In which “G1-ifying” and “G1-ness” get used far too much. Kre-O Aerialbots and Predacons!

With the Kreons, I have gained both a new appreciation as well as jealousy of the folks at Takara and Hasbro that design Transformers. It started with my experience bulking up and somewhat G1-ifying my Kre-O Wheeljack and has happened again with the new Kre-O Microchanger Combiners.

Before we get to that part, first let me go off on a bit of a tangent. With all of the announced Kre-O Microchanger Combiners — wait, back up: let’s start with the fact that the Microchanger Combiner teams based on their G1 releases even exist to begin with. Now, back to what I was typing about before my tangent went off on a tangent: even though each of the Kre-O Combined robots is only made up of four ‘bots; they are including the fifth ‘bot from the team as a single packed release.

Now I want one more person to tell me that Hasbro & Co. doesn’t love the fans. Just one.

There is absolutely no other reason they would include a single-pack release that is mostly indistinguishable to the average kid from the guys in the Combiner set other than for the fans.

For example, that way we (the fans) don’t miss out on Slingshot — released as Kre-O Quickslinger — with the rest of the Aerialbots that make up Kre-O Superion.

Quickslinger gets a different head and helmet from the rest of the Aerialbots, but other than that, has the same basic colour scheme as Firestrike — the Kre-O incarnation of Fireflight.

The remaining three are the ones that didn’t suffer a name change; Air Raid, the team leader Silverbolt, and Skydive.

There’s always that one really angry dude.

Air Raid’s is pretty much the only one of the five of them with a semi-decent alt mode.

Mind you, this isn’t a complaint or a strike against these guys in the least bit for me. None of the Microchanger series and especially none of the Microchanger Combiners have been bought because they can actually transform. Just like the pre-Microchanger Kreons, they were all bought based on their robot modes and the awesome G1-ness of it all. Pretty much the same reason I own all of the widely released G1 Robot Heroes.

Adorable nostalgia!!!

As much as I like Superion and the Aerialbots, I’m not too overly attached to them, which may be why I didn’t really feel the need — as so many other apparently did — to find a combination that included him in Superion. It wouldn’t be too difficult to do and still include a majority, if not all, of his pieces.

For some reason, I didn’t feel the same about Predaking and the Predacons. Not only did I feel the need to include the single-packed member of the group, Rampage, but I also felt compelled to correct the non-G1-ness of his combined mode’s legs.

For it to properly be Predaking, you have to have a rhino head for the left kneecap and a bull head for the right. What the instructions have instead is a — admittedly clever — single horn to represent the rhino and the double horned piece from Divebomb’s tail to suggest the bull head.

What I and countless others have done is to use the actual head pieces in place of the suggested ones. This presents a slight problem, because the combined mode uses the orange head piece for its head. All except Divebomb have an interchangeable helmet piece with holes to insert horns and make it into a rhino or bull head or left as is for the two cats. To solve this, I swapped out Rampage’s red head piece achieving even more G1 accuracy in the process. However, this wasn’t the end of the problems. As a further cheat, the red head for Rampage on Predaking’s shoulder is faked by using the red headpiece from the bull. I say “faked” because, remember, Rampage isn’t even included in the Predaking set.

I considered buying a second single-packed Rampage just for the headpiece, but for now I faked it even more by borrowing a couple of my extra red pieces for his shoulder.

By adding Rampage into the mix, I also made Predaking a little taller, which is appropriate given his comparatively hulking size in G1.

While I was adding extra pieces, I also increased Divebomb’s wingspan which in turn increased Predaking’s. Remember that appreciation and jealousy of the toy designers I mentioned? Divebomb is where a majority of it came from in this case. I had a lot of dislikes with Divebomb. First, his robot mode placed his wings directly on his arms, which is needlessly inaccurate. I moved those to his already existing backpack. I also used red for the wings rather than black in robot mode. I would have preferred a little more G1 accurate orange, but was lacking the pieces.

