The Energon Pub

Thu Nov 24, 2011 11:04 am

So I bought myself the RTS Bumblebee figure the other day, and I was kinda pissed off that he doesn't have a gun. I understand that the G1 toy didn't have a gun either, but really? WFC bee has weapons, Movie-verse bee has weapons... they couldn't have thrown a gun in this figure somewhere???

To temporarily relieve this annoyance, I stole Gen Scourge's little double-barreled blaster (I gave him a Fracas, so he won't miss it) so Bee has something to shoot with in robot mode, but it's kinda lame that there is no place to put it in alt-mode.

Does this annoy anyone else, and if so, what have you done about it? Thanks!

Thu Nov 24, 2011 11:09 am

it annoyed me to no end. i made him a gun and i love it. it will do until i buy him a better one. but the little water ski thing that sits on his shoulder is suppose to be his sorry excuse for a weapon. i trashed it.

News Credits: 33 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 11:34 am

i use G1 Defensors gun for my BB looks a little big but i like it.

News Credits: 3 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 11:43 am

I use Powermaster Prime's large gun. Little Bee big sting!

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 11:56 am

Bumblebee doesn't have a gun because of Volkswagon.

The story goes that Gen. BB was going to be a liscenced Volkswagon New Beetle, but VW refused to allow it. They stated that they didn't want their cars associated with war. So Hasbro decided to release an unarmed Bumblebee as a jab at Volkswagon, basically a little FU to the good folks at Volks.

That's the story, but the truth might vary. The Jetski is a jetpack, not a weapon.

Thu Nov 24, 2011 12:21 pm

adamassc,

That sounds like a decent reasoning. Silly Volkswagon...

So to those of you who have armed 'Bee, what do you do with the gun while he's in car mode?

I've considered adding a small bar somewhere to have the little gun clip on, but I don't really want it super-visible. I thought maybe I could mount it on the underside of the wave crusher's trailer, but I think it's just a touch too long. So for now, I just stuff it barrels-first into the wave crusher and it holds it pretty securely.

News Credits: 767 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 2:16 pm

adamassc wrote:Bumblebee doesn't have a gun because of Volkswagon.

The story goes that Gen. BB was going to be a liscenced Volkswagon New Beetle, but VW refused to allow it. They stated that they didn't want their cars associated with war. So Hasbro decided to release an unarmed Bumblebee as a jab at Volkswagon, basically a little FU to the good folks at Volks.

That's the story, but the truth might vary. The Jetski is a jetpack, not a weapon.

You're mixing two stories into one.
Classics Bumblebee has no gun due to the toy designer, and main man behind the original Classics line, wanted to portray Bumblebee as a childish robot that would rather have a jetpack and drive down to the beach.

The story with Volkswagen was about a different toy: Alternators Bumblebee.
Hasbro wanted to make Alternators BB a licensed VW New Beetle, they designed it and sent the concepts to Volkswagen. Volkswagen liked it and said yes, as long as they removed the gun Hasbro had planed, due to Volkswagen's darker history. Hasbro refused to remove the gun, so VW refused to give the license.

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 2:46 pm

that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

News Credits: 7 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 2:49 pm

Give him Mechtech weapons.

News Credits: 767 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 2:55 pm

adamassc wrote:that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

No idea, but looking at it, the Honda mold does come with a "shield" that's lacking the rest of the rifle parts, at least the Us one the Japanese one is unchanged. I believe in the case of Honda, they just had to leave out a part and the figure was still armed, just not with a rifle, while VW wanted no trace of a weapon.

News Credits: 241 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 3:13 pm

Dead Metal wrote:
adamassc wrote:that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

No idea, but looking at it, the Honda mold does come with a "shield" that's lacking the rest of the rifle parts, at least the Us one the Japanese one is unchanged. I believe in the case of Honda, they just had to leave out a part and the figure was still armed, just not with a rifle, while VW wanted no trace of a weapon.

Honda Japan had no problems with a weapon. The US branch however, did.

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 6:19 pm

That's weird... MY Bumblebee came with a gun...

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 6:20 pm

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:
Dead Metal wrote:
adamassc wrote:that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

No idea, but looking at it, the Honda mold does come with a "shield" that's lacking the rest of the rifle parts, at least the Us one the Japanese one is unchanged. I believe in the case of Honda, they just had to leave out a part and the figure was still armed, just not with a rifle, while VW wanted no trace of a weapon.

Honda Japan had no problems with a weapon. The US branch however, did.

In fact, Overdrive has the biggest gun in the entire Binaltech line.

News Credits: 3 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 6:22 pm

He has a gun, but it comes with the FP G3 trailer...

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 6:24 pm

Kibble wrote:He has a gun, but it comes with the FP G3 trailer...

I could glue an actual rifle to Classics Bee and give him a gun. The question is why Hasbro didn't initially give him one.

