Mr Bucket MR-02 Upgrade Set for UT R-01 Peru Kill

Something I didn't touch on in my write-up of Unique Toys' inaugural movie continuity figure, R-01 Peru Kill, was the omission of a couple of Lockdown's weapons. While his enormous 'head cannon' was basically his signature weapon in the movie, featuring even in the trailer with its own detailed on-screen transformation/reveal, he was also seen to wield a smaller, arm-mounted version at times, as well as the all-important Spark Extractor he used to off Ratchet when he was first introduced, in one of the early scenes of Age of Extinction.

It didn't really bother me at the time but, in retrospect, it seemed like a very strange omission... Surely it would have been better to release a more 'complete' movie Lockdown analogue, rather than chucking in the lacklustre 'Steeljaw' figure that I, for one, ended up just putting back in the box.

Mr Bucket evidently felt the same way because, at some point after Peru Kill's release, they put together this weapon set to correct these omissions. But do they live up to the quality of Unique Toys' figure?

Studio Series #11 Lockdown

It should be noted, first of all, that I did not dislike the Age of Extiction toyline's Lockdown toy. Prewarned that it was a bit rubbish, I bought it with suitably low expections and found it to be a competent toy with a fun transformation and a rather cool head-gun accessory... However, recognising that it was a poor representation of the character from the movie, I was quick to buy Unique Toys' Masterpiece-scale interpretation, Peru Kill, long before Studio Series Lockdown was announced.

So when the photos of Hasbro's entirely new take on the nonpartisan bounty hunter surfaced, I was impressed but, initially, not that interested... We all know how these things go, with my collecting habits, and I ended up ordering him almost as soon as he became available. How many Lockdowns does one collector need?

Unique Toys R-01 Peru Kill

Lockdown was an interesting addition to the fourth live action TransFormers movie, Age of Extinction, and potentially a clever addition to the franchise. Sadly, 'clever' is not a word that can be associated with the live action movies made thusfar under the auspices of Paramount and Michael Bay. In typical Hollywood fashion, he was killed off in the climactic battle of that movie, having very graphically killed off one of the Autobots from the first three movies right near the start (and several others off-screen, it's strongly implied).

There was a Deluxe class Lockdown released as part of Hasbro's mercifully brief Age of Extinction toyline, but it was one of the worst-received figures that year - short, blocky, weirdly-proportioned, and molded in entirely the wrong colours of plastic, about the only thing right about it was the way the face-cannon worked. Even so, and perhaps because I already had low expectations when I picked him up, I quite liked it. It wasn't perfect, but the transformation was reasonably clever, even if the results weren't quite right.

While Hasbro are due to release their Studio Series remake of AoE Lockdown pretty soon, Unique Toys have beaten them to the punch with a larger - essentially Masterpiece-scale - interpretation of this underutilised yet impressive character, under the baffling name of 'Peru Kill'.

Age of Extinction/Generations Lockdown

I'm not sure exactly when I became aware that Lockdown was a character in Age of Extinction, or that he was the robot whose head 'grows' a massive great face-cannon, but he was one of the few interesting elements of the movie. Neither Autobot nor Decepticon, Lockdown, much like his TransFormers Animated progenitor, is a freelance peacekeeping agent bounty hunter who, for reasons revealed only quite late in the film, has come to Earth and allied himself with a group of humans (echoing some aspects of Dark of the Moon).

While I'd originally intended to hold out for the Japanese version of this toy, despite the additional cost, I ended up buying the Hasbro US version in Forbidden Planet while on an evening out with my girlfriend, simply because I'd heard it was terrible enough that even the import version wasn't going to be any good, and this one was convenient... Plus, by the looks of things, Lockdown and other later-wave figures may not appear in UK Toys'R'Us stores...

TransFormers Animated Lockdown

Technically, the TransFormers line is no stranger to bounty hunters... After all, back in the days of the Marvel comics, a certain... ahem... 'Freelance Peacekeeping Agent' turned up almost regularly, hunting a key character from either faction. Animated had its detractors, but at least it's bounty hunter was a robot in disguise, rather than a large, horned metal monster with questionable taste in accessories. OK, Death's Head was a pretty cool character... but he didn't augment himself with 'trophies' taken from his quarries... and he wasn't voiced by Lance Henriksen. Lockdown is just plain chilling.