REVIEW: Ocular Max PS-01R Sphinx Regenesis

Love them or hate them, Generation 2 Transformers are a thing. And love them or think they're insanely garish repaints that you wouldn't waste your time with, but Masterpiece versions of them are now also a thing! Whilst it all kinda started with MP-12G Lambor back in 2014 (where have those five years gone?), it's only been more recently that the unofficial scene has cottoned onto the idea that they can rerelease their designs in a ludicrous second colour scheme and some people (like me) will eat it up. You see, be it ever so loud and gaudy, there's nothing quite like G2. So here's Ocular Max with what I fairly confidently believe might be the ninth(!) version of their Sphinx mould, and boy have they gone for it, huh?

REVIEW: X-Transbots MX-XIIIT Crackup (Youth version)

Third party combiners have been dominating the market for some time now, but of late we've definitely seen a rush by various companies to deliver the definitive take on these characters in so-called Masterpiece-style. Bigger, bulkier, more complex than ever and, crucially to some, intensely cartoon accurate. X-Transbots have thrown their hat in the ring with Monolith, their attempt at a 3PMP Menasor, but unlike some of the competition they've also carved a separate niche by releasing first Generation 2 redecos of their designs, and now Generation 1 toy-inspired versions as well. First out of the gate is Crackup, their attempt at a toy version of Breakdown, and given how much I continue to enjoy the original release I've been pretty excited to see how he fares!

REVIEW: X-Transbots MM-IXZ Barada

Time goes by extraordinarily quickly in the world of Transformers collecting. I was just sitting down to put together a few words on X-Transbots Barada when I decided to look up the review I did of the previous version of this mould, Klaatu, and was stunned to find it was from well over two years ago. How did that happen? In any case, we're back at it again with a fresh repaint for this design, and a slight feeling of reassurance that enough time has passed to fully indulge in another version of the same toy! Fortunately, it's a pretty good one too.

REVIEW: FansToys FT-29T Quietus

As I was preparing for this review I looked up the last write-up I did on this blog about a third party Masterpiece-style Cyclonus and was surprised to see it was published almost three years ago to the day! I don't know why but I'm sure that says something about the whole notion of assembling a Masterpiece collection and the fact that we're never really "done" as there'll always be tweaks and upgrades to make along the way. In any case it also made me feel that three years wasn't such a bad length of time to have passed before looking at a new version of the character, so with that said let's dive into it!

REVIEW: FansToys TF-31C Spoiler

For whatever reason, third party attempts at Transformers characters generally come in threes. Someone, somewhere decreed it. It's rarely less than three and it's even rarer to be more than three, as three seems to be the absolute sweet spot. Reflectors, Insecticons, Seasprays, Springers, you name it. Oh, and now the rule of three has spread to the Combiner wars (see what I did there?) as everyone and their mum is having a go at giving us Masterpiece-styled big lads. Well, now FansToys are throwing their hat into the Stunticon ring with - Spoiler alert! - Spoiler!

REVIEW: Aoyi Mech / Black Mamba LS-11 Ancient Leader Scorn

Boy, Michael Bay's Transformers movies are a bit of a divisive topic, eh? And knock off toys too, huh? Well fortunately giant robot dinosaurs are definitely awesome and everyone agrees, so it's all good! Yes, for today's review we're taking a look at Aoyi Mech Ancient Leader, which is an oversized knock off (or OSKO) of an official representation of Scorn from the fourth TF film, Age of Extinction. I guess depending on how you feel about the first two topics then perhaps you've already made up your mind on this one, but I'll attempt to walk you through it all the same. So let's go!

REVIEW: FansToys FT-39 Jabber

It's been a good while since I've flexed my review muscles properly outside of doing monthly rundowns, but here we are back at it again with a new FansToys release. Yep, I've been inspired to get typing by heft and sparkly finish. After all, many of us have been waiting patiently for another stab at a Masterpiece-styled Blurr for a little while now, so let's take a look at Jabber and see if he absolutely, positively, definitely hits the spot.

