TF Views

A year ago, I would have had a hard time seeing myself getting out. But, now, I see less reason to stay.

I will give the comics a few more months (until "Time Runs Out" at Marvel). But, they need to impress me before then. "Earth 2" was at this point about a year ago, and I just dropped that book, past fondness be damned.

There are better comics to be reading, and my pull-file (at twelve books) is more than bloated enough. (I added a few books to get a more honest number, along with some mini-series. If TF is going to be a generic comic, it needs to outshine other comics on more than the sake of habit.)

4 weeks off, pretty brutal. The solicitation for it in issue 3 said it was "just in time for Halloween" because the Oktober Guard were going to appear, and instead it hit last week.

Might not be Scioli's fault. (And, you know how little I want to defend his talentless ass.) Odd shipping schedules happen.

For me, if I'm going to purge it's going to be fast, I have thrown out stuff rather than let it wither and wait when it was going to be a burden. I can see keeping as much as 50% and as low as 10%, so probably it'll be 30%. I'm not sure I want to, but I'm not enjoying this hobby thanks to Hasbro so I'd rather have the cash.

I planned to sort my SW figures, and eventually just tossed them all to Robozone. I made less money, but I skipped sorting them.

For what it’s worth, the toys still look fine to me, I honestly have no idea what you guys are bitching about on that. I genuinely cannot see what guys like JT and Dom hate so much about Tankorr, that’s a perfectly serviceable little figure to me. Same for the upcoming Combiner Wars assortment, I seriously have no idea what’s got people (JT particularly) so saddlesore over those toys, they look completely on the level of Deluxes since at least the Classics era (and I honestly think Deluxes have been at the same ‘level’ since Beast Wars. Toy technology simply has not, and I believe CAN NOT advance that much further). The issue with wrist/ankle joints don’t bother me so much either, since I still think of those as ‘luxury’ articulation points, and I don’t know that they were ever as prevalent as some are giving them credit for. Are Deluxes smaller than they were a few years back? Sure, but compare the size of Deluxes since BW, through BM, RiD, AEC, Classics, the Movies, etc, they’ve always been all over the map.

Less articulation, less paint, poor engineering and design standards (visible screws and such), combiner parts not being a part of the component robots....

Ankle and wrist articulation can make or break a relaxed pose.

That’s kind of the straw that broke the camel’s already-strained back for me. I thought the same thing with Jetfire, and the last Warpath barely came out 4-5 years ago, and I KNOW everybody loved that toy! Right? Did we not all agree that Generations Warpath was one of the best toys of the year?

I am of two minds here. On the one hand, I would not mind a new/better Warpath. On the other, the 2010 figure would be hard to top on Hasbro's best day. They will not top it with their current standards.

but I dropped Barber’s book and anything written by him on principle after the monumental horse-shit he pulled towards the end of the ‘First Season’ of RID;

He might have been rolling with the punch of "Dark Cybertron", stalling the Prowl angle while he worked on the cross-over.

Roberts’s writing and direction has improved quite a bit on MTMTE since the ‘Second Season’ started, but it’s good writing and direction on a book that seems more of a personal, self-contained project, with little enough to actually do with TF, and indeed quite a bit of contempt for the franchise and its concepts directed at it. It’s a decently-written book that can be equally insightful and funny at times, but as a Transfan, it can make me rather antsy and uncomfortable reading it.

Roberts does not hate the concept. He does not hate you.

I'd have to say I'm not all that thrilled with Transformers as of late either. While I am looking forward to the combiner figures, I can't say there has been too much else to interest me. The toys seem to be taking steps backwards. I don't mind making them a little simpler to transform after how complicated some of the toys had gotten, but they're overdoing it. The one-step changer figures are clogging the toy isles I've seen. Nobody wants those. And unfortunately, the next cartoon series of toys looks like it'll make it worst from the figures I've seen in that line thus far. They all look very simplistic. Hopefully the cartoon will be better but then I don't exactly have high hopes there either, after the letdown that was Prime. The most recent movie I felt was a big improvement at least, over the previous films, although still room for improvement. Makes me more optimistic for the next film at least. Comics... can be hit or miss but MTMTE for the most part I'd say is probably the highlight of the entire franchise right now.

