Transformers: Kingdom Warpath is Something That Exists

OK, I went to TFNation Reading yesterday, and in all probability, I am dead right now. I'll try to have a write-up done for the end of next week, but in the meantime, here's a Tranformers review.

 

The 1985 Transformers Warpath toy.

In spite of myself, I've been belatedly drawn to the modern batch of deluxe Minibots. It must have been Beachcomber and Gears proving to be actually kinda good. I don't think I'll be a completionist or anything, but if the price is right, I'm certainly not opposed. Hence, Warpath. And who is Warpath? Well, blah blah blah blah G1 tiny dude. Diddly-do diddly-do diddly-do and so on; shallow tier 3 character with a distinct manner of speech. Tourette‘s syndrome, but with gunfire onomatopoeia. Blah blah blah, Sunbow cartoon appearances, fairly unique altmode, goto Autobot tank guy. Yada-yada-yada, memorable, but is basically a seat-filler. Look, if you've read my writings on similar vintage characters, which I admit is unlikely, you know where I stand. But is this toy any good? Let's find out.

 

At the risk of repeating myself, Warpath's altmode is a tank, although ran through three different filters. This version is aping the Sunbow Animation model, if adding more modern detailing. That model was an interpretation of an 80's toy done in the same penny racer style as the other Minibots, meaning it somewhat cutesy and simple rather than a scale model or owt. You know, the whole Super Deformed thing, but applied to a vehicle. So, peeling back those layers like an onion, what tank is it? The M551 Sheridan AA/ARV. An odd choice, even back in the 80's. Its not a tank in way as a layman might expect; its a light tank with an odd missile armament, designed to be easily transported by air. Its not really there to take hits or slug it out with other tanks, and its debut in the Vietnam War was not a glorious one. As a point of interest, the Sheridan had been retired from frontline service about 5 years before this toy was designed. One wonders if this choice of altmode was thematic in some way, given how the other Minibots are, but I suppose we'll never know. 

 

 

The real tank, as seen on Wikipedia.

I may have got sidetracked there. Moving onto the actual merits of the toy, Warpath does one very important thing right, which is have a functional turret. I.e. one that rotates. This is a pet peeve of mine; if the tank has a turret, it should turn. A lot of Transformers toys get that wrong. Warpath avoids that annoyance, and due to his character design, said turret is not an accessory either. Meanwhile, it rolls on tiny castor wheels, and has some down-played 5mm port and blast effect compatibility. Now, Warpath neither needs or likely wants additional firepower, but not putting in a few explosions or muzzleflashes was a missed opportunity. That aside, this mode's only overt flaw arises from the desire to be as Sunbow accurate as possible: the white tracks. OK, if that's what you want, I get it, but it prompts colour matching issues and reports of photo degradation. Doing them in dark or metallic tones would have made more sense and saved a lot of trouble. This complaint is however on the nitpick end of the scale, and otherwise this tank mode is on point. It looks good from most angles, does what it should, and has no small amount of surface detailing if you care to look.

 

The actual conversion process invites another tangent. As you might imagine, this isn't Warpath's first remake or spiritual successor. There's been a few prior to this, including a well-liked Generations deluxe, but none have really nailed a G1 style transformation. This one has, with the turret becoming the chest, the front of the hull becoming the legs, and the back becoming the arms. There's a lot of folding panels going on here, focused mainly on the legs, but the point of contention here is the partsforming. Like a lot of the modern Minibots, Warpath has a large removable panel that completes the vehicle mode and is used as a shield in robot mode. While not exactly a plus, I do feel this is a notably subtle and inoffensive example, and nowhere near a Huffer situation, let alone Cliffjumper. This panel tabs into the underside of the tank, finishing it off, but its not actually mandatory. Its not so much an obvious cut corner, and possibly more something they added because they had room in the budget. Plus it helps that you get a Zaku II style shoulder shield out if it, which actually suits the robot mode quite well. Even with that, when it comes to complexity, Warpath is making a good case for his pricepoint.