REVIEW: TakaraTomy Masterpiece MP-40 Targetmaster Hot Rodimus

One day someone will put together a list of "rather underwhelming new Transformers toy reveals", and I have no doubt that MP-40 deserves a spot somewhere on that list. Seriously now, would anyone have pegged Targetmaster Hot Rod, a seemingly-close repaint of a figure we received almost exactly two years prior as a desirable choice for the next mainline Masterpiece figure? The problem is of course compounded by the lack of other reveals happening at the moment; as it stands this chap is actually the last G1 standard release character on the roster, with only Beast Wars Dinobot and the special edition MP-17+ Prowl left to go before we're potentially in limbo. Whilst that doesn't concern me too much (I have no doubt Takara are cooking up something), I can understand why MP-40 was met with a collective sense of "huh?" when he was announced. After a fantastic last year run with the likes of Grapple, Artfire, Sunstreaker, Megatron... I don't think anyone thought that this is how they'd kick off 2018. But hey, here we are.

REVIEW: Alien Attack STF-01 Firage

Whilst putting this review together, I shared a couple of completed pictures of the figure with some friends of mine. "Who is that supposed to be?" came the immediate response from one of them, despite him having seen Dark of the Moon, the live action Transformers film from which the intended robot hails. Even when I pointed out that the character's name is Dino, they still had precisely zero recollection of him actually being in the movie, and it's perhaps not hard to understand why. If you check on Youtube, you'll find a video which collects all of the Autobot's scenes in that film into one handy package. It runs for a mere three minutes and fifty one seconds (by my rough approximation, that's about one hundredth of the total runtime, no? It just felt like it?), which is especially telling once you realise that most of that is spent in car mode or hanging around in the background. Still, Dino has seemingly made impression enough to be granted his own third party revision, and so here we are. Oh, and if you were wondering about the name, it's definitely not an unfortunate homage to that political pillock, Nigel Farage (puttup!), but instead a mash-up of Ferrari and Mirage, which was rather confusingly the character's name when he was originally realised in official toy form. And with all that cleared up, let's crack on with it!

REVIEW: Mayhem Mekanics The Unrustables MM01

Whilst I'm sure that many people, like me, tend to appreciate the wonderful world of Transformers as our sole collecting focus, that doesn't mean that we can't branch out occasionally and have a bit of fun, does it? After all, despite my rather exclusive appreciation of the infamous robots in disguise, I do also make time to keep up with the recent Diaclone reboot, for all its joys. I mean, it's all transforming robots at the end of the day, isn't it? And so it is that I find myself excited to check out new third party company Mayhem Mekanics' first figure, which is also the debut of their Unrustables line. And boy, is it an absolute corker.

REVIEW: Unique Toys R-01 Peru Kill

Lets be frank - some third party toys have rather bizarre names, don’t they? I mean, Unique Toys own efforts can be a bit ropey from time to time, with contributions like Allen and Sworder landing with all the elegance and charm of a handgliding rhinoceros, and that’s to say nothing of me still scratching my head over stuff like Gahz’ranka. Not that the competition have it sown up; let’s not forget that whole FansToys Willys debacle after all. Still, I was genuinely mystified by this submission in particular, until a friend reminded me that the character in question makes a notable kill in Peru as part of the movie from which he hails - hence Peru Kill. I’m not sure if I like it better now or not.

REVIEW: TakaraTomy Masterpiece MP-39 Sunstreaker

Ever since MP-12 Lambor was released in 2012, it’s fair to say that the carbots have been a sort-of backbone for the Masterpiece line. Despite some detours along the way, there’s been a relatively steady stream of the fellas, and so much so that the roster of characters still available for the treatment is actually starting to thin out a little nowadays. That said, there’re still some very notable spots left to be filled, although perhaps at long last we can tick off one ambition with this release, as the ‘bot that started it all is finally able to stand side-by-side with his brother. Sunstreaker is here at last.

REVIEW: Maketoys MTRM-09SP Bounceback

If I hadn’t already gushed enough about how generally wonderful and dreamy I find Maketoys Downbeat to be in my original review of that figure, then I’ve certainly cemented the case by sticking him in a fairly prominent position on my list of best figures from 2017. And why not? He’s positively delightful; an absolutely terrific representation of an iconic character that, thus far, we’ve seen no sign of in the Masterpiece line, presuming we ever will. In fact, as I’ve mentioned before, I think Downbeat is one of only a few third party toys that pretty much seamlessly blends with official figures in a way that some can only aspire to. If we never see a TakaraTomy Jazz, I know I’ll remain happy with Downbeat as a representation of that character.

