TF Views

Mmkay, so. Hasbro has recently been cranking out some classy repaints. Classy to the point where they're easily worthy of being prized convention exclusives. Big Daddy, now there's a prime example. Awesome mould, awesome colour scheme [/Bay], clever character use, and they even snagged the name for icing. Take a look at the upcoming Fracture for another. This is all enhanced by the Hasbro updates on the official TF site, with backstories and info on the character and colour choices.

Yet, despite this recent jump in desirability, I'm finding a lot of the upcoming Universe repaints extremely dull. Acid Storm, Blaster, Dropshot (Or whatever the Backgild repaint's named), the umpteenth milking of the Cybertron Legends, the two craptacular Evac repaints, Dirge, all scream 'meh' to me. I'm digging the Mini-Con pack, because it's a cool giftset format, and Heavy Load is surprisingly a winner in my eyes - perhaps because he's a new character with a cool bio, perhaps because Quickmix was searingly orange.

I think the key here is that a lot of them are riding the homage train a tad too much, and not offering much new aside from that. For a repaint to stand out, it has to be a notable improvement over the previous version, not just a different character. I'll point at Blades and Springer as examples. They're different from Evac, but they may as well be Raspberry and Lime flavours thereof. What gives? Why were these colour schemes chosen when we've got Energon Quickstrike and Bulkhead, who're essentially the same damned thing? Not to mention that Whirl had precedent as a use for that mould. Sigh!

So, am I alone in being underwhelmed by the filler? Do tell!

Filler is rarely good. Never bought a TF repaint of a toy I already own, never intend to!

Ironically, I DO have two Doubledealers, one of the more original G1ers. Though saying "original" about an '87 toy is maaaybe moot. So many gimmicks going on.

Definitely tired of the homage train, though; TF has been moving siiidewaaays for a good long time. Gimme a run of of a few serieses with no Optimus or Starscream, hmmmmm.....

I'll give Animated cred for doing the Primal act with Prime, hey. It'd make him slightly more interesting..if he was doing more than S1 Primal did. Hrmm.

Good repaints, those I heartily enjoy, especially when they get more character than the originals. BotCon Weirdwolf! My pleasure with Weirdwolf comes.

I too enjoy some good repaints. Case in point, the new Ratbat. That was pulled out of nowhere! And I love Ratbat!

But I can honestly say that these repaints are a little more inspired than say those of the later Armada and Energon lines. Powerlinx ____? Come on.

Well, as reported in the hauls thread, I snapped up Blaster just this night, and I gotta say...I'm actually impressed. Now, I don't have Soundwave for comparison, but there's some touches in there that I really appreciate. Mainly the eyes. At first I was worried that he was just gonna look like Red Soundwave, which has it's own snazziness merits, but you know. Then I transformed him, and was greeted by red paint around the edges and through the center of his visor, mimmicking that distinctive eye-thing that Blaster had going in the comics. That one little touch is the extra mile it took (for me) to get him to Actually Look Like Blaster! So to me, he works just fine as Classics Blaster. Contrarily to you, '86, Heavy Load was the one I found to be lacking and uninteresting, though I'll gladly chalk that up to Having the Mold Already.

See, I lack Quickmix, but find Blaster pretty crappy.

Also damn you for having these already. I've only just found the first wave of Deluxes.

Well there's still the one Heavy Load I left on the shelf if you feel like driving down to Fresno anytime soon...

Pfft. Like I can afford the gas.

Onslaught Six wrote:Pfft. Like I can afford the gas.

Well that can really depend on which Fresno. Ohio, California, or Texas?

I hereby demand pics of Blaster's non-crappy head!

Also, Prowl, note that the guns can be mounted on the arms and wings as well. Do dig the options with that mould.