Seibertron.com Energon Pub Forums

Welcome to the latest Seibertron.com Twincast / Podcast episode, featuring host ScottyP, along with xRotorstormx and Razorclaw0000 as we journey through the latest toy and comic news in the first episode of 2018.

Episode #192 "Transformers vs. Impropriety" is available directly and in our RSS Feed, and should appear on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher Radio within 24 to 48 hours of when you see this news post.

First up, we continue the in-hand impressions of Wave 1 Power of the Primes toys, this time focusing on the Leaders. We discuss the common QC issues as well as the play pattern, inner robots, evolution modes, and discuss the relative successes and compromises of both Optimus Prime and Rodimus Prime.



The discussion of the Power of the Primes toys leads us into a roundtable on the collecting epoch that is the Prime Wars Trilogy: as a new collector, are you OK to focus on Prime Wars (Combiner Wars, Titans Return, Power of the Primes) and largely ignore the first "Neo-G1" set of lines made up of Classics, Henkei, Generations, Universe 2.0, Thrilling 30, United, and Power Core Combiners? We discuss putting together a set of shelves of G1 characters using nothing but Prime Trilogy toys, thoughts on head sculpts, and other rules to help regulate a collection. Have opinions? We'd love to hear about them in the comments!



While our thoughts are on Power of the Primes, we spend a few minutes discussing the recent news regarding the unconventional, but high profile, casting for Machinima's Power of the Primes cartoon. Ron Perlman, Samoa Joe, Mark Hamill, Jamie King, Wil Wheaton, and many others round out a large ensemble cast for the third show in the Prime Wars animated trilogy. We get down to the nitty gritty on potential reasons for the big-name talent, discuss the current fan apathy towards the shows, and discuss a coordinated fan response to the recent and future developments.



Next, we shift focus to the recently revealed Movie Masterpiece Ironhide, focusing on scale, accuracy, face sculpt, and more. We then digress to a discussion of GMC Topkicks as well as other movie Ironhide toys, looking back at some of the decos and more. We also give our thoughts on the Movie Masterpiece line and question Hasbro's decision of numbering.



Things take a decidedly heated turn as we enter into a spoiler-filled and angry teardown of Transformers vs Visionaries #1 and IDW Publishing's social media presence around it. Hear our thoughts on the issue, the ending of the issue and editorial decision, and finally the Tweetstorm around IDW's decision to both spoil the ending of #1 two days after the book launched, and the borderline sociopathicly chipper way they did it. You won't like ScottyP when he's angry.



Turning our attention to happier things, we give our thoughts on the recently released MP-39 Masterpiece Sunstreaker. We break down the accessories and packaging, discuss scale, Chip Chase, transformation and the "masterpiece moments", and finally pairing him next to MP-12 Sideswipe. We get in depth on some transformation steps so take this as fair warning if you want to experience the transformation first hand and enjoy the surprises unspoiled.



We conclude the episode with some listener questions, specifically Skullcrunchberries' question regarding "surprise"/forgotten purchases and pre-orders. After discussing some, we hit some bragging rights from the holidays and discuss a few collecting goals for 2018.



We hope you enjoyed the latest episode and would love to hear your thoughts on our roundtable or any other topic. We've got some exciting things on The Road to 200 and we hope you'll keep listening!

I watched Combiner Wars and Titans Return on go90 on both my computer and TV.

The go90 site has it - I think I logged into my Verizon account.

And on my phone, I can easily cast the shows from the go90 app via Chromecast.

Official viewing isn't restricted to a phone via an app.

Rysquad wrote: Official viewing isn't restricted to a phone via an app.

As was acknowledged in the show. Just don't care enough to even put forth that modicum of effort.

Rysquad wrote:I watched Combiner Wars and Titans Return on go90 on both my computer and TV.

The go90 site has it - I think I logged into my Verizon account.

And on my phone, I can easily cast the shows from the go90 app via Chromecast.

Official viewing isn't restricted to a phone via an app.

