MODULATE!

 

Getting CHUGY with it Na na na na na na na
Na na na na na na
Getting CHUGY with it

 

There’s no real rhyme or reason to this photo.

 

Springer and Groove are there to rescue Cliffjumper from the hands of Starscream.


And Flywheels is there too.

 

I like that you refer to him as Flywheels and not as that cheap impostor Skytread.

 

I like it, he clearly had his name accidentally switched with his Duocon buddy in the 80's and I just roll with that.

 

Possibly the best voyager of all time:

 

I’ve had my eye on rebuying some of my classics figures and this is on my list.

 

I highly recommend him, the only things he's missing are an ab-crunch and an ankle tilt. The MMC Reformatted line's scale is loosely based around this guy if I recall correctly, so he scales better with them than he does modern CHUG figures.

 

I'm still hoping I'm the only person in the universe whose Springer started crumbling to bits. Too cool of a toy for everyone else to have ruined, but I would keep that in mind if you're looking to get one, lol. Don't pay too much.

 

Look, I'm going to be straight with you here. The only reason I ever got the Micromaster Stations was because I had incredibly fond memories of the Micromachine Travel City playlets. Those things were the shit, man! You could connect those bad boys up and make yourself a little city for your Micromachines to tootle around in. Who wouldn't love that?

So, it's no surprise that Hasbro decided to steal not only the 'micro' concept but the best play pattern too. And get this. The fucking things transformed. I know. I'm as shocked as you are.

Of course, Ironworks and Greasepit weren't the name of the stations. Rather these were the wee Micromasters that came with the base. Ironworks was a repaint of Powertrain and Greasepit a repaint of Mudslinger. And the stations took the flashy titles of 'Construction Station' and 'Gas Station'. Who says all the good names have been taken.

I was really, really checked out on the franchise by the time Micromaster's came around. A friend had Skystalker but I don't remember paying it much attention. So, like much of my G1, I didn't actually get to check these guys out until I was an adult.

Full disclosure; I was ready to pass these guys by. They never appeared in the comics, they weren't toys I had in my childhood or had pined for back then. Zero significance means no purchase. Usually. But then I saw a picture of them all connected up in glorious city mode and I had to get them. So thanks to whichever enabler took those photos.

Individually none of these bases are any great shakes. They're chunky, single colour, blocks of plastic with stickers attached to try and bring them some life. Sure, they're cute. But they're all so basic that it's kind of hard to believe they've got any relationship to the complex detailed toys of 1984.

But then you connect them up and they all come alive. Suddenly they're an environment. I believe the toy people use the term 'ecosystem' these days. You can just connect the four bases together, or you go all in and get Countdown, Skystalker, Groundshaker, or Skyhopper's bases and make yourself a l'il city! There's something utterly delightful about getting your Micromaster patrols and setting them up to move round the city. Stories just happen. It's the definition of play value.

And that's the reason I tend not to transform them into their 'battle' modes. They're charming enough, but the stand-alone nature of them doesn't excite me as much. Now, if they'd kept the connectivity in these modes as well, I'd be ALL over them. If I could connect up Airwave's Rocket launching station with Greasepit's armed comms station I'd be having a party.

After seeing Ironworks released in a 10-pack Target exclusive, along with a bunch of other non-Patrol Micromasters, I was rather surprised to see leaked listings for the first of Earthrise Deluxes and see Ironworks name there. Were we going to get Weaponizers that turned into Micromaster bases in WfC:II, I wondered.

Turns out I was actually right for once. Well, ok...they were called 'Modulators', but same deal. It was a lot of fun to see they'd created a new robot mode for the 'construction station' and given it the name of the wee guy that used to man the crane, or whatever he did.

Somewhat inevitably, we only got two 'true' Modulators (come on, Fasttrack is Weaponiser in all but name), with two repaints released via Selects. And Ironworks and Airwave (I almost typed Hairweave. I blame @Bob Schoonover ) got the honour of getting the mainline release.

Ironworks makes for a satisfyingly chunky little generi-bot. There's something about him that just screams 'drone', and I love it. He's surprisingly well done, with buckets of articulation and engineering solid enough to help him pull off a host of poses.

Where he loses points, kind of ironically, is in the modes that the original 'construction station' had. I have to squint at both modes to see something that resembles the original modes. In fact I have to squint at both modes to see than as anything other than a bunch of bits stuck together. AND you have to steal Grapple's claw to make the 'radar station'. Much like the original, the saving grace is the connectivity. As a stand-alone unit, Ironworks makes for a lame base, but connected between Omega Supreme and Sky Lynx's base modes he becomes essential.

Weirdly, his redo as Greasepit works a lot better for me. I know, when it comes to redo's, it's rare that someone is developed 'first'; everything is co-synchronous these days, but it's hard to shake this feeling that Greasepit is actually the primary. Both base modes resonate a lot better, with the petrol station achieving verisimilitude through an advertising sign and some gas pumps, and the colours just make the robot mode pop so much more.

Hairwe...AIRWAVE is the real star of this whole Modulator thing. He's just such a lot of fun. His 'bot mode is absolutely full of bonkers character, from his little but large chest, his nigh ecstatic colour scheme, to his brilliantly weird headsculpt. He's got a lot of the same energy as last years Brunt, with whom he happens to share some hips. To be honest, his whole waist and thighs section looks like an adaption of Brunt's. I believe we're calling this a 'partial' these days, though I still prefer the suggestion of one @Bob Schoonover for 're-cad' (two shout outs in one post? This is bad nepotism , Starscream).

Ironworks lent himself well to fan modding base modes, but Airwave took it to new levels. So much so that Hasbro themselves couldn't resist advertising a third mode for him. Yes, as well as the 'airport' and the 'rocket launch station', we have an official aircraft carrier mode. And all of them work pretty well. Certainly much more so than Ironworks.

And finally, we get Hot House from Airwave. Unlike Greasepit we don't get any new parts, but he makes some sort of sense of Airwave's most incongruous feature; why does an airport have tracks? Suddenly the 'aircraft carrier' mode feels more like a pre-fit for a more Hot House-y alt mode. Maybe they shouldn't have bothered, because even my best effort to make something along the lines of the of the 'battle tank' looks a little absurd. Sure, you can make a tank barrel, and you've got your tank tracks, but it feels like there's too much mass in the middle of this mode. Oh well, at least his deco looks suitably mad in 'bot mode. I'm sure I saw this the last time I took mushrooms.

They're a funny sort of dead end, these Modulators. I could have imagined them developing the idea in all sorts of exciting ways, but instead we're getting a couple of them before moving hastily on to Kingdom's Fossilizers. For those of us that love building up their TF cities, it's kind of a pity. But I'll make the most of what I have. Here's to you, you bunch of freaks.

 

"Nerd rambles about his childhood memories" indeed. I'm just messing with you, that was a fun read!

 

Yay! Having Arcee finally makes this shot possible!

 

It'll look so much better when SS86 comes out.

(Not insulting your photo, just talking about my excitement.)

 

Me too bro me too

 

Another mashup: