Dave Van Domelen
2024-11-19 04:47:34 UTC
Dave's Transformers EarthSpark Rant: Deluxe wave 4
Chaos Terran Aftermath (Wrecker truck)
Terran Jawbreaker (Pachycephalosaurus)
Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/ES/Deluxe4
Okay, so season 2 of the cartoon just plain sucks. I couldn't get past
about episode 4. They fired all the original writers and farmed it out to
lowest bidder hacks, from what I hear. I did get far enough to see one of
the new premises for the year, the idea of Chaos Terrans, born from the
shattered fragments of the AllSpark that got corrupted or something and
trying to remember details from those episodes makes me sad so I'll stop.
Basically, they're evil and aggressive and apparently quite stupid. The only
other Chaos Terran toy I've seen so far is Spitfire, which is a teal redeco
of One-Step Twitch...no clue if she's actually an evil clone or if they just
said, "Close enough to slap on the shelf."
Yes, I'm about done with EarthSpark, but Hasbro seems to have given up
on it first. Still, the Deluxe toys have generally been okay, and we might
get some proper toys of characters who only got Tacticons or One-Steps during
season 1 before the line peters out entirely.
CAPSULES
$20 price point.
Chaos Terran Aftermath: An interesting design that really needed more
testing or better QC or something. Mildly recommended.
Terran Jawbreaker: Overall slightly better than the Warrior version,
mostly in terms of colors and accessories. Also a the low end of
recommended, not THAT much better (and you're paying $5 more for the extra
colors and weapons).
RANTS
Packaging: Externally, the same as previous waves of Deluxes, but
there's no Build-A-Figure so the panel that was used to plug that is now just
a repeat of the box front portrait. The inner tray now has a purple gradient
instead of blue, it still has "EARTH SPARK" in Cybertronian glyphs at the
top, and part of the computer map from year one along the left side. There's
a sort of "footlocker" bit at the bottom with red alert chevrons, and the
instructions and safety sheet are stuffed into it.
Chaos Terrans do not get their own symbol, they just have Decepticon
symbols on their boxes. GHOST did not really survive the end of season 1, I
dunno if it rebuilt in season 2 and do not care.
DECEPTICON: CHAOS TERRAN AFTERMATH
Assortment: F8670
Altmode: Wrecker truck
Transformation Difficulty: 21 steps
Previous Name Use: None
Previous Mold Use: None
Packaging: Six plastic ties hold the robot to the tray. Two ties hold
the wrecker crane in the lower left, two more hold just the hook part in the
middle left. The pistol is held in by a corner flap in the lower right, and
freeing it requires cutting some tape or the cardboard itself.
Robot Mode: They seem to be going for a mix between retro-40s and Mad
Max here, with lots of curved fender lines but also spiked shoulders and a
jagged mohawk sort of helmet crest. The wrecker crane sticks out in back, or
can be mounted on either forearm. Normally he'd come across as a bit
top-heavy, but next to Jawbreaker he's got almost normal human proportions
(other than the tiny head). The torso side fender pieces aren't very stable,
it's clear that they have tabs that are supposed to go into slots inside the
backpack, but I can't get both to stay in at the same time. One of those "it
worked in the renders" design flaws, methinks. Additionally, the chest
doesn't lock down at all, nor can I see anything that's supposed to snap in
place, just a ledge to stop it from going too far.
4.75" (12cm) tall at the head, 5.25" (13cm) at the top of the shoulder
spikes. The colors are mostly warm violet, dark gray, black, and silver,
with some metallic purple bits. Slightly metalflake warm violet plastic is
used for the top and sides of the torso, the forearms, and the vehicle cab
top that forms a buttcape. A non-shiny plastic of the same color is used for
the gun, the hook part of the crane, the upper adbomen, the knee joints and
the ankle joints. Matte black plastic makes up the chest grille, pelvis,
thighs, lower upper arms, crane A-frame, and wheels. A more gunmetal gray
plastic is found on the head, shoulderpads, fists, thighs, feet, and the root
of the crane piece. The lower legs are light gray plastic.
