Zob's Thoughts on Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Bumblebee

When it comes to collecting toys from the Transformers live-action movies, I only buy toys of the characters who actually appear on-screen. Therefore, I consider my 2007 movie toy collection more or less "complete" despite not owning off-screen characters like Wreckage, Swindle, etc. I had originally sworn off buying any of the Revenge of the Fallen toys based on character I already owned, since it seemed silly to keep buying Optimus Prime and Ironhide and friends all over again just because there's a new movie coming out. That said, the first time I saw Bumblebee in the store during the weekend the Revenge of the Fallen toys broke street date, I couldn't tell right away whether or not it was the same toy I had at home or something brand-new. The head sculpt, in particular, convinced me to buy the toy since I knew for sure I'd never seen it before. Of course, after I got him home and did a comparison, I realized it was, indeed, pretty much the same toy, with some minor alternations. I thought about returning it since I hadn't opened it, but I liked the new head sculpt so much that I ended up keeping him.

Bumblebee was one of the only toys that was available prior to the May 30th release date; he and Soundwave were available for order on hasbrotoyshop.com several weeks prior to the street date, making them this year's equivalent of the "sneak preview" protoform figures that were released in 2007. They are the only two Deluxe-level toys from assortment who are packaged in robot mode instead of vehicle mode. (There's probably another reason for that besides being an attempt to distinguish the sneak preview toys from the rest of the assortment. As a Cybertronic satellite, Soundwave is the only Deluxe-level toy that transforms into something completely indistinguishable and unrecognizable—everybody else turns into realistic cars and jets and things. Bumblebee turns into a regular ol' car himself, but in vehicle mode, he looks exactly like his previous release two years ago, so packaging him in robot mode was a savvy way of showcasing the mold differences and convincing kids to get this toy. (Starting the toy off as a robot necessitated an entirely new instruction booklet, though they did recycle some of the illustrations—they're just in a different sequence.)

Bumblebee's vehicle form is actually a slightly modified version of the original toy. When the 2007 movie was under development, the decision was made to base Bumblebee on the fifth-generation Camaro Concept intended for the 2009 production year. Now that it actually is 2009, though, the producers went in a slightly different direction and made Bumblebee a 2010 Super Sport, which is similar to the concept version but with a larger front intake and dual fog lamps. Hasbro altered the toy's design to more closely match the updated vehicle design; the changes are largely cosmetic (they also tweaked his wheels a little), though the slightly bigger front bumper doesn't rest as snugly against his body in robot mode as the previous version, so his chest juts out a little more than it used to. (Note that Hasbro still refers to the vehicle mode as a Camaro Concept on the packaging.)

Another change Hasbro made was to replace Bumblebee's original handheld weapon—a cannon that converted into a blade, which detached and stored between his legs in vehicle mode. This time, his armament is fully integrated into his design, replacing his right hand altogether. (This is actually more accurate to the films, in which none of the Transformers carry accessories—their various blasters and swords and things are part of their bodies, and are usually created by transforming their arms into their weapon of choice.) The toy's entire forearm is essentially a missile launcher, and comes equipped with a bright orange "pulse missile" whose prototype was shown as translucent on the back of the package, but realized during production as opaque orange plastic. Even though his entire forearm has been hollowed out to make room for the missile, though, somebody must have made a slight miscalculation because it doesn't fit very well when the missile is loaded. The butt-end of the missile presses up against the inside of the chamber, which interferes with the potential launch distance by a considerable margin. The launcher is actually designed to rotate inwards, but while this eliminates the friction problem with the missile, it puts the launcher at an awkward angle with respect to Bumblebee's arm. (The actual reason it rotates is so that it can rest between both his arms for storage in car mode; the missile juts out from underneath the rear bumper, nestled right between his twin exhaust pipes.) The launcher is held on with a tiny little knob and pops off all too easily.

By far the most troublesome change, though, is actually the smallest—and at first, the least noticeable. There's a little plastic tab on each of the armor panels on Bumblebee's upper legs, which are designed to fit into the little slots on the other half of each fender and help lock the vehicle mode together. It looks like somebody decided to tweak that part of the toy's design, too, and altered the size and shape of the tabs, even though there was no real reason to do so. I didn't find out about this until the first time I transformed the toy and snapped one of the tabs clean off in an attempt to fit it in the slot. Suspecting I just ended up with another defective toy, I traded it out only to find that the second Bumblebee I bought had the exact same problem. As it stands now, the new tabs—particularly the one on the rear left quadrant of the car mode—is too thick to fit easily inside the slot it was designed for. There's an old saying that goes, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," and I find it to be more than applicable here. Unless you're careful, the tabs will snap off the first time you transform him to car mode. You'd probably be best off snapping off the tabs deliberately, or at least whittling them down, due to the way they interfere with his transformation.

