, even though the Arcee character was created first. She was the girlfriend of Powerglide, purported to be the "best sharpshooter in the galaxy" (or the Universe, depending on who you asked). The episode was the only appearance for Elita One and the other female Autobots introduced in the story; this is Moonracer's very first toy, 33 years after she first appeared!
The problem with a toy like this is twofold. For one, she was created for animation, with little regard for how it might be engineered in three-dimensional space. Also, female characters pose a particular challenge, since they're impossibly lithe and feminine-shaped as robots despite them all allegedly folding up into boxy vehicles.
So, Moonracer is actually styled after the humanoid proportions demonstrated in the cartoon, but the design concession is that she's carrying around a huge backpack. It's absolutely necessary, partly to create much-needed mass for her vehicle mode (so she's not just a floppy Windblade mess of folded-up body parts) but also to conceal the Combiner Wars tumbler, since there's just not enough room in her torso for it.
This is a rare toy that's based directly on an animation model, and within the confines of the toy's parameters, they captured her look reasonably well. The popped "collar," the oversized kneepads, and even her little bracelets are all there. The head sculpt, in particular, is a slam-dunk effort. Just about the only distinctive feature she's missing are the pylons that protruded from her shoulders in the cartoon. Her gun is approximately the animated weapon, or one that was run through a Hasbroification filter. (Incidentally, her package art doesn't even begin to serve as an illustration of the toy. It's just... a painting of her cartoon model. How is that okay?!)
Transformation involves folding up the feet to form the front of the vehicle (the windshield is actually the bottom of her feet and is destined to get badly scratched). Part of the backpack folds down to conceal the upper legs, her head tucks away, and the rest of the backpack forms the back of the vehicle. The only parts of her robot body that contribute to the vehicle are the armor panels on her forearms and part of her upper torso. Everything else just gets hidden.
Her vehicle mode has nothing to do with the squared-off, compact Cybertron vehicle she changed into in the cartoon. This is, like, the limousine version of it. Still, what can you do. The green Prime Armor can mount to the back of the vehicle to add a couple of gigantic rocket thrusters. Her gun can mount to either side (the panels attached to her forearms).
I got Alchemist Moonracer, who "becomes a mass of raw protons to travel between worlds."
This toy is on the slab for a Firestar redeco (called Novastar), which will have a different robot head but will otherwise be unchanged. It won't be a great representation of Firestar, but it's progress. Really, in a day and age where Girl Power is so prominent in media, with action heroes like Katniss Everdeen and Wonder Woman and Rey of Jakku taking center stage, it's about damn time that we finally got us some female Autobots from the show. They really can't improve significantly upon Generations Arcee (except maybe releasing her again so people can actually find her in stores), but my suspicion is that this is only the first step for Moonracer and friends. These toys are stepping stones on the way to better toys, eventually.
TERRORCON RIPPERSNAPPER
I seriously doubt that Hasbro has lost the rights to the name "Rippersnapper," but I suspect they're consistently using the Terrorcon prefix in conjunction with other dictionary-word names like Blot and Cutthroat to make them safer to use.
Rippersnapper is, hands down, my favorite Terrorcon. I got him for my birthday in 1987 and even though I was aging out of the target audience for the toys (which were themselves getting progressively dumbed down), I loved his cute little shark-monster mode. It was just such a shame that his robot mode was so stubby, with useless arms and a tree stump for legs. He sure didn't look that way in the cartoon! The new toy does not disappoint.
As a robot, he's instantly recognizable as the character, but he actually has proper humanoid proportions... and he's no longer a Scramble City midget, so he can easily take on normal-sized Autobots finally. Mostly light grey with some deep cerulean blue, he's decorated with red and yellow highlights meant to evoke the stickers on the G1 toy. He comes packaged with his twin guns mounted to his back, but you can pop them off and use them as handheld weapons if you prefer. Not that he needs them, since he's got Wolverine claws.
To transform him, you rotate his waist around so that the creature legs mounted to his robot legs can face the right way. The creature-mode tail halves are embedded within his lower robot legs. The creature head unfolds and covers up his robot head, and his arms serve double-duty as the creature claws.