Surprisingly, I am mostly with Prowl on this one.

I didn't buy a lot of stuff for the last 2 years or so because Hasbro made it very easy to skip swaths of the toyline--Prime was the focus so it was easy to ignore, and the FOC figures in general were Not Great. I've been very satisfied with most of my purchases lately--the QC is a little down, sure, but they're doing great new toys of characters I love.

Addressing Warpath: There have been several different--I don't know what the word I'm looking for is, campaigns? Attempts?--to try and get all the Minibots redone in the same scale as each other. The first was the one that made the most sense, the Legends size class, but those toys weren't originally made to be sold in large-scale retailers and by the time the guys like Warpath and Beachcomber and Cosmos were coming out, it was almost impossible to find them. There was an effort to start redoing them in a size class that was appropriate to their altmodes--which is why we get stuff like Huge-Ass Powerglide and Deluxe Warpath. Then the newest Legends scale class comes along and they see some pretty good success with guys like Swerve and Tailgate, so why not continue to redo them in that size class? It makes sense on that level. Warpath is also one of the only known tank Autobots, so it's not hard to see why he would get a few toys in the last few years.

I think Prowl is a little too "sky is falling" regarding the "GI Joeism" of the brand, but we've been over that before. I don't mind the occasional retread, considering there are people who, if you ask, want new toys of Rodimus Prime, Galvatron and Sixshot every year. It's easy to see where the original Classics Jetfire (or Generations Warpath) fell short--mostly in terms of things like scale, paintapps or design. And likewise, it's easy to see where the new figures can be improved on too. I think the key is largely finding the version of the character that works "for you." Just as an example, there have been a good chunk of Soundwaves released in the last decade or so--Cybertron Soundwave, two toys based on the WFC design, Prime Soundwave, and a chunk of others I'm probably forgetting--and still the single figure I immediately think of as "Soundwave" is my G1 reissue. They could release a new Soundwave every six months and I probably wouldn't think of a better toy for that character than that. The same stands, possibly, for Jetfire and Shockwave. Hell, on some level, G1 Optimus Prime can never be surpassed, as much as I dig the Classics toy.

I mean, I dunno. Maybe I'm easy to please. I got Whirl and Roadbuster here, and I like them. I'm excited for Arcee and Chromia. I got a chunk of other dudes waiting for me to ship from BBTS, and I'm planning on getting at least Menasor from next year's Combiner Wars. (That Megatron is tempting but I still need to see more pics.) I'm just happy that there's stuff I'm even interested in, y'know?

And then there's this other thing; I never truly consider a "big purge" of Everything. I've sold off or traded a chunk of stuff in the last two or three years, true, but that was primarily because of space and financial reasons, not for any dislove of the brand. As others have echoed, I can't see myself ever truly "leaving." I mean, even my other primary "hobby"--more like second job--revolves partially around TF, since my new album just had Megatron on the cover. I liked TF when TF wasn't cool, y'know? So to me, there is no real "getting out." If I was going to "get out," the closest thing it would resemble would be the last 2 years or so, where I didn't really buy a whole bunch (if at all). I mean, in early 2013 when I started selling a bunch of Universe 2.0 stuff I didn't want, I ended up spending the money I made on a G1 Jetfire and a junker Shockwave to fix my original. I still need to complete RID. There's a handful of Cybertron guys I never got that I still want. (Dark Scorponok! Crumplezone! That Japanese Fangwolf repaint!) There's periods where I go into "hibernation" with it, and that's fine. That's cool. You don't need to be 100% invested in the brand 100% of the time. It's alright to walk away for a year or two, or even five, or whatever, and come back when it's doing something interesting you like again.

