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Okay, so with movie time upon us, we have so many people voicing so many opinions. As a fandom, that's our right and we should all be encouraged to be vocal.

That brings me to the current The Last Knight repaints for Grimlock and Slash. I immediately point these out because they are the ones available in wave one and currently hitting shelves.

Honestly? I enjoy the movies, as grossly imperfect as they at e because they still fill me with a sense of wonder I had in childhood hoping to see these huge bots in "real life", so to speak. As such, I was at the very least interested to see the new figures, dare I say excited. Then we get the reveals. Now, I have posted an overview of the line where I share many of my shoughts, as well as my looks at both Barricade and Berserker. But...

That brings us to the Dinobot repaints.

So, Slash. I already looked at him before. This new version is the EXACT SAME THING again, and, trust me, he was nothing to get excited about to begin with. The overuse of soft plastic (and possible breakage due to that), the articulation limits and the conversion is the exact same thoughts I had before. The ONLY change is that he is now in a box and coloured differently. Ironically, I custom painted my Slash into a G1 aesthetic and were I to get the new one I would do the same. the irony is that where I put silver, they have pretty much put blue and where I put gold, they have largely put silver (of course, the new paint is more metallic-ish, but the parts molded in blue and grey plastic don't quite match. He was, and is, a hodge podge. About the only grade I would change for him is the paint. He was a 3 or 4 and might be a 5 or 6 now. So, that being the case, Is he worth the price of admission? Especially with the hike most places have? More on that later. In the meantime, for a greater coverage of my thoughts, he was a my look at the AOE one ages ago compared to my custom version.


And now, Grimlock. This mold HAS to be suffering from degredation as it has been used oh so many times now. We have the AoE version, then the one in the SDCC set, then the G1 inspired 5 pack, then movie the best and now the Last Knight. If you dislike the mold and styling, none of these paint changes are going to change your opinion. IF you like it, then which one is the best to have? Again, that depends. I have the FOC Grimmy as my Dinobot team leader, so I am way out to lunch. I find the AoE one does pop and looks nice. I enjoy looking at the G1 inspired versions but worry about the chrome wear. I don't know if the movie the best's green is screen accurate, but I'm not a green fan. I DO like the Last Knight one, and would likely score his paint as an 8. Every other thought, would again, be exactly the same as before. So, we go back to the question, is he worth the price of admission? Again, also, he was my original tohughts on him too.


My final verdict goes like this. Neither figure is particularly good or bad. Of course, Slash is weaker and Grimmy is, well, a good toy, just very, very stylized. They both do suffer from gorilla arms though. IF there is a price hike in your area as many report, then no, as a fan and a reviewer I cannot in good conscience recommend these to anyone anywhere. BUT, you might say hey, these have shown up at some US retailers for, I think, 15.88, are they worth that? Well, Grimmy at a regular voyager price, whatever that was for the last movie, yes, certainly, but Slash still isn't. he just isn't good. In sum, here is the question I would ask myself always - If I didn't want him before, do I really want him now? 

This brings me to my question to you guys, what do you think? Are these two terrific? Am I being overly critical?

Overly critical? Yes/no.

Yes - because lazy repaints are nothing new. If you don't like them, don't buy them. And why do they do them? Zero effort for more money.

No - because for wave 1 of a brand new series being 70% repaints is pretty lame. But one could argue that this is just a "preview wave" or something of the like, and the new stuff will be coming in subsequent "proper" waves.

For me, these two Dino's look good. But Canada recently had a hidious price hike so I won't be buying any domestic TLK figures unless they're on sale. I'll buy Slash since the deco looks much better than AOE's, but if I buy that Grimlock mold again it'll be "Movie the Best".

Thanks for the input. I sure know the hike. I broke down and got Barricade and Berserker from TRU. I saw the others, saw the price and just morally couldn'the support it, yet I felt a little like I was betraying the franchise I enjoy. I was a weird feeling to pass up new plastic so easily. Slah does look much better, even if he is, arguably, the weakest of the Dinobots. I might not feel this way if the repaint was a different character, like the seekers or the bee/cliff scenario we always see.
Sadly, I don'the think this is a preview. I think this is designed to be a collector line akin to Star Wars Black Series.

