The stand itself was split between Hasbro's Marvel, Star Wars and TransFormers products (interestingly, with the first two currently owned by Disney, I almost wonder why Disney didn't pick up TransFormers when a cinematic outing was first pitched). I had a brief look at the other bits and bobs (the electronic Infinity Gauntlet, Black Panther Mask and a more detailed, multi-part Darth Vader helmet being the highlights) and of course there was a small display of War for Cybertron stuff... but that was even more disappointing than I'd expected. 'Voyager class' Optimus Prime is positively miniscule, little bigger than a Deluxe from a few years back. Megatron looks worse in person than he did in photos, and the rest of the display amounted to Hound, Sideswipe, Cog and Flywheels. That's significantly less than they've revealed between the New York and Paris Comic Cons already, and seems like a pretty poor showing, under the circumstances.
For Studio Series, they had a couple of Bumblebees (natch) and a bunch of properly new reveals...
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| SS Rampage and Scrap Metal #1 |
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| SS Rampage and Scrap Metal #2 |
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| SS Long Haul and Cogman (a TLK repaint) |
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| SS Long Haul |
The heavy emphasis on Constructicons was explained by the RotF Devastator revealed in the panel at the end of the day, but I was honestly impressed by them as solo figures. Scrap Metal is an entirely new character, previously only seen as concept art, while Rampage was originally released as a disappointingly inaccurate Deluxe. RotF Long Haul didn't get a UK release back in the day (as far as I could tell), so I ended up buying Payload, the Hunt for the Decepticons homage to the yellow versions of the G1 Constructicons. Scrap Metal and these new versions of Long Haul, Rampage and are designed to be components of the eventual gestalt, yet the look pretty reasonable in and of themselves. Of particular interest is that Rampage, finally appearing at full size in his movie-accurate 'springsnake' form, has a low-profile, cross-shaped stand integrated into the toy, to keep him upright. Studio Series does seem to be where most of the innovation has been funneled to in the TransFormers line in recent years. That said, the issue of wonky scale rears its ugly head again, as Long Haul - ostensibly a Voyager class figure of a colossal CGI robot - is only a little bit taller than Cogman. Bulkier by far, obviously, but absolutely not in scale.
Cogman, meanwhile, is simply a repaint of the figure from The Last Knight... which feels almost like a middle finger to those of us who paid over the odds to obtain the hard-to-find figure at the tail end of The Last Knight's toyline. I mean, it's great that Hasbro have acknowledged the difficulties people had in finding him and will be giving him a re-release with a full-on silver paint job... but there's a sense of "OK, why did I bother?" because it is literally the same figure, with no changes to the engineering, and a far better paint job.
Cream of the crop - and given a shelf to herself - was Studio Series Shatter - truly a gorgeous figure, and very definitely confirmed on my Want List now. The mass of silver paint on the torso and legs means the head looks a little underpainted, but I like her nonetheless.
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| SS Shatter |
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| SS Shatter (apologies for the fuzziness - my phone's camera is terrible) |
The new Optimus Prime and Jetfire were also on display, I gather, but I didn't find 'em... and there was no sign that I could see of the Leader class DotM Megatron figure revealed online a couple of days ago.
There were also displays of the BotBots... which I find baffling, but more on that later...
The store tagged onto the display area was selling the two gold Bumblebee figures packaged with G1 cassettes, and I was tempted to pick up the VW version but, as always seems to be the case these days, it's something I already have on order... and I'm not sure I'd have been able to cancel the order at this point, so I decided not to bother. Mine will arrive, sooner or later... With their appearance at the MCM London Comic Con, one would tend to expect in the next couple of weeks...
