War for Cybertron: Kingdom Airazor

 (Femme-Bot Friday #77)

It's beginning to look as though there will be very little of interest to me in the final chapter of Hasbro's War for Cybertron line beyond a handful of its Beast Wars remakes. Even those have generally been undersized remakes and, for better or worse, minus many of the play features of the originals. The one area of the toyline where the results have exceeded my expectations is its Femme-Bots, with Blackarachnia being both an early release and a (small) Deluxe class reworking of the Masterpiece figure that ended up being, if not generally better, then at least better value for money.

So, when Airazor was revealed, and looked pretty fantastic, she went straight to the top of my want list. Considering I only acquired the original Beast Wars version comparatively recently (six or seven years ago, I think) and, broadly speaking, still think it's a pretty good toy (even if it's not remotely 'screen accurate'), my main reasons for wanting this are the improved articulation demonstrated by other War for Cybertron toys and a head sculpt more in line with her on-screen appearance.

 

It also came into stock on Hasbro Pulse UK ahead of its arrival in other UK outlets (and we can't all be YouTubers, graced by Zavvi's largesse) so that gave me an excuse to sign up.

However, all of the Kingdom toys I've picked up have come with several significant caveats, so let's find out if Airazor swoops to conquer what I've come to regard as the 'Kingdom Curse'.

Beast Wars Metals Airrazor

(Femme-Bot Friday #38)

Yes, you read that correctly - I had to double-check the box, instructions and bio card to be certain but, for no obvious reason, Beast Wars Metals Airrazor has a double-R in her name. For the sake of simplicity (and because I'm more used to typing a single R in her name) I'm going to call her Airazor throughout. That's not the strangest thing about the BWM version of one of my all-time favourite femme-bots, though. The strangest part is that, since she and Tigatron were imprisoned by the Vok at the point when the quantum surge hit, she never had a TransMetals form in the TV show, though she did in an incomplete 3H Productions comic.

I've seen plenty of photos of this figure over the years and it never really lit my candle in any way, shape or form, despite my fondness for the character, because the vast majority of TransMetals toys seemed to be a bit on the rubbish side, and the fact that she was repurposed into Armada - largely a junkpile of poorly-designed toys - kept her off my radar.

...Buuuut... Times change, I started this Femme-Bot Friday feature, and I figured it'd be worth picking up the first ever TransFormers mold that was designed to be a canonical femme-bot (the original BW Airazor wasn't designed to be any specific gender, and the original Blackarachnia doesn't count as she's just a repaint of Tarantulas). I picked up the Japanese version largely because it was available fairly cheaply on eBay, but I've since realised there are some significant differences to the US/European version, so I'm very glad I chose this one over the Hasbro version.

TransFormers Collectors' Club BotCon 2016 Combiner Wars Airazor

(Femme-Bot Friday #36)

While the Club (and BotCon specifically) isn't averse to retreading old ground and presenting alternate continuity versions of the same character, it's rarer for them to present a BotCon version of a character they've previously done as a Club premium exclusive.

And yet, BotCon 2016 seems, to some degree, to have brought us full circle with the Club's/BotCon's output, harking back to the appearance of the Tripredacus Council in the very first BotCon comic, Descent into Evil, updated as a Combiner Wars gestalt. There were other references both to Beast Wars and BotCon 2006's awesome Beast Wars prequel Dawn of Future's Past, too, with attendee exclusives including a version of TransMetals 2 Megatron made from RiD/Car Robots Mega-/Galvatron, Terrorsaur from CW Air Raid, CW versions of  BW Tripredacus Agent Ravage, a second pre-Beast Wars Tigatron and even a CW version of a character who'd previously only been a Happy Meal toy.

The one that caught my eye, though, was BotCon's do-over of the reason I joined the Club back in 2007. Daring, perhaps... but was it foolish for them to take a mulligan on what is still one of my favourites?

Beast Wars Airazor

(Femme-Bot Friday #2)

After Arcee in the 1986 animate movie, the TransFormers franchise suffered something of a dearth of Femme-Bots until Beast Wars, when suddenly we had two in one continuity (though admittedly Airazor was... shall we say 'gender-fluid' in the Japanese version, appearing as both male and female across the various sub-continuities). Airazor was one of my favourite characters in the TV series, being a strong female character who developed an understated romance with Tigatron. Blackarachnia was cool and all, but rather more of a Femme Fatale stereotype.

Since, as I've mentioned, I was rather late to the game with Beast Wars, finding some of the toys became an epic quest and, for absolutely ages, Airazor was ridiculously expensive for what would amount to a Scout class figure these days. Aside from the recent Generations reboots, I suspect Airazor was one of my final Beast Wars purchases... So was she worth the wait?

TransFormers Collectors' Club 2007 Exclusive (Timelines) Airazor

I'll be perfectly frank here - there was one reason that I joined the TransFormers Collectors' Club, and that reason is this model. The moment I saw it, I thought it was awesome. It takes one of the quirkier molds from the Energon line and turns it, quite successfully, into one of the coolest characters from Beast Wars.

Slugslinger may not have been the obvious choice for this accompaniment to the Dawn of Futures Past BotCon set (made, as it was, largely from Galaxy Force/Cybertron models), but it was one of my favourites... surely this is ideal stuff for an exclusive?