Revenge of the Fallen Ransack

It's often said that aircraft don't make for good vehicle modes for TransFormers toys... and with evidence running from G1 Silverbolt to the very latest incarnation of that same character in the Age of the Primes toyline, and even the Masterpiece version of movie Starscream, it's hard to deny. However, there have been rare treats, such as Generations/Reveal the Shield Lugnut, and Third Party companies have worked wonders with movieverse designs, let alone their own unique creations.

So, where goes Ransack fall on this spectrum of achievements? Buckle up, flybots... we're in for a wild ride!

Superlink Shadowhawk Cosmo Type

If there's one thing that can be said in favour of Energon/Superlink, it's that it did things very differently from both Armada/Micron Legend, which it followed, and Cybertron/Galaxy Force, which it preceded, albeit with mixed success. A lot of the larger figures were slightly higher-tech looking, but still much the same level of intricacy as the former, while the smaller size classes included an imaginative range of robots and alternate modes, some of which ended up getting reused in the earliest movie toylines.

One of the oddities of the line was that Takara released a few variants that appeared even in the US version of the TV show, but weren't picked up by Hasbro for release in the Western markets. One such figure was the blue repaint of Shadowhawk/Divebomb, and the somewhat limited nature of its release put the so-called 'Cosmo Type' on my radar.

Universe 'War of the Waves' Air Raid vs. Storm Surge

Hot on the heels of Energon Skyblast, we have a carded pair of vaguely movie-related Unicron Trilogy repaints, one of which is a Skyblast repaint!

War of the Waves was apparently a Black Friday exclusive at Walmart in the US, which would most likely have made it an Asda exclusive here... But I've never been a regular patron of Asda, and didn't exactly scour their toy shelves at the best of times. If it didn't come from Toys'R'Us, it was more likely acquired at Sainsbury's or Tesco, neither of which have consistently stocked any US store exclusives. In fact, the only one I remember even seeing in any supermarket was the Walmart exclusive racing repaint of Sidearm Sideswipe, which was a Sainsbury's exclusive over here.

I'd also assumed, based on the 'digital camouflage' paint job on Air Raid and the Sector 7 insignias stamped onto both toys, that this was a movie-related two-pack, but the instruction leaflet - shared between both figures in the pack - clearly labels it as being part of the Universe line... which both was and wasn't an extension of the movie line...

So, let's take a look at this curious, cross-generational two-pack.

Energon Skyblast

Here we have another of those instances where I genuinely don't recall when, where or indeed why I bought a figure. Aside from Arcee, none of the smaller Energon/Superlink figures were of a great deal of interest to me, at least until the Collectors' club re-used them either for BotCon or Club store exclusives, and even most of those weren't actually compelling enough to buy once I'd got my hands on a more readily-available version of the mold.

This one, perhaps, had the dubious benefit of being a fairly blatant G1 Jetfire homage, as well as seeming to complement the Energon version of Jetfire. But is a colourscheme that's as nostalgic as it is complementary to a contemporary enough to make a toy interesting in and of itself?

TransFormers (Movie) Strongarm (Target Exclusive)

Based on an Energon/Superlink Omnicon mold which I declined to purchase when it first emerged, something about movie Strongarm nevertheless tickled my fancy, because I can remember having to return the copy I originally bought to the Harrow branch of Woolworths for a replacement, because parts of it had become glued together during its construction. Whether this means it was a Woolies exclusive in the UK, I can't say...

I can also remember being somewhat interested in the BotCon 2005 'Descent into Evil' repaint as Outback (named Fallback in that set for legal reasons), but have never felt like paying the secondary market prices for it... It's possible I bought this to see if it would be worth trying to acquire Fallback, or it may simply have been a substitute.

Either way, this is the first - and, so far, only - iteration of this mold I own, so let's have a look...

Cybertron Shortround

Up until recently, when one thought of TransFormers hovercraft, there was pretty much only Seaspray. The Cybertron toyline forever changed the seascape by introducing a whole new character - Shortround - with a hovercraft vehicle mode, a geeky personality and (apparently) a dangerous (to himself) obsession with Chromia (aka Thunderblast).

There's probably a very good reason that seafaring TransFormers are a rarity. Even if one assumes Cybertron has no oceans of any kind, the very nature of its sentient robotic life is inclined toward adapting to its environment, and lack of exposure does not automatically preclude the ability to acclimatise. That said, I just don't feel that the open ocean on Earth presents as many opportunities for TransFormers stories as the land... I mean, even in the G1 TV show, the Decepticons gave up on attacking oil rigs after a single battle with the Autobots, despite the fact that the Autobots were largely unable to fly after the pilot episode, let alone travel over or through water.

TransFormers (Movie) Hardtop (Target Exclusive)

There are times when I really don't understand Hasbro. Their strategy with the TransFormers brand generally seems pretty haphazard, their strategy with specific toylines often seems not to be fully thought through... but their strategy for store exclusives can be utterly baffling. The only consistent thing is their inconsistency.

