Dave's Transformers Animated Rant: Target Mega Packs Rescue Ratchet with Legends Prowl and Starscream (in progress) Stealth Lockdown with Legends Optimus Prime and Bumblebee Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Mega1 Okay, this is listed as Deluxe Class on the box, but since it's $14.99 I'm calling it a return to the Mega size. :) These Target-exclusive sets each have a Deluxe TF:A figure in completely new colors, packaged with two Universe "Animated Series" Legends figures in tweaked colors. As an aside, Target is REALLY going big into exclusive sets this holiday season. In addition to these, there's Universe Legends 5-packs (Cybertron Legends molds recolored as G1 characters) and $30 "Voyager and a Deluxe plus a comicbook reprint" versus packs turning Cybertron molds into G1 characters. None of the other sets currently grabs me, though, I may wait and see if any are left on clearance. http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Deluxe1 - Lockdown review http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Deluxe2 - Ratchet review http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Legend1 - Optimus, BB and Prowl Legends http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFA/Legend1 - Starscream Legends CAPSULES Rescue Ratchet: Original Ratchet is Recommended, but I don't much care for the canary yellow redeco. Legends Prowl is Neutral, Legends Starscream was Recommended. All in all, I'd call the set mildly recommended. I passed at the original $14.99 price at Target, but grabbed one on clearance for $10.48. Stealth Lockdown: Lockdown was originally Recommended, as were the two Legends packed with him. The clear plastic deco, while not as good as the one shown on the package, is still striking. The redecos of the Legends figures are different enough to tell them apart from the originals, while still being "correct" (as opposed to doing things like Patrol Bumblebee or Nightwatch Optimus Prime). All in all, mildly recommended even if you have all of these molds already, and recommended outright if you're missing even one of them. $14.99 at Target. RANTS Packaging: A standard TF:A Voyager box, although the banner on the left front says Deluxe Class. The name on the front is just the Deluxe figure, but in the lower right is the banner "Includes 2 Legends figures!" An "Only At (o)" sticker is on the bottom of the window. The art on the box is a photoshopped recolor of the original toy's art, IIRC (I don't feel like digging out the old cardbacks). The left side cosells are Deluxes (Jazz and Sentinel Prime on Lockdown, Swoop and Sentinel Prime on Ratchet), the bottom cosells are the three Leader Class toys to date plus Power Bots Bumblebee. The right side shows package art for the Legends figures included. The back has photos of all three of the toys inside, but only stats/bio for the Deluxe. Lockdown's package photo shows crystal clear plastic rather than the smoky clear stuff we got. Ratchet's shows a more greenish yellow that's close to the movie Autobot Ratchet along with colorless clear plastic. Also, the vehicle mode on the package has Movie-style red stripe with EKG blip and the words "Search and Rescue", which are absent from the actual toy. The grayscale photo in the Rescue Ratchet instructions is also of this prototype. Inside the box, all three toys are in robot mode. Deluxe to the left, and Legends on a raised blister on the right. Ratchet has some of his tools to the right of Prowl (who's packaged with his shin wheels uneven, even the blister is set to keep them from lining up). Check carefully, one of the Ratchets I saw had a leg snapped apart at the thigh swivel in-box. No catalog, the instructions are loose inside. Grayscale only, no accent color, single side of a sheet. None of the twist-ties go all the way through to the back of the tray, you have to cut the tape securing the plastic blister to get at the twist-ties. DECEPTICON: STEALTH LOCKDOWN Altmode: Cruiser Function: DECEPTICON Bounty Hunter Previous Name Use: None ("Lockdown" on its own previously in TF:A) Previous Mold Use: TF:A Lockdown Callouts: "Flip-out hook!" "Engine converts to blaster!" (same as Lockdown) Motto: "They'll never see me coming." Galactic Powers & Abilities: > Active camo shorts out in rain. (More of a Galactic Weakness) > Stole camo mod from an AUTOBOT Elite Guard. > Happiest hidden in the dark. LOCKDOWN likes to know everything there is to know about a target before he takes it down. He employs his active camoflage modification in order to remain unseen while he stalks his target. Transparent to most sensors, and almost invisible to the eye, he lurks