Toy Review: Transformers Generations War for Cybertron Earthrise Quintesson Allicon (Deluxe)

Review:  #632

Name:  Quintesson Allicon

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Decepticon

Line:  Generations - War for Cybertron:  Earthrise

Year of Release:  2020

Size Class:  Deluxe (Wave 2)

Mold Status:  new

ALTERNATE MODE:

Allicon transforms into a hunched over alligator beast thing.  Whatever it is, it ends up looking better than expected in person, mainly thanks to the detailed head sculpt.

It's not as bad in person, however, the robot fists aren't stored anywhere and are fully visible.  To be honest, it's quite disappointing on a Deluxe figure in this day and age, it's just the continual cost-cutting in effect.

The head sculpt is seriously where Allicon shines, with multiple shades of paint, as well as a huge opening jaw.  It makes the figure very expressive.

In terms of size, he is a bit on the smaller side and it's not only because he is hunched over.  Above is a comparison against Deluxe Siege Sideswipe.

In terms of poseability, it's not too bad since he shares the same legs as robot mode.  His ankles are surprisingly nimble with side to side and forward to backward motion.  The short beast arms are only swivels though.

He has a spear for a weapon in this mode (as well as for robot mode, naturally).

The spear can be held in either hand but since his arm articulation is so limited, he can only really lift the spear up and down.

While it is a love or hate thing, for what it is trying to do, it achieves its goal and the figure is more endearing in person, despite all its flaws.

TRANSFORMATION:

You would have thought the alternate mode is just the robot mode hunched over and so the transformation is basically just straightening the figure.  You are not wrong but there are a few additional steps.  The beast legs become the robot legs, and the robot arms unpeg from the side.  The beast head folds into the back / tail, and clips securely into place.  This is a pretty neat step that works so elegantly.

ROBOT MODE:

Allicon's robot mode is short and stubby, and works wonderfully well for the character.  It holds a lot of style, especially the shoulder spikes.

The backpack is primarily the beast's head and tail, but it compacts really nicely and ends up giving the figure a bulkier feel, which is not a bad thing.

The head sculpt is another winner, with an awesome face plate and once again, multiple shades of paint.

Size-wise, he is a bit taller than beast mode but not by much.  He makes up the height difference with a normal Deluxe by being chunkier and less hollow.

Articulation is great, he retains the amazing feet articulation from beast mode, but without the limitation of having to hunch over.

He has two weapons, the spear from beast mode, and a sword that is formed from the beast's tail.

The spear can be held in either fist.  The beast hands just hanging off the robot arms is somewhat lazy though.

He has enough articulation (thanks to the wrist swivels) to hold the spear with both hands.

When not in use, the spear can peg onto his back for storage.

The sword can also be held in either hand, the curved nature lends well to his evil Decepticon look.

This is a really good robot mode that just oozes character.

OVERALL:

Allicon is a surprisingly good figure, which you might not have expected at first glance.  Granted, it will come down to your tastes but you may be pleasantly surprised.  It is built solidly, and has two charming modes.

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George of the Jungle (1997)

George of the Jungle is a film based on the cartoon of the same name.  It draws many similarities with Tarzan and the source material was actually a spoof of it.  While you can't say that it is a live-action rendition of Tarzan, you can't help but think it could have been.  George of the Jungle is a gag filled film that doesn't care about a good story or if things makes sense, it just wants to have fun.  As a baby, George was left in the jungle and he grew up there among various animals.  What is not explained is how he managed to learn and speak English fairly proficiently, as well as understanding the human culture.  Anyway, Ursula arrives in the jungle, exploring the jungle and watching the animals when they meet.  It's a love at first sight story which quickly then shifts to having Ursula's parents accept their relationship back in New York.  This is the biggest negative of the film, it constantly shifts scenes, tone and characters without warning, making it jarring and lacking coherence.  There are certain scenes which rely heavily on CGI and you can only do so many of the same types of gags without it becoming tired.  George of the Jungle is a kid friendly film, but as charming as George is, a lot of improvements could have been made.

Toy Review: Transformers BotBots Goo-Goo Groupies (8-pack #2)

Review:  #631

Name:  Goo-Goo Groupies

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  N/A

Line:  BotBots

Year of Release:  2019

Size Class:  BotBot (Series 3)

Mold Status:  N/A

PACKAGING:

As part of the Series 3 line of 8-packs, the Goo-Goo Groupies set comes in packaging that shows off seven of the figures, with a remaining "mystery" BotBot.