The new head sculpt is fantastic, and as I said, proved to be the selling point of the toy for me. It's a larger and more ambitious design, with the components on the sides of his helmet jutting out more prominently and much larger antennae that really help to convey the appearance of the character as he appears in the movies. Where the first version had a light pipe built into the head so that his eyes would glow when held up to a light source, the new toy does away with this idea in favor of eyes that are painted blue with black pupils, representing the camera lens-like optical sensors Bumblebee and the others have in the movies. It's a really nice look, though I had to look through several Bumblebees at the store before I found one that wasn't cross-eyed. (I have this trouble with C-3PO toys, too.) The first Bumblebee I bought had a loose head that kept popping off, but the replacement I got was fine, so obviously your mileage may vary.

Hasbro also tweaked Bumblebee's color scheme, swapping out his yellow-and-black colors for yellow with metallic grey. We lose some of the resemblance to the original incarnation of the character (as well as some of the metaphor behind his name), but it's more accurate to his on-screen appearance in the films, so I'm okay with it. It seems like the paint on his doors is a less precise match to the surrounding plastic this time, but that's a comparatively minor thing. A handful of other changes were made, like adding some pin striping around the borders of his racing stripes and a more authentic-looking GM logo that do improve the appearance of the toy.

Overall, though, the changes Hasbro made to the toy hurt it more than they help it. It's one thing when you take an action figure and package it with a different lightsaber or something, but when we're talking about a transformable toy that's engineered so that all the panels shift and fold and fit together precisely, just about any alterations you make are liable to mess things up along the way. I can appreciate that Hasbro was trying to offer something new and different so kids didn't feel like they were buying the exact same toy over again, but as far as the new gimmick goes, they really should have just left well enough alone.

Zob

Zob's Thoughts on Bumblejumper

Bumblejumper, or Bumper, is one of the oddest little Transformers toys ever produced. There's nothing particularly unusual about his design—indeed, he's markedly similar to two other well-known and widely-produced Mini Autobots—but what makes him so unique is the fact that even though he was packaged and sold as an official Transformers toy, his entire existence went completely unacknowledged by Hasbro!

A little history is required to fully appreciate the significance of this toy. Most fans already know that all of the original Transformers toys from 1984 came from two different robot toy lines produced by Takara in Japan. The vast majority of the original Transformers originated from Diaclone, a toy line featuring scale vehicles with tiny driver figurines. The other toy line was called Microman, which was a little different from Diaclone in that the transformable toys , part of that line's "Microchange" assortment, were meant to represent real-life objects at 1:1 scale—microscopes, guns, combination locks, and digital watches that all turned into tiny robots. All of the Mini Autobots were actually intended to represent toy cars—specifically, three of them were modeled after the Penny Racers (also produced by Takara), motorized super-deformed cars that could do tricks when the extra weight from a coin was added behind the plate in the back of the vehicle. The transforming Microman versions weren't motorized and couldn't hold a penny, but their styling was identical to the Penny Racers, right down to the fake coin slot in the back of the car that revealed the robot's head. Of the seven Microrobot Cars produced, three of them—the Volkswagen, the Porsche 924 Turbo, and the Mazda Familia 1500XG—all shared the same vehicle-to-robot transformation sequence. Unlike the others, these three toys were sold in multiple color schemes; each of them was available in a blue, yellow, and red version.

Hasbro made a handful of changes to the Japanese toys for release in the Transformers line. They assigned names and team allegiances to each of the robots (who previously had unimaginative designations like MC-02 Jaguar or Attack Robo Jet Type), including the addition of Autobot and Decepticon symbols to each toy. They also established the back story that these were living alien robots from another planet (which necessitated the removal of the Diaclone pilots, despite the fact that many toys were designed with obvious cockpits). Not every toy from Diaclone and Microman was used for the Transformers line; many were left out because they may have lacked play value (there were toys that turned into binoculars and a working flashlight) or were a bit redundant (there was a police car version of Sunstreaker that Hasbro never used, and differently-colored versions of Wheeljack and Skids with alternate head sculpts). By far the most important contribution Hasbro made, however, was the creation of the unique personalities and abilities for each character, which really helped to breathe life into the toys and made each one unique and distinct from each other. Jim Shooter and Denny O'Neil, both editors and writers for Marvel Comics, were assigned the task of creating 28 different characters for the toy line's initial launch in 1984. The only problem here is that there were actually 31 toys available when the toy line made its debut!


