Packaging is the same old stuff, with the figures packed in their robot forms. The presentation still looks good, but I’m getting a little tired of the bios on the back. Why does every character have to be paired with some kind of personal vendetta against another? Bah! Let’s start with Skystalker.

I can’t tell whether Skystalker is supposed to be a stealth bomber or just some little stealth tech drone. The little red eye on the front of his cockpit makes me think he’s supposed to be an unmanned device. Either way I absolutely love his aircraft mode. The design is fresh and original and we haven’t seen anything quite like it in the Transformers line yet. There’s an impressive amount of tooling on a figure this size, right down to the panel lines and rivets. The white ID numbers stenciled on the sides look great and I love the Decepticon logos with the wings. Apart from a folding front landing gear, Skystalker’s jet mode doesn’t do a whole lot, but it sure does look awesome.

It took me a bit to get this guy into his jet mode the first time, but once I knew what I was doing, transforming him is a breeze. In robot mode, Skystalker looks pretty creepy. He’s got huge feet, but the rest of him is pretty lean and lanky. His head is certainly reminiscent of G1 Shockwave and I really like how his eye in jet form is also his eye in robot form. Nice continuity there. I also have to point out all the nice details sculpted on the inside of his wings. Its just a fine example of Hasbro going the extra mile on these toys. Fantastic.

About the only thing I’m not crazy about with this figure is the way his wings hang off his arms. They’re on balljoints so they can be folded neatly to the back, but since they’re attached to his shoulders and not his back, every time you move his arms, you pretty much have to reposition his wings to keep them out of the way. Its not a huge deal for me, since I just display these guys, but I’m thinking it might interfere with the play value a bit.

Skystalker also has a pair of hooks or axes or some kind of hand weapons concealed in his wings. You can pop them out and put one in each of his hands. Doing so also creates some cool cut-out patterns on his wings while he’s in robot form. Generally speaking, i’m not a big fan of my Transformers having swords and axes and shit like that, but then again, weapons are always a nice bonus, so who am I to complain?

The articulation on this figure is excellent. He’s got balljoints in his neck, shoulders, elbows and upper legs. His knees are hinged and for some strange reason his feet are spring loaded and fold up as soon as you pick him up. Weird.

Next up is Breakdown.

Straight away, this guy gets extra points in my book for being a Decepticon car and an homage to a G1 Stunticon. Unfortunately, he needs that extra cred. His car mode is pretty simple, which I probably wouldn’t mind so much if I wasn’t looking at him at the same time as Skystalker. The difference in detail on these two figures is huge and the car design seems a little over stylized or even super deformed. Also, Breakdown’s colors, or lack thereof, aren’t helping him too much either. His white motif is pretty boring and the red patch on his hood looks like it was thrown in as an afterthought. I’m sure this figure will be repainted into something much more interesting, but that doesn’t mean that Breakdown here couldn’t have gotten a better treatment with the brush.

Overall, Breakdown is easy to transform and has a pretty good robot mode. The fact that his chest is made up from the back end of the car is at least something different and I really like his head sculpt. I’m not crazy about how far his hood hangs off his back, but at least its out of the way as is most of his car kibble. He’s a lot more colorful in robot form, as most of his hidden robot parts are blue, but I’m still not sure about the color scheme. The whole red, white and blue motif makes him look like he should have been a Red Alert figure, rather than an evil Stunticon homage.

Breakdown’s articulation includes balljoints in the neck, shoulders and upper legs, and hinged elbows, knees and ankles. He’s a fun little figure with nice balance and poseability, but with some of the incredible Scout Class figures we’ve been getting lately, he defintely comes up a little short.

And that’s about all I have to say about these guys. The Scout Class figures have come a long way since the launch of the Revenge of the Fallen toys. These guys were $7 a piece, and I think they were both worth it. Yeah, Breakdown could have been better, and I’m sure this sculpt will be put to better use with more interesting colors down the line, but either way I’m glad to have both of these new Decepticons in my collection.

