ChCse's blog

Wednesday, March 18, 2026

Toy Review: Transformers Generations Studio Series Megatron (The Movie) (Leader)

Review: #890

Name: Megatron

Brand: Transformers

Allegiance: Decepticon

Line: Generations - Studio Series

Year of Release: 2025

Size Class: Leader (Wave 19)

Mold Status: new

TANK MODE:

While this Megatron is based upon the G1 character (specifically his appearance in the 1986 movie), given the original transformed into a gun and that is a sensitive matter nowadays, Megatron transforms (expectedly) into a tank now.

It's a grey tank that looks fine from the front. Although the turret is a bit iffy, as well as the back, where you can see the robot shins, given that they're a different color.

He's not a bad size, a little bit bulkier and bigger than a Voyager.

While he may look like he has proper treads, he doesn't. There are small plastic wheels underneath that allows him to roll on a flat surface.

The turret can rotate, but cannot lift up.

The robot weapons can peg onto tank mode. The gun next to the cannon, and the sword on the side.

This is the weaker mode but it is still a decent tank mode, even more so when you see the robot mode and understand how much they managed to achieve in this mode.

TRANSFORMATION:

Megatron has a neat transformation, and it is satisfying complex, without being frustrating. There is a lot happening and the transformation relies somewhat heavily on panels folding up and shifting around to hide all the tank pieces. The sides of the tank mode fold up to form his legs, and the turret are his arms. The rest of the tank forms the torso. There is a minor bit of partsforming as the cannot detaches, and it is in two pieces, one for his arm cannon and the other as a replica of the gun barrel that you manually attach to his back.

ROBOT MODE:

Simply put, Megatron's robot mode is astounding. The designer did such an amazing job at hiding all the tank pieces that you'd be hard pressed to know that Megatron actually transformed, if you hadn't already known.

You might think that maybe all the kibble is hidden in his backpack but this is a super clean robot mode. There's absolutely no kibble at all, and the only tank elements that you can see are the treads that's folded into his legs, and even then, you can only see it from the behind.

The head sculpt is great, with a painted white face.

He is bigger than a typical Voyager in robot mode, which is what you'd want (given that he is a Leader), but he is still somewhat small (you'll notice how much empty space there still is when he's in the packaging), but he makes up for it with his more complicated transformation.

He's very posable, with nearly everything being a hinge joint. He can move his head, shoulders, elbows, wrists, waist, hips, knees and ankles.

He comes with two weapons, a miniature replicate of his original G1 gun mode, and a laser sword.

He can hold the gun in his hand, and it looks good, although a bit small (but then again, the gun is only a pistol).

And same goes for his sword, which he can hold in either hand. They opted to paint the sword rather than cast it in transparent plastic, so that the colors pop out a lot more.

Both weapons can peg on this back if you don't want to use them.

Of course he has his arm cannon as his biggest and more powerful weapon. It's perfectly scaled and not unwieldy at all.

Looking at Megatron from the side, you'll come to see just how clean the robot mode is.

The gun barrel on his back is actually a separate piece that was the tip of the tank's turret. It's only there for screen accuracy, and given it detaches, does felt like it was cheating.

The shade of grey used is fantastic, and nowhere near the usual boring "Hasbro grey" that a lot of figures use.

Given his transformation, Megatron feels really good and solid in the hand. There are no visible hollow parts, which makes his feel a lot more premium that some others in the Studio Series line.

It truly is impressive how well this robot mode was designed.

OVERALL:

Megatron is an astounding feat of engineering. We haven't had such a well designed figure in the Studio Series for a while (especially given the recent lazier efforts we've had). It's like all the budget went to this one figure, and what's more, there was enough left over to give him a dazzling amount of paint applications. The robot mode is simply amazing with the lack of kibble, and level of screen accuracy. It's just a shame that given such a popular character, and such a wonderful toy, that he was relatively hard to find when he was released.

-----------------------------------------------------------

For other Transformers reviews, have a look at this page and this page.

Support this blog by purchasing from Amazon using this affiliate link.

(As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)

Sunday, March 15, 2026

Toy Review: Transformers Age of the Primes Vortex (Deluxe)

Review: #889

Name: Vortex

Brand: Transformers

Allegiance: Decepticon

Line: Age of the Primes

Year of Release: 2025

Size Class: Deluxe (Wave 2)

Mold Status: new

HELICOPTER MODE:

An updated form for Vortex, part of the Combaticons that would combine to form Bruticus, transforms into a grey helicopter.

This is a great looking slim helicopter. The shade of grey used is perfect, dark enough to not be boring but not enough to hide the details.

He is a little bit longer than your average Deluxe thanks to the tail, but much slimmer overall.

It's a decent helicopter mode, but from the side, you can see that the rear section seems a little bit bolted on as the body seems to end abruptly right before the tail.

The robot weapons can attach to this mode, the pair of smaller guns at the back, and the bigger gun on the side.

Or you can combine the two smaller guns together and slot it underneath the cockpit, and it looks fantastic there.

The rotors spin freely which is a nice feature that adds some play value.

TRANSFORMATION:

Vortex has a very simple transformation, to the point of being boring and generic, like a lot of the other updated combiners. The front splits and extends to form the legs. While the rear also splits and folds up for the arms.

ROBOT MODE:

At first glance, Vortex's robot mode looks fantastic. The G1 combiners never really had much personality or uniqueness as individual bots, but Vortex gives it a run for their money here.

He does carry a lot of kibble, being the top of the helicopter, the blades, but perhaps the worst part, are the tail sections of the helicopter as giant panels that completely encase his arms.

The head sculpt with the huge painted red visor looks amazing.

He is about average height in robot mode for a Deluxe.

Vortex has good articulation, he has joints for his head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips, knees and ankles.

As mentioned earlier, he has a huge piece behind each of his arms, and they're attached such that they constantly get in the way of his arms, which is very annoying. Since they're on friction joints, they are also prone to just popping off, adding to the frustration.

He comes with two smaller guns, plus a bigger one.

The two smaller guns peg onto his forearms.

While he can hold the larger gun with his hand.

He has the tail rotor blade behind his right arm which he can't really use. However, you can unpeg the main rotor as it's just on a 5mm peg, and use that as a giant handheld weapon.

The addition of blue, plus the shiny black paint on his shins, add a nice dose of color that makes the figure pop.

With the skeletal frame system being favored for combined mode, this means that Vortex isn't compromised much to achieve being part of a combiner. He only needs to be able to split in half and the mechanism is hidden in such a way that you would never know unless you attempt to combine him.

The updated scramble city combiners can feel overly generic and forgettable but Vortex does a great job at fighting back against that idea, as he stands out in a good way.