New Toy Galleries: Pretenders Bugly, Iguanus, Finback, Groundbreaker, Sky High, and Splashdown!

Thanks for posting these Razorclaw0000. You and Blurrz both found my favorite shot I did of each of these. It feels great to finally have these 12 figures as part of the galleries after 7 years. Can't believe it took that long, but they're here now. Thank you to both of you for getting these news stories up so promptly. I really appreciate it.

Now to decide between finishing the galleries up for the Hasbro and Takara Tomy Masterpiece Grimlocks or the G1 Mega Pretenders. Hmm ...

Razorclaw0000 wrote:Mega Pretenders!

Also, do you have the beast Pretenders, like Snarler and Catilla?

I had Groundbreaker and Iguanus as a kid and really loved them.

Snarler, Catilla, Carnivac, and Chainclaw are some of the older galleries on the site.

Mega Pretenders.

I've been reluctant to buy anymore Pretenders. Nearly half the ones from my childhood have spotting (like in Bugly's gallery) and sticky, melty paint. They're kinda gross to touch and look at. The only ones that managed to avoid it are the small 1989 Pretenders (Bludgeon, Pincher, etc.). It's all Florida's fault.

It Is Him wrote:Mega Pretenders.

I've been reluctant to buy anymore Pretenders. Nearly half the ones from my childhood have spotting (like in Bugly's gallery) and sticky, melty paint. They're kinda gross to touch and look at. The only ones that managed to avoid it are the small 1989 Pretenders (Bludgeon, Pincher, etc.). It's all Florida's fault.

Hot soapy water did wonders for the "sticky" feeling that the Pretender shells had. I put some dish soap on the toy, rubbed the soap in with my hands, and then rinsed them off with hot water. Took care of the problem! It was just a sticky film that formed on the shells which washed off with the soap and water.

I have a feeling that the "spotting" is the same problem as the yellowing. I bet that's just the bromine gas from the fire retardant in the plastic that's coming to the surface, or collecting beneath the surface. I bet a hydrogen peroxide bath for a week or so with some UV light would take care of that problem as well. Going to have to experiment on my extra Waverider and Skullgrin in the near future.

D'oh!

Noideaforaname wrote:
Hey, it's these guys. And Skullgrin.

And with Bludgeon, Thunderwing, and Alice, we've been getting a lot of Pretender references lately.
...Just without the Pretender concept (except for Alice, but she didn't get a toy).
Here's hoping for more.

I don't know why everyone refers to Alice as a Pretender - she's much more like a Predacon, or maybe like Animated Sari. If you take into account her off-screen back story she's really just a normal Decepticon.

Really, I like the Japanese version with mass-shifting pretenders (why not? If the two techs are there, why wouldn't you combine them?) and the IDW version with the pretender suits being essentially Mjolnir or Iron-Man armor for Transformers. It's just the G1 Marvel version that got silly.

I also really thought they should have availed themselves of the opportunity to include a Transformer that turned into a human during Beast Wars. The second & third season set up the possibility rather well. In fact, the fuzor-gimmick in Beast Wars would have allowed for some human/animal hybrid alternate modes, many of which might look remarkably similar to some of the Pretender shells. And gee, if you add in the Transmetal gimmick, you could have robots organic-looking robots that change into armored mythological creatures (e.g. armored lizard-man fuzor) and quasi-vehicles (e.g. transmetal motorcycle). You could basically hit all the gimmicks of Beast Wars and highlights of the Pretender genre without the cheap Pretender shells.

It Is Him wrote:That's pretty amazing. You know, my beat up G1 Jetfire could definitely use an H202 bath, and I don't think I would mind if I accidentally ruin it, even if it is that rare sticker variant. I'll have to think about it some more.

It might be worth taking him apart instead of damaging those Robotech stickers. The H202 will rust the metal / die cast on the figure slightly (which might be removed with a rust remover but i haven't tried that yet). Alternatively, you could try to make this Retr0brite stuff at http://retr0bright.wikispaces.com/ and then apply it only to the pieces that need some TLC. I wouldn't damage the near unreplacable sticker variants, especially if it's a carryover Robotech sticker(s) on the wings.

It Is Him wrote:It's easy. Just borrow your wife's hair dryer, set it to high heat and low blast, or whatever settings those things have, and let'er'rip. Hopefully you'll see a difference after a minute or so. The trick also worked decently well on Animated Arcee's hands. As for storing them, try a little bit of bubble wrap.

That's a decent suggestion, or maybe i store the wings in some small rubbermaid kitchen storage pieces or something like that.

3.8TransAM wrote:No meet up Ryan, heard u couldnt make it at the last minute, was looking forward to meeting you in person.

One day my friend, one day. Just didn't work out that I could go after I found out a few weeks ago that my Dad was coming in from Michigan for the weekend and then my wife worked on Sunday night which made attending the meetup near impossible.

3.8TransAM wrote:I love the Pretender galleries. Might have to try the soap wash on the few I have as well. I can't believe how that Crossblades u have came out, looks great for a before and after deal.

