Toy Review: Transformers Earthspark Aftermath (Deluxe)

Review:  #907

Name:  Aftermath

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Decepticon

Line:  Earthspark

Year of Release:  2024

Size Class:  Deluxe (Wave 6)

Mold Status:  new

VEHICLE MODE:

Aftermath transforms into a purple tow truck, that has a vintage look to it, although the giant cow catchers at the front are a dead giveaway for this robot's allegiance.

While the front looks good, the back is so so.  There's a silver exhaust sticking out the back.

Aftermath is a decent-ish size for a Deluxe, although along with the rest of the Earthspark toys, he is a bit lighter than a Generations figure, as he's a little bit more hollow.

The tow hook assembly is good, at least it's not a mess like some other figures, although the hook is molded in such a way that it is difficult to actually find a Deluxe car to tow.

Looking from the bottom, it is more obvious how incomplete the rear part is, as there is a big hollow piece there.

Despite the flaws, Aftermath has a certain charm to him.

TRANSFORMATION:

Transformation is relatively simple for a Deluxe figure, but compared to other Earthspark figures, he is maybe a little bit more complex.  The back splits to form the legs, unfold the feet from the back, and fold the front wheels to complete the shins.  While the front forms the torso by pulling the arms out, rotating the cow catchers for the shoulder pads and folding the hood down.  The balljoints are tight, especially the shoulders, making it feel like you're going to shear something off.

ROBOT MODE:

It's great that we get a new and unique character when the line is focusing so much on a new take on the same characters.  Aftermath looks great with his bulky looks.

He has a massive backpack though, it's the tow hook assembly sticking out of his back.  While it's show accurate, it's still not amazing on a figure though.

The head sculpt is really good, it has enough detail without being too busy, and he looks very Decepticon-like.

He might look like he's big and imposing, but in reality when compared to other Deluxe toys, he's only the average height.

From the side, you can see how much his backpack sticks out.  Another thing to note is that he has noticeably hollow limbs, so he has a lighter feel to him compared to what you'd expect from his looks alone.

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

He comes with two weapons, one is a blaster and another is a hook.

With the blaster, he can hold it like a conventional gun.

Otherwise, his forearms has 5mm holes on them, so you can peg those weapons onto his forearms just like the show.

The purple plastic used here has a slight metallic sheen to them, and the purple paint used on his head definitely has some sort of metallic flake.

His shoulders are kind of awkward to pose due to how big they are, and how the balljoint is situated, and he does have flat feet.  However, this is still a unique robot design that looks great.

OVERALL:

Aftermath is one of those original characters that is visually interesting and made a good translation from onscreen to physical toy.  His vehicle mode has flaws, and the transformation isn't particularly amazing, and his robot mode also have its own issues, but as a whole package, and how he looks, Aftermath is a not a bad figure at all.

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Didn’t I Say to Make My Abilities Average in the Next Life?! (2019)

Didn’t I Say to Make My Abilities Average in the Next Life?! is a 12 episode anime based upon the light novels. This is an isekai anime, and there isn’t really too much of a twist here. At least the protagonist this time around is a girl, who died doing something heroic, and since she stood out in her past life due to her abnormally high intellect, requests god to be reborn into a very average person. It mostly succeeds… but she’s still a magical prodigy.

Going by the alias Mile, she attends a hunter school, which upon graduation she will be able to join the hunters. Mile looks unassuming, just your typical noble dainty lady, but both her physical and magical prowess are exceptional. Upon her first day in the city she foils a children kidnapping plot. Joining the school, she is clearly the best student. Of course, being an otaku in her previous life, she’s a bit socially awkward but is determined to change that, and joining the school, she manages to meet and get along with three others.

Despite the first two episodes setting up Mile arriving and attending the school, it has never been the focus. After a quite scene setup where Mile trains the others given she is just so clearly out of their league, there is a time skip to the graduation. Perhaps, it’s just an easier way to explain and justify the overpoweredness of the four member party now. It also avoids all the early awkwardness as instantly they are like lifelong friends. It can be a bit of lazy way to go about it though.

