Phil's ROTF Movie Repaints Review

[Philip Ayres]

The eye of Phil has turned towards some of the Movie toys repainted in Revenge of the Fallen......

[Philip Ayres]

Longarm

How many Transformer Tow Trucks can you think of ? G1 Hoist, all the variations on Wrecker Hook, perhaps a micromaster.... checks: No, unless Excavator counts. And I'm not sure Clench does either. And that's about it. So high time for a new one.

Longarm is a character that's not in the film but I'm told his vehicle mode is seen towing Bumblebee away. The mainly white truck with a blue front end has some in joke signage detail on it, a moving hook and a slightly oddly positioned lightbar that looks like it should be on top of the cab but isn't.

TF: This way is fine. Going back is a problem ! Fold the hook on top of the tow arm and flatten. Fold the doors upwards to the sides. Unclip the back bumper and fold out so it points behind the vehicle. Fold the rear side panels out to the sides, and then back along the mid side panels. Fold the bumper halves flat against this. Fold the rear halves of the silver flatbed to the sides. The instructions then show the front of the car being pulled out, but that doesn't do it justice: Wiggle the bonnet up a bit pull down on the rear of the sides of the front of the car - up to where the doors are - which starts to straighten the knees and in turn lets you swing legs down at the hips inside the front of the vehicle. Straighten out a the front of the vehicle with the legs fully extended. Turn the truck over so you can see the underside and then bend the bonnet forward and up as far as it will go. Fold back the black pieces under the middle and back of the bonnet. Fold the front of the bonnet itself into the foot and lock with the black pieces, and then fold the foot into position at the ankles. Pull his left arm (on your right) slightly away from the gun between the 2 arms, and fold the gun out upwards. Bend both arms down at the shoulder so they point straight out in front of him. Fold back the flatbed halves on his shoulders. Swing each shoulder part out to the side - they pivot within the body, but at the same time fold the actual shoulder in on it's ball joint. Bring both halves of the lightbar together and fold forward onto the front of the gun.

The reverse TF is where it all goes wrong - trying to get the front bonnet to fit back together is a nightmare - there 2 tabs at the sides that don't want to slide into place and when the do you have difficulty folding the doors back to lock the 2 halves of the vehicles together. Rather trying.

Resulting robot is perhaps a little oddly proportioned with huge legs, a very small lower body and huge upper body but it works. Head reminds me of Tankorr somehow, but the combination of the white, silver of the chest and blue on the arms and upper legs reminds me overall of the colour scheme for RID Ultra Magnus (which is odd considering the trouble I had returning it to vehicle mode) In fact you could see this as a pretty decent Magnus toy - the big gun makes me think of Magnus the soldier. Chest design looks like it's got a drone eye in the middle of it. His most obvious feature is the cannon attached to his right hand - screwed in I'm afraid. Looks like it aught to have been pegged but they discovered this caused problems late in the day and had to attach it. So all comments about the right arm must include the caveat that the cannon restricts it. There are 2 bending joints in a long ankle, a bending knee joint high on the legs, ball jointed hips, a very restricted ball joint bid chest, a fold at the base of the neck and a ball joint at the top, ball jointed shoulders, double folding elbows - lower joint is v stiff, and a ball jointed wrist which has it's movement out restricted. You can get some good poses out of his with the gun folded across his chest and supported with his left hand.

Overall: Superior to most movie deluxe toys. Can't put my finger on why but it just works for me. Wouldn't look out of place with the RID car brothers ! Well worth getting.

Longarm was a wave 4 Movie deluxe toy with Final Battle Jazz. He was sold in Japan as Movie toy numbered MA-15. He was also released as Screen Battles: Final Stand Longarm (the vehicle mode of the toy *is* in the film) with a Bumblebee action figure. This set was released in Japan numbered SB-02.

Revenge of the Fallen Hoist

Hoist appears in a VS set exclusive to Toys R Us that also contains Mixmaster a Constructicon green recolour of the ROTF Voyager Mixmaster.