 

Warpath ends up on the chunky and dense side in robot mode. He's not without the occasional hollow bit, and purposefully on the short side for a deluxe, but they have nailed the look. Its not purely Sunbow, the sculpt is too detailed, but I do find myself liking how the track kibble has been retained on the forearms but has been used intelligently, folding up to minimise itself. Niceties like Siege era articulation and 5mm ports are here, and thus the robot mode approaches an almost optimal of balance of form and function. Warpath looks maybe a bit dorky. Maybe a bit chubby and friend-shaped. That's the point though, that's what the previous revamps didn't really get. He's just a little guy, whom happens to be a tank. And not just any tank, a notably small and light one that was maybe a bit rubbish. So yes, the robot mode could pose a bit better. Is that something you'd really expect or need when he's built like Santa? Yes, he could have more accessories. Does he need more though? He's got his chest cannon. Its a good robot mode that does all its supposed to.

This guy could have very easily been in Earthrise, but he may very well have benefited from that extra time in the oven. Warpath has flaws, certainly. Reports of yellowing are not welcome, while the shield piece avoids strong criticism by being quite optional. Everything else though is good to great. I am not usually a fan of attempts to slavishly match the 80's cartoon, I wrote about it, but things clearly worked out here. And it does the tank bit very well. Its possibly the best of the modern Minibots. It will likely remain so until they take another swing at the character. Whatever happens: Kingdom Warpath is something that exists.

And now, Blast Effects!

 

Transformers: Kingdom Wheeljack is Something That Exists

Yes, yes. I know. Kingdom Wheeljack is just Earthrise Wheeljack in a new box. But it is how I got it, and this how it shall be titled.

The 1984 Transformers Wheeljack toy

Unlike a lot of the 80's originals, Wheeljack is a character I have some nostalgia for. I didn't have the original toy, but I did have the Actionmaster, and his evil counterpart Slicer. I did see a few cartoon episodes where he did stuff, and read a few of the later Marvel comics. Wheeljack benefited from fairly distinctive character model, and a role/personality that was simply "science/inventor guy", which meant a writer could easily find a role for him. Thus he created the Dinobots, any number of doohickeys, and most memorably to me, a comic appearence where he tended to the horrifically wounded Optimus Prime, in the minutes before his death. That last one doesn't get any nicer in context, so let's move on. While Wheeljack has definitely had his quota of new toys and tributes over the decades, he's a touch more malleable than most. The version we got in Transformers Prime was a swordfighter, not an inventor, while other versions take inspiration from Albert Einstein, Jamie Hyneman, and Steve Urkle. Part of that is undoubtedly the weak writing in 80's toy media, but the thing is, Wheeljack was very obviously replaced by Perceptor. Whom was a microscope, and thus more immediately convincing as a capital S Scientist. This left Wheeljack no unique selling point, and simply being a fast car amongst the Autobots wasn't enough. This is a bit of a shame, because if you look a bit harder, Wheeljack is not so much a nerd as a rally driver whom built his own car. While being it.

 

Wheeljack's original altmode was the Lancia Stratos Turbo, in a paintjob so specific you can find model kits of it. That's a rally car, and while I'm not knowledgeable on the topic, I do understand that its a somewhat more rugged affair that takes place outside of a purpose made race track. Rather than the bleeding edge of Formula One, Rallying suggests a more rough & tumble event, often using road legal cars. This modern toy attempts to capture the look of the original, while filing off the legally actionable parts of the design. The resulting car passes the squint test most admirably, with lots of paint and in-jokey sponsorship decals. Its nearly ideal as these things go, it avoids the common flaws like unpainted hubcaps, while working in a few 5mm ports in unobtrusive places. However, this general high quality does place what flaws there are into stark relief. There's a case of Visible Head Syndrome on the underside, something begging for a concealing panel, and an odd gap beneath the spoiler. Also, it feels maybe a touch bland with respects to play value. Its not bad by any means; it rolls okay, and it has weapon storage, but Earthrise tended to downplay the 5mm port thing and that's evident here. Maybe get some blast effects so he looks like he's rocket powered? What people, well, collectors/weirdos like myself, are likely to fixate on though are the translucent windows. These are a smokey sunglasses black, an element common to more modern takes on the character but not the 1980’s. Or they were aiming for original toy, and darkened the windows as there was little to see inside, I dunno. I personally think this is just fine, and there’s no reports of breakages as such, but chunks of the windscreen end up storing in the knees, and I wonder about the long term. Despite my nitpicking, its a solid car mode favouring the original toy visually.

