Monday Burst

It's the start of an new week of robots, monsters, and misadventure here on Zone Base. I hope you all had a great weekend, mine was pretty good... and went by way too fast. The Mrs and I did our weekend shopping and even checked out some early Halloween stock in our local At Home and Cracker Barrel. We got some great spooky stuff and had a lot of fun. 

Ealier in the week my Godzilla Megatron came in and I didn't expect my happiness to be that high. I knew I had it on the way and that it was real. But actually holding it in my hand... wow. I'm not sure when the MechaGodzilla Optimus Prime will ship, I guess it's coming later as it doesn't look like anyone has gotten theirs yet either. Speaking of Godzilla, the Mrs picked me up some fun Godzilla stuff while on a shopping trip with her friend. She got me a bag full of Godzilla blind boxes and bags along with some Ultraman, Kamen Rider, Stranger Things, and Shin-Chan stuff. That was super nice of her while they were in Popmart heaven.

My local stores are still pretty barren. I've still not gotten the rest of the Turtles of Grayskull figures and that's causing me some distress. I really want to complete the line and feel so close to my goal. Not to mention,  not a single new Transformer in some time. I haven't gotten the Studio Series B-127 yet... and that's all they seem to have other than leftover TF One stock. It wouldn't be so bad if I wasn't anticipating Cyberworld so much. I really can't wait to get my hands on those! Considering the show is premiering July 12th, I'm hoping they'll be on shelves soon. I did order a case of Blokees. I sure do love them... I just wish they were easier to get!

July the 4th is Friday and I'm gearing up for the holiday weekend. It's going to be a short work week and probably a hard one too. I'm looking forward to the break though and getting some rest. Well, we've got a fun holiday week in store for you all. Thank you for reading Zone Base. I really appreciate your support and just ask that you share the site with your friends. Mutual High Fives everyone, let's get this Monday started!

Solus Prime [Age of the Primes/Deluxe Class]

Joining the ranks of the butt heads I talked about last week is Solus Prime, another figure from Transformers Age of the Primes that I had bought and almost forgot about. Solus, like Prima Prime, is a member of The Thirteen. One of the original Transformers made by Primus. Solus Prime's role is maker and creator. With that fancy hammer you see her holding in the pic, she can make just about anything.

The Thirteen Primes are the template for the Transformer race and all female Transformers are based on her. She was also in a relationship with Megatronus Prime, which obviously didn't go as planned. Solus Prime created many of the more powerful and mystical objects in Transformers lore. Personally I think it's cool that they made her a more in depth character and didn't go down a cringe route like often happens with female characters.

Solus, like Prima, has a more fantasy themed appearance. I've always liked when robots are designed with similar cues. Egyptian, Easter Island, Mid-evil, and similar design elements make for an interesting looking character. Solus is pleasantly colored in dark purple armor with gold highlights on her grey robot parts. She's pleasantly articulated, you can even move her dress (is that a dress?) in sections to allow for leg movement. Her hammer can be held by one or both hands, though you'll have to disassemble it first. Solus Prime transforms into a Cybertronian Armored Truck, and that's unfortunately where things go south.

Transformation is not a pleasant experience at all. Honestly, it feels like the alt mode was an after thought. It looks cool, but the shape suggests they initially had something else planned. There's a few spots that feel over complicated for no particular reason. The arms, for example, form the front wheel assembly. By itself it's fine, but there's an odd flat plate in both shoulders that has to be folded into the truck body. I never noticed these panels in either mode and have no clue what purpose they serve. Fitting them into their spot in vehicle mode wasn't easy for my big fingers either.

Then there's the feet. the legs fold up into the rear section of the truck. Like the arms, that's mostly ok, but getting the feet to fold into place is pretty unclear and awkward. Even looking at the instructions, it just doesn't work until miraculously it just does. Of course you'll have to knead the toy a little to get everything to align properly after doing so. It just doesn't seem to work right. The biggest problem that's actually a problem and not subjective is various parts just kept coming off during transformation. The plastic grade on some joints isn't great and various places (like the knees on mine) pop out of place while you're folding them around. It's infuriating. Several others have complained about this online, so I can be assured it wasn't a case of clumsy fingers or QC issues specifically with mine.

Truck mode looks neat, though after the unpleasant transformation it'll take a minute to appreciate. The hammer can attach to the side. You'd think since it can be disassembled that the pieces would be distributed about the mode. That's another thing that makes me think the truck mode wasn't originally intended. She folds up into a shape and there just happens to be truck parts to put into place. The dark purple and gold highlights are dominant in the form and once again look great. It's a very neat looking toy, I just wish the less than stellar transformation didn't overshadow the positives. 

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Summer is a Spooky Season.

Wild Jungle Mission 5-Pack [Swapticons]

Between upcoming Swapticon waves getting revealed/leaked online and being inpatient waiting for this set at at stores, I ordered the Wild Jungle Mission 5-Pack from Walmart shortly after Memorial Day. I think it's Walmart exclusive here in the states, which may not be true, but Walmart has been the only place I've actually seen Swapticons... so maybe. You don't get much news about these sort of things online unless it's from a site's sponsor, so *shrug*. I've been anticipating this set since getting bit by the Swapticon bug for three reasons.