On the G1 toy, his dorsal shark fin was connected to his double-barreled blaster, so he lost his fin when you removed the weapon. This time, the fin is actually attached to the toy. Unlike the G1 toy, whose creature mode only had four points of articulation, the new version has fully-articulated creature limbs at the hips, shoulders, knees, and elbows. Plus, his jaw opens! He's got cute, adorable little silver shark teeth!
In a fit of cuteness, they actually included a tampograph on the top of his head that looks just like the heat-sensitive rub symbol on the G1 toy. This in itself is kind of ironic, since the Terrorcons were among the toys resold in 1988 who actually had their rub symbol intents removed. (A lot of fans seem to hate this for some reason, even though I don't recall anybody loudly complaining when they did this just a few years ago for Reveal the Shield...)
His Prime Armor can attach to his chest for robot mode in the same manner as Dreadwind (hidden flip-out panel in his chest) or to the base of his tail in shark mode (which isn't a bad look for him, actually).
Onyx Rippersnapper is an "unrivaled hunter in any terrain."
With the proper remolding, this toy could be reused as Skalor or Overbite, or possibly both. (We already know we're getting Seacons, so I'm just thinking ahead...)
DINOBOT SLUDGE
Okay, I freely admit that I'm a little more excited about the new Dinobots now that I've got a full set. (Really, they should have released Grimlock, Sludge, and Slag first, and then sold Swoop and Snarl in a later wave, to mirror their introductions from the cartoon.)
So, Sludge recycles some of the Slag design elements. He's got the same robot legs, the same pelvis, the same robot upper arms (the lower arms are different), and the same robot fists. They have the same guns, too. The robot shoulders are designed to look like the consumer-applied stickers on Slag, but the recycled parts aren't terrible on Sludge, and I didn't even notice it until I got him out of the packaging.
As a robot, Sludge is partly inspired by his animated design. This is particularly evident in the shape of his head, in which the sides of his helmet reach all the way to his body, with no neck in evidence. His eyes are yellow, like the Diaclone toy, rather than the blue of the cartoon. Unlike Slag, he's got grand, majestic, sweeping wings in this form. Unlike some toys that were released so far apart that Hasbro forgot what colors they used, there's a uniformity with these Dinobots, and Sludge shares the same tone of grey and red with Grimlock, Slag, etc. Just about the only feature of his robot design that I dislike is the large, obvious peg hole right in the center of his chest. Reminds me of Targetmaster Blurr.
Transforming him is very close to the G1 toy, but there isn't all that complicated business with having to arrange his robot arms just so, in order to fold up his wings to form the dinosaur shell. A couple of new tricks is that his dinosaur neck rotates at mid-neck (so it can tuck away better for robot mode, I guess) and that his fists tuck into his forearms instead of his forearms just folding up under the dinosaur belly and ask you to please not notice that they're there.
As a brontosaurus (the original toy was released in 1984; so, yes, he's a brontosaurus), he's only slightly smaller than the G1 toy. For some reason, they made his rear legs out of clear plastic and then painted the insides silver. On the upside, he's actually got eyes this time. His lines are pretty graceful this time, coming close to matching the sexy curvature of the Diaclone toy. His front legs seem like they're just too long, though. If I bend them at the knees, though, the architecture of his body interferes with the bolts on the insides of his knees. The rear legs are very heavily inspired by the G1 toy, but his ankles can't move. Overall, though, I really like the new Sludge.
Prima Sludge "grants allies courage equal in strength to his stomping," because why the hell not.
DINOBOT SNARL
I do believe Snarl is my favorite G1 Dinobot toy. I'm not super fond of their characterizations in the cartoon (they're all pretty much idiots) but as far as the actual G1 toys went, Snarl had the most shiny gold parts and was therefore the prettiest. Also, I like stegosauruseses.