 

 
The robot mode does better on the play value front, and similarly scores well on the squint test. He obviously favours the old Sunbow model here, but between the vehicle bits and the greebling its a not 1 to 1 update. I'll come back to that in the conclusion, but I will say for now that the only real visual weakness is the gappy lower legs. This is noteworthy as this is the first time Hasbro really tried to strongly match the G1 look, with the previous three(!?) attempts being remolds and thus having some compromises. I like his proportions and how his chest is formed, the vibe very much being there. Functionally its a step up too, with nothing to apologise for on the articulation front, the shoulders are good due to the conversion, and a full selection 5mm ports coming into play. The spoiler is also on a 5mm peg too, so you have some options, which is nice. His actual accessory is his missile pod, which can be handheld, but has dedicated tabs for the shoulder mount. This is absolutely fine, and I honestly don't think Wheeljack was ever really associated with a sidearm, but there is an absence of something to round things out. A wrench maybe? A sword? They could have gone the Cliffjumper route, and added in a one scene accessory. The Masterpiece version had a pistol. Otherwise, its a nice robot form, that does the vast majority of things well, and only one ignorable thing badly.

 

While working on this article, I slowly came to a realisation: this was probably the best, mass market Wheeljack ever made, it wasn’t quite the G1/Sunbow love letter I expected, but it also felt somehow off by a small degree. Its a solid performer in almost all ways, with most of its flaws falling into the category of personal preference or cut for the budget. Maybe this was meant to a more generic Wheeljack than a specific one, and it ended up in the very Sunbow Earthrise. Maybe something got left out; when they did Slicer with the mould, it did come with extra guns. Or maybe this was built along the same lines as Cliffjumper etc, and it just didn’t work out as well on those terms. And there is that Generations Selects version that is full Sunbow, removing the translucent plastic, but otherwise looking like a sidegrade. Given Hasbro’s habit of releases and iterative remakes, you’d almost think this was deliberate, but I digress. Regardless of which variant you go for though, and there’s a few, you're getting a good all-rounder here. And the package variant that is Kingdom Wheeljack is definitely something that exists.

Transformers: Buzzworthy Bumblebee Creatures Collide Set is Something that Exists

Hmm, I may have to keep on posting Transformers on a Thurday, got a bit of a backlog. Anyways, one of these days, I need to write about the "Buzzworthy Bumblebee" line. As the name implies, this is a line entirely about the very-very over-exposed Bumblebee character, although it's since become more of catch-all for various exclusives and reissues. As you might imagine, this has given me repetitive strain injury from rolling my eyes, but then something magical happened. I saw Iin a shop one of the Buzzworthy multipacks on discount. Deep discount. A pack of 4 deluxes originally 90 odd, sold at 45, and finally reduced to £12.98.

Obviously, I said yes to that. I was thinking it was daft not to, and if I didn't like any of it, gifts/donations were an option. Now, I could do an in-depth breakdown of each toy here, but I feel that would get boring pretty quickly. These are principally repaints of better known characters/toys, and the cadence of the discussion would be quite similar for each. So, I'm going to try to keep this to a paragraph for each before tying it all together in the conclusion. 

 

Not making the best first impression, Preadacon Skorponok is the weakest of the set. He's a 90's toy colours variant of the modern Kingdom toy, rather than a separate character, so not a huge amount of creativity going on, and the basic execution wasn't great in the first place. The robot mode is fine, a good approximation of the CG model with an optional head based off the old "mutant head" gimmick. He's not doing much of the 5mm port thing, but he is using in his claws for a set of decorative missiles and his Cyberbee. His beast mode legs are kinda just there, but the scorpion tail is articulated. The bad stuff starts with the transformation, which I found counter-intuitive, finicky, and ultimately doesn't do a great job of hiding the robot bits. One entire leg ends up stowing into the tail, not actually concealed, and it hampers the tail articulation. His head meanwhile sticks out on the underside. Also his joints are on the loose side, tolerances seem a bit off with this one, and a lot of him is translucent plastic. That said, the scorpion mode did grow on me, this being one of those toys that ends up appearing bigger in altmode, and there's some nice organic texturing on the bug bits. I don't think I can honestly say that this a great toy. I find myself comparing it to a RID 2015 warrior class toy which did the scorpion thing better, while the deco is outside of my nostalgia bubble and not especially interesting. Mind you, he's far from the worst in modern Generations, and I can see myself displaying him with the spare head.