I also left his tail piece on his backpack. Speaking of his tail, that I changed completely. The double-pronged tail piece from the instructions just didn’t work at all. His entire alt mode was pretty much just him bending in half, it clearly needed further help. I kept the black wing pieces along with the added red and gave him a bigger wingspan and used the two slanting orange pieces from his combined mode’s legs to try to recreate his G1 tail. I also replaced the two horns with actual clamps to give his bird legs some actual clawed feet.

Still not perfect, but much better in my opinion. The appreciation for toy designers came in the fact that I would make improvements to his alt mode, but then it was too bulky and I was removing way too many pieces to convert him to robot. What I had to do was find a balance between a definitive alt mode and a clean robot mode without a pile of pieces left over. Luckily Kre-O has a precedent of a couple pieces left over after you transform them. A toy designer doesn’t even that much leeway. These days they have to try to make a convincing alt mode and a convincing robot mode and use all the same pieces for both. A mind-twisting exercise, but a fun one (which is where the jealousy comes in). With the exception of not putting the vest piece on Razorclaw, I left the other guys pretty much alone in both modes. The vest pieces have been particularly annoying because they cover up all the wonder detailing included on the Kreon’s chest.

Vests are sooooo 90′s.

I’ve left them off of any Kreons where they aren’t strictly necessary.

Despite the identical headpieces, the menagerie of animals for the Predacons has just enough differences. Though they still come off rather… impressionistic.

Once again, not a problem. The combined mode is where it’s at.

Giant Dark Energon powered cannon not included.

I have purposely tried to stay away from their Kre-O names because two of them are a bit of a mess. Razorclaw, Rampage, and Divebomb all retain their original G1 names, but Tantrum and Headstrong are no longer available. Hasbro replaced them with Torox and Headlock. Now, Torox has history, it is actually Tantrum’s Italian G1 name. The problem is that someone got confused and swapped their names along the way, with Tantrum being renamed Headlock and my favourite Predacon, Headstrong, being renamed Torox.

Either way, whatever they’re named, I seriously doubt anyone’s going to mess with them about it.

They’ve got me constructing Transformers again, and I’m not sure how. Kre-O Wheeljack and Knock Out!

The surprise definitely isn’t about how they got me to buy the “Street Showdown” set in the first place; I most likely would have spent the $30 just to get the Kreon of my favourite Autobot.

“Someone find me some Legos and some high explosive.”

I was a little worried that he would be wedged into his Transformers Prime appearance, but his bio firmly establishes him as G1 all the way:

“Ah! Welcome to my lab! Don’t touch anything! Everything in here is top secret, and probably explosive. My job is to help the AUTOBOTS track down ENERGON before the DECEPTICONS do, and while I usually focus my research on things that melt or detonate, ENERGON-tracking is interesting too. I guess.

Favorite Creation:
GRIMLOCK.

Favorite Tool:
Quantum Circuit Bender.

Best Friend:
AUTOBOT RATCHET repairs me whenever I blow parts off.”

That’s my boy Wheeljack. It was definitely a bonus to get a Kreon of the preening, superficial, self-aggrandizing Knock Out as the other half the two-pack set.

“Even in miniature, I’m still a knock out. (See what I did there?)”

So, what happens when the Autobots’ Mad Scientist meets up with the Decepticons’ “Mad Doctor”? I can imagine it ends much like this:

“Sorry, I’m pretty sure that gun was not supposed to do that.”
“Medic! Ah, scrap, I AM the medic.”

As I typed previously, there was no possible way I was passing up this set, but what I didn’t expect was a random whim to actually construct Wheeljack’s Kre-O robot mode. I asked my wife if she felt like playing with some Legos, and she responded with a resounding, “Heck yeah!” (I know, I’m a very, very lucky man.) I set about building Wheeljack and she built Knock Out and we actually had quite a bit of fun doing it.

The reason I had decided to build Wheeljack’s robot mode, despite having not done so with any of the previous sets other than Optimus Prime, was the same reason I found myself putting together Mirage’s Kre-O alt mode. So far I haven’t found either the alt modes nor robot modes of the other sets I have to be indicative of the iconic Transfomers they were built from. Mirage’s alt mode changed that, looking very much like his distinctive Formula racer alt mode. Kre-O Wheeljack manages this same reminiscence in robot mode simply by including just enough detail between his stickers and his traditional “winged” backpack.

