Yup, love that Generations packaging. Onslaught comes packaged in his robot form on this beautiful card, which points out that he is number one of five Combaticons needed to build Bruticus. He’s not only the first, but also the leader of the pack and according to his little bio on the back of the card, he’s a master strategist and a damn good fighter too. Of course, original Onslaught was a lot bigger than the other Combaticons, whereas the Fall of Cybertron version he’s a Deluxe just like his brothers in arms. That doesn’t bother me; I like a little uniformity in my Transformers sizes these days. Let’s start with Onslaught’s alt mode…

Ok, I’ve mellowed on this alt mode a lot since I first transformed him. But let me give you a little taste of my initial impressions… What the hell is this? I know it’s supposed to be an alien war machine and all, but it just doesn’t look like anything. Hasbro calls it a missile carrier, I call it bullshit. I’m trying to be a little forgiving here since as the torso of Bruticus, Onslaught requires the most engineering for his third form, but this jumbled mess on wheels is really pushing it. I don’t even see any goddamn missiles. Even an alien missile carrier should have missiles. I just see two big guns. Now, like I said, I’ve mellowed on him a bit since. He’s still an odd conglomeration, but looking at the way his back is designed, he actually looks like he’s designed to be a cab for a larger military vehicle. And that’s kind of cool. Hey, there’s your cue, Fansproject… build him a trailer! Also, on the plus side, the coloring isn’t as bad as I originally thought it would be. I do wish Hasbro had toned down the neon green a bit, at least to match the more subtle green of his dual cannon.

Moving on to Onslaught’s robot mode… here’s the deal, folks. Onslaught looks really good standing on the shelf. He’s nicely proportioned, he has a slew of cool panel lines in the sculpt, and his head is a beautiful homage to the G1 toy and animated character. I’m not crazy about how the huge cannon looks in his hand, but you can clip it onto his arm and I think it works pretty well that way. I do wish Hasbro had designed the cannon so you could peg it onto his back with the two barrels coming up like the G1 design. Either way, he’s one bad ass looking robot and therein lies the problem…

The problem with Onslaught is I want to pick him up and play around with him, and that’s when I realize how screwy his arm designs are. His upper arms consist of his entire front wheels and when you rotate them at the shoulder, it’s just awkward. His forearms connect to his shoulders with hinges that don’t lock into place, and the swivel and ratchet joints in his elbows don’t help much either. Worst of all, his shoulders have no lateral movement. His legs feature decent hinges in the knees and swivels in the thighs, but his hip joints are ratcheted so tight it feels like I’m breaking him when I try to move his legs. Sadly, he’s definitely a toy that is best enjoyed when admired on the shelf.

In the end, I’m going to have to give Onslaught a pass. Call me a Transformers whore. Call me a Hasbro sycophant. Call me whatever. Maybe it’s the Jameson talking. Sure, Onslaught’s alt mode is pretty questionable, sure his arm designs are terrible, but truth is he still looks damn fine standing there among my Decepticons. And besides, I’m really not in all that forgiving a mood today, so if I can still find some good him, that’s worth something.