I actually ended up not buying any TransFormers at this show, but samples of the BotBots were given away just before the Hasbro panel started. Single, blind-packaged, carded toys were handed out to everyone in the audience, and I opened mine straight away (though I got the impression we were supposed to wait for the package-opening tuturial in the BotBots section of the presentation), finding that I had received Cocoa Crazy of the Sugar Shocks. His 'role' is described as "Heartwarming Hot Chocolate" and he's... a mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows on the top. Included in the package is a collector's checklist/instruction sheet with lots of bright, colourful cartoons of all the characters from Series 1. Since I'm not entirely 'down with what the kids are playing with these days', my girlfriend had to later point out that this is basically Hasbro ripping off Shopkins, only with items from around an entire shopping centre rather than just a supermarket. The thing being, the brand representatives on the panel (and I neglected to note their names - typical me!) claimed to have been working on BotBots for four years, essentially since Shopkins first appeared. Granted, they have almost 200 characters in the pipeline, with about 60 in Series 1 alone... but four years development time on a line of nonsensical, simplistic, cartoonish transforming items seems like four wasted years to me. The idea is to have a presence in the market for what they called "collectables" which, in their opinion, is the all-inclusive (as in 'suitable for boys and girls') style of toy. One has to wonder if any of them stopped to consider whether TransFormers was the correct franchise for this particular acid trip. Cute as they are, they strike me as harming the brand more than they help it. Do they expect that kids who collect BotBots will then upgrade to Cyberverse, Generations and/or Studio Series as they get older?
Most of the rest of the panel was nothing particularly new to anyone who visits the fan sites on a semi-regular basis, and particularly those who paid attention to reveals from SDCC/NYCC or the more recent Paris Comic Con. Granted, they showed as a couple of flashy bursts of advertising for War for Cybertron: Seige, but nothing new on the toy front (though there were hints in the Q&A at the end). The Bumblebee portion of the slideshow amounted to little more than a couple of brief ads featuring John Cena talking about Energon Igniters and Power Charge Bumblebee with a smile that tended toward "can I please die now?" levels of forcedness. It's frustrating when a company like Hasbro attends an event like the MCM Comic Con and then presents products that are already on the shelves at toyshops. I get the need to fire everyone up to #JOINTHEBUZZ, but maybe include a short presentation of the Masterpiece figure as well?
The revelation of Studio Series Devastator was very well-handled, though... They played up the fact that the majority of the newest reveals in the line were construction vehicles and asked, very pointedly, if there was any reason for this. One of the Hasbro representatives then dashed back off to the side of the stage, and lurked just to the side hiding a large, grey test-shot model. I saw one arm briefly and realised it was a large Devastator (I'd estimate it's about 12" tall in all its hunched glory), which was then paraded at the front of the stage. Reportedly made up of a total of eight figures (one more than the ambitious, eight-year-old Legends class set), including the three revealed at the Hasbro booth, it looks utterly fantastic - a huge improvement on the massive version released as part of the RotF toyline. As long as it's stable - and with reference to the Combiner Wars technology, there's no reason the expect it won't be - SS Devastator will likely be a must-have for fans of the (admittedly controversial) Revenge of the Fallen design. Deluxe class Shatter was also featured in the slideshow, and I found it distracting that all three Hasbro staffers consistently referred to the character as 'he'. Shatter, being voiced by Angela Bassett, is technically a Femme-Bot, so this slip-up left me thinking they don't know their own product.
The Q&A was surprisingly informative, even though it did feature a lot of "We can't announce anything about that... yet..."- and "We listen to our fans, so we'll take that feedback with us"-type responses. A brief, paraphrased rundown of the questions I heard (the microphone wasn't great, or the punters weren't close enough/speaking clearly enough):
- Any plans to introduce more LGBTQ characters (into the toyline)? - this got a somewhat evasive answer, understandably. Hasbro make children's toys, so taking what could be considered a 'political' stance may be problematic for them. But also, let's not forget these are robots, so the concept of 'gender' is something we have applied to them, not something they would necessarily consider, in and of themselves. The question they answered was more to do with their intentions toward widening the TransFormers fanbase to be more inclusive of girls.
- Given the partnership with the Cartoon Network over the most recent TV shows, is there any chance of a Season 4 of TransFormers Animated, and a continuation of the toyline? - while vague, the answer was something like "anything's possible". They confirmed that they do have a good relationship with the Cartoon Network, and suggested (almost jokingly?) that they would feed back the news that there is potentially a market for more TFAnimated within the UK fanbase.