As a robot, Snarl is arguably better-proportioned than the G1 toy, which had massive legs but tiny forearms and a ridiculously small head. His colors are a little weird in places (he's got gold forearms and the panel to which his robot head is attached is gold as well) but generally speaking, he looks good. He comes armed with a sword that is very similar in shape and size to his G1 sword, but it's molded entirely in clear plastic. Uh, did they forget to paint it or something? It looks really weird. Like it's made of glass.
All of his stegosaurus plates, along with the tip of his tail, are made of soft, rubbery plastic.
To transform him, it's more or less like G1, except that his robot torso faces the other way 'round. His tail halves are connected to an armature, and each other, rather than being attached to his body. His front stegonsaurus legs no longer fit into a recessed cavity (which would necessitate the inclusion of a costly spring, no doubt). Also, he's got panels to cover the holes in the backs of his robot legs, so there's that extra step to deal with.
In stegosaurus mode, he resembles a slightly undersized version of the G1 toy. His sword and Prime Armor can mount to either of his hips. (The Prime Armor is identical to the ones that come packaged with the other Dinobots, except that Snarl's has a gold connector peg instead of black.) There is an unused rectangular tab behind his head in dino mode; samples at Toy Fair showed him wearing a Bristleback style dual gun, so it's likely we can expect a redeco as the Pretender Monster in question at some point.
Solus Snarl "forges armor that can withstand infinite battles." Really, that just sounds ridiculous.
VOLCANICUS
So, now that I've got all five Dinobots, I can finally form Volcanicus. I went with the official positioning of the limbs, in which Swoop and Slag function as arms and Sludge and Snarl serve as legs.
Well, the combined form isn't terrible. The Dinobots having a uniform color scheme helps, since Volcanicus isn't a mish-mash of seemingly random colors like some other combiners I could mention (coughMenasorcough). Considering that this is an original design, and not an attempt to copy something Sunbow did 30 years ago, it's a pretty decent effort. It doesn't trigger any nostalgic memory cells in my brain, but it's also not supposed to. If I had any major complaints, it's that he doesn't really have any weapons. I can't just put Swoop's sword in his hand, because at his size, it looks like he's carrying a butter knife.
And, frankly, I always wanted to see the Dinobots combine. I get that their toys were never designed to do so, but they're pretty much the only five-member Transformers sub-group that can't do it, so their inability to do so, up until now, was fairly conspicuous. Even if you don't ever combine them, though, the individual toys aren't half bad on their own.
Zob (spent all night reviewing toys, yay!)
MWG
23 lut 2018, 19:48:2423.02.2018
do
On Wednesday, February 21, 2018 at 10:57:07 PM UTC-6, Zobovor wrote:
> Found a bunch of toys today. Bought them all on sight! Case assortment for wave two is Sludge (x2), Snarl (x2), Rippersnapper (x2), Moonracer (x1) and Blackwing (x1). The other three that I didn't buy were gone before the end of the day!
>
These seem to be hitting more heavily than the wave 2 legends (which I saw once last week at ONE Walmart in Oklahoma City and have yet to see again, got a set though) and voyagers (have yet to see the wave 2 set).
> Found a bunch of toys today. Bought them all on sight! Case assortment for wave two is Sludge (x2), Snarl (x2), Rippersnapper (x2), Moonracer (x1) and Blackwing (x1). The other three that I didn't buy were gone before the end of the day!
>
> BLACKWING
>
> Called Darkwing in 1988, the character has been renamed Blackwing. Darkwing Duck was a heavily merchandised Disney property in the early 1990's, and while it's faded into obscurity, Funko has recently been producing toys under the license. Funny thing is, Blackwing doesn't actually have black wings (they're purple). I am going to continue to refer to him as Darkwing and I expect all of you to follow along.
>
> The way my toy was jammed into the bubble resulted in the stabilizer fins on his legs being a little warped. Guess he's getting a bath later in some hot water.
