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interests / alt.toys.transformers / Dave's Studio Series Rant: Core wave 3

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o Dave's Studio Series Rant: Core wave 3Dave Van Domelen

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Dave's Studio Series Rant: Core wave 3

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From: dvan...@eyrie.org (Dave Van Domelen)
Newsgroups: alt.toys.transformers
Subject: Dave's Studio Series Rant: Core wave 3
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2022 18:46:27 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: Coherent Comics UnInc
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Originator: dvandom@eyrie.org (Dave Van Domelen)
 by: Dave Van Domelen - Wed, 28 Sep 2022 18:46 UTC

Dave's Transformers Studio Series Rant: Core Wave 3

Autobot Wheelie (Cybertronian car)
Autobot Ratchet (ambulance)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Studio/Core3

As of writing this review in September 2022, I have not seen wave 2
(just Spike Witwicky in his exo-suit) anywhere in person, it sold out
instantly on Pulse, and non-scalper online sources put it as coming out in
*maybe* October. I suspect that the actual wave got screwed up by supply
chain stuff, with only a few cases of samples making it here. If that's the
case, it might get released as part of a later wave.

CAPSULES

$8-12 price point. (I got them for $8.49 at Target, but Walmart has
wave 1 at closer to $12.)

Autobot Wheelie: About as close to the animation model as a real toy can
get at this scale, and it's executed pretty well. Recommended.

Autobot Ratchet: This design probably should've been saved for a
Deluxe. It looks pretty good in both modes, but the vehicle mode gets big
gaps no matter what I do. Mildly recommended.

RANTS

Packaging: The same style of hanging box as wave 1, but easily
distinguished by the more cartoony art style on pretty much all sides of the
box that have art. As with wave 1, there's no ID numbers, bio notes or
scenes, just the TFtM logo.

AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT WHEELIE
Assortment: F3140
Altmode: Cybertronian car
Transformation Difficulty: 12 steps
Previous Name Use: Uni, RotF, Gen:TR, Studio (other uses are just "Wheelie")
Previous Mold Use: None
Movie: TFtM

Packaging: Five plastic ties hold the robot to the backing card, the
slingshot is tucked into a couple of parallel slits in the card. The backing
is, I think, a bit of Quintessa, but it could also be inside Unicron or even
on Cybertron, some of those backgrounds are samey. Because of the hole cut
in it for his back, the card doesn't really make a reusable backdrop anyway.

Robot Mode: So, it's pretty close to the animation model. There's no
waist bit because of the clearance needed for transformation, the details on
top of the forearms are missing because they'd be wrong for vehicle mode, he
has a sort of "bustle" in back because there's no way to hide the trunk of
vehicle mode, and there's the usual angularization of the rounded 80s robot
designs. Still, it's as close as they've ever gotten to the animation model
while still being a transforming figure. Other than the colors missing from
the mold differences (e.g. the part of the waist that would be gray is simply
missing entirely rather than the wrong color), the only color lapses are on
the helmet (that horizontal slot is just all peach, no dark center) and the
feet (the gray is only on the front, not the sides or back).
3.25" (8cm) tall in burnt orange, light peach, gray, and silver. A
medium gray plastic is used for the head, the back (cockpit window), the
slingshot, the wheels, and the toes. Everything else is a burnt orange
plastic.
Much of the torso front is painted in light peach, as is most of the
helmet. The visor and chinstrap are left unpainted gray, while the face is
silver with bright blue eyes. The fists are also silver. The kneecaps and
boot cuffs are painted medium gray, a decent match to the plastic. The outer
faces (outsteps?) and soles of the feet are painted burnt orange, a
noticeably redder shade than the plastic. A red Autobot symbol is printed on
the chest. On the back, the small of the back is also painted light peach,
while the cockpit window part is painted medium blue (might be the same paint
that's on the eyes, just the eyes look different because it's over a silver
paint base?).
The neck is a restricted ball joint on a hinged strut that's intended to
let the head swing back into the torso for vehicle mode, but also lets him
look up at taller Bots (e.g. most of them). No waist, although the weird hip
arrangement allows a little illusion of waist swiveling. There is a hinge
inside the abdomen, but it's for transformation only, it's pretty much locked
in position in this mode. The shoulders are ball joints on shrugging struts,
the elbows are ball joints that snap in place very firmly when the arms are
straightened. The hips are ball joints on the ends of struts that can move
forwards and backwards a bit for transformation. Ball joint knees, and the
toes can point down for transformation or for kneeling positions.
The hands are 3mm sockets, and instead of a pelvis socket there's a 3mm
socket in the "bustle" formed over his butt by the trunk of vehicle mode.
This is also meant to be where the slingshot is stored in vehicle mode, but
it's not a very snug fit, and it's likely to fall out. (It works better in
vehicle mode because there's more stuff around it to prevent nudging of the
sort that can knock the slingshot loose.)
His slingshot weapon is just the Y-shaped piece 1.5cm tall with a 3mm
rod at the gripping end, no actual sling part nor really a good way to
connect a packaging rubber band to it. It has some tech greebles and looks
almost like a PKE meter so he can go ghost hunting with Ectotron. He can be
posed so that it looks like he's pulling back on an invisible elastic strand,
though.

