So I have the eagerly anticipated Generations Brainstorm! Presumably because it's the first 'proper' return of the Headmaster concept and also because we all want a piece of this wayward (evil?) genius. But was it worth the wait? Well, yes... and no. First off the Robot mode is actually very good, very reminscient of the old G1 toy, and a nice update for modern times. Looking at him, there's virtually no hollow parts to him. He is hollow judging by the weight and how he transforms, but every panel closes up so the only actual hollow bit is inside the nosecone on his back. His crotch and hips have movable armour plates which allow full hip action without visual compromise too! As a very nice nod to us old fogeys inside his chest is a graphic representation of G1 Brainstorms own chest tech spec meter. Essentially what's supposed to happen is the pilot seat flips down revealing the specs (which aren't the same as Generations Brainstorms stats) when Arcana is attached. Which is a great gimmick... assuming it works. More on that later. However, much kudos to the toy designer, a lot of effort has been made to make his robot mode look good. He's very posable, with practically everything I would want except waist and wrist articulation. Regardless with his big ol feet (on ankle tilts!) you can get some lovely dynamic poses outta the guy. Brainstorms head had tried to be very ambitious is that Arcana's (more on this) head is on a ball joint which results in Brainstorms head being on a ball joint too. Arcana himself is a bit of a mish mash. His arms form the entire sides of Brainstorms head, but as a result look a bit weird. He's moulded with a little smirk which coupled with his own little ball joint neck adds a lot of character to this little guy. One thing though, at no point is Brainstorms head ever referred to as Arcana. I'm guessing because if they do that, then they would have to admit the existance of Nebulans, who so far have no place in Transformers continuity. Boo! Brainstorms Jet mode does the job, the back end is a little odd which is probably due to the simplistic transformation. Seriously, it's simple, almost Legends of Cybertron Vector Prime simple. Essentially, pop his head off, fold up the nosecone from his back, fold the legs backward and tuck in the feet into the shins, fold up and rotate the arms. Tab it together, arrange the wings and voila! Space jet. I appreciate that Transformers are being simplified for kids but Brainstorms transformation isn't just simple, it's kinda boring. I guess the Jet mode does the job I suppose and it kinda looks like a Star Fox Arwing, so bonus points for that. Arcana with his legs in front (and slightly tucked) fits snugly into the jet cockpit. Not much to say there, except there he is! So far everything has been quite positive about this guy, but if you remember that far back I did mention a 'no' somewhere... what was that about? Well... QC on this guy is bad. Not Hasbro bad, but third party bad. This was what was wrong with mine... i) Arcana's head is held too tightly by Brainstorms torso. ii) Arcana (and thus Brainstorms) head is very very loose. Bobblehead loose. iii) Arcana's head appears fractionally too large, so the release mechanism doesn't actually ever release the head. iv) Arcana's own head is made from 3 pieces, the head (with an odd step moulded in, a metal pin and ball joint. My 'step' bit was mismoulded so it couldn't line up properly with the corresponding grooves in the ball joint, so the pin was never properly inserted. v) Arcana's own little head got ripped off because of the three previous problems. vi) His tech spec meter didn't hold as a seat on mine. It looked like the 'hook' that held it in place was mismoulded. So basically all my problems are centred around the actual Headmaster gimmick. Doh! In the end I had to spend a bit of time with this fella to fix it all. i) Filed down Arcana's heads ears, a fraction from each side. ii) Applied glue to tighten Arcana's neck joint. iii) Filed down a fraction from the back of Arcana's head, so it's easier to release from Brainstorms neck. iv and v) Filed down the step in Arcana's neck, applied superglue to glue the three pieces together securely. vi) Filed away a bit of mould flash/mismould from the hook that holds the seat in place. Had to do it in situ, because Brainstorms torso has three pins securing it as well as screws, and I hate pins. Lastly when you get yours make sure you press down the grey switch at the top of his torso to release the head. Once depressed it's meant to move a hook out from the back of Arcana's head making allowing removal, but in my case that didn't happen. So essentially this guy turned out to be a Third party experience, needed a bunch of fixes out of the box but once done he's a solid figure.
nice... i'm gonna go with a masterforce knockoff explanation and say the boy genius here is the little dude and he made himself a larger body that he can pilot because he's brainstorm and fuck you, science.
