G1 Headmaster Hardhead & Duros

Hardhead & Duros would be the worst cop show ever.

I was picking up my comics and hanging with one of my pals from the TFW2005.com board and I mentioned we should walk up the street to a new vintage toy shop by the comic shop. The number of vintage toy stores that I know about has doubled in the last half year. This one has a few toys, and by few I mean "a lot of He-Man figures, some other stuff, that's pretty much it," and the rest of the store space is arranged into a hipster thrift shop with a small and expensive record (vinyl) bin. Lots of young people with terrible mustaches is what I'm saying.

We found the small section of TFs on a table. Because I had seen little to mention of my few previous visits, I'm not sure what really compelled me to stop by this time other than that a TF fan hadn't been there yet, even though I thought little of the stock. This time, there was a G1 Hardhead, nearly complete (missing 1 of the guns) and in great shape. And, uh, at a pretty amazing price. I opened to cockpit, and there was Duros, the Headmaster head. SO, I bought it.

The few things I notice about Hardhead:
-He's got a hollow abdomen/butt area. That really stands out; a few thin plastic walls comprise a noticeable amount of his torso. This makes Hardhead seem like a Flimsybot (TM).
-I think I lucked out with the hinge on the armor piece that protects the tech spec area. It's perfect! Nothing broken on it.
-Duros's own face? Amazing for such a tiny robot. Puts all the city combiner faces to shame. TO SHAME!
-His legs are kinda weird looking.
-Careful with those feet. They are hard to lock into place, and then hard to push back in. I was afraid I was going to break them.

Well, not sure what else to say about this figure or the Headmaster line. I think it was a far better gimmick than the Targetmasters, though at the same time, you will always have just ONE robot as opposed to the two or three total you get with Targetmasters. The head (Duros) himself has a lot of moving limbs!

I never liked the idea that a human contortionist forms the head of the robot so that the robot itself can be active. That makes the robot very dependent on the human (or Nebulos). I've asked before, what if the human has to go to the bathroom? Gets cramps or aches while folded over? DIES? The sentient mechanical being that will generally outlive his human partner will be screwed! So I like the Japanese backstory better.

Anyway, enjoy the pics.

Duros' amazingly detailed face.

Tonight, on Airwolf. I mean, Groundwolf.

This doesn't come in a T-top?

Don't come UNHINGED. HA HA HA HA!
Seriously though, I lucked out.

Kreon wave 4!

LtoR: Cyclonus! Sandstorm! Kup! Brawn! Alpha Trion! Slipstream! Rodimus!

Slipstream was the one I wanted the most out of this batch.

There's some quality control issues with the Rodimus. You see that he's leaning over. His legs won't align straight enough for both feet pegs to stand on a brick. Kup was almost like that too. And I had a REALLY hard time putting on Brawn's helmet all the way.

Otherwise, the mission of being way cute has been accomplished.

silly page - Dark Cybertron! ...and SHARKTICONADO.

The altered comics page contains a minor spoiler for the Dark Cybertron series. So, it's after the JUMP.

In other news, yes, the preview to RID #28 is awesome. Thundercracker was one of the best parts of Mike Costa's Transformers run, and I was worried the current creative team was going to do something really stupid with the Decepticon left back on Earth. Instead, they did something so STUPIDLY awesome: they gave Thundercracker a dog and made him a screenwriter.

IDW did this. NOT ME.

Okay, I said I have little else to add. Been sick. Bunch of non-robots related stuff I wanted to work on is backlogged because I can't sit still long enough to draw my comics or type up stuff. I was on Twitter a lot with #sharkticonado, typing that up while laid out on the couch and watching baseball (and Frasier on netflix). Sharkticonado was fun but I should take a different approach.

ANYWAY, THE SILLY PAGE! AFTER THE JUMP!