If you were betting on a Longarm repaint then good money would say it would be like G1 Hoist. It's a little hard to give a straight set of colour swaps but we'll try:

Longarm's blue on the arms and legs becomes grey for Hoist.
Longarm's silver becomes metallic green for Hoist.
Most of Longarm's black becomes dark green for Hoist. The exceptions are the ankle joints and the gun which become grey.
The white of the gun becomes goldy beige.
The rest of the white becomes dark green - same as the black.
The clear orange of the eyes, lightbar, headlights and missile are now clear yellow
The clear windscreen panels are now clear blue

Now we have the toy in Hoist colours it's amazing how much the heads are alike - both have the vented side panels, both have a faceplate and from there it's a simple matter to paint it right. The folded up vehicle panels on the Longarm mould mirror the bulky shoulders of the original Hoist as do the sometimes spindly legs.

Cracking repaint, a suitable Hoist for your Classics/Universe collection. Seeing as the set it's in has been reduced at TRU to £20 you really have no excuse !

[Philip Ayres]

Movie Wreckage

The rest of my first wave Movie deluxe toys showed up this morning. We'll start with Wreckage. I'm not 100% sure he's in the film (He's not - the only first wave toy that isn't)

He's a sort of armoured personnel carrier/assault vehicle. What he really reminds me of is Cybertron Red Alert without the missile - big and chunky 8 wheeled military vehicle done in a white and grey urban camo scheme. There's a cannon sitting up dead centre on the vehicle. His weapons do get stored in the vehicle mode - pull the back up, fold the top and back forward over the gun and fold down the side/top panels about 1/3 of the way from the back to the front. Fold the weapons up in the middle and then slot them into the folded down panels - the curved section with the screw in on the weapon fits the curved cut-out in the panel - I'd have the screws facing up. Fold the panels and weapons back up and lock the top and back down. The weapons fill a gap in the vehicle mode and add a couple of extra gun barrels. Overall the vehicle is very solid if lacking in the clearance department.

TF: Be wary - some of the bits on mine were very stiff on first TF. Excessive force was required. It's also good to note certain features on the way out when you reverse the TF. To start raise the back - this has got 2 clips which align onto the robot legs underneath, then the top, fold down the panels described above and remove the weapons. Pull the feet out from under the car and straighten the lower legs out the back. Fold the feet into a more natural position and then separate the legs - there's a slot and peg arrangement for holding them together. Pull the wrists away from the underside of the car and pull out slightly on the elbows. The shoulders need TFing now and they're on a double ball joint so you want to pull out to the side and raise upwards at the same time - here's a diagram of what it should look like:

Before:
0
I
0

After
0-0

It'll make sense when you see the toy.

Fold the vehicle gun into his back - which now points through the chest and out through a red barrel in his lower chest - this should auto TF the head and chest but mine needed the folding down chest piece loosened. A lot. Clip the back of the vehicle into the rear of the shoulder blades. Flip out the weapons - sword blades - attach and pose.

The resulting robot is tall and quite thin on the limb department. Said limbs are a reddy orange not seen on the vehicle mode with hands, feet and mid limb joints in grey. There's a distinct beast machines vibe going on and I mean that in a good way. Head's got a red lightpipe but the eyes are so small it's not that effective. At All. Which is a shame because he's got a very good face, which is excellent by movie standards. Articulation - Wooo ! Ball jointed ankle, jointed knee, ball jointed hip, a waist (slightly restricted), the aforementioned ball jointed shoulders, a double bending elbow (so can put his hands on his shoulders) a rotating hand (very restricted) and a neck joint. The shoulder and the arm articulation is the tops. Weapons can be help - he's got a movie style hand but if you look closely it's been molded round a standard peg hole formed between the thumb and index finger. Where are my Minicon weapons ? There's also peg holes for them under the arms, and they can be holstered by folding out the panels on the side of the legs. And - if you really want to - you can peg the weapons into the hub of the wheels. You may be able to see why this is a bad idea. The Bumblebee designers didn't and we'll be coming back to this later. About the only complaints I have is the joint between the shoulders and the back being a tad loose and the lightpipe eyes not being better.

Overall: I like this toy. Ticks the boxes for me. Buy it.

Wreckage is a Wave 1 Movie Deluxe toy. He was available in Japan as Movie toy MD-10.

