Prelude: The Heroes‘ Toolkit set is not a product released by Hasbro or Takara-Tomy and thus not officially a Transformers product. It’s an upgrade kit for Animated figures released by third party company DX9. Many thanks to my good buddy Caked-Up who sent me this set as a birthday present this year. Battle Axe: The one big flaw of the otherwise near-perfect Voyager-Class Optimus Prime figure from Animated was the weapon. Instead of the axe we saw him wield in the cartoon, he came with... something, still not sure what. Now, though, there is finally a good axe for Optimus to wield. It’s a spitting image of the weapon we’ve seen in the cartoon and comes with an extra piece so Optimus can wield it in short or long form (also as seen in the cartoon) and even has a separate foot piece for those times Optimus used it as a vaulting pole. Just about the only bad thing I can say about it is that it does not integrate into the vehicle mode, but I can easily live with that. So bottom line here: probably the main reason to get this set. Very nice and, of course, also compatible with the Deluxe class versions of the character. Magnets: Grumpy old medic Ratchet’s main gimmick in the cartoon was the magnets he could deploy from his arms. Sadly the toy instead featured some kind of black handles snapping out of his arms that didn’t look even remotely magnet-like. The Toolkit solves that by giving Ratchet his magnets finally. The two magnets can be snapped into his palms and look pretty much exactly like they did in the cartoon now. Again, no integrating them into the alternate mode, but still: the second-best reason to get this set. Ratchet needs his magnets or he might get grumpy. Stasis Cuffs: And there is the “also there” part of this toolkit, two pairs of stasis cuffs. These were used extensively throughout the Animated cartoon and the two sets here are pretty good representations of it. They fit on most of the Animated figures I’ve tried them with so far. That said, they’re not something you’re gonna put on a figure for permanent display, so they’ll probably end up in your parts box and be forgotten. Still nice, but not really the point of this set. Remarks: Still a huge fan of Animated, still very upset that Hasbro cancelled it so soon, and loving this little set here that I got for my birthday. The main point of attraction is the axe, no doubt, because unless you got yourself the Battle Begins version of Optimus Prime, you don’t have a good axe for Animated Prime. The magnets for Ratchet are nice and the stasis cuffs are just kind of there, too. So bottom line: a very nice upgrade set for any Animated fan out there. Fully recommended if you have the requisite Optimus and Ratchet figures. Even Swindle thinks so, you think he would lend his face to the cover otherwise? Rating: A- Source: Transformers Universe!