It's possible that the confusion was due to the fact that several Transformers toys were sold together (Soundwave came packaged with Buzzsaw, while Ravage/Rumble and Frenzy/Laserbeak were sold in two-packs), essentially making each package a single product for Hasbro's purposes. You only had to make 28 different purchases to collect the entire set, after all. In any event, there were three toys that were not assigned their own names or personalities. Hasbro had approved five of the nine Microrobo color variations—the yellow and red Volkswagen, the yellow and red Porsche, and the yellow Mazda. The yellow Volkswagen became Bumblebee, of course, and the red Porsche became Cliffjumper, but the other three toys were somehow forgotten about. They didn't get their own package artwork—in fact, they didn't get their own packaging, period. My theory is that Hasbro had originally intended these toys to represent different characters, just as they had done with Ironhide and Ratchet or Prowl and Bluestreak. If unique names had been assigned to these toys at one stage, we may never know what they were. Instead, Hasbro just sold the red Volkswagens in packaging that had been created for the yellow Bumblebee toy; they did the same thing with the yellow Porsche, selling it in packaging created for the red Cliffjumper. The lonely Mazda Familia, however, had no other equivalent in the Transformers line. Hasbro could have delayed the toy's release until proper packaging was prepared, but instead they snuck the Mazda into the existing assortment by stuffing it into Cliffjumper packaging; the shape of the cars was similar enough that they were able to reuse the same plastic bubble. (The name "Bumblejumper" implies that the toy was sold in Bumblebee packaging as well, but this has never been confirmed.)


A lot of fans believe that these three toys were overstock from Japan, unsold Takara toys that Hasbro stuffed into Transformers packaging—pointing to the lack of a Hasbro copyright stamp on the early toys as evidence. In fact, all the original Transformers toys lacked a copyright stamp, even toys that we know were never sold in Japan. This includes the green version of Brawn, whose Microman equivalent was tan; the modified version of Soundwave, whose original Japanese toy had a logo that said "CassetteMan" on the tape door; and Skywarp, a Hasbro creation who had no Diaclone equivalent. (Hasbro copyright stamps didn't begin to appear on the toys until late 1985 following a lawsuit with a rival toy company, who claimed that the lack of copyright information on the early Jumpstarters gave them a free pass to copy the toys.) Further discrediting this theory is the fact that there are no examples of other Takara toys in Hasbro packaging—if overstock had been used, surely there would be some leftover blue Bumblebees and Cliffjumpers as well, but no such packaged examples exist.

What's interesting is that Hasbro never acknowledged Bumper in the 1984 toy catalog, which was supposed to showcase the entire product offering for that year. (The red Bumblebee and yellow Cliffjumper were conspicuously absent from the catalog, too.) Furthermore, in 1985 when Hasbro initiated a marketing campaign to set their product apart from competitors and knockoffs in order to identify their transformable robots as the only "true" Transformers, the entire first year's product line was revamped to include the heat-sensitive rub symbols—except for Bumper! Even the red Bumblebee and yellow Cliffjumper saw production that year, complete with rub symbols and new packaging with photographs showing the toys in the correct colors (even if the package artwork was still wrong). It's almost as if Hasbro realized their mistake, and quietly swept poor Bumper under the proverbial rug. Needless to say, he never appeared in any cartoon episodes or comic books during the limited time the toy was in stores—why advertise a toy that, for all intents and purposes, doesn't exist?


There's a lot more to say about the toy's history than about the toy itself. Bumper is superficially similar to Cliffjumper (and shares the same sticker on the back of his head plate that Cliffjumper's got), although the large black front bumper and much larger side windows are quite distinct. His transformation is identical to that of Bumblebee and Cliffjumper—though unlike Bumblebee, the way his arms are designed prevents them from rotating until they're pulled outwards. His helmet design is interesting—while a lot of the Mini Autobots had fairly nondescript faces with featureless masks, Bumper has a more human-looking face. Indeed, he already fits the design aesthetic from the Transformers cartoon so well that it's difficult to imagine that his face would need to be significantly redesigned in order to fit in. Had he appeared in the cartoon, the wheels on his arms would no doubt have been absent, and it's quite likely that his black colors would have been depicted as grey (which was also the case with characters like Cliffjumper and Wheeljack), but he certainly wouldn't have suffered from the complete disparity between the show and the toy that befell characters like Brawn or Ratchet or Megatron.


