Well, I didn’t know it at the time, but this past Marvel Monday was my last review of 2020. It was a pretty shitty and challenging year, but overall still better than my 2019, which is admittedly a pretty sobering and horrifying thought. Needless to say, it’s been tough to keep FFZ afloat these past couple of years, but I’m doing my best. I’ve still got some rough months ahead, but I’m hoping things will start to fall into place as we emerge from Winter. And I guess kicking off 2021 with a new review on Day One is a decent start. I’m not going to be doing any End of Year List or Best & Worst kinda crap. I’m just going to focus on trying to get back to some kind of regular routine. And with that being said, how about we look at a new converto-disguise-change-robot?

I have fond memories of Sunstreaker as a kid. His G1 toy was unique and a lot of fun to play with, and he was actually the only one of the Lambor Brothers that I had as a kid. Needless to say I have been jonesing for a new modern update for a while. And then he was revealed, and I was a bit taken back by how bad the official solicitation pictures of his robot mode looked. Well, it’s not the first time that Hasbro promoted a figure with bad pictures, so I just waited and hoped for the best. So now he’s here and I’ve got my fingers crossed!

See that up there is Hasbro’s official packaged shot and I’m using it for a reason. No, it’s not because I was too lazy to take a packaged shot before I tore into it. Well, maybe, but I’m also making a point. Sure, the Earthrise packaging is looking as fabulous as ever with some absolutely gorgeous artwork of Sunstreaker on the angled side panel. The window shows him off in his robot mode and straight away I’m seeing some really badly matched yellow paint and plastic. The chest/roof is so vibrant and the rest is so dull. Is the actual figure going to look like that? Well, let’s start with the vehicle mode and find out what this sunny boi looks like in hand.

Well OK then! That’s not bad at all. Make no mistake, there is some difference between where the blue transparent plastic that makes up the roof is painted yellow and the rest of the yellow plastic, but it is nowhere near as bad as it looked in the solicitation shots. As for the design, Earthrise has played it pretty close to the Classic G1 alt-modes and Sunstreaker here is no different. His auto mode is a canary yellow Lamborghini Countach and it looks damn good here. The low profile of this design is still as sexy as ever and when you pair it up with that flashy yellow, well it’s no wonder that Sunstreaker has a problem with vanity. I particularly love the tinted blue plastic used for the windshield and side windows, and you also get some silver for the wheels, headlamps, and engine. There’s a bit of black trim and an Autobot insignia on the roof. This is a beautiful alt mode!

I did have some difficulty getting all the seams on this car locked in together, and even then I felt they could have been a little more flush with each other, but with a little patience I was able to get a solid car that rolled pretty well. Because Sunstreaker’s engine doubles as his weapon in robot mode, there isn’t any additional weaponized mode for this car, and that’s fine by me! So far, I’m very pleased. Let’s transform him and see how the rest of him looks!

Transforming Sunstreaker isn’t too finicky and the result is a pretty damn good looking robot. He’s fleshed out pretty well, and not as flat and two-dimensional as the original G1 toy. Indeed, proportionally speaking, Earthrise’s version is very well done. All that beautiful yellow is still on full display here, and once again, the differences in paint and plastic are not nearly as bad with the figure in hand. I do like the additional black showing off here, particularly in the lower legs and forearms. The wheels land comfortably on his ankles and upper arms and instead of adding unsightly kibble, I think they compliment the robot mode nicely. Even from the back, this bot mode fills out nicely, and his engine can plug into his back where it looks pretty natural, and with a little imagination could easily double as a jetpack.

The original toy had two weird “rocket boosters” that would attach to his shoulders, and the sculpting here kind of pays homage to those. I really dig the diagonal vents in his upper arms too. Of course, the roof of the car makes for a great slab of chest with the translucent blue plastic on full display and the Autobot emblem on the roof landing in the middle of his chest. I would have liked it if they could have worked in some missiles to plug into the ends of his arms, as the original toy was able to shoot his fists and replace them with missiles, but I’m still happy with what we got. Sunstreaker sports some useful articulation, and he’s fun to pose and play with.

And that head sculpt is damn handsome, even if Sunstreaker does say so himself. The pronounced ear-vents are painted in yellow, while the face is painted silver, leaving the chin black. There’s no light-piping, but the blue eyes are still quite vibrant.

I’m not a huge fan of the engine-gun here. I would have liked to see a little bit of conversion here, like maybe have the sides fold down and make it look a little more gun like and less like he’s holding his engine. I don’t want to come down on it too hard. I willl, however, point out that the peg fits way too loosely in the hand and it does not stay put in his grasp. I was able to get him to hold it, but when I pose the figure it immediately falls out every time.