Guess I did not realize that go90 had a legit website...

Megatronus looks a bit like Galactus.

Halfway through, quick and dirty contribution.

Razorclaw0000 wrote:The discussion of the Power of the Primes toys leads us into a roundtable on the collecting epoch that is the Prime Wars Trilogy: as a new collector, are you OK to focus on Prime Wars (Combiner Wars, Titans Return, Power of the Primes) and largely ignore the first "Neo-G1" set of lines made up of Classics, Henkei, Generations, Universe 2.0, Thrilling 30, United, and Power Core Combiners? We discuss putting together a set of shelves of G1 characters using nothing but Prime Trilogy toys, thoughts on head sculpts, and other rules to help regulate a collection. Have opinions? We'd love to hear about them in the comments!

Neo-G1 Headmasters, impossible before Prime Wars!

Other than collecting current Ultra Magnus figures, I really got back into collecting because of Combiner Wars (and Rescue Bots, because of my young son).

Getting Guren Dragotron at a good price is tricky, I've been wanting one for a while. There aren't very many cheap ones on eBay because sellers tend to overvalue him, and you can get him for dirt cheap on Mandarake when he shows up there (under $25), but the shipping is prohibitive.

Emerje

Emerje wrote:Getting Guren Dragotron at a good price is tricky, I've been wanting one for a while. There aren't very many cheap ones on eBay because sellers tend to overvalue him, and you can get him for dirt cheap on Mandarake when he shows up there (under $25), but the shipping is prohibitive.

Emerje

Not too bad on BBTS: http://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/V ... tails/4774 Not dirt cheap or anything certainly, but still a pretty good price!

Emerje wrote:Getting Guren Dragotron at a good price is tricky, I've been wanting one for a while. There aren't very many cheap ones on eBay because sellers tend to overvalue him, and you can get him for dirt cheap on Mandarake when he shows up there (under $25), but the shipping is prohibitive.

Emerje

Yes, Guren Dragotron is cheap as chips in Japan and became so shortly after release, which was baffling. I can understand why the other "Oni-cons" didn't sell well, but Dragotron is big, beautiful and a steal at around ¥2,000 that I've seen it go for, even in used places outside of Tokyo.

What is Thrilling 30? I've seen it mentioned on BBTS also with some of their figures. Is it just what they're calling some of the Generations toys? And if so, what qualifies them as thrilling 30?

Rodimus Knight wrote:What is Thrilling 30? I've seen it mentioned on BBTS also with some of their figures. Is it just what they're calling some of the Generations toys? And if so, what qualifies them as thrilling 30?

Google and TFwiki are your friends, youngling:

- http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Thrilling_30

Rodimus Knight wrote:What is Thrilling 30? I've seen it mentioned on BBTS also with some of their figures. Is it just what they're calling some of the Generations toys? And if so, what qualifies them as thrilling 30?

It can mean the set of 30 "special", "x of 30" numbered releases that came out in 2013-2014. This is a hodgepodge of stuff encompassing various exclusive releases from Beast Hunters, Platinum, Generations, and even Age of Extinction. In the context of Generations toys, this is sometimes used to distinguish the toys from 2013 and 2014 from the earlier WFC/FoC era Generations toys. We meant the latter in this episode's context

ScottyP wrote:

Rodimus Knight wrote:What is Thrilling 30? I've seen it mentioned on BBTS also with some of their figures. Is it just what they're calling some of the Generations toys? And if so, what qualifies them as thrilling 30?

It can mean the set of 30 "special", "x of 30" numbered releases that came out in 2013-2014. This is a hodgepodge of stuff encompassing various exclusive releases from Beast Hunters, Platinum, Generations, and even Age of Extinction. In the context of Generations toys, this is sometimes used to distinguish the toys from 2013 and 2014 from the earlier WFC/FoC era Generations toys. We meant the latter in this episode's context

Okay, thanks.
I was looking at a couple of the listings on BBTS that mentioned it and couldn't figure out why they were being listed that way, and then I saw the note on this article.
So did they ever do all 30 numbered boxes, or their lack of doing so the reason why the other ones are included?