Bumper is comparatively rare these days, due in no small part to the confusion that his very existence creates. He's frequently identified on eBay as yellow Cliffjumper by sellers who simply don't know any better (and the fact that Cliffjumper was retooled into Hubcap, who's also yellow, doesn't help matters much). In a way, Bumper is more of a collectible than a character, since he's largely absent from the Transformers lore (he did appear in some of the Dreamwave comic books before the company went bankrupt), and we don't even have an official Hasbro biography to give us a hint of what this character might be like (indeed, Hasbro has stated that they have never assigned an official name to the toy, not even retroactively). Despite this, he's one of the cutest of the Mini Autobots, and no collection is truly complete without him.


Zob

Zob's Thoughts on the Encore Mini Autobots

Takara probably grossly underestimated the demand for the original Mini Autobots reissue set, which was released in 2004 and included a retooled version of Bumblebee with an all-new cartoon-style face. To this day, the set is in enormous demand on the secondary market (with eBay prices easily exceeding $100) and prompted TakaraTomy, as they're called now, to release a second set of Mini Autobots as part of the Encore series of reissues, this time with most of the characters from the 1986 assortment, once again including the ever-popular retooled Bumblebee. In addition to Bumblebee, the set also comes with Outback, Swerve, Tailgate, and Pipes; the only two characters left out are Wheelie (who is available separately with the Kup/"Chear" reissue) and Hubcap (who was probably left out by TakaraTomy due to his complete lack of media appearances). It's clear who the real star of the show is, since Bumblebee's package artwork dominates the front of the box, and is nearly two or three times bigger than the portraits of the others.

In 1986, Hasbro was quickly running out of workable Diaclone and Microman toy designs that hadn't yet been appropriated as Transformers characters. They had a choice of either continuing to recycle the available toy designs, or creating new Transformers that weren't based on previous Takara toys. As it happens, they did both. For the Mini Autobots assortment, they took the existing designs of toys they had been selling during 1984-85 and modified them, creating retooled versions to represent new characters. Bumblebee was the only toy from the Microchange series to remain unaltered, since he was a popular character who had also starred in that year's The Transformers: the Movie, earning him a spot in the case assortment for that year.

BUMBLEBEE

Bumblebee remains one of the most popular characters from the original cartoon, and he holds the distinction of being the only Transformers character who was available at retail for every single year of G1 (the original toy was sold from 1984-86; Goldbug was in stores from 1987-88; Pretender Bumblebee was introduced in 1989; and Action Master Bumblebee was sold in 1990). The character also appeared in two different forms for Generation 2; perhaps ironically, the character's name never came up during Beast Wars. Bumblebee (or an alternate version of the character) also starred in the 2007 live-action movie and was a merchandising favorite for young kids. This is, then, not the first time the original toy has been reissued; a keychain version has been widely available at retail in recent years on the domestic front, thanks to his widespread release as a Fun-4-All licensed toy. What makes the TakaraTomy version special, though, is the all-new head sculpt for the toy, which is modeled after his appearance in the original cartoon show. The disparity between Bumblebee's original toy and his appearance in animation is discouraging for fans of the show, since the two look virtually nothing alike. Some heavy creative liberties were taken with Bumblebee's look for television, taking a rounded helmet design with a pronounced visor and mask, and turning it into a geometrically-simplified hexagonal-shaped helmet with a regular face that's arguably far more easy for the target audience (i.e., humans with eyes and a nose and a mouth) to relate to. The toy remains otherwise unchanged, though there is some evidence that some minor clean-up work was done to the windows and front and rear bumpers, probably to account for the inevitable mold degradation (this mold has been used for over a dozen separate production runs, assuming it's the same production mold every time), and the color of the yellow plastic is slightly more orangey than the domestic keychain version. Obviously, this iteration of Bumblebee lacks the loop on his bumper for the keychain accessory to attach.

The new head sculpt for Bumblebee is very attractive and captures his animated persona nicely; this is only the front half of his helmet, but the reflective mirror-like quality of the Penny Racers style plate to which his head is attached helps to create the illusion of a fully three-dimensional helmet. His eyes are, of course, painted light blue, which was typical of Autobots from the cartoon. He does have a handful of other new paint applications, like red tail lights and silver headlights, and a tampographed Autobot symbol on his chest, replacing the metal foil sticker from previous releases. (His rub symbol is on the back of his Penny Racer plate; it had originally replaced the foil sticker on his chest.) His front and rear bumpers are also silver for this release, which helps to distinguish the toy somewhat from the previous reissue that was part of the Transformers Collection TFC-12. What would have been really cool and incredibly fanboyish is if TakaraTomy had also included a yellow version of Outback's turret gun to mount on Bumblebee's roof in vehicle mode, as seen during his role in "Five Faces of Darkness." Of course, that was in all probability an animation mistake—and would also leave a rather unsightly hole in Bumblebee's chest in robot mode, but surely there would have been a way around that (by clipping it to his roof, Super GoBots style, perhaps). Not like fans needed another excuse to buy the already highly sought-after version of this toy!