>
> Just as Dreadwind recycles some Skydive/Air Raid parts, Darkwing reuses some of the same assets. Both Dreadwind and Darkwing share the same robot leg design (which means they have identical tail rudders in jet mode); Darkwing uses Air Raid's forearms. Darkwing doesn't just reuse Air Raid's jet mode; Air Raid was an F-15 and Darkwing was a Panavia Tornado, so he got a new nosecone and wings and a different fuselage to help him more closely resemble the G1 toy.
>
> Robot mode has a blue chest and forearms with grey lower legs and head and teal shoulders and upper legs and feet. The shade of blue is a little light and pale compared to the G1 color map, but it still reads correctly as the character. He's got the Batman mask and everything. I like that he got newly-sculpted shoulders and a new robot chest. One of the things I disliked about the last Darkwing toy we got (the Universe Silverbolt redeco from 2008) was that he didn't get any remolding, so he just looked like a wrong-colored Silverbolt to me. What is it about Darkwing being forever cursed to share parts with Aerialbots?
>
> He comes with two tiny little grey pistols. They're certainly not as large and impressive as the one that came with Dreadwind, which was also styled like his G1 weapons. But, Darkwing also gets two of them. I guess if the trade-off is that we can only get one big G1-inspiured weapon or we can get two puny little peashooters... well, I think I'd prefer the bigger gun, because then I could get another one on eBay if I wanted to! (His package artwork shows him with bigger guns that look more closely styled after his G1 weapons.)
>
> Jet mode is dark grey with purple wings and teal cockpit and vertical stabilizers. He includes the yellow lightning bolt designs on his wings, and his air intakes are painted silver and red to mirror the design of the consumer-applied stickers on the G1 toy. He retains the variable-sweep wing design of the G1 toy, allowing him to achieve a delta wing configuration.
>
> Although Dreadwind's instructions don't mention anything about combining with Darkwing, the instructions for Darkwing refer to the combined form as "Duocon Dreadwing" and do include instructions on how to transform the Darkwing component to form the superjet. I suppose Hasbro expects us to guess how we're supposed to transform Dreadwind.
>
> It's not quite as clean as the fusion of the two G1 toys. Mostly, it involves folding back the nosecone on Darkwing (including his robot head, which kinda gets in the way a little) and flipping out a single connector peg (which is attached to the Combiner Wars tumbler). Not much to do with Dreadwind except swing his wings back and plug him in. You can attach Dreadwing's faux Powermaster engine in this mode, but not Darkwing's. I think the G1 assembly worked better because Dreadwind's tail section connected to Darkwing's jet nose to form this massive turbine. If Dreadwind came with two guns, you could plug them into Darkwing's guns and build double guns for each wing similar to the way the G1 toy functioned. The fact that there's only a single connector peg holding the two jets together makes the assembled form rather unstable. I've played around with ways of trying to create additional connection points but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. I appreciate that Hasbro tried.
>
> The collector card I got was Onyx Blackwing, who "toys with his prey like an apex predator."
>
> I hit the redeco fatigue really hard during Combiner Wars, so I was a little afraid I'd start to feel that way again after Darkwing and Dreadwind came out. Actually, though, they feel different enough that I don't just feel like I'm buying more Aerialbots over and over. So, there's that.
>
> MOONRACER
>
> The character of Moonracer was introduced in "The Search for Alpha Trion" from 1985, technically predating the introduction of Arcee, even though the Arcee character was created first. She was the girlfriend of Powerglide, purported to be the "best sharpshooter in the galaxy" (or the Universe, depending on who you asked). The episode was the only appearance for Elita One and the other female Autobots introduced in the story; this is Moonracer's very first toy, 33 years after she first appeared!
>
> The problem with a toy like this is twofold. For one, she was created for animation, with little regard for how it might be engineered in three-dimensional space. Also, female characters pose a particular challenge, since they're impossibly lithe and feminine-shaped as robots despite them all allegedly folding up into boxy vehicles.
>
> So, Moonracer is actually styled after the humanoid proportions demonstrated in the cartoon, but the design concession is that she's carrying around a huge backpack. It's absolutely necessary, partly to create much-needed mass for her vehicle mode (so she's not just a floppy Windblade mess of folded-up body parts) but also to conceal the Combiner Wars tumbler, since there's just not enough room in her torso for it.
