I COMMAND YOU TO RISE FROM YOUR EARTH

The week before Toy Fair is really exciting as all sorts of news is released ahead of the info dump that the weekend brings. Of course by Saturday afternoon it renders social networking unusable thanks to the same few bits of news being repeatedly spammed by click bait sites ... but we're not there yet. It's still fun right now. Earlier today, IGN released some cool Earthrise figure images.

Man these dang things look great. It's really funny how much better the Earthrise deluxe figure for Arcee looks a million times better than the recently revealed (and way more expensive) Masterpiece. I'm super stoked for Scorponok and Skylinx. I missed out on the Commander Jetfire from Siege, so getting Skylinx in the larger size will be a great. I've somehow never missed a Titan class figure, so I'll be glad to add Scorponok to the giant toy gang.

Siege was a really good line. I still hope I can find the last of the line that's evaded me so far as I love it so. Earthrise looks to build on that solid foundation with some of the best looking retail Transformers figures to date. I'm way more impressed with a $20 toy that looks more like a premium item than an actual premium item that costs $200.

Whoa Damn Cyberverse

Toy Fair is this weekend, so of course all sorts of news is dribbling out from various sites before the onslaught this weekend. Today's bit of exciting Cyberverse news is a pretty awesome. The new Battle Call figures are slated for release during the second half of this year. That's pretty unfortunate as I want them now. I've been a fan of Cyberverse since it's release and seeing it improve as it goes along is great. These new Battle Call figures are named such as they have voice activated lights and sounds... which I'll likely have turned off most of the time.

What I'm most excited for (other than the cool looking figures) is the cool battle armor. Depending on the size and class of the figure, the armor either flips out or attaches separately. That was called a simple explanation, you'll only get that here folks. I'm a sucker for this type of gimmick. Not only is it super fun to deck your bots out in neat armor bits, but it also tends to improve the looks of the figure a lot. I make a lot of comparisons of Cyberverse to older super robot toys, and with this armor, it's even more apparent. They look straight out of late Japanese G1 or Brave and I love that look.

I really appreciate the new characters. While I've never complained about the regular use of the main cast, it is super cool to see new characters. I really like Wildwheel, it's hard not to love a cowboy and something as silly as a cowboy robot is just fun. The returning characters look great a here as well. It could be a coincidence, but Starscream looks like a mix of Cyclonus and Leozack to me with his feline-ish armor. Megatron's armor pretty much converts him into Galvatron, which is really similar to an unused Action Master concept. Probably unintentional, but cool regardless.

Toy Fair 2019 reflections

It practically ordered itself

Another Toy Fair has come and gone, and if you're anything like me, you're probably grateful for your social media to return to normal. All joking aside, as usual there was a ton of news for the upcoming year in toys. Most of the Transformers news was already made available prior to the event in form of press releases, sneak peaks on popular pop culture sites, and fandom news sources scouring the internet (how do they have the time?). Though there still was some surprises to be had and honestly, not going makes the spoiled surprises hardly an issue for me since it's just reading news (though partially the source of my sarcasm towards the onslaught of news over the weekend after they already leaked it the week earlier). Power Rangers had some great looks at upcoming toys and I'm really looking forward to some of that stuff. There's a great Star Wars pseudo vintage Kenner style line coming that I'm excited over. My love for those old Kenner figures has never faded (and likely why I like the standard/basic figures so much), so getting updates of those is something I'm all in for.

Super 7 showed off some cool stuff that I'm really interested in. I've always dug their ReAction line (see, Kenner style toys) and they've got some great stuff coming. I wish I would have got a better look at their M.U.S.C.L.E line (another favorite toy style), but such is how the news flow goes. I'm sure I will as time goes. Honestly I didn't get to see much more than I'm talking about here as that was majorly in my optics over the weekend. That's kinda the end result of a flood of news, you end up just taking a few sips of the water and head for dry land. I'll take in more in time as really, more in depth information will be made available as the things get closer to release.

To give a spotlight on my favorites from the show, well, as far as Transformers goes I'm still in awe of Siege. I absolutely love the line and don't see anything I don't want. Really looking forward to those 35th Anniversary toys. Great reuse of already excellent Siege toys. Cyberverse has some great toys coming, and even though I'll hardly buy all of them, the Spark Armor figures as well as a few stand outs like Alpha Trion are must gets. With Power Rangers I mainly plan on buying the Megazords when they come out in fall, though the Micro Morphers and Playskool figures will be bought regularly. I'm really excited for the vintage Star Wars toys, though my main source of excitement is for episode 9 toys and they'll show those more in the coming months. If they showed any Mega Construx, I didn't see it. So I'm hoping there's some good stuff coming as I really like the Heroes series. Same with Imaginext. Since Power Rangers has went to Playskool, my focus is the blind bags and whenever series 12 shows up, I'm scooping up that new Adventure People homage and the robot from Big. They have some neat Batman figures coming, I'll get a few of those I'm sure.

In all, there's a ton of great stuff coming and I'm pretty excited for it. I don't get too worked up for Toy Fair as most of the big news seems to only cover a few months out of the year anyway (they acted like Generations was ending last year, remember?), but it is nice to get that few months worth of news even if it means my social media is practically unusable for a weekend. I did buy a sweet pair of Reebox this weekend and like 50$ worth of pizza (so far on day 3 of just microwaving pizza instead of cooking, I'm going to call that a win) while playing Sega (I really like Sega). So, thinking I had a better weekend than the folks at Toy Fair.

Beast Morphers toys at the Fair

Early looks from Toy Fair are steadily coming in, man I'm digging the Beast Morphers stuff. My main focus before was the Megazords... but those Micro Morphers are now in front of that. Holy crap that looks line a fun line to collect.

Hey Rob, how about the exact type of thing you like?