1. It's a mostly Beast Wars set. I'll cut a fool over Beast Wars. On their feet, so they feel me cutting them when they walk. 2. There's some choice selections here. Not just the Alligator Megatron, which was originally part of that initial Beast Wars 2-pack that I've always loved... and is apparently officially named Megatron Gator now (that's awesome). But also because of the addition of Apelinq. Not the movie Apelinq, but the BotCon 2000 exclusive Apelinq. That's super cool! 3. Because I've really been having fun with Swapticons. Despite being vastly different, they manage to fill the spots that BotBots and Kreons took. Fun and weird little Transformers like BotBots were. Then they're the fun cool mini-figures that occasionally take a deep dive into Transformers history like Kreons did.

Due to the nature of Swapticons and this being a 5 pack, there's an odd bot out. There's 2 complete sets- Apelinq and Optimus Primal (they form a gorilla) and Megatron Gator and Skullcruncher (who form an alligator). Scorponok is the back end of a Scorpion. Thanks to various leaks and reveals, I know an upcoming 5-pack has a lone G1 Scorponok. He'll form the front of a scorpion that will match up with this one. Well, kinda. It's G1 Scorponok and Beast Wars Scorponok. They'll be a little mishmash... but the idea will be there. HOWEVER, with the implied wackiness of Swapticons... you can just have an alligator with a scorpion backside. Think about that.

Let's look at these little bots individually. Apelinq is the front of the gorilla with Optimus Primal forming the rear. Both are colored pretty closely to the incarnations they're based on, but still manage to match when combined. Considering Apelinq was a repaint of Transmetal Optimus Primal, it's pretty neat that they work well together. Primal's robot arms do not hide away as well as other Swapticon arms do. In fact, they don't hide at all. There's just a set of arms hoping that you don't notice them... and they manage to blend in if you don't look very hard. The magic of unifying color. As you could expect, Megatron Gator and Skullcruncher form an alligator. Thanks to their similar color schemes it's a pretty cohesive alligator.

Due to how Swapticons connect, the alt mode tends to be a little stretched out. It works pretty well with the gators long body though. Skullcruncher is the lone G1 character in the set, but he's been paired with BW characters lately (Beast Alliance toys, for example). It works. Scorponok is the oddball like I mentioned here and... his colors look pretty nice on the square Swapticon body. He makes me think a Tarrantulas could probably pull off being a solo bot when not connected to anyone else. I'm looking forward to partnering him later on with the other Scorponok. This is a fun set. Swapticons are fun in general, but a themed set is extra neat. Thankfully there's more coming. They may be silly, simple little toys... but also a fun time. That's what a hobby is all about.

Monday Darkness

The evil of Monday is upon us Zone Base readers. Brace yourself for another week of robots, monsters, and misadventure to protect yourself! My weekend was pretty good! Saturday the Mrs and I attended the grand opening of our new Daiso store. It was a fun experience, though the long lines were a bit tedious. We got a good bit of fun stuff and plan to come back often. Local stores were pretty barren on the new toy front, fortunately my Transformers Godzilla Megatron pre-order shipped. For some reason the MechaGodzilla Optimus Prime hasn't yet, which I find really odd. I did pick up a Universal Monsters ReAction blind box and got The Wolfman! Hooray!

Sunday was a day full of household work and Super Mario Kart World. For dinner Mom ordered Olive Garden and we watched more Stranger Things. Our rewatch of the series is going well and we've completed season 1 last night. It's Mom's first time with the show and she's hooked! Mom surprised me with a Studio Series Leader Class Shockwave from Dark of the Moon! He's a really nice looking figure and a really great surprise. Well, it's time to get the week started. I've got some chores to do and content to get started on. I've been hard at work preparing for this years Halloween content. I know I say this every year, but this year's going to be great! This year has felt like a return to form for the site and I think our annual Halloween party is going to represent that. Thank you all for reading. Please don't forget to share with your friends and Mutual High Fives everyone!

Air Raid [Age of the Primes/Deluxe Class]

Rounding out the second new Aerialbot available as of this writing is Air Raid. Air Raid, like his team mates, is a butt head. He's fearless, reckless, and often in some sort of trouble. While that doesn't sound so fun to most folks, Air Raid couldn't be happier. I've actually got a bit of affinity towards the little shit. When I was younger Air Raid was my first Aerialbot outside of Easter Basket bootleg sets.

I had acquired him for cheap and happy to finally have an official member of the team. Those G1 toys are actually pretty small, and Air Raid found himself in my bag for a little while. I still remember a late night visit to Dunkin Donuts with friends after work with Air Raid getting passed around. Good times.

Air Raid is very faithful to his appearance in the original Transformers cartoon. He's well articulated and just overall pleasant. To be fair, the Aerialbots are pretty plane looking... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *cries*.  Originally, the Scramble City Combiners and Metroplex were designed to be Diaclone toys, but were released as Transformers only. I can see that Diaclone heritage in this Air Raid toy a lot. Makes me wonder what if Transformers never happened. Imagine if Diakron and Kronoform had lived and this was a new updated toy from those series? Air Raid has two blasters that can connect under his wings for alt mode firepower. That's a small thing that's done often... but I like it.

