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Tuesday 19 February 2013

Mech Ideas Demolition Crue Apex and Geminus - Pictorial Review

These past few years, the Transformers scene had change drastically as Hasbro/Takara focused more and more of their attentions to mainstream line (except for Takara's Masterpiece line) namely Dark of The Moon, Transformers:Prime and Fall of Cybertron, independent companies jump ship one after another into this gold mine of collectors. There are cases of failure debut while a few had significant improvement on their releases (Xovergen's Trailerforce TF-01).

Few however, passed with flying colors on their first try. Planet X for instance, went with the Genesis Project, their own rendition of War for Cybertron's Omega Supreme (hopefully, will be able to review him before end of February)

Another 3rd party company that kind of step in nonchalantly into the arena with the offering that (at least for me) really caught my attention. Mech Ideas first debuted their Demolition Crue (Not-Wreckers) project with Apex and Geminus in TFCon 2012 which schedule to be release on February 2013.

Apex and Geminus are homages of G1's Jumpstarters, Topspin and Twintwist which were said to be able to transform between modes in a fraction of a second providing them edge in combat

Jumpstarter - Topspin
Pic Credit : Web
Jumpstarter - Twintwist
Pic Credit : Web


The brothers made appearances in various series and publications like the Marvel comics and Dreamwave comics continuities. However, my favorite would be their appearance in the 5-issue limited series published by IDW Publishing in 2010.

The Last Stand of The Wreckers #1
Pic Credit : Web
 The story follows the adventure of the veteran Wreckers and their new recruits in a (suicide) mission of liberating an Autobots facility from the rogue Decepticons Overlord.

Different from other series, The Last Stand of The Wreckers focused on more 'benchwarmer' characters that hardly being explored in depth unlike the 'popular' characters.

A really recommended read but note, it's heavy and it gets bloody (or oily(?)) so if any of you guys can't stand the fact of losing any of your favorite characters, stay away! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!










 

The brothers - before the end
Pic Credit : Web

Let's get into the review, shall we?

Wednesday 13 February 2013

2013 Want List

During the recent Chinese New Year holiday, I decided to stay instead of going back to my hometown to rest a little bit, had friends over to hang out and stuff. Decided to do something I've planned for quite sometime, transforming all of my collections to alt mode just for kick (and doing inventory)

Left out maybe 3-4 figures, here's the only figures that are in my collection

My Neo-G1 collections


Looking at it, made a check list of what I'm still missing, hopefully can be a guide for my 2013 hunt


Lambor - Henkei
Sunstreaker - Henkei
Red Alert - Henkei

Bumblebee - 3 packs
Bugbite - Botcon 2007
Hound - Henkei, Scorch (Botcon 2010)
Perceptor - United
G2 Megatron - 2 pack, Special Edition
Skywarp - Henkei
Thundercracker - Henkei, Botcon 2007, Botcon 2010 (G2)
Thrust - Botcon 2007
Dirge - Botcon 2007
G2 Prime - Botcon 2012 (Shattered Glass)SG G2 Magnus - Botcon 2012 (Shattered Glass)

Strika - Botcon 2013

Ratbat - United
Tankor - Henkei
Mirage - Henkei
Ratchet - Henkei
Ironhide - Henkei
SG Soundwave - Botcon 2012
SG Grimlock - Botcon 2008
Cyclonus - 2 pack
Drift - United, Shatterd Glass 2011
Streak - Henkei
Smokescreen - Henkei
Deepdive - Hasbro
Powerglide - Henkei, Walmart Exclusive
Megatron - United
Magnificus - United eHobby
Springer - United
Blitzwing - United, Doubledealer (Hasbro)
Orion Pax - United


Skid - Hasbro
IDW Megatron - United, G2 Dreadwing (Hasbro)
G2 Dreadwing - Hasbro
Seargeant Kup - United, MW Electron (Botcon 2013)




Manage to secure United Stepper and Henkei Ghost Starscream, that's a good start I guess

Wednesday 6 February 2013

Perfect Effect PE DX01 Motobot RC (Pink Version) - Pictorial Review

This time, the choice of review would be a tad bit different than usual. But first, let us see the background of this important Transformers character.

This bot first made an appearance in the 1986's Transformers The Movie, and stayed all throughout the franchise till this day, keep on being updated and reimagined. Although not always great (and there were worst time), the bot have a special place in every TF fans all around.

The bot....she, is Arcee



Not the first female Robot (Fembot) being introduced but she became a regular and can be seen in most of Transformers continuity (maybe not all). Not to be fooled by her appearance, Arcee was an excellent gunner and marksman. During Season 3 and Season 4 of Transformers G1, she can be seen joining missions with Rodimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, Springer and others.

With a female character, there's bound to be love story. Although not much (nor apparent), Arcee was said to have feelings for Hot Rod which withered with his transformation to Rodimus Prime in which she grew closer with Springer.

In Season 1 and Season 2 of Transformers G1, we have our human friend, Spike, being taken cared of by Bumblebee, Arcee somewhat held the same responsibility with Spike's son, Daniel, especially in the last 3 episode of US G1 where Daniel became Arcee's Headmaster partner (although the 3 episodes were ignored during the Transformers Headmasters continuity)

It's interesting to note that there's several version of 'explanation' on where fembots came from. In the animation, it was made clear that there were fembot even before Arcee. In Marvel UK, Arcee came to being as a respond by the Autobots to the human accusation of them being Sexist (WTF?).