- Any plans to produce previously unreleased toys in any ongoing/upcoming lines? - another "anything's possible"-type response, but I noted that there seemed to be a particular nod toward Studio Series in their answer.
- Will there be any Euro G1/G2 references in new toylines? - another ambiguous response but, considering the sheer number of TransFormers toys that appeared across Europe after the franchise went into hibernation in the States, I would hope they'll seriously consider it.
- With only three components of the 8-part Studio Series Devastator so far revealed, how long will it take to actually complete the gestalt? - this got a less ambiguous response: just that they couldn't answer that question yet, but that we'd find out soon... Possibly "later this week"?
- Will there be a new Galvatron/Scorponok in War for Cybertron? - to this question, the response was another question: which Galvatron would you want? They were unable to announce anything about Galvatron, but mentioned that Scorponok was featured in a recent fan poll (versus Omega Supreme, who won the poll and hints had already been shown - both here and online - about an upcoming toy). Nevertheless, they suggested that there might be news about Scorponok soon...
- How do they go about choosing which characters to make into new toys? - interestingly, they admitted that it tends to start as the personal preferences within their team of designers, but emphasised that feedback from fans is also considered valuable input.
- How do they go about dealing with the licensing issues on the Studio Series line, with the example given that there hasn't yet been an official Dark of the Moon Dino figure that transforms into a Ferrari - again, they noted that fan feedback helps determine their choices, and they pursue licensing wherever possible. Little was actually stated about the process, but they pointed out that much of the Studio Series is based around licensed vehicles. What they did say is that they have to carefully consider what sacrifices they're prepared to make (in terms of colour, for example) to meet the licensor's requirements.
- When will we get a Masterpiece Jazz? - this question clearly excited the Hasbro staff on stage, and they admitted that we'd hear something "really, really soon".
- Will there be an Optimus Prime origin movie? - another noncommittal response, understandable as their marketing machine is in full swing with Bumblebee, but the message was "stay tuned". Apparently a certain Peter Cullen asked this question at one of the big US conventions. Personally, I hope we don't get an origin movie, per se... but, done right, another story with a single-character focus could be worth a try.
- One of the marketing images featured the head of Omega Supreme at the foot of Megatron's throne... does this mean there's a Titan class figure in the works? - funnily enough, they didn't mention that this has already been shown (the tank component was revealed during a Hasbro panel at another recent con), so I was a little surprised by the way they responded. First praising the punter for his "sharp eyes", the said the image was only a tease, and wouldn't be drawn on the possibility of a toy, despite having mentioned in answer to a previous question that Omega Supreme had won a fan poll for the next Titan class figure... Hmmm...
- Will there be any more IDW-influenced figures? - this got a more positive response, that there is absolutely going to be some interaction with IDW's artists/designers in upcoming toys... Rather puzzling, considering the news earlier in the year that IDW's portfolio was being shut down to make room for TransFormers comics that adhere more closely to Hasbro's marketing strategies...
- Will there be any IDW-exclusive characters? - the punter reeled off a list of possibilities that I didn't have time to note down, and I'm not sufficiently familiar with the characters, but this got another "no announcements yet"-type response, albeit with "we'll take that as feedback" tagged on the end.
- Are there any plans to revisit figures like Primus and Unicron in upcoming toylines? - this got a little derailed into a discussion about scale - to keep Primus and Unicron in scale with Titans, for example, they'd have to be larger than an average house, making it difficult to fit them into the average collection... However, they admitted it was something they wanted to do at some point, and seemed quite enthusiastic about the idea.
Another question occurred to me today, though, and I really wish I'd come up with it at the time... so, Hasbro, if you're listening:
To what extent do the innovations presented by Third Party developers of transforming robot action figures influence your decisions on the direction and/or gimmicks of upcoming toylines?
Extra photos from the Hasbro stand and the panel, taken by my best mate...
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