It's my fault really. I kept putting it off. Go into Toy Kingdom and see it sitting on the shelf at 30% off. Tell myself there are other things to get right now. Not a priority. Then I hear it's up to 40% off. 50% off. Now it's only p500.00 from p1,600.00. Still I tell myself, it'll be there tomorrow. Plenty of time to get it. I buy something else.
Finally the day comes when I pass by the Transformer aisle and go, "Wait a minute... where is he..." Of course, I'm too late. He's already disappeared from the shelf. A hundred kids a day pass by the display. it's close to Christmas time. It's a steal at something less than 33% of it's original price. It's amazing it lasted as long as it did on the shelf. I was just too stupid to pick it up.
Sound familiar?
I do this a lot. There's always something new coming out and the recent Transformers deluge has kinda spoiled me. I expected the surplus toys to remain on the shelves at Toy Kingdom forever, and I totally lost my chance to get a Blitzwing. By the time I realized he wasn't available anymore in Megamall, he was gone from all the other malls I visit regularly. argh.
Luckily, one of the PTKers had a friend selling one for p700.00. Sure it wasn't p500.00, but considering the only sightings I heard about were in Makati and the fact that I am a lazy fucking bastard, It was worth the extra p200.00. I'm glad to report that despite all the trouble I went through hunting one down, He is worth it.
He comes in his box in his jet form so let me start there.
If you didn't know, old Blitzwing is a TRIPLE changer. That means he's got 3 forms, one robot and 2 vehicle modes. In G1 he turned into a tank and a plane. The Animated (I've always wondered about this... wasn't G1 "animated"?) version is the same. He even has the same paint scheme; purple, gray, and black.
The jet mode probably suffers the most from the compromises they had to make in order to give him 3 forms. You probably already noticed he's got treads instead of landing gear. In reality, he probably couldn't take off at all. But this is the ANIMATED universe, so we'll cut him some slack.
In truth, given the design themes that the entire line has used, the jet doesn't really look all that bad. The fact that it is cartoon accurate makes it easier to swallow. The only real problem I've got with it is that the parts don't really lock together in either vehicle form. Things are easily bumped out of place at the slightest touch. It doesn't help that TFA toy joints seem to get loose fairly quickly.
The tank shares the same problems:
It's a lot weirder looking than the jet, with two barrels. You won't find it in any military guide, but it since it's such a departure from anything recognizable, it's easy to say that it's clearly an alien design, hence, acceptable.
I practice this kind of bullshit a lot.
There are wheels on the treads so he does roll, which is great. The two fireblasts lauch from the barrels, another plus. The turret turns full circle. Good. But one thing they missed was a joint to let the barrel go up and down. Since the design of the treads are somewhat slanted, the guns are always pointed down. boo.
The best thing about this toy is the Man-E-Faces gimmick he's got going on. In the cartoon, he can switch personalities from German officer dude, to Arnold Schwarzenner man, to crazy-ass nut. The toy does the same thing. This is all kinds of cool.
The robot form is probably the way I'll display him the most. He's got some pretty good articulation, though his shoulders are slightly blocked. Like I said though, the joints get loose over time.
If you can still find this guy, get him now. Though the Transformers animated line is dead, the toys are really some to the best to every be released.
No comments:
Post a Comment