Crossblades came out very well. The paint on his face is slightly pinkish from the sun damage, but if I didn't tell you that and if you didn't have one side-by-side you wouldn't know the difference. I was going to swap heads with another Crossblades shell that I bought last week but upon trying to take out the pin I slammed the piece I was trying to hammer into the pin right through the other shell's face. I decided that after spending so much time giving Crossblades an H202 bath that it wasn't worth damaging it until I could figure out how to knock out the pin without damaging the shell.

H202 is my friend.

3.8TransAM wrote:I can admit to anyone here thinking that a clean up can't do wonders, start busting out 20+ yr old figures u have and played with when u were a kid and put them on display now. I think a few of mine changed colors when I did it over the summer. Warm water with a little soap and then just warm water and nice towels to dry them with(not soaking them obviously)

Apparently the older figures just need a little TLC. After all of the money I've spent on having a complete US collection minus Costco Prime and the 3rd wave G2 Dinobots, I've decided that some of these figures are just going to need some love instead of being replaced.

3.8TransAM wrote:Pretenders aren't my favorites by far, but I don't understand all the hate poured on them. Everyone wants to army build, now u get two for one

I agree 100%. I remember back-in-the-day when I was a kid that I counted Pretenders as two toys in my figure count. Maybe that's part of why I liked them so much when I was little.

3.8TransAM wrote:Oh yeah, the original stickers for the Pretenders really sucked it, are those repro labels or whose? I'd be amazed if you say original? Even new the ones I have never stuck well.

The Masterforce Pretender stickers were applied right before the galleries and I didn't have a problem with any of them. Bomb-Burst already had his stickers applied, as did Landmine (who got a few touch-ups from an additional U.S. sticker sheet that I had for him.

Groundbreaker, Sky High, and Splashdown didn't have their stickers applied until a couple of weeks ago but their stickers were more challenging. I received them in their bubbles sans boxes. I have a feeling that those three figures I received from the Philippines might have suffered water damage at some point or high moisture exposure which is why their boxes were missing. They used to be pretty common on eBay in their bubbles with sealed instructions/stickers/paperwork as were their Decepticon counterparts -- and you used to be able to buy them all for relatively cheap (Groundbreaker for $83, Sky High for $62, and Splashdown for $83). I thought they'd be plentiful for years, but since I bought those Autobots in 2006 you can't find any of those guys for cheap anymore. Some of their stickers didn't want to stick that well so I just used a little 3M Spray Adhesive to get them to stick. Worked like a charm!

As for the Decepticons Finback, Iguanus, and Bugly, their stickers are more like what you'd expect from 23+ year old Transformers toys. Those are the only 3 that were my originals from when I was a kid that made it to the galleries. One of the pegs on one of Bugly's guns had snapped off in his hand at some point so I had to figure out how to get that out and super glue it back together. If you didn't know I had glued it, you probably couldn't tell that there was a problem. If you look on Iguanus' belly (lower torso), you'll see that the hole for the gun peg was shattered at some point so that got superglued as well. Some of their stickers were in pretty bad shape so I removed a couple of them, heated them up with a hair dryer, applied spray adhesive and then reapplied their bad stickers. It worked OK ... not really happy with the results but it was better than nothing for the time being.

I'm gonna have to try that hair dryer trick.

Seibertron wrote:

It Is Him wrote:It's easy. Just borrow your wife's hair dryer, set it to high heat and low blast, or whatever settings those things have, and let'er'rip. Hopefully you'll see a difference after a minute or so. The trick also worked decently well on Animated Arcee's hands. As for storing them, try a little bit of bubble wrap.

Um wow. Thanks for the tip. My Masterpiece rear wing tips look like nothing was ever wrong with them. And the one Skywarp tip doesn't look bent at all any more after this. Amazing! Is this a widely known fix for plastic stress?

I also tried this on my Classics Rodimus where the shoulder ball joint connects. I fixed one side with this but the other side was taking too long. I was getting worried about the hair dryer causing damage to the plastic so I decided not to continue.

Definitely want to try this on Henkei Wildrider's shoulder ball joints at some point as well as TFA Arcee.

Great tip!

Honestly, if this is the first time you're hearing about this tip, then I'm guessing it isn't commonly known.

Those are some nice results. I took some before and after photos with a few of my other guys, but nothing that noticeable. TFA Arcee definitely was an improvement though (I've got some before-and-after pics somewhere...)

Seibertron wrote:

It Is Him wrote:That's pretty amazing. You know, my beat up G1 Jetfire could definitely use an H202 bath, and I don't think I would mind if I accidentally ruin it, even if it is that rare sticker variant. I'll have to think about it some more.

It might be worth taking him apart instead of damaging those Robotech stickers. The H202 will rust the metal / die cast on the figure slightly (which might be removed with a rust remover but i haven't tried that yet). Alternatively, you could try to make this Retr0brite stuff at http://retr0bright.wikispaces.com/ and then apply it only to the pieces that need some TLC. I wouldn't damage the near unreplacable sticker variants, especially if it's a carryover Robotech sticker(s) on the wings.

Really I'm conflicted about doing it. On one hand, those stickers are rare and several parts are broken beyond repair, and on the other, it would be a fun experiment to try out. My Jetfire is really a junker, as are all of my 84-86 childhood toys. And the truth is, I don't mind if he's yellowed. It builds character.