Twincast / Podcast Episode #242 "Arise"

HUNGRR IS A RETOOL OF SILVERBOLT!!!!!

Small show cast, but some good thoughts!

I've had decent luck asking Employees for help looking in the back for figures, but rarely any luck with figures actually being in the back.

I still haven't seen any Earthrise figures, so your thoughts are about all I have to go by. I am super looking forward to Cliffjumper!

i still haven't seen a Siege Astrotrain either. He has eluded me.

Scotty: Would you say the SS trailer was more worth it compared to the ER one?


Also, did you put your Micromaster irontread with Ironworks yet?

As long as Target honors those pre-orders, that was a great sale.

Cobs, I am not getting Grapple for pretty much all of the reasons you said. I have the RTS one and he is my perfect Grapple.

Scotty: I understood that Classics reference! I got your mind path! I love the classics retro shows.

Galaxies: Insecticons are creepy AF. they did so good with them. I loved the constructicon issues, shame they will be put in a hardback with the ongoing.

It wasn't Alex milne who drew the initial issue Deathsaurus was in, that was Sakamoto. Milne drew him later, but Sakamoto drew 39 and that group shot. Deathsaurus did deserve more in the original ongoing, I loved that take. And i love this take too, he is awesome!

7-9 of Galaxies is Arcee, Greenlight, and their mentor Gauge. 10-12 is Magnus. and that is it for now.

Lightbright: another animated character that continues to shine, and it's even funnier cause she was a background creation. and yet she keeps living on as a very popular character!

megatronus wrote:HUNGRR IS A RETOOL OF SILVERBOLT!!!!!

And MP-10 is Headmasters Prime! #ariisneverright #canaribemorewrong

D-Maximal_Primal wrote:

megatronus wrote:HUNGRR IS A RETOOL OF SILVERBOLT!!!!!

And MP-10 is Headmasters Prime! #ariisneverright #canaribemorewrong

Eh, it's more 50/50.

megatronus wrote:

D-Maximal_Primal wrote:

megatronus wrote:HUNGRR IS A RETOOL OF SILVERBOLT!!!!!

And MP-10 is Headmasters Prime! #ariisneverright #canaribemorewrong

Eh, it's more 50/50.

Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I'd argue closer to 10/90, but who's to say

I’ll take two pairs of tank pants, two jet shirts, and one of those laser launcher ties please.

Great episode guys thanks for some good ‘ol bot talk.

I just got a chance to listen to the podcast tonight. Really enjoyed it. Quick note on the color siege prime (from an artist point of view): it’s a desaturated red. Muted would look faded. But I love this color it gives it a worn look without having to add battle damage deco.

listening to this today as I go Best Buy hunting. I had to order an Optimus Prime online only to find out afterwards the Best Buy sends one random figure from The Wave, not the one they have pictured. Wish I'd known that before hand. Astrotrain is a great figure and I adore it, bit no enough to need one from each toyline... Fortunately, the Best Buy staff is very helpful, and I was able to find hoist and Cliffjumper. So now I'm going to go check out the other stores to see if I can find Iron Works, and maybe even the Optimus Prime I'm looking for. And listening to my favorite podcast.

I did a pop and swap to blowpipe and Aimless, and made myself and all grey frenzy to go with Siege barricade. The siege guys all have the pins in the same place, so you can mix and match arms and legs as needed and still be able to transform them. I would be shocked at those pins match up with the earthrise figures, but I would not be surprised if the other humanoid earthrise ramp dudes all have pins in the same places as their counterparts, the way the siege figures all did.

There's only one Earth rising in earthrise. if there were more than one, it would be earthsrise

How many Earths could an Earthrise rise if an earthrise could rise Earths?

So I agree with everything you said about Optimus Prime in earthrise. Except for the fact that I don't have the toy yet and I'm just looking at pictures. Earthrise Prime is to me the perfect MP light Optimus Prime. Now I'm sure you guys can tell me about a ton of things MP figures do that this does not, but other than coming with a roller, how many of those added features are strictly necessary to a good Optimus Prime toy? And especially considering this is a figure that I'm paying $50 for or less for those of you who got them on sale, p h h t, vs Paying what, 150 for MP10, or four hundred bucks for mp44

What I think I like most about Siege Prime is the top of the truck gives him a jetpack in robot mode. I know of a lot of people were clamoring for an add-on part for a jetpack bit for me it did the job just fine on its own. I miss having that on the earthrise figure

As an accessory being worn by Optimus Prime, I think I like the silver trailer drone. But is a part of the trailer I definitely wish it was blue. There is just too much of that gray and silver in that trailer.