Revenge of the Fallen Bludgeon

Bludgeon appears in a Toys R Us Exclusive VS pack with Whirl who is a repaint of Movie Evac who is in turn a remould of Movie Blackout

Bludgeon is a relatively simple colour swap of Wreckage but some of the swaps help to illustrate which parts are moulded with which:

Clear orange becomes clear purple
White (bar the robot's chest) becomes green and looses the camouflage pattern
Orange plus the robot's chest & the grey used for the waist, head & feet becomes brown
Grey - the elbows, knees and hands - becomes black.

It's a fine looking repaint which takes it's colours - the green & brown plus the purple for the gun on the chest - from the inner robot for Pretender Bludgeon. Those wanting a toy looking more like the outer shell should buy the Movie NEST Voyager Decepticon Bludgeon.

[Philip Ayres]

Movie Scorponok

This toy falls into the fun toy category. Bear this in mind and you'll get along better with it. Turn up expecting the latest collectors masterpiece made plastic and you will be disappointed. You'll like Wreckage a lot better than this.

You might also want to bear in mind that only the beast appears in the film. The robot mode had to be formed from what they had on screen.

Scorponok is - yet again - a Scorpion. Several previous appearances - Headmaster (along with a Masterforce repaint), Beast Wars and Energon (with a Cybertron repaint) go before this one. This is the smallest Scorponok being only a deluxe. It captures robot Scorpion well in a Beast Machines type way - imagine a Vehicon scorpion. The top of the tail swings round and pivots up and down, there are 2 more joints on the tail, and another swivel at the base. The 6 legs are unarticulated. The arms have universal joints at the shoulders, a swivel at the bicep, a bending elbow and each arm ends in a 3 part claw. If the words "egg whisk" aren't going through your mind when you see this then you're too young and are thinking about a food processor. However everything above the elbow can nestle snugly against the head in beast mode limiting the articulation to the elbow and below.

Scorponok is gifted with 2 action features. His tail sting is basically a restricted missile, click the button and it jumps forward. Bar far the more impressive is the claws. Roll Scorponok along a flat surface and motion is transmitted to the claws from a wheel underneath. Egg Whisk action ! The claws spin really quite fast. You can see some gearing moving in the body of the scorpion as you push him along but it seems to serve no functional purpose. What does is the 2 5mm peg holes in his back, and the hexagonal cog at the base of the tail - these attach to the underside of Blackout allowing Scorponok's claw gimmick to be powered by the mechanism for Blackout's rotors. Unfortunately the claw speed is a lot slower when powered this way.

TF: Pull the Scorpion legs and their base away from the side of the beast and fold down. Fold down the face. Pose the arms. That's it

Robot mode looks like some demented beetle or Doctor Who monster. V short legs, visible tail and undercarriage mechanics, odd 4 eyed head, and big arms with articulation as outlined earlier. Which is a marvel when you consider the power for the claw gimmick is being delivered inside the arms. It'll win no beauty awards but it's functional and you can easily imagine a drone army of these - like the Scrapmetal

Overall: I like it. I like the gimmick, I like the combination and the robot mode works for me in a certain way. But it ain't gonna be everyone's cup of tea.

Scorponok is a wave 1 Movie Deluxe toy. He was sold in Japan as Movie toy numbered MD-04. Scorponok was also sold in a 2-pack with Blackout. A very similar version was sold as Screen Battles: Desert Attack Scorponok with posed figures of soldiers Donnelly, Epps & Figueroa. This set was available in Japan numbered SB-03. A smaller non articulated version of Scorponok is included with Movie Blackout.

Revenge of the Fallen Stalker Scorponok

Stalker Scorponok's colour scheme is quite different from the silver and bronze used for the original. Broadly speaking silver plastic becomes black and bronze plastic becomes grey. Some of the paint applications - the eyes, shoulders and the fans inside the claws - are now red. The influence behind this colour change probably comes from Beast Wars Scorponok who in turn is probably evolved from the paint scheme used for Masterforce Black Zarak.

Nice repaint - always good to see some Beast Wars love.