>
> This is a rare toy that's based directly on an animation model, and within the confines of the toy's parameters, they captured her look reasonably well. The popped "collar," the oversized kneepads, and even her little bracelets are all there. The head sculpt, in particular, is a slam-dunk effort. Just about the only distinctive feature she's missing are the pylons that protruded from her shoulders in the cartoon. Her gun is approximately the animated weapon, or one that was run through a Hasbroification filter. (Incidentally, her package art doesn't even begin to serve as an illustration of the toy. It's just... a painting of her cartoon model. How is that okay?!)
>
> Transformation involves folding up the feet to form the front of the vehicle (the windshield is actually the bottom of her feet and is destined to get badly scratched). Part of the backpack folds down to conceal the upper legs, her head tucks away, and the rest of the backpack forms the back of the vehicle. The only parts of her robot body that contribute to the vehicle are the armor panels on her forearms and part of her upper torso. Everything else just gets hidden.
>
> Her vehicle mode has nothing to do with the squared-off, compact Cybertron vehicle she changed into in the cartoon. This is, like, the limousine version of it. Still, what can you do. The green Prime Armor can mount to the back of the vehicle to add a couple of gigantic rocket thrusters. Her gun can mount to either side (the panels attached to her forearms).
>
> I got Alchemist Moonracer, who "becomes a mass of raw protons to travel between worlds."
>
> This toy is on the slab for a Firestar redeco (called Novastar), which will have a different robot head but will otherwise be unchanged. It won't be a great representation of Firestar, but it's progress. Really, in a day and age where Girl Power is so prominent in media, with action heroes like Katniss Everdeen and Wonder Woman and Rey of Jakku taking center stage, it's about damn time that we finally got us some female Autobots from the show. They really can't improve significantly upon Generations Arcee (except maybe releasing her again so people can actually find her in stores), but my suspicion is that this is only the first step for Moonracer and friends. These toys are stepping stones on the way to better toys, eventually.
>
> TERRORCON RIPPERSNAPPER
>
> I seriously doubt that Hasbro has lost the rights to the name "Rippersnapper," but I suspect they're consistently using the Terrorcon prefix in conjunction with other dictionary-word names like Blot and Cutthroat to make them safer to use.
>
> Rippersnapper is, hands down, my favorite Terrorcon. I got him for my birthday in 1987 and even though I was aging out of the target audience for the toys (which were themselves getting progressively dumbed down), I loved his cute little shark-monster mode. It was just such a shame that his robot mode was so stubby, with useless arms and a tree stump for legs. He sure didn't look that way in the cartoon! The new toy does not disappoint.
>
> As a robot, he's instantly recognizable as the character, but he actually has proper humanoid proportions... and he's no longer a Scramble City midget, so he can easily take on normal-sized Autobots finally. Mostly light grey with some deep cerulean blue, he's decorated with red and yellow highlights meant to evoke the stickers on the G1 toy. He comes packaged with his twin guns mounted to his back, but you can pop them off and use them as handheld weapons if you prefer. Not that he needs them, since he's got Wolverine claws.
>
> To transform him, you rotate his waist around so that the creature legs mounted to his robot legs can face the right way. The creature-mode tail halves are embedded within his lower robot legs. The creature head unfolds and covers up his robot head, and his arms serve double-duty as the creature claws.
>
> On the G1 toy, his dorsal shark fin was connected to his double-barreled blaster, so he lost his fin when you removed the weapon. This time, the fin is actually attached to the toy. Unlike the G1 toy, whose creature mode only had four points of articulation, the new version has fully-articulated creature limbs at the hips, shoulders, knees, and elbows. Plus, his jaw opens! He's got cute, adorable little silver shark teeth!
>
> In a fit of cuteness, they actually included a tampograph on the top of his head that looks just like the heat-sensitive rub symbol on the G1 toy. This in itself is kind of ironic, since the Terrorcons were among the toys resold in 1988 who actually had their rub symbol intents removed. (A lot of fans seem to hate this for some reason, even though I don't recall anybody loudly complaining when they did this just a few years ago for Reveal the Shield...)
