I found all three of the new Power Core Combiner 2-packs at Wal-Mart today, so it was worth having to endure Wal-Mart to get 'em. I opened Icepick w/Chainclaw first. Why? I don't know, it was a hot day so I went for the snow specialist.

Sorry for the rudimentary photos, for some reason my camera just doesn't like the lighting in my toy room or something.

Icepick comes in robot mode, the bot mode is mostly dirty white with silver, dark navy blue with painted gold windows. It's pretty easy to tell how he transforms when you see him in the package, especially if you have Energon Snowcat, he's pretty much Snowcat's runt brother without the annoying missile feature or skis.

I like the robot mode quite a bit, there is good poseability in the arms with two sets of shoulder universal joints, hinge elbows and big weird claw hands that are on ball joints but the joints point upwards, so you have to bend the hands upwards to twist them. Still, though, the effect is that he has wrist swivels. The plow front forms three panels of hip skirt armor. The shoulder pads have the PCC connectors pretty obviously on the ends, but you can point them down and have them stand in for jets or something. There is a hardpoint on the right shoulder perfect for Chainclaw to perch in missile launcher mode.

Icepick's regular mode head looks like he's wearing a turtleneck sweater! The face is pretty good, medium metallic purple and posed like he's blowing out a (frozen?) breath. There is a fold-down hardpoint on the chest for the armor mode. The feet are tiny, not folded down in package, but there aren't any heel spurs. It's not terrible, but it does make him a little tougher to pose.

Armored mode head swivels up from the chest like on Smolder, though there's not much of a back panel to hide it, so you may want to swivel the larger head around when it's stowed so there's not a face peeking upside down at you from his back. The larger head is cool, made of translucent blue plastic with a frozen crystal 'ice elemental' look to it. It's not so big to where it looks strange as the regular robot mode head.

Torso mode is okay, not great but not bad. The legs turn and the connectors rotate down from the sides of the lower legs. There's no connectors for the upper legs in torso mode, the instructions say to bend them 90 degrees but most poses are fine. The hip skirts rotate up to plate the sides. The shoulder pad pegs stay there, and the arms fold up so that the claws wind up gripping the chest in kind of an odd, unsecured way. It doesn't really lock in too well, but it works well enough with the drones, I guess.

Transformation to vehicle mode is simple, again very much like Snowcat. Shoulder pads come together to hide the head, arms go under the pads with the claws forming snow groomers or some such. Tabs on the arms lock together and more tabs attach to the legs, which detach from the plow area and fold back, forming the treads. Easy, but tight and secure once transformed, and pretty satisfying. The shoulder hardpoint winds up front and center on the snowcat top, again a perfect place for a missile launcher.

It's worth noting that the plow is nicely adjustable, all three flaps can fold forward or back. The chest peg winds up on top of the cab and can be unfolded a bit to form maybe a mortar or snowball cannon.

Chainclaw is a misnomer - I don't see where the name comes from, though he's got claws for hands. No chainsaw or chains of any sort to be found though. He is a great mini con, though, forming the missile launcher very well, the feet tab together and the arms tab onto posts on the legs. The robot mode is nothing special, he walks on the missile launchers, but most likely he will permanently stay in launcher mode anyway. Chest armor mode is rudimentary, just forming a rectangle of sorts, but you can wrangle a chest-mounted launcher mode out of it too.

All in all, a very nice 2-pack, a worthy successor to Snowcat, and a nice addition to the PCC lineup.

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Tim
"toy geek"

 

Thank you x 1000 for being the person to finally talk about these guys after many people have reported picking them up. I'm liking what I see in this guy so far. Could you be so kind as to do the others as well? Wave 2 on the 2 pack front look great.

 

Nice to know that Chainclaw has tabs to keep him held together in while in the weapon mode.

 

Nice. I can't wait to get my hands on these new 2-packs, Leadfoot most especially.

 

I just noticed that Icepick looks a lot like movie Screamer in torso mode. Any other pictures of Chainclaw in robot mode though?

 

Been eagerly anticipating this wave since seeing them in the case at BotCon. Not super-crazy about the individual robot mode for Icepick, but the combiner head and Mini-Con looked to me like the best of the bunch.

 

Most wanted of the upcoming 2-packs, glad to see he looks good.

 

My Energon Snowcat broke at the clear missile launcher assembly, so I wound up giving him away to a kid who wanted him still.

I think Icepick is somewhat better designed than Snowcat - no beer gut, the arms are more solid due to the shoulder pads forming the top hardpoint, and the plow is a nice poseable bit. I would like some skis on Icepick though.

I will see if I can get a shot of Chainclaw in robot mode, but it's nothing special. He really belongs in launcher mode permanently.

The combiner mode head is definitely something special on this guy - kind of reminds me of that one Xevoz ice elemental toy.

Tim
"toy geek"

 

Out of all the PCC so far, this guy is by far my favorite. I love the alt head that is supposed to be the combiner head. It works much better with the figure than the smaller one. The arms are sort of weird, but I don't mind them.

I don't like the detail on his back, probably because there is none. You can clearly see the other head from behind in the middle of his chest on the back. Also, he has the connector limbs just sticking out from each shoulder. It looks kind of off. I have the connector pieces angled down. It kind of gives the impression that they're peices of ice hanging from his shoulders. Along with the head, they sort of fit in, but I really wish they weren't there.

His combiner mode is ok. As someone posted above, it is sort of like RotF Voyager Starscream. I had him combined with the rallybots until I noticed just how nice the scout was and I took them off. His minicon is pretty cool too. I defiantly don't have any complaints about him. He turns into a missile turret and has a neat little robot mode.

 

Because of the peg on his back, you can turn Chainclaw into a standard-type Targetmaster by, well, basically putting him in a sitting position. While if you really look at it, it's kinda silly looking, but at the right angles, it looks pretty neat. For example, here's Smolder using it:

 

Icepick is awesome, probably my favorite of these PCCs.

 

Icepick, as with basically every PCC I own thus far, is a pretty mediocre figure that could've been much better were it not for so many inexplicable engineering oversights. Seriously, I can't fathom how HasTak after all these years continues to put out TFs with so many unsecured connections that just BEG for pegging. Icepick holds together just fine in vehicle mode but that's about it. There's a connection that's intended to hold his waist together in robot and torso modes, but it's not terribly stable. And in torso mode, where the robot arms should clearly have SOMETHING to link them to the connector struts and the sides of the body, HasTak didn't even bother. Any attempt to rotate one of the drone arms is liable to take the entire shoulder section along with it.

And this may be another line-wide problem, but I really don't understand why they feel the need to give the torso mode legs that are fifty feet apart. It looks completely absurd and it's not like any of the drone legs are wide enough to necessitate it.

On the other hand, this figure's far from a write-off. I like the LOOKS of the modes okay, though the robot arms are kind of gangly and silly and the articulation isn't anything to write home about. Chainclaw is a decent Mini-Con with a very good weapon mode. I think my absolute favorite aspect of the toy, though, is that combiner head, which is a stand-out in the line and looks strangely deific.

 

Anyone feel like posting a picture of the character his super head resembles seen in a Matrix vision in the 3rd season of the 80's TV show.?

 

This is my favorite PCC Commander so far. His allspark blue linx match him so well and I like to pretend the one hanging off his shoulders are some kind of funky James Bond jetpack.

 

The torso legs normally split wide apart so that you can get the drone legs to stand parallel with one another. You don't have to split the legs out - you can just keep them A shaped, but the drone legs, which have no ankle articulation, might not stand so easily anymore. It's optional, really.

 

This guy doesn't get much love. I kinda like is frostilicus head.