Dave's Transformers Kingdom Rant: Walgreens Red Alert

Red Alert (redeco of Battle Across Time Sideswipe plus lightbar)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/RedAlertK

This year's Walgreens exclusive is another Red Alert, this time based on
the heavy retool of Sideswipe done for the Battle Across Time Amazon
exclusive sets. So, no mass-market version of this retool available.

https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/BattleAcrossTime - Sideswipe mold
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeS1 - original Sideswipe

CAPSULE

$23 at Walgreens, I have never actually seen it on shelves and it was
very elusive to buy online.

Red Alert: BAT version of the mold was recommended.

RANT

Packaging: Externally, it's standard Kingdom Deluxe packaging, no
exclusivity indicated. Both the art and the box back render show the pistol
and lightbar combined in axe mode (from way back in Siege, the RT-10 Particle
Beam Circuit Welder Axe Mode). Internally, like other store exclusives that
looked like regular Deluxes, there's no trading card nor does the inner tray
have a spot for one. All the plastic ties that hold the robot in have
plastic disks reinforcing the spots where they go through the cardboard tray.

AUTOBOT: RED ALERT
Assortment: WFC-K38
Altmode: Fire Marshal's sportscar
Transformation Difficulty: 17 steps (one more step for the lightbar)
Previous Name Use: Yes
Previous Mold Use: Gen:K
Division: Ground Command
Unit: Medical
Rank: Private

Packaging: Five ties hold the robot, two ties each on the rifle, the
shoulder launcher, and the lightbar.

Color Swaps: Dark red becomes white, white becomes bright red, although
some places are made inobvious by paint. Clear plastic is very slightly
smoky gray. Most of the black plastic stays black, except for the following
which become medium gray: toes, shins, underside of the front end (hidden
almost entirely inside the torso in robot mode, other than some hinges). The
back of the head is now red plastic as well, and the front is black as far as
I can tell.

Paint Apps: In robot mode, the front half of the head is painted red,
then the face silver and the eyes metallic blue. The same metallic blue is
used to paint the headlight-slits on the chest. A reasonable approximation
of his G1 chest decal is printed down the center of the chest in mostly red
with negative space Autobot symbol and black-outlined fire badge and F D
flanking the badge. The warhead part of the shoulder launcher is painted red
except for its peg, just as Sideswipe's was red plastic painted white. The
abdomen is painted the same red as the head, and little borders at the
bottoms of the shins are painted white. The wheel hubs are painted gunmetal
gray. The center part of the lightbar is painted white on the top, front,
and back, but not the underside. The tops of the lightbar wings are painted
clear red.
In vehicle mode, the backing of the windows is painted gray (or maybe
just a thicker layer of the smoky clear paint) rather than silver. The roof
is painted gloss white, while matte black is used for the rear window
louvres, the rear side windows, and the intentations on the doors (which are
unpainted on Sideswipe). Like Siege Red Alert, it suffers from a black chunk
along the top side edges just behind the front fenders.

Mold Changes: He has the same head as Siege Red Alert, although the lips
are somewhat indistinct...not sure if that's a mold problem, or if they just
put too much paint on the face (since they probably painted the entire piece
red before painting silver over the face).

Other Notes: Same lightbar piece that Siege Red Alert had, and same
rifle.
There's a lot more red on the robot mode of this one than on the Siege
version, which had no red plastic at all, and only had red on the head, the
torso front and boot outer faces.

Overall: A good update to finish out the Lambo set in Earth-style
altmodes (Sunstreaker being in Earthrise). Good luck finding it, though.

Dave Van Domelen, just slowly replacing Siege molds in his main display
with their ER/K updates....