Looks fucking good, but now I'm worried about what kind of shape the head'll be in when I get mine. Could've easiy been avoided if they just ditched the headmaster gimmick. But Generations aren't being simplified for kids. Brainstorm's simple because he's simple, that's what it takes to get him from point a to b. Not everything has an alterior motive.
It's a shame these QC issues seem to be more common than was hoped Still, the figure as a whole looks fantastic, and I can't wait to be able to get him and add him to my (very small) MTMTE shelf To be fair, given the look of his jet mode, there wasn't a whole lot that could have been done to make it more engaging Personally, I'm not too bothered about the simple transformation. It gets the job done. His robot mode is the real shining jewel of this piece, and the vehicle mode looks neat too
SQUEEE!! I was waiting on this review to pop up (Thank you tikgnat ) The mold really look good. Very clean very sharp, with the slight exception of the headmaster, which seems a bit rough. Hopefully (really hoping) this is something that has been refined along with the actual gimmick to work and that this might have just been an early QA issue. Other than that...I'm really looking forward to this figure. And also happy that Hasbro sorta went "Planet Master" route, as that always seemed to make much more sense to me.
Can't wait to add him to my MTMTE cast! Too bad they didn't add a briefcase accessory for him..oh well. Thank you for the review bro.
I've seen one reviewer accidentally tear the Headmaster off its peg because the release switch was defective. That worries me. Almost glad I canceled that preorder.
Boring transformation that doesn't really disguise the robot = Pass Gimmick so ridiculous its awesome = Yes, god, YES! QC/design issues up the wazoo = Pass
They are being simplified. Not stupidly so but it's apparent when compared to previous releases from 2010-11. If simplification wasn't emphasized we wouldn't see "transforms in _insert number less than 20_ steps_!" hyped up on packaging. Peaugh showed how to remove the head if it is stuck or pushed down to far, you basically pull on it towards you using a curving motion, while remembering where the tab is hooked in. I never expected that we would get a modernized Brainstorm let alone a new Headmaster. I love the more aggressive space fighter look. The tech spec gimmick thought not implemented as well as it could've been, is a nice touch. The head sculpt is awesome. Looking forward to this figure. Hope mine doesn't have the head misassembled nor loose wrists. Tikgnat or anyone else who has this, do the tech specs match with any other G1 headmaster? That may give us a clue as to which character/figure this one may inevitably be retooled as...
Tikgnat, I know Brainstorm has ratchets for side to side hip motion, but where else are the ratchets?
They're simpler because of engineering and production costs, which have gone up as the price of crude oil has. It's funny, because most Generations deluxes since Classics itself started have been far less than twenty steps. It's all a subliminal thing.
Simplification has been pushed by Hasbro since at least 2013. One of the design team guys made a comparison to Car Robots/RID and vowed to never have anything as complex. I don't think the simplification we've been seeing in Generations is bad, I've accepted the necessary sacrifices and I don't think these are stupidly simple. Lower production costs align with the simpler direction Hasbro is pushing. If they weren't pushing for simplification all around(outside of Masterpiece) then they wouldn't have made a big deal of it at the sdcc panel last year nor bothered to advertise the number of steps for transformation on the packaging. Full articulation, more detail and intricacy separate Generations from all other non-MP lines but the simplicity of transformation is still there. Agreed. I'm happy we've seen ways to work with it though, as shown in Peaugj and Baltmatrix's videos.
Thanks for the great pics and review, I've pre-ordered the Takara version as he's got a bit more deco going on, but this is an excellent primer. Sorry to hear about the QC issues - that's two out of three that I've seen in the past 24hr.
Excellent review tikgnat. I appreciate your effort to bring pics and such a well thought out description to us. I will gladly buy this knowing the issues you've stated. Still looks cool.
Looks cool, and a lost light character, so if I see him I'll get him, but less excited about him that I was after the initial pics came out