Of course, the headsculpt goes a long way towards making sure you realize, “Hey, that’s Wheeljack!”, but that’s been true of almost all of the sets. The headsculpts have been the best part of all the sets; which is why I have an admittedly morbid display of just the heads from the other sets I own. Meanwhile, Kre-O Wheeljack’s alt mode looks nothing like any past incarnation of the character; looking instead like a heavily armed dune buggy — despite being called a “street racer” or somesuch nonsense. Of course, as much as Wheeljack breaks slightly away from that “looks nothing like the ‘bot he supposed to be” mold, Knock Out does not.

Minus the headsculpt, there’s no telling who that could be. His alt mode doesn’t provide any redemption either, basically looking like a slightly modified version of the boxy dune buggy that Wheeljack has; an alt mode Knock Out would never even imagine being forced to take.

All this being said, there’s still much about Wheeljack’s robot mode that I’m unhappy with, from his lack of hands to his overly thin torso. Then it struck me: this is Kre-O, the first line to allow me to actually fix things that I am unhappy about with my Transformers. Thanks to the quantity of unassembled Kre-O sets around here, I had more than enough spare parts to go all Dr. Frankenstein and build me a better Wheeljack.

First, add real hands (courtesy of Optimus Prime, he doesn’t use them, he never leaves truck mode) and remove all non-black from his forearms. Next, bulk out the torso — a lot — and replace all the dark red with bright red (courtesy of Sentinel Prime, I got his set for free so he never leaves bagged piles of pieces… mode.) Then, add a lot more bright red (thereby ensuring I never have reason to even think about putting together Sentinel) and make the little bit of green more prominent. Move the arm wheels to the front, the leg wheels to his feet, his windshield to his stomach, and give him bigger backpack wings. Last, but certainly not least, provide him some shoulder launchers. The difference is dramatic.

Yeah, I know the real Wheeljack doesn’t have wrist guns, but he likes them so much, I let him keep them.

If I do say so myself, looking at his official robot mode and my improved version is like comparing someone’s middle school picture to their college graduation picture.

Still too cool for school. G2, Kreon, Bot Shots, and Transformers: Fall of Cybertron Jazz!

I’ve already established that Jazz is the coolest cat you know, no matter what dimension. I think Jazz would most likely be my favourite Autobot were it not for Wheeljack. Of all the dumb things I did early on in my Transformers collecting, not picking up G2 Jazz ranks up there with my most regretful. Seeing him on the shelf with his mind-blowing new paint scheme was just too much for my still G1-centric mindset.

Judging by a lot of the online auctions I have seen out there, Jazz’s new sticker set proved somewhat challenging for kids. Or at least I hope it was a kid that did this.

To fill this hole in my collection for now, I broke down and bought a cheap Reveal the Shield Jazz and ordered the G2 Jazz upgrade stickers from Reprolabels. Moments after receiving the stickers in the mail, the news hit the internet that the very unlikely choice had been made to release an official “G2 Jazz”.  This, naturally, annoyed the heck out of me because I am not a customizer in the least and Reprolabels’ G2 Jazz set required using rubbing alcohol to remove actual paint applications from Jazz. I would much rather just buy an official release and be done with it.

So, boo.

Then it was announced that G2 Jazz would be in a set and an exclusive.

So, yay!

Then it was announced that the price would be surprisingly reasonable.

So, boo.

Then a picture was released.

So… wait, what the heck is that? Nothing against the deco, per se, but that is not even somewhat G2 Jazz. My choice to go the semi-D.I.Y. route now seemed to be a very, very good choice.

As I said, I’m not customizer. I would like to say that removing the red line across the bottom of the front bumper was intentional, but it was actually removed accidentally. I considered getting paint and tape and putting it back, but I actually think I’m ok with it. It pulled attention away from the other added details, and this rainbowed wonderfulness is fine without it. Granted, it wouldn’t be G2 without a big, brightly coloured gun with overly elongated missile sticking out of it.

