The Energon Pub

On sale, this is a great figure. At full price, the parts forming makes it a little harder to recommend.

Fans are getting their online orders fulfilled for the Transformers Crossovers Star Wars The Mandalorian figure. And we now have a review from Chuckdawg1999. While it has appeared at Walmart in the US, sightings have been very sporadic and happen to be now that people are getting their orders, so it's unclear if it is available across the US or we are just seeing returns. For those unsure if this toy is for you, especially with that price in mind, this review is for you.

chuckdawg1999 wrote:On sale, this is a great figure. At full price, the parts forming makes it a little harder to recommend.

I got the Mando from Walmart.com. It was on preorder for half price on the twelfth at around noon. So I ended up getting two. I would not have gotten one so soon otherwise. Having them in hand, there was a mighty Crossovers/Disney tax placed on this. It's a good figure but not $55 good. It's about a small voyager sized figure with blast effects. So maybe $45 would've been a better price even factoring in the Crossovers tax.

I ended up modifying the 5mm peg on the weapon so that it could slot into the rectangular port on the back. So now that weapon has storage. I also leave the astromech pod on it as well. Makes it look goofier as a weapon but it was goofy looking to begin with. Wish it turned into a lance or something.

I also wish the arms pulled down and out at the bicep to make them longer for robot mode. That would also allow for the shoulder spikes to go down into the upper arms to fill the space where the rest of the arm just came out of to shorten them as a result too. As is, they're way too tall with the style of shoulder articulation the figure has and they bump into everything.

Coincidentally I had Legacy Vector Prime out when I got this and thought it looked good next to him. Very similar colors overall but different shades. So I ended up opening my second Mando and slapping the stock wings from the two Vector Primes that I have on them inverted using the 5mm Minicon pegs. So now the two Mando are knights for Vector Prime. I gave them the stock swords too. One of my Vector Primes are now wingless as I'm still waiting on the DNA kit but oh well. The wings on the sides of the vehicle look a bit like a TIE Interceptor's. Might paint them a bit so that they're not just translucent blue.

I don't use the shield or cape now as a result though. Although, the cape would make sense to still use next to Vector Prime. The Vector Prime wings stay on the arm ports and the large weapon stays on the back. The sword and small weapon stay in his hands. Or the small weapon goes in the hip holster to use the larger one. The sword then stores on the port under the vehicle that the stand would've pegged into.

I also got the Naruto crossover from Entertainment Earth as it was in stock so I got the 10% off. Not bad but not great.

Gamakichi is cool for a new mold. Obvious Spittor mold is obvious...well, I guess it'll be Diver before Spittor. The way the front frog legs flip around is weird though. They're on this circle that you need to manipulate around by opening the head first and then using the legs to kinda latch onto tiny tabs to get the leverage needed to spin them around ever so slightly so they're out of the way for the lower frog legs/robot arms in robot mode.

Kurama is good too but those tails are just chunks hanging off the back with minimal poseability despite having two joints each, one ball peg for each and then another swivel the ball pegs are attached to. Oddly, the new feet don't fit into the leg cavities the same way as on the original mold. On the Cheetor mold versions the robot feet go into the thighs and then you can push them until the heels kinda lock in under the gap in the thighs. The new feet don't do that. At least on mine. Almost like they're a millimeter too thick to lock in that last bit properly. The new front fox legs can be used as extra arms in robot mode like Naruto does when he uses the nine tails cloak. They each have 5mm ports for the Rasengan and Rasenshuriken. Otherwise they can also be used in the right hand due to the new articulation. The left hand is new too but is mostly for holding the kunai and making Shadow Clone poses. You can put the Rasengan in that hand but it would end up looking pretty weird. I ended up shaving off some plastic on the hinges holding he new tail flap so that it can fold up onto itself in robot mode. Also shaved off some plastic on the central tail chunk's hinge. It's ovular on one side normally but I made it circular to not have it be so limited.

Surprisingly I managed to catch Super Ginrai in stock at EE too so got that for 10% off which was nice. Not an amazing amount off but anything off is great as I don't see that one ever going on sale otherwise and it's $20 more expensive at the normal places I would've gotten if from like Show Z. Also got a "not mint" discounted Cosmos to go along with him.

Long story short:

Mando is good but not $55 good. It's been going on sale since before it released though so just hold out a bit for another sale as bad as that is to say for what's going on at Hasbro lately.

Naruto set is good too. I'm not as upset by this set's price.

Maybe because it's two figures and not one. Could be that I like Naruto more than Star Wars. Or like beast modes better. I don't know. Would've paid more if the set had Gamatatsu as well...obviously. I mean, he was there too at the only time they could've scanned both "Kurama" and Gamakichi at the same time. That being the Naruto vs Gaara fight which is when those Cybertronians landed on that planet. It just would've been cool to have both of them like we'll hopefully get both Spittor and Diver from this mold later. More hopefully is that we'll also get Euro "Transmetal" Spittor too. Blue, green, red, orange and yellow frogs. Just need a purple one at that point.

Mando is a pretty decent crossover, but I agree about the arms being too short and shoulder spikes too long. Plus, they really dropped the ball not including any Grogu accessory. It's probable that they'll release another version down the line with more/different accessories, given how many Ectotron releases we've had so far.

kirbenvost wrote:Mando is a pretty decent crossover, but I agree about the arms being too short and shoulder spikes too long. Plus, they really dropped the ball not including any Grogu accessory. It's probable that they'll release another version down the line with more/different accessories, given how many Ectotron releases we've had so far.

The fact that that cockpit and ONLY that cockpit opens and has an accessible 5mm port in the floor makes me think a Grogu was planned and cut

Flashwave wrote:

kirbenvost wrote:Mando is a pretty decent crossover, but I agree about the arms being too short and shoulder spikes too long. Plus, they really dropped the ball not including any Grogu accessory. It's probable that they'll release another version down the line with more/different accessories, given how many Ectotron releases we've had so far.

The fact that that cockpit and ONLY that cockpit opens and has an accessible 5mm port in the floor makes me think a Grogu was planned and cut

Agreed, it was very clearly designed for that. I personally could have done without a blast and effect or two in favor of Grogu.

Flashwave wrote:

kirbenvost wrote:Mando is a pretty decent crossover, but I agree about the arms being too short and shoulder spikes too long. Plus, they really dropped the ball not including any Grogu accessory. It's probable that they'll release another version down the line with more/different accessories, given how many Ectotron releases we've had so far.

The fact that that cockpit and ONLY that cockpit opens and has an accessible 5mm port in the floor makes me think a Grogu was planned and cut

Yeah, thats what I think too