What radar dish?

Remember that Deluxe Movie Optimus Prime that came with a trailer, and had all the 5mm peg holes running through the sides AND the roof? Thats what I want. Holes inside and out

And maybe slightly lower

Now that we have a "Definative" G1 Optimus Prime in the everyday buyer pricepoint. CAN WE NOVE ON FROM G1 PRIME NOW?? PLEASE???!!!

Hoist: I like the peesence. This is a big dude. I am surprised he is the same as Ironhide and Ratchet. I could swear he is 10% more... More than they are.

I knew I should have sanded the pegs first... *snap*. One came off first transformation. The other came out. I think part of the problem too is that the Head pegs isn't just able to come straight up, it has to tilt forward ever so slightly and its enought to bind and make a bad situation worse.

I don't like how the flat yellow plate that is his outer calf is just stuck to the side of the crane mode. What are those leg cylinders even supposed to be? They look like a wheel with no tire to me. I do prefer this to the Universe toy overall, but I don't super like the vehicle mode on this.

I really want an Inferno from this.

I am still holding out on Starscream to find out what read that goes we end up getting. But I'm like you, and having looked at it in stores and seen pictures, I don't think I would have any remorse in the toy at all. And I have like eight or nine of the versions of the classic toy. It's just me trying to save money where I can until I can't. I is really excited to see earthrise Earth mode Starscream against some left behind cybertronian Seekers from Siege

*Hunt Update* two more Best Buys... A total of 3 Astrotrains. I am wondering if these are left brhind from the case or like me, returns from people who expected to recieve an Optimus Prime. A lot of Wheeljacks left behind. Is he overpacked in the case? Or do people not want Wheeljack? I think he is great. My favorite CHUG Wheeljack and second to Prime Wheeljack... Barely. Also hitting 2 Targets now, only the Micromasters and Smashdown to report. I have seen Soundbarrier before. The giant city map gimmick does not excite me, as much as I am excited for the base bots themselves on their own (maybe because Ironworks is new and different?) So the oodles of ramp dudes does not thrill me. Sltherfang and Doublecrosser are on my list, but moreso because they are unique. We dont see many two headed Transformers or Snakebots. Onwards!!

I think the last bot I am waiting for a new update is Jazz and the RTS figure is gonna be hard to top. Maybe Tracks, but I like his Generation figure. I am still waiting for my definative Bumblebee, but thats more personal taste. I think most are happy with the TR mold and the LG deco.

Welcome to my world, Cobin.

See, my collection is on a shelf which is rather close do my baseboard heat in my apartment. Should I be concerned? Cuz I kind of already am.

knowledge is good but too much knowledge can be dangerous, and while I am glad they have shared as much of the design process with us if they have, and very much hope they continue to do so and show more, I think at this point we have become so ingrained in the idea of the old ways when there were only so many toys Hasbro could design and everything had to fit within a specific number of molds, to me a specific number of boys, and it was pretty much guaranteed that you would have ate mold, 16 characters, most of them would be repaint, and maybe three or four of them would get new heads. And I'm a little over exaggerating things, but that's pretty much what we were expecting all the way up until we got Generations Sideswipe and sunstreaker. And even then, we still had Echoes of the old rules. We are conditioned to an idea that, and we dont know the specific threshhold, but one mold has to carry a specific weight of the overall budget. But the game has changed now. It changed during Titans return, Hasbro started doing not just re tools but pre tools, co tools; they are playing chess not just with figure designs but PART designs, thinking three and four moves ahead now. We need to forget the old ways. Yes, Hasbro still has a specific budget that they have to meet by year end, the figures all have to contribute and share that, and there are still only so many slots in the Waves and the Wave Calendar, but we need to retrain ourselves to not expect that one carbot is going to apply to three mostly unrelated characters. Which will be hard to impossible, Maybe.