He still looks amazing in robot mode, still one of the best designs of recent years. Most of the deco ends up on his back in robot mode, so he’s definitely going to get displayed in alt mode; sporting speakers, of course.

This guy isn’t the only Jazz to hit my collection since the last Jazz post (which is pretty impressive considering there were already five different Jazz toys in that post). At this year’s Botcon, free Kre-O sets were being given away and thanks to some trading with an awesome friend (Hi, Rebekah!), I ended up with Jazz rather than a second Prowl — or was it Mirage?

Of course, all I wanted was the Kreon, the construction set itself didn’t even warrant building the alt mode and has joined a growing pile of Legos for playing with in imaginative, none-instructions-directed ways.

Next up is another dose of Jazz rating an “OMG!” on the adorable scale. Naturally, the ever-popular culture maven was given a release in the new Bot Shots series.

His alt mode is very reminiscent of the original “Penny Racer” style G1 minibots.

Which brings us to the most recent Jazz, Transformers: Fall of Cybertron Jazz. Like a lot of the characters in the game that were turned into toys, Jazz is pretty much as close to his game model as you can get.

The only thing his toy is missing, is the sense of bulk his game model has, but that would have been difficult to achieve in while still keeping his alt mode streamlined.

His alt mode keeps the sleek lines of his traditional mode but dispenses altogether with the concept of being a passenger vehicle.

He also is one of the rare toys that doesn’t look goofy with his weapon mounted on his alt mode.

I’m assuming that’s just because Jazz is as inherently cool as he is.

Jazz Dance Party!

Steve, Winged Steve, Mini Steve, and Other Steve. Transformers Prime, Arms Micron, and Kre-O Vehicon and Igu!

I take the most delight in things that send a small portion of the fandom into an irrational frenzy. These topics include:

This guy

Animated‘s design aesthetic

Michael Bay

Steve

Now, if you don’t know who Steve is, well, he’s one or more of these dudes,

Possibly also one or more of these dudes,

But he’s definitely this dude,

 

Though, I am firmly convinced the truth is a little more insidious.

In actuality Steve is a name applied by fans to one or all (depending on who you ask) of the Vehicons in Transformers Prime. As the fandom is made mostly of children (I’m not being judgmental here, this is statistically true) there are some that react rather violently in opposition of naming Vehicons. This is especially true when you name them all the same name.

I, however, find the joke to be funny and the violent opposition from a small, but vocal minority to be absolutely hilarious.

So Steve they are.

Despite what could be called janky arms (with elbow joints much like Airachnid’s) these guys are still some of the best toys to come out of the entire Transformers Prime line.

When it was discovered that the Winged Steve (in my house that’s pronounced rather dramatically as “wing-ed”, ’cause it’s funnier that way) would be a Takara-only release, I grabbed a pre-order. Much like Breakdown, he and his Mini-con are very, very much worth the import cost. As the flying Vehicons in Prime actually have cars with wings for alt modes, rather than jets, it was initially thought that Arms Micron‘s somewhat ironically named Jet Vehicon would be nothing more than the Robots in Disguise mold minus wheels and plus wings. However, this was not the case.

Takara completely reshelled the alt mode while keeping essentially the same robot mode underneath. This also gives him the advantage of not having to have the large 5mm posts added, instead just having holes and pegs pre-built into his wings.

It would have been nice if they would have given Winged Steve a 5mm post or hole somewhere along the center of his alt mode, so his Mini-con Igu could be attached without looking so unbalanced. Speaking of whom, Igu is a large recreation of the Vehicon weapon from the cartoon who transforms into an Iguana.

Proving Steve comes not only in many shapes, but also in many sizes, there is Mini Steve, the Cyberverse-scale Vehicon.

Though only with a car alt mode, so no Mini Winged Steve (but one can hope).

At Boton we were introduced to a trio of Kreon Steve, including Steve with wheels, Winged Steve, and Steve with no apparent alt mode but with a gun arm, or Other Steve as I have oh so imaginatively decided to call him.