Metallic purple paint is found on the mohawk, cheek guards, shoulder
front details, a little bit on the sternum, and kneecaps. Silver on the
face, the shoulderpad fronts, the shoulder spikes, some pipes on the chest
fenders, the triangular barrel of the gun, and various vehicle-only details
I'll cover below. The eyes and chest headlights are red. No faction symbol
that I can find, unless it's blending in REALLY well with the purple
plastic.
The neck is a ball joint, and the entire collar area is prone to come
unsnapped and sink the head into the chest. Smooth swivel waist, the hips
can go a decent distance before hitting the buttcape. The shoulders are ball
joints on the end of long struts giving a somewhat weird range of motion.
Bicep swivels, ball joint elbows, and the wrists bend down on transformation
hinges. Ball joint hips, mid-thigh swivels, hinge knees (and secondary
hinges for transformation). The ankles have hinges at the instep and swivels
where the struts attach to the feet. The crane on the back is hinged at the
root and hinged at the end where the hook is connected.
The hands can hold 5mm pegs, there's 5mm sockets on the forearms, and on
the bottoms of the feet. There's also 5mm sockets on the backs of the
calves, but they're partially blocked by vehicle panels. The end of the
crane is a 5mm socket meant for the hook to go in. The wheel hubs on the
shoulders are inadvertant 3mm sockets.
The gun has a triangular barrel with three muzzle apertures (too small
and shallow to hold anything). The grip is a 5mm peg, and there's short 5mm
pegs on either side above it for attaching in vehicle mode. It's 1.5" (4cm)
long.
The hook piece is only 23mm long including the 5mm peg at one end, and
there's a second peg at a 90 degree angle to it on the same side as the
pointy end of the hook. The hook can hold a 5mm peg, but you have to really
force it, I think it might not be intentional. The box back render (but not
the instructions) shows it used as a melee weapon, and I suppose it can do
that. While it's not on the crane, the gun can be attached for a sort of
scorpion tail gun.
Transformation: Another one of those designs where once you get all the
tabs in the right slots firmly enough, the result is quite stable...but prior
to that point it's a sloppy mess. It doesn't help that the legs need to be
bent at juuuust the right angle to make it possible for the tabs to find
their slots. One trick that's not apparent from just the package photos is
that the two pegs on the sides of the pistol must go into the soles of the
feet in order to secure the back end...leave the pistol out and the result
remains pretty unstable.
Vehicle Mode: A six-wheeled wrecker truck, but with some retro 40s
rounded look bits to it, and then "I guess disguise isn't really on the
table" Mad Max blades on the front bumper. There's a sort of shark fin on
the roof, which might be intended as Moar Spikes but also could just be a
prosaic radio/satellite antenna. The back end looks rather like the robot is
just bent over with his butt in the air, the crane mount doesn't exactly
cover that up. The front half is mostly purple, the rear mostly dark gray
and light gray.
5.5" (14cm) long including the gun poking out the back. Most of the
purple plastic ends up in the cab section with a little bit left for the
partly visible knee and ankle hinges in back, as well as the hook part. The
side fenders of the rear half are light gray plastic. Dark gunmetal plastic
makes up the front bumper, the root of the crane, and the feet stuck together
in the middle of the rear part. The wheels, the crane arm, the front grille,
and the robot butt are black plastic.
There's some more cool purple metallic paint on the center of the hood
and the fin on top of the cab. The windshield and side windows are painted
gloss black. The ram blades are painted silver, as are pipes connecting the
hood to the tops of the front fenders, the side mirrors, and the lights on
the roof. The headlights are painted red, and the smokestacks are painted
gunmetal. No faction symbol visible in this mode.
The crane is attached via a 5mm peg on its root that goes into a 5mm
socket in the base, and it can rotate freely to about 45 degrees to either
side. The arm is hinged and has a range of slightly below to horizonal to
almost vertical. The hook end is also hinged with about a 270 degree total
range, and the hook attaches via another 5mm peg/socket combo so it can
rotate or even be attached at 90 degrees to the strut. At full extension,
the hook can stick out a centimeter or so past the gun in back, and with the
secondary peg on top can haul anything with a 5mm socket in a decent spot on
the underside.
