Dave's Transformers Universe Rant: Deluxe Wave 4 Starscream (G1 Series, jet) Autobot Hound with Ravage (G1 Series, jeep and cassette) Cyclonus with Nightstick (G1 Series, jet and Targetmaster) Cheetor (Beast Wars Series, cheetah) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/U2/Deluxe4 Starscream is Yet Another Redeco of the Classics Starscream mold, first reviewed at http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Classic/Deluxe1 (Recommended mold). The other three in this wave are new molds. CAPSULES Starscream: A more cartoon-inspired redeco of the mold. Going back to the well a few times too many, but what the heck, it looks nice even if it's kinda floppy. Mildly recommended. $7.77 at Wal-Mart. Autobot Hound: Hound has a good vehicle mode, interesting transformation and a very good robot mode, with only a few design flaws to keep it from being perfect. Ravage is mostly in the category of "nice try", but as a bonus figure it's pretty good. Strongly recommended. $9.99 at HasbroToyShop.com Cyclonus: Somewhat unstable and finicky vehicle mode, good transformation, very good robot mode. Recommended. $9.99 at HTS. Cheetor: Realistic cheetah beast mode hampered by some needlessly limited range of motion, slightly tricky transformation, backpack-y robot mode covered in kibble. Mildly recommended. $9.99 at HTS. RANTS Packaging: Time to upgrade to the 25th Anniversary packaging, with a "25" molded into the upper left facet of the blister and a silver foil "25 Years 1984-2009" corner banner in the upper right of the card. On the card just above the blister on the right is "G1 Series" or "Beast Wars Series" as appropriate. The cardback adds an era slider in the lower left, listing the years and era (i.e. Generation 1, '84-'91). The co-sells on the bottom are only of two other figures in the wave, not all three. No catalogs inside, just instructions. Mottos and functions are my creations. And just a reminder, when I list previous name or mold use, I only mean U.S. mass market...I leave out Japanese and convention-exclusive releases. DECEPTICON: STARSCREAM Series: Generation 1 Altmode: F-15 Fighter Jet Function: Designated Backstabber Weapon: Twin Null-Ray Cannons with Launching Missiles Previous Name Use: G1, G2, MW, Armada, Energon, Cybertron, Classic, Movie, Animated Previous Mold Use: Classic Starscream, Skywarp variant Motto: "Megatron has fallen! I am now LEADER of the...oh, hello, Mighty Megatron. I was just, er...." STARSCREAM is one of the deadliest warriors ever to emerge from the early battles of the civil war. He allied himself early on with MEGATRON, realizing that the DECEPTICON way was the easiest path to absolute power. He takes joy in destruction, his shrill laughter echoing across any battlefield over which he flies. Despite his power, he is a coward at heart, a bully more than a tyrant. He lives to lord his strength over those weaker than him, but he lives in fear of anyone stronger. STR 7 INT 6 SPD 10 END 6 RNK 8 COUR 4 FRB 8 SKL 8 Avg 8.375 Yes, these are the same numbers as Classics Starscream. Packaging: Four twist-ties on the jet, one each on the missiles. No rubber hands. The co-sells are Hound and Cheetor, and the package art is basically the same as the Classics version but with some color tweaks. Color Swaps: The silvery gray is replaced by a very light ghost gray, almost white. The rubbery nosecone matches this light ghost gray. The blue is a little brighter, and the cockpit cover is more of an amber. The thrust nozzles are the same as before, whether painted or cast in that gunmetal color. Paint Apps: Very close to the G1 look, rather than the semi-realistic scheme used on the Classic one. The coverage of blue on the tail fins is really good, to the point it almost looks like blue plastic. The red paint has a strong UV glow, and likewise does some pretty full coverage in places. There's no rubsign, but two dark purple Decepticon symbols are printed on the tops of the wings, although they end up upside down in robot mode. The front and top of the head are painted gloss black, the face and cockpit interior are gunmetal, the eyes are red. The face really should be lighter if they're shooting for cartoon accuracy. Other Notes: The mold may well be showing its age. The guns peg rather loosely into the wings and the shoulders, and the wings themselves are pretty loose in robot mode. The toy is generally pretty loose, it might be time to retire the mold already. There's one concession to the mold's panel lines in the paint scheme. The wing stripes don't simply turn a sharp corner as they approach the wingtips, there's a small zigzag to follow some panel lines, a nice little bit of flair. Overall: Nice, bold appearance that's generally faithful to the animation model. But the mold seems to have been used at least once too many times now...either retire it, or overhaul it more carefully than they've been doing. AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT HOUND Series: Generation 1 Altmode: "Off-Road" Function: Scout Weapon: Hologram projector