OUTBACK

Outback is a retooled version of Brawn, effectively having replaced him both in the fiction and in the Mini Autobots toy assortment. In addition to his new tan and brown color scheme, Outback differs from Brawn in that his roof-mounted spare tire is shorter, his claws were replaced with more normal-looking hands, and that his entire undercarriage with his robot head, chest, and pelvis were completely redesigned. He also comes equipped with a removable turret gun, making him the first and last Mini Autobot with a detachable weapon, though he is not able to carry it in robot mode. (The turret gun seems like it was almost deliberately designed as a miniature version of Megatron's fusion cannon—which makes it a perfect accessory for Action Master Megatron if you don't mind gluing the accessory to his arm.) Despite the apparent indent for his rub symbol on the roof of his Jeep mode (which previous versions of Brawn have also had), Outback's rub symbol is actually on the side of his vehicle mode, covering one of his driver's-side windows. He has a matching Autobot symbol on the other side. This symbol placement has always bothered me; the panel on his hood with the Microchange insignia would have been an eminently better place than covering up his vehicular windows!

In robot mode, Outback is one of the more oddly-shaped Autobots, with spindly, stilt-like legs, stubby arms, a fat body, and a head nestled inside his brick-shaped torso. (Unlike the animation design for Brawn, which seemed to gloss over these design abnormalities in favor of portraying him as nearly humanoid, Outback's animation design makes no apologies for his appearance and presents him very much as his toy appears.) Oddly enough, the instructions still use illustrations of the Brawn toy, only with the turret gun attached (a mistake made 23 years ago with the G1 instructions). One minor change made to the reissue is that his wheels are held on with pins instead of bolts, which is actually enormously beneficial since the old bolts tended to interfere with the movement of his legs during transformation (particularly sliding them up into his hip sockets to lock them in place for robot mode). One new change made for the reissue is that TakaraTomy painted his eyes blue. Normally I would applaud any change like this, particularly if it brings him closer in line with his cartoon potrayal, but in fact Outback is one of the few Autobots who didn't normally have blue eyes in the cartoon (originally the toy's entire head and face was painted silver and his first appearance in "Five Faces of Darkness" reflected this). Outback does have an alternate animation color scheme used in the Korean-animated "The Quintesson Journal" in which his eyes are blue, though, so perhaps the change made to the toy is not completely unwarranted.

PIPES

Pipes was the most heavily altered of the original Microchange vehicles; not only was the appearance of his vehicle mode heavily retooled, but his entire transformation sequence was completely reinvented. Where Huffer had strange, V-shaped smokestacks, Pipes has more standardized round ones. Huffer had square-shaped headlights; Pipes' headlights are round. Pipes also got a different front grill and an elongated tail section, which goes a long way to help distinguish him from Huffer. The most significant change, however, was altering the vehicle-to-robot conversion so that Huffer's back actually became Pipes' front. This necessitated the introduction of a new robot head, the removal of Huffer's old one, and some minor cosmetic changes to the tabs that hold the vehicle cab in place (which, by accident or design, now look more like seats than ever before). All of Huffer's vestigial robot elements are still present, though, and remain visible on Pipes' back. (Like Outback, he's got "M" logos on either side of the cab left over from his Microchange heritage.) His rub symbol is in the same place that Huffer's was when he started wearing one, but Pipes also gets a nice, big Autobot symbol on the back of the cab, off-set to the left that's plainly visible in robot mode. One change that's new to the reissue is the silver paint applications on his headlights.

As a robot, Pipes is even cuter than Huffer, with an adorably tiny little head framed by this gigantic truck-cab backpack. He's a little taller than Huffer at the shoulders due to the extended rear truck section, but his arms are bent at a more natural angle due to the reversal of his shoulder joints, though he remains one of the only Mini Autobots without discernible hands or claws of any sort. His original sticker was replaced with a tampo-printed Autobot symbol, though it seems a bit pinkish rather than the vibrant red that would have been expected. Pipes also got his bolts swapped out for pins holding his wheels in place, but unlike Outback this doesn't significantly affect the toy's functionality. Pipes was the only one of the Mini Autobots from 1986 who originally had painted eyes, so TakaraTomy made no changes to his paint deco, and his visor remains red. (Pipes actually had blue eyes in the cartoon, but he would have required a Bumblebee-style remold to make him look like he did in the show. Pipes is notable as the leader of the Mini Autobots in the cartoon, commanding the intercept squad that attempted to stop Trypticon's attack on the volcano base. This is a far cry from the mechanic-slash-junk-collector he's described as in his toy tech specs.) The color of white plastic used on the reissue Pipes is actually brighter than on the original, which was more of an eggshell white.


