Review: #828
Name: Masterdominus
Brand: Transformers
Allegiance: Autobot
Line: Generations - Legacy
Year of Release: 2022
Size Class: Deluxe
Mold Status: retool of Kingdom Ractonite
BEAST MODE:
Masterdominus transforms into a skeletal mastodon (similar to a woolly mammoth).
He has a weird black color scheme on the upper layer for some reason, with some gold highlights. This does kind of detract against him.
As a retool of Ractonite, the main new thing is a new head sculpt, and this is the best thing about the figure as it looks awesome. The mouth can open and close too.
There is articulation, but not too much of it is meaningful as it is hard to not make him look awkward when moving his limbs.
An awesome retool (and surprising at how much can change with just a swap of the head).
TRANSFORMATION:
There is little change in the transformation compared to Ractonite, but he transforms as a partsformer. You pull him apart, do a little bit of fiddling around with some parts, and then put him together again. Basically, the limbs become the limbs of the robot mode, but with the front and back piece of the skeleton forming the shoulder pads. The torso of the beast mode is the torso of the robot mode.
ROBOT MODE:
Ractonite had a terrible robot mode, one that may eventually grow on you. Masterdominus is the same, and he is very wide thanks to the shoulder pads.
He has a wide upper body with slim legs, and that is a big reason why he looks so weird. Thanks to the long heel spurs though, he keeps his balance well.
The head sculpt is unchanged and has a knight theme to it.
He is about average height for a Deluxe, although quite a bit wider than normal.
Articulation is fine, with joints for his head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips, knees and minor ankle tilts.
The mastodon head defaults to a shoulder pad but you can take it off and attach it to his arm as a weapon.
The other nice change compared to Ractonite is that while Ractonite has 5mm posts as "hands", Masterdominus tries to improve it by having another set of 5mm posts, so that it looks like "claws" instead. It's a slight improvement.
FOSSILIZER MODE:
As a carry over of the mold, Masterdominus is a fossilizer, which means he can split up into pieces to form as armor for other characters.
He predominantly splits into three pieces, two weapons and a backpack which acts as shoulder guns. It doesn't look too bad, although the weapons are a little bit too big for a Deluxe so probably Voyager and Leader classed figures are where you would want to use them on.
OVERALL:
Masterdominus is a clever retool. Who knew that changing only the skeletal face can make such a big impact on how the figure looks (yes, a lot of the figure has been retooled, but the most notable change was the beast mode head). As part of an exclusive set, he can be a bit pricey, but if the alt mode interests you, then he is worth getting during a sale.
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