>
> His Prime Armor can attach to his chest for robot mode in the same manner as Dreadwind (hidden flip-out panel in his chest) or to the base of his tail in shark mode (which isn't a bad look for him, actually).
>
> Onyx Rippersnapper is an "unrivaled hunter in any terrain."
>
> With the proper remolding, this toy could be reused as Skalor or Overbite, or possibly both. (We already know we're getting Seacons, so I'm just thinking ahead...)
>
> DINOBOT SLUDGE
>
> Okay, I freely admit that I'm a little more excited about the new Dinobots now that I've got a full set. (Really, they should have released Grimlock, Sludge, and Slag first, and then sold Swoop and Snarl in a later wave, to mirror their introductions from the cartoon.)
>
> So, Sludge recycles some of the Slag design elements. He's got the same robot legs, the same pelvis, the same robot upper arms (the lower arms are different), and the same robot fists. They have the same guns, too. The robot shoulders are designed to look like the consumer-applied stickers on Slag, but the recycled parts aren't terrible on Sludge, and I didn't even notice it until I got him out of the packaging.
>
> As a robot, Sludge is partly inspired by his animated design. This is particularly evident in the shape of his head, in which the sides of his helmet reach all the way to his body, with no neck in evidence. His eyes are yellow, like the Diaclone toy, rather than the blue of the cartoon. Unlike Slag, he's got grand, majestic, sweeping wings in this form. Unlike some toys that were released so far apart that Hasbro forgot what colors they used, there's a uniformity with these Dinobots, and Sludge shares the same tone of grey and red with Grimlock, Slag, etc. Just about the only feature of his robot design that I dislike is the large, obvious peg hole right in the center of his chest. Reminds me of Targetmaster Blurr.
>
> Transforming him is very close to the G1 toy, but there isn't all that complicated business with having to arrange his robot arms just so, in order to fold up his wings to form the dinosaur shell. A couple of new tricks is that his dinosaur neck rotates at mid-neck (so it can tuck away better for robot mode, I guess) and that his fists tuck into his forearms instead of his forearms just folding up under the dinosaur belly and ask you to please not notice that they're there.
>
> As a brontosaurus (the original toy was released in 1984; so, yes, he's a brontosaurus), he's only slightly smaller than the G1 toy. For some reason, they made his rear legs out of clear plastic and then painted the insides silver. On the upside, he's actually got eyes this time. His lines are pretty graceful this time, coming close to matching the sexy curvature of the Diaclone toy. His front legs seem like they're just too long, though. If I bend them at the knees, though, the architecture of his body interferes with the bolts on the insides of his knees. The rear legs are very heavily inspired by the G1 toy, but his ankles can't move. Overall, though, I really like the new Sludge.
>
> Prima Sludge "grants allies courage equal in strength to his stomping," because why the hell not.
>
> DINOBOT SNARL
>
> I do believe Snarl is my favorite G1 Dinobot toy. I'm not super fond of their characterizations in the cartoon (they're all pretty much idiots) but as far as the actual G1 toys went, Snarl had the most shiny gold parts and was therefore the prettiest. Also, I like stegosauruseses.
>
> As a robot, Snarl is arguably better-proportioned than the G1 toy, which had massive legs but tiny forearms and a ridiculously small head. His colors are a little weird in places (he's got gold forearms and the panel to which his robot head is attached is gold as well) but generally speaking, he looks good. He comes armed with a sword that is very similar in shape and size to his G1 sword, but it's molded entirely in clear plastic. Uh, did they forget to paint it or something? It looks really weird. Like it's made of glass.
>
> All of his stegosaurus plates, along with the tip of his tail, are made of soft, rubbery plastic.
>
> To transform him, it's more or less like G1, except that his robot torso faces the other way 'round. His tail halves are connected to an armature, and each other, rather than being attached to his body. His front stegonsaurus legs no longer fit into a recessed cavity (which would necessitate the inclusion of a costly spring, no doubt). Also, he's got panels to cover the holes in the backs of his robot legs, so there's that extra step to deal with.