Take wrestling, for example! I was HUGE on wrestling in the 2003-2005 period. (Shit, my avatar is STILL Kenta Kobashi!) Went from being an avid WWE fan to being a big Japanese fan, and then after a while my interest just fizzled out because nothing I was interested in was happening. For damn near a decade, I didn't really care about wrestling beyond watching the occasional 90s match on YouTube or watching a pirate stream of Wrestlemania for free. Then this year, I watched Wrestlemania, and I was hearing a lot of talk about some of the stuff they were doing--Bray Wyatt, the Shield, Cesaro, etc.--and I got hooked. It only got worse when a friend let me start using his WWE Network subscription, so now I can actually keep up week-to-week with that's going on, and I'm full-on in right now. I mean, in January or so of this year, I was 100% about making Doom levels. That was how I spent my spare time. Then I made like 10 levels and I got a little burnt out and sick of it, and I moved on to something else. I'm sure in a year I won't care about wrestling and I'll be super into TF again, or GI Joe if they manage to resuscitate the line, or I'll be obsessed with playing Metal Gear Solid V because it'll hopefully be out by then. Or who knows what cool new thing I could get into.

It's alright for me to fade in and out of being attracted to what's going on. It doesn't mean you have to completely flip a switch and say, "Time to sell off all my shit because I don't like what the toyline is doing right now!" I mean, unless you have some kind of personality disorder where looking at your old toys only reminds you that there are, in fact, new toys that you don't like out there, in the nebulous Other. That's fucking weird.

I think most of the 30th Generations new molds are all epic home runs and top notch toys. Love what I see in the CW toys, Best Combiners new molds since the Energon 5-in-1 combiners. With these lines here, It seems that Hasbro is really trying to create great homage toys.

It's a shame Hasbro implemented so many budget short cuts on the 30th Leader Jetfire toy. Not having rotate wrist and having so many gaps on certain sculpted parts is just sad.

It's alright for me to fade in and out of being attracted to what's going on. It doesn't mean you have to completely flip a switch and say, "Time to sell off all my shit because I don't like what the toyline is doing right now!" I mean, unless you have some kind of personality disorder where looking at your old toys only reminds you that there are, in fact, new toys that you don't like out there, in the nebulous Other. That's fucking weird.

It is a question of not wanting to be in a hobby that is not impressing me in the present.

I got out of SW a bit in '06 after the comics went (exceptionally) bad (exceptionally) quickly.

2 years later, "Clone Wars" was enough to push me away completely. I had no inclination to keep the figures (and comics) of a property that had not impressed me in *years*. Same might end up applying to TF. I was not looking to purge SW. But, when I needed space (and money), I decided that a full purge was just easier than selective pruning.

Here's a question: why purge older figures when presumably you enjoyed them at the time you bought them? I can see not buying current figures/comics if they're not bringing enjoyment, but I don't get disposing of older stuff. Unless it's just a case of wanting the cash for other hobbies.

I've occasionally thought of selling some of my Transformers to fund some other things, but I start going through them and find that there are very few that I genuinely want to part with. But then I've always been selective about which figures I bought anyway.

Tigermegatron wrote:I think most of the 30th Generations new molds are all epic home runs and top notch toys. Love what I see in the CW toys, Best Combiners new molds since the Energon 5-in-1 combiners. With these lines here, It seems that Hasbro is really trying to create great homage toys.

I tend to agree. And I think the fact that plastic costs have gone up has to be taken into consideration here. I agree with others that quality probably peaked a few years back and that we're definitely seeing the results of cost-cutting with current TF designs. But I think we're still getting some good homages out of the deal. I really don't mind having hands and feet as extra, non-integrated components. And as I said before, combiners that are less fiddly than the Energon designs are welcome as far as I'm concerned.

Dominic wrote:Less articulation, less paint, poor engineering and design standards (visible screws and such), combiner parts not being a part of the component robots...