A workaround is to attach the engine-gun to the peg in his forearm, where it fits snugly and will not fall out. I’ll admit, I think I like it better as an arm-attachment than a hand-held weapon.

And so, I came into this figure with a lot of trepidation and I’m coming away a happy robot collector. This is an excellent update to that weird and wonderful toy that I loved so much as a kid. It remains true to form as both car and bot, and brings with it all the lovely updates that I look for in these releases. In the end, my only real gripe is that I would have liked to see a proper gun or some wrist-missiles, and that’s just me looking for something to complain about. Sunstreaker also looks pretty good paired up with his Lam-bro, Sideswipe, even if Sideswipe is sporting his Cybertron mode and not his Earth mode. I’ll admit I was weary about getting a lot of do-overs when Hasbro moved the line from Cybertron to Earth, but this is one case where I would not mind getting a proper Earth Sideswipe to display with Sunstreaker.

When Hasbro transitioned from the Cybertron modes of Siege to the Earth modes of Earthrise, I didn’t expect we’d be getting redos of a lot of the same characters. And yet, here we are! It was just back in May that I reviewed the Siege versions of these fellas, and here we are checking out their Earth modes. Am I complaining? Nah. Let’s check out some Datsuns!

The Siege versions of Smokescreen and Bluestreak released as exclusives and each in special packaging. This pair features the normal packages, but Bluestreak was a Walgreens Exclusive, whereas I picked up Smokescreen off of Amazon. They come in the always fantastic Earthrise Deluxe window boxes, with the usual bitchin’ character art. They are packaged in their robot modes, but I’ll start with the alt modes.

Here’s Bluestreak and no, these guys aren’t really Datsuns, but close enough for me. Indeed, this is a great looking little sportscar with a decidedly vintage vibe. Bluestreak retains the same gray and black deco as his previous alt mode, with the black portions having more of a matte finish this time around, and a much bolder Autobot insignia stamped on his hood. He’s got translucent windows and head lamps, a raised hood, a low spoiler, quad exhaust, and silver mag wheels. The panels on mine don’t lock together quite as seamlessly as I would like, but that might be user error. Although, I did give him a good once over to make sure everything looked like it was where it belonged.

Here’s a quick look at the Cybertron and Earth modes together, and I really dig the evolution at work here. The Earthrise version has basically grown a cabin for its human driver and passenger and the wheels have gotten a bit smaller. The Cybertron version actually looks like a concept car that grew out of the 80’s Datsun design and I can dig that!

Just like Siege Streak, the Earthrise version comes with three weapons: A rifle and two shoulder cannons. The shoulder cannons can mount into the hood and the rifle can mount on the roof. These are all fresh sculpts with the shoulder cannons being a lot smaller than what we saw for Siege, while the rifle is a lot closer to Bluestreak’s original G1 weapon. The tabs used for the shoulder cannon are the same for both figures, so you can mix and match if you like.

Transforming these guys is very similar, but there are some key differences in the robot modes. I liked Siege Bluestreak’s bot mode well enough, but the Earthrise version tweaks it to near perfection. Obviously the chest is completely different, as it’s formed from the front of the car. But to me the biggest improvement is in the legs. Earthrise Streak’s legs look better filled out and the lower legs and feet are better defined. Besides the more familiar aesthetics of the Earth mode, I just think this robot looks much more polished and proportioned. I absolutely love it! From the deco standpoint, there isn’t a huge difference. You still get the black and gray from the car mode with some red added in the lower legs and elbows. Earthrise Streak’s lower legs are now all gray, as are his shoulders, and there’s more black in his chest.

I was surprised to see a brand new head sculpt here, and while it’s excellent, I think any question of which one is better will come down to a matter of personal preference. Siege Streak’s “helmet” is more detailed and his “wings” are more pronounced. If I had to pick one, I think I’d side with the Earthrise head, just because it’s more stylized. But either way, they’re both fantastic. If you can’t tell, I really dig this figure a lot. My only real gripe centers around the inner panels on his lower legs. These flip down to fill in the legs a bit, and one of these refuses to stay on when I’m transforming him. Maybe not a big deal, and to be fair I could remove both and not really effect the figure much, but worth mentioning nonetheless. Let’s move on to Smokescreen!

As expected, Smokescreen is mostly a repaint with the major difference of the car mode being the apron on the front. While I’m fine with Bluestreak’s colors, Smokescreen’s red, white and blue deco really brings this excellent auto mode to life. The colors are vibrant, and while I would have preferred more of a glossy finish on both of these vehicles, I have to admit there’s something about the rich, satin finish on Smokescreen that really works for me. The wheels are less flashy here, as they are all black with just the blue clips showing, but otherwise I just love everything about this sportscar. The paint lines are clean, he’s got a bold Autobot emblem stamped on his hood and the racing numbers “80” on either door. The windows are now tinted, as are his head lamps.

