Dima Core/Mechanical Skull Studio DC-01 Antagoness Upgrade Kit Evolution

Femme-Bot Friday #91

Technically, this probably should have been supplemental for FBF #90, but I'm feeling somewhat generous, given the significant changes wrought by this upgrade kit. Legacy's version of Inferno/Antagony was a huge disappointment and, while I would never have expected Hasbro to alter the mold to make it more feminine, Dima Core/Mechanical Skull Studio clearly felt that some improvements were required.

How much of an improvement this actually is - considering applying the kit makes the figure untransformable - is very much subjective... So, let's take a closer look.

Eighteenth Anniversary

Is being around for eighteen years as much of a milestone for Blogs as it supposedly is for people?

If so, this anniversary is certainly going to be a disappointing one. With Hasbro fully embracing the AI bubble and shedding more staff every so often, it's hard to find anything truly positive to say about them. The TransFormers brand is in a sorry state, with Age of the Primes limping on and set to be followed by another equally dull toyline that does precious little new.

On the upside, I've had far more important things to spend money on this last year or so. Courtney and I had a short holiday in Eastbourne for my birthday last year and then, just before the 2025 Anniversary, we took a trip to Iceland. This year, everything is rather closer to home. I bought my flat in July of the same year I started this blog and, due to a leaky roof, had to put off some of the renovations it needed. I've finally been able to replace the ceilings - some of which were seriously water-damaged - and, as of this very day, my complete bathroom refit will be underway. On top of that, having replaced my windows and front door last year, I'm having to replace the door already, following a fire safety assessment, which determined that the front doors of all the flats are not compliant. I'd say "it never rains, but it pours," but that would be rather too close to the bone, even though the roof has been secure and leak-free as of the spring/summer of 2024.

As a result of all this domestic work, both elective and necessary, I've bought just four 'proper' transforming figures since September of last year... I'd like to say they were all bangers, but one of them broke after I started customising it.

To bulk the list up, I'm going to cheat a little, and add a transforming toy that I bought for Courtney, which was delivered on 21st September 2025... and which will likely mark one of a few little changes this blog will require going forward, as I step away from collecting Hasbro's utter garbage output.

So... Away we go:

The dishonourable mention is obvious:

Retro G1 Brawn
I'm not a fan of any Brawn toy based on the animation model, and only reluctantly bought the
Titans Return toy, years ago. This is essentially a repaint of the Studio Series '86 figure with a
toy-accurate head sculpt and, while it may seem counterintuitive to prefer the original toy's bland
head, I maintain that it's leagues better than the hideous humanoid face applied to the animation
model and almost every toy since the original. It's a shame that the arms crumbled when I applied
some chrome paint, but I have to admit it's a pretty mediocre toy regardless.

And now, onto the good stuff... In which the Third Party contingent is very much dominant...

4. 52Toys BeastDrive BD-16 Fickle Step
Bought this for Courtney (kind of) but ended up building the kit myself. It's hugely fun, vehicle
mode is cool, and robo-kitty mode is absolutely adorable... As is the tiny cat figurine who acts
as its 'driver'. There's a good chance I'll pick up the other figures based on the BD-16 structure...
though, for some reason, 52Toys have elected to sell the body kits separately from
the inner robot structure.

3. Metal Cardbot W Tachy
While I've not been overly impressed by most of the Metal Cardbot figures I've seen reviewed
on YouTube, Tachy caught my attention, not just because it's a Femme-Bot, but because it's a
remarkably interesting figure, generally and very well-built. It comes across as an alternate
universe version of Cheetor, where he's a Femme-Bot who transforms into a car.

2. SXS R-04 Hot Flame
I figure if I'm going to be a Femme-Bot fan, I should at least entertain the possibility of acquiring
any 'sexualised' male-coded 'bots that might exist... And SXS's take on IDW Rodimus - as a
full-on Himbo - is easily the best place to start. While the version created by Mastermind Creations
is no doubt the more sturdy figure, it's also rather bland and flat, while this one nails the narrow
waist and protruding robo-pecs. A very cool figure, overall.

1. Classics/Masterpiece Starscream
Back when MP Starscream first appeared, I was content with the Takara Tomy figure and,
frankly, a little snobby about Hasbro's version in G1 toy colours. In the twenty years (!)
since it first went on sale, my opinion has changed a little. I put it down to MP-11 and MP-52
becoming increasingly slavish in their adherence to the G1 animation model and colourscheme,
so this figure, with its stark white plastic given a weathering treatment, is a relic of a bygone time
when Masterpiece could borrow from G1 without compromising the nigh-perfect F-15 jet alt mode.

