Damn, I kind of want this figure now, after seeing some of the pictures the lack of abdomen isn't as bad as I initially thought.

 

Really, Barricade has about as much waist as he does in his promo art.



I had no interest whatsoever in Barricade until I played with someone's (Vangelus'? I don't remember) at Botcon. Those few brief moments really sold me on him. He's simple to transform but effective and fun, easy to pose, and he looks great. I love the way his arms and shoulders look, especially. Layered and complex looking without actually being either of those things.

He's a far cry above the original Movie 1 barricade, and a great deluxe equivalent to the larger, more complicated Human Alliance version. I'm quite happy to own both. HA Barricade hangs out on my Big TF shelf - DOTM barricade hangs out on my desk to be handled, transformed, and posed.

 

My thoughts on DotM Barricade:

Pros

• Highly posable
• Great head sculpt, a scaled down version of the HA's head
• Great hand sculpt!
• Intuitive transformation

Mixed

• Mechtech weapon; looks okay in gardening fork mode, but barrel looks too small in gun mode, looks ridiculous mounted on the light bar in car mode, but at least you can take it off.

Cons

• Looks scrawny for Barricade
• The deformed chest that's a cheat
• All the white areas but the doors (which I'll fix when I get a duplicate)
• Fat thighs (car kibble on the back of upper legs)
• Face paint apps (which I'll fix when I get a duplicate)

 

I don't know if the chest transformation counts as a cheat since you're still actually transforming the chest. It's not like the Voyager Primes where there's already an accurate chest in place.

Got him this past weekend and am happy I did. He's definately solid in both modes and looks great. Only thing I don't care for is his death rake.

 

I think it is a cheat since a hypothetical real Barricade wouldn't rotate his radiator grill around. Whereas with the HA toy you can (modestly) deform the car front end genuinely by rotating the grill up and pivoting the the two bumper sections.

 

Aside from the car parts in his hamstring area and lack of solid hip placement, he's great. Nothing bad to say about his upper body.

 

Perhaps Hasbro might repaint him in DC (white) deco and if they do they might have enough sense to but a black lower torso on the repaint and it might be possible to swap parts or do some reshelling to fix the white lower torso uglyness.

 

I don't understand the issue people are having with Barricade's hips. They seem perfectly normal to me - no weird angles or awkward movement.

I do find that his knee and ankle joints are looser than I would like. He ends up having a little difficulty standing up sometimes. Other than that, though, he's a huge improvement over the 2007 version (despite being fairly short for a deluxe).

 

I don't have a problem with the hips either. I'm not seeing it. Thankfully the joints on my Barricade are fine. I love movie Barricade and it's just a good piece to add to the collection.

 

They're really wide, and there's nothing between them and the hood-chest. It's like somebody surgically removed his stomach and abs.

 

Maybe Bumblebee got bored.  

 

A distinct possibility.

 

In effort to center his legs directly underneath his torso, is it possible to rotate his waist 180 degrees and switch out his legs?

 

He looks alright with that, but he can't transform

 

Newmanium: I actually did a leg mod based on your idea. I shaved plastic away on the side of the leg, where the ball joint is, so the cup could rotate around.
You can now rotate his legs 180 and still transform. But the bits on the side of hit foot made it hard to stand. Chopped it off. He stands and looks a lot better!
Thanks for the inspiration.

Pics:
Before:



After:

 

^I am glad to know that it is possible, and with very little modding needed at that!

Thanks for running with the idea TFareCool. I may now pick him up next time I see him (he and sideways would like good together.)

 

Thanks for giving me the Idea, and now a near perfect Barricade at that  

 

In this picture, he looks so much like he'd be a character in Cars... all he needs is the eyes in the windshield. He looks like he'd be the "bad cop" kind of character.

 

Neat. I did the same general mod, except I didn't cut off the things on the side of his feet, and I posed the legs a bit closer together. Yours seems more in line with the designer's intentions, though.

 

Just bought One I like the car Mode - the Mechtech Weapon borders on useless though even by their already very low standard.

Robot mode is a floppy ill balanced mess from the waist down - in all honesty he's to floppy bordering on unacceptably so it nearly stops him from supporting his own weight.

I think he has some good arms and hands but over all I still prefer the 2008 Premium Version or the Cinema scene version.

If they tightened him up a bit painted his head a less clownish colour and tried again I might grow to like him more - and he's probably still a bit better than Jolt over all.

Certainly not worth £13.00 though.