Predacon Skywasp is obviously a Waspinator in new colours, although it's slightly more creative than the above. The colours are taken from a cancelled exclusive, by way of a Diaclone-inspired Botcon toy with a name too generic to trademark so they made him a beast wars tribute to Skywarp. Waspinator was possessed by Starscream that one time, and has had jet modes, so it's not really a stretch to have another seeker involved. As colours go, it's definitely striking with those blood red wings and eyes, but when it comes to wasp mode this doesn't do much for the organic realism. Wasps can be all kinds of colours, but not this specific scheme. I took a moment to check. Your mileage may vary on that point though, it certainly doesn't look bad in wasp mode, just toyetic, and that may be what you want. Otherwise, I'd say the basics are here, with little to apologise for. There's siege/Legacy standard articulation, a splattering of 5mm ports, more than most beasts in Kingdom, weapon storage, and an alternative humanoid head, as another nod to the mutant face thing. It's just with Waspinator, things got swapped around for the TV show, and the mutant face is considered his usual one. There's been a few Waspinator remakes over the years, and I don't quite know where this sits in the rankings, but this seems decent. I mean, I'm not a fan of the robot bits in wasp mode, but lots of beast formers have that problem. Less subjectively, one wing likes to pop off and there's a few cut marks that stick out. 

 

Ransack is the most modern of the toys here, the largest overall, and perhaps the one with a disproportionate amount of the paint budget, as there's an awful lot of translucent plastic painted over. Ransack is actually a G1 original, one of the larger "Deluxe" Insecticons, but you'd be forgiven for not knowing that. The toy wasn't a Takara original, and that seems to have meant no cartoon or comic appearances in the 80’s, or much after. Ransack here is a headswap pretool of the much better known Kickback, something which the Legacy release telegraphed with two otherwise inexplicable sword accessories. Ransack therefore looks an awful lot like Kickback in both modes, and only becomes more so if you apply the alternative head. (Said head goes unmentioned in the documentation, and seemingly exists as a toy-accurate head for Legacy Kickback.) Due to a quirk of design the robot mode and bug mode head are the same thing, just at different angles, so the rounder head is doing the heavy lifting here, although the swords do become a butt extension for bug form. As the mould is basically a 1983 design upscaled and given modern joints, Ransack isn't doing anything especially clever, but they aren't failing at it either. There's probably a third party "not-Ransack" out there that more faithfully updates the 80's original, but in so far as headswaps go, this is entirely acceptable. Decent robot mode, three weapons, not quite the right bug mode, but close enough. 

 

And finally, after a trio of bugs, we have a beetle. Autobot Goldbug was undoubtedly the most desirable of this set, although as a retool of Earthrise Cliffjumper, also the most familiar to me. Who is Goldbug? Well, he's Bumblebee after an emergency repair job and reassignment to the Throttlebots, which obviously didn't stick, but I did have that toy back in the day. The point of interest here is the fully licenced Volkswagen Beetle car mode, which like the boombox version of Soundwave seems to be under some sort of exclusivity arrangement. This is only the second time we've seen this specific toy released, while the original Cliffjumper variation has seen five releases. As a base mould, Cliffjumper was pretty good. A shame about the back-end of the car being a partsforming bit, but pretty good regardless. This means that Goldbug benefits from a strong foundation, I.e. a pleasingly involved transformation and a huggable shape, but if you're not a big Herby and/or Throttlebots fan it's more of a sidegrade than a slamdunk. The new vehicle bits omit 5mm ports, a tangible loss, with the instructions presenting a decidedly compromised alternative for weapon storage. Goldbug retains the modular bazooka/waterski/twin-blaster/random-greebly thing, and as fun as that is, it's very specific to Cliffjumper. Mind you, it looks great in gold, caramel, black, and blue, and the play value is there. Definitely worth a look, but it's very easy to overpay here.

I mean obviously, I didn't. But looking at the eBay listings, a few people have.

The Spare Head Three...