SWERVE

Swerve looks very much like Gears as a vehicle, though in addition to his alternate color scheme, he's obviously wearing a different camper shell for his truck bed. Oddly enough, his rub symbol has always been applied to his roof sideways, right on top of his sun roof. (If this is a factory error, then TakaraTomy reproduced it faithfully on the reissue.) Somehow it seems befitting, somehow, for the poor little mixed-up absent-minded Autobot. Swerve is perhaps one of the lesser-known Mini Autobots due to his absence from Marvel's TRANSFORMERS UNIVERSE profile collection and his lack of a prominent role in the original cartoon. He was a member of Pipes' intercept squad to defend Teletraan I, but his most notable involvement in that battle was firing off a few shots with his weapon before getting stepped on by Trypticon, who buried him in the ground neck-deep with a single stomp.


Swerve transforms exactly like Gears, though his uninspired pull-the-arms-out and flip-the-legs down transformation style has been used repeatedly (both within the Transformers line and in contemporary competitors like Tonka's GoBots) and offers nothing unique or innovative. He's not entirely dissimilar to his mold brother; though his robot face and torso were redesigned, it doesn't particularly change his overall appearance as much as Outback or Pipes. The most welcome change is a detailed robot helmet design with proper eyes, nose, and a mouth, a far cry from the fairly abstract, generic face design on Gears. Swerve's original paper decals were replaced with metal foil stickers for the reissue, which sit against his body flatter with less chance of peeling off. He also got not one, but two new paint applications; where the head on the original toy was painted entirely red, the reissue has blue eyes and a silver face. One particularly thoughtful change, which isn't readily evident unless you're peeling off stickers (or fixing ones that were misapplied), is the fact the screw hole that's covered up by his Autobot symbol has a plastic plug in place. This makes the surface area more even and gives the Autobot symbol something to stick to (and prevents the symbol from falling into the hole, which was also a problem on Gears). Like the others, Swerve got his bolts swapped out with new pins holding his wheels on, which is a change for the better since the old bolts tended to scrape the chrome off his upper legs (and transfer unsightly rust spots to the sides of his chest). The assembly of the bolts on Swerve's legs was reverse so that the head of the bolt is now visible from the outside, above his rear wheels inside the wheel wells. Like Pipes, Swerve has a brighter shade of white plastic this go around, rather than the creamy white used on the original toy.

TAILGATE

It seems like every one of the 1986 Mini Autobots had some kind of fundamental personality problem, and Tailgate is probably the most deeply-disturbed of the lot. He believes that everyday Earth devices are in fact sentient machines that have been enslaved, and he's passionate about their rights to the point of lunacy. It's a small wonder that this character was never approached in the contemporary fiction, since he would have been a very difficult character to write for. He made a cartoon appearance in "Five Faces of Darkness" along with the other Mini Autobots, but his role was so small as to be completely insignificant Unlike Swerve, Tailgate did at least get a TRANSFORMERS UNIVERSE profile, though he was never featured in any of the Marvel Comics stories proper. Perhaps the most interesting thing that can be said of Tailgate is that his toy served as the model for Wipe-Out, the diminutive partner of Trypticon who effectively replaced Full Tilt, and who was briefly featured in issue #27, entitled "King of the Hill."

As a vehicle, Tailgate remains recognizable as a super-deformed Pontiac Firebird, though he differs from Windcharger in that his off-center cowl induction hood has been modified to be symmetrical, (leading to the impression that it's not a working induction assembly at all but a blocked-off intake). Spoiling the look even further is the fact that his rub symbol indent is smack-dab in the center of this induction vent; the introduction of a badly-placed rub symbol really does ruin the lines on a toy this tiny. His transformation is identical to to that of Swerve, though due to the size and shape of his car mode he ends up a lot taller and leaner in robot mode. Tailgate's transformation is actually one step less complicated than Windcharger's; originally, the toy's arms were designed to slide down on a pivot so that his shoulder axis was lower, but this functionality was removed for Tailgate. On the reissue version, the plastic blocks to which his arms are attached appear to have been pinched at the ends, probably an attempt to get the arms to lock in place more securely when in vehicle mode. (What he really needed, honestly, was locks for his legs. Ironically, the animation model for both Tailgate and Windcharger shows them transformed incorrectly to vehicle mode, with their conjoined legs halfway unlocked and looking like an oversized rollbar.) Like Swerve, Tailgate also got a different style of pins holding his lower legs in place; the heads of those pins are visible inide his rear wheel wells (though they aren't quite as obvious as they are on Swerve). Tailgate also got a new blue paint application for his eyes to bring him a little closer to his animated appearance, and his original paper decals have been replaced with metal foil. Like the other reissue Mini Autobots, he's also made from a brigher grade of white plastic, but aside from that he's essentially identical to the G1 version.

