Post by Philip Ayres on Mar 22, 2012 10:47:19 GMT
Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Megatron
We went into why Phil didn't buy the Beast Wars anniversary Optimus Primal when we reviewed that. Megatron was more of a close run thing: he doesn't have a hyper huge useless accessory like Prime's surfboard and the original Ultra has some more obvious faults that can be improved on.
As a consequence of using all the plastic on the main toy Megatron's beast mode is much bigger than Prime's, bringing him most of the way to the old mega sized toys. I've not got a Transmetal Megatron to hand to check how big they are in relation to each other but they look a similar size. He's a similar pinkish colour to the original Megatron Ultra. He's got an opening jaw, sadly not with the original's water pistol gimmick. The small arms are ball jointed at the shoulders while the legs are ball jointed at the hips plus bending knees, ankles, toes & heel spurs. The tail is solid and unarticulated but houses the toy's gimmick: slide a Planet chip into the slot under the tail and the top of the tail springs up revealing a missile launcher underneath. Yes, that means he has a missile launcher sticking out of his bottom!
TRANSFORMATION: Separate the chest in front of the shoulders and fold the halves of the body out to the sides. Fold back the flap over the top of the neck. Pull the tail back & down to separate it from the body, then pull the tail off the robot's hand. Fold the underside of the robot's body back. Rotate the robot's body 90 degrees so the robot's head points out the front of the toy. Fold the panels on the side of the beast's underside round the robot's shoulder. Fold the head forward and then the chest back. Fold the beast head arm down and pose all four limbs. Place the tail in the robot's left hand.
This Megatron is a slightly odd robot, much less bulky than you'd expect given the dinosaur. he's the same height as Primal, which is a surprise, and most of that is in the legs which seem disproportionately large thanks to the massive beast thigh panels which I'm forever catching on his body. Literally the tops of the thigh panels clear his arm pits by a matter of a couple of millimetres! His legs have the same articulation as the beast legs, but he gains a turning waist, ball jointed neck, turning shoulders, arms that raise to the sides within the shoulders, high bicep joints & bending elbows. The Dinosaur head arm turns at the base of the head but the other arm has no wrist. Instead there's a 5mm peg hole on the forearm and another between the claw at the end of the arm which allows him to hold his tail/missile launcher or any other 5mm peg weapon. A nice improvement there: the original Ultra has no hands, just the water pistol dinosaur head and the crank operated claw.
Now we're in robot mode we can see what parts are coloured how more clearly:
Pinky/purple: Toes, feet, lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, robot back panels/dinosaur body & arms
Black: thighs, head, upper limbs
Purple: missile. hips, chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, inner right shoulder, right lower arm, weapon handle, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm
Red: tongue & eyes
Overall: love the beast mode. Robot mode is good, but doesn't quite hit the spot. Needs a larger upper body/arms and to loose the the thigh guards.
Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Megatron was sold in the USA in 2006 accompanied by a model of the Darksyde, the Predacon spaceship. It was not sold in the UK or Japan.
Cybertron Megatron
Shortly afterwards a recoloured version of Megatron was released in the Transformers Cybertron toyline.
Plastic colour swaps on this toy are:
Pinky/purple (Toes, feet, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, robot back panels/dinosaur body & arms) become olive green
Pinky/purple (lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist) become dark green
Black becomes bluey purple
Purple (missile, hips, inner right shoulder, right lower arm , weapon handle) becomes bronzey gold
Purple (chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm) becomes brown
Red stays the same.
Looking at the toy you might be thinking "these colours are slightly familiar". And you'd be right. They were previously used on Armada Predacon, a repaint of Transmetal Megatron. It's a decent repaint but I've never been able to get hold of one at a decent price.
Cybertron Megatron was released in 2006 in the USA but not released in the UK or Japan.
Botcon Cindersaur
Are you sitting comfortably?
Then we'll begin.
Once upon a time there were three little Decepticons called Cindersaur, Flamefeather & Sparkstalker. They did everything together. They made their comics début in the same frame, they were released in the US & the UK together. They even went to Japan together when they become the Destrons Guzzle, Flamefeather & Javil.