near his prey, sometimes watching and waiting for days before he strikes. Hm, could he perhaps have stolen this mod from Mirage? Packaging: Five twist-ties hold the robot mode to the blister, althought the one on his right arm had come undone on its own. A rubber band holds the weapon onto the right arm. Color Swaps: Well, can't really do this the usual way, since Lockdown had mostly black from several sprues. The torso core, the shoulder roots, the back-of-head lightpiping (ironically), the two elbow joint sections, the thigh "bones", the engine base and the "spats" are light gray opaque plastic. The rest of the toy is a clear lightly smoky plastic, generally with a matte finish. The picture on the packaging shows that they tried this with all clear colorless plastic, I guess it must not have passed safety tests or something. A pity, the crystal Lockdown looked even better. Paint Apps: The face is gunmetal opaque with opaque bright green tattoos. The opaque bright green is also used for some stripes on the arms and legs, and on the belt area. Windows, taillights, headlights, a bit on the front of the engine and the eyes are clear pale red. Clear pale green is on the upper arms, chest, pelvis, thigh armor and kneecap details. Other Notes: The hand issue has not been corrected. In vehicle mode, the few opaque bits mostly cluster together just ahead of the windshield, which does tend to mess with the look. Getting the car mode to peg together was a bit tricky, possibly due to the plastic change, or maybe just random quality control. Overall: Too bad we didn't get the version in the prototype, but this is pretty good, and notable as one of the very few mostly-clear Transformers to be released in America rather than Japan. :) (The Stealth Recon Team from Cybertron and Energon Saber Team from Energon are other examples.) AUTOBOT: BUMBLEBEE Packaging: Held to the blister by 2 twist-ties. Color Swaps: The yellow plastic is a little more golden, and it's not just batch variation since the UV response is a LOT stronger. Black remains black. Paint Apps: The red paint on the police light is a bit brighter, and the window paint is more of a slightly silvery medium-light cool gray. The Autobot symbol on the robot chest is now silver, in keeping with the TF:A line's pattern. The window paint wraps around the edges better, so the obvious seams that hurt the look of the original are absent. Other Notes: Not sure why they didn't lighten the face, but hey. Overall: Still a good toy, and if you don't have the Legends separately yet, they make this a good set to get. AUTOBOT: OPTIMUS PRIME Packaging: Held to the blister by two twist-ties. Color Swaps: Replace both the wheel plastic and the gunmetal plastic with a medium-dark gray plastic. The blue plastic has been replaced by a slightly brighter blue plastic with a MUCH stronger UV glow. Paint Apps: Almost identical to the single-pack, but with dark blue paint on the windows instead of black. Other Notes: Going to the darker gray helps the wheels, but hurts the vehicle mode a bit since the side stripes are less obvious. Overall: A good toy in need of some more paint. AUTOBOT: RESCUE RATCHET Altmode: Rescue Vehicle Function: AUTOBOT Medic Previous Name Use: Movie (ironically, used for the red and white recolors) Previous Mold Use: TF:A Autobot Ratchet Callouts: "Tools store in backpack!" Motto: "It's okay, I reattach these parts all the time." Galactic Powers and Abilities: > Can modify Earth technology to AUTOBOT systems. > Assisted in early open-core surgeries during training. > Laser scalpel is a family heirloom. As gruff as AUTOBOT RATCHET can be, he is, at heart, the kindest of the AUTOBOTS. His rough demeanor is rooted in his concern for those around him, for he worries constantly about the well being of others. AUTOBOT RATCHET fears no DECEPTICON, and he would not hesitate to face destruction in order to help another being. The only thing he's afraid of is that one day, one of his friends will be injured so badly that his mechanical skills won't be enough. Just like with STEALTH LOCKDOWN, the bio note doesn't actually use his modified name. Packaging: Six twist-ties hold the robot in a sort of walking position. Each of the tools has its own twist-tie holding it to the blister. The tie on the right wrist is hard to undo, but it's easy enough to cut the little bit of tray that holds it in and just undo the tie after the arm's free. He's packaged with his magnets deployed. No rubber bands. Color Swaps: Black stays black on the tools (but not the tool clips), forearms and wheels. Clear blue becomes clear slightly smoky. The dark red plastic becomes