The rest of the season kind of like a slice of life, but just the girls going about their early days as hunters, and enjoying life in general. They are clearly overpowered, so they have the potential to just take on any quest and succeed, get rich, and live out their lives. However, they’re all young and inexperienced, and so must go through the regular rites of passage. There are many episodes where it fleshes out their backstories, diving deeper into their family, however, the plot is very episodic, as everything basically will be resolved within one episode.

Mile still retains a lot of her knowledge from Japan, and she often uses the science from this previous world to help now. It has potential for her to become even more overpowered and utilize her magician clever ways, but it’s only lightly touched up and more often than not, it is used for laughs. This is because Mile is a huge otaku, and she gets excited over typical anime things, and even goes so far as to general and reference those anime herself.

To be fair, there’s no overarching objective to the anime, so there isn’t any urgency in anything the characters do. There’s also little incentive for any sort of multi-episode spanning plot arc, thus, it can be too laid back and chilled, leading it to being bland at times. That said, the season finale had some interesting tidbits about this world, which sheds a little bit of light into why magic is created by nanomachines. It’s also at this point that the anime gives up any pretense that Mile is not the most powerful character in the whole world.

Overall, Didn’t I Say to Make My Abilities Average in the Next Life?! is an average anime. It had an interesting idea, reincarnating a character that doesn’t want the overpowered abilities. However, it ended up being more of the same from what you’d expect of the isekai genre. Mile is slightly different in that she prefers to have a fun normal life, but can’t help but still be dragged into all sorts of situations.

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Toy Review: Transformers Generations Studio Series Ironhide (Bumblebee) (Deluxe)

Review:  #906

Name:  Ironhide

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Autobot

Line:  Generations - Studio Series

Year of Release:  2022

Size Class:  Deluxe (Wave 16)

Mold Status:  retool of Studio Series Ratchet

VEHICLE MODE:

While the figure is based upon the Ironhide that appeared in the Bumblebee movie, he never transformed onscreen, and so for the toy, this mode is made up.

It's not a bad vehicle at all, and the rear of the vehicle doesn't leave any unsightly gaps or exposed robot parts, which is great.

The biggest negative though is the small size.  He's small and compact for a Deluxe.

Ironhide is a retool of Ratchet, but there are no new parts in vehicle mode, just a different color scheme.

The robot weapon can peg on top of the vehicle.

The front section is transparent blue plastic, so a lot of red paint was needed to cover up the parts that are not windows.

A decent, if small, vehicle mode.

TRANSFORMATION:

Ironhide has an interesting transformation and one that's complex, but let down by the small size so it can be a little bit fiddly.  The easiest are the legs which just unfold.  The hardest (and thus the most interesting) is how the the arms the panels at the back kind of fold backwards / inside out around the torso.

ROBOT MODE:

Ironhide's robot mode is great, he has a buff bulky look to him.

Impressively, Ironhide has no kibble.  Thanks to the transformation scheme, the panels fold up around the torso nicely and neatly.

The head sculpt is good, although like with most movie toys, the face can be slightly overly complicated with too many details.

He's around normal Deluxe height in robot mode.

The only retool compared to Ratchet is the head.

He comes with a cardboard stand depicting Cybertron.

Articulation is great, he has joints for his head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips, knees and ankles.

He comes with a black gun.

The gun itself is actually quite large and long, a bit too large for him.

The gun can peg on his back for storage.

The robot has a really good design, although you can see the weirder plastic color clashes where they must have been on different sprues, such as his red hips but grey thighs.

The other thing is that while the Deluxe class usually has a lot of balljoints, Ironhide actually has hinges and swivels.

A great robot mode.

OVERALL:

Ironhide is a good solid figure.  If you don't want to get both Ratchet and Ironhide, then whichever one you like the color scheme more of is worth getting.  It's a nicely engineered figure, where the only negative really is his smaller stature.

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