See, we’ve had a few toys over the years that rose above this, no question, but it’s not like these sorts of things were ever consistently absent from retail-level TFs. Hell, the designs of the things practically demands that screws be visible *somewhere*, and an overabundance of paint on them considering what they do can actually be a bad idea. I just got GT Megatron last week, and yeah, he’s covered from head-to-toe in beautiful silver paint and nifty tampo’d decals, but I also want to be super-careful when I handle and transform him to avoid scraping or chipping. There was a lot of paint back in RiD, but do we really want a repeat of a chip-monster like Super Speedbreaker? You have to take the toys’ functions into account.

Not seeing ‘poor engineering and design standards’ or even completely comprehending what you mean on that one. TFs work as well as they always have.

Ankle and wrist articulation can make or break a relaxed pose.

They’re nice, but you can’t consistently expect luxury articulation points at a basic retail price. These aren’t Marvel Legends, they have better things to do than just be super-posable toys of dudes.

I am of two minds here. On the one hand, I would not mind a new/better Warpath.

But…why? What was so wrong with the previous Warpath that we need a new one already?

On the other, the 2010 figure would be hard to top on Hasbro's best day. They will not top it with their current standards.

It would also be hard to top because Generations Warpath was damn near perfect.

Roberts does not hate the concept. He does not hate you.

I just can’t shake the feeling…

Onslaught Six wrote:Addressing Warpath: There have been several different--I don't know what the word I'm looking for is, campaigns? Attempts?--to try and get all the Minibots redone in the same scale as each other. The first was the one that made the most sense, the Legends size class, but those toys weren't originally made to be sold in large-scale retailers and by the time the guys like Warpath and Beachcomber and Cosmos were coming out, it was almost impossible to find them. There was an effort to start redoing them in a size class that was appropriate to their altmodes--which is why we get stuff like Huge-Ass Powerglide and Deluxe Warpath. Then the newest Legends scale class comes along and they see some pretty good success with guys like Swerve and Tailgate, so why not continue to redo them in that size class? It makes sense on that level.

But where does it end? Do we have to sit through them remaking every ’84-’85 dude every time they come up with a new scale or aesthetic? When can we just be *done* with this shit and move on to something new?

Warpath is also one of the only known tank Autobots, so it's not hard to see why he would get a few toys in the last few years.

Why do they have to do a ‘known’ tank Autobot, though?

I think Prowl is a little too "sky is falling" regarding the "GI Joeism" of the brand, but we've been over that before.

See, this is what I mean, dismissal. Even though every time I say this is happening, and everyone else says it’s not happening, it *keeps happening*. Where do we actually draw the line? Does Hasbro have to release two versions of some fucker like, I dunno, Gears within the same year for it to become obvious as a problem?

I don't mind the occasional retread,

This is way more than the occasional retread, this is the *entire line* being a retread with the odd outlying New Thing.

It's easy to see where the original Classics Jetfire (or Generations Warpath) fell short--mostly in terms of things like scale, paintapps or design.

See, this is what I’m talking about! We haven’t even seen New new Warpath yet, and already Old new Warpath sucks now, apparently? It seems like just yesterday I remember reviews heaping accolades on that toy, websites appointing it Toy of the Year and the like. What happened that we’re supposed to hate it now? I didn’t get the memo.

I mean, I dunno. Maybe I'm easy to please. I got Whirl and Roadbuster here, and I like them. I'm excited for Arcee and Chromia. I got a chunk of other dudes waiting for me to ship from BBTS, and I'm planning on getting at least Menasor from next year's Combiner Wars. (That Megatron is tempting but I still need to see more pics.) I'm just happy that there's stuff I'm even interested in, y'know?