Transformers Windblade writer Mairghread Scott interview on RwC

Yup. Mairghread Scott, a writer on some recent Transformers cartoon programs, was kind enough to do a q&a with ROBOTS WITH COFFEE. It's a Facebook page and you don't need to 'like' the page to read the interview, but if you DID like RwC on the ol' FB, I'd appreciate it.

Click on the photo (by Jason Enright, @jasonenright on twitter) to read the interview!

Okay 'bots,  you ALL want coffee butNONE of you know how to refill the pot?

I want to say that I'm proud to feature Mairghread on RwC. Make sure you give Windblade a shot! You can still get your local comic book store to order it for you!

BIG McLARGEHUGE! Oh, and Scoop & The Ammonites.

I promised a review of Scoop and the MiniCons, who came in about a week and a half ago. "I've been busy" is what I'm going to say to the deep empty universe awaiting a "review" of toys.

As usual, the toys come with comics, though I'm not sure what parts of the Dark Cybertron story these are part of. The MiniCons are known in the comics as The Ammonites, a faction of another set of transforming robotic life-forms engaged in their own war, and are not called such on the packaging. But whatever.

The first thing I noticed about the combined form of the MiniCons is that, when you look at the robot from the back, the face of the figure making up the legs of the combined figure is...

...THE COMBINED FIGURE'S BUTT. Granted that piece's arms should be blocking the face, but I'm incredibly immature and will be pointing this out to EVERYONE. The figure was easy to take apart and turn its three components into regular bots. There's very little transformation on that end.

I think the helicopter figure on your right is a ladybot, based on the diamond-ish shape of its head and her high-heeled footware. I do NOT have to point this out to anyone. I have more proof and more to gain that the combined bot's butt is a face.

Never got into the TargetMasters part of the TF lore because the Headmasters were much more interesting and, despite being just as blocky, better designed. G1 figures after the movie weren't based on specific vehicles (other than the Throttlebots?) and so they looked LIKE toys, and the Targetmasters especially looked like toys holding other toys. So other than Cyclonus, here's the first actual Targetmaster redone in Generations mold. The construction vehicle looks pretty good and the transformation is pretty easy. There's not much else to say about that other than that he's holding two implausible weapons (living people who turn into guns, at least in the original G1 world; they're robots in the IDW comics, of course). The weapons can stack on top of each other, which for those of you with a dirty mind...

ANYWAY.

I was at a gathering of local TF collectors, and my pals Til All Are Mine and Collecticon were present, and good times were had. The host, Rick, who organizes Atomic Sketch, gave me this:

It's a KO tiny Fortress Maximus! It falls apart easily! The transformation would only risk further damage and lost pieces! And it's called...

Which makes me think of this wonderful MST3K bit:

Shockwave With Coffee

Okay, DARK CYBERTRON #10 (aka MTMTE 27) came out today. It was really good. I don't like how the first half of the series was paced or that it interrupted the momentum of MTMTE. I'll say more later. I also owe a review of Scoop and the Minicons, aka Ammonites, but I don't have much to say about them.

Today was all about the comic books. More Than Meets The Eye was so anticipated that I COMPLETELY forgot that Stray Bullets #41 came out today. That was one of my all-time favorite comics, and always the first on my new comics pile that I would read, and then reread, before touching the other comics. The comic had been in limbo for, I don't know, a decade? Limbo? Forgotten? I followed David Lapham's other projects and I stopped after Young Liars. He's had success with other things I'm sure but this is the one comic I wanted to see finished, and kudos to Image Comics (despite their publisher's "not real" speech) for allowing Lapham to finish off the series, with another six issue mini that started  today as well...and both were GREAT!

But I read MTMTE 27 first.

Anyway I took Shockwave around work today and ran some errands with him. IT WAS PART OF HIS PLAN! HAIL MEGATRON!

Robots With Celebrities

Coming soon: "reviews" of Scoop, the Minicons, and...Dreadwing? Dreadwind? Darkwing? Darkwind?

WindDark?

