Transformers Power of the Primes Deluxe Class Blot: Who made Dr. Frankenstein's assistant a Transformer?

Finally, a second Terrorcon to review. Hopefully, this doesn't end up like Volcanicus, and the remaining limb bots are impossible to find. While other combiner teams go with a consistent theme to them, the Terrorcons were one of the teams that didn't have a consistency to them other than being monsters. The only other that comes to mind, in terms of Generation 1 Combiners is their Autobot counterpart, the Technobots. We go from a double-headed dragon to a... troll? Ogre? To tell you the truth I honestly don't know what this is supposed to be. I can at least review him, so I will.

Transformers Combiner Wars/ Power of the Primes Jet Mould Bonanza: So. Many. REPAINTS!!!

If Combiner Wars was known for one thing, it was mould reuse. If there was ever a line that milked engineering dry, it was this one. To give an extreme example, let's take the Dead End mould, one introduced in Wave 2 as a part of Menasor. How many times was that mould used? sixteen times when combining Hasbro, Takara, and convention exclusives. So while at first, it might appear that this review is looking at five different toys, we are in fact only looking at two, and at the same time, we're looking at twenty-eight toys. For you can find nine versions of Blast Off, and nineteen versions of the other four. And that's ignoring the fact that all five share almost the exact same engineering so it could be argued that we're looking at the same toy five times out of twenty-eight! If I included a revisit to Vortex here too, we'd be looking at forty different versions of the same basic toy released in three years. Will this get me out of reviewing all the variants of the Arialbot moulds? I hope so. Here is the revisit for Combiner Wars Blast Off (General Retail), the review of Combiner Wars Fellbat and Guyhawk, and Power of the Primes Dreadwind and Blackwing.

Starting in the Jet modes, it's clear who got which mould. For you see, all of these started in Combiner Wars Wave 1, with the Arialbots. Or more accurately, Blast Off, Fellbat and Dreadwind were in wave 1, Guyhawk and Blackwing's variant came in Wave 2. For some reason, they released Wave 1 with Drag Strip, one of the limb-bots of the Decepticon Combiner, Menasor, and Air Raid was in Wave 2, and Wave 2 had Air Raid, one of the Limb bots of the Autobot Combiner, Superion. Now, why is this weird? Because the rest of the Wave 1 Deluxes were the other Autobots needed for Superion, and the rest of Wave 2 were the Decepticons needed to make Menasor (well, in terms of the traditional configurations). You might say that they didn't want to have a wave of Autobots and a wave of Decepticons, but every later wave in the line didn't bother mixing them up. We even got two waves of nothing but Autobots in terms of the Deluxe Class. Now, what separates all of these flyboys? In terms of engineering? Not much. What defines any variations in engineering really comes down to what happens to the wings and tailfins. Arms, Legs, Heads and Cockpits? All exactly the same. Dreadwind and Blackwing have the most variations in engineering due to the requirements of Power of the Primes, but on top of that, there's also a gimmick that the two have that no other variations of the moulds do.

They can combine into a larger jet, which is, unfortunately, more impressive then it really is. All the extra engineering really gives you is two jets barely hanging together thanks to Blackwing only relying on the port meant for the combiner hand in Dreadwind's arm mode. A port not meant to take a lot of weight, and as such it takes no effort to separate the two. I'm also not a fan of how they handled Blackwing's nosecone and head, as they kinda just hang there, breaking the "sleek" look the rest of the jet goes for. What's also annoying is that one of the wings on my copy of Dreadwind doesn't properly connect to the leg assembly, though it's manageable. It still holds in place, it's just at a slight angle.