I’m not one for army building (the term for buying multiples of the exact same toy because they are a generic character in the fiction) but as long as they keep putting out all these different molds, I can build an army of Steve without ever duplicating. That’s pretty much the only reason I will buy the First Edition Steve when he is re-released as a Toys R Us exclusive later this year.

After all, the more Steve, the merrier.

‘Til All Are Displayed! The Collection… well most of it.

I was just looking at the pictures on my “‘Til All Are What Now?” page and thought it was just about time for an updated shot of my Transformers display.

As I sit at my computer typing this out a turn to the left reveals three shelves, each roughly six and a half feet tall, as well as an assortment of smaller satellite shelves. To my immediate right is display shelf 1. Topped by three (soon to be three and a half) shelves of the star of Transformers — no, despite what they would have you believe recently, not Bumblebee: Optimus Primes and Convoys of all shapes and sizes.

Working our way counter-clockwise, shelf-by-shelf from there we have:

• Half a shelf of Hot Rod/Rodimus Primes.
• Ultra Magnus’ (Magni?) and Blaster and his tapes.
• Smaller Constructicons and a slew of Micromasters.
• Constructicons (old and new) and other combiners.
• Scorponok, SkyLynx, and Omega Supreme.
• In the middle is the Dark of the Moon shelf and Kre-O Optimus, which is a bit of a mess at the moment.
• My wife’s “girl Transformers that could kick your tailpipe” shelf.
•  The multiple incarnations of Mirage, Prowl, and Jazz.
• The Targetmasters.
• Finally, the Headmasters and Wheeljack.

On the wall opposite display shelf 1, there are shelves 2 and 3 and two more ancillary shelves.

For this one, I’ll do each shelving unit individually, starting on the top left:

• Various incarnations of Star Saber (except an actual Star Saber, sadly) and Dai Atlas (with an actual Dai Atlas, happily.)
• Two shelves of Minibots and their updates.
• An entire shelf of Grimlocks.
• The rest of the Dinobots, as well as Grimstone and his Dinobot drones.
• The G1 repaints from the newest movies; such as red Ironhide, white and blue Jazz, and Revenge of the FallenSkywarp (look! I finally found my G1 repaint Movie (2007) Starscream!)

Display shelf 3, starting at the tippy top:

• AssortedGods, Monsters, Primes, and one tiny Fortress Maximus.
• The Animated Shelf, including the full 2011 Botcon set and TFCC Exclusive Animated Cheetor.
• The G2 and G2 Classics with all the glorious colours of the rainbow.
• The first section of G1 and G1 Classics Autobots.
• Shattered Glass and the second section of G1 and G1 Classics Autobots.
• The Movie (2007), RotF, and DotM Leader and Human Alliance class toys.
• More Combiners! Predaking!

Display shelf 2, from top to bottom:

• Shockwaves, The Fallen, and movie Megatrons.
• G1, G2, Masterpiece, Classics… just a whole bunch of Megatrons as well as Classics Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge and their updates.
• TheshelfoftheSeekers.
• Soundwavesgalore and mini-cassettes (and updates) galore.
• G1 and G1 Classics Decepticons.
• Japanese Beast Wars, including my beloved Tako Tank.
• Another shelf full of combiners.

The last little shelf is a mishmash of stuff:

• Smokescreens G1, Classics, and Alternators (soon to be joined by RotF and Cybertron Smokescreens once I dig them out.)
• The Generations Junkions.
• Scan series Bumblebee, Sideswipe…
• …Ratchet and Ironhide.
• The Power Core Combiner Autobots.
• The Power Core Combiner Decepticons.

Oh yeah, also Supreme class Beast Machines Cheetor standing to the side.

With the exception of G1 Metroplex and Cybertron Metroplex that stand ever vigilant above my computer (which is itself named Metroplex) and an extra Micromaster Tailwind, that is the entirety of my current display.