Point is, I got a few 'bots (cons) and I'll write 'em up, albeit briefly, soon.

IN THE MEANTIME!

Joseph Cranford, who played Pete Ross in Man Of Steel, tries to finish up his takeout cup while Fracture talks to him about her fanfic ideas. Her, terrible, terrible fanfic ideas.

Talk soon.

Testing: Gears' video blog comic strip

This is a test. IDW comics colorist Josh Burcham asked on Twitter @jcburcham what it might be like for some of the characters in More Than Meets The Eye to have their own blog, to see what their adventures are on the Lost Light separate from the main cast (& focus) of the story.

So I did this kinda quickly. Sorry. It's a test, AFTER THE JUMP.

Odds n ends. Just plain odd.

Though I'll probably trip and fall on them in mass quantities at big box stores without even looking, I preordered SWERVE and TAILGATE with my pal Eric from Til All Are Mine, through Big Bad Toy Store. No hurry.

UPDATE! My Hasbro Toy Shop order of Scoop & the Minicons has shipped! According to an email HTS just sent me! With tracking #s that I don't understand what service they belong to! But I give it about a week. So, keep those fingers crossed. Yo.

MORE THAN MEETS THE NEWS: More Than Meets The Eye Vol. 1 is, as of this moment (Feb. 27th) and until the end of the day possibly, $3.99 on Comixology. That's the "Death Of Optimus Prime" 1 shot and issues 1-3 of this awesome comics series. BUZZER! It is back to $7.99, which is still a good price.

Speaking of MTMTE, look to your right and you'll see MTMTE movie taglines. James Roberts had a contest on Twitter for movie poster taglines if MTMTE ever got a movie...and I submitted 117 lines. And they're terrible. Enjoy!

Okay, that's it for now. Looking for Generations Skids for a few friends, so if you got one and it's not a billion dollars then hit me up and I'll see if I can connect you, yo.

Oh, I'll have some ROBOTS WITH COFFEE news soon. It'll be fun.

Enjoy these too (click on them to see them at their original size):

Like the Raccoon in the Guardians Of The Galaxy trailer? Help out its creator.

Bill Mantlo is one of the guys who created Rocket Raccoon, probably the most interesting part of the introdump trailer for Guardians Of The Galaxy. I mean, c'mon, it's a raccoon shooting a machine gun. Who cares about Andy from Parks & Rec? (Well, I do, I love that show.) Anyway, he also wrote the first two issues of The Transformers Marvel comics, that's just a small taste of the multitude of comics he wrote in the 70's and 80's.

Anyway, if you know anything about the comics biz, especially from the time before Image Comics, you might know that 1. most comic book contributors were freelancers 2. they did something called "work for hire," which among other things meant that if you created a gun toting space raccoon, the publisher and its parent company owned the rights. Listing you as the creator was them being nice.

In this case, Bill Mantlo created Rocket Raccoon and he doesn't see a dime for it today. He probably won't see any money from Disney/Marvel. For them to start paying him would be an admission of shared ownership and that'd be a legal and fiscal problem for everyone, like say Todd McFarlane who created Venom. Things like that. Even DC comics tried (and succeeded, recently) to undo the goodwill gesture of giving Superman's creators a slight piece of the pie until Man Of Steel came out.

Anyway, the real point is: Bill Mantlo was hit by a car 22 years ago and hadn't been the same ever since. It's pretty unfortunate and despite his long time in the Marvel Comics bullpen he probably had no pension or health insurance deductions as a freelancer. I don't know, but I do know that he probably won't see a penny from Rocket Raccoon's appearance in this new movie or action figures sold. There's probably a reason why so few characters are created these days by the big publishers. There's a reason why big publishers sue the former freelancers when they try to sell t-shirts of the characters they created, and don't own.

You can help Bill by checking out this link, reading the story, and donating to his family as they continue to help him out. That would be great.

I will get to more trash talking about plastic toy robots and farts next post, sorry.