Then in 1994 Hasbro held the great big Generation 2 party and everyone wanted to go and get bright new colours and clear plastic and everything. But on that day a sad thing happened: the three Firecons didn't get an invite to the big American party and even though Flamefeather & Sparkstalker were given their new bright clear colours in the UK poor Cindersaur was left out :-(
Ahhhhhh, Poor Cindersaur.
Then in 2010 the Transformers Collectors Club decided to do a Generation 2 themed boxset for their convention. They heard what had happened to Cindersaur and thought "right, it's time we righted this wrong and gave Cindersaur some Generation 2 colours. And since he's had to wait sixteen years for them, he can have a new larger form as well!" So they gave him Beast Wars 10th anniversary Megatron's body.
Get your sunglasses out. It is, after all, a Generation 2 homage:
Pinky/purple (Toes, feet, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist) become blue
Pinky/purple (dinosaur body sides, arms an tail top) become clear dark blue
Black becomes lime green
Purple (missile, hips, inner right shoulder, right lower arm , weapon handle) becomes grey
Purple (chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm) becomes purple
Red stays the same.
It's a decent Generation 2 style repaint..... as in the combination of colours is completely shocking. I might suggest though, given G2 Flamefeather & Sparkstalker , that they didn't go far enough with the clear blue plastic.
United Beast Megatron
When UN-30 Optimus Primal was released in the Transformers United toyline he was, for all intents and purposes, identical to the 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal. Megatron however gets a make over: the pinky purple of the original is replaced by a purple about half way between the original and that used on UN-25 Generation 2 Megatron/Archforce.
I think the repaint works really well and adds some life to the toy that wasn't there before.
Repaints
Two obvious repaints spring to mind: in red as either Beast Machines Dinobots T-Wrecks or a homage to Transmetal 2 Megatron. The other option would probably need a new head but in silver/grey it wouldn't make the world's worst Grimlock either.
We went into why Phil didn't buy the Beast Wars anniversary Optimus Primal when we reviewed that. Megatron was more of a close run thing: he doesn't have a hyper huge useless accessory like Prime's surfboard and the original Ultra has some more obvious faults that can be improved on.
As a consequence of using all the plastic on the main toy Megatron's beast mode is much bigger than Prime's, bringing him most of the way to the old mega sized toys. I've not got a Transmetal Megatron to hand to check how big they are in relation to each other but they look a similar size. He's a similar pinkish colour to the original Megatron Ultra. He's got an opening jaw, sadly not with the original's water pistol gimmick. The small arms are ball jointed at the shoulders while the legs are ball jointed at the hips plus bending knees, ankles, toes & heel spurs. The tail is solid and unarticulated but houses the toy's gimmick: slide a Planet chip into the slot under the tail and the top of the tail springs up revealing a missile launcher underneath. Yes, that means he has a missile launcher sticking out of his bottom!
TRANSFORMATION: Separate the chest in front of the shoulders and fold the halves of the body out to the sides. Fold back the flap over the top of the neck. Pull the tail back & down to separate it from the body, then pull the tail off the robot's hand. Fold the underside of the robot's body back. Rotate the robot's body 90 degrees so the robot's head points out the front of the toy. Fold the panels on the side of the beast's underside round the robot's shoulder. Fold the head forward and then the chest back. Fold the beast head arm down and pose all four limbs. Place the tail in the robot's left hand.
This Megatron is a slightly odd robot, much less bulky than you'd expect given the dinosaur. he's the same height as Primal, which is a surprise, and most of that is in the legs which seem disproportionately large thanks to the massive beast thigh panels which I'm forever catching on his body. Literally the tops of the thigh panels clear his arm pits by a matter of a couple of millimetres! His legs have the same articulation as the beast legs, but he gains a turning waist, ball jointed neck, turning shoulders, arms that raise to the sides within the shoulders, high bicep joints & bending elbows. The Dinosaur head arm turns at the base of the head but the other arm has no wrist. Instead there's a 5mm peg hole on the forearm and another between the claw at the end of the arm which allows him to hold his tail/missile launcher or any other 5mm peg weapon. A nice improvement there: the original Ultra has no hands, just the water pistol dinosaur head and the crank operated claw.