I like Whirl and Roadbuster too, but like I said, I just can’t stop being paranoid that Hasbro’s going to turn around next year and go “Ha ha, got you, you dumb fucker. Those weren’t the cool ones, those suck and you weren’t supposed to like them. Buy these new, better ones!” Moreover, I’m also worried that the cynical retread stuff I’m not interested in WILL eventually choke out the stuff I actually am interested in. Time was, ALL of TF was ‘stuff I was interested in”, and I really want that feeling back, y’know?

And then there's this other thing; I never truly consider a "big purge" of Everything. I've sold off or traded a chunk of stuff in the last two or three years, true, but that was primarily because of space and financial reasons, not for any dislove of the brand. As others have echoed, I can't see myself ever truly "leaving." I mean, even my other primary "hobby"--more like second job--revolves partially around TF, since my new album just had Megatron on the cover. I liked TF when TF wasn't cool, y'know? So to me, there is no real "getting out." If I was going to "get out," the closest thing it would resemble would be the last 2 years or so, where I didn't really buy a whole bunch (if at all). I mean, in early 2013 when I started selling a bunch of Universe 2.0 stuff I didn't want, I ended up spending the money I made on a G1 Jetfire and a junker Shockwave to fix my original. I still need to complete RID. There's a handful of Cybertron guys I never got that I still want. (Dark Scorponok! Crumplezone! That Japanese Fangwolf repaint!) There's periods where I go into "hibernation" with it, and that's fine. That's cool. You don't need to be 100% invested in the brand 100% of the time. It's alright to walk away for a year or two, or even five, or whatever, and come back when it's doing something interesting you like again.

This I completely agree with. I still grab random older stuff off eBay every now and again, when it strikes my fancy (right now I’m wanting to get a MW Megatron to go with my Megaplex, but he goes for way too much for what he is). I finally grabbed a GT-R Megatron, something I’ve been wanting for a while now. There’s so goddamn much of the hobby that it’s perfectly viable to enjoy it in a ‘retro’ fashion or however you would qualify that.

(Also I apparently really like Megatron, lately? It’s weird, normally he’d be WAY too much of a ‘main’ character for me to justifiably count as a ‘favorite’, but I’ve been into the dude recently. I blame his consistently awesme IDW portrayals.)

But damn, do I miss waiting to see the ‘new’ Transformers and what they would turn into and how they would do it.

Dominic wrote:

It's alright for me to fade in and out of being attracted to what's going on. It doesn't mean you have to completely flip a switch and say, "Time to sell off all my shit because I don't like what the toyline is doing right now!" I mean, unless you have some kind of personality disorder where looking at your old toys only reminds you that there are, in fact, new toys that you don't like out there, in the nebulous Other. That's fucking weird.

It is a question of not wanting to be in a hobby that is not impressing me in the present.

Yeah see, I just can’t see TF as an interest being that ‘disposable’.

I mean, I’ve been a fan of TF, a collector of the toys, an enjoyer of the media, pretty much non-stop since I was five years old. It’s ingrained into me, it’s practically a component of my personality at this point. Even if I get 100% actually fed-up with what Hasbro’s doing with the brand right this second, that’s going to be a completely contemporary situation, and I may stop collecting *those* toys and stop watching *those* shows and reading *those* comics, but it’s not taking away all the enjoyment I got from previous iterations throughout basically *my entire life*. I’m still going to be all “Fuck yeah, I loved Beast Wars and Beast Machines, maybe I should rewatch BM again!” or “Fuck yeah, Animated was the tits, time for me to finally scour and buy a Blackout and that Optimus Prime with the clip-on armor!” or “How have I never watched Headmasters, time for me to check that out!”. Hell, there’s still UK Comic collections coming out, you know I’ve got to get those. Being ‘done’ with TF is an impossibility for me, on a lot of levels.

It may not be the same as it was for me, the ‘hobby’ as it were may not like ME as much as it seemed like it used to, but it’s still *there* in one form or another than I’m able to enjoy.

I got out of SW a bit in '06 after the comics went (exceptionally) bad (exceptionally) quickly.