Generations Voyager Whirl - another comics page!

If these photos are too dark, um, there are other people who have this figure and took better photos. Enjoy those too. SO, I said I'd update you. The tracking #s that Hasbro sent didn't seem to work under USPS, UPS, or UPS-Mail Innovations, so I would check and there'd be no info as to the progress for this package. Anyway, I got home and woo hoo, there was a box for me! And it was WHIRL!

These weapons? Going right into a ziploc bag
and into a parts box and never coming out
until I sell this guy on eBay in five years.

Now, I'm a huge fan of the Head Robots Drone upgrade, and figured it'd be enough for a Generations Deluxe Whirl (made out of a HFTD Tomahawk) to fit in with the rest of the Lost Light crew. I was going to pass on the Voyager Whirl because it looked way too much like his G1 counterpart, and I had been spoiled by More Than Meets The Eye and was hoping for something with two rotors, one on each side as part of his forearm or elbow. The comic gave him a great personality and a freakish, almost contortionist appearance, and I was disappointed this toy looked like the G1 version.

Of course, the G1 toy (lifted from another toyline, but you have TFWIKI for that info) was remarkable because unlike the TakaraTomy figures that made up the bulk of the line, he had moving arms AND legs. No elbows or knees, but he had 100% more poseability than the Decepticon jets or the Autobot cars (how many had moving legs?).

Jetfire had to be renamed and redesigned for the cartoon. Yet Whirl & Roadbuster couldn't become Dizzy and Pavement Crasher? (Hasbro: call me). I mean, weren't Jetfire and Roadbuster in the same catalogs as Jetfire? Did they just run out of time scrambling to turn Jetfire into Skyfire that they said forget it with Whirl & Roadbuster?

Smile.

You don't have to answer that, I just envision a great introduction of Whirl and Spike freaking out over Whirl's bizarre appearance compared to the rest of the Autobots. "It's not on the outside what counts," lectures Optimus Prime, but Spike is too terrified to listen and runs screaming from the Ark, felled seconds later by Decepticon laser-fire. Wait, why did I go there with that?

You'll notice I didn't do the 3rd mode, "Heloped."
Because there is no Gerwalk mode for Whirl.
"Too lazy to finish transforming" is not an alt mode.

Freakish is what this figure still manages to accomplish. Giving him the chicken legs helps a lot, but be careful: that "knee" piece is really thin. So are the shoulder parts. You'll be moving these pieces a lot transforming and posing him, so be really really careful.

That part? In the middle? Between the blue and silver?
Be REALLY careful. Can't stress that enough. Really.

Some clumsy assembly required.

It also comes with stickers. WHAT? Is this the first Classics to do so? How much work do I have to do with this one? They remind me of the GI Joe vehicles you'd spend too much time putting decals on only to skew ONE and have the whole thing look extra fake. There doesn't seem to be any injokes/references from More Than Meets The Eye hidden in the stickers.

Anyway, cool figure. I took a quick pic of the Whirl lineage. Tiny Whirl became incredibly fragile since I got him, by the way.

I gave Head Robots Whirl a baseball bat just because.

BONUS! I bought this from Brian Shearer. It's a page from More Than Meets The Eye, #20. This is another terrible phone pic with some boosted contrast. Sorry. It and some other pages (mentioned in previous posts) are being framed. I'll take a good pic when I get them all back.

Okay, that's it. Continue reading the news and fan heartbreak and 2nd guessing from the ToyBusinessConventionThing. I'll read all about it in Transformers Aficionado magazine, known for its great articles and tasteful photos of Arcee on a bearskin rug.

(Transformers Aficionado is not a real magazine.)

Robots with Valentine's...cards!

Hey, I added a new page of Valentine's Day cards taken from the RwC page. Enjoy.