Transformation: Open the back and lift up the chest so that the head
goes into the backpack. Then point the toes and rotate the shins to face
each other so that the tab on top of one toe can go into the slot on the
other toe. This is where the weird hips come into play, letting the thighs
touch. That abdomen hinge now lets the whole thing swing forwards and have
the robot torso front snap onto the outer faces of the boots. Straighten the
arms, making sure that the tabs snap into place at the elbows, and swing back
to peg onto the trunk. There is nothing you can do to hide the fists, they
just stick out the back.

Vehicle Mode: Well, it's Wheelie all right. Albeit with fists sticking
out in back. Amusingly, you can open the canopy (part of the painted window
stays behind, mind you) and Wheelie's head can be tilted up a bit to make it
look like a chibi version of Wheelie is driving his own body.
2.75" (7cm) long, about as long as a typical Hot Wheels car if maybe a
little wider, about the same colors but the silver is either hidden or should
have been hidden, and the blue canopy adds some contrast (literally, blue and
orange being complementary colors). The painted toes do stand out a bit as
the front end of the vehicle. It rolls okay on the little gray plastic
wheels, but friction slows it down pretty quickly after you push it.

http://www.dvandom.com/images/StudioWheelie.JPG for "kneeling while
slingshotting" and "creepy head poking out in vehicle mode" pics.

Overall: Okay, it's Wheelie, not a big dealie. But they made it look
right, and the vehicle mode is tight. Recommended, this review ended.

AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT RATCHET
Assortment: F3143
Altmode: Ambulance
Transformation Difficulty: 15 steps
Previous Name Use: Yes
Previous Mold Use: None
Movie: TFtM

Packaging: Five plastic ties hold the robot to the backdrop, and one tie
each on his pistols. The backdrop is the bridge of the Autobot spaceship
that gets attacked early on, and it only has some small holes.

Robot Mode: For trademark reasons, they can't be totally movie-accurate
here, since the Red Cross has been cracking down on people using the red
cross emblem without permission. So he has the three-bar snowflake sort of
workaround in red on the fronts of his shoulders, with Autobot symbols in
front of them and a lot of white outlining so it looks a bit too busy at any
real distance. Otherwise, he's as close as they can get to his brief
appearance in TFtM, down to the twin pistols he futilely fires at the
Decepticons (so, unless you go third party or scratchbuild, no laser scalpels
or other tools).
3.25" (8cm) tall, mostly white, with a few bits of red and gray and
light blue for the windows on the torso. It's entirely made of white
plastic. There's gloss red paint on the fists, the pelvis front and a bit of
the abdomen front, and for the shoulder emblems. The face is silver with
bright blue eyes and medium gray on the front of the helmet crest. The
pistols are painted silver except for their grips and the storage tabs on the
sides. The wheels (visible on the outer lower edges of the boots) are
painted gloss gray. The chest windshield and the side windows on the chest
are painted a sort of dull light blue that tries to capture how the character
looked on screen (and in a possibly so-so print, at that). On the back is a
molded lightbar with gloss red paint on the bars. (The almost inevitable
Ironhide retool will definitely have a new head, and might have a new roof/
backpack piece without the lightbar.) The molded windshield wipers are just
left blank white.
The neck is a swivel, and there's a swivel joint for transformation
between upper torso and abdomen, but you have to undo a bit of the backpack
if you want it to move more than a little wiggling. The shoulderpads are on
ball joints that can rotate or swing back (for transformation), while the
upper arms are snapped into ball joints inside of the shoulderpads. The
elbows are snap-on hinges, but pretty firmly attached. Ball joint hips and
knees, no thigh swivels (since the knees can cover that).
The hands can hold 3mm pegs, there's a shallow 3mm socket on the back,
and the elbow joints have 3mm sockets as part of the snap-on joint, so you
can put his pistols on his elbows for something approximating his fold-out
surgical tools.
The pistols are a little less than an inch long (23mm), and mirror
images of each other. They have 3mm peg grips, and 2.5mm by 1.3mm
rectangular tabs on one side that go into slots on the sides of vehicle mode
for storage. Those slots are inside the boots in robot mode, but you can
open up the boot, insert a gun, and close the boot around it if you'd rather
they be securely stowed out of the way. Amusingly, the counter-sink hole for
plastic saving is as thick as one of the side tabs, so the guns can be linked
together side by side into a gun that shoots the user and the target at the
same time, or stowed together on the back socket that way.
If you want to repurpose any Lego tools as his surgical kit, keep in
mind that they use 1/8" rods, and will need to be very carefully trimmed down
to fit.


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