Transformation to his black F-15 Eagle jet mode is pretty easy. Everything just goes into place easily. The only place where you've got to be careful is when folding his legs into the rear of the jet. There's nothing too hard about it, but it's another one of those exactly right or it's not working type spots. It took me a second to get the two sections to snap together out of lack of wiggle room. Not a deal breaker and or a dark spot. Just a brief moment of saying dammit. Air Raid's mix of white, red, and black looks great. It gives a fairly simple looking bot and give him some visual pop. It's funny that a team of butt heads have such simple looking figures. I guess the old mantra 'keep it simple stupid' is always true for a reason. Air Raid looks great in his simplicity and jet mode is fun. Maybe I'll take him with me to Tim Hortons and relive some old memories. My local Dunkin sucks.

Optimus Prime [Galaxy Version 05-One]

Being the main character of my main subject matter, I talk about a lot of different Optimus Prime toys. I don't even talk about all of them and there's still a lot of Optimus talk around here. Fortunately he gets some really cool toys. In Transformers One, we got another version of his origin that was pretty great with some pretty great toys as well. I've been praising these Blokees takes on the Transformers One characters and Optimus is no different. Peanut butter and jelly, Blokess and Transformers One. Some things just go great together. .

In addition to the parts that your standard Galaxy Version kit offers is that way cool take on his energy axe. It's always looked good, but was downright awesome the way they used it. Because of that, it stands out to me more here than the normal inclusion would. He's also got that cool generic rifle the various Trackers carry around. It's dumb, but for some reason I just like these generic guns. Of course there's the standard set of hands and display base to stand on. Don't forget that new Galaxy Version build that debuted in this series. It's so much sturdier and better. I can't express just how much better it is. So much. One thing I enjoy is his smoke stacks. Thanks to the way they attach, you can flip them around to simulate when he used them as a flamethrower.

It's just a coincidence, but a cool accident is still cool. I mainly liked that part as when I was a kid and playing with the original Optimus Prime toy, his smoke stacks often got turned around to be used as little gun turrets. Newer editions lack that ability, but my 1984 one could do it. Optimus has a standard Optimus color set, but it's a good color set. So of course it looks great here. Of note is the Matrix shining through his chest windows, which is a nice touch. I like it when there's something going on in those vehicle windows in robot mode. In the end, this is another Optimus... but not just another Optimus. It's a good Optimus. Nice things are nice.

Slingshot [Age of the Primes/Deluxe Class]

The other day I was at Walmart with the Mrs and my Mom. When we had walked out to my car, a Slingshot was parked next to us leading my Mom to marvel at how neat it looked. That lead to me remembering the Age of the Prime toys I've been sitting on without posting about.

For example, today we'll be looking at Slingshot the Aerialbot. The Aerialbots, like other classic combiner teams is getting updated with all new and improved toys. It feels like just yesterday that the Combiner Wars version came out... but it sure wasn't. That was 9 years ago. So hey... almost a decade later they're getting updated with new engineering and frankly, they look great!

The Aerialbots are mostly remembered for being butt heads in their initial appearances in the original cartoon. Slinghsot's claim to fame was his adventures with Prince Jumal/Hassan in the episode Aerial Assault. During this episode, the Aerialbots were damaged and got repaired with car parts, leading to Slingshot having an older cars grill for a chest. I think an aftermarket company is making a snap on version of that car grill, which I might be tempted to buy. Slinghsot is also known for his G2 toy being one of the most fragile Transformers ever. It's made of solid gold plastic, which doesn't age well.

Horror stories of fans finding theirs in piles of rubble are well spread. Allegedly newer metallic plastics don't have this problem, but time will tell. Fortunately his newest toy is pretty good. Thanks to advances in toy engineering in the more recent years, the design team is able to make toys that look as if they stepped right off the TV screen. Well, toys that actually physically transform that walked off the TV screen. Slingshot looks like the butt head I just watched the other day. Just so happened Aerial Assault was recently aired on the Transformers Channel. I watch it daily.

In robot mode Slingshot is fairly well articulated. He can be put into a variety of poses and is pretty expressive. It's like the design team made a point to engineer his attitude. He's packing twin double barrel blasted that plug under his wings in jet mode. Transformation is pretty easy and he folds into a jet pretty quickly. Jet mode is the same Sea Harrier you know from his classic appearance. It looks great and is pretty solid. I enjoy how the front landing gear unfolds from the back of Slingshot's head.

Like most jet Transformers, there's a good bit of robot folded under the plane. It's been 41 years, I'm used to it. Thankfully there's not much to really complain about. The bulk of his jet kibble in robot mode is part of his classic appearance. Like I said, transformation is pretty easy. My only gripe is the same I have with a lot of recent cad designed Transformers. There just isn't a lot of wiggle room in the design, so you'll have to get thing exactly right or it's not coming together. Fortunately that wasn't as much of a problem with Slingshot, who being a butt head, you'd expect a little fuss.