The Energon Pub

Boring title, should probably keep it that way for these things.

I don't believe I ever had a Swoop toy as a kid. I remember playing with the other Dinobots, but not him for some reason. Now I have an updated version of that character, and though I don't have the original in hand for a proper comparison, from pictures I've seen on the internets, I can say for certain that this recreation is exactly what I would have wanted the original toy to be like.

He comes with a sword, but in place of a pair of plastic missile-launching weapons, he has a big fist that he can either wear as a backpack, or a shield. Or, if you must, you can give his beak a sword strap-on and put that big block of plastic on top of the other big block of plastic on his back. But it looks terrible so I don't do that.








His transformation from Pteranodon mode to robot mode is so simple that I was done by the 3rd picture in the 3 picture transformation sequence thing that I do. Worst toy ever. Do not buy. It has irritated me. The designers should be ashamed of what they have birthed into this world.








For real though, I can appreciate the simple transformation. It does what it needs to without being overly simple, or overly complex. Just a dinosaur that turns into a robot. Exactly as it should be. Speaking of his robot mode, for some reason, Swoop reminds me of Link from The Legend of Zelda, with his slender frame, weird shield, tiny sword, and pointy hat. In his robot mode his fist can either be a shield or a backpack again. It can also become chest armor, but that looks stupid so I don't do it.







Swoop also has a butt-hole. Other than just being an aesthetic choice, this is actually there for people who have action figure flight stands, which I happen to have purchased months ago. So with the flight stand shoved firmly up his butt, Swoop can take on various flying poses while I'm still down here on the ground using my legs like a chump. Do they make people-sized flight stands?






So now that Hasbro has unleashed a new set of Dinobots, I'm going to have to buy them all. Thankfully I've already grabbed 3 of them, so there's only 2 more that I need to buy before I have a proper set. 1 more if I want the proper set +1 additional one that Hasbro recently invented for the hell of it. So 3 more, I need 3 more. Watch that balloon up to 10 more as Hasbro makes more slavishly G1 accurate updates to toys I loved. I'm never gonna afford the Pacific Rim 2 action figures at this rate.