Conclusion

As I lucked out as got this set for 13 quid, it's honestly a little difficult to judge it from any sort of value-for-money metric. I could have had any single one of these for that price and feel quite happy about it. Hell, it was reduced from £45, and that's an objectively good deal as deluxes go for 25 each these days. That leaves broader creativity commentary, and whether or not something has an overt problem. On the overt problem front, only Scorponok has issues. He's not terrible, the vast majority of Generations isn't, but with his engineering and QC, he's in the "fine for now" tier. In terms of grander commentary, I'd say this demonstrates the issues that can occur when moulds are designed to be a specific character, but then reused for different ones. If you do a new head and new paintjob, or if the character is somewhat generic like a seeker, you're usually OK. That largely isn't the case here. For example, Goldbug, as mentioned, has the same accessories as Cliffjumper. These were based on memorable scenes in the Sunbow cartoon, so great for the mould original, but Goldbug never used them, and truthfully Cliffy-J didn't use them more than once. Maybe some small arms for all the other minibots would have been a better call? You could also make the case that Goldbug doesn't actually match his character model; and given how anal-retentive Earthrise was about such things, it's noticeable. You can make similar observations about the other three.

Ultimately, the Creatures Collide set is a multi-pack through and through. There's one you probably want most, but also one you don't, with two you're probably neutral on. As the toys are generally good ones, your choice will likely be based on your budget and how it fits into your collection. I got absurdly lucky with the price, and that three of the moulds were new to me. Regardless, the Creatures Collide set is something that exists. 

 

Also, the week after? I heard Game was offering this has as part of a "2 for £20" offer. Because of course it would :) 

Transformers: Kingdom Core Class Soundwave is Something That Exists

 

The 1984-1986, also 1990, Soundwave toy

I've been wanting an excuse to talk about the modern "core class" Transformers toys for a while. These replaced the rather good Battlemasters, and the often non-good Micromaster twin packs. In terms of overall size and complexity, the Core class is comparable to the old "legends" class last seen in Power of The Primes, although given that they use 3mm fist holes I'd also point at the small toy + micromaster sets circa 2013. Now, I'm predisposed to like Transformers of this type. I like small toys that you can easily fit in a pocket, easily fit in a budget, and easily fidget with on a desk. There is a pleasing simplicity to such things. However, one thing I'm less inclined to like is how the inevitable has happened. Rather than being the domain of small chaps, we had the likes of Optimus Prime right out of the gate. Yes, that was exactly what we needed. Another Prime, another Megatron, and another Starscream to repaint to buggery and back. And within five minutes of Earthrise too. I exaggerate, but not by much. Seeing characters like Iguanus and Spike are a welcome bit of variation, but we've also had two Shockwaves, I have both because I am a sucker, and are in the process of getting new Dinobots. This is not to suggest that these are bad toys, mind you. But with the amount of redundancy going on, one wonders if this is brand consolidation, a lack of imagination, or a just a means of securing trademarks.

What does this mean for Soundwave then? Well it might mean a few things, but he's got his own baggage. Soundwave is subject to exactly the same "daddy, what's a cassette player?" issue Blaster is, please consider this to be a partner piece, but as he's a much more prominent character, he's had a few more tries. What's weird about this presently there is indeed a modern tape version, the mould mate to the Siege "flying brick" iteration, but that seems be locked behind an exclusivity agreement. As it stands, the Core class version may very well be the only easy way to get a "classic" Soundwave in recent years. Other than that, you'd have to track down a Titans Return version, or hope for Studio Series to do a new mould, like they did with Ironhide.

Let's mix things up a bit, and start with the robot mode. This more than anything is the bit they had to get right, and I think the designers probably focused on it. When it comes to a basic likeness, we are in the realms of functionally ideal for the size, although there is a tension here between budget and looks. There's a few avoidable cavities here, like the back of his head. I wonder if he was meant to have a panel for transformation purposes, but it was cut. Soundwave does have both his gun and shoulder launcher, a luxury on a toy this size, if both being hollow too. These also store on his legs, each with a dedicated port, and can actually stay there during conversion, a nice touch. What makes the accessory situation here remarkable though is that the tape door actually opens to reveal a non-converting Laserbeak in tape mode. This is made from the same translucent plastic as the door, but is lavishly painted on one side. Again, more than they needed to do, welcome, but with an obvious cut corner. Articulation meanwhile is adequate to good. There's effective use of ball joints, and while the waist is omitted, he's actually got moving skirt armour, so the buttons don't limit the legs. So, yeah, pretty good robot mode for the price. 

