Eighth Anniversary

I've played things a little differently this year - rather than trying to cram my picks into this post over the course of a few hours before this blog's birthday rolls around, I've added items to it gradually, over the course of the year (and pretty much finished in June, bar an honourable mention or two), so that it can go live in the morning. It's been quite a year for special releases of one kind or another, with Takara Tomy's Unite Warriors and Legends interpretations of Hasbro's Combiner Wars and Titans Return figures and some phenomenal third party products. I can't decide whether I'm glad I got back into TransFormers back in 2003, or if I'm spending too much money and letting these damned things take up too much space in my flat... I've certainly had to rotate a small chunk of my collection back into its boxes... and may decide to flog some stuff off on eBay...

But let's forget all that for the moment, and celebrate my top eight purchases since last year (with apologies for listing some figures I haven't yet properly written up!)...

Robots in Disguise (2015) Windblade

(Femme-Bot Friday #40)

It comes to something when a toyline includes a homage to a toy/character that only came out one year ago... But then, Windblade isn't just another toy, she's quite a significant entry into TransFormers mythology for several reasons. First and foremost, she was the inaugural Fan-Built Bot, created from a series of online polls (an exercise which seems to have clued Hasbro in to the idea that TransFormers fans have been clamouring for more Femme-Bots, where the myriad Third Party releases did not). Secondly, she was introduced with a 4-part miniseries of comics from IDW, - written by Mairghread Scott and illustrated by Sarah Stone - in which her pivotal role in the upcoming stories (and, by extension, the toyline) was introduced.

I'm still not intending to collect the new Robots in Disguise range - I'm not a great fan of the angular aesthetic, most of the toys seem terribly simplistic and I've read reports of light and flimsy construction on some toys - but there are a few which are just no-brainers... or, at least, which should be...

TFNation 2016 - Day 2 & Toy Haul

Sunday got off to a better start despite not sleeping especially well again, but at least I didn't have another anxiety dream to ruin my day. I didn't bother with breakfast that day as I wasn't feeling at all hungry, but equally didn't make a beeline for the day's only purchase - the two-pack of DX9's War In Pocket G1/TransFormers: The Movie homages Leah and Toufold (aka mini-Arcee and mini-Kup). In fact, I ended up taking a walk around the hotel grounds and the nearby lake before even heading in to the main hall. After that, and having checked the day's scheduled panels, I decided to deal with checking out of teh hotel straight away, rather than risk missing the noon deadline sitting in one of the halls or wandering around the retail area.

TFNation 2016 - Day 1 & Toy Haul

The first indication I had that there was such a thing as TFNation was a somewhat cryptic business card-sized card on a table at Roll Out Roll Call. At first, I didn't even look into it and, had I known it was a convention rather than, say, a webstore selling TransFormers toys (which had been my initial assumption) I probably wouldn't have bothered with it. If I'd been told it was happening in Birmingham, specifically at one of the hotels in the NEC complex, I wouldn't have been keen because getting there would involved a train journey (I have terrible luck on trains - the first time I go anywhere is invariably a disaster) and paying for accommodation (albeit simplified as TFNation had made a deal for much-reduced rates with the hotel that was hosting the event).

In the end, I only properly found out about TFNation because of a posting on DaimChoc Reports' Facebook timeline, about Mastermind Creations' event-exclusive boxed set release of what had previously been an April Fool in their Reformatted line, Feral Queen, and its partner figure/repaint Nero Queen. It was created for a Canadian TransFormers convention but was also being brought to the UK - and TFNation - by Kapow Toys.

TFNation 2016 Waffle

This is not the full and proper summing up post (which will likely be split into two days again, as with Roll Out Roll Call) for a whole collection of reasons. I got back from TFNation yesterday evening after my train was cancelled and I had to take a later one. I'd slept very poorly over the weekend due - somewhat embarrassingly - to some very bad dreams, so I was basically exhausted the whole time anyway (Saturday in particular was a Very Bad Day for me) and, even now, feel in need of a weekend to recover (and not in the good way). Basically, I'm not yet in a frame of mind where I can look at my notes objectively and come up with a decent post.

Briefly, though, I bought some stuff, I enjoyed some stuff, and I'll write about it soon. Maybe even this coming Bank Holiday weekend...

In the meantime:

The Day 1 Haul in its meagre entirety.
Day 2 added only the DX9 War In Pocket Leah/Toufold set

DotM Mechtech Crankcase

The giant alien robots in the TransFormers movie series have, so far, been pretty light on character, and there haven't been any of the traditional teams so far (Starscream but no Seekers, Devastator but no properly individual Constructicons) and, when a proper team was introduced - the ground-based 'Dreads' in Dark of the Moon - they were all unceremoniously offed by the Autobots before we learned anything interesting about them.

While all three appeared on screen as large black SUVs, in a strangely uneconomical move, they were reimagined for the toyline, with two becoming Legends class cars, another being a Cyberverse Commander class jet, and only one becoming a Deluxe class toy that vaguely resembled the character's on-screen appearance. That lucky fellow was Crankcase...