Old toy but one without a review thread. Poison Bite is one of the Mutants, a small faction of four TFs with two beast modes and no robot mode. PB himself turns into a barracuda and a scorpion. I'm not sure if there are any varieties of those two in coral-snake-inspired colors or "crusty" texture; dull/dark blue and smooth skin would be a better fit. Looks natural enough, lots of poisonous/venous have similar markings, so I give it a pass. Barracuda Mode One of the few non-shark, non-fish-with-legs fish-formers. Colors/texture aside, a passable barracuda. Got the definitive underbite and long, streamline build of one. Scorpion legs are pretty obvious, but put to good use. Limited articulation, as you might guess with such a mode. The mouth can open/close, and you can move the pectoral {"arms"} and pelvic {"legs"} fins quite a bit (ball joints). The caudal fin(s) {tail}, being a pair pegged together, cannot sway side-to-side... unless you un-connect them, but that's a bit weird. Underside! As you can see here, the pectorals have proper fin details, but on the curved side, which tends to be hidden. Incidentally, the blue is metallic. This makes too much sense. All in all, pretty nice fish mode. Not extraordinary, but not bad. TRANSFORM! Essentially, you just rearrange the limbs and extremities. Scorpion Mode PB is a very flat and wide scorpion, almost looking like a crab (the texture and color certainly don't help), and the fins are pretty obvious. The spindly legs have limited movement and the tail can't go any further forward than as in the picture. The claws, on the other hand: They have excellent range of motion, they can even reach the tail! You can pull off a lot of poses with them. They're formed by the fish's head covered by the fins, which don't peg or snap into place. It generally holds together fine, but you may have to close them back over after posing. PB's right claw has an interesting gimmick. The insignia is on a panel... ... and opening that reveals a mechanism of some sort. Doesn't flip out or anything, but it's still pretty neat. I can't help but think it's a gun, and in a weird way he reminds me of Saddlesore from C.O.W Boys of Moo Mesa because of it. This town ain't big enough fer the two of us! An alright scorpion. The tail sucks but the claws make up for it. Robot Mode... sorta To show that these are still sentient mechanical beings and not just monsters (somewhat ironic compared to shows like Samurai Jack), the Mutants all have a hidden robot head. Poison Bite hides his in, of all places, the scorpion's stinger. Press the stinger and: Spring-loaded reveal, hence the wire. Hard to see here, but the lower jaw is bade up of a pair of mandibles. Looks like a whistling wolf. Weird. Although one may expected a sting-activated head-reveal would position said head to look at the victim, it ends up facing it's own tail. Shame. You can kinda achieve a robot form: Eep. Conclusion: Poison Bite is a quirky toy. An animal-to-animal Transformer was always a desire of mine as a kid, and glad they did it in some form. Both modes are done well, especially considering just how different they are from each other. The only real complaint I have is color and texture, and even then only because I'm such an animal nut. Recommended, though he might not have a place in most collections.
Poison Bite is the only one of the mutants that can hold up to scrutiny in both modes IMHO. I actually really like this figure!!
My favorite of the Mutants; his vibrant colors really make him stand out. Soundwave is a close second, but this guy is the best of the four (IMO). Though that's not saying too much, as these are some of the most obscure (and disliked) Transformers toys...
I love Poison Bite. He will be the very last BW fig I sell off, it ever. Awesome barracuda mode (metallic blue paint FTW) and decent scorpion mode (given what it transforms from). The "gun" in the claw is similar to the head---it's simply there to "reveal" that they really are mechanical robots inside. It's just "miscellaneous robot hydraulics" etc.
I think the point there, though, was that being "mutants", it would show through to their decoes a bit as well. Like Razorclaw, the green wolverine. Or Icebird, the polar bear/snowy owl with "tiger-stripe" patching. And Soundwave, the bat who... thinks it's Batman?
I'm personally fascinated by Poison Bite and Razorclaw myself. Might have to hunt them down one of these days.