 

Toy Fair is right around the corner waiting to jump out and stab you with a knife. It's THAT close. So, as per the norm, almost all the news from the show is being released early to various sites either officially or by leaks. I'm not complaining, because the news is just wonderful (and I just can't click every link on Twitter). Wonderfest was this past weekend holding tons of news that I'm interested and really want (hello Star Convoy and Armada Prime). Today the news was new Cyberverse toys. I've enjoyed the line as is, but haven't jumped in whole hog as it's not 100% for me (and that's ok). Well, now they made it 200% for me (and that's ok)!

The new Spark Armor Battle Class figures are exactly the type of thing I go for. Legion/Speed style figures (they might be a little bigger) with partner drone vehicle type things that can turn into armor for said figure. Pardon me while I find somebody to shake violently and yell in their face about how awesome that is. I'm really digging the looks of these toys too, completely traditional looking Transformers characters with the additional armor friends. Often they'll reinvent the look of the bot for such a gimmick, which I'm not opposed too at all. Just when they look so drastically different, I'd prefer they'd be a new character. That and maybe it's a holdover from Action Masters mentally that's got me really excited for traditional looking characters with such a gimmick.

With Siege being as awesome as it is right now, the general greatness that is the Walmart reissue line, it's extra fries and ketchup with my combo meal that Cyberverse is doing such an awesome awesome. I hope the gimmick see's life the the cartoon, that'd be great. It's hard not to be excited for such a thing, I kinda hope Takara gets hold of this as I'd love to see it in their manga stories. Seems perfectly compatible with the general storytelling that takes place there.

Forming Voltron in 2018

Toy Fair also brought me a healthy dose of exciting Voltron news. Looks like as the Voltron 84 assortment cools, Playmates plans on bringing a updated Legendary Defender Voltron out that mirrors his upgrade from the big fight during the end of season 2. Something I've wanted since I saw it!

I'm very excited for the chance to build this guy after finally completing my 84 Voltron (I'm slowly but surely doing it).

Also of interest is the stealth lions in the standard action figure assortment. The lions in those crystal colors are beautiful and look like a sight to be held.

Unfortunately there wasn't a new Metal Defender shown, but I'll keep my hopes up as I that was seriously great. Hoping to get a Metal Defender 84 or even a Quintessence upgraded version at some point. Playmates has really been bringing it with their Voltron line and it's hard to contain my excitement for their upcoming products.

Credit for the photos: Toy Hype USA

Collective thinking

With the news from Toy Fair today, it was hard to not stay in good spirits. Most of my news intake came in spurts as I had a somewhat busy day. I work overnight and had a few chores to do before getting some sleep. Upon waking up I caught up with the various news from the show in between a lunch run to Krystal (my favorite fast food restaurant). In the evening a friend came over to shoot for a Toylanta video as well as some footage for a Transformers fan documentary he's working on. He's got more shooting to do, so I'm looking forward to future segment filming as it was fun.

As far as my thoughts from the show, I thought it best to just compile the so far thought below.

Transformers:

Looks like the movie series reboot isn't as hard as it was initially reported. John Warden casually mentioned that reports were a little off base. My theory is that they'll follow the Bumblebee movies lead. I feel like it's along the same line as the newer X-Men movies that did a soft reboot with a younger cast. I'm fine with that.

Seems that Generations will return in 2019 with the new War for Cybertron trilogy planned. Not an adaption of the old game, but along the same idea of a pre-Earth Transformers adventure. Really excited for that, I'm always for that setting. I'm guessing it's going to run in tandem with the movie studio series toys as a line for older collectors.

Cyberverse continues to look fun, though my initial impressions of the Scouts were wrong. Seems like they don't have a full alt mode and they transform into a simple play mode. Not the new Legend class I took them to be, so I guess time will tell how my Cyberverse buying works out.

*edit* It's finally been confirmed that they do have full alt modes, so I think my original plan now lives again. Really wish news sites would have been clearer on that.

Power Rangers:

Hasbro announced their first Power Rangers series starting in April 2019, BEAST MORPHERS! I'm extremely excited for this as Hasbro just just just IT'S MORPHIN TIME!!!!!!!

Pardon me.

An adaption of the awesome Go Busters, Beast Morphers looks to be a good time on the way. Not to mention the hopeful rumors of crossover with TF, my favourite being reuse of Transformers molds in PR similar to Takara using TF molds in Brave. I have no words, this is amazingly exciting.

I'll be updating again tomorrow with more thoughts on news as they come from the show. Right now, the future is looking bright at Zone Base.

Go Go Hassenfeld Bros!

As Toy Fair begins rearing it's mighty head and roaring out news, one of the first bits of information was when it was revealed last night that Saban and Bandai of America have parted ways. Many speculated as to who would take over producing Power Rangers toys, and there was plenty of evidence that it could be Hasbro. By this morning it was revealed, Hasbro is INDEED taking over the Power Rangers brand. Not only in toys, but the possibility of Hasbro BUYING Power Rangers from Saban is a reality that could happen as soon as next year. Right now Bandai of America will be producing PR toys until April 2019 when their contracts expire and Hasbo's products begin rolling out. If Hasbro does indeed buy Power Rangers, I see this as a good thing.

Hasbro has a good record with taking Japanese assets and making a much more successful property with it (hello, Transformers). Not to mention, they make good toys. Power Rangers is an ideal fit for Hasbro. Now I wonder how this would effect my beloved Imaginext Rangers, but thinking if it did go to Playschool, there probably would be a more expansive selection of toys to choose from. I could easily see Zeo, Dino Charge, or whatever appear in the selections.

In the end, I'm excited about this development. I know some people have a grudge against Hasbro for whatever reason, but I don't. They've been steadily selling me toys for my entire life, obviously I like what they do.