It's TFNation 2019 Weekend, and I'm Not in Birmingham...

Yes, for the first time since its inception, I decided to skip TFNation this year.

The main reason for this is that my finances aren't especially stable right now - not bad, by a long shot, just not good enough that I can comfortably spare the money I'd have to spend on transport, accommodation and entry to the event.

Unfortunately, there's not as much in-the-moment coverage of the event (other than attendees live tweeting or Instagramming, perhaps) compared to BotCon, which had pretty much dedicated media coverage on the fan sites, so I'll have to wait pretty much until it's all over to see what I actually missed.

I'm not blown away by the guest lineup this time - but then, it's never really been about the guests for me anyway - though the fact that Flame Toys, makers of all those super-stylised non-transforming action figure model kits, are listed as being in attendence is of mild interest. I'll be keen to see if they showed off anything new, but if it doesn't transform, I'm generally not that interested.

As far as the other guests go, I've mentioned before that I'm just not particularly interested in the comics (even less now they're a more direct advertisement for the toyline) and, much as it's cool to see some of the voice actors from the TV shows and movies, they tend to tell the same sorts of stories. Had the guest list lived up to the promise of this year's Beast Machines branding, I'd have been far more interested, and may even have run the risk of overspending to see what was on offer... So there's not a great deal to regret on that score.

There's a strong chance that I'm not missing out on buying anything I can't pick up at a later date - WfC:Siege Brunt is very high on the list of figures I want and, of course, I'd have been likely to pick up as many new Studio Series figures as possible, particularly the Devastator components. Other than that, I think the only likely purchase would have been Perfect Effect's Jetforce Revive Commander. Hopefully nothing I'm going to miss out on entirely by passing on this event.

Binaltech BT05 Dead End

And here's where Binaltech really started to upset a certain kind of fan. Having released Sideswipe as a Dodge Viper, the announcement of a second Viper - this time based on the souped-up 'Competition Coupé' version of the car as opposed to the street version - brought with it certain expectations. When the head sculpt was revealed, it looked as though Sunstreaker was on his way...

...And yet, instead of a bright yellow Viper, we got a black Viper with silver stripes, and the Binaltech line's first Decepticon: the former Stunticon, Dead End. Deprived (for a time, at least) of Sunstreaker and instead lumbered with a Decepticon who wasn't even released in the right colourscheme, the only ray of hope seemed to be that the line had already repainted molds, so a later repaint of this figure as Sunstreaker was surely inevitable (and arrived about a year later).

So let's take a look at this bonkers entry in the series...

DX9 Kaleidoscope 03 La Hire

In all honesty, I hadn't been paying much attention to DX9 among the myriad Third Party producers of transforming robot figures. Their Kaleidoscope line has been quite random (the first figure not a direct TransFormers rip-off, the second a Beast Wars hybrid) and the War In Pocket line looked generally quite ugly.

Then came a huge surprise. Around the time that newcomers TFEVO revealed their take on a Masterpiece-style Hot Rod from The Last Knight, DX9 (in collaboration with Unique Toys, apparently) revealed their own version of the same thing. Initially, the TFEVO version looked superior due to its more intricate transformation and pretty stunning screen-accuracy in both modes, and I preordered it as soon as it became possible to do so... However, when review copies started to circulate, it became clear that the newcomers QC wasn't quite up to the task, and Hot Fire was a nightmare of floppy joints and tiny parts that had to be arranged just so. After I cancelled my preorder, I started to keep an eye on DX9's version in the hopes that it would be closer to Unique Toys' take on movie Lockdown in terms of build quality and mostly-intuitive transformation.

La Hire became available for purchase quite recently, and without much fanfare... Which would often be a bad sign. Throwing caution to the wind, I didn't even wait for more YouTube reviews to arrive before ordering, so lets take a look and see what DX9 have produced.

Power of the Primes - A Plethora of Prime Masters

Although, technically, thirteen wouldn't really be 'a plethora', let alone the mere eight I managed to obtain. The Prime Masters - much like the 'loose' Titan Masters of the Titans Return line - were released in single packs with 'Decoy Armour' (AKA Pretender shells - a homage to part of the 1988/89 section of the Generation 1 toyline) which, for no obvious reason, also transform into TargetMaster-style weapons which the Prime Masters could then attach to externally.

