Dave's Animorphs Rant:

     Marco/Beetle

     Thanks go out to Terry Flora who got me this toy.  It never showed up in
my area, but Terry snagged a lonely peg-warming clearanced Marco this week
and mailed it to me.

CAPSULE

     Marco/Beetle: Unlike most Animorphs, this is made from a rigid plastic.
Beetle mode is very nice, humanoid mode is okay, transformation is pretty
good.  On the off chance you can actually find one, Recommended.

     Scans of Marco are up at http://www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~dvandom/Ani

RANT

     Beast Mode: The core body is 4" (10cm) long, if you measure from
mandible tip to rear leg "toes," the beetle is 7" (18cm) long.  Made from
rigid plastic in yellow and dark green (mostly dark green) with red and dark
green accents (the dark green accents are on the yellow, natch).  A little
bit of peach color pokes through around the mouth from the human hands.
     All six legs are fairly poseable at the "hips" on ball joints, and the
toy stands very nicely on its legs in a realistic pose.  The mandibles move a
little, although the fact that they're pegged on means they might pop off if
you mess with them too much.  The rear carapace folds out like a proper
beetle's, although there's nothing but human mode stuff underneath, no wings
or anything.  With the exception of the mandibles, this mode is very stable
and holds together well.

     Transformation: Once again, the instructions lack words, but fortunately
this is a reasonably intuitive transformation.  The rear legs fold up into
humanoid feet about the same way the original Waspinator's do, but with one
fatal flaw...the insect leg bits are longer than the shins, so they keep the
knees from bending.  As usual, there's a regular head and a mutant head, and
again there's a parallel to the original Waspinator with the rotation of the
heads.  Given that it's possible to fully transform the figure without
removing the mandibles, I think making them so easily removed may have been a
bad idea...another part to lose.

     Humanoid mode: Like many Animorphs toys, this would be a lot better if
they just gave up on the pretense of a human mode.  The molded shirt and
silvery pants just look stupid on what would have otherwise been a very nice
beetle Transformer.  Stands 4.75" (12cm) tall at the head, the yellows are
subdued and the reds brought to the fore.  And the stupid silver cutoff
jeans.  The carapace piece doesn't actually lock down to anything, instead
flapping about like a short cape or something.  The forearms are the halves
of the insect head, and they're rather bulky, inhibiting motion.
     Unlike a lot of transforming insects, Marco doesn't have a pile of legs
to deal with.  Two fold up into his legs, two more tuck neatly behind his
back, and the remaining pair on his upper arms don't get in the way.
     His weapon/gimmick consists of his insect mode mandibles, which can be
kinda used as hand weapons, either left plugged into his wrists or removed
and held kinda dippily in his hands.  They really don't look all that good no
matter how he holds them, because the Popeye forearms he's got get in the way
of any potentially good positions.

     Overall: I actually hope to see this figure come back as a remold
somehow.  Replace the head and eliminate the clothing molding and it'd be a
very nice Insecticon.  And maybe fiddle with the mandibles so that they can
be held better in robot mode.  If you can find this on clearance in your
area, snap it up.

     Dave Van Domelen, snagged a couple of $1.97 Grand Moff Tarkins at TRU
today to kitbash into professors....