Yes, the arm transformation is quite ingenious. If only they'd put the same amount of thought into the robot arms on Kingdom Cheetor originally. There would have been all this room on Cheetor's underside for, oh, I don't know, a gun or something  

 

Damn, forgot that this thread existed.

Will copy what I said in other similar threads: Cybershark, Manterror and Wolfang are some of my most wanted figures. Polar Claw deserves justice and get revenge at Tigatron. After seeing Ravage, I believe a B'Boom/Apache remould from Primal is perfectly possible. New Lio Convoy and a repaint into Rodimus Primal (If Nemesis Primal can happen then Rodimus deserves a chance too).

 

I mean, it's not every once in a while that we get a new treatment of Beast Wars Ravage of all characters, especially since his original figure is the ultimate holy grail of any Beast Wars collection.
The last time we ever got something close to a BW Ravage figure was in 2016 (and before that, 1999) for BotCon, which was a CW Breakdown repaint. So if they ever revisit Ravage again (if at all), we'd have to wait other 5 years at minimum to get a new figure of him.
So even if this new Ravage may not be for everyone's cup of tea, a lot of us are experiencing with Beast Wars figures/characters for the first time through Kingdom, so we'd like to have as many characters get the same treatment. So this new Ravage not only does it get the job done as updating Ravage (I think it looks great), it gives fans a chance to have the character in their BW shelves to compensate for the X9 figure, and it satisfies the hunger for Ravage for the time being.
Besides, what great time would it be to revisit Ravage if not Beast Wars' 25th anniversary?

 

Ravage is a real curiosity for me. I won't be picking him up myself, but certainly encourage those interested to track him down, and hope he's readily accessible for them to do so. But I'm just kind of bewildered by him for a few reasons.

But looking forward, Cheetor is in Kingdom, he'll no doubt be in Rise of the Beasts, he was introduced into Cyberverse in 2019... He's going to be about for a while, as he's synonymous with Beast Wars. He was the second cab off the BW MP rank, so there's no doubting his place and prominence.

Eventually, we're going to get Generations versions of Transmetals figures, and Cheetor will be chief among them -- there are only 9 Transmetals figures that made it into the show after all, and that includes X-9 Ravage.

Given Hasbro's love of redecos and retools, I'm in little doubt Ravage would get another look in at this point, and I'm happy to wait for that to eventuate.

As you say, X-9 Ravage is perhaps the holy grail for Beast Wars collectors, and I'm fortunate enough to have tracked one down some years ago (though it should be noted that we've all had 20+ years to...) and perhaps owning the figure is factoring in my willingness to wait.

 

Honestly, I really don't like X-9 Ravage. If I'm perfectly honest... I think he looks kinda terrible. I mean, he's great for what he is, a decent retool of Transmetal Cheetor... but other than that, he's kinda ugly and not terribly screen accurate. That's just *my* view. If I had X-9, I'm pretty sure I'd be hunting down WFC Ravage, because I think this new version looks a lot better.

The only reason I'm not going to though is because I have TransArt, which is a pretty damn beautiful version of him. Even then, I'm still kinda tempted by WFC just because I actually think it has the superior transformation over TransArt's non-transformation.

 

Hell, I've only got the Botcon Tigatron version of X-9 so I'll be hunting this new one, but I'd also hunt down a Tigatron version of the new one as well

 

I've been slowly piecing together in my mind why the WFC Ravage isn't doing it for me, and another part fell into place yesterday.

TM2 Prowl. He's an owl, and a quintessential mess of a figure that is a TM2 (I say that lovingly, of course). Now, Hasbro have this terrific new bird mould floating around thanks to Kingdom Airazor. We know it's being used for BWII Skywarp and the Terrorsaur retool, but let's say they wanted to use it again. They look at the original Beast Wars line-up, but birds are actually thin on the ground. They do have Prowl, however.

Instead of totally reworking the design and plastering it in chrome, they decide to make an organic version of Prowl -- Season 1 Prowl if you will. And looking at the transformation of Kingdom Airazor and TM2 Prowl, they share quite a number of similarities with the bird head on the robot chest and bird legs as robot legs.

But...

This, to me, actually takes something away from TM2 Prowl.

The beauty of the Transmetals and TM2 designs is that they were such a departure from that which had come before. Prowl is a tough example as he doesn't have that Original organic design to compare to in the real world, so let's use Iguanus for a moment as he had both an Original figure and a TM2.

His TM2 design isn't just a chromed version of the Original design. It's totally different. But an Original Prowl design would be just a de-chromed version of the TM2. That's boring, and I think this is part of what is throwing me with WFC Ravage. Original or Transmetal, he's the same design. But Transmetals and TM2's should be totally different from a preceding design.

I don't think I'm explaining this very well, but I hope you kind of get what I mean.

 

Well. Wow. Place your bets.

 

Am I missing something? What are you referring too?

 

Potential. Could be fake. But if not...