Now then, Combiner Limb modes (I'm skipping deco until robot modes for now). While these pictures don't have them include their hands or feet, it's because there's nothing extra to talk about with them. Blast Off, Guyhawk and Fellbat all have the Combiner Wars Hand/Foot/Guns, Dreadwind and Blackwing both have Prime armour hands with two thumbs. Seen them before, not much to add on the matter. All five leg modes look like squashed jets, and all five arms look like they're stuck halfway in the transformation process. Blackwing has one of the most awkward leg modes while Dreadwind doesn't even try to hide his robot mode arms. The other three manage to hide them better purely on the basis of their arms not standing out thanks to colour schemes. One annoying problem I noticed though with Fellbat and Guyhawk though is the shape of their heads. They're a tad too long to let the combiner peg assembly they're attached to do a full 360 movement. It's not the end of the world as it's easily worked around, but it is somewhat annoying as there are only a few other toys (to my knowledge) that have that same problem in the line.

To Robot Modes, and while they all share the same engineering to an extent, all five do at least look like different robots. Dreadwind and Blackwing have the advantage of being heavy retools, but if I was reviewing any other variant of the moulds from Combiner Wars, I would not be saying that. A lot of variety in the Combiner Wars versions of the moulds were in the heads and paint jobs. There was very little retooling in the line to help separate characters. As a result, Dreadwind and Blackwing are a nice change of pace, though while I'm more open to them, I probably wouldn't be if I got all the Combiner Wars versions of the moulds. What I find strange though is that while Dreadwind and Blackwing are built off Combiner Wars moulds, their combined modes feel like an afterthought. This is especially true for Blackwing, as all the extra joints needed for the combined jet mode make the combiner limbs look awkward. But at the same time, due to how bad the execution is on the combined jet, it's at least a good sign that the jet and robot modes look good at all. Out of the five though, I prefer Fellbat's robot mode. It's still surprising to me how powerful it looks when most jets go for a leaner look in their robot modes. When Blast Off was confirmed as an Arialbot repaint, most people were mad at it due to the fact that a Blast Off that was accurate to Generation 1 would be a Space shuttle. I honestly don't care either way, though I do stand by the belief of the fighter jet making more sense in the army team. As for Guyhawk, as obnoxious as the colour is, it is accurate to the original toy. There really is a pink Decepticon jet. As a pink Decepticon jet, Guyhawk does look good, though who in their right mind thought a pink jet would be a good disguise?

Should you own one of each of these? It's up to you. Should you own all twenty-eight variations of these moulds? No way! Unless you want them for combiner limbs, you do not need every version of this ever made, and even the combiner limb excuse isn't well justified as that number includes convention repaints and Takara releases. Are they fun toys to mess around with? Yes. Fun enough to buy them that many times? No. Nothing like this is.

Nendoroid Number 620; Zelda, The Wind Waker Version: Better then Funko Pops in every way?

I am not a fan of Funko Pops. Honestly, I hate them. I think they're quite bland, and either very generic or for those rare times when the standard mould can't be used, really creepy. It's why you'll never see a review of a Funko Pop on here that I bought for myself because I never will. I'm a huge Pokemon fan, not enough of one to look past the eldritch horror that the Funko Pop Pikachu is. There are other alternatives to it though, including a Japanese collectible line known as Nendoroids. At least when it comes to Australian releases, most never see the light of day here, but there are a few that do get a release here, including one that I picked up a few years ago, "Zelda, The Wind Waker Version", or as she'll be known as from here on out, Toon Zelda. Who's ready for a constant attack on Funko Pops?

Lego City 60191; Arctic Exploration Team: Perfect timing on my end!

Too late for Australian winter, too early for winter in the Northern Hemisphere, truly the best time to review a set themed around arctic exploration!

It might be because I've never actually been to the snow, but themes and locations based around snow, ice and the like always do intrigue me. I even tend to let Ice themed platformer levels slide just due to the theme, even if it means subjecting myself to Ice physics leading to awkward platforming challenges... Moving on, while the Lego City theme, one of the few original themes Lego does still prioritize to some degree, has a lot of sub-themes to it, a lot of it can be connected to either Firefighting, Police, or some form of rescue operations. There are some like trains that tend to remain in circulation for a long time, but rarely does the line branch out from the norm, most of it tends to be in "Lego City". However, every now and then, you get something new, such as a new sub-line themed around Arctic Exploration, and where we go to today because I rarely get interested in City themes, starting off with one of the smaller sets of the wave, the Arctic Exploration Team.

