Binaltech was presented as a sort of alternate timeline of events between the second season of the TV show and the animated movie, in which a group of Autobots who had become infected with the Cosmic Rust virus were rebuilt in new forms with the latest technologies and the aid of various real-life car manufacturers. Each vehicle was fully licensed by Takara and, while they tended not to be precisely the same vehicle as their G1 equivalents, they were either the latest iteration of the same series, or appropriately similar alternatives. They were also part die-cast, much like the G1 toys, and all made to 1:24 scale. I'd picked up the first few Binaltech figures before Hasbro's version - the all-plastic Alternators - surfaced in the UK, and tended to keep buying Binaltech because the Alternators tended to look quite lacklustre in comparison...
I wrote up one of my final Binaltech purchases way back at the start of this blog, so I figured it was about time I got back to the first of the line...
Vehicle Mode:
Where G1 Smokescreen was a Nissan/Datsun Fairlady modified for rally or race driving, the Binaltech version has become a Subaru Impreza, as modified for their World Rally Team. Rather than keeping the red, white and blue colourscheme of the original, he features the paint job and full set of sponsor decals of the actual Subaru rally car from the 2003 Monte Carlo Rally. This is largely a gorgeous metallic blue, with the fluorescent yellow stylised Subaru logo on each side and on the back, along with labelling from Pirelli, STI Performance, Prodrive and many others. The Alternators version retained all the decals, but was molded in a flat blue plastic with no base paintwork.
While the Impreza was a road car, this one features modifications to the roof (a silver box which is probably some sort of radio antenna), the front bumper (where the secondary light fittings are covered over to accommodate more sponsor decals), the wing mirrors (which are smaller and squarer than on the road version) the wheels (which feature a different arrangement of spokes unique to this model and are painted gold) and, of course, the spoiler (which is larger and more fancy). This particular rendition of the vehicle is so well made, it's easily mistaken for a 1:24 model car from a distance - there are transformation seams, but most of them have been made to follow the natural lines of the car, including the doors (all of which open), so they blend in very well. The only exception to this being the fairly obvious split down the back of the car, where the Subaru logo and numberplate highlight the split.
The Binaltech series was most notable for attempting to emulate model cars in that the vehicle interiors were largely quite realistic. Smokescreen, for example, has four seats, a full dashboard, steering wheel and gearstick... and yet still contains all the robot mass. This was a completely eye-opening feature on a TransFormers toy back in 2003, since virtually all of them up until Binaltech - and since, with the partial exception of the Human Alliance line - have filled the vehicle interior with robot parts. Given that this was four years before the first live action movie and seven years before Human Alliance, it was significant achievement, and a real milestone in the TransFormers brand.
But that wasn't all... because, not only do all the doors open, but the bonnet opens to reveal engine detail (actually the robot's weapon, cleverly disguised) and the boot opens to reveal a small amount of storage space. Furthermore, the front wheels can turn in tandem, thanks to an awkward arrangement of tabs, magnets and a bar joining the wheels. Add to that, the smaller details such as the use of translucent plastic for the headlights and tail lights - the latter being properly coloured and backed with silver paint to help them stand out - chrome on the exhaust and a proper numberplate (matching the real-life rally car) and you've got a stunning-looking debut model in a new, collector-oriented line.
It's not perfect, though - as well as the split down the middle, the rear windscreen is broken up with four pieces of structural plastic that form parts of Smokescreen's transformation joints, and the bonnet includes a separate hinged flap centred around the engine ventilation, but they really just serve as a reminder that this is a TransFormer, not a model car. I'd also argue that the engine/weapon could have used a bit more paintwork - it's molded in grey and black plastics with black paint on the side that becomes the gun's grip and red paint on the raised Autobot insignia, but the main block is designed to resemble an actual, metallic part of the engine in the real vehicle, albeit with the proportions exaggerated.
Note that the two launchers attached to the spoiler in the final picture (and several of the robot mode images, below) are from the Binaltech Arming sets made by TFClub, and are not part of the stock package.