When the first TransFormers live action movie came out, the new toys featured novel and impressive engineering, the likes of which had genuinely never been seen before. It may not have been perfectly accurate to the on-screen CGI, but the movie toylines were the first step in a quantum leap in toy engineering than continued over the next few years.

And yet, for a set of Target Exclusive, movie branded Scout class figures, Hasbro mined their back catalogue for repaints. The selection was, somehow, very Energon-centric despite the clear disparity in aesthetic. Then again, the other line selected was Cybertron, which generally wasn't much better. Hardtop - a repaint of the Cybertron figure of the same name - turned out to be the best match, at least as far as his vehicle mode was concerned, since it's not a million miles away from Landmine.

TransFormers Collectors' Club BotCon 2006 (Timelines) Buzzsaw & Laserbeak

The pattern with me and TransFormers toys appears at times to be "the weirder, the better". The Beast Wars figures I picked up tended to be rather strange (Lio Convoy, Mach Kick, Longrack, Break, etc.) and I often appreciate a robot mode more the further it is from standard human proportions.

That said, the Superlink/Energon Shadowhawk/Divebomb mold really ticked my fancy because it managed to do both its avian beast mode and its robot mode in a convincing, innovative way, without wasting the bird's wings as the robot's backpack the way so many other avian TransFormers have.

BotCon 2006's Dawn of Futures Past boxed set was one of the things that got me into the idea of joining the Collectors' Club and possibly, eventually venturing across the pond to a BotCon. While the boxed set was awesome in and of itself, I did also covet a couple of the attendee-exclusive souvenir packs. Since I wrote about the boxed set and one of the attendee figures, Tigatron, almost nine years ago and I still haven't found an affordable Megatron/Waspinator (the former appearing every so often for something in excess of a thousand pounds, while the latter has recently turned up on eBay for over £500), I figure it's about time I wrote about the other bagged pair I currently own...

Cybertron Hardtop

Hasbro's Cybertron line wasn't just their take on Takara Tomy's Galaxy Force toyline - it actually included a handful of figures that didn't appear in the TV show or the Japanese toyline.

Quite what the rationale was for this, I'm not sure anyone knows - it's not as if there was any shortage of Galaxy Force toys to repaint if Hasbro wanted new characters. It's entirely possible Hasbro's designers had simply been working away in the background, and needed a toyline - any toyline - to release their work into, and Galaxy Force/Cybertron was the best available option.

One such figure was Hardtop, who doesn't seem like a particularly good fit...

Cybertron Brakedown GTS

I noted in my writeup of Galaxy Force Autolander that he seemed to be a homage to Kup in his overall appearance, but that it took a repaint to make it more apparent... and here is that repaint!

 

I'm not sure I ever understood what the whole 'GTS' suffix thing was about (outside of allowing Hasbro to release repaints that weren't even new characters) but it certainly brought with it some interesting reuses of a variety of molds... at least some of which were better than the original.

But is Brakedown one of them..?

 

Cybertron Ransack

While the majority of my Galaxy Force/Cybertron collection is made up of Takara's version, there were a few toys that, to begin with at least, didn't exactly light my candle. I wasn't even watching the TV show (I don't know if it actually aired in the UK - probably only on satellite TV if it did), there was no investment in the characters, as such, so my purchases were entirely based on how I felt about the toys.

One such toy was Gasket, who just looked weird... But, having decided against importing him, I ended up buying his cheaper Hasbro analogue after acquiring the BotCon 2006 boxed set, 'Dawn of Futures Past', in which the mold had been repainted as a pre-Beast Wars Rattrap.

Revenge of the Fallen Nightbeat

One of my favourite Generation 1 characters was Nightbeat, the Cybertronian detective forged in the image of the traditional Film Noir gumshoe, with the exception of his ostentatious choice to 'disguise' himself as a blue and yellow Porsche 959 with red flame patterns on his doors.

The former Collectors' Club released their exclusive version - based on the Energon Hot Shot mold, which had a fairly similar vehicle mode - which just happens to be the first proper post I ever made to this blog. A few photos of the G1 version were included there, in lieu of a proper write-up of that (which I will get to... eventually... I do feel like doing some G1 stuff soon...), but Nightbeat is one of those fringe characters who has gone unrepresented in the mainstream toyline ever since...

...Until he was referenced (weirdly) in the Real Gear subline from the first movie, only to return in this (slightly) more traditional form in the extended Revenge of the Fallen toyline.

Hunt for the Decepticons Hubcap

One of the few coherent and interesting concepts to come out of Revenge of the Fallen was the idea that TransFormers have been on Earth far longer than Optimus Prime and his team believed. It's an idea that deserved - deserves, even now, in the wake of The Last Knight - a proper and thorough examination in a movie of its own, rather than being shuffled aside as a minor plot point in one of RotF's many silly, ad-libbed scenes.

Perhaps by way of compensation for this oversight, Hasbro decided to release a few smaller Autobots and Decepticons based around the movie's reinterpretation of the 'Seeker' title, more generally applied to the earliest visitors from Cybertron on their quest to find the Allspark. One such visitor was the vaguely G1-referencial Scout class Autobot, Hubcap...