And here are some comparison shots of the Siege and Earthrise modes. The deco is pretty damn close, with the Earthrise version adding some red to the roof, the white side stripes straightening out, and the small panel of Cybertronian lettering on the Siege mode giving way to the larger Earth digits on the doors.

Smokescreen comes with the same rifle and shoulder cannons as Bluestreak, only this time they are molded in blue plastic, and once again these can be attached to the car mode to weaponize it. They can also be swapped out with the Siege weapons if you like.

Smokescreen’s transformation is identical to Bluestreak’s, although I don’t have the same problem with the leg panel popping off. The flashy deco really serves to make Smokescreen stand out over his Datsun Bro, as does the addition of the apron on the chest. I can’t stress enough how impressed I am with the way these robot modes turned out. And yet the transformations are so simple and intuitive. It makes me wonder why Hasbro wasn’t able to do this back when they did the Datsuns in the Classics line. The improvement is like night and day.

And here’s a look at Smokescreen’s new noggin, which is a huge departure from what we got with Siege. The face is now white and all smoothed over, with the “helmet” also going for a simpler look. The new portrait really embraces Smokescreen’s look in the old Sunbow cartoon. I also dig the green eyes!

At first I wasn’t all that keen on re-buying these Autobots again so soon, but now that I have them in hand, I’m glad I did because it’s hard to imagine we’ll ever get better versions of Smokescreen and Bluestreak in a Deluxe Class figure. What’s more, I’m actually happy to have them represented in both the Siege and Earthrise lines. How often do we get to display the Cybertron and Earth modes of a Transformer beside each other in what is more or less the same line and the sane continuity! So where’s Prowl? Well, he just hit my doorstep yesterday as part of an Amazon Exclusive two-pack with Ironhide. And I should get around to checking that out next week!

It’s been a long run, but I’m finally getting to where I’m almost caught up with my Earthrise reviews, and have just a handful of Siege figures left to look at! And speaking of long runs, can you believe it’s been nine long years since Hasbro last delivered naïve but well-meaning Autobot engineer Grapple to the toy aisles. That Reveal the Shield figure shared a mold with Inferno and was a really solid figure and a rather unique style. Well here we are, nearly a decade later, and we’ve got something that seems a lot closer to the original G1 toy!

What else is there to say about the packaging, other than it’s awesome. Grapple comes boxed in his robot mode and surrounded by some amazing artwork. And this time, Hasbro just slapped Autobot onto his name to get around copyright issues, rather than calling him SOLAR STORM Grap-PEL. What the heck was that all about? Why not just call him Fred? Anywho, let’s get him out of the box and we’ll start with his alt mode.

As always, Grapple is an orange construction crane, and not a bad looking one at that. Sure, anyone with even a cursory knowledge of convertorobots will be able to see most of what’s going on here. He wears his arms on the vehicle’s back and you can even see his head tucked in at the base of the crane, but turned around and pretending that you don’t notice it! Of course, none of these things bother me, as I’d much rather deal with some obviousness than unnecessary panels that complicate the transformation and wind up as unwanted kibble on the robot mode. I mean, come on, I bought this, I know what it is, it ain’t fooling me! There is some nice detail scattered here and there like sparing panel lines, and the non-functioning stabilizers on the sides painted silver.

As for the deco, the bulk of the crane gets by with a lot of orange plastic. You do get some black on the wheels and a little more scattered about the body, and a little silver paint. There are also some black and orange hazard stripes. The cab gets the most flourish with some blue tinted windows, roof lights, and headlamps, and some silver on the bumper and grill. Grapple also wears his Autobot symbol proudly on the front of the cab. All in all, I’d say this is a really nice looking truck. It does feel like it may not have as much in the way of detail or paint applications as some of the other Earthrise figures, but that’s just my impression and I don’t think it hurts the toy at all.

The crane is fully articulated in that it can rotate, raise and lower, and it can extend outward a bit. The hook on the end is also hinged. There’s a clip on the side for one of his robot hand attachments, and to be honest, it kind of just looks like a hydraulic or something, so I’m fine with leaving it on there. Of course, you can take it off if it bothers you.

There are plenty of ports on Grapple’s alt mode available if you want to weaponize him with his rifle. Some attachments look better than others, but I’m not a big fan of any of them. Your mileage may vary, depending on how badly you want your crane truck to be armed with a giant rifle.

