Apologies if this has been debated before.

Confession: I am a G1'er. I'm old as dirt (#oldwhiteguy) I watched the cartoon and bought the toys (the 1984's and 1985's) when I was a kid. So with VERY few exceptions (mainly Arcee toys) that's the extent of my TF interests: G1, in all it's brick-like, 2-points of articulation glory!

And normally I would describe my self as a "completist." And, with G1, I am... In a way.

Because: I REFUSE to recognize Pretenders and Acton-Masters as "things I want to collect," or even as Transformers. Lol

I'm sorry... Pretenders just SUCK. These are NOT transformers. They're just WRONG. All-around WRONG. Hate me if you must, but that's must opinion. And as far as the G1 Pretenders go? 27 flavors of SUCK. I'm not buying them. Bleh.  

Also? ACTION-MASTERS? WTF?! Nothing that doesn't DO anything should have the word "ACTION" in it's name! And a Robot with no ALT-MODE should ever be called a TRANSFORMER! So I'm not buying those either.  

And... IDK... Not to exited about decoys or mini-spies either. Jury's out on that. But probably not.

So my QUESTION... With all that said... Can I still call myself a "G1 COMPLETIST," knowing that there are a SHIT-TON of G1's that I will NEVER own?

Is there another term I'm unaware of? What do the Completists out there say?

 

 

Not really... but what does it matter? Nobody is going to think any less of you because of it.
Even though I like both Pretenders and Actionmasters I can't fault you for not spending your money on things you don't want.
Arbitrary labels really don't matter, just call yourself a discerning collector.

 

There are always going to be things that are out of our taste. I still consider (outside of falling slightly behind because of budgetary reasons) a classics completionist, but I don't care for the beast figures or FOC figures in the line. Same goes with MPs for me. (I will openly admit that Cheetor looks good), the Beast MPs don't fit into my collection, so I will be passing on them.

For a lot of people, G1 got a bit weird in its latter years (and some of us who were into Transformers from 84-86 had moved on to other things), so some of the later either don't fit in, or don't have the nostalgia of other G1 figures. Pretenders are still on my list of figures I would collect, because I do like the aesthetic of many of the shells, but my focus right now is completing my last couple G1 combiners (was my 2016 goal, that I didn't quite finish), and my Headmasters for 2017. Picking up the Targetmasters I am missing will likely fall to 2018, and Pretenders after that. Different strokes, but I can definitely see them not having the same appeal as other transformers.

 

Just a note... On Monday, I'll be getting my G1 Rat-bat, including ears, and with silver weapons, to complete my G1 1984, 1985 and 1986 collection. So I'll be sure to post pics, once I've got it in hand! I wasn't going to go beyond that orginally... but... well, now here we are. Lol. And there ARE some cool figs in '87. (Fort Max?! COME ON!) So i'ma keep going, but I just look at the pretenders and my eyeballs break out in hives. Lol. No. I just can't. lol

 

I like the animal and monster pretenders.

 

It's all OK. I try to be a G1 completist but I also stop at Pretenders and Action Masters too. But the reason why I stopped there was due to changing interests back in the day. I remember around that time, I became more interested in LOTR Middle Earth RPGs, Macross and other anime/manga so Pretenders and Action Masters was dead to me. The gimmick of Pretenders in my eyes back then, were nowhere close to the complexities and fun of i.e. Metroplex, Grapple, and the combiner teams.

So yeah, its OK to call yourself a G1 completist like I regard myself, but up to say season 3 or something like that.

Cheers, and welcome to the board!

 

Welcome !

 

As an old fart G1 guy myself, G1 ended for me after the original season 3. Technically it's anything pre-G2 but who cares. You aren't collecting for other's approval, you're doing it for nostalgia. I know most G1 collectors count Japanese toys of the era but I couldn't bother. Collect for YOU

 

You could say Pretenders are the ultimate "shell-formers!"      

And that's why I like them, personally. They do have a shell, granted, but they actually change into something significantly different than TFs (i.e. they change into He-Man/TMNT/etc.). They're interesting to me, in that sense, because I also enjoyed those other 80s toys.

Plus, I'm betting you NEVER saw Japan's Super-God Masterforce!   If you're open-minded enough to enjoy Japanese anime, it's a darn good show, and it definitely will flip your opinion on Pretenders. PRETENDEEEEEEEEERRRRR!!!!!

 

Collect what you want and enjoy what you collect. I think that's the only "rule" we should go by. And if you want a label, I like the discerning collector label that was mentioned. Completionist? Well, unless you're actively searching out every variant and odd-ball repaint, I don't think a G1 collection could ever be "complete".

I do agree with you though, I don't like pretenders or actionmasters and they'll never be part of my collection. I consider my collection to be complete but I've stopped at 1987 with the headmasters. I don't have any monsterbots or throttlebots, etc and certainly haven't bothered with later stuff like the pretenders and action masters mentioned above. Otherwise, I've got everything 84-86, most of 87 and some 88. I think Powermasters would be the only figures, I'd consider adding at this point. Still, I consider my G1 collection complete and I'm happy with that.

I hope you find contentment with whatever line you decide to draw for your collection.

 

There's nothing wrong with being a completist within the subset your own particular interest, though, but yeah, claiming 'G1 Completist' outside of your own head is kinda out from a semantic sense.

If you really wanna use the 'completist' label in some way, how about by year or something similar, as in "complete thru 1987" or "pre-Pretenders completion" or whatever qualifier you prefer?

 

It is really not as black & white.

You don't have to be a completist to be Geewunner or vice versa. Imo, you don't have to own them all, to 'get' what they were about.
I'm from 1978 and throughout the years on these forums the one phenomenon which surprised me was the amount of people to whom "G1" ended with TFTM 1986 and the 1986 season 3 Sunbow cartoon.

Personally, I love the 84 & 85 toys.
Although iconic, I still feel the TFTM cast and 1986 season 3 toys to be the weakest link in G1 to me.

So even though the Transformers animated media died a horrible death in EU and USA, the actual toys of 1987, 1988 and 1989 made a superior comeback imo.
This is the reason why I love Titans Return so much because character revivals of those years start to trickle in. Whenever I see a post about worries which characters are still left beyond the usual TFTM characters,
I know they're not all too familiar with 1988, 1989 Transformers. There are still plenty of fantastic 1988/89 designs left to revisit.

 

Pretty much that.

"G1 completist" without modifiers would imply to me that you're also complete through Zone characters/figures, so all of the Japanese figures as well. With what it sounds like you have, it sounds like US through '87 completionist sounds like your jam.

 

I love Pretenders. Pretenders are awesome toys inside toys.
They are like a suprise egg where the egg itself is a toy.
But hey, if you dont wanna buy 'm you'll be cheaper of than me.

 

I don't collect G1 toys, but here's my   on Pretenders - They're your average Transformers toys inside a chunk of plastic you don't need to like.

Apparently Bludgeon did some important stuff in the Marvel comics, so if you read those, at the very least he would be worth picking up.

 

Welcome, old timer! Always nice to see fellow Transformers geezer.

To your original question, YES. I think you can be a completest by putting a barrier around any collection...and frankly we all have to do this. If someone was a completest for the whole Transformers line, they'd be buried in toys. We all have a vision of what a complete collection looks like.

I'm not into Pretenders and Actionmasters either...but I get what they were going for. Transformers were dropping in popularity thanks to competition from other action figures and to an even greater extent, video games. Pretenders and Actionmasters were an attempt to start fresh with a new idea because the old "vehicle becomes ro-bit" thing lost its luster. Well, the attempts were pretty far off the mark, IMO and I don't believe they sold all that well. What I remember noticing as a kid was how cheap and cheesy they seemed...they didn't belong in the same toy bin as Ultra Magnus and Predaking (who came out just a couple years earlier). I got one or two and moved on. In retrospect, I like quite a few of them (Octopunch is my favorite) but they feel a lot more like He-Man or some other toy line.

Congrats on completing your set! That's a drool-worthy collection, sir.

Did you get all of the mini spy variants?
IIRC, there are four different car models, each available in white, blue or yellow, each available with two different wheel/hub variants. Yeah...it's ok to draw a line, IMO.  

 

I think that a collection is complete once you say it is. It's yours. Granted you don't want to collect certain sublines, but would you rather shell out your hard earned moolah for toys that you have no connection to just to say that you've caught them all?

 

You can call yourself whatever you like... and for a small fee I can call you whatever you like too.

 

I don't think it would be accurate for you to describe yourself as a "completionist" if your end goal is not a complete collection. Just call yourself a G1 collector.

 

Let it be known, NO ONE ELSE dictates someone else's collection. If it is complete as how you see fit, it is complete.