The mystery bot is within the capsule that has an easy way of popping out, which means it is susceptible to be stolen in-store, which can be annoying.  However, there is a nice piece of artwork at the back showing off several of the BotBots.

BOTBOTS:

There are four different variations of the pack, and the theme of the set is around baby and young children related items.  The #2 pack comes with:

- Avocando

- Batterhead

- Crib Watch

- Excessory

- Halloween Knight

- Sardank

- Shushifier

- Strike Four

This is a pretty strong set with the majority being great molds, especially if you haven't had them already before.

OVERALL:

Goo-Goo Groupies is a good solid set.  There are some really inventive and unique figures in here, with Halloween Knight and Shushifier being the standout.

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Avatar: The Last Airbender - Season 1 (2005)

The first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender, also known as Book 1 Water, is 20 episodes long. It is a Nickelodeon animated series. It is set in a world with four nations, each based on one of the classical elements, being fire, water, air or earth. Each nation has a subset of people who can control and manipulate the elements and are known as benders. In the past, the Fire Nation declared war on the other nations, and the avatar, a bender who is able to use manipulate all four elements and keep the harmony between the nations, disappeared. As a result, the world begins to fill with despair as the Fire Nation has superior firepower and dominates the world.

Focusing on a pair of siblings at a small Water Tribe located in the South Pole, they are Katara and Sokka. They’re partly responsible for helping the tribe continue to function as all people of fighting age had gone to assist in the war, leaving only the very old and very young. Katara is a waterbender, albeit she is just beginning to learn about her powers, while Sokka is nothing special (although a bit hotheaded). The pair were fishing when they come upon Aang, an airbender (and soon revealed to be the avatar) who was encased in ice and awoke when they were near.

Things quickly go south as the Fire Nation comes to attack, having realized that Aang was there. Once that threat is temporarily over, Aang explains that as the avatar, he will need to learn the other three types of bending. Conveniently, it has to be learnt in a specific order with waterbending being first. The trio then decides to travel all the way to the other side of the world to North Pole in order to properly learn waterbending. The season covers the trio’s travel as they stop at towns along the way. This serves the double purpose of showing off just how oppressed several towns and cities are with the Fire Nation having taken over. There is a sense of fear with a lot of the population. The show also takes this chance to show how the world works and the different cultures that it contains.

During the whole time, the Fire Nation’s exiled Prince Zuko relentlessly follows them to try and capture Aang. This is supposedly his ticket back to his father’s good books and be allowed back into his own country. Zuko is shown to be ruthless, impatient and having a fiery personality. Of course, as the season progresses, we learn the tragic backstory of Zuko and how he came to be the person that he is now. The show has good humor, with a lot of gags that works really well. While it is mostly visual gags and in typical cartoon fashion, it is done in such a way that can be enjoyed even if you’re outside of the target audience.

The show also handles various themes and lessons. Katara and Sokka will often have opposing views, and over the course of the episode, will sort them out. The main message being that you accept differences in others. It can be a bit predictable and repetitive when various episodes have similar messages. Aang will continually make the same mistakes of not trusting Katara and Sokka. They are travelling this journey together and been through so much, yet he is always afraid that they’ll leave whenever something comes up. Aang is also a bit too impatient in trying to learn and explore everything, making him an easy target to be tracked at times.

The ending is strong and are the best episodes of the season. We see the experience that Aang had gained over the course of the journey and it leads to a powerful final episode. By this point, you’re invested into all the characters and it brings more of its lore to the forefront. It had a satisfying battle with strong pacing.

Overall, the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender is a good show. While it follows an episodic structure that can make some episodes pointless in the scheme of their journey, the season ties together really well with a clear objective. The characters are clearly making progress and have strong reasonable motivations, which leads to an epic season finale.

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Harmonia (PC)

Harmonia and a visual novel developed by Key for the PC.  Interestingly, in an unusual twist, the English version was released a few months before the Japanese version.  Considering the English translation of Key visual novels are usually released years after the Japanese version, this feels like a miracle. The game is defined as a “kinetic novel”.  Harmonia removes even the most basic of gameplay of visual novels.  There are no choices, decisions or any other gimmicks that pause the story, instead, it is literally a visual novel.  You read the story from start to finish with no player input at all.  This also means that it is a linear path, there is only one ending.  Text comes in huge chunks and usually half the screen is dedicated to the text, at times expanding to the whole screen.