2 years later, "Clone Wars" was enough to push me away completely. I had no inclination to keep the figures (and comics) of a property that had not impressed me in *years*. Same might end up applying to TF. I was not looking to purge SW. But, when I needed space (and money), I decided that a full purge was just easier than selective pruning.

See, this ‘in or out’ mentality escapes me.

Like, I am, by all accounts, ‘done’ with Power Rangers as a fandom or ‘hobby’. I haven’t kept up with the show itself in over a decade, I made the full transition to Super Sentai fanboyism a few years back (and hell, Sentai’s been more enjoyable to me recently than Kamen Rider, no thanks to the slog that Drive has been). But I’ve still got a lot of love for PR ingrained in me. I grabbed the Super Megaforce In Space Red Ranger toy specifically because I remembered how much ass In Space kicked (I’ve never watched Megaranger, I’m not going to be a poser that way). I might watch the Supermega finale just because I saw some characters I had fondness for (TJ!) would be getting cameos in it. Hell, when my PTO cashout and ‘bonus’ paycheck roll in this month, I’m probably going to splurge and order the Legacy Dragonzord and Dragon Dagger (Merry Christmas to me!). I have a *big display of SHF MM Rangers with the Legacy Morpher and the 2010 Megazord* on the shelf right below my TF display right now. PR hasn’t impressed me in ages, but there’s no turning off the part of me that always thought PR was cool as hell.

I’ll always like the things I like, it’s pretty impossible to, as Six said, ‘flip a switch’ and just be done with something I’ve generally thought was awesome for ages.

The Combiners are terrible. I agree with JT about the exposed combination plugs on the jets. Would it have killed Hasbro to cover those up? (G1 Slingshot had a fold-down chest plate that could have been duplicated on the modern figures.)

Here's a question: why purge older figures when presumably you enjoyed them at the time you bought them? I can see not buying current figures/comics if they're not bringing enjoyment, but I don't get disposing of older stuff. Unless it's just a case of wanting the cash for other hobbies.

If I am out of the hobby, the standard for what I keep will change. With "Star Wars", I was out for long enough that I had zero interest in SW. I did not like it any more. Why would I keep the figures? Along the same lines, some of the comics were good. But, few were truly excellent. It was easier to just make a clean sweep of it. (I have plenty of comics, and there are always more comics coming out.)


Not sure I would do a full purge. But, the last year's worth of comics would probably got pitched. Some other parts of IDW would get tossed. "All Hail Megatron" and Costa's run would stay. The "Spotlight" compilations would be iffy. (I long since got rid of single issues. But, might swap some of those back in rather than keep some of the compilations.) Furmans run would likely be pruned (but I would read through it one more time to be sure.) I long got rid of the "Beast Wars" comics a long time ago. The G1 reprints might get a pass just because those are functionally a complete run. (But, if I needed the space....) I am already planning to get rid of some Fun Publications stuff. (No "Diamond Edition" of this year's comic breaks my run, creating less incentive to keep what I do have.)

Toy-wise, I am already looking to purge. I just need to inventory what I have. The less associated a figure is with a comic or episode I like, the less likely I would be to keep it. There would be some exceptions (such as "Timelines" Tracks, aka Roadrage), but I would keep less. For example, during the late UT, I was less picky about context (as there was less context to be picky about). But, I doubt I will keep as much UT stuff as I have thus far.

Not seeing ‘poor engineering and design standards’ or even completely comprehending what you mean on that one. TFs work as well as they always have.

Would it really have killed Hasbro to cover up those combiner plugs on the new Superion components, as mentioned above?

They’re nice, but you can’t consistently expect luxury articulation points at a basic retail price. These aren’t Marvel Legends, they have better things to do than just be super-posable toys of dudes.

No, I can and I will. Hasbro delivered on that for nearly a decade before cutting back. They set the standard, they need to live up to it.

