This toy was originally unveiled in October 2021, but of course it took a while to get it produced and shipped out to consumers. I worry that I might end up with five Galvatron-based toys when all is said and done (I'm assuming Leader-class Straxus is based on this design, and I'm still waffling on whether I'll get the Legacy refresh version, since it's reportedly a cleaner toy without the battle damage deco).

Anyway, for me the appeal of this set was the tiny little slug figures and the tiny ships, and not necessarily Galvatron himself. (Yeah, I won't spend $20 on a Transformers R.E.D. version of Megatron in mid-recreation, but I'll spend $50 on a Galvatron in mid-creation. I don't get me, either.)

The box is in a lovely shade of Hasbro Selects Brown, as is standard, and it's decorated with graphics from the HasLab Unicron box (Unicron in planet mode, and the Quintesson spiral cruiser) as well as new line art that's based on Galvatron's first appearance in the 1986 animated film. Open the seal and you get Galvatron in robot mode, rattan-tied to a piece of cardboard, and a smaller white box filled with tissue paper. Unwrap the tissue paper and all the little accessories and things come flying out. Nano-sized half-inch robots all over the place. There's gotta be a better way. I realize Hasbro is trying to avoid using plastic baggies, so how about a paper envelope to stuff these things into...?

So, anyway. It's the Kingdom version of Galvatron, cast in translucent purple where possible. Sadly, this doesn't mean the entire toy. Select parts are made of an opaque vinyl, what the fandom likes to call "unpaintable plastic," and it kind of ruins the overall look a little bit. I guess the trade-off is that these are all load-bearing parts (shoulder joints and elbow joints and such), and translucent styrene has been known to become brittle and crack, so this is Hasbro's attempt at sacrificing aesthetics in order to make the toy more durable.

The toy is decorated in lines that bring out the details of the sculpt. Comparisons to TRON are inevitable. It's honestly very attractive. There are no such paint operations on the helmet crest, collar, biceps, or upper legs, because these are the opaque vinyl parts mentioned above. The barrel of his particle cannon is a lighter shade of purple, almost energon cube pink. I almost wish they'd cast these vinyl parts in translucent PVC plastic or something instead. His parts would be rubbery, but at least he wouldn't look like he's made from parts from two different toys.

I expect to see this toy used frequently during YouTube toy-based stop-motion recreations of The Transformers: the Movie.

He comes with the same accessories as the Kingdom toy, so he's got two translucent copies of the Decepticon mothership, plus a soap-on-a-rope. Wait, that's a Matrix-on-a-chain, sorry. The chain is opaque, but the Matrix itself is a gorgeous translucent purple. It's the Decepticon Matrix of Leadership! Those crafty Quintessons in the cartoon claimed that it doesn't exist, but I know better! I've got it right here in my hands!

So, here's where it gets a bit more interesting. Galvatron also comes with three new ships, which are kinda-sorta scaled to HasLab Unicron. One is the Decepticon mothership again, slightly smaller than the guns (I guess it's called the Revenge, because why not). It's cast in yellow PVC plastic but painted entirely purple. It has a hole on the bottom and can be mounted on the clear plastic stand that came with Unicron.

We also get the Junkion ship from the movie (which I guess is called the Minnow, named after the boat from Gilligan's Islang). It's yellow with some silver-painted bits. The actual ship was orange in the movie, so it's kind of disappointing that they didn't paint it. Peg hole is on the bottom.

Finally, we get the Quintesson cruiser, the spiral-shaped ship (what fans sometimes call the "corkscrew ship"). It's also made from yellow plastic but painted almost entirely silver, except for the very front and very back end. Or is that the very top and the very bottom? It's nice, but I wish it had been cast in green plastic, because that's what color the ends should be. It's also got a peg-hole to mount it. (This ship is arguably not to scale with Unicron, for a couple of reasons. For one, it should be able to crash through his eye, and it's much too large for that. This also throws the scale of the slug figures into question, since there's no way they could fit inside any of these ships and pilot them.) I do believe this is the first time we've ever gotten an official representation of this iconic ship, though, so that's great.

There are also fourteen new slug figures, and yes, Dinobot Slug is one of them. We also get Grimlock and Swoop and Snarl, all in dinosaur mode, but sadly, no Sludge. On the humanoid robot side of things, we get tiny nano-sized editions of Arcee, Kup, Perceptor, and Ultra Magnus for the Autobots and Cyclonus, Dirge, Megatron, Scourge, Soundwave, and Starscream for the Decepticons. (They're all grey, so these could arguably be Ramjet or a Sweep or Thundercracker/Skywarp if you wanted them to be, but these are the names Hasbro identifies them as in the instructions.)