Revenge of the Fallen Dirt Boss

Ever have one of those times when you look at a figure in your collection and wonder why you bothered buying it? I don't often have moments of introspection of that particular kind, but I suspect the extended toylines of the live action movies - that is, the toys made of character not actually featured in the films, but developed as concept art or for the licensed videogames - probably account for the greatest proportion of those few I have.

Probably the finest example of this very specific breed of buyers' remorse would be Dirt Boss - one of the toys based on a drone from the videogame of the first movie. Some of those drones took on cool alternate modes, like jets and cars... Dirt Boss became a small forklift...

Oh well, let's get on with it...

TransFormers United 2-pack: UN-20 Rumble & Frenzy

If there's one thing I find frustrating and disappointing about the TransFormers brand, it's the reliance on tanks to solve just about any issue with updating a character's form. Megatron can't be a gun anymore because gun toys are considered more dangerous and contentious in America than real guns? Make him a tank. Shockwave can't be a space gun anymore because space guns are still guns? Make him a space tank.

Perhaps I shouldn't be so fussy about a toyline which is still, let's face it, predominantly made up of cars... but surely there are better updates to contentious G1 alternate modes than tanks?

And yet, just because the extended Classics line had no Soundwave of its own (despite there being a sort of contemporary figure in one of Takara Tomy's short-lived offshoot lines), two of his more enduring minions appeared in somewhat familiar and sadly unimaginative forms...

Generations Laserbeak

Every so often, Hasbro seems to have read my mind in a particularly bizarre and sadly incomplete way. I noted when I wrote about Tokyo Toy Show 2010 Dreadwing & Smokescreen that the Mindwipe/Strafe/Dreadwing mold was basically suitable for a custom movie Soundwave, had he not been turned into a car. Since Smokescreen could then have doubled for a Cobalt Sentry Garboil analogue, when images of Hasbro's own Laserbeak repaint (released only in the Asian markets initially) surfaced, the only surprise was how good it actually looked.

TransFormers Collectors' Club Botcon 2005 (Timelines) Flamewar

(Femme-Bot Friday #39)

In a lot of ways, this somewhat hard-to-find BotCon exclusive is the origin of my femme-bot fixation, moreso than the original Energon/Superlink Arcee/Ariel or the Paradron repaint. This is partially because I just really like the mold, and a lot more because it was so hard to find at a reasonable price. She turns up once in a while on eBay, with her price ranging between £120/$175 and £185/$270 but, though exclusive she may be, she's still only a Scout class figure, and even the low end of the secondary market price scale is a little more than I'm comfortable paying.

Cut to April of this year, when one turned up on eBay at less than £60/$80, with the only caveat being that while the figure and weapon parts were in their sealed bag, she was without her bio card and instructions. Call me crazy if you will, but a 50% saving at the expense of a mediocre bio featuring hideous artwork and a sheet of instructions I already have for other iterations of the mold represents, to me, a saving well worth taking advantage of.

Tokyo Toy Show 2010 Dreadwing & Smokescreen

I noted in my write-up for Reveal the Shield Strafe that I would much rather have purchased Mindwipe, but I don't think he was ever available in the UK - lost, perhaps, thanks to another of Hasbro's remarkably short-sighted marketing decisions. The mold itself was great, but Strafe's colourscheme was terrible, and meant I had a Skystalker with no vehicle mode partner.

Enter 2010's Tokyo Toy Show, at which a repainted set of the two molds was available as a boxed set of Generation 2 Dreadwing & Smokescreen (aka RiD Dreadwind & Smokejumper in blue)

Galaxy Force Ramble Drones

When I first got back into TransFormers, Galaxy Force was pretty much the perfect toyline for me, combining nostalgic character references with bold new designs and levels of articulation that just hadn't been possible when I first encountered the toy line back in the 80s.

While some homages were more obvious than others, the toy designers didn't shy away from taking things in unexpected directions, and some references were broader than others. Soundwave's design came across as a fairly logical extrapolation of the G1 character, except that he only had one minion.

Or did he? Technically, the Ramble drones were nothing to do with GF Soundwave, coming across more like evolved Scraplets, and the fact that their name was romanised to 'Ramble' rather than 'Rumble' seemed to confirm that these weren't intended to be a homage to G1 Rumble (and Frenzy), but that seems to be just a symptom of poor translation.

TransFormers (Movie) Arcee (Target Exclusive)

(Femme-Bot Friday #12)

The first live action movie must have seemed like a license to print money for Hasbro. With such a limited cast of robots, they were able to make some additional toys of characters from the videogame but, beyond that, the toyline featured a lot of repaints. About a billion Bumblebees, and at least a couple of just about every mold, where a G1-inspired repaint was possible.

But beyond that, Hasbro looked into its back catalogue of Energon/Superlink toys and repainted anything that looked vaguely worthwhile... And so the Energon/Superlink biker femme-bot/Omnicon got two repaints... Having now written about this model four times already, there's not a great deal more to say, so this, like the Target Exclusive Elita-1 write-up, will probably focus more on the character.

On the upside, this will be the last time I write about this mold... until I get my hands on BotCon 2005 Flamewar...