You can also attach his claw to the front of the crane, which gives it a bit of an intimidating look. Hey, it’s always cool to have different play options! So, the vehicle mode is solid, let’s see how the robot mode turned out…

Transforming Grapple is refreshingly simple and very similar to his original G1 toy. There are absolutely no surprises here, but I can’t argue with how great the robot mode looks. He’s tall and lean compared to the squat chonk of Solar Storm Grappel. And while he lacks that certain hyper-realistic detail the previous figure had, I like the smooth and clean robot mode that’s presented here. I think it toes the line between updated toy and cartoon homage quite nicely. And I’ll always have a soft spot for Autobots that wear the front of their vehicle mode on their chest. IT just always feels so right!  What’s more, Grappel’s crane collapses down and hugs close to his back to keep it from being too in the way. The wheel placement on the outside of ankles and above the hips is fantastic, and there are some very nice details sculpted on the lower legs. The coloring in robot mode is more or less the same as his vehicle mode, and this figure just proves that you don’t need a whole lot of paint operations to make it look good.

As expected, Grapple’s head is nestled inside the box that houses the crane’s main hinge. This has always reminded me of those ridges you sometimes see on the shoulders of armor to keep a rival from getting  clean sword stroke at the neck. So, Decepticons, if you’re going to try to decapitate Grapple, you better think again! The “helmet” is exactly as I remember it from the cartoon, including the two bumps coming off the top at opposing angles. The head does turn independently of the box it’s mounted in, so Grapple may not have the best peripheral vision. The face sculpt is excellent and I love the silver paint, but Grapple looks a lot more dour than I remember him being. Although, I guess the expression does have a certain, “GOD, YOU”RE SUCH A DICK, OPTIMUS. WELL, FINE, I’LL GO BUILD MY TOWER BY MYSELF… OR MAYBE WITH SOME DECPTICONS… THEN WE’LL SEE HOW YOU LIKE IT!” kind of look to it.

Grapple comes with a couple of replacement attachments for his hands. You just fold in the hand and that exposes a port to plug these into. One is his big claw that we saw attached to the crane earlier. I’m thinking he can shoot this like some kind of grappling hook. Or maybe it just shoots a mega-death-ray. Whichever the case it looks pretty cool.

The other is this nozzle, which I don’t remember him having in the cartoon, but it’s been a while. I was thinking this looks more like a repurposed firehose nozzle from the inevitable Inferno repaint/remold. You can equip them both if you don’t want poor Grapple to have any hands at all.

And finally he comes with a pretty cool looking rifle. This is one of my favorite Autobot weapons in a while, and a pretty impressive piece of hardware for someone who would rather be off building things with the enemy instead of fighting.

I can’t say I was terribly excited to get my hands on Grapple, but now that I’ve been playing with him, I’m surprised at how much I dig him. I never disliked Grapple, but he was never up there on my list of favorites. But this toy is excellent. I’d say it has a very solid alt mode, a fantastic and fun robot mode, and a quick-and-easy transformation connecting the two. And while I don’t mind a little complexity in my change-a-bot engineering, these days I find simplicity to me more appealing, especially when it can deliver a toy this great.

To quote the great Bob Dylan, “How many roads must a man walk down, before he gets an official figure of a Quinesson Judge from the original Transformers movie?” Well, if we equate those roads as years, the answer is 34 roads. While Hasbro once dabbled with the idea by releasing the horrifically terrible Alpha Quintesson in the Energon line, it really has taken us this long to get a proper Quintesson Judge. I’m not sure if it’s because they were convinced it had to have some kind of transforming gimmick, and up until now couldn’t come up with one, but more on that later. For now, let’s just see if it was worth the wait!

The Judge conforms to the Voyager price point, and he comes in a window box with all the typically awesome artwork that I’ve come to expect from Siege and Earthrise. You can get a good look at the figure inside, but he does require a little bit of assembly as two of the Five Faces of Darkness are detached so he can better fit in the package. I don’t think I can adequately stress how amazing it was to finally hold a toy of this guy. The Quintessons blew my little mind back in the day. They epitomized the new direction that the art and design would take in the movie, and also represented the new direction for the Transformers lore that would go on to characterize the third season of the Sunbow series. They were a prime example of the kind of look we would get into the Universe that the Transformers lived in, and introduced a whole new backstory to the series canon. So yeah, getting this toy is kind of a big deal.

Here he is out of the box and sure enough, he is indeed a proper Quintesson Judge! These things were so damn weird, that it’s hard to believe they were actually incorporated into a Western released cartoon. The Judge is characterized by his egg shaped, eh body? levitating on a stream of energy, with tendrils coming out the bottom, and the fabled Five Faces surrounding the middle of the egg. The body itself features some basic panel lining and features a lever, which can rotate the heads as they were apt to do in the cartoon. The tendrils are bendy, but they pretty much hold just one configuration, although they can be positioned up or down thanks to some jointing where they meet the body. The levitation beam is translucent plastic and can be removed from the bottom. The above image shows my favorite of all the faces, Death, and it is a fantastic sculpt. A lever on the bottom allows the mouths on some of these faces to articulate.

