the comic was released in the stores in May 1984, i remember still being in school before summer break when i got it at the RT18 Indoor Flea Market at H&H Comics

 

and they were advertising the comic in commercials way before the toon aired (the designs of the characters changed considerably in some instances)

 

yup

 

The official listings of the cassettes are live again (although NOT currently available to order online yet):

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Transform...vage-and-Rumble-Collectible-Figures/700137863

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Transform...y-and-Laserbeak-Collectible-Figures/641642900

 

I was just able to order the 2 pack for pickup from a local store. We shall see if the order gets fulfilled...

 

i know they'll disappear quickly if/when they go live but at least they're back up

 

I was able to order the Frenzy/Lazerbeak set for pickup not as lucky with the Rumble/Ravage set. Since the stores around me won't stock these their website is the way I'm going to get these.

 

With 12 per case, I think these will be plentiful once mass released. I found my set this morning at a Herkimer, NY Walmart. They were also on the pegs at Utica & New Hartford, NY

 

Has anybody else noticed Lazerbeak has short guns, and Rumble/Frenzy don't have the gold chrome? They are not 100% original.

 

Short guns are the result of safety in toys changes made to comply with the law in later reissues. That won't be changing sadly. As to gold, the gold guns did not appear until the packaging with Ratbat / Frenzy & to my knowledge never as Rumble / Ravage.

 

How odd... I just looked at the packaging for the cassettes and it seems they've mis-labeled Rumble (who is blue) as Frenzy. Must be an error...

 

 

I tend to agree. Walmart put out the full stock in my area this morning. Down to two Soundwaves already, but about 8 packs of cassettes. Not sure why people aren't buying the cassettes, maybe it's the $20 price point. But I'd say your chances of finding a cassette in the wild is pretty excellent. In fact, if Walmart delivers multiple shipments then the cassettes may actually make it to clearance. Probably too early to talk about that though.

 

Maybe he meant the gold on their chests, not the guns?

 

"Way before" is a little bit subjective. I wouldn't say way before. And since when do we go by comics and package art as the default canon for 80s toys? In no other line that I'm aware of. Nobody considers the He-Man pack-in comics as the "true" canon. Nobody considers Ram-Man as evil (and his toy even has a pirate skull on his belt.) We always use the cartoon as canon unless it's something like X-Men where the comics debuted 20 years earlier. And those Transformer comics may have been tacked onto the end of early G1 commercials, but how many kids truly owned those comics? Damn sure not me. If you lived in a rural area then comic shops were pretty rare and getting my mom to buy one was even rarer than that.

 

Another difference I noticed is the art on the new Buzzsaw's wing stickers is actually Laserbeak's with an added yellow tint/overlay.

Original Buzzsaw's wing sticker art was slightly different from Laserbeak's.

https://static.seibertron.com/images/toys/files/01/r_buzzsawvsz019.jpg

https://static.seibertron.com/images/toys/files/01/r_laserbeak010.jpg

 

That's a good catch.

 

they were advertising the Marvel comic Transformers #1 in a dedicated commercial before the issue hit stands, which was months before the cartoon started airing...

(love the memories this brings back)

the toys in store were probably the first time anyone saw the characters for the first time but the cartoon's reach was much wider to a broader audience and the commercial for the comic book definitely put it on the radar of kids...

so a lot of people consider what was onscreen to be definitive, but that doesn't discount the fact that the toys and comics were out first...

(if I'm not mistaken, the latter days of the Mattycollector He-man line was trying to incorporate a lot of those comics into canon, or at least a canon that blended the more common toon-continuity with the comics...I've always considered the TF cartoon and comic continuities as separate, different incarnations because there are too many inconsistent or contradictory elements, but it is fun to see stuff like the Witwicky name pop up in the toon or a cartoon reference turn up in the comics)

 

That may be a bit disingenuous. Only TWO comics came out before the cartoon debuted. The comics didn't even finish their 4 part origin story until around the beginning of 1985. And Red-Rumble was only mentioned by name in two panels across those two issues, two issues where everyone was colored a bit crazy. So someone explain to me how that's not a He-Man mini-comic situation?

 

not saying comics were the be-all canon at all, just that they came out before the tv show, just like the toys

if anything, the toys themselves should be the final word

(now this new reissue does make it interesting as the names have flipped...Star Wars had 4LOM and Zuckuss flipped for twenty years...

if they continue to make Rumble reissue toys the blue one and that continues to be the case going forward then you could have a good argument that the official canon has changed

 

Regardless of whether the comic or cartoon (which it should be mentioned was notorious for coloring errors) the TOY is the definitive thing here, which the two fictions were made to support. Hasbro created and released Rumble as red, therefore Rumble is red.​