Dave's Transformers Animated Rant: Leader Wave 2 Ultra Magnus (Assault Carrier) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Leader2 When I went looking for the last Real Gear Robot I was missing on HasbroToyShop.com, I saw that they had Ultra Magnus available. Between the 10% off code I had and the lack of sales tax, it was cheaper to get it from HTS than wait for it to hit a local store. :) Well, that was the THEORY. Looking at the invoice, it turns out they failed to apply the coupon code to this part of the order (it shipped separately from the rest), plus the split shipment had higher shipping cost. I think this wave is just two Ultra Magnuses per case, but I haven't gotten enough sightings reports yet to really be sure. The Ultra Magnus I got from HTS was broken (no robot mode sounds), so I'll have to complete the review after I get a replacement. Yay, time to navigate Hasbro's customer service complaint department. I will add to this review once I have a replacement, as well as go over what I've already written and edit it. Update 9/27/08: The invoice thing was an error on the invoice, not an actual boost in what I was charged. So I've sent it back for a replacement rather than for a refund. Update 10/22: Still waiting on a replacement. Meanwhile, I've inserted guest comments by Doug Dlin on the robot mode voices. Update 11/26: FINALLY got the replacement. The shoulder block triggers are a little dodgy, leading to random transformation noises when moving the robot around. Otherwise, Doug's comments on the robot mode sounds hold true for mine. And the "It's not in your programming" line just drips with condescension and/or sarcasm. CAPSULE Ultra Magnus: Great-looking robot mode, somewhat frustrating transformation (mostly dealing with the force required to get some parts to move), solid vehicle mode, loads of weapons in both forms. Recommended (the struggle to transform drops it from Strongly Recommended). $39.99 at HasbroToyShop.com (plus $8.95 shipping). RANT Packaging: Same as wave 1. The co-sells on the side are Roll Out Command Optimus Prime and the Wave 1 Leaders. On the bottom are Soundwave and the Wave 4 Deluxes. Comes with the second catalog (the one with Universe rather than Iron Man), and the instructions are unbagged in the bottom space of the inner tray. Be sure to try the Try Me button if you see this in the store, before buying it. As my first HTS sample proves, there's some broken ones out there. AUTOBOT: ULTRA MAGNUS Altmode: Assault Carrier Function: Elite Commander Previous Name Use: G1, RiD, Universe, Classic, Energon, Titanium WarWithin Previous Mold Use: None Callouts: (front) "Spring-loaded mass-hammer!" (upper right) "ULTRA MAGNUS is the ultimate AUTOBOT warrior!" (back) "Expression changes when he talks!" "Flip up heavy cannons!" "Hidden weapons!" "Spring-loaded, expanding mass-hammer!" "Weapon power-up sounds!" "Flip out machine- cannons!" "Electronic lights, sounds and speech!" Mottos: "Stand your ground, AUTOBOTS!" "We must return the Allspark to Cybertron!" (the second one is actually a call-out for one of his voice gimmick phrases) Galactic Powers & Abilities: > Carries several experimental weapons. > Mass-hammer also controls local weather. > Even older than AUTOBOT RATCHET. Commander of the CYBERTRON Elite Guard, ULTRA MAGNUS is the most powerful AUTOBOT warrior in the galaxy. He has trained for hundreds of years in all forms of fighting known on CYBERTRON, and several other planets. No AUTOBOT is more courageous, or more dedicated to the protection of life and freedom. He is a master tactician who has never been beaten on a battlefield, and was instrumental in driving the DECEPTICONS from CYBERTRON and into deep space. Packaging: As with all Leaders, he's packaged in robot mode. He's holding his hammer in his right hand with the help of twist-ties and rubber bands. Two ties through the bottom of the inner tray wrap around the feet, five ties through the back of the tray get torso and arms, one on the side around the hammer. No hard to get at ties. A profusion of rubber bands hold the torso, shoulders and knees together, and keep the hammer in the hand. 8 bands in total. Robot Mode: 8.5" (22cm) tall, 6.5" (16.5cm) across at the shoulders, 1 pound 4 ounces (562 grams). The overall look is very close to the animated model, albeit with a higher level of detail. Primarily darkish metalflake blue a little darker than Sentinel's, plus