The only other connection point in this mode is on the front axles,
where the hubs are unintentional (probably) 3mm sockets. The rear wheels
snap in through the other side, so have solid-ish hubs. All six roll
reasonably well.
Overall: An okay design, suffering from the all too common problem of
things not fitting properly in real space.
TERRAN: TERRAN JAWBREAKER
Assortment: F8671
Altmode: Pachycephalosaurus
Transformation Difficulty: 16 steps
Previous Name Use: ES
Previous Mold Use: None
Packaging: Seven plastic ties hold the robot a bit awkwardly into the
inner tray. The tail is held by two ties in the upper left, while the guns
are held into the lower left by tray corner flaps.
The package renders show the apertures of the guns painted red, but the
actual toy has no paint on the guns. Somewhat more significantly, the render
shows the fist/forearm pieces as dark gray but the toy has them as golden
yellow. This is the color that the TakaraTomy version used for those parts
(although at least the thighs were painted that color), but this picture
isn't the TT version either. Maybe the render was an early version that kept
some of the TT elements? The package render also seems to have either left
the tail off robot mode entirely, or very carefully posed it so that it
doesn't show up from the angle of the shot.
Robot Mode: Well, the dino head is just sort of there as a backpack and
if the tail isn't used as a weapon it sticks out in back, but otherwise a
decent representation of the robot mode from the show. The facial expression
is kind of the 8| emoticon...wide circular and kinda blank eyes, mouth a
perfectly straight line. As noted above, he's very top-heavy with gorilla
arms and skinny legs. As with the Warrior version, his forearms have the
dino rear claws attached to them, but they aren't involved in any gimmicks,
they're just decorative. Instead, he gets a couple of pistols that look like
big lightsaber hilts with pegs sticking out the side near one end.
Hollowness isn't too bad, mostly the backs of the boots and somewhat
jarringly the backs of the fists. The forearms are filled in with beast mode
stuff.
5" (12.5cm) tall in total, but due to a combination of hunchback and
kibble his head doesn't quite make it up to that height. Mostly orange,
yellow, dark gray, and metallic blue. A slightly shiny dark yellow plastic
is used for the collar area, dino head backpack, the tail weapon, the lower
biceps bit, forearms, fists, and feet. A slightly metallic dark orange
plastic is used for the head, the outer parts of the torso, shoulders, and
boots. Dark gray plastic makes up the central torso, pelvis, thighs, elbows,
forearm claws, and the shoulder joint pieces. (UV light puts the pelvis and
elbows as a different batch than the rest, might be due to joint plastics
often being a slightly more flexible and lower-friction sort.)
Much of the central torso is painted gloss orange, which is a little
brighter than the plastic. This paint is also used on the tops of the
forearms and the "spats" on the forearm claws. There's very dark gray,
almost black, paint on the centerline of the chest (rather than leaving the
dark gray plastic there unpainted) and a little bit at the front of the
helmet crest. Gold paint is used for the horns and eyebrow spikes on the
helmet, as well as the knee spikes and circles on the outer faces of the
shoulders. A gold Terran symbol (like a rounded Autobot symbol) is printed
on the center of the collarbone area. The face, thigh fronts, shin fronts,
and most of the tail are painted metallic bright blue. The eyes are gloss
red, and glow strongly (and a little creepily) under UV light.
The neck is a ball joint, the waist is not really articulated. You can
bend the transformation joint a little before it looks wrong, so the robot
can stop slouching. The shoulders have lifting hinges where the struts meet
the torso, and swivels where they meet the shoulder pieces. Swivels just
above the hinge elbows, as well as just below (necessary for transformation,
but it does compensate for the lack of wrist swivels). The elbows do
soft-lock in place at the 90 degree bend, to add stability to their default
pose in dino mode as legs. The wrists can bend in on transformation hinges,
and you can swing the claws all the way out in a sort of echo of the Warrior
version's gimmick. Ball joint hips, hinge knees, ankles rock back and forth
a little. The tail is attached via a hinged peg, which is useful in dino
mode but can make it a little hassle-some to get the peg into a tight socket.
