So, Hasbro have chosen to pre-empt their own online PulseCon event - running Friday 22nd to Saturday 23rd October - by revealing a couple of toys from the upcoming TransFormers Legacy toyline: new versions of Skids (from G1) and Bulkhead (from TF Prime). It's a bold move... but also means they can get a feel for the fan reaction without their own servers being bombarded.
Call me a cynic, but I think that might be the main reason... Because, if these two toys are representative of what TransFormers Legacy is going to be, Hasbro have pretty much lost me as a customer.
Let's break it down:
According to the article on IGN.com (most likely quoting from Hasbro's promotional material) the Legacy line 'is a merging of different "fan-favorite" Transformers characters representing the entire scope of the Transformers multiverse, each with "deco inspired by their universe."'
Except that's not what I see... Or it is, but the description is disingenuous and misleading.
Skids almost looks good, with his vehicle mode most closely resembling Marvel Comics' misinterpretation of the Honda City Turbo as a people carrier. The front end is boxy and angular, with the downward-sloping bonnet so, while it's not quite to my tastes, I can kind of see what they were aiming for. Vehicle mode's paintwork looks... acceptable. The characteristic red stripe is there... or most of it, anyway.
Unfortunately, robot mode is pretty much a travesty. In what appears to be an attempt to emulate the G1 toy's transformation, the lower legs are a hollow mess, in which the knee becomes a transformation joint comprising a large chunk of the car's roof and rear window. The shin is a flap of plastic, and the inner faces of both the lower leg and the thigh are entirely hollow. The torso looks to be as hollow as Binaltech/Alternators Hound (or Skids, to be fair), and the wheels on his shoulders are those weird 'split' wheels, where the only part that spins is a sort of outer shell only seen in vehicle mode, while the inner face is sculpted detail that forms part of the shoulder joint. The head folds out from under the bonnet in a style more closely resembling G1 Prowl/Bluestreak/Smokescreen than Skids, even down to him ending up with a panel of bonnet stuck to the back of his head. In almost every respect, the original G1 toy looks superior, even today. The only advantage this thing has is its improved articulation. His weapons have been neutered (as has become the norm) and one of his guns has been switched for some sort of translucent plastic 'Energon axe' that looks as though it may end up being combinable with similarly translucent weapons packaged with other toys in the line. This seems to be corroborated by information that has come out since:
"You can harness the power of Energon, with all-new Energon-infused weapon accessories that come with figures across the line."
That being the case, that's one (small) point in Legacy's favour: I do like modular weapons. I liked them in in the Energon/Superlink line, I liked them in the TF Prime/Arms Micron line... but these don't look as interesting, and why package Skids with an axe? Other than that, I'm more than content to stick with Generations Skids from 2014.
Addendum 22/10/21: What's really sad about Skids is that the design by Robby Musso looks great... but the finished toy design has been squared off and simplified. I'd have to assume that the Deluxe class budget is part of the problem, but why the front end on the toy is rectangular when the design is hexagonal is a real mystery.
Bulkhead almost looks like a joke, though. Hasbro's laughable 'Robots in Disguise'/Powerisers version of TF Prime Bulkhead was so poorly executed I ended up importing the First Edition version, and when fans started theorising that Legacy would be a continuation of Generations' rare gifts of new spins on non-G1 characters (such as TF Animated Lugnut and IDW Stealth Bomber Megatron), I was hoping Hasbro might take a second run at some of the TransFormers Prime characters whose mainline toys weren't that great. Y'know, take the opportunity to remake them in a new style, making use of all the engineering improvements they've made in the intervening years.
This interpretation of Bulkhead is categorically not that.
This interpretation of Bulkhead is a piece of crap.
Its engineering is so out of date, it looks more like a figure from the pound shop staple M.A.R.S. Converters line than a genuine TransFormers toy. The entire cab of his vehicle mode remains unchanged in robot mode, becoming a giant, ugly, disproportionate box of a torso, wider than it is tall. In some respects, admittedly, it's just like G1 Inferno and Grapple - or, perhaps more appropriately, War for Cybertron Inferno and Grapple... But the end result with Legacy Bulkhead is far, far less elegant than either of those, because its limbs are even more bland and boxy. It's simplistic, lowest common denominator engineering is borrowed from the 2009 Marvel Crossovers line, and delivers a boring, lanky mess of a robot that doesn't suit the image or character of Bulkhead.
I know Hasbro are reluctant to make 'fat' robots - just look how they've handled the likes of Hound and Leadfoot in just about every size class across the myriad movie lines - but the only times they've got Bulkhead even close to right were the TransFormers Animated versions and the TF Prime First Edition... And both of those had the appearance of being 'fat' without actually being 'fat'. On the downside, in both cases, the toys' legs were longer than the animation models suggested but, as a whole, both toys looked right. This lanky, squared-off thing does not look like Bulkhead, whatever head gets lumped on top of it. When 'reimagining' a character as distinctive as Bulkhead - be it the Animated or Prime variety - removing just about every physical characteristic that first defined him is a really bad idea, and makes for a bland toy. The only connections he has with either of his forebears are the colourscheme, the head sculpt (very Prime) and the wrecking ball weapon. It's not simply that it's G1-styled or Generations-styled, it's simplistic and ugly in ways that just shouldn't be possible in a post-TransFormers Prime and post-Live Action Movies toyline.
If anything, Legacy Bulkhead looks like a knockoff Optimus Prime, and many fans are already theorising that it's a 'premold' of another character.
Bottom line: Generations did it better, and to call these "Generations-style" designs is an insult to all the designers and engineers who worked wonders with the toyline for its 30th Anniversary.
On the upside, Hasbro appears to be continuing its most recently-developed tradition of saving me an awful lot of money and shelf space by releasing rubbish.
What's more, the 'leaked' list of product numbers suggests there's not going to be a lot that I would have been interested in, even if these first reveals were remotely appealing. Core class is irrelevant to me, the Deluxes are a jumble (three out of five Stunticons? Are they planning to do combiners again?! And do they really think they can do better than FansProject's take on the Stunticons?), while the Voyagers and above might have been vaguely interesting had the engineering on show with Skids and Bulkhead been so poor.
I'll probably tune in to some of PulseCon, but my enthusiasm for it has taken a nosedive, so I may just catch it on YouTube after the 'event', once I've gauged how bad it was from the online chatter.
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