light faintly blue gray and black. His most obvious vehicle mode bits are his shoulderpads, made from the halves of his front end. Most of the other vehicle parts are folded up and hidden in the boots. The following pieces are definitely made of faintly metalflake dark blue plastic (moderate UV glow): helmet top, helmet sides, neck, torso, hip flaps, forearms (including palms and thumbs), energy cannons (mostly), energy cannon strut, shoulder tops (under the shoulderpads), vehicle kibble flaps at the backs of the shoulderpads, most of the boots (including the toes). The face and chin are probably this plastic, but might be painted clear blue. The following pieces are a light silvery-blue gray (moderate UV gray): most of the shoulderpad chunks, connectors between the back and the shoulder struts, a flap behind the head, finger pieces (a single mitten-like chunk for each hand), kneecaps, inside of the shoulder joints, some hinge pieces on the boots, soles of the feetm push-tabs on the energy cannons for deploying secondary barrels. The following pieces are black plastic: upper arms, elbow joints, part of the inner shoulder, windows on the shoulderpads, struts inside the shoulderpads (see Weapon Deployment), struts connecting the shoulders to the back, thighs, wheels on the back of the boots, barrels of the secondary shoulder guns. Clear dark teal plastic is used on the eyes, the molded Elite Guard symbol on the chest, muzzles of the energy cannons, little bits on some flaps on the sides of the boots. And possibly the face. Visible through the grille slots on the abdomen is the speaker, which seems to be covered in green plastic or paint or something. Red paint: Chest symbol and its flanking stripes, little bits on the toes, tech detail channels on the hip flaps. Black paint: Tech-detailed stripe across chest, abdomen flanks, most of the toes, shins, the rearmost windows on the cab. Yellow paint: headlights on the shoulderpads. Electric blue paint: fog lamps on the shoulderpads, vents on the tabs on the back of the shoulderpads, strips on the sides of the boots. Gunmetal gray paint: helmet antennae, bumpers on the shoulderpads. Dark blue paint: grille and foglamp borders on the shoulderpads, maybe the chin and nose. The most extensively used paint is a light blue-gray that's a decent match for the similarly colored plastic. It's on the following bits: face, lower chest, central abdomen, inner thighs, and a >||> pattern on each forearm. Yeah, it's the G1 Optimus Prime pattern but with an extra flag at the flat end to make it into a sort of modified set of Sergeant's hashmarks. So they're definitely using that symbol as a rank insignia, and added the flag at the end to put Ultra Magnus at a rank above Prime. Nice touch. There's a recurring motif in his design of semi-chevron borders between colors. Gives him a vaguely heraldic (as in knights) appearance. Reinforces the idea of his extreme age...he's a holdover from a bygone age, and no amount of upgrading or assuming Earth vehicle modes will completely hide that. On to articulation. The head turns and the top tips back to open the mouth. The head can only turn 90 degrees to either side, which suggests that the LED inside is connected by wires rather than a sliding contact. The waist does not turn, the entire torso being a single chunk. This seems in part to be due to the electronics filling part of the pelvis, since the battery compartment takes up most of the chest. Due to transformation joints, the shoulders are over-articulated, but the intended joints are universal ratchets, 16 point (1/16 of a circle per click) in each direction. Smooth upper arm swivels, 16 point ratcheting hinge elbows, smooth opening mitten-hands. No wrists. 16 point soft-ratcheting universal hips that can move 90 degrees away from staight down in all the usual directions. Smooth swivels just above each knee, knees are soft-ratching at 16 points, five clicks possible before the wheels on the back of the boots ram into the thighs. No meaningful ankle or toe articulation. Weapon Deployment: The cannons on the back can fold up and over to flank the head. A tab in an L-shaped slot on the outer side of each cannon raises up a secondary gun and then slides the barrel forward. The secondary barrels have tank gun styling, so they're presumably shell-firing weapons, as opposed to the main barrels being energy cannons. It's hard to work the deployment tab