Nah, don't think of it as betraying the franchise. Think of it more like you do love it, but because you love it it hurts even more to see them making this bad a decision. That's how I look at it!

Good way to look at it. I hate to say it, but I feel like they need a new brand manager

Ha! Feeling bad? Don't worry, some one'll buy them and it doesn't have to be you. Put your hard earned money towards TF's you think are actually worthwhile.

I'don't put it toward a Gnaw if I could ever find one lol.

I get a hunch that they're simply re-releasing them in new decos, not just to be overly cheap, but frankly, since they seem to be unchanged between movies, no new molds needed to be made. Scorn is an exception, only to bump him up to Grimlock's size (as the animals they represent are similar in size) and to give him his movie-accurate three sails while they're at it. The increased price is still a bit hard to swallow though.

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:I get a hunch that they're simply re-releasing them in new decos, not just to be overly cheap, but frankly, since they seem to be unchanged between movies, no new molds needed to be made. Scorn is an exception, only to bump him up to Grimlock's size (as the animals they represent are similar in size) and to give him his movie-accurate three sails while they're at it. The increased price is still a bit hard to swallow though.

I get your reasoning, but this seems less an actual reasoning why and more an excuse on their part. "They look the same so we don't HAVE to make new ones, we can just sell 'em the same **** as last time!"

Kurona wrote:

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:I get a hunch that they're simply re-releasing them in new decos, not just to be overly cheap, but frankly, since they seem to be unchanged between movies, no new molds needed to be made. Scorn is an exception, only to bump him up to Grimlock's size (as the animals they represent are similar in size) and to give him his movie-accurate three sails while they're at it. The increased price is still a bit hard to swallow though.

I get your reasoning, but this seems less an actual reasoning why and more an excuse on their part. "They look the same so we don't HAVE to make new ones, we can just sell 'em the same **** as last time!"

Do other toy companies use the same tactic? Reusing molds from a previous movie for the new one?

True, molds get reused. I am fine with that. Maybe the issue here is 2 fold for me. 1, if it was a different character I might accept it more. But, they had a chance to fix weaknesses here. For example, give Grimlock wrist swivel and, well, redo Slash. He is just not good.

I kinda like that the are closer to matching in colour - yet they need to do a "Boring Grey" Scorn too. since the new one is red.

I don't mind them - but neither do I have any intention of paying retail price either.

The new Slash is not red anywhere. He is blue and silver.

Typo I fixed it.

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

Kurona wrote:

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:I get a hunch that they're simply re-releasing them in new decos, not just to be overly cheap, but frankly, since they seem to be unchanged between movies, no new molds needed to be made. Scorn is an exception, only to bump him up to Grimlock's size (as the animals they represent are similar in size) and to give him his movie-accurate three sails while they're at it. The increased price is still a bit hard to swallow though.

I get your reasoning, but this seems less an actual reasoning why and more an excuse on their part. "They look the same so we don't HAVE to make new ones, we can just sell 'em the same **** as last time!"

Do other toy companies use the same tactic? Reusing molds from a previous movie for the new one?

Well, Transformers has done it few times:

-Deluxe Barricade from 07 to ROTF(granted, he was given a new set of "arms")

-07 Voyager Ratchet to ROTF Ratchet(no change)

-07 Voyager Ironhide to ROTF Ironhide(new guns though)

-Deluxe 08 Bumblebee got some part reuse to ROTF Bumblebee, though the wiki says it's mostly the lower half.

As to the other toy companies, hmmm....

-Batman Returns Penguin was a repaint of Kenner's "DC Super Powers" Penguin.

-The fighter jet from the "Independence Day" toy line was reused for "Godzilla" (1998)

-Looking up a pic for below revealed that "The New Adventure's of He-Man" He-Man figure was reused for John Spartan in the "Demolition Man" toy line!

-Most famously, Kenner's "Robin Hood" toyline reused "Return of The Jedi" Ewok Village as The Sherwood Forest Playset! They didn't even upscale it, making it work even better for Star Wars:




-Kenner also remolded the Gammorean Guard from "Star Wars" into Friar Tuck for "Robin Hood". Granted a quick image search reveals they gave him a cloak to hide it, but underneath...