Robot Mode:
I think I'd already seen photos of Smokescreen online before I picked him up, but I was still amazed by how cool he looked in-hand. The robot has very similar proportions to the G1 toy, just a bit more detailed and overall tidier. Sure, he still ends up with the car's roof on his back, attached to the windscreen... but it's been flipped round, so I guess its a little bit more involved in his transformation, and ends up slightly flatter against his back than it otherwise might. Binaltech debuted alongside the original Masterpiece figure, and it's hard not to draw parallels. This thing, more than any other TransFormer I'd seen back in 2003, looked like a believable robot that actually could transform into a car. Of course, in the light of the designs to come out of the live action movies, he seems rather basic... even quaint, perhaps, but it seemed exactly right when it came out - new, yet familiar - and I doubt anyone could have forseen the aesthetic revolution the movies would later bring to the toyline.
The shoulders are a little on the saggy side, placed at the lower end of the main chest bulk due to the way they transform, but they work well enough where they are. The arms do end up looking a little long, since his hands hang down at his knees so, in that respect, even the G1 toy had better proportions. That said, taken as a whole, it actually works quite well. All this proportions are somewhat exaggerated - from the enormous, clodhopping feet that make his legs look short, to his broad, protruding car bonnet chest - so the arms don't become a weird sticking point in his overall appearance.
Naturally, as with vehicle mode, the original G1 toy's colourscheme has been replaced with the glossy, sparkly blue of Subaru's World Rally Team colours. With some fairly bare blue parts in his midsection and grey as his secondary colour, Smokescreen does end up looking a little plainer in robot mode than he did as a car, but the large Autobot insignia on his shoulders add a little colour variation, and there's a greater depth of detail on his waist than on the G1 toy, so the simple play of light and shadow on the figure is interesting enough to my eyes. The arms and legs aren't exactly replete with sculpted detail, but they're certainly functional... though I do miss the sticker details that were applied to G1 toys, and think it's a shame Reprolabels never produced some colour highlights for Smokescreen's robot mode. There's one really strange aspect to the robot mode paint job, in the way blue paint was applied to the tops of Smokescreen's thighs - rather than following any of the sculpted detail, it sort of curves shallowly downward from the outside toward the groin, giving it the look of a pair of tight, blue underpants. Given that this style of application was not carried over to BT03 Streak, it seems as though this may have been a mistake.
Smokescreen's gun, when folded out from its vehicle mode engine form, is shaped surprisingly like the chromed weapon provided with the G1 toy, just a little stubbier. It plugs into his hand via a peg on the side of the grip, so it's held very securely... but I do wish it had either been painted more substantially or chromed, as the grey and black plastic looks a little dull. The first Binaltech figure's weapons is still one of the best designed, but least well decorated of the whole line. The real shame, for me, was that it took a Third Party company to come up with the shoulder launchers which were so much a part of the original G1 toys if not the character models from the TV show/comics. Even after the omission was officially corrected, with BT07 Smokescreen GT, subsequent figures still didn't tend to have their full complement of weapons, and TFClub's Binaltech Arming sets, frankly, looked better anyway. They may not have looked strictly G1, but the chromed tips were a more than adequate callback to the original toys.
What really makes this model - for me - is the head sculpt. I've made no secret of the fact that I loathe the fudged, ugly character models from the G1 TV show and the Marvel comics, and that I'm baffled by Hasbro and Takara Tomy's apparent fixation on remaking figures for increased adherance to these lazy, inconsistent designs. That's why I think the first Binaltech figure's head sculpt is so good - it's a development of the head sculpt on the G1 toy, but made unique to this character, taking the chinstrap from the old character model (not present on the G1 toy, which had exactly the same head as Prowl and Bluestream, just in different colours), but making it look properly part of the head. The gold-painted crests feature little sculpted details of their own, and the central block extends beyond the back of the head. It all looks intentionally designed, versus the crass oversimplification of the more recent Masterpiece figure. The face looks a little chubby, I must admit, and is possibly not as robotic-looking as I'd have preferred but, again, it's a development of the G1 version, and works pretty well in context.
The big surprise - or perhaps not - is that Smokescreen's transformation is very much just a development of the Diaclone-derived Nissan/Datsun Fairladys of G1. The arms fold up under the bonnet in a slightly different configuration and the legs are rather more complicated, but much of the rest is the same. Possibly my favourite aspect is the way the floor of the cockpit collapses down and in to form the waist area, with the seatbacks folded down against the seat itself to give the body its traditional tapering from the chest in to the hips. Most of the process is fairly fluid overall, but there are three sticking points. The aforementioned legs are a bit of a pain to compress back into their vehicle mode configuration, not least because they're stuck behind and attached to the rear windscreen halves, which have to line up with the back of the car and the roof just so. There's also the way the arms have to be reconfigured, switching the magnetic connection for the steering bar from the inside of the shoulder joint to the outside before stowing the arms under the bonnet, simply because there's so little clearance around the joint. Possibly the most frustrating part, though, is the small hatch in the bonnet that allows the head to pass through, since it's hinged further forward than one might expect, and so tends to catch on the bonnet, popping out if not handled precisely. Aside from these quibbles, everything does come together nice and securely in each mode.