Movie Blackout is also repainted for Revenge of the Fallen into Grindor. The Scorponok minifigure with the toy is also repainted into the black colours used for Stalker Scorponok.

[Philip Ayres]

Blackout

As many of you will know I'm not that keen on the Movie toys - the overall design aesthetic doesn't appeal to me. Transformers have a look to them - especially in the faces - and many of the movie toys don't have that look to my mind. However there are some that work better for me, usually ones that have names that haven't been used or used prominently before. Blackout is one.

Helicopters are flying machines that are used by the military. So an ideal vehicle mode for Decepticons. But for some reason the helicopter is the one flying vehicle I associate more with the Autobots. I mean look at how few Decepticon Helicopters there have there been over the years:

Blackout is a blue/grey Sikorsky Pave Low. Well I assume that's what it is as that's what's credited on the box. Yes, Wikpedia agrees. It's a 6 bladed helicopter, the rotor of which is on a crank via a push button on the rear of the tail, you know the form here. Lots of molded on weapons detail. Of especial note are TWO MINICON POSTS on each wing (Yes !) I've tried the Classics Minicon tank on it and the rotor blades just cleared it. Nice touch. There's a bay at the back of the helicopter for storing a mini Scorponok animal mode in - think decoy size - which has a small button on the back of the bay to drop the mini Scorps out of. The full sized deluxe Scorponok can be pegged to the underside of the vehicle - repeatedly cranking the Helicopter blades can power Scorponok's spinning claw gimmick. That was enough to sell me a Scorponok to go with this.

The transformation is a bit of a nightmare: unpeg mini Scorp's cage and swing it round onto the top of the tailfin and repeg it into place. Fold the rotor blades together into 2 sets of 3. Fold the cabin roof out to the sides. Fold the arms down from under the wings, turn out to the sides, fold the rear of the wings (connected to the arms) up and fold the hands down. Unpeg the side panels connected to the wings and fold back. Fold the undercarriage down to form the legs - this should in theory Auto TF the cab into the chest and head. In Theory. It's shafted on my toy. Rotate at the waist, fold the legs to the sides at the knees, fold the feet down, open the flap at the back, fold the heal spurs down and close the flaps up. There's a folding join connecting the robot's back with the blade section - concertina that up and then clip the side panels of the middle of the helicopter onto the sides of the cab. Position the arms out and fold the roof halves into place so the missiles are revealed - either separately to the sides covering the minicon ports or together in the centre above the head.

The robot relies on you have clicked and aligned lots of bits together - I've seen transformations that are a lot easier to get right. The movies design aesthetic comes through on the face mainly but apart from that he'd happily sit with other older Transformers robots. He's got knees, rotation above the knees, universal hips, a waist, shoulders fore and aft and to the sides, a bicep, elbow, wrist and neck joints. The head is lightpiped which is always a plus. He's got no obvious hand weapons but the entire rotor and tail assembly can be removed and loosely held as a rather buly weapon. The Minicon ports from the Helicopter have ended up on the shoulders of the robot mode which is idealling placed for mounting some of the missile launching Minicons like the Land Millitary team. The robot's head is mounted lower down than the recently released Voyager Classic Megatron, but the rotor structure pushes the toy's overall height up above the previous toy.

Overall: Good toy. Bonus points for minicon ports and combining with Scorponok. It's a panel pegging nightmare though !

Black out was available as a Voyager toy - numbered MD-01 in Japan - and in a 2-pack with Deluxe Scorponok. There's also Premium Blackout which retouches the colour scheme slightly.

Evac

The problem with Blackout is he's an evil looking toy, especially the face in robot mode, while the obviously military feel of the vehicle mode doens't help. So how do you make an Autobot from it ? Solution - recolor & remould. The grey is swapped for a mixture of orange and white with the black becoming grey to give the helicopter a Coast Guard rescue theme. For the robot we get a new head, shaped more like a traditional robot with helmet head that comes complete with a new lightpiped visor. The robot gets new hands complete with a traditional 5mm peg hole, making it easier to hold the rotor blades weapon mode.