The inclusion of one of 52Toys figures kind of opens the door for me to include more of their output on the TransForm-A-Blog... I've acquired three BeastBox figures so far and, in all likelihood, I'll be buying more in future. While I was initially put off by the fact that they literally just turn into boxes - something I am vociferously against in TransFormers toys - the engineering is truly marvellous. A puzzlebox that turns into a robotic creature is infinitely more interesting than a humanoid robot that folds into a box which may or may not have wings attached... and, yes, I'm looking at you, Siege Seekers and Soundwave.

So, disillusioned though I may now be with the TransFormers brand - with the exception of things like Takara Tomy's Overgear project and the Masterpiece Movie line - it seems there should be no shortage of transforming robot toys for me to examine in future. Between Metal Carbot, BeastBox/BeastDrive and the healthy Third Party scene, this blog may well slow down considerably, but it ain't going anywhere anytime soon.

As I write, I have just six more drafts to complete - most of them being Femme-Bot Fridays. The last one published - my write up of MPM Brawl - took almost a year and a half to finish, such is my sense of ennui about the TransFormers brand. I mean, granted, I haven't bought much in the last year... but it really says something that my biggest highlight of the year is a figure that was released 20 years ago - two years before I even launched this blog!

Perhaps opening this blog up to other brands of transforming robot toys, beyond the Third Party TransFormers-analogues, will help revitalise me in the coming months and years.

Energon Tow-Line

The strange thing about my ongoing sense of ennui about current TransFormers toys is that, for the most part, it has failed to cause me to seek nostalgia in the older toys I have yet to write about. I already have folders full of photos - some of which more than ten years old, and from when I was still growing my collection after moving into my flat - but I still lack the impetus to drag them out and post them. Admittedly, many of these photos were taken with a much older camera, with a much lower resolution and, in some previous cases, I've taken the opportunity to take new photos...

But I don't feel that way inclined about every toy in my collection so, in an effort to just churn through what I've got - particularly as I've been donating batches of my collection to Toy-Fu this year - there are some figures I'm just going to use the existing photos for... Tow-Line is one of them.

Is that because he's not a great figure? Read on, and find out...

Masterpiece Movie Series MPM-15 Brawl

Given the number of Third Party Masterpiece-analogues I own, I have been fairly slow in getting into the official Movie Masterpiece line, largely because they've become so expensive since Barricade, Jazz and VW Bumblebee. Their size and requirement for shelf space has obviously played a role as well, given the limited space now available in my home but, in several cases, I've divested myself of older toys of a specific character to make space, because the Studio Series versions were better representations of the movie CGI, made to a more appropriate size, with vastly improved engineering and articulation.

Brawl, however, was one that I owned the Leader class toy from the original movie's toyline, and had been sufficiently pleased with it that the Voyager class Studio Series toy was surplus to my requirements. However, when the improved oversized KOs came out, I reconsidered and sold the Leader class toy to make space in my collection for a more accurate replacement (or tried to, at least: the courier lost it en route to its new owner, so I had to refund the buyer and then neither of us had the toy!). It was never an urgent purchase, though, particularly while I was only working intermittently as a freelancer, and the more I looked at the SS mold, and its oversized KOs, the more shortcomings I saw. In the end, it wasn't till last year - having started a new job - that I decided to shell out for the Masterpiece instead... and, even then, I only bought it because it had been discounted by about a third of the original UK RRP.

Given the lacklustre presentation of MPM Bonecrusher, my expectations for this figure were somewhat lower than they could have been for a Masterpiece figure. So, let's find out how this compares to the existing Masterpieces in my collection.

Generations Selects Legacy: Evolution Antagony

Femme-Bot Friday #90

These days, even now I'm back in full-time work, impulse buys of TransFormers toys are few and far between, because my abiding impression is that overall quality has dropped substantially versus toys from a few years ago. Where a new figure is a remake of an earlier Generations toy - especially something like the Kingdom Waspinator mold feeling like a cheap knockoff of the 30th Anniversary toy - I'm even less inclined to pick up the newer version.

However, Legacy Inferno was the first new toy of the Beast Wars character since the 1997 original, which I've never owned, and Antagony was a BotCon 1998 exclusive repaint as a Femme-Bot, which I've also never owned... The new toy appeared to be such a hopeless simplification of the original, losing most of its impressive features, so Inferno was among the majority of Legacy toys that I skipped.

And yet... when I happened upon Generations Selects Legacy: Evolution Antagony - ostensibly a limited edition repaint by Hasbro themselves - at a branch of Game inside a Sports Direct in Eastbourne, that old impulse arose. Could this be another case of buyer's remorse? Let's take a look...