The fists can hold 5mm pegs, there's 5mm sockets on the shoulders (gun
storage in both modes), and a 5mm socket in the butt where the tail goes for
storage or in dino mode.
Including the peg, the tail weapon is about 5" (12.5cm) long with a leaf
or blade shaped tip. The two guns are simple 1.75" (4.5cm) long cylinders
with some tech greebles that look kind of like lightsaber hilts, with 5mm peg
grips. The apertures are flat, so no inserting any sort of Fire Blasts. The
two guns are identical, and do not connect in any clever way to make a bigger
weapon. You can put both in one hand, though, top and bottom of fist.
Transformation: Kinda fiddly and reliant on some small tabs and slots to
hold things together. I did find that once everything was in place it wasn't
too bad (the neck doesn't really lock in place, though, and the outer hips
are supposed to tab into place on the inner hips but don't stay on well), but
during the process it feels like it's gonna fall apart into a pile of plastic
rubble. The basic idea is similar (by necessity) to the Warrior class
version, with the hulking robot arms becoming the hind legs, tiny dino
forelimbs coming out in this mode, and the robot legs folding up to become
the hips and back. The whip weapon lets them make for a more impressive tail
than the Warrior has, but the robot toes end up sticking up in back with no
real attempt to even minimize them.
Dinosaur Mode: A really wide-stance juvenile pachycephalosaur (briefly
known as a Stygimoloch until the consensus shifted) with pretty hollow legs
that have obvious fists sticking out the back because they couldn't find the
budget for a joint to let the fists fold in to fill the gaps in the shins.
The general hollowness and "don't look at it from that angle...or that one,"
nature of the design makes it feel like a LOT of compromises were made
between original design and final approved mold.
Noticeably bigger than the Warrior version, more of a Voyager in size,
with the head 5" (12.5cm) off the tabletop and a total snout to tail tip
length of 7.5" (19cm). Colors are about the same but with a little less of
the dark gray visible and the addition of bright red atop the head. Golden
yellow plastic is used for the dino head and back of the neck and the little
forelimb claws. Those dark gray claws from the backs of the arms are now the
feet, while the hips are made up of several of the orange plastic bits jammed
together.
The dino face is metallic blue with light purple eyes, the dome of the
skull is painted the aforementioned bright red. The robot sternum is the
dino sternum, so the Terran faction symbol is still visible. The orange
paint on the chest is more obvious now that the shoulder roots have moved to
become the hip roots. No other newly revealed paints.
The mouth opens, if a bit weirdly. The forelimbs have ball joint
shoulders. The hips are tabbed in place by default, although there's still
ball joint articulation there if you want it. The elbows are mostly soft-
ratchet stuck fully bent in this mode as knees, and there's hinges for the
ankles (transformation joints for the forearms) and toes. The tail is hinged
to lift up and down, and it can wiggle back and forth a little on the peg
attachment.
There's 5mm sockets on the hips now, where the guns are supposed to go.
The fists stick out behind the ankles, and I suppose can still hold things.
The forelimbs cannot hold 5mm pegs, although if you fiddle around a bit you
can jam a gun securely into a claw. Not held to fire it, just sort of toting
it around. A 5mm peg will sort of stay in the mouth too, but now I'm just
getting goofy with it. The 5mm socket for the tail is too hemmed in to be
useful for much else if you remove the tail.
Overall: Hm. I wouldn't really say it's better than the Warrior or
worse, it is more ambitious but doesn't pull off everything it tries. More
paint apps and colors overall, at least, so I'd say if you only want to get
one Jawbreaker this would be the one. If you already have the Warrior class
version, this isn't enough better to merit purchase unless you're trying to
be completist, in which case...well, this won't trigger buyer's remorse.
