Animated Review Thread

Some cartoon with big chins and a little girl that got beloved by fans and taken off TV to make way for a different show on another network. Yeah, that's fair.
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JediTricks
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Re: Animated Review Thread

Post by JediTricks »

I finally found Rodimus at a TRU way across town. In order to avoid the problems I ran into with my Arcee being defective and having to track down a replacement, I bought 2 out of the store's 3, and will return my second Roddy if I don't find someone who wants it first. So how is Rodimus?

Rodimus is... welllll... this figure after all its anticipation is just alright, and a bit half-baked. The alt mode looks like a car that's had the frame broken in the middle and is sagging. For an Animated figure, this one requires a little more panel massage than I'm used to. Also, the rear of the alt mode is a gap for no reason, there's a panel back there COULD have hid it if they had extended it. Transformation is interesting but gets wonky at the chest, and the shoulder joints pop out too easily.

Bot mode is decent with pose potential and a very Hot Rod look, but also awkward with some gaps around the torso, and I don't like the noseless face with the low mouth. I get it, it's the opposite of all the other figures in the line, no giant boots, no giant chin, but the long wide face is odd and not quite what the show art had, and the way the torso comes together doesn't feel complete. That said, it's got good articulation (if you don't mind the shoulders popping out all the time) and a trim profile, no kibble really. The bow looks decent but doesn't have storage in bot mode when he's not holding it. When his eyes lightpipe, they have bubbles in the middle for irises, just like the animation, an interesting touch.

All in all, I'd give this a "B-" while trying to ignore the price-increase to $15. The alt mode feels a bit odd but isn't terrible, the transformation is unusual if a little bothersome at spots, the bot mode is decent but has issues.
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See, that one's a camcorder, that one's a camera, that one's a phone, and they're doing "Speak no evil, See no evil, Hear no evil", get it?
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Shockwave
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Re: Animated Review Thread

Post by Shockwave »

Wait, what happened to your Arcee?
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JediTricks
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Re: Animated Review Thread

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Shockwave wrote:Wait, what happened to your Arcee?
Sorry for the delay, just saw this. There was some white plastic in one of her eyes, it looked really bad, a stupid 1-off problem where the guy running the tooling didn't clear the lines before shooting the plastic, most likely.


Wow, Animated is quite dead of late.
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See, that one's a camcorder, that one's a camera, that one's a phone, and they're doing "Speak no evil, See no evil, Hear no evil", get it?
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138 Scourge
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Re: Animated Review Thread

Post by 138 Scourge »

Yeah, but it's not like there's a lot of new Animated stuff to comment on, though.

I can add a little bit, though. I got Skywarp the other day, and man, that thing, talk about a mixed bag.

The best things about Skywarp is just how friggin' awesome he looks. And he really does look great, I'm always a fan of the Skywarp color scheme, and this is a bang-up job of how to do it.

The worst thing? Holy balls, this toy is fragile. Trying to transform him back and forth, this sucker just falls apart. And mine even came minus a thumb. I should return it and get one with the full complement of fingers, but the store's a long way away, and also, screw it.

So yeah: Animated Skywarp: Fantastic toy as long as you don't have to touch it. I'd be very soured on this mold if I didn't have the Sunstorm variety, which holds together considerably better.
Dominic wrote: too many people likely would have enjoyed it as....well a house-elf gang-bang.
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Re: Animated Review Thread

Post by 138 Scourge »

And slowly I catch up on the few things I missed from Animated.

This time: Ahrnhide!

Easy choice to get this dude for six bucks on clearance. Guess he didn't have that wide of appeal. Still, he did better than the Ratchet version of this mold around here. Man, I'm still finding that thing on the shelves.

I like this mold okay, as I mentioned before. The space-van thing still echoes Rodimus Prime's Space Winnebago thing, only spacier, with the Animated Cybertron vehicle's weird tread-leg things instead of wheels. While I'm sort of burnt out on "Cybertron Modes" after the crappy movie-line attempts at such, this one is still not all that bad, it at least looks sort of like a vehicle, instead of a vague jumble of parts. And you get the sense that the toy's actually turning into something when you transform it.

The robot mode looks pretty decent, he's got a lot of bulk that suits this big brawlery kind of character. I like it pretty well overall, but as with most other Animated toys, I wish to hell they'd just left the lightpiping out and painted the eyes. Ironhide winds up looking like he's just got black sockets unless you catch the light juuuust right. Minor gripe in an otherwise solid figure.

The weapons are still sort of silly, though. From "shock paddles" to brass knuckles, courtesy of a repaint. They don't look bad, just sort of there.

The bio focuses more on Ironhide's kind of country-boy side, since Ratchet's got the resident "Grumpy Old Man" slot filled.

Overall, I dig this toy well enough. It's not as exciting to me as Rodimus was, but especially for a clearance buy, I'm pretty happy with it. Solid, but not totally thrilling. C+, I'd say.
Dominic wrote: too many people likely would have enjoyed it as....well a house-elf gang-bang.
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