Yolopark AMK Series TransFormers One Elita-1 (Cogged Bot Mode)

Femme-Bot Friday #89

I'm honestly still not sure what I think of TransFormers One. While it was great to have a fully CG animated movie - and one that looked fantastic, at that - if felt more like a series of loosely-connected set-pieces than a coherent, considered - or even valuable - addition to existing TransFormers lore. I'm not a great fan of origin stories at the best of times, but the problem with creating one for the cinematic TransFormers oeuvre is that the general public will inevitably ask "but how does this connect to Bayverse?" and, no matter how one tries to convince them it's a new, wholly separate continuity, that's too much for the general public to grasp, given the cultural impact - for better or worse - of the Bayverse series movies. After all, each attempt to reboot the franchise since the diminishing returns of those five movies has met with failure - including TransFormers One.

On top of that, I've always been dubious of the concept of the T-Cog - the singular component that grants a Cybertronian their capacity to transform - because it simply makes no sense. How would a race evolve with such a huge aspect of their 'biology' reliant on a single 'organ', the removal of which poses no significant problem for their function? And why should the reintroduction of a T-Cog to their living anatomy - particularly a T-Cog from another Cybertronian, as presented in this movie - trigger an instant increase in physical size, rather than simply unlock the ability to transform that must surely have been already built-in?

All of which is, let's face it, entirely beside the point for a write-up of a non-transforming 'model kit' based on one of the movie's characters, so perhaps I should leave further discussion till I (can be bothered to) get round to writing up my full, unfiltered thoughts about the movie... Perhaps after I inflict it on Courtney give it a second watch. Instead, for now, let's focus on the supreme irony that is a non-transforming figure of the transforming, upgraded form of Elita-1.

Classics/Masterpiece Starscream

Back when I wrote about Takara's MP03 Starscream, a whole fifteen years ago, I said I'd gladly acquire every iteration of this mold if I had the money and the space. While space is still something of an issue (I am in the process of thinning down my collection, but it's a slow process due to real life concerns), I happened to find this guy on eBay for a surprisingly reasonable price... When I later received a discounted offer from the seller, I just had to buy... Especially as I'd been having a rather trying time at home (due to redecoration work) and in the office, while Courtney was away travelling across Europe, and basically needed something cool to cheer me up.

Since MP03 emerged, I have to confess I've had a love/hate relationship with this iteration. Part of me feels the whole G1 colourscheme does the mold a disservice... but part of me thinks the mold transcends the ridiculously bright paint job, resulting in a truer interpretation of G1 Starscream.

So, let's take another look at this now 20-year-old mold, and see how it stands up to scrutiny in the year that is the 40th Anniversary of the original animated movie...

Flame Toys FuRaiModel Kit Arcee

(Femme-Bot Friday #88)

So, after enjoying the Windblade kit, it was a foregone conclusion that I'd want the Arcee kit as well. This model kit seemed to take a while to arrive - first revealed back in 2022, it wasn't available (in the UK, via my usual channels) till late 2023, at which point I snapped her up and, unlike with Windblade, started building her soon after she arrived... and, instead, this draft has been sitting around waiting for me to complete it for more than two years now.

Just like Windblade, Flame Toys' second Femme-Bot kit met with a mixed reception but, Arcee being dearer to the hearts of fans of a certain age, it was perhaps even more vitriolic. It's a strange thing to observe, frankly, that the 'mom/babysitter' character from the 1986 animated movie - who was clearly designed with the male gaze in mind - is somehow not 'allowed' to be sleek and feminine, even though Hasbro's most recent versions of her have been precisely that, just with an entire car shell stuck on her back.

As I've said before, the very idea of non-transforming TransFormers is anathema to me, but it's been apparent for some time that Hasbro themselves - and even Takara Tomy, to a degree - are incapable of designing good Femme-Bot figures, and it's really been up to the Third Parties to innovate. And, while this isn't a Hasbro or Takara Tomy product, it is officially licensed... and, because I really enjoy model kits, they've become an exception... as future Femme-Bot Fridays may continue to demonstrate.

For the moment, though, let's take a look at this new interpretation of Arcee, to see how she compares to other depictions of the character.

Unexpected Challenges

Back in March, my girlfriend took the opportunity to go travelling around Europe. Over the last year or so, she'd had two complicated bereavements within the space of just two months, a toxic situation had developed at work at much the same time and, all the while, she was working on her Masters degree in Space Science and Technology. When she received her results (pass with distinction) she handed in her notice and started planning in earnest a trip she'd fully expected to have to put off till she retired.