Zob

Zob's Thoughts on Legends Beachcomber, Brawn, and Bumblebee

Mini Autobots are back! The Legends Class has, of course, traditionally been reserved for miniaturized versions of larger toys, giving kids a chance to afford their favorite characters at a reasonable price point of right around five bucks a pop. Lately, though, some of the Legends toys have also paid tribute to popular G1 characters from the past, offering tiny little bite-sized versions of Transformers like Jazz and Hound and even G2 Megatron. This trend continues with the toys slated for 2009 release as part of the 25th anniversary. All three of the latest characters were previously part of the Mini Autobots assortment, making these updated versions eminently appropriate as Legends toys. They're shipping along with a tiny little Legends version of Animated Starscream, which I did not buy.

BEACHCOMBER

There are so many Transformers characters out there, even if you just limit yourself to the 1984-85 characters, so it's not really too surprising that there are still characters out there like Beachcomber who have never gotten new toys (the last time he was approached by Hasbro was the metallic green G2 edition back in 1993). The new Beachcomber is instantly recognizable as his G1 namesake, with an attractive dark blue color scheme with white highlights. (White and grey are colors that seem to get confused with each other regularly. I'm thinking mainly here of the SCF version of Starscream. It's not really the right scheme for Beachcomber, but it looks okay. Blue-and-white works for Mirage, anyway.)

He measures at about three inches tall in robot mode, just barely taller than the original Beachcomber toy, and he has most of the appropriate details in this form (the tilted exhaust pipe shaped design on his chest, the round thingies on his pelvis, and even the slanted I'm-so-sad-to-see-you visor). Some effort was made to turn this into a cartoon-like version of Beachcomber, with blue eyes and a silver-painted face that includes an actual mouth, rather than the strange multi-faceted duckbill on the older toy. (I would be remiss if I didn't point out that in the show, Beachcomber was one of the few Autobots who didn't actually have blue eyes. Still, they get points for trying.)

He's got some nice articulation, with working hips and knees and shoulders that move in two different directions, plus little feet that pivot a little because they form the flip-out seats in his vehicle mode.His transformation is pretty similar to the original version, with a handful of new tricks (his head is connected to his pelvis so that it disappears into his chest when you slide his torso up). He turns into a dune buggy that really doesn't look anything like his older vehicle form. It's like they took the same wheel base and tacked on a bunch of armor paneling. This is sort of like what would happen if Beachcomber and the Batmobile from Batman Begins had a kid. On the upshot, at least he doesn't have side fenders that are pretty obviously shaped like robot arms. He looks more like Triggercon Ruckus, actually, complete with a little machine gun mounted in the back. (The gun-and-spare-tire assembly pops off, but there's no way to arm him with it in robot mode. That would have made a nice little bonus feature.) All in all, this is a great update for the character. Now all I need is to go find a tiny little plastic bird so I can perch it on his shoulder.

Incidentally, Beachcomber rang up as "DO NOT SELL" at the cash register today. I know that a week or two ago, the entire Legends assortment was temporarily pulled from shelves for reasons I'm not entirely clear on. It's possible that Beachcomber's specific UPC wasn't cleared out of the block list in the computer system. (In my case, it wasn't a big deal, since the cashier just rang up Brawn twice for me. Still, don't be surprised if they don't let you get Beachcomber, because usually stuff rings up like this when it's on recall.)

BRAWN

Brawn is a character who's basically needed an updated toy ever since 1984. It's not the toy's fault that Floro Dery took enormous liberties with the looks of the characters for animation, but the end result is that Brawn is the second-least humanoid looking Transformers toy, with his featureless mask, blank visor, skinny chicken legs, and giant squared-off robot claws. The Car Robots toy Wildride was named "X-Brawn" when the toy line and cartoon were ported to the U.S., but that's about as much of an homage as Brawn has ever really gotten (not including unofficial CybCon exclusives, of course). This toy was very clearly intended to represent the cartoon version of Brawn, and it's a very good-looking update.