The story is set in a post-apocalyptic world where when the population peaked, it started to decline (as they do).  Humanity up until that point had managed to create androids, known as phiroids, to be their workers, companions and everything else.  Phiroids were dramatically improved to be almost humans themselves, with true AI, able to eat and convert that to energy, have the five senses and look the part with artificial skin.  Yet their internals remain mechanical.

The visual novel begins when one of these phiroids wakes up and finds himself in an abandoned factory.  He goes outside and explores before quickly encountering a friendly girl by the name of shiona.  Stating his name as Rei, the pair lives together as Rei starts to get a better understanding of the world.  Shiona had lived by herself in the outskirts of a town.  He learns that the world has a dire energy shortage.  Electricity is precious and so nearly everything that can regress back to analogue has done so.

It is a bleak world but at the same time, there is some warmth.  People still go about with their lives.  This is a peaceful town but there is talk of violence happening elsewhere.  Rei will meet two more important characters, Madd being the perpetually angry shopkeeper, and Tipi, a small girl who constantly cries and is the librarian. Harmonia has a typical story structure by Key with a slow beginning.  It follows a predictable structure where Rei starts to warm to his current life and then decides he wants to help the people around him.  The story then follows one arc after another as he understands the problems that is plaguing others and causing them to be sad.  All this is accompanied by the fantastic pieces of music that is also typical of Key.

Key themes of the story include Rei slowly discovering his own humanity.  As a phiroid, he was initially confused due to his feelings, but as he experiences them more and more, he understands what he wants to do.  Mixed into it is his relationship with Shiona.  Shiona is portrayed as a sweet girl, but later on, it becomes hard to understand her actions, actions that seemingly go against her nature. Rei can never escape that fact that he isn’t human.  He has the notion that once he reveals that he is a phiroid, no one will ever accept him.  Yet because his body is mechanic, he needs to keep himself serviced, and fix himself up if anything breaks down.  Despite the slice-of-life tone of the story, this is set in a post-apocalyptic world and the story takes a turn for the darker.

Due to the speed at which the arcs go by, you don’t develop a good solid bond with each character.  Sure, their plights are sad, but it lacks the familiarity of a close relationship such that you are truly invested in them.  As a result, the resolution of their arcs kind of falls flat.  As if to emphasize this, Harmonia has a short story; it only takes three to six hours to complete it, depending on your reading speed.  It’s a small game, taking place in a very limited amount of areas, only four voiced characters and only those four characters have artwork.

The twist in the story can be easily predicted.  While there is a section where you’re confused as it throws piece after piece at you that make it more mysterious, ultimately, it is nowhere near as impactful as some other Key games.  Nevertheless, the climax and ending was still sad, and you have developed just enough of a bond to still empathize with the characters’ plights.  Despite that, you can’t help but feel just like the rest of the game, it was rushed and could have been a lot more impactful if more time was allowed to see it all play out.

Despite the lack of replay value after you have finished the story, Harmonia is a solid visual novel.  It has pretty artwork, sweet serene music, and a story that eventually pays off.  While it’s not a story that has a huge emotional impact, the ending will still tug your heartstrings as you think of what it could have been for the characters.

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Toy Review: Transformers Masterpiece MPM-10 Starscream

Review:  #630

Name:  Starscream

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Decepticon

Line:  Masterpiece

Year of Release:  2020

Size Class:  Masterpiece

Mold Status:  new

PACKAGING:

As part of the Masterpiece line, Starscream comes in a windowless box.  It has the signature black packaging with the big stock photo on the front.

The back is filled with pictures and looks a tad bit bare without the words to support it.  It shows off all the gimmicks and detail the figure has.

JET MODE:

Starscream is based upon his mode in the first three movies, and the paint job from the first movie (given his lack of tattoos).  He transforms into a Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor Jet.

Given its size and price point, this is a pretty good jet.  Unfortunately, like most jet Transformers, he suffers from undercarriage kibble, and you can even see it sticking out from underneath the wings.

That said, the camo paint job is fantastic and uses various shades of beige and grey to achieve the layered effect.

In term of size, Starscream is massive.  He is easily much bigger than a Leader class figure, and a Deluxe is placed above for scale.