Thu Nov 24, 2011 7:55 pm

Autobot Strider wrote: I understand that the G1 toy didn't have a gun either,

That's hardly an excuse. None of the minibots had guns, just the nature of that subline of the original series.

When Bumblebee got "upgraded" to a pretender, he did get a gun. Actually two, though one was for the shell. But the one for the inner robot could also be stuck on the roof in car mode. Suck it, VW. :lol:

News Credits: 3 · Thu Nov 24, 2011 7:58 pm

Dark Optimum Supreme wrote:
Autobot Strider wrote: I understand that the G1 toy didn't have a gun either,

That's hardly an excuse. None of the minibots had guns, just the nature of that subline of the original series.

Outback came with a gun:

News Credits: 10 · Fri Nov 25, 2011 12:58 am

Dead Metal wrote:
adamassc wrote:that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

No idea, but looking at it, the Honda mold does come with a "shield" that's lacking the rest of the rifle parts, at least the Us one the Japanese one is unchanged. I believe in the case of Honda, they just had to leave out a part and the figure was still armed, just not with a rifle, while VW wanted no trace of a weapon.

I think that they removed the barrel of the rifle on the windcharger mold as they were afraid kids would poke their eyes out. It's very long, and COULD hurt someone. Makes no sense that Honda allows weapons in their vehicles in Japan (Binaltech) and not in the US.

Fri Nov 25, 2011 1:42 am

I used the pistols from an extra ROTF Brawn I had and gave one to CBB and the other to CCJ. I plan on painting the pistol's shielding yellow to match better, but all in all, it's a good fit.

Once I got an extra WFC CJ and did the head swap with CCJ, I just used the WFC pistol for CJ and gave the extra Brawn pistol to Classics Sideswipe.

Fri Nov 25, 2011 3:22 am

Hasbro/Takara has a limited TF toy budget. FWIW,The classics 1.0 deluxe bumblebee does have a weapon/accessory. it's the boat thing that transforms into a flight pack for the robot mode to wear via a back pack.

News Credits: 9 · Fri Nov 25, 2011 5:06 am

Doubledealer93 wrote:it annoyed me to no end. i made him a gun and i love it. it will do until i buy him a better one. but the little water ski thing that sits on his shoulder is suppose to be his sorry excuse for a weapon. i trashed it.

How is a jet pack a weapon?

I gave him the gun from Classics 2pack Megatron.

Fri Nov 25, 2011 7:02 am

Tidalwavex wrote:Hasbro/Takara has a limited TF toy budget. FWIW,The classics 1.0 deluxe bumblebee does have a weapon/accessory. it's the boat thing that transforms into a flight pack for the robot mode to wear via a back pack.

See, I just thought that was included because, size-wise, Bee is pretty tiny for a deluxe. Most other deluxes are quite a bit bigger - take WFC Megs for example - and still manage to include a weapon.

Fri Nov 25, 2011 7:47 am

how about the fact that Hasbro is aware that not all parents want to buy their children toys with weapons, so why not make sure that in the classics line at least one didnt come with a weapon. Even Hotrod's weapon worked better as an exhaust than a weapon.

It means they can appeal to a wider range of people, and you never know that one child that gets bought a BB with no weapon, goes onto buying more TF's as they get older may be more value than loosing that entire market.

The RTS BB is just a recolour of the Classic BB hence no weapon.

Besides as shown here, its not hard for Tf fans to get weapons from elsewhere

Fri Nov 25, 2011 9:01 am

Mykltron wrote:
Doubledealer93 wrote:it annoyed me to no end. i made him a gun and i love it. it will do until i buy him a better one. but the little water ski thing that sits on his shoulder is suppose to be his sorry excuse for a weapon. i trashed it.

How is a jet pack a weapon?

I gave him the gun from Classics 2pack Megatron.

lol, i did not even know it was suppose to be a jetpack until i saw this forum

News Credits: 241 · Fri Nov 25, 2011 11:20 am

gavinfuzzy wrote:
Dead Metal wrote:
adamassc wrote:that does explain some of the loose ends about the story,like why classics bb would be a licenced vehicle.

The question now is, why did Hasbro make that concession for Honda?

No idea, but looking at it, the Honda mold does come with a "shield" that's lacking the rest of the rifle parts, at least the Us one the Japanese one is unchanged. I believe in the case of Honda, they just had to leave out a part and the figure was still armed, just not with a rifle, while VW wanted no trace of a weapon.

I think that they removed the barrel of the rifle on the windcharger mold as they were afraid kids would poke their eyes out. It's very long, and COULD hurt someone. Makes no sense that Honda allows weapons in their vehicles in Japan (Binaltech) and not in the US.

It's confirmed not to be a safety issue. Also, keep in mind that even though Honda has its main office in Japan, the US office has its own guidelines independent of Japan, to the point it could be considered a separate company. Hasbro had that as well back in the 1980's and 1990's, with Hasbro UK continuing the Transformers line while the US branch canceled it.