Dave Van Domelen, back to Legacy next.
Chaos Terran Aftermath (Wrecker truck)
Terran Jawbreaker (Pachycephalosaurus)
Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/ES/Deluxe4
Okay, so season 2 of the cartoon just plain sucks. I couldn't get past
about episode 4. They fired all the original writers and farmed it out to
lowest bidder hacks, from what I hear. I did get far enough to see one of
the new premises for the year, the idea of Chaos Terrans, born from the
shattered fragments of the AllSpark that got corrupted or something and
trying to remember details from those episodes makes me sad so I'll stop.
Basically, they're evil and aggressive and apparently quite stupid. The only
other Chaos Terran toy I've seen so far is Spitfire, which is a teal redeco
of One-Step Twitch...no clue if she's actually an evil clone or if they just
said, "Close enough to slap on the shelf."
Yes, I'm about done with EarthSpark, but Hasbro seems to have given up
on it first. Still, the Deluxe toys have generally been okay, and we might
get some proper toys of characters who only got Tacticons or One-Steps during
season 1 before the line peters out entirely.
CAPSULES
$20 price point.
Chaos Terran Aftermath: An interesting design that really needed more
testing or better QC or something. Mildly recommended.
Terran Jawbreaker: Overall slightly better than the Warrior version,
mostly in terms of colors and accessories. Also a the low end of
recommended, not THAT much better (and you're paying $5 more for the extra
colors and weapons).
RANTS
Packaging: Externally, the same as previous waves of Deluxes, but
there's no Build-A-Figure so the panel that was used to plug that is now just
a repeat of the box front portrait. The inner tray now has a purple gradient
instead of blue, it still has "EARTH SPARK" in Cybertronian glyphs at the
top, and part of the computer map from year one along the left side. There's
a sort of "footlocker" bit at the bottom with red alert chevrons, and the
instructions and safety sheet are stuffed into it.
Chaos Terrans do not get their own symbol, they just have Decepticon
symbols on their boxes. GHOST did not really survive the end of season 1, I
dunno if it rebuilt in season 2 and do not care.
DECEPTICON: CHAOS TERRAN AFTERMATH
Assortment: F8670
Altmode: Wrecker truck
Transformation Difficulty: 21 steps
Previous Name Use: None
Previous Mold Use: None
Packaging: Six plastic ties hold the robot to the tray. Two ties hold
the wrecker crane in the lower left, two more hold just the hook part in the
middle left. The pistol is held in by a corner flap in the lower right, and
freeing it requires cutting some tape or the cardboard itself.
Robot Mode: They seem to be going for a mix between retro-40s and Mad
Max here, with lots of curved fender lines but also spiked shoulders and a
jagged mohawk sort of helmet crest. The wrecker crane sticks out in back, or
can be mounted on either forearm. Normally he'd come across as a bit
top-heavy, but next to Jawbreaker he's got almost normal human proportions
(other than the tiny head). The torso side fender pieces aren't very stable,
it's clear that they have tabs that are supposed to go into slots inside the
backpack, but I can't get both to stay in at the same time. One of those "it
worked in the renders" design flaws, methinks. Additionally, the chest
doesn't lock down at all, nor can I see anything that's supposed to snap in
place, just a ledge to stop it from going too far.
4.75" (12cm) tall at the head, 5.25" (13cm) at the top of the shoulder
spikes. The colors are mostly warm violet, dark gray, black, and silver,
with some metallic purple bits. Slightly metalflake warm violet plastic is
used for the top and sides of the torso, the forearms, and the vehicle cab
top that forms a buttcape. A non-shiny plastic of the same color is used for
the gun, the hook part of the crane, the upper adbomen, the knee joints and
the ankle joints. Matte black plastic makes up the chest grille, pelvis,
thighs, lower upper arms, crane A-frame, and wheels. A more gunmetal gray
plastic is found on the head, shoulderpads, fists, thighs, feet, and the root
of the crane piece. The lower legs are light gray plastic.