The undercarriage is thick when viewed from the size.  A neat plus is that he has three landing gear that folds down, and the wheels on them roll as well.

There aren't many gimmicks in this mode.  The cockpit is detailed with a seat and other things but it doesn't open like you would expect it to.

The robot weapons can store in this mode but pegging underneath each wing with the small Gatling gun under the nose.  Looks ridiculous but helpful to not lose them.

This is a great jet mode overall.  He has a nice size and heft to him.

TRANSFORMATION:

Transformation is understandably very complicated.  There are a lot of small moving parts that the instructions doesn't necessarily always make clear on what you needed to do.  The undercarriage is a bunch of pieces that will need to manipulate to form his torso and arms.  That might sound easy but it is not as there are many small pieces that unfold and clip together.  The legs are much easy as while they still are from the undercarriage kibble, they pretty much just swing down.  Most of the top of the jet then breaks apart and folds to his backpack.  To be honest, it's not really a transformation that is recommended to be done for fun.

ROBOT MODE:

The tough transformation is definitely worth it because the robot mode is absolutely amazing.  It beats any previous Starscream toys, including the Leader class one we had from Hunt for the Decepticons.

The attention to detail continues to his back, including the two jet thrusters that we saw from the first movie that allows him to fly.  Considering everything, he doesn't actually have that much kibble on him.

The head sculpt is suitably detailed as well, with nice gold highlights.  The only negative, and this extends to the whole figure, is how it is a lighter unpainted grey plastic rather than a darker more metallic shade.

As with all the MPM figures, he has a small gimmick in relation to his head.  It can lift up to open up his mouth, it's a tad bit subtle.

In term of size, he still towers over Leader and Deluxe figures, although true to his design, he is a bit wide as well.

There are plenty of details to be found on the figure.  There's the aforementioned rear thrusters, that are on various joints to allow them to be posed however you want.

Then the front has a ton of pieces to replicate the complex Movie designs.  This is definitely the best integration of the cockpit that we've seen on a Starscream figure.

The feet are the only pieces that are cast from die-cast.  They add a bit more stability to him but more will be covered on that later.

The hands also sports many joints, with individual hinges for both thumbs and each finger.

While most of the figure is unpainted, there are various spots where he has a nice silver touch or metallic sheen.

Poseability, as you can expect, is absolutely amazing.  He mostly has ratchet joints, which is required for something of his heft.  While his chest doesn't quite flex inwards and back as much as the Leader class version did, there's still some movement allowed.

The bigger problem are his legs.  He has the double jointed backwards facing legs, but unfortunately, the ratchets there doesn't seem to be able to fully support the large upper body.

What usually happens is that you will need to fiddle around with his legs and feet (which sports ankle joints as well) in order to not have him collapse upon himself.  It's not as bad as it sounds, but is prevalent enough to be mildly annoying.

And therein lies his biggest advantage and disadvantage:  he is a big hefty figure, and as such, can be "tiring" to play and pose with.

It is very odd that the rear wings don't also seem to clip into place, relying rather on friction instead.  His shoulders also like to hit the wings too.

He comes with three weapons, a Gatling gun, a circular saw, and a missile pod launcher.

The Gatling gun is simple, it just attaches to his forearm, and it can be either arm as both have the slot required.

In order to attach the saw, you need to fold the hands in, and then open up the bottom attachment of the weapon and clip in into the arms in two places.

Once in, the saw looks like a natural extension and is a huge weapon.

Similarly, the missile pod launcher attaches in the same way and while it is cool, it does seem to be a tad bit too big for the arm to handle.

If you don't want to use any of the weapons, that is fine as well since all three can attach on his back for storage.

Just to reiterate, the amount of sculpted detailing here is extremely impressive.  There is a good usage of paint to highlight certain areas.

Due to transformation, he does lack a waist joint but considering how many other joints he has, it is not missed at all.

And of course, Starscream can use both weapons at the same time.  This is an absolutely amazing robot mode and is the definitive figure of the character (as should be expected of a Masterpiece figure).

OVERALL:

Yes, the jet mode had to be compromised, albeit slightly, to achieve the near perfection that is the robot mode.  It's not bad, and the jet still looks great.  However, the key star is definitely the robot mode which is simply the best rendition of the character we have ever had.  While he may be pricey, it is justifiable due to the high parts count and complexity of the design, and hey, he's still cheaper than the G1 Masterpiece figures that are two-thirds his size.

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