Previous Name Use: Alternators, Universe 2 Legend (G1 was "Hound" unadorned) Previous Mold Use: None Motto: "Observe everything, remember even more." DECEPTICON: RAVAGE Series: Generation 1 Altmode: Tape Function: Saboteur Weapon: None mentioned, but missile pods molded on hips Previous Name Use: G1, Alternators ("Battle Ravage" and "Command Ravage" have been used in Energon and Alternators) Previous Mold Use: None Motto: "Today's AUTOBOTS are tomorrow's scrap metal." Chief tracker and scout for OPTIMUS PRIME, AUTOBOT HOUND packs some of the most sophisticated sensing technology of any of the AUTOBOTS. He is capable of tracking even the most stealthy and light-footed DECEPTICON - namely RAVAGE - through rivers, across bare rock, and even through the air by the spare whisper of electromagnetic radiation the robot panther leaves behind. Though RAVAGE can hide almost perfectly in even the slightest shadow, no amount of skill can prevent AUTOBOT HOUND from finding him. STR 5 INT 8 SPD 5 END 7 RNK 6 COUR 10 FRB 3 SKL 9 Avg 6.625 Heh, nice. A dedicated "versus pack" here. I presume the stat numbers apply to only Hound. Packaging: Two twist-ties on Hound's jeep mode, one on Ravage in panther mode, one on the hologram projector. No rubber bands. "RAVAGE included!" is printed below the name on the blister insert. The package art, however, is just Hound. He's snarling slightly, they seem to have found a balance between "zombie" and "constipated". The toy photo on the cardback has some odd differences in the arms. The main colors are swapped (black forearms, green fists and upper arms), the paint apps are different (three yellow stripes per arm, not just one), and the left fist has no peg hole. Vehicle Mode: Well, it's a jeep-like vehicle, with dune buggy characteristics to it, plus a big brushguard and a winch. A pretty good modernization of the classic Hound. Like Beachcomber, there's a certain amount of Halo's Warthog in the vehicle mode too. The interior detailing is almost at the Alternators level, with bucket seats, molded dashboard, doors, etc. Okay, nothing opens up, so the comparison ends there, but still. The hologram projector clips onto the back of either seat rather than being a mount in the rear. It kinda looks like a Gurren Lagann drill. :) [Later note: Hound is essentially the Jeep Hurricane, a twin-engined concept vehicle capable of turning in place. But with the trademark elements suppressed as usual.] 4.75" (12cm) long with big 1" (2.5cm) diameter tires. The dominant plastic color is olive green. The seats are white plastic. The protective bits behind the seats are black, as are the tires, the grille and the tabs that fold up to let you carry Ravage around. The headlights and windshield are clear medium blue plastic. It took a bit of knifework, but I determined that the brushguard is mostly green plastic dipped in paint, with a black plug to let it pop off for safety purposes. The main paint color is gunmetal gray, which is on the brushguard, the rear bumper, the bottom sides, the hologram projector point and the trunk top. There's green paint on the windshield piece that's a bit glossier than the green plastic but otherwise matches okay. A red Autobot symbol is printed at the front center of the hood, and the taillights are red. The foglamps on the front and at the top of the windshield are yellow, the winch cable is silver, and there's a white five-pointed star on the right front fender. It rolls along nicely on the wheels. The seats fold down, and if you want the brushguard can be removed (although it's not meant to be optional). There's essentially no robot kibble, even looking at the underside it's mostly non-obvious block shapes. Transformation: When you look at the vehicle mode, the most "obvious" thing that might come to mind is "Oh, the seats become feet, like in a lot of Alternators." This thought, however, would be wrong. The seats fold down and become the THIGHS. That is pretty cool. In fact, the whole way the legs assemble is quite nifty. The front end is fairly standard "arms fold out from under the front end and the head pops up from the center of the hood" in nature, although the wheels are on separate struts. This can be a bit tricky the first few times, but it's a nice extra step. About the only real problem with the transformation is that the torso doesn't really lock together, being held by ratcheting joints. The wheel struts have a lot of play to them, and you can also position the wheels directly behind his head, face to face, for a more compact version. Robot Mode: 5" (13cm) tall. Overall, it's pretty close to the animation model, if a bit more black and less white or yellow. In this mode it's more obvious that they moved the Autobot symbol from the left fender to the center of the hood (the fender's partly blocked by the brushguard). The entirety of each arm is black plastic, as are the shins, pelvis, spine and calves. The neck base, thighs and the inner joints of the shoulders (the strut holding the ball) are white plastic. The lightpiping in the eyes is clear blue. That leaves the head, chest, feet and some panels on the sides of the knees to be green plastic. Oddly, the forearms are painted entirely green, in a "dipped in the paint" sense. There's a single yellow stripe on each forearm, as per animation (rather than the toy's twin stripes), and yellow kneecaps. The sides of the pelvis front are gunmetal, the face is silver. Other paint as per vehicle mode. The hologram projector doesn't really stay on the shoulder very well, and it points downwards due to the slope of the chest anyway. It seems like it was designed to be a pistol first, and they just sort of arbtitrarily picked a place on the shoulder where it could more or less clip on. The grip is rectangular, 5mm wide, and he has 5mm holes in both fists. A nice undocumented feature is that you can clip the projector onto his hip panels as if holstering it. Really good articulation. The head is on a ball joint, although the collar section doesn't really lock into place so it can hinge back too easily (there's tabs at the front of the collar piece that are supposed to lock into slots, but mine do nothing...it looks like a matter of a tenth of a millimeter is the difference between solidly locking and brushing past with no effect, so quality control is vital here). The shoulders are ball joints, and have a teeny bit of up and down motion from the joint at the root of the struts. Upper arm swivels, hinge elbows. The wrists bend inward on transformation joints, but are very stiff. The hips are ball joints (mine were VERY loose, but the superglue trick fixed that, and others have reported no problems), there's peg-swivels above each knee (also kinda loose), hinge knees, hinge ankles. There's also side to side hinges that let the feet stay flat for even Extreme Jack Kirby Poses with his legs as far apart as his arms can span. Ravage: While it's pretty unlikely we'll get a tape deck Soundwave, it's nice to see a modern engineering take on one of the cassettecons. All black plastic, no metal, naturally. In beast mode, it's got an arched back and somewhat short and oddly placed tail, plus a head that looks more like it'd work on Laserbeak than on Ravage, but it's a good effort. There's gunmetal paint on the lower legs (just the outsides), red eyes and a dark purple Decepticon symbol printed between the front shoulders. He has tiny missile pods molded on top of his rear hips, but they're not painted. About 3" (8cm) long in beast mode and an inch (2.5cm) across at the shoulders, he's a lot more 3-D than the original. The transformation is totally different as well, almost more like Laserbeak's in terms of the way things fold up. Because of the butterflied way he transforms, there's 5mm holes in all four upper legs. And yes, you can put Hound's hologram projector into one of Ravage's legs, although he tends to fall over sideways. Articulation in beast mode is sort of hit or miss. The head can raise or lower, and both sets of ankles (the reverse "knees") are hinges. The front hips only splay outward, but the rear hips are swivels. The tail is on a hinge as well. Tape mode is 5cm by 3.2cm by 1cm, and doesn't really look much like a tape aside from the general dimensions and the two holes. Not that many of the kids who'll be playing with these toys have even seen a cassette tape before. Tabs flip up from the back of Hound's jeep mode that will fit into the holes in the tape, so Hound can transport his outsized prisoner back to the Ark. [Later note: The cassette mode will fit into G1 Soundwave's chest, being exactly the same size as G1 Ravage. Woot.] Overall: A few weak design choices here and there, but a really good toy in both modes otherwise, with a pretty cool way of transforming the interior of the vehicle mode. Makes Alternators Hound look like it was designed by a high school student, by comparison. And Ravage is just icing on the cake. DECEPTICON: CYCLONUS Series: Generation 1 Altmode: Hypersonic Starfighter Partner: Nightstick ("Nightstick becomes laser cannon!") Function: Viceroy of Annihilation Weapon: Laser Cannon Previous Name Use: G1, Armada Previous Mold Use: None Motto: "By your command, Lord Galvatron!" Constructed from the cast-off chassis of deactivated DECEPTICON warriors, CYCLONUS was programmed by UNICRON to be loyal only to GALVATRON. Powered by nuclear engines, and a small fragment of his creator's supernatural power, CYCLONUS wields enough might to sterilize the surface of an inhabited world by himself. He never unleashes this power without his commander's leave, however, and he focuses all of his energy on ensuring that GALVATRON is obeyed without question by those under his command. STR 8 INT 8 SPD 9 END 8 RNK 9 COUR 9 FRB 7 SKL 7 Avg 8.125 Note that the G1 Nightstick became a "black beam gun" rather than a laser cannon. Also, G1 Cyclonus's function was Saboteur, but that really doesn't fit the description in his bio here, and I wanted to continue the "Emperor of Destruction" theme I applied to Universe Galvatron. :) Also, I'd like to point out that "starfighter" and "hypersonic" don't really go together. Hypersonic only has meaning for an aerial fighter. ;) Packaging: Three rubber bands hold the vehicle mode on, and no rubber bands. But it probably could have used a few. We're talking Energon Slugslinger levels of floppy vehicle mode here. One tie holds Nightstick in. The art has him as a very angry rabbit robot.... You know, we've had zombie, angry and constipated as far as expressions go. Plus expressionless faceplates. Why are none of these Universe characters happy? Vehicle Mode: Before I go into details, I should note that the deep purple plastic used on Cyclonus appears black under fluorescent lighting, at least the type seen in compact fluorescent bulbs. An older extended fluorescent bulb I use for my photo shoots picks up the purple nicely, as does the flash on my camera (as you can see in a picture linked later on). An LED "tap light" makes the colors look wrong in other ways, but at least lets me tell the purple plastic from the black. :) 6.5" (16.5cm) long and with a 6" (15cm) hypercritical wingspan, this is a fairly close update of the original G1 toy, although with the cockpit slid forward and the nosecone rendered more like an elongated version of the MiG-21's intakes. Or Voyager TF:Animated Starscream. Mostly a very dark purple with some silvery gray bits and dark red accents. The general appearance is of two huge thrusters with a cockpit stuck at the front and forward-swept wings as well as secondary thrusters tacked onto the sides. Plenty of weapons stud the surface of this "fighter" (which is more of a space destroyer in size), including triple gun barrels at the front of each wing root, larger twinned blasters ahead of the cockpit, and what might be point defense lasers on the fronts of the secondary thrusters. There are landing gear at the nose and on the undersides the the main thrusters, but the rear two are really hard to deploy without the aid of a knife unless you have really strong fingernails. There's a 5mm peg hole at the top rear of the cockpit for attaching Nightstick. The wingtips and most of the wingroots are made of silvery light gray plastic, as is a section of the fuselage near the front. The needle tip of the nose is a softer silvery light gray plastic, and doesn't lock into place. The secondary thrust nozzles, primary thrust vector paddles and some joints are a slightly darker warm gray plastic. The cockpit windows are clear red plastic. The landing gear and the hinges attaching the wings to the body are black plastic. Several of the light gray parts are painted a dark purple that's a reasonably good match, but has slightly different UV glow characteristics. The main blaster barrels are painted silver, as are some robot bits visible on the underside of the vehicle. A sort of bronze-red paint is used for accents on the leading edge of the wings and in stripes along the sides of the fuselage. Stability is okay, but you have to get the boot halves positioned just right as the main thrusters or the whole thing just flops around. I wish the shins would lock down properly, rather than just sort of sit close in with joint friction holding them in place. [Later note: There's a small clip on the shin piece that's supposed to lock onto the thigh to keep the bottoms of the main thrusters stable. It's a victim of quality control issues, though...on mine it's hard to get into place and easy to slide off, but for others it works fine. I've since gotten a second Cyclonus, and it holds together a little better, but it's looking like solid connections are rare. The looser of my pair is headed for the paint bay....] Transformation: The wings unpeg and swing up to clamp onto the fuselage front as arms, unfolding a bit and having the wingtips swing out of the way. The thruster shell pulls apart and the top and bottom each swing around to reconnect as the lower legs, snapping together very firmly. The nosecone collapses down and folds away inside the cockpit area, which becomes the chest. The hands may fold out from the secondary thrusters, although there are rectangular slots in the thrusters that can accept a peg on Nightstick. Robot Mode: A lanky 6" (15cm) tall, with very little kibble, mainly just short winglet/fin bits here and there. Only his right fist has a peg hole, and the index finger is bowed out as if wrapped around a trigger. The head, forearms, shoulder roots and backpack wings (well, wings on the backs of his shoulderpads) are light silvery gray plastic. The upper arms, fists, thighs, knees, toes and heels are light gray plastic (darker than the silvery stuff). The eye lightpiping is clear red, and there's some black plastic under the armpits and on the shins. Otherwise, dark purple plastic. Purple paint is used on the helmet and forearms, with the face and bunny ears left unpainted. The kneecaps are silver elongated hexagons with bronze- red interiors, and the abdomen is silver vents around a bronze-red elongated hexagon. There's a silver Decepticon symbol printed at the center of his chest. All joints are smooth, no ratchets in the toy. The head turns on a swivel, the waist does not turn. Each shoulderpad chunk has a swivel for forward/back motion, and there's a hinge inside for "lift to the sides" articulation. Hinge elbows, a swivel just below the elbow, and the fists can bend inward on transformation hinges. Ball joint hips, mid-thigh swivels, hinge knees. The toes and heel spurs are hinged for transformation, but offer some useful articulation. Nightstick can be held in the right hand as a pistol, or pegged to either wrist if you don't deploy the fist of that arm. See below for more on that feature. Nightstick: We've had plenty of Mini-Cons with weapon modes in recent years, but this is the first proper Targetmaster Nebulan since the 1980s, leaving aside reissues like Stepper/Ricochet. In robot mode, he's 2" (5cm) tall, mostly made of dark purple plastic. This upper arms are black plastic, while his toes and the abdomen/pelvis piece is light silvery gray plastic. Like most Targetmasters, he wears a huge gun barrel as a backpack. His face is painted silver, and his eyes are red, which is the extent of the paint job. Shoulder swivels, hinge elbows, hip swivels and a hinge between chest and abdomen meant for transformation but usable to make him bow. If you flip up the barrel and bend him over some, he kinda looks like a cousin to Shockwave. Transformation involves flipping up the barrel, raising the arms straight up, flipping up the toes and then bending the figure double at both the chest and hip joints. 2.25" (6cm) long as a gun, the legs form secondary barrels atop the main one. Nightstick's 5mm peg grip is a Mini-Con hardpoint. The barrel end looks like it might work as a Mini-Con connetor, but it's a little too narrow to accept a hardpoint into it. [Later note: Your mileage may vary in using the grip as a hardpoint, apparently it's iffy. It's not intentionally a hardpoint, so they didn't try very hard to make sure the hole in the middle would end up the right size or depth.] Undocumented feature: In addition to being held as a pistol, Nightstick can be plugged onto Cyclonus's arm, replacing the hand. This is an homage to how the Targetmasters linked up in Transformers Headmasters (Japanese cartoon). Connected in this manner, Nightstick's grip becomes a usable hardpoint for attaching Mini-Cons for extra power. This isn't in the instructions, although it'll likely be in the instructions for the inevitable Henkei release in Japan. http://www.dvandom.com/images/cyclonusarm.JPG to see what I'm talking about. Overall: The vehicle mode could stand a few more pegs or tabs to lock it down, and I'd rather have had a much lighter cartoon-style purple color scheme. But the robot mode is good, and Nightstick works quite well as a neo-Trgetmaster. [Later note: the Henkei version has cartoon-style light purple plastic, but unfortunately blows it by crapping chrome all over the toy.] MAXIMAL: CHEETOR Series: Beast Wars Altmode: Cheetah Function: Scout Weapons: Battle Club, Triple-bladed Battle Discs Previous Name Use: BW, BMac, BWX Previous Mold Use: None Motto: "Wheels and wings are for losers who don't know how to RUN!" CHEETOR has always been fast. Other robots move at speeds that seem agonizingly slow to him, as if they were trapped in tar. Unfortunately, a lot of the time he moves a lot faster than he thinks, and finds himself in situations that, in retrospect, could have been avoided. Still, his speed has gotten him out of a lot more jams than it's gotten him into, and when speed isn't enough he can always break out the blades. STR 6 INT 5 SPD 10 END 8 RNK 6 COUR 9 FRB 7 SKL 7 Avg 7.25 I suppose run-on sentences are appropriate for Cheetor. And yUm, jaAms. Awfully high Fireblast given that this version has no guns, those battle discs must be pretty badass. Packaging: A massive seven twist-ties hold the beast mode in, two on the torso, one on each foot and one on the tail. The battle discs are just held in by the blister. There's a rubber band on the right rear hip to keep it from flopping open (the battle discs are stored in the rear hips). The left rear hip is pressed against the blister and needs no bands. "BEAST WARS: Introduction of the Beasts!" runs from 1996-1999 according to the packaging. Ignoring all the beasts seen in G1, of course. :) The package art has Cheetor snarling, and his beast head seems somewhat calm aside from the red eyes. The package photos show the blades of his throwing stars made of blue plastic, but they're yellow on the actual toy. Beast Mode: With an arched back and long neck, this is probably the closest we've ever gotten to a realistic cheetah altmode, although the panels on the stomach break the illusion. 7" (18cm) from snout to tail tip, and it seems to pose most naturally with forelegs straightened and hindlegs out to the back so that the hips are 3" (8cm) from the tabletop. Almost entirely yellow with black spots and white paws, but a few bits of metallic blue plastic are visible here and there. Kinda unstable, this is mostly held in shape by joint friction, with very few locking tabs or pegs. This one definitely can't be redeco'ed into Tigatron, although a Ravage/Jaguar redeco is certainly feasible. Made almost entirely of golden yellow plastic, with a few bits of robot mode metallic blue plastic visible. White paint is seen on the paws (and the claws), while black spots decorare the head, neck, back and thighs. The face has the requisite facial striping and a black nose. No neck or waist articulation. The front hips are very restricted ball joints, with their range of motion limited by the fact that the hip shells hide some jointing bits from the transformation. The front knees do not bend, but the front ankles and toes are hinged (the "backwards knees" are really ankles, and the apparent ankles are actually toe joints). The rear hips, knees, ankles and toes are all hinges, but while the robot kneecaps are made to swing out of the way, the hinges themselves won't bend forward past straight down. So no poses where the rear paws are ahead of the forepaws in running, sadly. The tail is on a hinge, but can't drop below "straight back". The upshot of all the range limiters is that there's pretty much just two poses that look good. Hunkered down hiding in the grass, or forelegs straight as he pops up to take a look around while hiding in the grass. No real action poses to speak of. There's one gimmick in this mode. Pressing a button at the small of the back causes the jaws to open up, revealing teeth (the upper jaw opens less far than the upper head, so the teeth emerge). When this happens, the eye holes in the upper head move from showing green-painted eyes to showing red-painted eyes. A cute homage to the fact that the original Cheetor toy was available with beast eyes that were in different colors depending on the time it was released (although there's no blue-eye option on this new toy). It's cute, but not all that impressive, all things considered. Transformation: Rear legs straighten and become robot legs, surprise surprise. The robot head pops up from inside the beast neck. However, there's a new twist on the design, as a complicated bit of joint manipulation in the chest brings robot upper arms out from inside the chest. It's a fairly simple "blossoming" move to go to robot mode, but getting it all back into beast mode can take a few tries to get the hang of it. The tail can detach to use as a beatdown stick, and the battle disc weapons are stored in the rear beast hips, which are now robot calves. Robot Mode: 6" (15cm) tall, Cheetor is a narrow-hipped, generally slender and almost bishonen-proportioned figure...with a huge backpack that consists of most of his beast chest. And a cheetah head sticking out pretty far on his chest. He's got big Don Martin feet unless you try to balance him on just his rear beast paws, which ain't easy. The look is a mix of golden yellow and metallic dark blue, plus all the spots from beast mode. the face is molded with much stronger feline features than seen in the show. The shoulders, forearms, pelvis, collar area, kneecaps and armor plates on the fronts of his thighs are metallic blue plastic. Everything else is yellow plastic, including the battle discs. The face is painted metallic blue in a good match with the plastic. The eyes are painted green, the forehead jewel is painted red, and a red Maximal symbol is printed on the belly. The roaring gimmick still works in this mode, and keeping it was probably why he has such a huge backpack instead of having the chest unfold and store better. He's shown in the instructions with feet in a position that has serious difficulty with staying standing, due to the backpack. The heels have to be pushed back via a hinge in the shin, or he'll tend to fall over backwards. The head can turn, but the fact that the panel that covers it is attached to the back of the head can make this a little tricky at times. The waist does not turn. Ball joint shoulders, upper arm swivels, hinge elbows. Ball joint hips, swivels above the knees, hinge knees, multiple hinges around the ankles. The boot sides are hinged to swing open and reveal the hidden battle discs, but do not lock in place. Cheetor's fists have diamond-shaped holes that can hold either the slender peg of his tail weapon or one of the blades of a battle disc. The battle discs are geared to open up in much the same way as TF:A Prowl's hub weapons. They peg firmly inside their compartments, even if the compartments themselves don't stay closed well. The tail is pretty much just a furry sigmoidally curved baton. As an undocumented feature, you can flip out his beast forelegs for an extended range slap. Overall: Well, it's nice to see Beast Wars get some new mold love in Universe, but this might have worked better as a Voyager, with more budget for locking pegs and extra range of motion on joints. It's a nice cheetah statue in beast mode, and a hunchbacked bishy in robot mode. Dave Van Domelen, not really sure where to display Cheetor, it's not like he fits in with the other Universe figures.