>
> In stegosaurus mode, he resembles a slightly undersized version of the G1 toy. His sword and Prime Armor can mount to either of his hips. (The Prime Armor is identical to the ones that come packaged with the other Dinobots, except that Snarl's has a gold connector peg instead of black.) There is an unused rectangular tab behind his head in dino mode; samples at Toy Fair showed him wearing a Bristleback style dual gun, so it's likely we can expect a redeco as the Pretender Monster in question at some point.
>
> Solus Snarl "forges armor that can withstand infinite battles." Really, that just sounds ridiculous.
>
> VOLCANICUS
>
> So, now that I've got all five Dinobots, I can finally form Volcanicus. I went with the official positioning of the limbs, in which Swoop and Slag function as arms and Sludge and Snarl serve as legs.
>
> Well, the combined form isn't terrible. The Dinobots having a uniform color scheme helps, since Volcanicus isn't a mish-mash of seemingly random colors like some other combiners I could mention (coughMenasorcough). Considering that this is an original design, and not an attempt to copy something Sunbow did 30 years ago, it's a pretty decent effort. It doesn't trigger any nostalgic memory cells in my brain, but it's also not supposed to. If I had any major complaints, it's that he doesn't really have any weapons. I can't just put Swoop's sword in his hand, because at his size, it looks like he's carrying a butter knife.
>
> And, frankly, I always wanted to see the Dinobots combine. I get that their toys were never designed to do so, but they're pretty much the only five-member Transformers sub-group that can't do it, so their inability to do so, up until now, was fairly conspicuous. Even if you don't ever combine them, though, the individual toys aren't half bad on their own.
>
>
> Zob (spent all night reviewing toys, yay!)
pinkiep...@gmail.com
26 lut 2018, 01:44:4326.02.2018
do
On Thursday, February 22, 2018 at 12:57:07 PM UTC+8, Zobovor wrote:
> Found a bunch of toys today. Bought them all on sight! Case assortment for wave two is Sludge (x2), Snarl (x2), Rippersnapper (x2), Moonracer (x1) and Blackwing (x1). The other three that I didn't buy were gone before the end of the day!
>
> BLACKWING
> . . .
> Found a bunch of toys today. Bought them all on sight! Case assortment for wave two is Sludge (x2), Snarl (x2), Rippersnapper (x2), Moonracer (x1) and Blackwing (x1). The other three that I didn't buy were gone before the end of the day!
>
> BLACKWING
> Although Dreadwind's instructions don't mention anything about combining with Darkwing, the instructions for Darkwing refer to the combined form as "Duocon Dreadwing" and do include instructions on how to transform the Darkwing component to form the superjet. I suppose Hasbro expects us to guess how we're supposed to transform Dreadwind.
>
> It's not quite as clean as the fusion of the two G1 toys. Mostly, it involves folding back the nosecone on Darkwing (including his robot head, which kinda gets in the way a little) and flipping out a single connector peg (which is attached to the Combiner Wars tumbler). Not much to do with Dreadwind except swing his wings back and plug him in. You can attach Dreadwing's faux Powermaster engine in this mode, but not Darkwing's. I think the G1 assembly worked better because Dreadwind's tail section connected to Darkwing's jet nose to form this massive turbine. If Dreadwind came with two guns, you could plug them into Darkwing's guns and build double guns for each wing similar to the way the G1 toy functioned. The fact that there's only a single connector peg holding the two jets together makes the assembled form rather unstable. I've played around with ways of trying to create additional connection points but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. I appreciate that Hasbro tried.
> . . .
