Cartoon Grimlock and Soundwave are beyond overdue. The Robot Paradise Soundwave pre-order sold out everywhere.

 

Total plot twist, simultaneous release of SS v2 and SSV2 toy repaint complete with tampos and rally flags, or Tigertracks done up like that.

They had to make some concessions for Sunstreaker a toy release of both together would be pretty cool, but I'm thinking they go strictly Sideswipe for the anniversary if it happens.

I wouldnt count Tracks out, hes the weakest out of the carbots with the worse articulation, and I think they could execute better what they did in Kingdom with the fake roof? Using the real one to fill his upper body out. Only problem is the Stingray is a very wide car in the first place.

 

This.

I have no worries, but dammit I want more accessories as a whole just to begin with, haha. More extra faces being my paramount of course, but also a couple more one-episode pieces wouldn't hurt.

Agreed. Personally, here's a little list I put together, grouped by priority rather than a more traditional ranking for almost if not every character that only got a V1 before the new toon aesthetic.

High Priority

Rodimus Prime (EXTREMELY dated, tries to be an all-singing all-dancing Rodimus and Hot Rod that hasn't aged well, at least in my opinion, and a V2 would do absolute WONDERS by comparison)

Sideswipe (Dated, DESPERATELY needs a cartoon-accurate refresh worthy for only the best)

Red Alert (Dated, could be redone to match the cartoon WAY more)

Medium Priority

Soundwave (alongside the tapes) (Still a very solid figure to this day, but a V2 would be very welcome)

Ultra Magnus (Bulky boi with some slight proportion issues, could be redone to match MP-44 moreso, also get rid of that damn buttflap)

Hot Rod (Has some proportion issues mainly with the shoulders and torso, could be absolutely spectacular if given a second shot)

Tracks (Dat back tho)

Grimlock (Dated, yet still can fit alright aside from being a bit too short)

Low Priority

Vannettes (Ironhide and Ratchet) (Transitional pieces between Hasui and toon era, but have some flaws that could be ironed out with another go)

Wheeljack (Recent MP+ redeco and is still a pretty solid figure even now)

Datsuns (Smokescreen, Prowl, Bluestreak) (Recently had the MP+ redecoes, but I personally believe they could have a bit more of a solid build, for one, using swivels instead of ball joints for the arms)

It'd honestly be neat but I personally would moreso imagine seeing Sideswipe come with a sticker sheet rather than a toy deco outright, at least from the start. Would still be really cool though.

 

I'm ready for a v2 of Acree and a v3 of Starscream...they're looking a bit dated.

 

C'mon man, what about a V4 of Prime? It's been enough time since V3!

 

I thought V3 Starscream just released?

 

It's Tigertrack, no 's' on the end (though his name should be Spinout  )

I'm counting Tracks out because he's a B-lister at best. But sure, depending upon how well a v2 Sideswipe sells they might give Tracks a second go to tie in with Blaster, it's not impossible.

You say Rodimus Prime is outdated but actually he matches the current toon direction pretty brilliantly in many ways. I think a new Rodimus Prime will also either try to incorporate a Hot Rod inside it too, or it'll try for an all-in-one transformation.

I would put Soundwave in the High Priority List for sure, alongside Grimlock. Actually, how about different categories altogether:


There's three As that most MPs follow these days. Animation accuracy, Articulation and Accessories.

Animation accurate, super-Articulated, many Accessories

MP-44 Optimus Prime
MP-36 Megatron
MP-52 Starscream
MP-51 Arcee

Animation accurate, not super-Articulated, many Accessories

MP-27 Ironhide
MP-30 Ratchet
MP-29 Shockwave

Animation accurate, super-Articulated, basic Accessories

MP-45 Bumblebee

Animation accurate, not super-Articulated, basic Accessories

MP-9 Rodimus Prime
MP-22 Ultra Magnus

Not Animation accurate, super-Articulated, basic Accessories

MP-28 Hot Rod

Not Animation accurate, not super-Articulated, many Accessories

MP-8 Grimlock
MP-20+ Wheeljack

Not Animation accurate, not super-Articulated, basic Accessories

MP-12+ Sideswipe
MP-17+ Prowl
MP-18+ Bluestreak
MP-19+ Smokescreen
MP-25 Tracks
MP-53 Skids


That's how I view them, anyway. Only didn't put Wheeljack in the last category because he doesn't need that many alternate faceplates. Just because it has three or more red categories doesn't mean it's gonna get remade. That part depends on whether it's A list or not.