The toy comes mistransformed in the package, with his shoulder detached and his arms pointing the wrong way 'round. (The toy fits just fine in the bubble and tray the correct way, which leads me to suspect it's just a packing error at the factory.) Brawn is actually cast in silver and black plastic, with liberal paint applications (silver on his helmet; lots of orange on his chest) to give him his signature color scheme. The only problem is that his face remains unpainted, so it's black with blue eyes. It's not a horrible look, but painting his entire head would have been better than just the helmet. He's got a head design that's true to the cartoon, actual fists, and some big, chunky legs instead of those embarassing stilts. He's got a silver Autobot badge on his chest, which seems a little strange since both Beachcomber and Bumblebee got red ones. He's articulated at the shoulders and hips (his knees move backwards for the transformation but not forwards; his waist also pivots back for the transformation but it's not very useful articulation). He's just under three inches tall, though his height is somewhat variable depending on how you pose him. (He's designed so that his feet will be flat on the ground if you pivot his legs slightly apart from each other.)

If you took a toy and gave it Nightbeat's arms and Skids' legs, you'd have an idea of his transformation process. The backs of his legs are clearly visible along the roof of the vehicle mode, and you can see his face peeking out from underneath the vehicle from the sides and front. His feet also protrude rather prominently from the bottom of the chassis, giving him less than a millimeter's worth of clearance, but aside from this it's a good update. (The packaging calls it an SUV mode; there's no way they could get away with using the Jeep trademark without permission.) In this form he's got five rolling wheels (his spare tire is mounted on a pin so it spins, too). He does suffer from one problem the original Brawn toy had--his rear windows are unpainted. Deliberate tribute, or paint application budget? You decide.) The shade of green is a little too rich for Brawn (he should be more of an army green), and the unpainted face bothers me, but aside from that, this is a mighty fine tribute to a mighty Autobot.

BUMBLEBEE

It's funny how there are two Legends Class toys called Bumblebee on the pegs at the same time (the G1 edition and the Animated version). There were a couple of parents in the store shopping when I was looking through the action figures aisle; one of them had a three-year-old boy, the other had a four-year-old, and both of them were looking for toys named Bumblebee. When I found mine, they each snapped one up as well. I heard one of them remark that half the toys on the pegs weren't even in the movie, which leads me to suspect they weren't shopping for Legends toys at all. Clearly, Hasbro is going for name recognition as much as anything else.

This is not the first version of Bumblebee that's designed to look like the character from the G1 cartoon. The Pretender was a good try, and definitely an improvement over the original, but for some inexplicable reason it was sculpted with Cliffjumper's face (This was considered a mistake back in 1989; you know, back before Hasbro thought that Bumblebee and Cliffjumper were the same toy in different colors). The Classics toy was also a good-looking toy, but it deviated a little too much from Bumblebee's original look, making it more of an update than an homage. Unfortunately, there's no way Hasbro can produce a Transformers toy that turns into a Volkswagen Beetle (unless they find a nice loophole to circumvent things and release it as a "Transformers brand" keychain instead of a toy), but given the constraints under which they're working, I find this to be a very nice attempt. (I'm sure we'll eventually see a red version of this toy named Cliffjumper. Sigh.)

Again, Bumblebee's a little less than three inches tall as a robot (making him shorter than the original G1 toy; despite the way he was portrayed in the fiction, Bumblebee's toy was actually one of the tallest Mini Autobots). His chest and feet are a little more square-shaped than I'd like, and his head sculpt seems to take its cue from that, as his helmet and face are very angular as well. He's colored appropriately and does resemble his animated self--he has black arms and fists with yellow forearms, and a silver face and mouth with blue eyes. He's even got a pelvis, this time, something the original toy lacked completely. He is poseable at the shoulders, hips, and ankles; his waist also pivots a little. His head looks like it should rotate, since it's a separate piece, but it doesn't.

Bumblebee's described as a "street racer" on the packaging, owing to the somewhat nondescript vehicle form he turns into. Interestingly, Bumblebee transforms almost exactly like the original Wheelie toy. Seriously. The only difference is that his head is mounted on the top of his chest instead of in the center of it, so his backpack covers it up when you flip it up and over. Despite the fact that he doesn't turn into a bug, he still looks like Bumblebee, all yellow with metallic silvery-blue painted windows and bright blue headlights. He's flat and lean, not nearly as cute as he used to be, and kind of reminds me of the Mini-Con named Oval (or maybe it's Backtrack; I can never tell those stupid little things apart). Still, if somebody said they were going to make a new Mini Autobots version of Bumblebee, this is exactly the way I'd want to see it done.

Zob