>
> It's not quite as clean as the fusion of the two G1 toys. Mostly, it involves folding back the nosecone on Darkwing (including his robot head, which kinda gets in the way a little) and flipping out a single connector peg (which is attached to the Combiner Wars tumbler). Not much to do with Dreadwind except swing his wings back and plug him in. You can attach Dreadwing's faux Powermaster engine in this mode, but not Darkwing's. I think the G1 assembly worked better because Dreadwind's tail section connected to Darkwing's jet nose to form this massive turbine. If Dreadwind came with two guns, you could plug them into Darkwing's guns and build double guns for each wing similar to the way the G1 toy functioned. The fact that there's only a single connector peg holding the two jets together makes the assembled form rather unstable. I've played around with ways of trying to create additional connection points but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. I appreciate that Hasbro tried.
Is Blackwing's head fully hidden away in their combined Dreadwing mode? I've seen some photos from ToyFair, iirc, and that doesn't seem to be the case, although sometimes those display figures are mis-transformed. It's one of my pet peeves when there's a robot mode head peeking out of any alt-mode, so that might make or break the pair of Dreadwind and Blackwing for me.
Zobovor
26 lut 2018, 08:43:3726.02.2018
do
On Sunday, February 25, 2018 at 11:44:43 PM UTC-7, Chris Castro wrote:
> Is Blackwing's head fully hidden away in their combined Dreadwing mode?
Regrettably, no. It pokes out rather noticeably.
> Is Blackwing's head fully hidden away in their combined Dreadwing mode?
Zob (obvious head is obvious)
pinkiep...@gmail.com
9 mar 2018, 02:01:489.03.2018
do
Zobovor
21 mar 2018, 00:50:0521.03.2018
do
On Wednesday, February 21, 2018 at 9:57:07 PM UTC-7, Zobovor wrote:
> So, Sludge recycles some of the Slag design elements. He's got the same
> robot legs, the same pelvis, the same robot upper arms (the lower arms are
> different), and the same robot fists.
Somebody else found a really good and surprisingly simple fix for some of the sameness between Sludge and Slag. If you pop off Sludge's upper arms and reverse them, it creates a different look for his robot mode without affecting his transformation at all.
> So, Sludge recycles some of the Slag design elements. He's got the same
> robot legs, the same pelvis, the same robot upper arms (the lower arms are
> different), and the same robot fists.
Hopefully Nonnef Productions comes out with some guns soon, though. I've heard they're doing Battletrap guns, but my wish list is growing much more quickly than their release schedule. I want guns for Sludge, Snarl, Blackwing, Hun-Gurrr/Abominus...
Zob (a nice, big Elita One rifle wouldn't hurt, either)
William A. Rendfeld
21 mar 2018, 11:38:5121.03.2018
do
I'm waiting for my figures from BBTS - they should be here either later this week or early next week, depending.
In any case, excepting these and the Voyagers, I've seen all of Wave 2 at some brick and mortar location - TRU and Wal-Mart for the Leaders, Kroger for the Prime Masters, and Target for the Legends.
On Wednesday, March 21, 2018 at 12:50:05 AM UTC-4, Zobovor wrote:
> Hopefully Nonnef Productions comes out with some guns soon, though. I've heard they're doing Battletrap guns, but my wish list is growing much more quickly than their release schedule. I want guns for Sludge, Snarl, Blackwing, Hun-Gurrr/Abominus...
>
>
> Zob (a nice, big Elita One rifle wouldn't hurt, either)
I've been checking daily for the Battletrap guns, and I imagine that there will probably be weapons of some sort for Abominus and Elita-One's combined form from someone.
In any case, excepting these and the Voyagers, I've seen all of Wave 2 at some brick and mortar location - TRU and Wal-Mart for the Leaders, Kroger for the Prime Masters, and Target for the Legends.
On Wednesday, March 21, 2018 at 12:50:05 AM UTC-4, Zobovor wrote:
> Hopefully Nonnef Productions comes out with some guns soon, though. I've heard they're doing Battletrap guns, but my wish list is growing much more quickly than their release schedule. I want guns for Sludge, Snarl, Blackwing, Hun-Gurrr/Abominus...
>
>
> Zob (a nice, big Elita One rifle wouldn't hurt, either)
MWG
21 mar 2018, 19:32:1121.03.2018
do
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