Arcee's legs are so freaking thin. Like, 0.5 pencil lead thin. Slag's horns are conjoined together, but Cyclonus's bunny ears are not. Soundwave has a volume knob on the back of each leg. I'm wondering whether I should try to paint them or not. (I never got around to painting the tiny Aerialbot jets that came with Titans Return Broadside. It's realistically probably not going to happen.)

All these characters have little rectangular stands, so they can be mounted on the aforementioned clear display stand that came with Unicron. It seems like they deliberately avoided copying characters who have been released and packaged with other toys (Optimus Prime, Galvatron, Hot Rod). I predict that in 20 or 30 years' time, every person on Earth will have lost every single one of these. I have no idea how to even store them. They're so damn small.

The set is listed as being $57.99 on Hasbro Pulse (sold out, of course), so you're only paying like eight bucks for all these extras. That's pretty cool. (Or conversely, you're paying like $3.40 for each of the 17 new parts, and getting Galvatron for free. Depends on how selective you want to get with your calculations.)

Zob (also found the NECA Ninja Turtles "Catwoman from Channel 6" set at Target today, and I am SO HAPPY ABOUT THAT)

On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 4:57:45 PM UTC-8, Zobovor wrote:

> So, anyway. It's the Kingdom version of Galvatron, cast in translucent purple where possible.
> Sadly, this doesn't mean the entire toy. Select parts are made of an opaque vinyl, what the
> fandom likes to call "unpaintable plastic," and it kind of ruins the overall look a little bit.

I would be all for a 'downgrade kit' with translucent arms and thighs with painted outlines, weight bearing concerns be damned. I wouldn't be posing this one anyway. The best display for this figure would be to have it standing at attention on a turntable rotating round and round as if in the middle of reformat-ation.

> The toy is decorated in lines that bring out the details of the sculpt. Comparisons to TRON are inevitable.

It's really good execution on the concept. I don't know if any deco could really capture everything going on during Megatron's metamorphosis. So much goes on from the stripping away of his outer 'skin' showing a sort of x-ray schematic of robotic organs, to his body then being covered with glowy horizontal lines, then the final grid pattern with a million little squares covering his form like a 3D wireframe.

When I first heard what they were attempting to do I thought this Galvatron would be covered in lots of tiny squares like R.E.D. reformatting Megatron.. Those grid squares aren't as dynamic or eye catching as the outlines on translucent plastic. I love the outline approach they took here but wish they would have done it on every surface of paintable plastic and not just the main facing sides. They did a good job but I'd have loved about 50% more glowy panel lining.

I wish there were a way to cover robot figures with lenticular stickers. Then I could have the reformatting Megatron/Galvatron I imagine in my head.

> I expect to see this toy used frequently during YouTube toy-based stop-motion recreations of The Transformers: the Movie.

Or TRON/Transformers crossover animations.

>It's the Decepticon Matrix of Leadership! Those crafty Quintessons in the cartoon claimed that it doesn't exist, but I know better! I've got it right here in my hands!

Yeah this is one accessory that really doean't make sense in the context of the fiction it's derived from. I guess Megatron must have already had it inside his body or it was created by Unicron and incorporated into Galvatron or something. If that's so, the Autobot marix isn't really a creation unique to them, just a sort of interchangeable power pack/removable organ patterned on some template compatible with certain cybertronians' internal workings. Maybe there's matrixes everywhere, one for every subfaction or group.

> One is the Decepticon mothership again, slightly smaller than the guns (I guess it's called the Revenge, because why not).

So betweeen the mini ship in this set and the guns, which is the better representation of the Revenge? Which is more screen accurate? From the Pulse pictures I think the guns are a little too flat up top but the mini ship sculpt looks blocky and lacking in detail.

> We also get the Junkion ship from the movie...
> Finally, we get the Quintesson cruiser...

The sculpts look really good on these, especially at this size. I wish they would do larger versions like the old Star Wars Action Fleet ships. Or maybe Lego could jump in here and make some playsets. A big ol' Revenge with Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge mini figures would be neat.

> This also throws the scale of the slug figures into question, since there's no way they could fit inside any of these ships and pilot them.)

Maybe they are actually meant to go with/fit inside the Titan Ark.

> There are also fourteen new slug figures, and yes, Dinobot Slug is one of them. We also get Grimlock and Swoop and Snarl, all in dinosaur mode, but sadly, no Sludge. On the humanoid robot side of things, we get tiny nano-sized editions of Arcee, Kup, Perceptor, and Ultra Magnus for the Autobots and Cyclonus, Dirge, Megatron, Scourge, Soundwave, and Starscream for the Decepticons.

I wonder if the slugs are an idea they'll only be doing for movie characters. This set is a big push toward completing the movie cast in nano scale. There are still a couple left out, like Rodimus, Wreck-Gar, Springer, the Quints, Gnaw, and Wheelie. And like you mentioned, Sludge. I wonder if they have at least one more selects release that will round out the movie cast in nano. Maybe a Selects Shining Magnus or Shining Rodimus is coming with the rest of the slugs. It's unusual that the movie characters get done before the majority of the '84-'85 cast in any format. I get the feeling they're trying to pump out as much movie merch as fast as possible post Haslab Unicron and we won't see any more slugs after their final movie selects toy is released.

> I'm wondering whether I should try to paint them or not. (I never got around to painting the tiny Aerialbot jets that came with Titans Return Broadside. It's realistically probably not going to happen.)

I wonder if we are losing motivation and enthusiasm in our old age. 20 years ago Zob would have painted all of these by now and built the missing cast out of aluminun foil. Meanwhile as we wonder what to do, in China there's this guy on ebay...

> I have no idea how to even store them. They're so damn small.

Do what Hasbro would not and break out the tiny plastic baggie. Put them in a dimebag. They are your drug after all.

> The set is listed as being $57.99 on Hasbro Pulse (sold out, of course),

Looks like it's back now but I had to search for it.

On Saturday, February 19, 2022 at 2:13:10 PM UTC-7, evil.king.m...@gmail.com wrote:

> I would be all for a 'downgrade kit' with translucent arms and thighs with painted outlines, weight bearing concerns be damned.

If somebody comes up with one, and it matches the color of stock plastic used, I will totally buy it.

> So betweeen the mini ship in this set and the guns, which is the better representation of the Revenge? Which is more screen accurate?

Neither is perfect, but I think I like the newer one, because it's not also trying to be a gun.

> The sculpts look really good on these, especially at this size. I wish they would do larger versions like the old Star Wars Action Fleet ships.

The ships of the Transformers universe aren't quite as iconic as the ones in Star Wars, but there are still a lot they could do. There's at least one more style of Quintesson ship, there's Bosch's freighter from "The Gambler," there's Aron's toy rocketship from "Child's Play," there's Octane's junk hauler from "Starscream's Ghost," there's the Interceptor from "Dark Awakening"...

> I get the feeling they're trying to pump out as much movie merch as fast as possible post Haslab Unicron and we won't see any more slugs after their final movie selects toy is released.

Yeah, that's probably how it will go. The focus will eventually shift away from the movie. But, it's been great so far. I'm really happy that Hasbro has been pushing the movie and its characters so hard core lately.

> I wonder if we are losing motivation and enthusiasm in our old age. 20 years ago Zob would have painted all of these by now and built the missing cast out of aluminun foil.

I think I'm just choosing my projects more carefully these days. It used to be that I would just bounce around from repainting G1 toys to Ninja Turtles projects to Star Wars projects. Mostly there were characters, or specific iterations of characters, that I wanted to own, and nobody was making them so I made them myself.

Nowadays, NECA is paying tribute to some seriously deep cuts from TMNT, and Hasbro has duplicated nearly every version of C-3PO and R2-D2 that I've built and painted, and is finally paying attention to the background characters from G1. I was gobbling up broken G1 Reflector pieces with the intent to paint them cartoon purple when Hasbro finally gave us Siege Refraktor. There's arguably no need for me to do that project now. I just wanted a cartoon Reflector, and now there's an official one. Which is great.

So, there's arguably fewer projects that I really need to bring into the world. NECA hasn't done REX-1 the TMNT robot cop yet, for example, but I'm confident they'll get to him some day, so I'm not going to spend a month trying to cobble one together when they'll arguably do a better job. Final Fantasy IV monsters is where my focus is right now, and I calculated at the start that it would take me five or six years to get to them all, so that's where I'm comfortable spending my efforts at the moment.

I've been eyeing my projects more closely than usual lately because I'll need to pack them up soon, and it's funny how many of them have been made redundant. Kup in cartoon colors, Dinobots in cartoon colors, a purple Galvatron, Red Alert with a red helmet, Scourge with pink fingernails... we've gotten all of these officially, or we will eventually. We've never gotten a lumpy Scourge mutated by the Matrix, so that project is arguably still pretty important. But a lot of the other ones have been supplanted, and I honestly couldn't be more pleased.

Zob (was seriously considering getting a second Siege Omega Supreme to paint into a Guardian Robot, and now I'm really glad I didn't)