white on the inner lower body and upper thighs as well as on the vehicle roof, but it become light warm (almost brownish) gray on the forearms and boots. Pretty much everything else becomes bright yellow. It turns out that the headlights are clear plastic as well, they were just totally painted over on Autobot Ratchet. Paint Apps: In vehicle mode, the rear half of the roof and the top of the hood are painted white (the same paint masks as the dark red on Autobot Ratchet). The rear fenders are painted canary yellow, the brushguard and side front windows are painted silver. The winch is black. There's a big red Autobot symbol on the hood, and Ratchet's usual circle-with-blip logo on the rear sides. The lightbar and taillights are painted over with translucent dark red paint. In robot mode, the main accent color not found in the vehicle scheme is red. Red on the shoulder panels (the circle-blip thing again, but without the extended line seen on the package photo), forehead crest (all of it, not leaving the center blank), horizontal stripes on the shoulders, lengthwise stripes on the forearms and boots. The vent slits on the sides of the helmet are also red. The face is gray (good match for the plastic color) and the parts that are red on the cheeks of Autobot Ratchet are black here. Under fluorescent lights, there's a pretty bad match between the white paint and the white plastic, and a really bad match between the yellow paint and the yellow plastic. To the point that it's kinda sad having it in vehicle mode, even leaving aside the lack of resemblance to the Movie Ratchet thanks to the changes in plastic color and paint masks. Under a more natural white light or sunlight, the differential UV glow of the plastic versus paint makes things match up pretty well, though. Other Notes: He looks like he's wearing white boxer briefs and no pants. Very loose ankles and out-to-side hip joints, but at least the ankles can be unscrewed and mucked about with...the relevant hip joints are pinned, and it looks like about the only way to stiffen it up will be to completely fill the gaps with something. Superglue didn't work, nail polish hasn't worked after four layers, and driving the pin out seems to be impossible with the tools at my disposal. He holds together poorly in vehicle mode. If I were feeling REALLY ambitious, I'd try dyeing all the yellow parts red and make this into Channel. :) Overall: The idea of a Movie-style deco of the toy was a decent one. Too bad that's not what we got. It's actually not a bad deco all in all, and the red stripes tie the yellow/white/gray scheme together well. But it's really not Ratchet. It's more like lemony fresh RiD Optimus Prime. AUTOBOT: PROWL Packaging: Held to the blister by three ties, and as mentioned earlier, his shin wheels are held down in such a way as to make his legs non-symmetric. Color Swaps: Black stays black, the cream color is a little brighter. Paint Apps: Almost the same as on the solo-pack, but the Autobot symbol on the belly is silver rather than red and white, the gold's a little brighter and the helmet crest is silver rather than gold. Other Notes: Has the same stability problems as the solo-pack. Overall: Different enough to tell apart from the solo-pack, but not really improved. Maybe I'll tinker with this one. DECEPTICON: STARSCREAM Packaging: Two ties hold the robot mode to the blister. Color Swaps: The plastic is more of a purple-gray color, but not purple enough to be Skywarp. Paint Apps: Similar, but not the same. The red apps are brighter and glossier, and there's an extra bit on the collar area so that in jet mode the red flanking the cockpit continues between the thrusters. There's also red stripes on the heel spurs that form the vertical tail bits. The black paint is glossy instead of matte, and it covers the insides of the forearms. However, only the top crest of the helmet is black along with the sideburn vents. The face is still silver, the eyes still red. The cockpit orange is a little brighter, and has a stronger UV response. The Decepticon symbol is still gold. Other Notes: This is probably getting kitbashed. :) To keep this separate for now, I'm folding the wings all the way down in robot mode to form a cape (which requires mucking about with the nosecone a bit). Overall: If you put this paint scheme on the solo-pack Starscream, but kept that one's helmet paint, it'd have made the solo-pack even better. As it stands, I think they should've made this even more purple so that it could stand in for one of the clones more obviously. Or made it a totally different color. Dave Van Domelen, did eventually review those Roadbots.