See, this is what I’m talking about! We haven’t even seen New new Warpath yet, and already Old new Warpath sucks now, apparently? It seems like just yesterday I remember reviews heaping accolades on that toy, websites appointing it Toy of the Year and the like. What happened that we’re supposed to hate it now? I didn’t get the memo.

We are getting hung up on specific figures. But, to use them as examples:

Warpath: The 2011 figure is going to be hard to beat. It has room for improvement (maybe articulated wrists and such). But, it will be hard to beat. (Which is why I almost want to see Hasbro try.) And, like O6 pointed out, there is call to have all of the 84-86 Minibots in one scale.

Jetfire: The 2006 figure has plenty of flaws to be improved on. The helmet is clunky. The figure is stiff and can only be stably posed so many ways. The jet has blocky under-carriage. I do not hate the mould. But, it really could be better. And, I want a better Jetfire figure. The problem with the 2014 figure is that it is arguably a downgrade.

(Also I apparently really like Megatron, lately? It’s weird, normally he’d be WAY too much of a ‘main’ character for me to justifiably count as a ‘favorite’, but I’ve been into the dude recently. I blame his consistently awesme IDW portrayals.)

What is wrong with main characters? There is a reason people tend to like them, specifically the main character doing the important stuff.

Hell, there’s still UK Comic collections coming out, you know I’ve got to get those. Being ‘done’ with TF is an impossibility for me, on a lot of levels.

The franchise has gone a year without really flooring me. And, before that, it was much more hit or miss than it should have been. I am only going to look back at old stuff so much. The UK comics are functionally "new" to me because I have not read most of them. But, after I finish up with those, Hasbro and IDW need to start impressing me in the present tense.


Years ago, (decades actually), I promised myself something. I would never be the backwards looking fan. I never got the appeal of it, and (truth be told), always thought it was kind of sad. ("Sad" as in "pathetic", not "sad" as in "wallowing in despair".) When I was a kid, I gave up on "Star Wars" when new stuff stopped coming out. I went back to it, but gave up again when it stopped impressing me.

I never understood "Star Trek" fans who watched the same episodes over and over and over and over and over. I do not understand comics fans that are stuck on runs from 20+ years ago. I can see the value of Michelinie's run on "Iron Man". But, I cannot see never moving on from it. (Been there, read it. What else have they got for me?)

If TF stops delivering the goods, then there is other stuff to go look at and make room for.

Dominic wrote:I never understood "Star Trek" fans who watched the same episodes over and over and over and over and over. I do not understand comics fans that are stuck on runs from 20+ years ago. I can see the value of Michelinie's run on "Iron Man". But, I cannot see never moving on from it. (Been there, read it. What else have they got for me?)

Because they're good episodes worth watching over and over and over and over again. Seriously, I really do not understand your logic here. By this standard, why do you even waste your money on anything. Ever? Seriously, if you're just going to be a "once and done" consumer, then why waste your money on owning comics when you could just as easily and for MUCH cheaper check them out from the library? You're not going to read them again anyway, so again, why waste the money? Same with movies and tv. Why own anything on dvd if you're only going to watch something, even something you like only once? Rent it and be done with it (or, again, library, they tend to have a section for that too). But to consistently spend money owning copies of something you're not ever going to go back and enjoy again is the definition of waste. This could also extend to toys as well. Why buy toys if you're just going to be done with them as little as a year later? The whole approach makes no sense.

I get what you mean by not wanting to be a "backward looking fan", but I really think you're going about it the wrong way. The kind of fan you want to avoid turning into is one that cannot accept change. That's a big different from being able to go back and enjoy again what you enjoyed before. It just means that you don't have to be one of those fans that's all bitchy and moaning because the latest version isn't just like the old one. It doesn't mean that you discard the old one. Unfavorable new content doesn't (or rather, shouldn't) negate or eliminate previous good content. The thing you enoyed before doesn't go away just because new stuff comes out. And going back to enjoy something over and over again is why people buy things rather than rent them. There's a multibillion dollar industry centered around people doing that exact thing. It doesn't make you backwards thinking neanderthal, it just makes you normal.