Next up we have The Face of Wisdom. Not nearly as creepy as Death, but still pretty cool. It really shows off the more organic types of faces that the artists were starting to design for the robotic life in the Transformers Universe. Heck, even a number of Transformers were starting to get much more organic looks to them.

For number three we have The Face of Judgement. This one strays a little bit from what I remember the orginal design looking like, but after consulting some pictures, it’s really no that far off. Maybe just a bit more stylized. I love the long face and those tapering sides of his “helmet” The spikes on top are pretty cool too.

The fourth face is The Face of Wrath, and it is a pretty nasty looking piece of work indeed. The yellow teeth and the beady red eyes are great. Once again, I dig the way they did the “helmet” with the sides protruding from an outward angle away from the face. The pointed chin gives the face a severe look. I’d also like to point out here how Hasbro went overboard with the coloring on this figure. Lately, we’re lucky if we get a handful of colors on a Deluxe or Voyager, but here we get greens, reds, oranges, grays, everything is colored the way it should be.

And finally we have The Face of War. I always thought this was the goofiest of the faces, and an unlikely candidate for being War, but it’s still a remarkable sculpt, with the bulbous lips, the circular cheeks, and the angled slits for eyes. We also get the coloring that suggests a mustache, along with a beard. What was it with Transformers and facial hair? I remember first seeing that on Alpha Trion back in the day and even my little mind, full of wondrous imagination, couldn’t comprehend it. Either way, there you have a tour of all the Faces and I think they look great. Indeed everything about this toy registers as a direct hit in my book.

The Judge needs his throne, and Hasbro included a little green chair for him to sit in, or in this case levitate on. It’s a nice reference to the throne that the Judge was sitting on in the movie, but it’s very basic and lacks the pomp and circumstance of the one seen in the movie. Honestly, I think this was included solely for the transformation gimmick.

Oh yeah, he also comes with a little gun that can be pegged into any of the tendrils. The gun also has a regular peg handle so it can be used by any of the other figures. Cool! I’d be perfectly fine with ending the review right here, but of course, Hasbro had to give him a transforming gimmick, because… you know… Transformers! So let’s see what they came up with!

Yup. That’s certainly a thing. Hasbro has made it a habit of dropping in a few figures here and there that transform into playsets for the tiny figures, and that’s the direction they went for here. Conceptually, I’m not all that clear on what they were going for here. It’s basically a tower and a jail cell. The cell is designed for the little guys in this line, but I just had a Titan Master handy, and he works pretty well. Honestly, I don’t know if the person who designed this alt mode deserves a commendation for originality or to be laughed at. On the one hand, I guess it’s impressive that they were able to get any kind of alt mode out of a Quintesson. On the other hand, you can be sure that this will be the first and only time I’ll ever transform the figure.

I have one rule about bad and unnecessary transformers: If they don’t mess with the figure, I don’t care, and that’s most definitely the case here. Sure, I would have been fine if they had just left out the transformation gimmick altogether, but since it doesn’t effect the figure I can just pretend that it doesn’t exist. And this is a really great little figure! Hasbro did a beautiful job bringing this creepy guy to my collection, and yes, I will be hunting down a couple more. Now I can’t wait until the rest of the Quintessons start turning up. Oh, and I wouldn’t mind a Deluxe Class upgrade to the Sharkticons either!

After taking a few detours back into the Transformers: Siege line, I’m switching back to a figure from the first wave of Earthrise Deluxe Classes. This time we’re checking out Cliffjumper, and man it feels like a while since this guy has had any love in the toy aisles! When I think about Cliffjumper, my mind goes to a smaller figure and, while that’s still the case here, Hasbro has upgraded him to a Deluxe Class. Was it justified? Eh, maybe. Let’s take a look…

We saw the Earthrise packaging last time with Hoist and I’ll just say once again how much I dig it. It’s collector friendly and I wouldn’t blame anyone for wanting to hang onto it for the bitchin’ artwork, but I don’t have the space to save a bunch of boxes, so I’m going to tear into it. He comes in his robot mode, but we’re going to start with his alt mode.