Other stuff:
-If your local comics retailer is the type that rewards you for pre-orders (like discounts), now is the time to pre-order More Than Meets The Eye & Robots In Disguise #28, and Windblade #1.
-WTF is going on with the KREO line and Cosmos? I'll miss the Kreons (if they're really cancelled) but can deal. COSMOS? This better not mean I won't get Swerve.
-first shots of Windblade look like First Edition Prime Arcee, but with a new head. "BUT SHE HAS A NEW HAT!" yells Smithers. Still, will probably get it.
-Voyager Generations Jetfire looks great, but, uh, I have enough actual Jetfires and the last Skyfire. So I'm passing.
-The TF4 figures look dopey but I have no interest in them to begin with.

UPDATE: Comic Book Movie link has clearer movie toy pics and, uh, no thanks.

Nothing else to add. Much love to you all. @robotswcoffee on Twitter.
-paul

Happy Valentines' Day...with Coffee.

Head over to the RwC Facebook page for more. Hit the like button, share, whatever. Maybe I'll post more tonight and tomorrow. Love you all.

The Robocop remake needs this guy falling down a flight of stairs. Just sayin'.

Reasons Megatron becomes an Autobot in MTMTE #28

So if you had been lulled into a deep coma by the pace of IDW's Dark Cybertron (oh, be nice! It started to pick up with the most recent issues), you may have awoken to this teaser/cover to More Than Meets The Eye #28. Pretty wild, huh? Megatron with an Autobot symbol? What the what?

Beyond Megatron & Co. carrying out the dream envisioned by Ironhide in the Ongoing #31 for Pax Cybertronia (colonizing other worlds, reforming them into places inhabitable for robots blah blah blah), what could be the reason for this TWIST? I speculated on twitter a few months ago:

1. lost a bet.
2. amnesia.
3. kicked out of Decepticons by Starscream.
4. Revelation/prophecy by Titan, similar to the one Starscream received.
5. red badges have a slimming look.
6. eh, why not?
7. Orion Pax: "Megatron, join the Autobots!" Megatron: "Oh Orion Pax, I can't say no to you!"
8. have you MET the Decepticons? Ew.
9. shanix discount on wax jobs.
10. Decepticons have a bad reputation with the rest of the Universe for some reason.
11. We're not tired of the "Mirror Mirror" bit.
12. Maybe it will impress Elita-1.
13. The Lost Light crew are a fun bunch. Swerve CERTAINLY won't get on my nerves.
14. the PERFECT disguise!
15. wants to show Cyclonus how to commit.
16. ringer for Autobot bowling team.
17. prank by troops when he had too much to drink and passed out a Decepticon mixer; same prank for humans, but with faction symbols, not magic markers.
18. Finally got a chance to cover up that unsightly birthmark...wait, you guys thought it was a symbol for a new movement?
19. egging on the DJD at this point.
20. trying to blow the DJD collective minds in hopes that they stop being the DJD.
21. if he "quits," the other Decepticons will start killing each other in attempts to take control. When the dust settles, he takes it back!
21.5 But if they're dead, who would he be in charge of? A bunch of dead decepticons?
22. very convoluted plan to meet, punch Thunderclash.
23. despite being leader of the Decepticons, had to share habsuite with Astrotrain for the last 2 million years. Breaking point finally reached.
24. Megatron was the Autobot spy Punch...THIS WHOLE TIME!
25. come to think of it, trying to reclaim a devastated, "primordial" barren Cybertron kinda sucks. Let Starscream have it, I'm outta here!
26. Ammonites are pretty annoying. Better join Autobots and exterminate Stenorians.
27. You still talking about the slow pace of Dark Cybertron? (slaps on Autobot logo) There, this'll shut you up.
28. Run is a GREAT psychiatrist.
29. Reprolabels sent the WRONG stickers!
30. Good friends with Pipes, despite war. PIIIIIIPES!

another silly page.