Now we're in robot mode we can see what parts are coloured how more clearly:
Pinky/purple: Toes, feet, lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, robot back panels/dinosaur body & arms
Black: thighs, head, upper limbs
Purple: missile. hips, chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, inner right shoulder, right lower arm, weapon handle, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm
Red: tongue & eyes
Overall: love the beast mode. Robot mode is good, but doesn't quite hit the spot. Needs a larger upper body/arms and to loose the the thigh guards.
Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Megatron was sold in the USA in 2006 accompanied by a model of the Darksyde, the Predacon spaceship. It was not sold in the UK or Japan.
Cybertron Megatron
Shortly afterwards a recoloured version of Megatron was released in the Transformers Cybertron toyline.
Plastic colour swaps on this toy are:
Pinky/purple (Toes, feet, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, robot back panels/dinosaur body & arms) become olive green
Pinky/purple (lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist) become dark green
Black becomes bluey purple
Purple (missile, hips, inner right shoulder, right lower arm , weapon handle) becomes bronzey gold
Purple (chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm) becomes brown
Red stays the same.
Looking at the toy you might be thinking "these colours are slightly familiar". And you'd be right. They were previously used on Armada Predacon, a repaint of Transmetal Megatron. It's a decent repaint but I've never been able to get hold of one at a decent price.
Cybertron Megatron was released in 2006 in the USA but not released in the UK or Japan.
Botcon Cindersaur
Are you sitting comfortably?
Then we'll begin.
Once upon a time there were three little Decepticons called Cindersaur, Flamefeather & Sparkstalker. They did everything together. They made their comics début in the same frame, they were released in the US & the UK together. They even went to Japan together when they become the Destrons Guzzle, Flamefeather & Javil.
Then in 1994 Hasbro held the great big Generation 2 party and everyone wanted to go and get bright new colours and clear plastic and everything. But on that day a sad thing happened: the three Firecons didn't get an invite to the big American party and even though Flamefeather & Sparkstalker were given their new bright clear colours in the UK poor Cindersaur was left out :-(
Ahhhhhh, Poor Cindersaur.
Then in 2010 the Transformers Collectors Club decided to do a Generation 2 themed boxset for their convention. They heard what had happened to Cindersaur and thought "right, it's time we righted this wrong and gave Cindersaur some Generation 2 colours. And since he's had to wait sixteen years for them, he can have a new larger form as well!" So they gave him Beast Wars 10th anniversary Megatron's body.
Get your sunglasses out. It is, after all, a Generation 2 homage:
Pinky/purple (Toes, feet, inner left shoulder, dinosaur head, lower legs, outer thigh panels, waist) become blue
Pinky/purple (dinosaur body sides, arms an tail top) become clear dark blue
Black becomes lime green
Purple (missile, hips, inner right shoulder, right lower arm , weapon handle) becomes grey
Purple (chest, parts inside body, outer shoulders, left shoulder hinge & left lower arm) becomes purple
Red stays the same.
It's a decent Generation 2 style repaint..... as in the combination of colours is completely shocking. I might suggest though, given G2 Flamefeather & Sparkstalker , that they didn't go far enough with the clear blue plastic.
United Beast Megatron
When UN-30 Optimus Primal was released in the Transformers United toyline he was, for all intents and purposes, identical to the 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal. Megatron however gets a make over: the pinky purple of the original is replaced by a purple about half way between the original and that used on UN-25 Generation 2 Megatron/Archforce.
I think the repaint works really well and adds some life to the toy that wasn't there before.
Repaints
Two obvious repaints spring to mind: in red as either Beast Machines Dinobots T-Wrecks or a homage to Transmetal 2 Megatron. The other option would probably need a new head but in silver/grey it wouldn't make the world's worst Grimlock either.