 

 

Putting him into tapedeck mode is where we start running into weaknesses that can't be solely attributed to the budget, and to put this into context, I'm gonna talk about the original 80's version for a bit. Generally speaking, 80's Transformers haven't aged too well in the areas of articulation and conversion. It was early days, the technology wasn't there yet. Once you get into late G2 and the beast era, you start seeing more toys with ball joints and posability as a desired aim, and they hold up. Articulation, transformation, budget and the balance between those three is a solved problem. Soundwave was one of the rare exceptions in that his conversion scheme allowed for some articulation, and if you followed that scheme, and just put joints in the obvious places, you’d have a nicely posable toy. Also, the idea of a tiny Soundwave has already been done. Takara's Smallest Transforming Transformers version shrunk down the toy to a height of two inches with very little functional loss. So, the designers had the advantage of good source material, a previous attempt that took it to the edge, and most importantly, the forgiving requirement that he turn into a box. Behold. 

 

Yes, those are his little tosey-woseys sticking out of the top. Seriously guys. So close, and yet, so far. I don't know what the thought process was here, but I have my suspicions. Here's the thing, if you spin the feet 180 degrees on the ball joint, so heels become toes, the foot sticks out exactly as far to the front as the normal way. It's undetailed, but you are loosing nothing in the ankle by doing this. Was this the original idea? Just have those panels spin around and form the feet?  Did someone decide to make the feet look better at the last moment? Or was something cut in favour of his accessory count? I have no proof, but if someone told me that was the case, I'd believe them. This is a crying shame, because otherwise, it's ideal. The altmode has been harmed so the most forgettable bit of the robot form can look better.

 

My point? Only that Kingdom Core class Soundwave is something that exists. And while he's a bit of a frustrating near miss at times, he has still managed to stay on my desk...

Transformers: The Legacy of Siege

So, after Legacy Impactor was announced, and the discourse that followed, I found myself thinking about War for Cybertron: Siege again. It was something I've thought about writing on before, what that toy line was, and what it proved to be. So, today, I talk about Siege’s legacy. Which, of course, isn’t the same as Transformers: Legacy, but does include the new Legacy line. Don’t worry, it will make sense.

Context

Coming under the Generations banner, War for Cybertron: Siege was advertised at the time, as well, a War For Cybertron, the first of a 3 part franchise set on the home-world of the Transformers. This wasn’t the first time they did this, but you might ask why not? Its fun. This was coming after the disappointing and truncated Power of the Primes line, too, it looked promising. Seemingly hurried to the US market in late 2018, early 2019 elsewhere, there was barely a gap between the two. Siege got a lot of respect for its play features, but also criticism for its muddy battle-damage look, and also a bit of a heavy focus on G1 characters. There was a lot of that happening at the time, with the Bumblebee movie going quite G1, and Cyberverse using similar cast. This was then shortly followed by Earthrise, and Kingdom, whom did many of the same characters again, often with iterative retools, reused engineering, and old toys in new boxes. The specifically Siege toys became repaint fodder, which happened in bulk for the Netflix cartoon, as well as more recent examples like TakaraTomy’s Premium Finish line and the aforementioned Impactor. As a result: Siege is reasonably described as a stopgap and a repaint mine. How many repaints, you ask? Well, I went and ran the numbers. I got out a spreadsheet, and trawled the wiki. Here are my findings.

Distinct Siege moulds: 49

Uses so far/pending: 161

Not counting: blast effects, unchanged TakaraTomy releases.

Assuming: ER Prime is a retool, but ER Smokescreen is not.