Metallic purple paint is found on the mohawk, cheek guards, shoulder
front details, a little bit on the sternum, and kneecaps. Silver on the
face, the shoulderpad fronts, the shoulder spikes, some pipes on the chest
fenders, the triangular barrel of the gun, and various vehicle-only details
I'll cover below. The eyes and chest headlights are red. No faction symbol
that I can find, unless it's blending in REALLY well with the purple
plastic.
The neck is a ball joint, and the entire collar area is prone to come
unsnapped and sink the head into the chest. Smooth swivel waist, the hips
can go a decent distance before hitting the buttcape. The shoulders are ball
joints on the end of long struts giving a somewhat weird range of motion.
Bicep swivels, ball joint elbows, and the wrists bend down on transformation
hinges. Ball joint hips, mid-thigh swivels, hinge knees (and secondary
hinges for transformation). The ankles have hinges at the instep and swivels
where the struts attach to the feet. The crane on the back is hinged at the
root and hinged at the end where the hook is connected.
The hands can hold 5mm pegs, there's 5mm sockets on the forearms, and on
the bottoms of the feet. There's also 5mm sockets on the backs of the
calves, but they're partially blocked by vehicle panels. The end of the
crane is a 5mm socket meant for the hook to go in. The wheel hubs on the
shoulders are inadvertant 3mm sockets.
The gun has a triangular barrel with three muzzle apertures (too small
and shallow to hold anything). The grip is a 5mm peg, and there's short 5mm
pegs on either side above it for attaching in vehicle mode. It's 1.5" (4cm)
long.
The hook piece is only 23mm long including the 5mm peg at one end, and
there's a second peg at a 90 degree angle to it on the same side as the
pointy end of the hook. The hook can hold a 5mm peg, but you have to really
force it, I think it might not be intentional. The box back render (but not
the instructions) shows it used as a melee weapon, and I suppose it can do
that. While it's not on the crane, the gun can be attached for a sort of
scorpion tail gun.
Transformation: Another one of those designs where once you get all the
tabs in the right slots firmly enough, the result is quite stable...but prior
to that point it's a sloppy mess. It doesn't help that the legs need to be
bent at juuuust the right angle to make it possible for the tabs to find
their slots. One trick that's not apparent from just the package photos is
that the two pegs on the sides of the pistol must go into the soles of the
feet in order to secure the back end...leave the pistol out and the result
remains pretty unstable.
Vehicle Mode: A six-wheeled wrecker truck, but with some retro 40s
rounded look bits to it, and then "I guess disguise isn't really on the
table" Mad Max blades on the front bumper. There's a sort of shark fin on
the roof, which might be intended as Moar Spikes but also could just be a
prosaic radio/satellite antenna. The back end looks rather like the robot is
just bent over with his butt in the air, the crane mount doesn't exactly
cover that up. The front half is mostly purple, the rear mostly dark gray
and light gray.
5.5" (14cm) long including the gun poking out the back. Most of the
purple plastic ends up in the cab section with a little bit left for the
partly visible knee and ankle hinges in back, as well as the hook part. The
side fenders of the rear half are light gray plastic. Dark gunmetal plastic
makes up the front bumper, the root of the crane, and the feet stuck together
in the middle of the rear part. The wheels, the crane arm, the front grille,
and the robot butt are black plastic.
There's some more cool purple metallic paint on the center of the hood
and the fin on top of the cab. The windshield and side windows are painted
gloss black. The ram blades are painted silver, as are pipes connecting the
hood to the tops of the front fenders, the side mirrors, and the lights on
the roof. The headlights are painted red, and the smokestacks are painted
gunmetal. No faction symbol visible in this mode.
The crane is attached via a 5mm peg on its root that goes into a 5mm
socket in the base, and it can rotate freely to about 45 degrees to either
side. The arm is hinged and has a range of slightly below to horizonal to
almost vertical. The hook end is also hinged with about a 270 degree total
range, and the hook attaches via another 5mm peg/socket combo so it can
rotate or even be attached at 90 degrees to the strut. At full extension,
the hook can stick out a centimeter or so past the gun in back, and with the
secondary peg on top can haul anything with a 5mm socket in a decent spot on
the underside.