Lockdown comes on the standard ROTF deluxe card. This may be the last wave of figures we see mounted on these cards, although the new ones shown at Toy Fair aren’t all that different. Why there’s a NEST sticker on the bubble, I don’t know as that should just be reserved for Autobots. Also, I usually don’t bother commenting on the little bio blurbs on the back, but in the case of Lockdown, I thought there were two interesting tidbits. First off, despite his Decepticon allegiance  he’s also a bounty hunter. Secondly, the bio lists Ratchet as being Lockdown’s main target. Ratchet? Who the fuck would put a bounty out on Ratchet? Did he give someone a bad lube job? Wow that sounds dirty. And how hard could Ratchet possibly be to capture? Strange stuff, indeed!

I don’t know why I love Decepticon cars so much, but I have ever since the Stunticons were first introduced way back when. Lockdown’s car form is amazingly unique and distinctively Decepticon. He’s like one part vintage Corvette and two parts Road Warrior. The spoiler and elongated hood, and exposed engine give him a sleek muscular sportscar look, while the front scoop and copious helping of spikes make him something Mad Max would be happy to drive. The car’s body is brown with green two-tone accents. The windows and windshield are clear (always a plus in my book) with a red-orange tint and there’s a little gold trim on the ground effects and quad exhaust pipes. I really dig the spikes coming out of the wheels. The only thing I don’t care about on this car mode is some of the robot kibble scrapes bottom a bit when you roll it along. Maybe I just don’t have him locked down properly… HA!

Lockdown is really easy to transform, once you figure out how to unlock his solid car mode. Once you do, wow, what a great robot form! His left arm is a claw and the engine attaches to his forearm as a gun. His right arm ends with a hook, which is cool, but both his hand and hook are soft rubber, which is kind of disappointing. His head is fantastic. He looks grim and almost zombie like and his head features double ball joints to give him an unprecedented amount of articulation for a figure this size. And speaking of size, Lockdown is probably the tallest deluxe class figure I’ve seen. Just as a point of comparison, the recently released Brawn figure barely comes up to Lockdown’s shoulders! And that’s with his chicken legs fully compressed.

As great a figure as Lockdown is, I really don’t think he fits in the Revenge of the Fallen line. Besides being over-sized for a deluxe, he doesn’t quite have the same aesthetics of the ROTF figures. He almost looks like a cross between the Classics and movie lines and on that point, there’s something about him that makes me think of the G1 Junkions. It’s probably the non-symmetrical shoulders and the spiked tires he wears on his hips. Either way, it works for me!

So, yeah… this was an interesting experiment on Hasbro’s part. I’m curious to see if they try this with some other Animated figures. Maybe dropping Ratchet’s name is a hint that the Animated Ratchet design could get some kind of similar retooling? As a stand alone figure, he’s really great and I highly recommend him, especially if you’re like me and skipped the Animated line as this gives you an opportunity to incorporate one of Animated’s coolest figures into your collection. In fact, even those collectors who are passing on the movie toys entirely may want to give this Con a second look.

Dune Runner is a military-style dune buggy. I think I passed on him before because he reminded me so much of that Deluxe class dune buggy that was released at the tail end of the first movie line. If I wasn’t motivated enough to get that guy, why buy this one? I want to say his name was Armorhide, but some of this movie stuff is just a big blurr to me. Either way, Dune Runner’s vehicle form looks like a cross between something out of GI JOE and Halo. But, like all of ROTF’s Scout classes, he’s packaged in robot form, so we’ll start there.

Dune Runner has a pretty nice, complex and, super detailed robot form for a Scout Class figure. In fact, I think this guy could have been upscaled to a Deluxe and he would have gotten by just fine without any additional work. He has a nice clean, humanoid profile with the front of the vehicle becoming his feet, the roof forming his chest plate and the sides forming his arms. He has a slender gatling guns mounted on each shoulder and they’re mounted on double hinged arms so you can aim them all over the place. I absolutely love his little head sculpt. Its a great mix of classic and new design, complete with a blue visor for eyes and a cool helmet. The head seems like a Beachcomber homage. I don’t know if that was intentional, but it certainly fits since they’re both dune buggies.

I really dig the coloring on this figure too. The buggy parts are all green, his inner parts and limbs are black and he’s got some pale blue, metalic blue, silver, gold and yellow trim. There’s just a ton of color on this figure, albeit mostly subdued military tones. He has military style ID numbers painted on his doors, a silver Autobot symbol on his chest and a NEST insignia. You know how a lot of times Hasbro will release preview photos of figures with all sorts of great paint apps that are ultimately cut from the final release to save cost? (*cough* Long Haul *cough*) Well, Dune Runner looks like all the initial paintwork was kept in for the final release.