Cliffjumper is sort of faithful to his G1 roots, as he’s still a red sports car, but in this case with a bit of a Trans Am vibe. As such, this alt mode reminds me more of Windcharger than it does Cliffjumper. I was never really sure what Cliffjumper was supposed to be in his original super-deformed Minibot alt mode, but this isn’t it. That’s OK. I don’t mind Hasbro straying a bit with these designs. I do, however, kinda mind when they take a much smaller toy and release it in the Deluxe Class. Yes, Cliffjumper was originally a Mini-bot. And no, this toy isn’t small enough to be what was called a Basic or Scout Class in previous lines, but the size still feels wanting at this price point.

Size notwithstanding, I think this is a fine little alt mode. The red plastic looks great and there are some additional silver and black paint operations for the front and back. The wheels are also painted silver, the rear window is painted black, and the windshield and side windows are cast in translucent blue plastic. I’m not really a fan of different color windows, but whatever. An Autobot insignia stamped on the hood ties the whole thing together. Despite the usual seams, the car holds together pretty well and it feels solid.

As if to make up for the toy’s small size, Cliffjumper comes with a massive bazooka-style weapon similar to one he used when scouting with Hound in the original More Than Meets The Eye Sunbow miniseries. And this is a really clever modular design that can be broken down into several pieces and reconfigured to give him a version of the hydrofoil configuration used by the Autobots in the episode Atlantis, Arise! including turbine pontoons and skis for the front wheels. Cool! If only they used some of that engineering skill for the actual figure. Let’s get him transformed!

Broadly speaking, I think this is a pretty solid look for Cliffjumper, in that you get the car roof landing on his chest and the front of the car splitting to form the feet. One strange choice was to give him those circular, tube like biceps, which were seen on Bumblebee’s Sunbow model, but not Cliffjumper’s. I know, these aren’t really cartoon-based toys, but it makes me wonder if we’re going to see this toy recolored and remolded as Bumblebee in this line. I also find it odd that Cliffjumper has an Autobot insignia on his car mode, but not his robot mode. And to that point, I really wish they had printed it on his roof rather than his hood, because his robot mode looks naked without it. Oh yeah, and after just two or three transformations, the paint on my figure’s right shoulder is starting to chip.

Cliffjumper does sport a rather prominent backpack, which doesn’t bother me because it makes his back look tidy and it’s kind of stylish the way it angles outward behind his head. What does bother me is that this whole piece has to be removed for transformation and then reattached. I don’t mind this sort of thing if it’s on a complex figure or if it’s done for some mind-blowing reason, but when Hasbro does it as a basic step in transforming a small Deluxe Class toy? That rubs me the wrong way. If you don’t care for it, you can just leave it off the robot mode. I suppose you can also give it to him as a shield, but that wouldn’t be my first choice.

And then there’s them feets! The proportions on this guy are pretty good until you get down to his big clodhoppers. I actually really like the engineering for how the hood packs away the wheels to form the feet, but they’re just too big for such a small robot. At least we know he’ll always come in first in those Decepticon ass-kicking contests. None of these gripes are instant deal breakers, but they do start to add up.

At least the portrait is absolute perfection.  I love the rounded “helmet” with the horns and the way it frames his face. The silver paint looks fantastic as does the blue used for his eyes. The heads in Siege and Earthrise have really been on point.

And I do love the Bazooka! It features some brilliant silver paint, two hand grips, and it even has the bipod at the end to stabilize it. Of course, that didn’t help Cliffjumper’s accuracy in the cartoon when he used it to take a shot at Megatron, missed, and got his buddy Hound crippled as a result. Still, I gotta give him props to the writers for having him try to sneak-attack murder his enemy in a Saturday morning cartoon. When he’s not using the bazooka it can be stored on his back.

The weapon can also be broken down into a couple of big and beefy pistols and I dig the way these look a lot! You can also mount one or both on his backpack for a shoulder cannon, although it’s mainly just angled for taking out aerial Decepticons from the ground. Still, not bad!

After a whole lot of bitching, it may surprise you to learn that I don’t hate this figure. Not at all! I think Cliffjumper here would have ranked a lot higher in the context of some of the past lines, but Earthrise and Siege have been so damn good that maybe a figure that’s just decent feels a lot worse. I still think it’s kind of lazy to employ parts-forming in a toy this small and simple, but when all is said and done I really like this spunky little bot quite a bit.

Work is still very crazy for me, but last week I actually hit my goal of three reviews, let’s see if I can make lightning strike twice this week, eh? Despite still having a whole bunch of unopened Siege figures, today I’m revisiting the Earthrise series with another Deluxe Class figure from that initial wave. It’s my personal favorite absent-minded Autobot scientist, and the Dinobot-Daddy himself… Wheeljack!