The only other connection point in this mode is on the front axles,
where the hubs are unintentional (probably) 3mm sockets. The rear wheels
snap in through the other side, so have solid-ish hubs. All six roll
reasonably well.
Overall: An okay design, suffering from the all too common problem of
things not fitting properly in real space.
TERRAN: TERRAN JAWBREAKER
Assortment: F8671
Altmode: Pachycephalosaurus
Transformation Difficulty: 16 steps
Previous Name Use: ES
Previous Mold Use: None
Packaging: Seven plastic ties hold the robot a bit awkwardly into the
inner tray. The tail is held by two ties in the upper left, while the guns
are held into the lower left by tray corner flaps.
The package renders show the apertures of the guns painted red, but the
actual toy has no paint on the guns. Somewhat more significantly, the render
shows the fist/forearm pieces as dark gray but the toy has them as golden
yellow. This is the color that the TakaraTomy version used for those parts
(although at least the thighs were painted that color), but this picture
isn't the TT version either. Maybe the render was an early version that kept
some of the TT elements? The package render also seems to have either left
the tail off robot mode entirely, or very carefully posed it so that it
doesn't show up from the angle of the shot.
Robot Mode: Well, the dino head is just sort of there as a backpack and
if the tail isn't used as a weapon it sticks out in back, but otherwise a
decent representation of the robot mode from the show. The facial expression
is kind of the 8| emoticon...wide circular and kinda blank eyes, mouth a
perfectly straight line. As noted above, he's very top-heavy with gorilla
arms and skinny legs. As with the Warrior version, his forearms have the
dino rear claws attached to them, but they aren't involved in any gimmicks,
they're just decorative. Instead, he gets a couple of pistols that look like
big lightsaber hilts with pegs sticking out the side near one end.
Hollowness isn't too bad, mostly the backs of the boots and somewhat
jarringly the backs of the fists. The forearms are filled in with beast mode
stuff.
5" (12.5cm) tall in total, but due to a combination of hunchback and
kibble his head doesn't quite make it up to that height. Mostly orange,
yellow, dark gray, and metallic blue. A slightly shiny dark yellow plastic
is used for the collar area, dino head backpack, the tail weapon, the lower
biceps bit, forearms, fists, and feet. A slightly metallic dark orange
plastic is used for the head, the outer parts of the torso, shoulders, and
boots. Dark gray plastic makes up the central torso, pelvis, thighs, elbows,
forearm claws, and the shoulder joint pieces. (UV light puts the pelvis and
elbows as a different batch than the rest, might be due to joint plastics
often being a slightly more flexible and lower-friction sort.)
Much of the central torso is painted gloss orange, which is a little
brighter than the plastic. This paint is also used on the tops of the
forearms and the "spats" on the forearm claws. There's very dark gray,
almost black, paint on the centerline of the chest (rather than leaving the
dark gray plastic there unpainted) and a little bit at the front of the
helmet crest. Gold paint is used for the horns and eyebrow spikes on the
helmet, as well as the knee spikes and circles on the outer faces of the
shoulders. A gold Terran symbol (like a rounded Autobot symbol) is printed
on the center of the collarbone area. The face, thigh fronts, shin fronts,
and most of the tail are painted metallic bright blue. The eyes are gloss
red, and glow strongly (and a little creepily) under UV light.
The neck is a ball joint, the waist is not really articulated. You can
bend the transformation joint a little before it looks wrong, so the robot
can stop slouching. The shoulders have lifting hinges where the struts meet
the torso, and swivels where they meet the shoulder pieces. Swivels just
above the hinge elbows, as well as just below (necessary for transformation,
but it does compensate for the lack of wrist swivels). The elbows do
soft-lock in place at the 90 degree bend, to add stability to their default
pose in dino mode as legs. The wrists can bend in on transformation hinges,
and you can swing the claws all the way out in a sort of echo of the Warrior
version's gimmick. Ball joint hips, hinge knees, ankles rock back and forth
a little. The tail is attached via a hinged peg, which is useful in dino
mode but can make it a little hassle-some to get the peg into a tight socket.
