While Legacy promised a return of variety, its taken a bit of time to make good on that promise. Wave 1 had the look of business as usual, with a very high percentage of G1 characters, repacks, and toys that could have been in Kingdom. The Prime Universe toys, the main exceptions, screamed repaint fodder, and it would have been very easy to assume Hasbro would not go further. Happily, the balance is definitely shifting with wave 3 and what is known about Evolution next year. The first real evidence that Hasbro was serious came from the “Velocitron Speedia 500 Collection”, a sub-line of exclusive repaints that replaced Netflix Siege. This went hard on the whole alternate universe thing, visiting 6 different continuities immediately, whereas Legacy wouldn’t really begin to branch out until wave 2. This brings us to today’s subject: Burn Out, a massively obscure repaint of a rather obscure character that plays homage to something that was Transformers before Transformers was a thing. Burn Out is also notable for being, well, a girl. The Speedia stuff has a good gender balance, which does mean I have to talk about gender issues again, although I’ll try not to repeat myself. I picked this one up on sales on the last day of a vacation, with the hope of returning to work in a good mood. It worked.
Now, I had to shelve my first draft of this post, as I was struggling for a focal point. I had skipped the original version of this toy, Skids, because I already had a toy of the character. Its kinda hard to avoid mentioning him, but also hard to talk about for any real length of time. He had a very limited fictional presence until the highly regarded More Than Meets The Eye comic series by James Roberts, and basically everything that happened there probably counts as a spoiler. There is something of a tradition of comics writers taking blank slates and making them desirable, its called the Furman Effect, although it seems that it didn’t stick. Legacy Skids, and for that matter the unexpected Masterpiece version, is very faithful the G1 iteration, which as mentioned didn’t get much to do. Burn Out has even fewer fictional appearances, and is very much in the exclusive/obscurity bracket. She’s a character with a distinctive paint job, but is so far from the mainstream that nobody would mind that she is an exclusive, unlike, say, half of Earthrise. Her singular claim fame is that she’s based off a colour variation from Takara’s Diaclone, one of the toylines that would provide raw material for Hasbro’s Transformers. Diaclone is kinda of a big thing in collectors circles, with a boutique modern reboot, but in the Transformers context its mainly a convenient source for repaint ideas. So, yeah. Burn Out is obviously part of the black repaint phenomenon, but given that she is referencing a rare variant from 1983, this is about as deep as cut as you can make. If you want actual legacy in Legacy, why not homage the gestation of Transformers brand, and something that was probably only one marketing decision from a western release?
Righty, that’s the context established, on with the show. Burn Out's vehicle form is a legally distinct copy of the Honda City Turbo. Its a vehicle type that isn't really seen in Transformers that much, unless realistic cars are the main thing that year. It is more blocky than big or speedy looking, but it is distinctive. I have read that this car is a big thing in japan which is probably half the reason Skids gets any attention at all. Nerds like myself may recognise it from the anime/manga You’re Under Arrest. As to how much this differs from Skids? More than is immediately obvious, but once you get past the black its a bit subtle. Burn Out retains the stripes, red plastics and translucent blue of Skids, which is faithful to the source, but possibly faithful to a fault. Less obvious are the grey wheels, gunmetal front bumper, clear sunroof, and tail-lights. All-in-all its a nice looking car, with plentiful 5mm ports for weapon storage. The basics are there, and in black, so that’s good. Of course, the vehicle mode also inherits the same problems of this mould, such as overuse of translucent plastic, clip-on wheels, the face visible from the underside. While Burn Out has seemingly has not suffered the issues with tolerances Skids did, and mine seems fine, a certain degree of care is recommended with regards to anything blue.
The transformation ticks all the boxes you'd expect it too, presenting a similarly pleasing robot form, but if you were paying attention to the first picture above, you may have clicked what is different. Yes, Burn Out has a mouthplate, whereas previous iterations have either used the Skids head, or a new feminine sculpt in the case of the Masterpiece. This brings us to the promised, if brief, discussion of gender issues. Burn Out is on the other end of the scale from Elita-1, and is a toy which makes no attempt to use gender coding at all. On the one hand, this totally sidesteps the design compromises that affected Elita-1 and others. Burn Out is not a shellformer with a mannequin body shape, and is instead a classical "door wings" carformer with merits that I will shortly get into. There is no requirement for a robot to fit gender norms in the first place, and if this means a better toy, maybe this is a justifiable route? I mean, I we’re getting a Gobots character this way too, and then there’s Override, whom probably needs her own article. People seem to like them a lot. On the other hand, if you told me this was gonna be Crosscut, until someone realised that they could save him for later and thus get more repeat sales on the mould, I'd believe you. I’m cynical like that, and a black paintjob is the sort of thing you get an intern to do. For its faults, the Elita-1 mould tried harder. That having been acknowledged, Burn Out’s status as a premium redeco is more evident in robot form. The shoulders that were neglected on Skids are picked out in red and blue, with the limbs having more grey and black. Burn Out lacks chromed thighs, but the there’s a smoother transition between chrome grill, gunmetal bumper and charcoal grey plastics. Its a good look, if understated still. She also benefits from an earnest attempt to improve on Skids’ characteristic weapons storage. The two silver ones can be either forearm via dedicated ports, combine into a bigger gun, and further combine with that blue axe thing for a bigger gun. I clearly wasn’t paying this energon weapon business due attention, because its working out pretty well here. Posability is similarly pleasing. Its a good toy.
My point? Only that Legacy Burn Out is something that exists. And exists in the shadow of rather obscure character in the first place, which I wasn’t rushing out to buy. I’ll admit to having been a little unimpressed by Transformers: Legacy at time of writing; I’ve liked what I’ve chosen to post about, but I haven’t brought much, and I have yet to find a must-have. Wave 3 and Evolution look like more my sort of thing. Burn Out however suggests maybe I should have taken a few chances.
No comments:
Post a Comment