Articulation includes balljointed neck, shoulders and upper legs, double-hinged elbows and hinged knees, and as I already mentioned those arms that hold his gatling guns have three friggin points of articulation allowing for all sorts of great firing positions. Dune Runner can just as easily target Decepticons in the air as he can on the ground in front of him.

His transformation is pretty straightforward, although his dune buggy mode isn’t entirely solid. Sometimes, I do have some trouble getting the doors locked in tight and other times it all comes together just fine. The detail and paint apps in his buggy mode are just as amazing as his robot mode. There are spotlights molded on the front bumper and above the windshield, tiny rivets everywhere and the gatling guns on the back are still poseable in lots of positions. Hasbro has even detailed it with molded shocks on the front and back wheels and tiny vents and exhaust pipes on the back. It’s incredible work for such a tiny vehicle.

It just goes to show you, you never really know about a toy until you have it in your hand. I passed on this guy lots of times, and now that I own it, I have to say he’s probably the best Scout that Hasbro has turned out in years. I’m almost tempted to say he’s wasted on this small scale, but then there’s something so impressive about having a Scout class figure with this much detail, paint quality and articulation. Being a Scout also probably puts him in better scale with the Deluxe cars. If I was still a kid, I’d probably have this figure in my pocket all the time, he’s just that much fun. Great job on this one, Hasbro!

Like Brawn, Dirge is a deluxe figure that is part of the Revenge of the Fallen line, but not really a character from the movie. Maybe he was in the game, I don’t know, but he’s obviously a fanwank back to the original G1 character in more ways then his name.

In jet mode, Dirge is a harrier jump jet and a pretty good sculpt. There’s robot kibble a plenty underneath, but from the top he looks really good. I’ve always been fascinated by this aircraft design ever since I was a kid, so straightaway, Dirge is scoring some major points. The panels in his fuselage are nicely sculpted, the clear canopy actually opens to reveal a tiny molded seat, the landing gear retract and he’s got a big honkin missile launcher under each wing, which are pretty reminiscent of the ones on the original three G1 Seekers (although, ironically, the original Dirge had long black guns instead of launchers so FAIL, Hasbro… FAIL!). The coloring is primarily dark blue with some gold trim on the wings, forward vents and missiles, and some silver trim around the cockpit. Dirge has a big black Decepticon logo stamped right on his back.

Dirge’s Transformation is a bit complex, but you should already expect that from the ROTF deluxes by now. Its definitely a unique transformation that results in a pretty unique robot form, but there are both good and bad ideas at play here. The worst two things about the figure’s robot mode are his right arm and the wings on his legs. The right arm is comprised of the cockpit and nosecone part of the aircraft. Its stubbier than his good arm and while it does have articulation, the nosecone interferes with the shoulder so that basically all it can really do is rotate up and down at the shoulder. It is, however, saved by the fact that you can mount one of his wing rocket launchers onto it and at least make it into a functional weapon. I’m a fan of symmetry in my robot modes, so this does throw off the figure’s aesthetics quite a bit. You can also mount his other launcher on his good arm, but it does interfere with articulation. It seems like you really can’t win.

The wings on his legs are just kibbly, and Hasbro obviously saw this because they designed them with double hinges in addition to the ability to rotate. The result is that you can come up with all different positions for them and choose the one you like best. The one I like best isn’t the one shown in the instructions, but it gets them out of the way and makes them look like armor plating rather than just bits of aircraft hanging off of him.

With those two issues out of the way, the rest of this figure has some good points. I absolutely love the sculpting on his chest and head. The center of his chest is made up of what looks like a diminished cockpit, but its obviously just a fake-out because, as already pointed out, the jet mode’s real cockpit is on his right arm. There are two gears on his chest that make up his “mech-alive” feature, which rotate when his arms move up and down. The head sculpt is detailed and very much in line with the movie style faces, although it reminds me the most of the Armada Thrust figure. He does still have a conehead and the two shoulder cowls from his original G1 namesake are present. All in all, considering how bad the other Deluxe movie jets have been, Dirge is at least a step up. Now, onto Wheelie!