 

The Road to Robotic

We all know Beast Wars. We know the journey the characters go on, both in terms or story, but also in regards to the journey they go on in a design sense:

From Original (organic), to Transmetal (robotic), then Transmetal 2 (an organic and robotic mix)

The Transmetals do have organic elements to their robot-modes of course, but let's narrow in on just the beast-modes for a moment. This is Beast Wars after all.

We start with the organic, then do a complete shift to the opposite, then return to something of a mish-mash middle ground. When you sit back and look at it, it's actually quite a jarring journey, flipping from one extreme to the other, then finishing in an amalgam.

A "smoother" transition (for lack of a better term) in a design sense would be:

Original (organic), to Transmetal 2 (an organic and robotic mix), then Transmetal (robotic)

The jumps are thus smaller. From fully organic, to partially organic/partially robotic, to fully robotic.

Where am I going with this?

If the little tidbit of rumoured leakage today is true, Hasbro might be mixing up the order of things in order to "smooth out" this transition going forward, which ultimately ends up with purely robotic beasts, much more akin to G1 beasts.

Think of it, too, in terms of technological advancement. The Transmetals now being the end point means them gaining a 3rd mode makes more sense, rather than getting it, then losing it again as with the original flow of things.

You can put Fuzors alongside TM2's, as they're also organic, and that helps explain TM2 Tigerhawk, who can be a melding of Tigatron and Airazor.

All of this rampant speculation from a single name-drop. I've missed this.

 

I literally JUST got MetalBeast a few weeks ago. TMII Megatron isn't something I'm craving massively right now. Normal TM Megatron, though...

Who am I kidding? I'll buy another.

 

I now find myself staring at Kingdom Dinobot, and given how those thigh pieces work, all they'd need is a swivel joint (instead of the hinge that's currently in place) in order to rotate onto the top, and you've got the foundations of a TM2 Dinobot ready to go.

Interestingly, for what would probably be a Voyager class figure, he doesn't have any accessories.

 

With Rise of the Beasts from what we've heard will have the Maximals and Predacons being somewhat inspired by both the organic and TM aesthetics blending together I wouldn't be shocked if what Hasbro's doing with ROTBs may also have a part in that pattern you've talked about. Also I can't help but wonder if Hasbro's willing enough to do this we can then see a transition from the robotic to the fully merging of organic and robotic elements akin to both Beast Machines and Transtech as a way to bring things full circle in the form of a line that's mixed with Beast Machines and Transtech characters. Pipe dream I know but still how awesome would it be to finally get Transtech figures?

 

Ever since I first converted him myself, I've had similar musings about Kingdom Beast Megs: those giant hip covers start and end where the VTOL should, and just try to convince me that once you allow for the detachable tail, the torso conversion would be more complicated for TM Grapeface than S1.

 

TransTech is, for me, the missing piece of the Transformers puzzle. Beast Wars is always seen as this "other" thing. Linked, but separate. We saw it with the original Beast Wars, with the characters coming from the distant future, and this looks to be repeated with the Kingdom storyline. Even Cyberverse seems to have something like this.

TransTech would have joined these pieces together more solidly, wtih G1 and BW characters being contemporaries, rather than distant ancestors. From that point on, you can then make them contemporaries all the time without it feeling slightly odd. Thus, you can do Beast Wars figures any time, not just on anniversaries or special occasions. They're part of the normal fabric of Transformers, not some disconnected oddity.

So yeah, bring on TransTech.

I had a similar thought myself, but hadn't mused more on it because of the difference in robot arms and where they end up. There are perhaps more similarities with TM2 Megs though.

 

The main exception coming to mind being the dragon's butt-head  

 

Yes, it wasn't the best location for the robot head  

 

Originals: 14
Transmetals: 9
Fuzors: 2
Transmetal 2s: 5
Total: 30

Kingdom has chewed it's way through 12 of the 14 Original figures, leaving us with Inferno and Tarantulas to arrive in due course.

If the Transmetal 2's, with their organic elements, are the next phase for Beast Wars characters in the Generations line, that's just five figures -- more than achievable in a single year if Kingdom with it's 12 is any indication. Add to that the missing Inferno and Tarantulas, giving us seven, and then perhaps the Fuzors as well, and you have a total of nine, with this organic theme still tying them together:

Deluxe:
Original Tarantulas
TM2 Cheetor
TM2 Blackarachnia
Fuzor Quickstrike

Voyager:
Original Inferno
TM2 Dinobot
Fuzor Silverbolt

Leader:
TM2 Tigerhawk
TM2 Megatron

Nothing untoward there.

That then leaves the nine Transmetals to conclude with:

Deluxe:
TM Cheetor
TM Rattrap
TM Tarantulas
TM Ravage

Voyager:
TM Optimus Primal

Leader:
TM Megatron
TM Depth Charge
TM Rampage

Commander:
TM Optimal Optimus

 

Oh hey, a new exciting list full of figures that
A. An extremely small minority of which are legitimately seeing updates in the future and
B. You would be unhappy with every single one of