 

After the V2s, I'm done buying Seekers.
I'm also done buying new version MPs of Optimus and Bumblebee.

I'm not a fan of the Coneheads, Roddy, Arcee or Kup, so MP money saved there.

They really do need to fix the QC issue on MP Hound and rerelease him.

 

All this talk about redos. Hot Rod v.2 is still at the top of my wishlist.

Followed by Sideswipe, Grimlock and Soundwave. I love the originals though and might very well keep them, as I did with MP-10 and OG Wheeljack.

This line is so awesome and it’s insane that the 20th anniversary is already coming up two and a half years from now. That means it’ll be half the age of the brand as a whole. Wonder how/if TT will commemorate it.

 

Optimus Prime 4.0
 

 

Fml! Haha

I’m half expecting them to reissue V1 for the anniversary. Maybe they can release him with the ugly yellow accents he was originally gonna come with  

 

Oh well, for the redone MP, i think that only ones that needs a V 2.0. in an indipendent way from their brand popularity ( there are only 5 or 6 face on this brand) are Red Alert, Sideswipe, Soundwave, Grimlock (of course) and Rodimus Prime.
Unfortunately these are not remasters of videogames, and doing from scratch a character steals resources from other ones, and the to-do list is long.
For accessories, they could include new accessories in repaints (it's not a takara esclusive, JoJo figures does the same)

 

I think it's amazing with literally hundreds (thousands?) of possibilities for Masterpiece Transformers just how often Sideswipe 2.0 comes up. A few months (years?) ago I went on a long rant about why I think that it will happen, with my biggest wish being that Takara would take some of that empty space and give us a transformable rocket pack from his regular back ala Sunstreaker's vehicle engine reveal. I think some good points about the anniversary of the Countach upcoming as well as a shift towards more recognizable vehicles in the Movieverse only strengthen my that argument. I also think it's very interesting how recently Takara has made an unexpected shift to pushing out repaints very quickly as opposed to the long drawn out game we've seen before - and of course Sideswipe is *very* repaintable. The question then becomes how does Takara go about doing this in a way to maximize fan acceptance as well as generate maximum profit. Every new reveal comes with some amount of controversy as we've seen time and time again. Some will rejoice at a Sideswipe with cartoon accurate proportions while others will raise pitchforks that we still don't have XYZ or they thought that MP-12 was just fine the way it was. I think both sides have a point. So is there a middle ground as to how they can do this in a way that makes sense? Let's see.

First off, before any V2 is done - give us a Deep Cover from the MP-12 mold. For a couple reasons. 1. People have been waiting for this for almost a decade. Reward that patience. 2. There is a certain aesthetic quality to symmetry of recolored molds.

If you jump ship and not complete this full set of MP-12 Lambos then you would force a new mold Deep Cover which doesn't give the above picture the same feeling of completeness. There will be people who will never be interested in a V2 mold, but I feel like they would at least acknowledge and appreciate the fact that Takara had those people in mind. 3. It would be a very low risk release. Yeah, I know it's outdated by this point and a minor character and everything. But financially it's just a new coat of paint and I feel like enough people are such completionists that you're going to come out on top. 4. Advertise it as it's retirement. This generated tons of free publicity for Megatron. Just blindly guessing at upcoming releases is a lot of rinse wash repeat of our favorites list. But I've noticed that anytime Takara gives us even a little hint of something to go off of the boards explode in excitement. And of course if all that's not enough...pair him with Masterpiece Powered Buggy. That way when we get red Mirage we will have a complete Powered Convoy DX Set!

Moving on. Who do you release with the new mold? I suppose the knee jerk reaction would be to milk the mold and give us the full gambit of Sideswipe, Red Alert, Tigertrack, Clampdown, and Deep Cover (and maybe toy versions of Sideswipe and Red Alert). That seems like a lot to swallow but I'm not wholeheartedly opposed to it if they do it right. One of my favorite memories of the Masterpiece line was when Red Alert was announced and he had the faux wheels on his shoulders. I felt like Takara didn't need to do that but I was extremely grateful that they gave the character it's respect so early in the untested line. And as I've said before, it's not wholly cartoon accurate, but did represent at the time a Hasui inspired Masterpiece version of the character. Times of course have changed and with the exception of Skids we are in a very cartoon direction with the line at this point. To this end Sideswipe and Red Alert need to be very different.