As for losing interest in Transformers specifically, I never will be out of the fandom. Like Prowl said it's a part of who I am. And, there will always be TF stuff for me to buy, even if it's just memorabilia. Which is mostly what I tend to get anyway. I have a whole wardrobe of shirts and my car has no less than 5 Autobot logos in various places. So yeah, even if the cartoons, toys or comics aren't grabbing me, the franchise in general will. Also, unless I magically win the lottery and am able to go buy every TF I've ever wanted ever, there will always be TF lines for me to go back and focus on if new stuff doesn't set me ablaze.

Having said that, I do feel like the current offerings are "meh". And I'm actually with Prowl now on a lot of what he's said. And his Warpath example is a pretty good one. Granted, I wouldn't really compare a deluxe to a legends scale figure, but if they were going to offer a legends Warpath, they could have just reissued the previous one which no one could find anyway. And, Jetfire is an even bigger example of it. Better articulation was the norm for at least 5 years and we got some great figures from it, but now we're regressing back to a spec that was standard 7-8 years ago. Toy engineering is supposed to get better, not worse and the new Jetfire isn't even as good a figure as the one from 30 years ago. That being the case, I also have to wonder why bother? As for visible screws, yeah, they have to go somewhere, but four fairly large screws placed very prominently on the chest is pretty bad. they could have used smaller screws and maybe put them on the back (top of vehicle mode). Anyway. It was nice a few years ago when we were getting new updated figures that had good articulation of characters we hadn't seen a bajillion times, like skullgrin and Straxus and... um... that other guy... Thunderwing. And I think we even got a few new guys. Who was the Thunderwing repaint? That guy I'm pretty sure was new.

See, this is what I’m talking about! We haven’t even seen New new Warpath yet, and already Old new Warpath sucks now, apparently? It seems like just yesterday I remember reviews heaping accolades on that toy, websites appointing it Toy of the Year and the like. What happened that we’re supposed to hate it now? I didn’t get the memo.

Nothing! The only real problem with Generations Warpath is that it's a Deluxe toy of a character traditionally portrayed as being small. You can make arguments that a tiny tank makes about as much sense as a tiny Volkswagen but it is what it is. It seems Hasbro is very much trying to complete the Minibot lineup in the Legends scale, and to do literally every other Minibot except Warpath would be weird...and the amount of people going "When are we getting Legends Warpath?" Will likely outweigh the amount of people going, "Ugh, Warpath again?"

And here's something else. Like, okay, you like MovieScream. You've professed this many times, and basically no matter how many times or in how many different scales and designs Hasbro makes one in, you will buy it. Like, that's just a given. The same way Scourge will buy literally any Grimlock or Shocktrek will buy literally any Shockwave or I'll buy pretty much any Onslaught (if it fits my narrow scope of what Onslaught should be, naturally) or 86 will buy literally any Prime, even that shitty Voyager up scaled from a Commander mould. For us, those characters or designs capture us in a way that others don't, and we will gladly and stupidly buy Another MovieScream or Another Grimlock.

Well, what about that guy who really likes Warpath? You can have your huge MovieScream shrine but WarpathBamKaboom69 has to deal with only getting three or four toys of his favourite character? GearsHead85 has to settle for the handful of Gears toys released in the last 30 years? Gears and Jetfire and Warpath aren't fucking up TF; Optimus Prime and fucking Bumblebee are! Why aren't you complaining about the literally DOZEN toys of each released EVERY year for the past EIGHT years?!

Also, as you said, we haven't even seen the new Warpath yet. It's entirely possible that he's an example of Retool Released First, which is becoming increasingly common. It's possible Warpath is a half-assed repaint/remould of a different tank guy, released first because Warpath is more likely to sell just because he's Warpath. We dunno yet.