I'm sure there's a few others out there. If you want to include Toybiz's various "Spider-Man", "X-Men", "Marvel" etc. figures I could be here all day on the reuses. Simple example off the top of my head was Rogue was repainted into "X-Factor's" Polaris.

So it's sale time at Canadian TRU's, and I bought Barricade and Slash. Not only did I not remember how bad the Slash mold is... but I realized something: better deco aside, this new one doesn't fit in anywhere. Which is odd because there's multiple sets of Dinobots. So lets look at this new guy, and the existed sets we have:



AOE Retail Dinobots:
Like they came right out of a cereal box, and there's already a Slash. Moving on.


SDCC Dinobots:
Pretty obviously not a contender.


Platinum Dinobots Unleashed:
Now we're getting somewhere. But the lack of chrome and clearness knocks him out.


Takara Black Knight Dinobots:
Probably as close as it gets, but still. These guys have too much black and dark grey.


So you know what conclusion I came to? He'll probably fit in great with... whatever TLK Dinobots that are released. So now I've inadvertently committed myself to collecting ANOTHER set of Movie Dinobots. Cause I have all those sets listed above. Good lord

Just put him with the other Slash. Raptors are pack animals (at least in fiction...), you can have multiples of him.

Of course, ideally you'd want at least a third one...

shajaki wrote:So it's sale time at Canadian TRU's, and I bought Barricade and Slash. Not only did I not remember how bad the Slash mold is... but I realized something: better deco aside, this new one doesn't fit in anywhere. Which is odd because there's multiple sets of Dinobots. So lets look at this new guy, and the existed sets we have:



AOE Retail Dinobots:
Like they came right out of a cereal box, and there's already a Slash. Moving on.


SDCC Dinobots:
Pretty obviously not a contender.


Platinum Dinobots Unleashed:
Now we're getting somewhere. But the lack of chrome and clearness knocks him out.


Takara Black Knight Dinobots:
Probably as close as it gets, but still. These guys have too much black and dark grey.


So you know what conclusion I came to? He'll probably fit in great with... whatever TLK Dinobots that are released. So now I've inadvertently committed myself to collecting ANOTHER set of Movie Dinobots. Cause I have all those sets listed above. Good lord

And people talk about Gnaw as an army builder lol? How many Slashes you need before you learn? That was an awesome overview though. Thanks for taking the time to add this.

Noideaforaname wrote:Just put him with the other Slash. Raptors are pack animals (at least in fiction...), you can have multiples of him.

Of course, ideally you'd want at least a third one...

THAT is actually a very valid point. Okay, so mind is officially blown. I would maybe be on board for that if the mold was any good, but it'seems not....it really just is not.

GotBot wrote:And people talk about Gnaw as an army builder lol? How many Slashes you need before you learn? That was an awesome overview though. Thanks for taking the time to add this.

Well, I only got the 2 Slashes

shajaki wrote:AOE Retail Dinobots:
Like they came right out of a cereal box, a Super Sentai Team, and there's already a Slash. Moving on.

There we go. I do understand why the multi-colored Dinobots aren't very popular, but I really like it. Movie accuracy is just a boring wash of grey and black to me.

Duke of Luns wrote:

shajaki wrote:AOE Retail Dinobots:
Like they came right out of a cereal box, a Super Sentai Team, and there's already a Slash. Moving on.

There we go. I do understand why the multi-colored Dinobots aren't very popular, but I really like it. Movie accuracy is just a boring wash of grey and black to me.

Unfortunately AOE Slash also goes in the complete other direction of being so garish he makes G2 Bruticus and Menasor blush.

Colorful Dinobots are a beautiful thing!

LOL, now that m8ght be the best defense for skittles Dinobots I have ever seen.

GotBot wrote:True, molds get reused. I am fine with that. Maybe the issue here is 2 fold for me. 1, if it was a different character I might accept it more. But, they had a chance to fix weaknesses here. For example, give Grimlock wrist swivel

The wrist IS on a swivel though. It's just that the wrist is also joined to the dino foot kibble. To swivel it just means not tabbing the dino foot kibble securely into the arm but and (on mine at least) the joint is stiff enough to keep the foot kibble up in place and turn the wrist around.