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Friday, April 27, 2012

In honor of Botcon: Action Master Thundercracker

Since Botcon is being held in Dallas this week I thought it would only be appropriate to do a post about a G1 figure that received an update from the Botcon folks last year. Of course I am talking about Action Master Thundercracker. Like so many other things at Botcon, AM Thundercracker has a complicated history that only the most fervent fans tend to appreciate, but I'll do my best to iron it all out.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

It's Botcon Time Yet Again

Wow, it is hard to believe it has been almost a year since Botcon 2011 in Pasadena. This year it is a little more convenient for most people since it is in Dallas, Texas, essentially the middle of the country rather than one of the coasts. I was betting on Chicago myself, but I guess when Fun Publications can't figure out where to go they'll just default to Texas. We'll see how this theory pans out in the future...

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Lego Town Hall

For some reason this one flew under my radar. I usually keep a close eye on new Lego releases but somehow I completely missed the new Town Hall set. I didn't find out about it until the day it was released! Last year, when the Pet Shop and Brownstone were released I was at my local Lego store that day! But fortunately for me my local store had plenty of Town Halls in stock when I went to pick it up last week. Upon arriving home I wasn't able to even start construction for another few days due to work and other responsibilities, but once I finally did the build went fast. This is another great modular building set from Lego, and it does a great job continuing to add more and more interior details.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

D-108 Slugfest and D-109 Overkill

Ohhhh baby. I have been waiting quite a while for these two gems. These guys can be impossibly hard to find and I'm not really sure why. As far as I can tell they got a relatively wide release during the Headmasters toyline in Japan but for some reason are really obscure. Regardless, they now have a permanent spot in my collection. And fortunately I was able to get them in excellent condition. Slugfest is still MISB while Overkill is MIB, but all his paperwork and weapons are still sealed. I could send these guys off to AFA if I wanted, but I think I would rather keep them out. I doubt I will ever unseal them, but you never know.

Sunday, April 15, 2012

TF-05 Sixtrain Giftset

I finally did it, I got my first Japanese Micromaster giftset. There are five of these sets total if I'm not mistaken: Sixliner, Sixturbo, Sixwing, Sixbuilder and of course Sixtrain here. All but Sixliner were released in 1992 at the very end of Generation One in Japan and thus can be somewhat difficult to obtain in good condition. Of course they were all rereleased between 2002 and 2003 in Takara's Transformer: The Micromaster series. And then they were subsequently released again by Hasbro (sometimes in different colors) through 2007 under the Universe banner. But it all comes back to the original releases in 1992. I've had the reissues for years but this is yet another example of how I am trying to obtain all originals for my collection. With Sixtrain here it is pretty easy since his colors are completely different from the re-releases.

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Movie Optimus Spychanger..."GASP!"

Yeah, that's right. I bought a movie figure. But it isn't really a movie figure. Technically it is a movie repaint of an existing Robots In Disguise figure. And it was a total impulse buy; I was just browsing eBay the other day and I happened to come upon it. I didn't really know a whole lot about it but I thought it would be something cool Flywheels would like, but upon checking his Shmax page I discovered he already owned it. Big surprise (he has, like, everything). But the seller had it for half off at what seemed to be a pretty reasonable price especially for a Japanese exclusive so I bit the bullet.

Monday, April 9, 2012

The Return of Convoy

Back in 1991 when Generation One was dying off Takara was trying to think of a way to bring kids back into the toys. I must assume they decided that the re-creation Convoy (Optimus Prime to those of us outside of Japan) in the form of a Micromaster base would be the best idea since they were all the rage at the time. Since in the Japanese fiction Powermaster Prime was actually a different character named Ginrai this was the first new Convoy toy since the Goodbye version back in 1986! Nothing like bringing back the most popular character from past fiction to revitalize a series, huh? On an additional note they brought Megatron back too but unfortunately there was no toy created for his new form.

Friday, April 6, 2012

Pipeline, Gusher and the Tanker Transport

This is more of a celebratory post than anything. I have been attempting to complete this particular G1 figure for a very long time. It was one that not only has been expensive for a while now, but I never had as a kid either. A few years ago I found a boxed Mexican sample in a local comic store which I purchased for a cool $40, but unfortunately when I got home I discovered it was missing four of the parts! These parts really don't come up very often and after two years and one Botcon of looking I finally found all four. Now they did cost me a good bit because they are so obscure, but it was still a lot cheaper than buying the entire set over again for the ridiculous prices they go for on eBay.

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

The Masterpiece Starscream Saga

Starscream has always been my favorite character. Always. Ever since I first saw him on TV in 1985. I don't know why, but for some reason I identified with this lying, cheating megalomaniac. I felt like he never quite got his due, except in the 1986 movie when he was finally crowned Decepticon leader for a few brief moments before being destroyed at the hands of Galvatron. But his toy was abhorrent. The figure came from the Diaclone mold and was more or less a parts former (which means you remove the parts from the robot and put them back on in a different way to form the jet). Very little of the figure actually transformed.

Monday, April 2, 2012

With this comes a complete loose Beast Wars Collection

Being able to replace my failing Rattrap with Metals Rattrap at last year's Botcon I was only one other figure away from completing my loose Beast Wars collection. That remaining figure was Transmetal Megatron. Much like figures with GPS, TM Megatron is notoriously brittle, but for different reasons. Therefore it is difficult to find one today that hasn't broken in some manner. I'm proud to say my original lasted for at least eight years before it decided to snap one day in mid transformation. I also have a MISB version just for completion's sake, but my display never looked quite right with such an iconic and important character missing. The solution? Purchase the Japanese version of the figure which uses a different and stronger type of plastic and doesn't have the same breakage problems.