Here's what each character *needs*.
Sideswipe - thin chest, no doors on arms, no shoulder wheels, roof on back
Red Alert - wide chest, doors on arms, big shoulder wheels, spoiler on back
I don't know if two completely different molds are required to do this. What's interesting is that my hypothesis as to why we haven't seen Trailbreaker and Hoist yet is that Takara hasn't quite made up their mind about how to do them. If Trailbreaker had come out 6-7 years ago he probably would have been followed by a slightly modified green Trailbreaker that was good enough for Hoist (like Red Alert and Smokescreen). If Trailbreaker and Hoist are released cartoon accurate now which different molds or heavy modifications, then it makes Red Alert and Smokescreen stick out even more and almost mandates new versions. But Red Alert and Sideswipe do have a lot more similarities so maybe some clever parts swapping would suffice. I think it would be amazing if one mold could be somehow transformed into both configurations - but that might be asking too much.

So what to do with the other three? My personal preference is, in the absence of a cartoon representation, to look for the original source material. (My favorite example of this would be Wheeljack (cartoon), Exhaust (Diaclone toy), and Slicer (Action Master toy) to get subtle differences in wheels, number of shoulder launchers, face sculpt, etc). Unfortunately in this case the original source material for all three are the Diaclone toys (and subsequent Transformers releases). That would mean that each of them would be:

Tigertrack, Clampdown, Deep Cover - wide chest, doors on arms, big shoulder wheels, roof on back

making them from the front identical to Red Alert and toy Sideswipe. Which to me is unexciting, especially if you want to sell me a Clampdown V2. So what should they look like? There was a long and heavily debated topic way back on ATT just about this. Some were in the camp that since Clampdown is a recolor of Red Alert then "cartoon" Clampdown should be a recolor of cartoon Red Alert. The same for Sideswipe and Tigertrack and Deep Cover. Others were in the camp that since cartoon representations didn't exist then you can't assign one, or that it would matter whether they were on the Ark crew or a later addition. There is no right answer but my personal preference would be for them to have slight differences. With the flexibility of the mold (or molds) perhaps you could have something like this:

Tigertrack - thin chest, no doors on arms, big shoulder wheels, roof on back
Clampdown - wide chest, no doors on arms, no shoulder wheels, spoiler on back
Deep Cover - wide chest, doors on arms, no shoulder wheels, roof on back

Those are just random combinations to try and have a little variety. Obviously it would be amazing if this was all one mold and you could make these variations on your own. The reason I like variations so much is that I feel like it's more of an Autobot thing. For the Decepticons (military hardware), it makes sense that a lot of their designs would be identical. To back this up, I think in the US cartoon only Eject and Rewind share the exact body type (with Blaster and Twincast being added in Japan).

But I am also a sucker for honoring the past and extremely mindful that not everyone in the world wants to invest in a whole new set of Sideswipe molds. Here is what I propose with consideration of number of releases, financial investment, accuracy, and fan appreciation.

A new mold (or molds) for Sideswipe and Red Alert as described above.
MP-14C remains as the definitive Clampdown.
MP-12D is released as the definitive Deep Cover.

And as for Tigertrack. While the Diaclone toy is the only official source material there is one other consideration. You see, Sunstreaker and Sideswipe had a very confusing pre-Transformers release lineage. There were name changes, color changes, bio changes, and whole mold switches! In fact, the 1984 Sunstreaker toy should actually be colored red and called Sideswipe and the 1984 Sideswipe toy should actually be colored yellow and called Spin-Out. Which is confusing since now we have a red Sunstreaker named Spin-Out since the actual toy that was intended to be Spin-Out is now called Tigertrack. Oy. But here's what I'm getting at. As we know, the first "cartoon" Autobot designs were Optimus Prime, Prowl, Jazz, and Sideswipe by Shohei Kohara.

But it's very possible that at this point, that wasn't Sideswipe at all. It was Spin-Out, who would later be known as Tigertrack! This would give a repaint option considering the probably extensive cost to develop the new Sideswipe and Red Alert, while also being interesting and historical.