I pre-ordered stuff! with an UPDATE

As of this writing, Hasbro Toy Shop has Voyager Whirl and the Deluxe wave of FOC Skywarp, Armada Starscream, Scoop and Ammonites (Mini-Cons) available to order. Try this coupon: TFLEGENDS15

UPDATE: It would be irresponsible to NOT mention that my shipping confirmation reads like this: I'll be getting one Deluxe at the end of February and the rest in late March. D'oh! But I'm in no hurry. So, sorry if you rushed like I did to take advantage and they won't be sending yours out until the end of March.

DOUBLE UPDATE! Looks like Whirl is marked as "shipped" and both Deluxes scheduled for the end of March. What the what? Now I just have no idea. Also don't know how this will affect the "Free shipping" I was offered if they keep breaking it into separate packages. Anyway, I WILL CALL EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU INDIVIDUALLY WHEN I LEARN MORE. OR I WILL JUST POST IT HERE.

I preordered Whirl, Scoop, and the Mini-Cons. I really LOVE the Headrobots upgrade for Tomahawk and originally was going to skip this version because it looked closer to the G1 version and I was hoping for a more MTMTE design as I've been spoiled with Hoist, Trailbreaker, and Skids. I saw a few pics of the final product online and thought, hmmmm, not SO bad. Well, HTS has it for $19.99 (CURRENTLY). When I go to Toys R Us, the Voyagers are $29 before tax, and then some Target are priced in the 23-27 range. SO, with free shipping over a certain amount, I figured why not. If he sucks, one of you can buy him off of me.

This simplifies the search for me because the Deluxes from this wave are showing up in the burbs and will start creeping into places that I'll have wade through more snow...did I mention that it hasn't stopped snowing or being terribly freezing since the last post? Because there's even MORE snow and temps are still going to plummet every other day. Yay.

I have other errands to run and going to a Target out of my way to see only Armada Starscream on the shelves is not how I want to spend my weekend.

Anyway.

I'll let you know how it turns out, yo.

Trypticoffee.

So cold. Thinking warm thoughts. With help from Gears.

This has been the most brutally cold weather I have ever experienced for the longest time I can remember. I have witnessed blizzards. I have witnessed what I thought was extreme cold. But I've never felt freezer burn by walking outside, have I? And I'm bundled up. I'm wondering if I'm exaggerating about how terrible the weather has been. It's the weather, I have no control over it (no debate over the validity of global warming & climate change, please). I don't like complaining about it and I don't like hearing complaints about it.

But I had never, ever, ever considered moving. Or thought about moving, just to be somewhere warmer. Until last week as I'm walking from the train over a highway and through a college campus with blistering winds on a GOOD DAY that was above zero degrees. And I've felt some subzero temps! So what is it about this month? I've NEVER felt this way, EVER. I can take a blizzard! I own a shovel!

My much farther northern friends are probably shaking their heads at me. I know I have felt hardier about dealing with the cold. Am I old? I certainly don't want to move to Florida or Arizona.

But I WOULD move to San Francisco. In a radiation-cloud-moving-eastward second.

Anyway, I have nothing else to add. Awaiting Scoop and the Mini-Con team (Ammonites). Waiting until Dark Cybertron is over to include my two cents. SO, here's some pics of Gears accompanying me on my last trip to San Fran, June 2012. It wasn't even hot. It was probably a little chilly on some days. But I'm going to look at these pictures and think warm thoughts.

Gears and I looking at the city from Golden Gate.

Looking at Sausalito 

Taken before Gears and I biked over the bridge.

Enjoying a Giants game.

Trolley to take us to Mr. Rogers...wait, no.

TINY WHIRL!

Whoa! Look what I found in the $3 bin at Quake!

$3 because he still has no hands, poor guy.

It's a really tiny WHIRL! No more than four, maybe five inches tall. Adorable. I'm sure MTMTE Whirl would find it adorable.

