Review: #5
Name: Smolder w/ Chopster
Brand: Transformers
Allegiance: Decepticon
Line: PowerCore Combiners (Wave 1)
Year of Release: 2010
Size Class: Scout with Minicon
Variations: Stakeout is a repaint of Smolder, while Razorbeam is a repaint of Chopster
VEHICLE MODE:
Smolder is a fire department truck with the back half of the truck being a boxy affair. It's very attractive and quite realistic, although it's not based on any real life vehicle. There's a transparent yellow strobe light and a flaming Decepticon insignia near the back. A Decepticon as a fire truck, there's some irony there, and I like it. Chopster can plug on top in his gun mode, although it does ruin the realism, but without him Smolder seems to be lacking, as there would be a Minicon port sticking out.
The back is Smolder's downfall, its an open gap, and really disappointing, all it would take is some panels and he would be fine. As such, it ruins all realism, I have turned his head around because it conceals it better, but you can clearly see the bright blue combiner pegs, hands, and that gap is just hideous.
Still it's a nice little vehicle (keep in mind he is Scout sized, so he's small), he just really appeals to me. I guess if you really let your imagination run wild, you can flip back the combiner pegs to act at some sort of rocket boosters (and also can rearrange Chopster into some sort of wing pack).
TRANSFORMATION:
He's really simple to transform, so he's really fun to play with and going between the two modes. It gives a nice break from the complexity of the recent Movie toys. The simple transformation does create liabilities for the vehicle mode, particularly the open back and the obvious hinges on the side.
ROBOT MODE:
A very nice robot mode, some people might be bothered with the huge shoulder pads, but in real life, he does look a lot better (remember, he is a small size, so naturally they look worse in pictures). Here he is holding Chopster in axe mode, and it's an ok axe, there are a few gaps but it does its job. The front of the truck that forms his legs is very natural and looks good there, and the two Decepticon logos on either side of his shoulders is a great place to put them.
The bright blue pegs really stand out against the black and red and ruins the colour scheme, but you would get used to it. His knee joints are set lower than normal and looks weird when you bend them too much (they're mainly set that low for transformation to work and also for the torso mode to work).
The head is a bit simplistic and lacking in good detail, while it's also a bit small, it tends to be overwhelmed by the huge shoulder pads.
He has good poseability, with a lot of joints everywhere. The hinge coupled with the balljoint for his elbow is really useful, legs might be a bit limited. I think the robot mode could be a bit better, it's mainly lacking paint on some of his sculpted details.
Now onto Chopster, he's a nice little Minicon, actually my favourite out of the Wave 1 (and in general, the whole PowerCore Combiner line) figures. He supposedly have four modes: a vehicle weapon (gun), robot weapon (axe), robot and chest armor. As such, he's lacking a real defined alt mode like the original Minicons of Armada. He is a good proportioned robot, with guns for hands, and knees joints too.
In my opinion, he has one of the better chest armour modes, looks quite... regal. If you're really desperate, you can always point his arms and central cannon forward to create a three barrelled gun. You can attach Chopster like this via a flip out Minicon port in Smolder's chest. As with all chest armour, he sticks out somewhat from the figure's chest, so it doesn't really look like armour from the side. I like to point the combiner pegs up so he looks a bit different and more powered up.
A good robot mode, with good articulation and aesthetics. He has a lot of playability owing to his Minicon Chopster.
COMBINED MODE:
Being a PowerCore Combiner, he has a third mode, being the torso of a combined form. He can combine with any arm or leg drones in the line, here I have combined him with the Combaticons. He's actually quite attractive in combined mode, although not the best, very wide shoulders though, and head is set lower, so he looks like a hunch back.
He is a bit hard to stand, and on my Smolder at least, it seems that his left leg's port is a bit too big, causing the Jeep drone to keep being pushed out, annoying to say the least. What I found was elegant was that his arms do plug into slots dedicated for this mode, making his arms more stable.
I don't really like his head, looks more like a dog's to me, with the prominent nose, his head is supposed to look like he's wearing a gas mask. It is light piped yellow, but it really needs more paint, some silver detailing would do wonders.
He's got all the standard articulation, only lacking elbows since the arm drone's automatic transformation don't really allow for that. You can cheat a bit and move the shoulders so Smolder does have two distinct parts for his arms.
A nice combined mode, but it's not terribly stable, he's really hard to stand, and so all the articulation is somewhat wasted as he can only really stand properly in a neutral pose. Still, this makes a nice display piece and adds another dimension to his funness.
OVERALL:
I love this toy, and I still find myself to this day fiddling with him from time to time, going between the three modes. He really is a fun toy to play with, I can see the dislike from some people because of all the gimmicks they tried to pack into the one small Scout sized toy, but he is really well designed. Only liability is the lack of proper elbows and hands in combined mode, but that's more to do with the drones than Smolder himself.
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If you need any more pictures, check out Seibertron's gallery here.
Credits: linked a few TFwiki.net pages in this review if you wanted more info on the respective links
Check out other toys reviews in the 'My Transformers' page which you can access at the top of the blog.