I don’t have nearly as much to say about Wheelie. I skipped his deluxe version because I just thought it was ridiculous of Hasbro to make him in the same scale as figures like Bumblebee or Sideswipe because in the movie he was an RC off-road truck and just a few feet tall in robot mode. He’s much more suited to the smaller and simpler Legends class. I don’t usually collect the Legend’s class toys at all, mainly because they’ve gotten way too expensive. Don’t get me wrong, some of the toys are impressive for such a small scale, but paying five bucks for an oversimplified Matchbox-sized version of a figure when you can get the original deluxe for ten or twelve is just not my bag. And as much as I like Legends Wheelie, I still can’t help but be amazed I had to pay five bucks for this little thing.

His “vehicle” mode works well, because it looks simple and toyish. Its mostly blue with silver painted windows and it rolls along on its over-sized black wheels. There’s a fair amount of robot kibble visible in his truck mode, most notably his face staring out the back of the cab. Granted, since Wheelie’s face is a rather abstract, it isn’t so obvious unless you know to look for it. His transformation is easy, but pretty clever and despite how complex Wheelie’s character model is, this simple Legends class gets it down pretty darn well. In fact, the only complaint I have is I wish the arms shifted toward the front so that they would be more prominent. Apart from that I think Hasbro really nailed this one. If only it were priced at around $3.99 it would be a sure thing.

Brawn’s vehicle form is a military style pick-up truck. Keep in mind that the figures being released now are focusing on the NEST teams, that is to say the Autobots working with humans to hunt down Decepticons, and as such, Brawn’s alt mode really fits the bill perfectly. The truck’s body is brown with a little black and green trim and the windows and windshield are all clear. There is some excellent detailing on the mold and the seams are pretty well placed so as not to be too ugly or too obvious. Each side of the truck bears the NEST emblem, and there’s an articulated black machine gun mounted on the top. As an homage, to G1 Brawn, its not too obvious, but it is close enough. I think the colors are actually a little closer to G1 Outback, although granted he was a repaint of Brawn. Overall, the truck mode is solid and unless you pick it up and peak underneath, there’s no obvious signs of there being more than meets the eye here.

Transforming this guy isn’t too bad, but there are a lot of plates to move out of the way and a few double hinged pieces to deal with. His transformation is definitely unique and while he does have a fair amount of truck kibble, most of it gets tucked off to the back and out of the way. I do have a problem with his upper leg ball joints wanting to pop out during transformation. Its a big pet peeve of mine with these toys. It’s been an issue with a lot of the RotF figures, so its not fair to single out Brawn here for it. Besides, better they are designed to pop off than break off.

In bot form, Brawn is just plain awesome. His primary color goes from brown to green, with a substantial amount of gold in his chest and upper arms. Its a little closer to G1 Brawn’s coloring, especially if you are substituting gold for yellow. He has two cutouts in his chest, which are supposed to show off the “mech alive” gears that are connected to his arms, but they are sunken pretty deep and aren’t easy to make out. I absolutely love Brawn’s head sculpt, which can be best described as Autobot meets Cylon and it is quite reminscent of the head on the G1 toy.

Another cool and unique thing about Brawn is that he comes with two pistols that are actually in his hands when you transform him. They can both be removed if you wish, but this is the first Transformer I can think of that had detachable hand guns that were already in place when he was transformed. This design would be right at home in the movie, transforming to bot mode, doing a roll and coming up with both guns blazing.

Brawn’s articulation is quite good. He has the aforementioned ball joints in the upper legs, hinged knees and ankles, and hinged heel spurs. He can turn at the waist and at the neck. His shoulders are ball jointed and his elbows are hinged. Despite all the truck parts hanging off of him, none of them really deter his articulation, making him a pretty fun figure. The machine gun from his truck mode can also be positioned over his head. He can be a bit back heavy, though, if you don’t get his kibble positioned just right.

I really tried to be picky about the ROTF toys I buy, but Brawn is yet another reason why I have so many. He’s a really well designed figure with great coloring and sculpting. For a while I was bitching a lot about Hasbro upping the price on the Deluxes to about $12 now, but I don’t seem to mind so much when I’m buying figures like Brawn where the investment in details and complex engineering is so apparent. He’s a quality piece, its obvious a lot of work went into him, and I highly recommend adding him to your Autobot army.