The box art is looking as smashing as ever! As the name suggests, the second chapter in the War For Cybertron series gets us a bunch of G1-inspired characters in their more familiar Earth modes. It feels like it’s been almost ten years since Wheeljack got a release in Hasbro’s main Transformers line, and I think he’s long overdue. As usual, the figure comes packaged in his robot mode, we’re going to start with a look at his auto mode.

Originally, Wheeljack transformed into a Lancia Stratos, and Hasbro stuck to that design pretty damn closely for this figure. It’s just as sexy as ever, with the sloping hood, futuristic horseshoe canopy, shuttered back window, and wide spoiler that sits up nice and high. This is an auto design that holds up beautifully and wouldn’t have needed a lot of tweaks to make it look like a Cybertron vehicle, had Hasbro included him in Siege. I also really dig the way they put two sockets in the back, so you can plug in some blast effect parts to look like rocket thrust. There is absolutely nothing I dislike about this mold. It locks together well, rolls smoothly, and it’s just an absolute home run.

The coloring is really great too. The base plastic is a little off-white, maybe eggshell? Either way, it’s adorned with a similar style of red and green deco that the original toy featured and the wheels are also painted red. In addition to the Autobot insignia on the roof, Wheeljack is positively littered with markings from the bold 638 stamped on his doors to the Aerobolt on his spoiler, and all sorts of other stamps and sponsor advertisements. Some of it is even in Cybertronian. The deco perfectly captures the feel of the vintage toy without being a straight copy.

There’s a peg hole on the roof so you can weaponize Wheeljack’s auto mode with his gun/missile launcher. Unlike some of the weaponized vehicle looks, I think this one works well. The weapon is small enough that it looks like it could have appeared from an opening hatch, rather than look like something that was just stuck onto it.

Transforming Wheeljack isn’t too difficult, it’s not too simple, indeed it feels just right for a Deluxe Class toy. But the engineering also holds my one gripe about this figure. The lower portion of the windshield splits into two little plates. When transforming him into robot mode, these fold into his legs just behind and under the knees. The problem is these pop off every time I transform him, and by that I mean EVERY TIME I TRANSFORM HIM! Half the time, they go flying onto the floor and it’s a mad rush to recover them before the cats do. I feel like this could have been handled better, especially since the rest of the engineering is perfectly fine. And it’s hard to argue with how great the results are.  From the canopy chest to the big split-hood feet, the robot mode preserves everything I remember and love about the original G1 design. It even manages to do some clever stuff like use the spoiler to make those angled panels behind his shoulders, where they were separate pieces on the old toy. Hell, this guy even looks great from the back, and that’s not something I can say about a lot of Transformers these days.

The head sculpt is as quirky and distinctive as ever. He’s got those big ear panels, which I can practically see lighting up as he talks. He’s got the three-pronged crown coming off the top of his domed “helmet.” And his nose disappears into the segmented mouth plate. The blue eyes are painted on, so no light-piping, but they look fine.

Wheeljack’s weapon can serve as either a handgun or a shoulder cannon. It kind of looks like the one that came with the original toy, although that toy came with two of them, one for each shoulder. I don’t recall the original figure coming with a handgun either, but that always made sense to me because he was a scientist. Sure, I would have loved to get a second weapon so I could mount one on each shoulder, but he looks fine with just one.

I was, and still am, a big fan of the Generations Wheeljack figure from around 2011. Of course, it was more stylized than this release and took a lot more liberties with the auto mode. And while that figure will always have a special place in my heart, I think this Earthrise Wheeljack trounces all over it. This version is certainly more faithful to the original toy, a lot less fiddly to transform, and has superb robot and auto modes. He definitely carries on all the love that I lavished on Hoist and I’m hoping that Earthrise continues to impress as I keep opening these toys.

I still have a bunch of Transformers from Siege left to review, and I do hope to get to those eventually, but a few weeks back I got in the first wave of Earthrise Deluxe Class figures, and I thought it would be fun to be topical and current for a change. Plus, I was really excited to open one of these and that motivated me to squeeze in a second review this week. I can’t even begin to tell you what a triumph of time management this is! Anyway, this assortment consists of Wheeljack, Hoist, Cliffjumper, and Ironworks. I’m going to go for Hoist first!