Transformers Generations Thrilling 30 Deluxe Class Chromia: Congrats on the new legs, they're better then the Unicycle look

While some might try to disagree, try to call it out as a form of forced inclusivity, it's hard to deny that Transformers is a toyline mostly aimed at boys, and for a while, female characters were a no-show. While female characters have existed since G1, it took until Beast Wars for the girls to be getting toys, with Blackarachnia's first toy being a repaint of Tarantulus, and the first toy to be made from the ground up to be a girl being Transmetal Airazor. "What about Arcee!" I hear you say, well, while she apparently had prototypes and sketches, her first toy was a retool of Transmetal 2 Blackarachnia, as a convention exclusive in 2001. her first toy was in the same wave as today's review, in 2014. And people wonder why we're getting at least one female Transformer each line now? Granted, that wasn't her first toy, as every time she's had appearances in a show of even the live action films, she's had a toy. The reason I say that is because Chromia here is a repaint of one of those toys, from Transformers Prime, something that is surprisingly common because, for all her appearances, she's never had a unique mould. How well does this look work for her? Well, one way to find out.

Transformers Power of the Primes Leader Class Orion Pax/Optimus Prime: Two toys for the price of one

Optimus Prime combining with his trailer to get stronger is not something new. Powermaster Prime did it (originally), I know off the top of my head that it's something that the Robots in Disguise 2001 toy did along with Armada and Cybertron. one of the toys for Dark of the Moon even did it (I couldn't tell you if he did in the film, other then it's implied that he did). However, there is something that the others haven't really done, and that was introduced Prime's identity before he became a Prime into this formula, Orion Pax. See, the gimmick of the Leader Class Power of the Primes toys was the ability to turn a toy that's roughly Deluxe sized into a Leader Class toy with some extra armour. For some characters, this worked out well. Others... not so much. Apologies Primal, this is one case where Truck is better then Monkey... oh you thought fans complaining about changes was something new in this Fandom? It's been going on longer then I've been alive. Anyway, how well does this hold up? Is this the superior Prime Wars trilogy Prime? Ok, that one I can answer now as yes because it looks the closest to what many fans consider Optimus Prime to look like, but that's beside the point.

Transformers Titans Return Leader Class Powermaster Optimus Prime: When the white one gets to be the original

Oh Titans Return, a line of strong potential, great figures with few duds, but alas, unable to capitalize on its full potential, with many believed shoe in faces never to get the light of day. Apeface and Snapdragon, a pair of triple changer headmasters in a line of triple changing headmasters? Nope. Star Saber and the other Brainmasters? Nope. Well known and well-loved headmasters in the community? Maybe as standalone Titan Masters. The first two waves even had teases of returning cassette bots and cons in the Legends class to connect to Leader class Blaster and Soundwave (yes I know the irony of not reviewing that figure still, even though I go by Blaster, in some form, online), yet neither Blaster or Soundwave got their full set of iconic cassettes. The line as a whole really felt like, at least to me, it had some more room to grow, especially in Japan where the figures eventually started getting Targetmaster companions to go alongside the figures that were originally Targetmasters in the Generation 1 toyline. What was also very annoying was the distribution from wave 3 onwards here, let alone the exclusives. "No Hasbro, absolutely no one here in Australia wanted those exclusives. No one wanted Nautica, or Tidal Wave, or Magnus Prime, or Brainstorm, or Quickswitch, or Arcee, or a full set of Monsterbots". (I'd love to give a review of those three, but the only one I have is Twinferno). Apparently they also really didn't want to make a Godbomber and left Takara to do him and a Powermaster Prime that can connect to it. What did we get at general retail? A repaint of Combiner Wars Ultra Magnus. Well seeing as Magnus isn't here to defend himself, let's see what this Prime's made of as we delve into a somewhat mini-marathon of Combining Primes, starting with the one who can't combine unless you get him from Japan!