However, though admittedly a lot of floorspace is taken up by the display (and yes, I am aware that I am very, very lucky to have a wife that is not only ok with, but actually encourages my collecting and displaying), it only amounts to a little under half of my total collection. The rest are in plastic bins in a closet.

One day I will have an entire room devoted to the collection, until then, I’ll keep enjoying them by occasionally pulling them out of their bins to take pictures of them for this blog. That way I get to share the joy this collection brings me (and yes, a little showing off too.)

Kinda like Spock minus the charm. G1 Prowl!

[Much like Ironhide's post, this post will be completely ignoring IDW's 2007 assertion that Beast Wars Prowl is the same character as G1 Prowl. In this case especially because they already had a better Beast Wars Prowl to choose from.]

Prowl is kind of a tool. That’s the eternal summation of his fictional appearances. All of them. Rather boringly logical, he’s a stickler for protocol, kind of a teacher’s pet, or something like Star Trek’s Spock without any of the charm. At one point Prowl became interesting in the IDW comics when it was revealed that he was actually logical to the point of coldly calculating and sometimes morally ambiguous, but they put a stop to that pretty quickly (much to the chagrin of the fans.)

As toys go, he is one of the original Autobot cars, and the car that was released — minus the lightbar — as Bluestreak that same year and then Smokescreen the following year. *gasp!* Yes, Hasbro has been doing this repaint thing the whole time! Everyone that gets offended by it nowadays just need to realize that and hush up.

Despite his reputation as a jerk, he’s still been a mainstay of the Autobot forces, which was enough to garner him an update in the Classics line.

Of course, this being a longstanding tradition, Prowl’s Classics release was then remolded into Bluestreak (now called Silverstreak) and then into Smokescreen. In between his G1 and Classics releases, Prowl also received an update in the Alternators line.

"This time I have a nightstick and I'm not afraid to use it."

From a Datsun 280ZX to an Acura RSX to a Nissan 350Z, his two updates stay true to his original alt mode, being deco’ed out as standard Japanese police cars.

I don’t know, maybe being a jerk pays off? Prowl’s original toy received three reissues (of which mine is the 2003 Commemorative Series release), plus updates and even a release in the recent Kre-O line.

Stuffy, uptight, and demanding times three and a quarter.

Pay no attention to the Formula 1 race car, he’s a spy. G1 Mirage!

Mirage has lent his name to many a Transformer since his original appearance, but most are along the lines of,

“Hey, it’s a Formula-1 race car Transformer, we have to name it Mirage.”

R.i.D. Mirage came closest to a real homage (Mirage homage! Heh, say that five times fast) by actually being a blue-and-white Formula-1 race car. Energon Mirage gets the award for being the least homage-like by not only being the wrong colours but being a speedboat, not to mention a Decepticon.

Of course, being a Decepticon isn’t that much of a stretch for Mirage. Much like Thundercracker, who is “not totally convinced of the Decepticons’ cause”, Mirage is “unsure of Autobot cause… can’t be fully trusted.” Thanks to that line from his G1 techspec with very few exceptions Mirage has been either an outright traitor or at least suspected of being a traitor in his fictional appearances. Another line that seems to carry over to his fictional appearances along with this inherent distrustfulness is “Prefers hunting turbofoxes on Cybertron with his high-priced friends.” Basically, I think the writers just have something against rich people.

Over the years his function of “Counter Intelligence” and his original cartoon ability to turn himself invisible has since been boiled down to “Spy”. Naturally. Because nothing says “Spy” like a ground effect laden race car for an alt mode.

Sadly, Mirage’s G1 toy has been guaranteed not to be reissued. Reportedly at Botcon 2005, Hasbro announced that the mold had been “lost”. Luckily for those of us with no original Mirage and a serious distaste of the secondary market, a Chinese knock-off company decided to reverse engineer Mirage into a very high quality knock-off. Thanks to my lovely wife, the G1 Mirage-shaped hole in my collection has been filled this holiday season.

The counterfeiters didn’t stop there though, they actually made a slight improvement over the original release. Certain stickers have actually been replaced with full-on paint applications; such as the stickers of red and white stripes that run up the sides of his alt mode.