REVIEW: TakaraTomy Masterpiece MP-15E/ 16E Cassettebot Vs. Cassettron

If there's one thing that can be guaranteed in the Masterpiece line, it's that TakaraTomy like to throw us a complete curveball every so often. The history of the official line is peppered with examples where particular releases went against expectations, or were released in a manner that defied the perceived logic of what came before them. Well, I'm not sure there's ever been a better example to show us that really, we have no clue what the future might hold than this release. I mean, c'mon, who seriously would have predicted that a Masterpiece Nightstalker would be on the way any time soon? Yet, here we are.

REVIEW: TakaraTomy Masterpiece MP-12+ Lambor

It was only a little over a month ago that I was looking back at a variant edition of the first release of MP-12 Lambor, (Sideswipe to you and me), the write-up for which can be found here. Of course, that first release stretches all the way back to 2012, and was in fact the original Masterpiece carbot, so it's an unusual opportunity to be looking back at other versions of it twice in such close proximity all these years later. Yet here we are with the newest version, MP-12+, which sees the mould being given a bit of a makeover in an attempt to make it even more cartoon accurate and bring it more in-line with some of the current Masterpiece releases (such as the upcoming MP-39 Sunstreaker, which is released this month!).

REVIEW: Badcube OTS-01 Huff & OTS-13 Piper

Cubex Huff is an interesting tale. Released in 2014 by a then-brand new third party company, the figure was initially well-received and, in a lot of people’s minds, quickly became the definitive not-Huffer for your burgeoning Masterpiece collection. And a great figure it was indeed! Not only was it an almost-dead-ringer for the character’s animation model, but it proved to be a fun toy with two great modes and a relatively fluid transformation. But there was a twist... whereas most Huffs seemed ok out of the box, reports soon emerged of a variety of quality control problems, including loose joints and floppy limbs. However, the most notorious example was definitely the flaky paint, which in the subsequent years has proven to be something of an inevitability, much to the disappointment of a lot of collectors. Indeed, it happened to my own copy, previously thought to have escaped the dreaded curse, with Huff forever left looking like his has a bad case of cosmic rust.

REVIEW: MAAS Toys CT-001 Skiff & CT-002 Gold

Time for something a little different with this review. New third party company Maas have already done a good job at creating an engaging presence in the online Transformers community, and they certainly seem to be picking some unique designs for their first couple of releases. No doubt most collectors would recognise that CT-001 Skiff is a rendition of Bumblebee, but perhaps not one that they're familiar with. Well, for this release Maas have drawn inspiration from the short-lived but much-loved 2002 comic series The War Within, which featured the early days of the Transformers' war back on Cybertron. A lot of popular characters were given a Cybertronian-style makeover for the series to depict how they looked before travelling to Earth, and it's that depiction of Bumblebee that you see made real before you here.

REVIEW: DX9 D11 Richthofen

I've mentioned it a couple of times before, but growing up in the UK I wasn't familiar with the entirety of the G1 cartoon. I had a handful of episodes on VHS tapes, which were of course played on repeat and so became well worn, but much loved. Consequently, the episodes featured have an enduring place in my memory and remain some of my very favourites to this day, and the characters contained within have all made a rather lasting impression too. So, if I told you that some of my favourite adventures were Dinobot Island and the absolute classic The Girl Who Loved Powerglide, it will probably give you some insight into how much I adore the arrogant sky jock that this figure represents. Yep, it's POWERGERRRLIIYYDE!

REVIEW: Toyworld TW-M07 Spaceracer

I'm still a Toyworld newbie. In fact, this is only the second figure of theirs that I have even held in hand, having reviewed a test shot of Primorion a little while back. I found that release to be somewhat promising if ultimately a little lacking - not quite enough to convince me that it deserved a definitive place in my collection. Since then it's taken me a little while to give the company another go, if only because I've yet to feel enough temptation for any individual release to bite. So what convinced me this time? Well, the first and most obvious reason was that they put out a character that still currently has not been released by any other official or third party producer in a Masterpiece-style. The second reason is that I thought he looked pretty good!

REVIEW: TakaraTomy Masterpiece MP-11ND Dirge

It was only in my last review that I stated the case for the defence of repaints, and attempted to show that they're more than mere cynical cash-grabs, attempting to somehow take advantage of unwitting collectors. Of course, it would only be fair to consider all sides of this argument, and it would be difficult not to at least ponder the last few releases of the Masterpiece Coneheads as supporting any potential case for the prosecution. That's not to completely write them off, of course, but it's fair to say that Ramjet and Thrust have not exactly been universally acclaimed.