As 'play patterns' go, it was just as daft as that of the loose Titan Masters, but further aggravated certain elements within the fandom who had been hoping for a bigger, more impressive revival of the Pretender concept. For me, though, Hasbro's most heinous crime was releasing only eight of the thirteen Primes at mass retail, and holding back the remaining five for special boxed sets - Onyx Prime being made available only with the Predaking boxed set (which I had zero interest in) while Amalgamous, Nexus, Prima and the Thirteenth Primes coming only with the San Diego Comic Con 'Throne of the Primes' set (also made available at mass retain in Hasbro's Asian markets). Exacerbating this, Prima Prime also ended up packaged with the Amazon exclusive Punch-Counterpunch, so the completist would end up with two copies and a total of fourteen Primes.

Aside from all of this, the Prime Masters served no real purpose other than the decorative. Sure, each one was supposed to grant special powers to whoever wielded it - via slots on the larger figures and on the updated (and now separate) hand and foot parts of the gestalts - but there were no new features activated - Unicron Trilogy-style - on the toys. Furthermore, they were rendered mostly redundant by prexisting chunks of plastic - molded as either weird, flat handguns, Enigmas of Combination or Matrices of Leadership - which already occupied the Prime Master slot on every single Power of the Primes toy of Deluxe class and above.

So, to close off the Power of the Primes and, indeed, the Prime Wars Trilogy posts on this blog, here's a roundup of all the mass retail Prime Masters...

Studio Series #38 (Bumblebee movie) Optimus Prime

I can't have been alone in the expectation, while watching the Bumblebee solo movie, that the version of Optimus Prime seen briefly in the trailer - as a hologram projected from the titular Autobot's chest - and in more detail during the Cybertron-set sequences, would somehow end up looking more like the Peterbilt truck from the first TransFormers live action movie once on Earth - if, indeed, he were to make a terrestrial appearance at all. So seeing him at the end of the movie, as a properly G1-styled 'cab over engine' truck, pulling a metallic trailer that looked just like the one packaged with the G1 toy (minus the obvious Autobot insignia on the sides) was a huge treat.

Naturally, I eagerly anticipated a Studio Series toy of this new interpretation of Optimus, particularly in the light of the amazing work that went into creating Evasion Mode Optimus Prime back in 2014, let alone the upscaped and improved Japan-only version released under the Bumblebee movie banner as 'Legendary Optimus Prime' in 2018.

Based on initial photos, it looked as though the Studio Series version would not disappoint, potentially being something to rival the Age of Extinction Voyager... but let's take a closer look, just to be sure.

Cyberverse Cyclone Strike Windblade

(Femme-Bot Friday #69)

The TransFormers Cyberverse toyline is the latest of Hasbro's attempts at producing a 'mid-level' entry point into the ever-expanding TransFormers franchise, using a new continuity that appears to combine aspects of various other existing continuities with a development of the TFPrime/RiD2015 aesthetic, and which isn't quite their 'Evergreen' style. Some of the fans appear to be embracing it - the larger Shockwave toy in particular seems to have impressed a lot of people - but, like the new War for Cybertron line, Cyberverse generally has left me cold.

Bad enough, in my humble opinion, that Hasbro feels the need to create another separate toyline of simplified TransFormers to cater to a particular age range (6+ in the case of the 'Warrior' class, which is essentially equivalent to Deluxe in size), but to burden them with spring-loaded, geared gimmicks suggests to me that whoever came up with the Cyberverse concept has no idea what made TransFormers cool back in the mid 1980s.

And yet, here we are... I decided to pick one up. I was vaguely interested in the Windblade figure simply because I seem to have developed a distinct subsection in my collection specifically for her, beginning with the Generations/TF Legends figure that accompanied her introduction to the IDW comics-verse after a series of fan polls selected her key attributes.

So, I mean, however bad this figure might be, it's still a Windblade... and that has to count for something, right?

Let's find out...