We loose the mini Scorponok included with Blackout but gain in it's place a tent shaped life raft which can be dropped from the bay at the back that used to contain Scorponok. The life raft also transforms: a 5mm peg folds out the top of the tent enabling Evac to hold it as a weapon - the floats on the underside of the raft become missiles this way up with two gun barrels in the middle being revealed.

Evac is one of the better Movie repaints. So naturally he was in the Voyager wave due appear after Christmas 2007 that was skipped in the UK.

Grindor

The original Blackout mould returns for the Revenge of the Fallen line recoloured as Grindor. Grindor is a relatively simple colour swap with the blue/grey becoming an off white.

Not something you need to bother with if you've got a previous version of this toy.

Whirl

Whirl - named after the 1985 Deluxe Autobot Whirl (a repaint of the Dorvack 1/55 Ovelon Gazzette toy licensed from Takatoku Toys) - appears in the Toys R Us exclusive Master of Metallikato VS pack with Bludgeon (a repaint of Movie Wreckage).

Whirl is a reuse of the modified Blackout mould used for Evac above. The dark blue colours on this toy's helicopter mode are more inspired by Universe Whirl rather than the predominantly light blue of the original. The robot reveals arms, legs, waist & head that are light blue making this mode coloured more like the original version.

This pack is currently reduced at Toys R Us, the Bludgeon is decent and it's your only chance to buy the modified Blackout in the UK.

[legios]

Jun 16, 2010 13:48:25 GMT Philip Ayres said:

Movie Wreckage

We'll start with Wreckage. I'm not 100% sure he's in the film (He's not - the only first wave toy that isn't)

He's a sort of armoured personnel carrier/assault vehicle.

Specifically a Stryker - the US Army's new chassis of choice for.... well there is a variant for just about everything, Wreckage is the baseline infantry carrier version.

I have a great soft spot for this mold, one of the few movie toys I have a strong liking for. I think it is perhaps because the design aesthetic isn't really that movie-like. Even the head is much more humanoid than really fits in properly with the rest of the movie line. Nice weapons too, we have had plenty of the usual swords and axes over the years, but the bladed tonfa are an interesting excursion in to new territory.

How is your Bludgeon in terms of build quality? I ask because mine is plagued by a lot of ejector and sprue-cutting marks, and the parts fit is a little bit iffy (he seems to suffer more clearance problems than I remember my Wreckage haing as well), and I ws wondering if I just have a bad one or if the whole run is iffy.

Karl

[legios]

Jun 16, 2010 18:35:44 GMT Philip Ayres said:

Whirl

Whirl - named after the 1985 Deluxe Autobot Whirl (a repaint of the Dorvack 1/55 Ovelon Gazzette toy licensed from Takatoku Toys) - appears in the Toys R Us exclusive Master of Metallikato VS pack with Bludgeon (a repaint of Movie Wreckage).

Whirl is a reuse of the modified Blackout mould used for Evac above. The dark blue colours on this toy's helicopter mode are more inspired by Universe Whirl rather than the predominantly light blue of the original.

I'm not sure if it is deliberate but those colours could also be a homage to the source of the original Whirl toy. I seem to remember that Louise Oberon's Gazette in Armoured Trooper Dorvack being primarily dark blue with the light blue as a trim colour. (I think that the 'mook' versions were blue-grey or some other non-descript colour).

I actually quite like this repaint. The remoulded head goes a long way to changing the overall look of the toy but I think that it makes a creditable reimagining of Whirl - it even has a built in gun and missile tubes to match up with the original. A shame about the basket gimmick which doesn't look quite right to me glommed onto the back of the vehicle mode. I think I would have prefered it if we had got the Evac version, but as a double-pack with Bludgeon I think it is good buy really.

Karl

[The Doctor]

Hoist is great but Mixmaster is such a turd so it would be paying £20 for one deluxe for me!

-Ralph

[blueshift]

Jun 20, 2010 11:26:12 GMT The Doctor said:

Hoist is great but Mixmaster is such a turd so it would be paying �20 for one deluxe for me!

-Ralph

Part of me really wants to own the Mixmaster figure since it looks so terrible.

But the other, bigger part of me is all "NO"

[The Doctor]

It's just not fun to play with. I'd rather have the RPM version!

-Ralph