This presented a useful opportunity for me to get some work done on our flat, since I'd only have to worry about my own (in)convenience. I've needed to get the ceilings redone ever since the roof got fixed about two years ago, so that was the main job I wanted to get done. Courtney and I had also discussed redecorating the bedroom, so I was even able to tag the redecoration onto the end of the ceilings refit, once I had her preference for paint colour.

But what has this to do with TransFormers, you ask? Why is this momentous enough to warrant a blog post?

Well, because I ended up transforming a bunch of my figures into vehicle mode for the sake of portability (also to pass the time while work was going on in another room), and completely empty an Ikea 'Detolf' cabinet so it could be moved without the contents falling over (or out).

And the figures in this cabinet were largely Masterpiece and 3P MP-analogues, with a couple of exclusives.

So, while work progressed in the lounge, I had the cabinet temporarily in the bedroom, with its contents spread out on the bed and, in every case, the instructions stashed away in the boxes which were, naturally, inaccessible... Some of the figures were notoriously breakable, or had complicated or fussy transformations, while others were simplicity itself... Here's a quick breakdown:

Retro G1 Brawn

After struggling through my write-up to Retro G1 Gears toward the end of last year, I intended to fast-track this one, to get it out of the way and - with any luck - prevent any ruminating. Thing being, Brawn was always one of my favourites, partly because of the early Marvel UK strip, The Enemy Within, in which he basically gets a blow to the head and goes nuts, then has to prove his loyalty in a battle to the death with Starscream, who's on Megatron's naughty list due to his scheming. The fact that his G1 toy was, let's face it, a little on the goofy side - lanky, with short arms featuring tool-like claws rather than hands, and little 'wings' on his shoulders - just added to his appeal.

The one glimmer of hope I've had for my continued collection of Hasbro's output was kicked off by the last two War for Cybertron chapters, Earthrise and Kingdom, which brought back some of the original, first year Mini Autobots in Deluxe class form. It hasn't all been great - Cliffjumper was a partsformer, and Huffer had the animation-style head - but the most recent bone Hasbro have thrown their GenX audience has been the Retro G1 line as an alternative (and presumably the eventual Retro G1 Huffer will use the toy-accurate sculpt which made its debut as the Go-Bot Road Ranger in a Generations Selects 2-pack).

Their failure to create a new toy-accurate head for Bumblebee meant I had no reason to acquire that one, but Gears got a decent update to the G1 toy's head sculpt, though the toy as a whole was somewhat disappointing (leading Courtney to name him "Gears Starmer"). I've been keeping my eye out for new Retro G1 releases since then, and the second pair came out in the late Autumn/early Winter of 2025, coupling Brawn with... Seaspray, a wholly new take on a figure from 1985, just as we're getting a new Deluxe class Windcharger, the last of the 1984 Mini Autobot set, as part of Studio Series '86.

Brawn is, for better or worse, a retooling of the Studio Series '86 toy which, despite being leagues better than the Titans Return toy, didn't interest me in the slightest due to it having another ugly, animation-style head sculpt. Once again, the question here is whether or not the new, toy-inspired head sculpt is enough of an improvement on this mold... so, let's find out.

Unique Toys R-09 Red Destroyer

The moment I learned that Unique Toys were planning to develop Stinger for their line of Masterpiece-analogues, my curiosity was piqued. After all, this was a nonentity who dissolved into a flying cloud of metal cubes rather than transforming. When the first grey prototype images appeared, I was instantly hooked. My experience with Unique Toys products thusfar has been uniformly positive: their engineering has always been clever without being overly complex and their QC has yet to disappoint. However, in terms of screen-accuracy, particularly on their head sculpts, they've never been 100% on the mark, which resulted in some of their more recent figures later being 'fixed' by cheaper knockoffs.

Their strategy for this figure was to cut down on paint applications to reduce the retail price as far as they could, in the hope that people would buy the original rather than wait for a KO, and they teased the release of a Camaro Bumblebee with much the same robot mode as additional motivation - the suggestion being that the reception of Red Destroyer will determine whether the yellow Camaro goes into production. Their paintwork has almost always been considered lacking by fans and, coupled with the eyewatering prices of some figures and inaccuracies in their sculpts, they've given the KO merchants ample room to make improvements in the past. Dialling things back even further seems like the worst decision to me. As it turned out, they revealed images of the Camaro remix within a month of Red Destroyer shipping.

But let's see how Red Destroyer stands as his own product, before anyone has the opportunity to reverse engineer it and produce a cheaper option.