This is a tiny version of the "Dorvack" figure from Takatoku Toys (i'm looking this up on the TF Wiki, yes.). The only readable word for me (in English) is "JAPAN" and the copyright symbol so I can't tell where it officially comes from. There was also a line called Convertors and it looks like this is "Chopper." (We covered Convertors before when I found that tiny camera dude earlier this year.)

Okay, mystery solved. Isn't looking up stuff WHILE typing up a blog entry fun? It is. That's the kind of writing and editing that will get Transformers Aficionado the Pulitzer it deserves.

That rotor's a little sad. EDIT: The rotor was upside down. I fixed it.

EDIT! For scale, here's Tiny Whirl with...coffee.

It was the best of times, it was the BLURST of times?

Here's some random thoughts about last year, as usually published in the end of the year issue of Transformers Aficionado magazine, out of print after its inaugural issue.

BEST GENERATIONS FIGURE
My opinion is the only one that counts. The answer is Skids. See the last couple of posts. If you're having a debate, if Skids is better or if some Masterpiece is better, it's Skids. I solved the problem for you. I'm partial to G1 homages, you bet. So thumbs up for Trail(cutter)Breaker and Hoist. The popularity of the More Than Meets The Eye comic helps develop more appreciation for these characters and their figures, but the comic that comes with Skids is an added incentive: Skids comes with one of the best (and funniest) Transformers comics ever, one that caps off the 'first season' of MTMTE but, unlike the other pack-in comics that are focused on their respective characters, serves as the best introduction to the series. Great figure, great advertising for the awesome comic. Skids wins on every level. I win because I'm right.

WORST GENERATIONS FIGURE
IDW Bumblebee (Costa run). By the way, one day I will get around to defending Mike Costa's run on the comic. (I will definitely not be asking anyone to agree.) Anyway, the only thing that looks decent on this is the headsculpt. And even then I question myself on this. This was a great opportunity to truly update the figure and instead we get a lame Flimseybot (tm).

MOST UNNECESSARY GENERATIONS FIGURE
Goldbug? (Goldfire?) A slight retool of IDW Bumblebee?

I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO HATE IT, BUT I LOVED IT
Generations Voyager Springer. I thought there was no need thanks to the GDO version, which itself was kind of crappy. I thought the Voyager from the two pack a few years ago was really good, even if it wasn't a triple changer. Hasbro did a great job with this. And I only got it because I was impressed with Sandstorm.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT
Sigh: Voyager Blitzwing. This guy is a mess if you take him out of robot mode. You can almost feel the tension in the tabs and joints as he rests in vehicle mode, waiting to spring open. Transforming him is a pain in the afterburners. I totally dig this character too, hence the bummer.

I DON'T GET
ConstructoBots. Or Construct Bots. I don't get it.

THAT SAID, WHAT HAPPENED TO
Kre-o Transformers. Are these even on the store shelves? Well, good riddance. I ended up giving away the Kre-o sets and keeping the TF Kreon figures. Keep it up with the Kreons, Kre-o!

BEST SHELFWARMER
I'm guessing that honor goes to MP Acid Storm. I'm waiting for his price to be knocked down to the lower 30's or something.

WHAT THE HECK ARE THOSE SKINNY OPTIMUS PRIME AND BUMBLEBEE FIGURES? THEY'RE LIKE A FOOT HIGH OR SOMETHING. THEY LOOK WEIRD AND LIKE THEY DON'T EVEN TRANSFORM. WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY?
Still can't figure it out. They look like novelty flasks. Were these intended for the QVC audience?

Next post: what to expect for next year. Maybe. Depends on if Transformers Aficionado Magazine sends its beat reporter over here to cover it.

Transformers Aficionado is not a real magazine.

Happy Life Day! (Merry X-mas, happy Festivus, Season's Greetings, etc.)

Hopefully I won't be off the radar much this holiday week. But if I have nothing TF related to write about between now and New Years, well, thanks for the visits and comments. It was great connecting with a bunch of TF fans from around the world this year.

In the meantime, here's some Life Day cheer: