Dave's Transformers Rant: Real Gear Robots Wave 3 Wire Tap V20 (83346) Night Beat 7 (88347) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Movie/RGR3 This wave is both recolors, of Speed Dial 800 and Booster X10 respectively. The reviews of the original molds can be found at http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Movie/RGR1 There had been some speculation that these two would be exclusive to one store, or available only as a two-pack, and so forth. However, given that these two have been spotted at three different stores, and separately, puts paid to that rumor. I suppose a store-exclusive two-pack is still possible, though. CAPSULES Wire Tap V20: Looks a little better than Speed Dial, more dynamic. Otherwise not significantly different. Original mold was recommended, this one's a little better but not enough to go to Strongly Recommended. $7.44 at Wal-Mart. Night Beat 7: While it's cool to have an homage to the G1 Headmaster detective, this is kinda bland-looking. Original mold was recommended. This one's not quite as good, but I wouldn't drop it all the way to mildly recommended unless you already have Booster X10. $7.44 at Wal-Mart. RANTS Packaging: Same as previous waves, with the usual "Not a working phone/music player" bits. Identical strapping and so forth to the originals of the molds. Co-sells are Meantime, High Score 100 and the other one from this wave. DECEPTICON: WIRE TAP V20 Altmode: Cellphone G1 Homage: Reflector (minor) Previous Mold Use: Speed Dial 800 Motto: Cracking the Signal WIRE TAP V20 is a master code slicer for the DECEPTICONS. No matter how tough the encryption, no matter how tight the security, WIRE TAP V20 will find a way through. He's a genius at compromising people's computer systems. Wireless carrier waves allow him to remotely access your computer from the other side of the house, emptying bank accounts, cracking government code, and filling your browser history with compromising links. With him in your house, nothing is safe. STR 4 INT 8 SPD 3 END 5 RNK 6 COUR 5 FRB 4 SKL 9 Avg 5.5 Color Swaps: The cool medium gray from the main phone housing is replaced by black, while the warm dark gray on the limbs is now red plastic with a strong UV glow. The clear colorless plastic on the lens/eye is unchanged. Paint Apps: The numberpad has the same font, but in red and with the numbers and letters moved down to the raised part of each button. The * and # keys are no longer labeled. The talk and end buttons are the same. There's no silver paint across the top part of the control pad. The blue dots above talk and end are now two small red dots on the left side and three small red dots on the right side. A purple and white Decepticon symbol is printed just below the hinge. Silver paint is used on the border of the screen, on the side buttons, on the robot face and feet, and on the part of the cover that's metallic blue on Speed Dial. Metallic red is used on the forearms and framing the face. The sticker on the cover has a black Decepticon symbol on a roiling red and orange background, with a time of 3:35 PM. Not sure what, if any, significance this time has. The main screen sticker has a similar look, but larger and with some black border stuff. Other Comments: No mold changes that I noticed. I think I'll leave this one unmodded (I added details to Speed Dial's back so that he can make it his chest and leave the number pad stuff hidden on his back), further telling the two versions apart. Too bad the lens piece is glued on so firmly, it'd be nice to be able to pop it off and backpaint the eye a brighter color. Hmmm...Speed Dial is gray and blue, Wire Tap is red and black. Rumble and Frenzy color schemes! Overall: A much more dynamic color scheme in robot mode without making the phone mode look too garish (only a little red is visible there), plus they thought to put a faction symbol on it that's visible on the front of the robot mode, a nice touch. On the off chance you only want to get one version of this mold and actually find both at once, get Wire Tap. AUTOBOT: NIGHT BEAT 7 Altmode: MP3 Player G1 Homage: Laserbeak (form), Nightbeat (function) Previous Mold Use: Booster X10 Motto: Seeking the Beat Most of the other REAL GEAR ROBOTS focus on covering their traces, but NIGHT BEAT 7 makes it hs job to expose them to the light. Using sophisticated reality-search software, he constantly scans the world around him for evidence that a DECEPTCION has been at work. He's trained in finding the most obscure evidence, from the faint time particle trail left by MEANTIME to the sonic leftovers of the mischief of BOOSTER X10. STR 7 INT 8 SPD 5 END 8 RNK 7 COUR 8 FRB 6 SKL 8 Avg 7.125 Color Swaps: Red becomes a very pale blue (a little lighter than 99FFFF but not as light as CCFFFF), black becomes very light gray, clear orange becomes clear medium blue. Rubbery black becomes rubbery very light gray. Paint Apps: A slightly metallic light blue is used on the clear pieces, not quite matching the light blue plastic. There's silver along the sides of the player, plus on the neck and head of bird mode, on the leading edges of the wing roots, and on the microphone shaft of the earpiece. There's some medium blue paint details on the neck of the bird. A tiny red Autobot symbol is printed on the head of the bird, and a larger one at the center of the earpiece. The beak is left unpainted, the eyes are medium blue. There's no name printed anywhere on the toy. Other Comments: The hips are kinda loose, a problem it shares with the original mold (and, like the original, mine will get some nailpolish on the ball joints). Overall: A bit bland-looking. Bringing in some bright yellow a la Nightbeat would have helped, I think, although it's hard to figure where they could have put it unless it were to replace the light gray. And that might be overkill. Something tells me that the light gray plastic is of a sort that doesn't take factory paint applications well, otherwise one of the two would likely have had paint on the buttons. Even a little but of bright yellow on the beak might have helped, though. In fact, I've gone ahead and done some some work on it. Check out http://www.dvandom.com/kitbash/nb7.JPG (although it might not be available until later on September 2, 2007). Dave Van Domelen, not a working particle beam cannon.