The fists can hold 5mm pegs, there's 5mm sockets on the shoulders (gun
storage in both modes), and a 5mm socket in the butt where the tail goes for
storage or in dino mode.
Including the peg, the tail weapon is about 5" (12.5cm) long with a leaf
or blade shaped tip. The two guns are simple 1.75" (4.5cm) long cylinders
with some tech greebles that look kind of like lightsaber hilts, with 5mm peg
grips. The apertures are flat, so no inserting any sort of Fire Blasts. The
two guns are identical, and do not connect in any clever way to make a bigger
weapon. You can put both in one hand, though, top and bottom of fist.
Transformation: Kinda fiddly and reliant on some small tabs and slots to
hold things together. I did find that once everything was in place it wasn't
too bad (the neck doesn't really lock in place, though, and the outer hips
are supposed to tab into place on the inner hips but don't stay on well), but
during the process it feels like it's gonna fall apart into a pile of plastic
rubble. The basic idea is similar (by necessity) to the Warrior class
version, with the hulking robot arms becoming the hind legs, tiny dino
forelimbs coming out in this mode, and the robot legs folding up to become
the hips and back. The whip weapon lets them make for a more impressive tail
than the Warrior has, but the robot toes end up sticking up in back with no
real attempt to even minimize them.
Dinosaur Mode: A really wide-stance juvenile pachycephalosaur (briefly
known as a Stygimoloch until the consensus shifted) with pretty hollow legs
that have obvious fists sticking out the back because they couldn't find the
budget for a joint to let the fists fold in to fill the gaps in the shins.
The general hollowness and "don't look at it from that angle...or that one,"
nature of the design makes it feel like a LOT of compromises were made
between original design and final approved mold.
Noticeably bigger than the Warrior version, more of a Voyager in size,
with the head 5" (12.5cm) off the tabletop and a total snout to tail tip
length of 7.5" (19cm). Colors are about the same but with a little less of
the dark gray visible and the addition of bright red atop the head. Golden
yellow plastic is used for the dino head and back of the neck and the little
forelimb claws. Those dark gray claws from the backs of the arms are now the
feet, while the hips are made up of several of the orange plastic bits jammed
together.
The dino face is metallic blue with light purple eyes, the dome of the
skull is painted the aforementioned bright red. The robot sternum is the
dino sternum, so the Terran faction symbol is still visible. The orange
paint on the chest is more obvious now that the shoulder roots have moved to
become the hip roots. No other newly revealed paints.
The mouth opens, if a bit weirdly. The forelimbs have ball joint
shoulders. The hips are tabbed in place by default, although there's still
ball joint articulation there if you want it. The elbows are mostly soft-
ratchet stuck fully bent in this mode as knees, and there's hinges for the
ankles (transformation joints for the forearms) and toes. The tail is hinged
to lift up and down, and it can wiggle back and forth a little on the peg
attachment.
There's 5mm sockets on the hips now, where the guns are supposed to go.
The fists stick out behind the ankles, and I suppose can still hold things.
The forelimbs cannot hold 5mm pegs, although if you fiddle around a bit you
can jam a gun securely into a claw. Not held to fire it, just sort of toting
it around. A 5mm peg will sort of stay in the mouth too, but now I'm just
getting goofy with it. The 5mm socket for the tail is too hemmed in to be
useful for much else if you remove the tail.
Overall: Hm. I wouldn't really say it's better than the Warrior or
worse, it is more ambitious but doesn't pull off everything it tries. More
paint apps and colors overall, at least, so I'd say if you only want to get
one Jawbreaker this would be the one. If you already have the Warrior class
version, this isn't enough better to merit purchase unless you're trying to
be completist, in which case...well, this won't trigger buyer's remorse.
Dave Van Domelen, back to Legacy next.