For an early 2000s TransFormer, Binaltech Smokescreen's articulation is actually surprisingly good. Granted he's lacking luxuries like bicep and thigh rotation joints, but he has 360° rotation at the shoulder (assuming you move the doors out of the way), and can swing his arms out and up a full 180°. He also has double-jointed elbows (thanks to transformation) allowing for more than 180° of bend, the wrists are ball joints, and the fingers are articulated at the base knuckle, the index finger being separate from the other three. The waist can technically rotate a full 360°, but is hindered by the design of the upper thighs, which clash with protruding parts from the lower torso section. The hips themselves are ball joints, the knees are double jointed (again, thanks to transformation) and the ankles offer a decent range, even though there's no sideways tilt. The chunky feet are serviced by a double-jointed toe section (the vehicle's rear bumper) and a hinged heel block so, while the range of movement isn't ideal, it's more than enough to keep him stable in a variety of dynamic poses.
Two versions of BT01 were released. Mine, as you'll have seen from the photos, is car number 8, driven in 2003 by Tommi Mäkinen with co-driver Kaj Lindström, whose names appear on the passenger windows on both sides of the vehicle. Car number 7 was also released, featuring the names of its driving team, Petter Solberg and Phil Mills, but it seems harder to find any images of that variant online. I can imagine this causing some aggravation to TransFormers completists, who would have felt compelled to own both, despite them representing the same character. Making matters worse, another version of Smokescreen was released as BT07 - with an updated paintjob as well as remolded front bumper, wheels, spoiler and roof - to reflect the 2004 rally Impreza. This one included an official shoulder-mounted rocket launcher accessory, but was also released as two variants - #1, driven by Solberg and #2 driven by Mikko Hirvonen. Possibly not the smartest move for Takara, launching a collector-oriented line with two variants of the same character, particularly as Smokescreen wasn't even one of the earliest G1 releases, and never really became a core character in the TV show or comics. There was only ever the one version of Alternators Smokescreen, based on the 2003 number 8 car.
Looking back on Binaltech from over 15 years after its debut, I still find it hard to understand why it had such a poor reputation. If ever I wanted a proper Generation 1 reboot, Binaltech was it - at least on the strength of the first handful of figures. Licensed scale model cars with fairly accurate interiors that nevertheless transform into recognisable, yet better articulated versions of the Diaclone-derived Autobots. Sure, none of them were perfect, the engineering on some of the later ones was a little iffy, quality control dipped a little toward the end of the line, and one has to be careful not to chip some of the paint in certain areas of some figures, but I'd say Smokescreen's design stands up well even today. Granted, it's been superseded in many ways by the Masterpiece Nissan variants, but I loathe the animation-style head sculpts, and Smokescreen's is particularly bad.
Interestingly, the Japanese story behind Binaltech continued on into Alternity, despite the very different aesthetic and scale... but it's said that there was initially some disagreement between Hasbro and Takara over the scale, so perhaps Alternity - which Hasbro never picked up - was closer to what Takara had originally intended for Binaltech...
Personally, I'm a huge fan of Binaltech, flaws and all, and bought all of them except yellow Tracks, Smokescreen GT, Prowl, Arcee, Corvette Ravage and Convoy (the last two I ended up buying as Alternators instead, the rest just didn't appeal), supplemented my collection with BT Asterisk Broadblast, Kiss Players Hot Rodimus and Alternators Sunstreaker, (Jaguar) Ravage, Rumble and Nemesis Prime, as well as picking up a handful of Alternators with the intention of customising them. The only one I completed was Skids, who I turned into Soundwave, but I also had a Silverstreak I wanted to turn into Metropolitan Police Prowl and a Decepticharge I'd intended to become Nightbeat (with the head switched over to the red variant of BT08 Meister, as Windcharger). Binaltech may not go down in the annals of TransFormers history as one of the best lines, but it certainly caught my attention and set me firmly back on the path of collecting, and I'm really looking forward to writing about more of them... Not sure yet whether I'll do them entirely in order, but that seems simplest and most likely.
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