Dave's Revenge of the Fallen Rant The Fury of Fearswoop Fearswoop (Movie1 Dreadwing) Sideswipe (Legends redeco) Mudflap (Legends redeco) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/RotF/Fearswoop This is a Walmart exclusive set that combines a redeco from 2007 and some Legends and actually throws together a storyline to make sense of the combination. Fearswoop is a G2 Hooligan homage in deco and personality, and the Dreadwing mold is appropriate given that his bio in 2007 was also a Hooligan homage. Sideswipe and Mudflap are essentially just battle damage decos. Given my lack of enthusiasm for the Dreadwing mold, I don't plan to get this for myself unless I find it on deep clearance, but Wonkimus Major wanted a set. http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Movie/Deluxe2 - Dreadwing http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/RotF/Legends1 - Legends Sideswipe http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/RotF/Legends2 - Legends Mudflap CAPSULE Fury of Fearswoop: All three molds were originally mildly recommended. Neither Legend was particularly improved on by the weak battle damage paint, but Fearswoop does look a lot better than Dreadwing. The mold's no better, though. Mildly recommended if you have none of the original molds, otherwise just barely above neutral. $24 exclusive to Walmart, you might want to wait and see if it gets clearanced. RANTS Packaging: A Voyager-style box, but a little smaller than Voyagers. 11" (28cm) wide, 8" (20cm) tall, 3" (7.5cm) deep. Everything's in robot mode, with Fearswoop on the left, Sideswipe in the upper right, Mudflap in the lower right. At the bottom left is Fearswoop's name, allegiance and faction symbol. In the lower right are the names, faction and symbol of the two Autobots. The middle bottom of the front has the overall line logo and "THE FURY OF FEARSWOOP". There's the usual "Only at Walmart" sticker in the lower right of the window. The co-sells on the bottom are Voyagers Longarm and Blackout. Yes, Blackout, not Grindor. Looks like this packaging was finalized before Grindor's. Each side panel has the set name and the name or names of the character on that side. On the back, there's photos of the three in both modes, in the same relative positions as in the box (Fearswoop on the left, etc). They have individual techspecs, the Legends have the same specs as their original versions. I've just cut and pasted the relevant parts of the entries from my Legends reviews for those two. There's a single bio note for the set in the upper right, I'll include it in Fearswoop's entry. It ties the set together by making Fearswoop out to be a Legends class figure, to scale with Sideswipe and Mudflap. Inside, the combined instructions are a single folded sheet behind the cardboard tray. It's single-sided, grayscale only. All the twist-ties are through just the plastic tray, nothing goes all the way through. Fearswoop's missiles are in the upper right corner, mostly concealed by the border of the outer box. DECEPTICON: FEARSWOOP Altmode: F-35-ish fighter jet Licensor: None Previous Name Use: None Previous Mold Use: Movie1 Gimmick: Automorph Function: Hooligan Motto: "What, can't take a joke? Then take this instead! (ZAP)" FEARSWOOP has always been dangerous, if only by accident. His passion for practical jokes inevitably crosses the line from possibly funny to almost certainly dangerous. Now, his latest exploit has brought him into contact with an ancient and mighty artifact that causes him to grow to immense size. Delighting in his newfound power, he has embarked on a riot of destruction, cackling the whole time. It's up to SIDESWIPE and MUDFLAP to find a way to stop the giant DECEPTICON, before the devastation threatens the entire planet. STR 10 INT 3 SPD 8 END 9 RNK 2 COUR 3 FRB 10 SKL 2 Avg 5.875 While the name has not been used in the U.S. before, it was one of the Trakkons (a gimmick subline that didn't get used in G2 here) in Europe at the tail end of G1, re-released at the start of G2. Packaging: Five ties around the robot, one around each of the missiles, although you can slide the missiles out without undoing those ties. The right arm of the one I got had popped off the shoulder in package, but was easy enough to pop back on. The winglet flaps are not deployed for robot mode in package, but the instructions do show them out. Color Swaps: Blue-gray becomes bright orange, all the clear plastic is clear yellow, purple becomes black, black stays black. Paint Apps: Most notable in both modes is the black tiger striping that completes the homage to Hooligan. Divebomb (Cybertron Thundercracker redeco) was an earlier Hooligan homage, but it was very subtle. This one is obvious and unambiguous. The only paint unique to the robot mode is silver on the upper arms, covering more of the arm than the silver paint on Dreadwing. The leading edges of the wings are white. There's silver on the orange plastic parts of the jet thrusters, but the black plastic parts are left unpainted. There's dark purple Decepticon symbols on either side of the cockpit and on the outsides of the vertical tail parts. The insides of the vertical tail sections are mostly black with "J725" in negative space. I don't know what J725 means, if anything, nor does Googling or checking tfwiki.net reveal what it might mean. Mirror-flopping it vertically kind of gives you 7J52, especially if you rewrite it in old style calculator font, but that may have nothing to do with the intent. There's orange paint on the strutwork of the cockpit, a so-so match...they'd have been better off with black. The root of the flames on the missiles is painted clear red. Mold Changes: None I can find. Other Notes: The shoulder sockets hold REALLY weakly. The arms pop off with very little provocation. Overall: Not really sure why they felt they had to add the white stripes, they don't particularly improve the design. I like the looks a lot better here, but I didn't really care for Dreadwing's colors (and yes, I know the movie Dreadwing's colors were an homage to the G1 Dreadwing...didn't much care for the colors there either). AUTOBOT: SIDESWIPE Altmode: Corvette Stingray Concept Licensor: GM Previous Name Use: G1, G2, Alternators, Armada, Universe2 (Side Swipe in RiD) Previous Mold Use: RotF Function: Warrior Motto: "Who needs a gun?" STR 8 INT 7 SPD 8 END 6 RNK 5 COUR 7 FRB 3 SKL 9 Avg 6.625 Packaging: 3 twist-ties. Color Swaps: None. Paint Apps: As far as I can tell, identical to the original, but with the addition of several gunmetal clawmarks. Two clawtracks on either side, a long trio on the top of the car, and two smaller ones on the hood. No changes to robot mode. Mold Changes: None. Other Notes: None. Overall: As battle damage goes, it's not convincing, especially since Fearswoop doesn't have claws! AUTOBOT: MUDFLAP Altmode: Chevy Trax Concept Licensor: GM Previous Name Use: Cybertron, Movie1 (TRU exclusive recolor, not the same character as this one) Previous Mold Use: RotF Function: Kid Sidekick Motto: "Man, that's so immature! Big orange dummy..." STR 4 INT 5 SPD 7 END 5 RNK 2 COUR 9 FRB 4 SKL 3 Avg 4.875 Packaging: A full five twist-ties. Color Swaps: None. Paint Apps: Same as the original, but vehicle mode has gunmetal clawmarks. Three-claw tracks on the roof and either side and a two-claw track on the hood. No changes to robot mode. Mold Changes: None. Other Notes: None. Overall: It'd have been nice if the extra paint budget were used to fix up the back and and put more color on the taillights, rather than some weak battle damage. Dave Van Domelen, figures Mudflap is immune to irony.