I remember the quint Allicon on being bipedal. They did lean over and have more of a hunch to them than what the earthrise toy has, however I fully expect that part of the compromise in the earthrise toy is due to center of balance. We all remember how hard it was to stand up the sharkticons because they were front-heavy and standing on ball jointed elbows as their knees.

Hunt Update: total of 5 Best Buys. Although I did find something non-tf related, none of the other stores bore either of my quarries, Prime or Ironworks. Shoulda quit while I was ahead, but thats the fun I guess. Of course, if I quit now, the next store I would have checked would bear fruit... Ugh.

On with the Podcast!

"Show. Don't Tell". I do think it helps to explain the world because I suspect that how Skystalker was able to convince Vigilem into this will require us to know about his "upbringing". But yeah, we need to see it, not be told about it. Vigilem would have been a good Galaxies candidate if they had been able to put it out before this.

Question: is Ruckley maybe a better Novel writer and its not translating to comic format?

Okay, now you tell me that. we get to bragging rights for you to tell me that my entire day's Quest might have been for naught. Hehehe. That does explain why I'm seeing the trends I was seeing on the shelves. At least partially anyway. I will say that the first Best Buy I hit today for my return, I had checked that store earlier in the week and found Wheeljack there alone. So coming back on a Sunday and finding three of the four deluxes (2 WJ, 2Hoist minusbthe one I bought, one CJ) so quickly is interesting. I love when I go into stores and every once in awhile you find a Hot Wheels car hanging on the peg from the 90s that either somebody returned, or fell out of a case in a warehouse and was lost for 20 years, with the old corvette style logo on the packaging.

For my Bragging Rights, I will open Hoist and Cliffjumper from the day's hauls.

Hoist: So I totally see what Scotty was saying about Hoist being the least thrilling of the line because he doesn't do anything really new. I wish he had a tow hook like his T30 toy or his Movie redeco and not that ramp thing that is supposed to be a wheel snatch. This is a bog dude though and I like it. Not sure the knee pads needed to be double jointed, but its cool. Do wish the arms did something other than hang down, but that seems to be a style now. What are the wings in truck mode supposed to be?

Cliffjumper: so, I gotta confess, the size does bug me a bit, in that when I heard he was small, I was thinking more like Classics Bee, they have a similar foot and leg and was hoping they would pair up. No such luck and I think for my primary display lineup I am still going with GDO CJ and T30 Bumblebee for now. I don't have the TR Bee and as much as I love the LG54 Bee deco over the Hasbro one I am still not sure I $46 love it. But that aside, this figure is amazing for everythibg it does. I love his individual guns, I love his bazooka, although I do not like it with the black part attached, and the ski mode is zany and fun. I love putting them on and hearing that old Hanna Barbara foizzing sound. And its still a pretty good size small compact sports car. I cant wait for Selects Hubcap

Small soapbox moment: slightly unrelated, but something we can learn from:

On January 24th, my local Model Railroad Club was broken into. The good news? Nothing was stolen or broken. The bad news? The Vandals decided to find out what would happen if you fire off 2 10lb dry Powder Fire Extinguishers.

Yeah...

If you have never seen what a dry powder fire extinguisher aftermath looks like, try imagining splattering a bag of flour against a wall.

How does this apply to Transformers?

1)Please, for the love of all things that are holy, if you have a dry powder extinguisher in your collection room, trade it out for a CO2 extinguisher if you can get away with it. This *censored* goes everywhere and gets into everything.

2)If you think your Insurance covers your collection automatically, You Are Wrong. They will fall under Contents, but so does everyrhing else, including cleaning them. In our case, it would have been 60,000 just to have a contractor clean the parts of our layout that were removable and even our coverage did not go far enough for that, so once they are done with the building, members and volunteers with dust masks and makeup brushes will be going to town on the the towns. The building was another 20K, and covered by a seperate part of the ins. Policy. and that does not include replacing anything that was damaged by the powder or would be destroyed in the cleanup. Again, Trains =\= Transformers, but our TF Collections are still huge, expensive, and some of them irreplacable now, and if catastrophe struck in your own home, odds are your "Contents" coverage would be gobbled up extremely quickly by other household stuff and cleanup, before you ever got around to buying another Powermaster Optimus Prime. So please, consider options, and do not just gamble blindly. And I hope none of you who read this ever have to find out.