I’m delighted to see that Hasbro hasn’t changed the package design from Siege to Earthrise. The artwork is still as gritty and wonderful as ever and the figure is packaged in his robot mode. Earthrise is the second chapter in this War For Cybertron Trilogy and as the name suggests, Hasbro has moved on to giving the robots proper Earth vehicle modes. It’s an interesting way of doing things, although with the scattershot character selection it means we’ll have some characters, like Hoist here, with only an Earth mode and no Cybertron mode, while presumably we’ll have someone like Ironhide with only a Cybertron mode. On the other hand, characters like Starscream and Optimus Prime are getting both, so who knows. Let’s start with Hoist’s alt mode…

And you can’t get much more faithful to the G1 alt mode than this! Hoist is a rugged looking tow-truck with a satisfyingly boxy 80’s aesthetic. That includes sharp angles (actually even sharper than the original toy!), flared wheel wells, and big chunky tires. I love it! The body is hunter green with black and yellow hazard stripes running down the sides, and he’s got a bold Autobot insignia crisply printed in the center of his hood. The front grill is painted silver and features translucent blue headlamps and fog lights. Some sculpted detail here includes three sections of grill and what I presume is supposed to be a coiled winch. The towing rig in Hoist’s bed, and some of the undercarriage, is cast in bright orange plastic, completing that familiar G1 deco perfectly. The windshield matches the plastic used for the headlights and the side windows are opaque black plastic. Finally, Hasbro is continuing to experiment with weathering, and that’s evident here by the silver spray around the edges of Hoist’s hood. I think it looks fine.

I’ve got to say that I’m smitten with this alt mode. It’s a fantastic update to the original toy, it feels like quality, and everything looks so incredibly clean and sharp. But that’s not to say it’s perfect. The body rides high on the wheels and you can see a little too much of the robot mode in the exposed undercarriage. The way the arms are just angled down there kind of reminds me of Siege Hound, only they’re even more prominent here. I also would have rather the light box on top of the cabin be painted silver to match the grill and the wheels. I’m also not a big fan of having the windshield translucent and the side windows painted a different color. But these are all gripes that I can set aside, because all in all it really is a great little truck.

And yes, the towing plate is articulated and can fold down to allow Hoist to tow one of his fallen comrades out of a hot spot!

Transforming this guy took me a couple times before it felt natural. It’s a little less intuitive than I expected, but it gets the job done. Like his alt mode, Hoist’s robot mode is also slavishly faithful to his old G1 design. There isn’t a lot of effort spent in smoothing out the design, although the proportions are improved and this modern version actually has a visible pelvis, rather than a pair of legs coming out of the hood. Utilizing the car bumper as a chest (like Prowl and the Datsuns) will always be my favorite Autobot design, but this one works well too, with the windshield taking on role of the chest and the hood pointing down to become the abdomen. This is undoubtedly a solid looking bot mode! The coloring remains faithful to the alt mode deco and I think the positioning of the weathering spray makes more sense in this mode. Although, I’m surprised they didn’t add some to his feet as well. If I were to nitpick the coloring here, I would just say that I wish the white parts were painted silver.

When viewed from behind, Hoist ain’t exactly pretty, but he’s not too bad either. His tow gear becomes a backpack with the two “wings” angling upward off his shoulders. He’s got a little hollow leg thing going on in his lower legs, but that’s nothing unexpected from a Deluxe these days. And then there’s those arm panels. Yes, they are totally faithful to the design of the original toy and that’s a good thing for keeping up tradition, but it’s also a bad thing for the overall workings of the toy. With the more modernized aesthetic and articulation, they feel rather out of place. And I can’t help but think that a few strategically placed hinges would have served to pack them up nicely and out of the way. Although, in fairness, I hadn’t remembered that they were included in the animated Sunbow design. Ultimately, I can go either way on them. At first I did not like them at all. But after playing around with the figure a bit, I’m finding that I don’t mind them nearly as much as I thought I would.

The head sculpt embraces the old Sunbow animated design a lot more than it does the original toy, and I’m happy with that. The “helmet” is painted black and his mouth-plate is gray. There’s no light-piping in effect here, instead the visor is simply painted blue. But it looks good and the color pops surprisingly well.

Hoist comes with a chunky orange funnel-like gun, which can be held in either hand. When it is held, however, it looks more like a natural extension of the arm, which is something that Hoist had going on in the old cartoon. Even the toy had the option to replace the hands with a missile-like weapon. I’m not sure why they went with orange, but I don’t hate it. It works well with the existing deco and I like that it preserves the option for him to have two hands if you want. You can also peg the gun into either side of his vehicle mode to give him a little more firepower.

I’ll confess that I was a little iffy on Hoist when I first got him out of the box and started playing with him. There were a few design elements that I thought could have been done better. But after just a couple transformations and a little bit of fiddling, he has more than won me over. He’s even going to stay on my desk for at least a few days because I can’t stop playing around with him. More than any other recent Transformers release, Hoist here feels like a straight up update to the original toy, and that’s not a bad thing at all. I don’t think he reaches the heights of Deluxe Perfection that we saw in a line like Titans Return, but he’s still damn good and I’m eagerly awaiting the remold into Trailbreaker!