Sorry, Hasbro and Takara, but in this case you’ve been one-upped at your own game. Of course, I don’t feel bad about this considering Hasbro’s statement about no reissue, so I count no harm no foul on this one.

Mirage took a little researching, as his labels weren’t something I had paid too much attention to before. I did know that “Ligier” was Mirage’s name for his Japanese release, but what I didn’t know was that it actually comes from the name of the Motorsport team that fielded this particular Formula 1 car, the number 26 JS-11 driven by Jacques-Henri Laffite.

“Elf” comes from the French oil company “Elf Aquitaine”, “Citanes” is a deliberate bastardization of “Gitanes”, a brand of French cigarettes, which lead me to this particular sticker,

It took me a while to figure out what it was supposed to be (turns out I could have just read his Wiki entry a little more closely) but I finally hunted it down. The original cigarette company, Gitanes, had a dancing “gypsy” lady for a logo. Though the original designers chose to bastardize the name, they didn’t bother to modify the logo itself.

Another reason I am perfectly ok with getting a “brand-new” Mirage, is that his original toy has a bad habit of breaking at the waist pivot, making an intact, good condition Mirage even harder to find on the secondary market. Now, I don’t know if the knock-off addresses this at all, but either way, I am being very careful with him.

Mirage went on from G1 to get a G2 release in the Go-Bots line as well as a planned G2 release as a “flip-changer” which would see release in Machine Wars instead (more on that in a moment), but neither was as grand as the concept art for a repaint of his G1 toy done in pure G2 style, note the wonderful alligator image on his arm and the scales on his legs.

From my post on the recent Transformers Vault book.

Back to that Machine Wars release of his planned flip-changer G2 release. The “flip-changer” part is that he mostly transforms with one spring-loaded click, in his case by lifting his rear spoiler. Unfortunately they decided to go with a “close enough” approach on the colour choice and made him teal and white. They also changed his alt mode number from “26″ to “7″. Both of these changes, as well as the fact that the mold later saw release as R.i.D. Skid-Z, contributed to my continued ambivalence towards it. In 2004 in the Takara-only Robot Masters line, they saw fit to correct this by painting him a more appropriate blue and giving him the correct number.

They also gave him some extra weaponry.  He comes with the mold’s original two-piece blue gun that allows for storing in alt-mode, but, like other Robot Masters releases he comes with an additional (very shiny) weapon, which clearly was not designed for this line originally. They couldn’t use the original G1 toy’s sponsorship labels and instead chose to cause an odd meta-self-referencing situation by replacing them with the toyline name and his ID number.

Heck, even Mirage’s original name in Japan, Ligier, was now off limits. They got around that by naming him Rijie, which apparently has the same pronunciation in Japanese anyway. Not sure how that makes everything ok with trademarks and whatnot.

Next up in 2006, we got a release of Mirage as my favourite car in the Alternators line. Though I did an entire post on him already, he still deserves his place within G1 Mirage’s post, (also, I can never get enough of him) so here he is again.

Who needs to be a Formula 1 racer when you’re this pretty?

Just a great job on the headsculpt. Definitely more square than the original, but still very Mirage.

Where was I? Oh, yes, 2006. The end of 2006 saw Mirage get an absolutely amazing update rather early on in the Classics line. Back to his original alt mode, he got his 26 back.

This time his sponsorships became a mix of Transformers homages like Witwicky Sparkplugs and Lithonian Drivetrain, and designer in-jokes, such as “Plasma Injection Energy” or P.I.E. (mmmm, pie) and “F.P. Racing”, a reference to Hasbro designer Joe Kyde’s RPG guild. Keeping that integration of his weapon in alt mode, this toy is brilliant with a great Mirage head update and absolutely phenomenal articulation

Such a perfect update, it inspired one of my favourite pieces of fan art. From Xiling on Deviantart breathes such life into the character with just one image.

Given how perfect his Classics update is, I’m not sure where that leaves his Robot Masters release in my collection, but I like it so much it will probably still find a place on display.