for the secondary guns when the main guns are deployed, as the shoulderpads get in the way. The front ends of the shoulderpads can fold down to reveal weapon pods that flip up on struts to rest on top of the shoulders. The pods are the same color plastic as the shoulderpads, as are the slider tabs on top of the pods. Pushing the tabs forward pushes three black barrels forward, making the whole thing look like a battleship gun battery. The pods can elevate, but not rotate. The bumpers on the shoulderpads can be pried out (seriously, I had to use a knife) to reveal 4-barrel miniguns made of black plastic, with barrels about an inch (2.5cm) long. In vehicle mode these meet together at the centerline. His Mass-hammer can be simply gripped by either hand, but there's a tab on the upper half of the handle that fits snugly into a slot on either palm for a firm grip. However, he's choked up enough that the hammer head and shoulderpad get in each other's way. Pulling up on the center of the hammer head makes the clear blue plastic peens pop out on springs, increasing the head's length from 2.25" (4.5cm) to 3" (7.5cm). The total length of the hammer is 5.5" (13.5cm). The shaft is black plastic, the head core is dark blue metalflake plastic, and the peens are dark teal clear plastic. Some light electric blue details are painted on the sides of the head. One nifty feature is the use of inertia to deploy it...if you swing the hammer quickly enough, the peens will pop out on their own. Unfortunately, the hinge in the middle of the shaft is likely to bend when you do this. Physics geek time, the center of mass of the hammer is about a millimeter from the bottom of the head. I know this because you can lay it down on the side without it tipping over, but trying to set it on the peen face results in tipping. Folding the shaft lets it rest on the face without tipping. Sound and light gimmick: Pressing the Elite Guard symbol on his chest makes the majority of the head tilt up and back, leaving the chin center in place so that his mouth opens about 1.5mm. If you manually tip the head back, the mouth opens as much as 4mm. A pity...at 5mm he could eat Mini-Con hardpoints. :) When the top of the head tilts back, the "scalp" of the helmet tilts a little bit so that it looks like he's raising his right eyebrow. The vehicle mode button is concealed under a flap under the left armpit, but pressing the flap will press the button. There's a red LED behind the chest symbol, a green LED in the head that lights up the eyes, and yellow LEDs in the energy cannons. Further anaylsis (including whether the vehicle mode button is disabled in robot mode) will have to wait until I get a working copy. Headmaster: There are slots to hold Headmaster's pegs. As far as I can tell, they're "dead" slots, but since the robot mode sounds are broken, I can't tell if Headmaster unlocks anything. =========================================================================== Guest comments by Doug Dlin, who got a working Magnus before I did: The robot mode sound gimmick involves three voice clips of Jeff Bennett as Ultra Magnus, cycling through the following order: "Ultra Magnus here." "Don't be a hero, Optimus. It's not in your programming." "We must return the Allspark to Cybertron." I don't recall the "Allspark" clip from any episode, but the other two are alternate takes of two of his lines from "Transform and Roll Out! Part 1". Each clip is accompanied by a series of LED flashes from his chest (red), eyes (green), and dual cannon muzzles (yellow). The number of flashes is different for each quote: 3 for "Ultra Magnus here," 8 for "Don't be a hero" and 5 for "We must return". Pressing the chest button repeatedly will interrupt the quotes. Holding it down continuously won't do anything once a voice clip is done. Sadly, the Headmaster head unit doesn't unlock any further voice clips. The vehicle-mode sound button is disabled so long as one shoulder block is in place (or one shoulder button is held down). The vehicle mode sounds are accessible as soon as both shoulder blocks are dislodged, and can be activated by pushing on the blue "armpit" panel under his left arm, as well as directly pushing the red-painted button under the panel. Dislodging the shoulder just enough while a voice clip is playing will interrupt the clip to activate the transformation noise. The energy cannon/zapper noise lasts about 3.5 seconds and is accompanied by seven flashes of the yellow cannon LEDs. Holding down the button will cycle the noise and flashes until you let it go. =========================================================================== Transformation: A lot of very stiff panels with double joints to reposition stuff. Pretty simple in princple, and I was able to get it to work without looking at the instructions. The shoulderpads lift up to become the front of the vehicle, with the chest being on the underside of the vehicle. The boots unfold and wrap around the sides in a manner reminiscent of Leader Decepticon Brawl...except no hair-trigger automorph mucking up the works. It's a little heavy on the tab-and-slot, but once you do get all the bits in place it's stable. In practice, getting some of those joints to bend takes Excessive Force and really good leverage. I guess he's getting the Cybertronian equivalent of arthritis in his advanced age. And there's a few flaps (kneecaps and boot side flaps) that don't really go far enough to be useful, being excess kibble. Undoing the light gray bits that hold the shoulder struts will cause a G1 transformation sound effect (which will happen once for each shoulder). During this sound, all of the LEDs will flash three times. You have to undo both shoulders before it will switch over from robot mode sounds to vehicle mode sounds. The black clips that hold the gray parts in place are NOT the triggers. If you look into the slot a few millimeters centerward of each clip, you can just see a tiny 1mm wide round button. A tab on the shoulder piece pushes that button...pushing it or releasing it will trigger the sound. [Or, in the case of my replacement one, just flexing the plastic a little in that area. The tabs pushing the buttons down are just a hair too short.] Vehicle Mode: While officialy an "Assault Carrier," it looks a lot more like an eight-wheeled airport firetruck along the lines of the Classics Mini-Con Firebot, with the main weapon system resembling a storage tank. Predominantly dark metalflake blue with a light blue-gray cab and black wheels. The rivets on the cab do make it look more armored, though, as do some of the details around the windows (nice windshield wipers). There's numerous grating patterns and even some diamondplate on the top deck. Hydraulic hoses are molded into the wheel wells. [Later note: Suspsy points out it's based on a "Dragon Wagon" Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_Expanded_Mobility_Tactical_Truck ] [An even later note: the entry on him in vol 8 of the TF:A celbook collections confirms that he's a HEMTT.] As a default, no weapons are deployed. The miniguns are hidden in the bumper, the tribarrels are hidden in the cab, the main cannons are folded backwards. With no weapons out, it's 9" (23cm) long, 3.5" (9cm) wide and 3.75" (9.5cm) tall at the hammer in back (only 2.75" or 7cm tall at the front). Popping the guns out doesn't change the height (unless you elevate the guns), but increases the length to 9.75" (25cm). It rolls well on its eight 1" (2.5cm) diameter wheels, and a load of weapons can pop out. The tribarrels can elevate, as can the main guns. None of the weapons can rotate, although you can aim the miniguns off to the side by only partly pulling them out. Looks kinda doofy, though. Most of the plastic colors and paint applications are visible in robot mode. The clear teal bits on those boot flaps become tail lights. The soles of the feet are side panels between the two wheel sets, and they have silver- painted molded fuel tanks. There's a plate with six rivets in it above each side panel, painted gunmetal. Ahead of the driver's side gunmetal plate is a molded rectangular button with a triangular indent (think Planet Key slot indicator), painted red. This triggers the sounds in this mode. Pressing the red button yields an electronic zapping sound and seven flashes of the yellow LEDs in the main guns. The red and green LEDs are disabled, so no ricing-style underbody lights going off. Overall: There's some panel issues (both in transformation and in staying together in vehicle mode), and the big shoulders can cause problems in robot mode. Other than that, assuming you get one that works, it's a great toy. No random missiles firing off to get lost, plenty of visible weapons that are in-scale with the figure (i.e. no giant Q-tip missiles). Dave Van Domelen, only had to wait two months for a replacement.