But the worst of all.....the origin introduced in the IDW comic....

Yes....I understand...
Pic Credit : Web


Transformers Energon
Pic Credit : Web

Arcee made recurrent appearance in other series such as Headmasters, Energon, Animated, Prime as well as the second movie, Revenge of The Fallen, also in vast amount of publications.

Let's get back to G1 Arcee. Despite being popular, Arcee was damned to never have her G1 toy. There's a lot of rumors as to why this happened, some said the popularity of a female character to not be appealing to boys and another was the abomination of the prototype design.

There was an effort to release a G1 Arcee toy under the Titanium Line but it stop with the death of the line.








There's a few versions of Arcee toys post-G1 in which mostly depicting Arcee as either a motorcycle or car. But one of the most popular of all would be iGear MGT-01 Delicate Warrior


Pic Credit : Web
Yes, the fan rejoice! The G1-accurate incarnation of Arcee. I was fortunate enough to own her and I was pleased. However....the release used her G1-accuracy to make people forget...it was an overly expensive release with crappy quality. "Delicate Warrior" was not just a name I guess.

Despite all that, to each their own i guess. I could understand fans wanted a G1-accurate version of her in which, Delicate Warrior is the way to go.




PE-11 Scouting Force

Now, let me go ahead to the main event. Perfect Effect, a company that is known for releasing an updated version of Frenzy, Rumble and also other G1 cassettes.

However, their breakthrough release would be PE-11 Scouting Force, their take on G1's Reflector.






On August 2011, Perfect Effect release a concept images of what seems to be a homage of G1 Arcee (in robot mode) and prototype of it next to some Classics-verse figures. Many fans (myself included) hold judgement for her due to the fact that her alt mode is a futuristic motorcycle rather than car. But due to my dissapointment with Delicate Warrior, I opted for her on a whim and found myself really happy.

Tuesday 5 February 2013

Milestone~

Began posting on 8th of January 2013 and now it February 5th, almost 1 month already. Reach my 1000 visit counts yesterday and now 1100.

Thanks for the viewing, will continue making reviews. And thanks for the support, my lovely fiancee, hime_s

September 2012

Monday 4 February 2013

Xovergen Trailerforce TF-01 Masterarmor - Pictorial Review

Xovergen perhaps is one the few 3rd party companies that doesn't release 2-3 figures per year hence reducing the damage to my wallet. They first annouced their debut project with STC-GP Grand Patriot which was annouced in June 2010.


Pic - Credit

Xovergen STC-GP Grand Patriot was release circa 2011, a release inspired by a concept art by artist don Figueroa, a Transformers-G.I Joe Crossover design of Optimus Prime as Rolling Thunder.

It received several releases of green and red colors but not great reception by the fans (especially green color version) as there were issues of quality of the plastic and the design itself.




However, not giving up, Xovergen teased us in 2011 with their plan of producing on of the iconic characters in Transformers fandom (and haven't received any release since he last appearance in 1988), Super Ginrai of Transformers : Super-God Masterforce

Super Ginrai
Pic Credit : Web

Transformers : Super-God Masterforce was the 2nd series that wasn't released by the US after Transformers Headmaster.

There are a few version of the story which gave different explanations of the event happening during Masterforce (not to mention how Ginrai looked like Optimus Prime) so I'll be skipping it.

But you can just easily google it for either the TV Series, the Marvel Comic or the Japan Comic versions





So, let us start!


First of all, the top left is Super Ginrai in Alt Mode, bottom left is his Powermaster, center is Ginrai with the trailer as Battle Station and lastly Super Ginrai. Xovergen Trailerforce TF-01 Masterarmor is an add-on homaging Super Ginrai with either using Classics/Henkei Optimus Prime, Masterforce Ginrai or G1 Optimus Prime.

Saturday 2 February 2013

Toyworld TW-T01 Grindrod - Pictorial Review

Toyworld first made their appearance in December 2011 with a prototype of TW-01 Hegemon, their own take of G1 Megatron. Considered a daring attempt by the fans as G1 Megatron have a unique robot mode that's hard to be engineered. Personally, even Takara's MP05 Megatron failed on that

Pic Credit : Web


Skipped him due to the fact that I settled with Classics Megatron but Toyworld pulled this off nicely, especially considering it's their first product. And after that, Toyworld's next offering is the homage of G1 Throttlebots, all six of them (although the last 4 still haven't got any actual pictures yet)


Pic Credit : Web


The Throttlebots are more or less a G1 Season 3 - Season 4 version of the minibots, consist of 6 members which are Rollbar, Chase, Searchlight, Goldbug, Freeway and Wide Load




 





Pic Credit : Web

The Throttlebots made their appearance on G1 Season 4 The Return of Optimus Prime Part 1, joining Rodimus Prime's mission of rescueing the body of Optimus Prime, before being infected by the hate plague .And then again during G1 Headmasters series, defending Cybertron from Galvatron's siege





  
Personally, I think it was in 2009's IDW Spotlight : Metroplex that gave a fresh breath to The Throttlebots with their heroic act defending a secret from the deadly Sixshots. And that turned the fans to the Throttlebots again

Rollbar and Goldbug standing their ground

And for the first of the gang, Toyworld released TW-T01 Grindrod, homaging Throttlebot Rollbar. This might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I'm happy none the less