The 2019 Seeker 3 pack

The Generations Grab-bag

The thing about Generations and similar collector lines is that it can lack a strong theme. It's a melange of homage and updates, and the extent which there is a solid unified theme has varied over the years, even when going back further into the old C.H.U.G days. In the time of Combiner Wars and Titans Return it was notably strong, but more typically Generations operates as a grab-bag, usually a few big names, but with obscure stuff around the edges, and maybe some new stuff if we’re lucky. The thing about Siege is that it talks a big game about its theme, but when you actually look at, its all set dressing. Its actually a Generations Grab-Bag. We must ask ourselves the following: which toys in Siege explicitly and unambiguously have a Cybertronian vehicle form? And is this vehicle form distinct from their Earth form, or what might be considered their "iconic" appearance? I put it to you that only three-maybe-four moulds of the forty-nine actually started out as purpose built pre-earth designs. The rest were either late-G1 characters that were sci-fi vehicles in the first place, and/or characters fated to be released again in Earthrise 18 months later with a face-lift. The Starscream and Soundwave moulds are the only toys that actually tried to have new & alien vehicle modes, and not an especially good one in 'wave's case. You could argue Shockwave, but that gets a little muddy as shockers largely doesn't have an earth mode and isn't allowed to be a gun any more. The aforementioned Impactor is a similar case, he’s never had an Earth mode as a comic original, but then he does have that odd habit now of being repeatedly retooled into himself. Overall, Siege doesn't hit the same visual style as the conceptually identical War for Cybertron and Fall of Cybertron video game toys, which had gone hard on the alien-ness, so almost everything could fit unobtrusively into a "neo-G1" collection and truthfully many would not look that out of place as an Earth mode. And then Earthrise came along with functionally the same toys, but with a better defined cartoon look, and made a whole whack of stuff obsolete, often via exclusives which were hard to get. This understandably annoyed people. And then we got the Netflix branded Siege stuff, which cost a little bit more and tried to be more cartoon accurate…why? So, even if you liked the Siege moulds, they got obsoleted again, and if you missed them the first time, there’s now a confused market with a bunch of overlapping toys. Did the cartoon get delayed or something? Because this is an inelegant way to do things.

The 2019 Siege Sideswipe toy

The New Autobot Seeker

To illustrate my point of how generic a lot of Siege moulds are, I'm going to talk about possibly the most aggressively re-used toy of Siege, Sideswipe. It's a perfectly fine toy in most ways, and actually a favourite of mine. I am not especially a car fan, but that is not a Cybertronian altmode. That looks more like a legally distinct Lamborghini. Or any super car stand-in. Car modes such as these are the bread & butter of Transformers in general. The thing is, we already had a pre-earth Sideswipe, and that wasn't a great toy, but that a least that made an attempt to be alien. Siege Sideswipe fits in everywhere, because a specific style is harder to reuse. And then it got retooled into something more specifically G1 for an exclusive, as well as nine other things. The whole Cybertronian theme never was a serious effort. It was a stopgap. Siege exists mainly as a reset point for Generations, lessons learned from Combiner Wars etc, setting a new design standard and laying the groundwork for a repaint-based business model. Because if you didn't like the battle damage paintjobs in Siege, almost immediately you'd be able to get a cleaner version, and it would likely be a limited release too. And if you liked the dirt, well, there’s Netflix, innit? Why does Hasbro do this? Well, its basically a cost saving measure, and you can see similar things in their action figure lines. For example, with their Marvel stuff they get away with base moulds for the varying body types, call ‘em “Brawny”, “Skinny”, and so on. It makes a lot of sense, especially when certain characters recur. And since a lot of people like the G1 guys and try to have a complete seeker team, we were easy marks for it. Just look at Kingdom if you need more examples. The downside is that Transformers are inherently more involved as toys, so its more obvious, and you end up with a self-confirming loop. Only only certain characters sell, because that’s only what is sold most of the time.

Eh, that’s capitalism for you. However...

 

 

The 2012 FOC Sideswipe toy

The Legacy of Siege is not Just Repaints

So, if Siege failed to deliver on its theme, what did it deliver on? Play value, posability, and general quality. Siege toys were legitimate fun to play with, and added entirely news concepts to the brand. It popularised the use of 5mm ports for accessories, and while the basic idea wasn't new, the execution and standardisation was praiseworthy. Factoring into that was a revolutionary new style of Transformers, the Weaponizer, who made full use of those ports, and the toys were robust enough to take the added weight. These embraced partsforming to provide a toy whose job it was to be made of guns, and if you don't think that's fun, I can't help you. Finally, there the Battlemasters whom brought their beloved blast effects to the table. So, while the words Cybertron & Siege in the title were questionable, at least the word War made sense. And because I don’t want this article to be just about repaints, I’m going to talk about each price-point a bit.

 

The 2019 Siege Rung Toy

BattleMasters

Famous for the blast effects mentioned above, these were inexpensive little dudes that turned into weapons, and came with little translucent explosions. They were a joy. While this price-point would see a lot of variety with new characters, melee weapons and Rung getting his first toy, it was front-loaded with orphaned targetmasters to go with toys from Titans Return, in another example of the Generations Grab-Bag. Its a tragedy that Earthrise replaced them with ramps, and Kingdom dumped the idea entirely.

 

The 2019 Storm Cloud & Visper toys

Micromasters

There's no delicate way to put this, but these failed. The teams were cut down from four members to two, and given a largely unconvincing combined weapon mode. The individual toys meanwhile offered little posability or visual improvement over the late-G1 originals, and largely didn’t commit to the theme. Soundwave's menagerie also ended up here, and I don't know hard I should be on those as they just had to turn into a slab, but I'd say Laserbeak did alright, while Ravage was overfed. If you’re into Micromasters, they aren’t bad, but if you aren’t? Stick to Storm Cloud & Visper.

 

The 2019 Siege Cog toy

Deluxes

All killer, no filler. The toys featured here are notably consistent performers across the board, with the possible exception of Chromia, only marked by distribution woes and the occasional QC fault. Pick your fave, then pick a weaponizer, and you’ll have a good time. Add a Battlemaster for a fantastic time. Its mostly Autobots, but the Deceptions are a good bunch of chaps too.

 

 

The 2019 Siege Soundwave toy

Voyagers

This price-point is probably the one going the hardest on the whole “Cybertron is supposed to be a messy warzone” thing, featuring some big names, and most of them looking pretty sci-fi. Unfortunately, as characters like Optimus Prime and Starscream live here, successive re-releases and over-exposure makes the toys of this slot less appealing. They aren’t bad, but don’t pay too much. Notable exceptions include Apeface, whom has not been re-released, and the Megatron which I feel came out better than the Earthrise version. There’s also a Springer with the misfortune of following arguably the best voyager of all time. He’s OK though.

 

The 2019 Siege Galaxy Upgrade Optimus Prime toy

Leaders

At the time, many people felt that these were merely voyagers with more accessories, something typified by the Shockwave and later Astrotrain releases. Its not an unreasonable view, given overall design, and the general vibe of “biggish dude armouring up into bigger dude”. That overshadows the actual merits of the price-point though. The Ultra Magnus brought back the long-absent inner robot gimmick, and paid tribute to the 2001 RID version at the same time. Its nicer than all the subsequent versions, TBH. Galaxy Upgrade Optimus Prime brought a welcome bit of Unicron Trilogy to events, and you’d have to very grumpy not to appreciate the four-arms-but-only-one-hand super mode of Shockwave. And to bring up the matter of theme again, Astrotrain is a steam engine with a coal tender. On Cybertron. Just saying.

 

The 2019 Omega Supreme toy

Big Boys: Commander & Titan

This is a slot that I regret my own inexperience with. Jetfire and Omega Supreme where however well-received, so I assume they’re good if you can find them. Omega is currently unique, too.

 

The 2019 "Final Strike Figure Series" artwork

Concurrent Exclusives

Sorry, gotta talk about repaints again. There were 12 concurrent exclusive releases, of which 7 were multipacks, usually if 3 or 4 toys of the straight repaint variety. Generations Select had a further 9 solo releases, and TakaraTomy did a Nemesis Prime. As Starscream was present, this group included the seekers, and similar common repaint candidates and army builders. This trend would continue into Earthrise, and would generate much of the general annoyance discussed earlier. There was also more oddball stuff though, like the Powerdashers, a well-regarded toy-style Refraktor set. The Hot Shot repaint/retool is another personal fave here, but maybe don’t get Slamdance. He breaks.

Conclusion

Transformers in the modern sense largely starts with Siege, and its legacy is that of a bunch of good toys, basically ran into the ground. There’s not much actually bad in the line, as everything is fun to play with and holds up well. The problem is that it was immediately followed by Earthrise. Earthrise was certainly more pleasing to certain sets of the fanbase, and a worthy sequel, but it made people regret buying into Siege like an early adopter. More so after the Netflix business. The extensive use and reuse of Siege moulds, either as repaints or retools or suspiciously similar engineering, has devalued them. This is a real shame, as Siege is generally excellent outside of the Micromasters, and even they have an appeal. I actually kinda miss it, and hope Legacy can live up to it in every sense of the word.