In summary, this creates similar, but unique versions which honor the source material while giving variety, don't make you double down on new Clampdowns and Deep Covers, might be a happy medium to satisfy fans, and hopefully finally gives Sideswipe his rocket pack.
Sideswipe - thin chest, no doors on arms, no shoulder wheels, roof on back
Red Alert - wide chest, doors on arms, big shoulder wheels, spoiler on back
Tigertrack - thin chest, no doors on arms, big shoulder wheels outside the shoulders, roof on back
Clampdown - wide chest, no doors on arms, small shoulder wheels, roof on back
Deep Cover - wide chest, no doors on arms, no shoulder wheels, roof on back (and also no rocket launcher)

 

Though I agree with that list, probably the only one I would buy again is Grimlock and that is mainly due to him being out of scale (being pre-MP10 when scale did not seem to be established)

But how about we get the discussion back on track for *new* characters we really need?
None of these re-dos do not come close to breaking my top ten, which is still full of s1 and s3 characters that we are missing.

 

Well, this thread is titled the speculation thread and not the new characters speculation thread.  

There are a lot of characters that I would love to see released for the first time in the Masterpiece line, but there are also various characters that I would love to see redone, such as Grimlock, Rodimus Prime, Soundwave (and Soundblaster) and Ultra Magnus for example. I wouldn't mind a Sideswipe v2 either, but the other mentioned characters are higher up on my wishlist. Shouki, Skyfire and Skids seem to make any character possible at this point in time.

To be honest, I'm glad with anything that we're getting. Would love a Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge for example, but if they would announce Grimlock, Rodimus Prime and Soundwave in v2 form, I would be just as happy.  

 

Lol you're really saying that after this epic post by @brianjnelson?? smh

First of all, brilliant post! Love that you correctly talked about how Sideswipe and Spinout/Sunstreaker were originally supposed to look (yup, MP-39+ is a dead ringer for Sideswipe's original form, and MP-12T is how Spinout/Sunstreaker would've looked).

I do think you're factoring Deep Cover and Clampdown a little too heavily into the speculation for v2 though. We might get an MP-12/14 version of Deep Cover, we might not.
I can imagine that it might not be so easy to swap over the engineering between the new Sideswipe/Red Alert mould(s), so while I love the idea of mixing and matching, we might have to settle on Tigertrack as a repaint of Sideswipe, and Deep Cover (if we get him) as a repaint of Red Alert.

I really do hope they'd do Tigertrack again, either way. Him as a repaint of Red Alert v2 would work for me too (actually maybe a little better, the door wings would look damn cool!). They could go the same route as MP-42 and MP-39+ and give Tigertrack a brand new toy-accurate head, as well. Maybe a toy-accurate gun/launcher while they're at it.


There really is a fair difference between the two of them, I really wonder how they'll engineer things. I imagine they'll try to give Red Alert the actual car tyres on his shoulders, while Sideswipe's will have to be hidden in his body. And it really looks like Red Alert could benefit from the entire front of the Countach as his chest while Sideswipe will definitely need to cheat somehow. Even for the legs, which look kinda similar, Sideswipe needs to hide the tyres while Red Alert's should be fully on display.





They might share some parts, like abs, thighs, feet, hands, maybe forearms, but they'll be so different it practically will be like having two separate moulds! Grapple and Inferno shared 50% of parts, I can imagine these two sharing even less. Maybe overall the transformations could follow a similar path so much of the internal engineering could remain the same. Damn it's exciting to imagine the two of them done right!

 

Figure King in 2 weeks, before we get to a hypothetical new Sideswipe, we have to get through CJ, Skfire, and. Raiden gauntlet . It took 2 months after the Megatron release before they acknowledged it. I wonder what kind of coverage CJ will get. In essence it’s a repaint/remold but if it’s actually licensed, I could see them making a bigger deal out of it. I would love for Skyfire to come with minifigs similar to xtbs perceptor.

I’m just hoping Raiden is at least 19 inches it would be a shame to pass on him because he’s 11 inches tall .

 

If they ever repaint MP-28 again, what are the chances it would be this?

 

They should do Shattered Glass.
If anything so we can get that sweet evil goatee.