Rodimus Knight wrote:

ScottyP wrote:

Rodimus Knight wrote:What is Thrilling 30? I've seen it mentioned on BBTS also with some of their figures. Is it just what they're calling some of the Generations toys? And if so, what qualifies them as thrilling 30?

It can mean the set of 30 "special", "x of 30" numbered releases that came out in 2013-2014. This is a hodgepodge of stuff encompassing various exclusive releases from Beast Hunters, Platinum, Generations, and even Age of Extinction. In the context of Generations toys, this is sometimes used to distinguish the toys from 2013 and 2014 from the earlier WFC/FoC era Generations toys. We meant the latter in this episode's context

Okay, thanks.
I was looking at a couple of the listings on BBTS that mentioned it and couldn't figure out why they were being listed that way, and then I saw the note on this article.
So did they ever do all 30 numbered boxes, or their lack of doing so the reason why the other ones are included?

The wiki link given above has a list of all of the figures, showing that number 14 is TWO figures, whereas some didn't even received numbers on their boxes.

^ I am 99% certain their info about 14 is incorrect with respect to the AoE multi pack not having it labeled on the package. I threw that box away though, will go dig through the gallery here to see if that caught it.

But yes, there are 31 toys because of two number 28s. That whole thing could have been special but just ended up being a highly pointless mess

Edit: I can't find a picture of the box from every angle. Still pretty sure that one had a sticker, but really, all we need to know it was truly thrilling is this gem of stock photography:

ScottyP wrote:^ I am 99% certain their info about 14 is incorrect with respect to the AoE multi pack not having it labeled on the package. I threw that box away though, will go dig through the gallery here to see if that caught it.

But yes, there are 31 toys because of two number 28s. That whole thing could have been special but just ended up being a highly pointless mess

Edit: I can't find a picture of the box from every angle. Still pretty sure that one had a sticker, but really, all we need to know it was truly thrilling is this gem of stock photography:

Well, this IS Hasblo, we're talking about here, not Hasbro. They NEVER get things like this right.

Not feeling POTP's Voyager and Leader class figures.

Even popular TF reviewers on YouTube are having a hard time saying nice things about Rodimus and Starscream. Grimlock isn't terrible but it's not good enough to make me replace my FOC version with Iron Factory add on's.

And I was looking forward to finally getting a CHUG based Rodimus and Voyager class Starscream. But after seeing more and more reviews and feedback. I'm skipping both.

YoungPrime wrote:Not feeling POTP's Voyager and Leader class figures.

Even popular TF reviewers on YouTube are having a hard time saying nice things about Rodimus and Starscream. Grimlock isn't terrible but it's not good enough to make me replace my FOC version with Iron Factory add on's.

And I was looking forward to finally getting a CHUG based Rodimus and Voyager class Starscream. But after seeing more and more reviews and feedback. I'm skipping both.

Frankly, I'm surprised that so many reviews like POTP Optimus, with it's fugly cab rear, robot kibble on the trailer, having Orion Pax turn into an Earth lorry, etc. Personally, I think it would have been better to have a separate, decent Orion Pax, while using the POTP mold to make a decent, PM OP that can actually stand up on feet, can rather than wobbly, unstable hooves.

"I think they're giving a lot for $45"

??????!

Are we talking about the same Leader class figures.... The TR Leader's are one thing but these especially that Rodimus???

primalxconvoy wrote:while using the POTP mold to make a decent, PM OP that can actually stand up on feet, can rather than wobbly, unstable hooves.

Yeah he's wobbly, if you don't transform it properly. The piece that connects the feet to the leg clicks in as you move it towards the back of the leg. If you don't do this, he has trouble standing.

YoungPrime wrote:"I think they're giving a lot for $45"

??????!

Are we talking about the same Leader class figures.... The TR Leader's are one thing but these especially that Rodimus???

Yeah, especially when compared to Movie Leader toys like recent Movie Optimus Leader molds. He's big, has four modes, a two-gun combining rifle, and a fun transformation. The toy has its flaws but it's a great usage of the pricepoint and concept despite the execution not being pitch perfect. I could spend $5 less and get two SW Black series figs or Marvel Legends and not get anywhere near the play value available with Rodimus.

ScottyP wrote:

primalxconvoy wrote:while using the POTP mold to make a decent, PM OP that can actually stand up on feet, can rather than wobbly, unstable hooves.

Yeah he's wobbly, if you don't transform it properly. The piece that connects the feet to the leg clicks in as you move it towards the back of the leg. If you don't do this, he has trouble standing.

YoungPrime wrote:"I think they're giving a lot for $45"

??????!

Are we talking about the same Leader class figures.... The TR Leader's are one thing but these especially that Rodimus???

Yeah, especially when compared to Movie Leader toys like recent Movie Optimus Leader molds. He's big, has four modes, a two-gun combining rifle, and a fun transformation. The toy has its flaws but it's a great usage of the pricepoint and concept despite the execution not being pitch perfect. I could spend $5 less and get two SW Black series figs or Marvel Legends and not get anywhere near the play value available with Rodimus.

I've done that, but the figure is still unstable.

as a new collector, are you OK to focus on Prime Wars

I registered a new account just for this -- heard the question on the podcast originally, of course.

I'm a old new collector. G1 Transformers are my childhood. My first figure was pre-rubsign Mirage, ca. 1984. My last childhood figure is one of the Technobots, though I'm not sure which (Afterburner?). My collection lay mostly dormant for 30 years, with the exception of getting the Commemorative Re-issue Optimus Prime in 2002-03 and Alternators Smokescreen shortly thereafter.

A coworker re-introduced me to the toys in late 2015 with CW Devastator. I was beyond impressed with the figure. I couldn't believe that such articulation was possible while maintaining fidelity with the old toys. It's as if someone had taken my memories of the old toy and run them through a wish-granting machine. They were a dream come true! So in late 2016, I pre-ordered UW Computron to fulfill a life-long dream of having a complete set of Technobots. I've since picked up Devastator, Defensor, Superion, Bruticus and various other figures from CW, TR and PoTP.

My collecting is driven almost entirely by nostalgia -- both for what I had as a kid and what I wish I had back then. So am I okay with focusing on Prime Wars? In short, no.

My focus is getting the best modern representation of childhood favorites. Many of the PW figures are lacking. For example, the limb Deluxes that were supposed to be a part of that Optimus combiner don't feel right to me. First, while the Deluxe scale is a notable and dramatic upgrade for the Scramble City combiners, it feels like a downgrade for the original G1 Car Robots. I'm probably just G-whining here, but I feel like those characters deserved better. That led me to digging through the past and discovering the Classics/Henkei/early Generations line of figures. These strike me as more faithful representations. They're probably not perfect (I don't own any yet, but will in a few days), but at least in pictures I've seen online, seem to be a damn sight more accurate than the CW Deluxes.

TL;DR -- I'm going to cherry-pick from Classics on forward for the best (IMHO) incarnation of my childhood favorites. Money allowing, maybe some day I'll have a full stable of Masterpiece as well.

Welcome back to TFs! I agree with what you wrote, too. Luckily, you are now in the position of hindsight to purchase toys of yesterday now. It's like some sort of time travelling TF collection!

primalxconvoy wrote:It's like some sort of time travelling TF collection!

It's weirder than that. I started just as my oldest son started getting Transformers toys. He ended up getting all of Wave 1 and 2 of Titans Return Deluxes, i.e. the modernized Headmasters.

This is surreal because my SON is picking up, essentially, where I left off 30 years ago. Computron was introduced right along with the first Headmasters. Meanwhile, my youngest son is constantly asking me, "is that a Headmaster?" with every new figure I bring home.