But, wait, who’s that little guy? Another present I received this year (apparently the year of Mirage?), that would be the great little Kreon release of G1 Mirage, sold with the Mirage Kre-O set. Now, I have stated previously my feelings on the Kre-O releases, but to sum it up: I’m probably never going to go to the effort of building Kre-O Mirage’s robot mode. They did a good job of capturing his Classics headsculpt, but the rest of the body just doesn’t look worth the effort to me.

His alt mode is great and there’s no way I am passing up the opportunity to let Kreon Mirage drive himself.

So here you have it, the very odd evolution of Mirage.

Kre-O! Kreeeeeee-O! Kre-O come an’ me wan’ go home. Kre-O Optimus Prime!

This post was a week in the making. I seriously underestimated the effort necessary to “transform” Kre-O Optimus Prime from one form to the other. Optimus is the only set from the new Kre-O line that I had any intention of buying and that has been further reinforced after the amount of effort it took to assemble him, take him apart, and reassemble him. I’m a much bigger fan of pre-assembled toys, which is why this line and the Built To Rule line, the previous Transformers building block set don’t really interest me. (Of course, it didn’t help that the Built To Rule line was hideous to begin with.) Other than vastly improving the look of both robot and alt modes, they also did one other awesome thing with the Kre-O line. Included with all but the smallest sets are Kreons, little Lego-man versions of Transformers. I absolutely love the Kreons, far more than the actual buildable robots that they came with.

Because I only applied two faction stickers (more about that to come), I placed one of those pieces on his chest instead of the pieces the instructions called for. He just didn't seem right in robot mode with no Autobot symbol at all.

Don’t get me wrong, I am still glad I have Optimus and he will take his place on my Optimus Prime shelves. Being the highest pricepoint of the Kre-O sets, he is quite large. As a robot that doesn’t have to take transformation into consideration, he’s very flexible, though his head is too small for the size of his body. A head, I might add that is almost pulled straight from Classics Optimus Prime.

Psycho Movie Prime: "This new building block thing should make taking people's faces easier."

I also have to applaud the fact that, though this is clearly a movie related line, the Kreons that are included are all patterned on their G1 incarnations. In fact, the thing that moved this set from the “might have to pick that up” to the “MUST. BUY.” list was that included along with the Optimus Kreon was Skywarp, my favourite Decepticon.

Careful who you play pranks on, Skywarp. They might have a big brother.

As much fun as Kre-O Optimus’ robot mode is, the real greatness of this set lies in alt mode.

This is the mode he's going to be displayed in. It's possible the long transistion back to robot mode may never happen again.

However, here’s where I have a problem with the Kre-O line. Stickers. I am not a big fan of stickers, it’s my least favourite part of getting a new reissue and I definitely wasn’t expecting them in a new toy. This set is absolutely sticker-tastic too. Following the instructions, there are seven Autobot symbols from his grill to the front cowl of his trailer alone. The result is quite comical and pretty much unnecessary so I left them off altogether.

Being a toy for kids, he comes with two extra little dudes as well as two motorcycles for the little dudes to ride. Here’s the little dudes.

…and that’s pretty much where they are going to stay. Squishy human folk are not generally welcome on my shelves. However, the motorcycles as well as the Bluestreak Kreon also included are very much welcome and still got put to use.

The trailer opens up and the rear section of the truck cabin comes off to form a “Command Center”. Overall, the truck and trailer have some great little details. The back cabinets on the truck have little opening doors.

The cab itself has a gear shift and a seat. Disappointingly, Kreon Optimus can’t be put in the driver seat because the wheels on his own legs won’t let him fit and his helmet is too tall for the interior.

Apparently Kre-O Optimus is not interested in hiding his identity. I’m pretty sure there’s not a state that has that many letters in their license plates.

Unfortunately I did this photo shoot backwards and now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to start the process of turning him back into a truck from robot mode.  I’ll leave you with this nonsensical battle shot.

Optimus Prime and Bluestreak battling Skywarp on top of Optimus Prime? Nonsense.