The prospective Skyquake looks good. And the Jhiaxus was a 10/10 robot with a 3/10 jet mode. I expect both of those to be repurposed and repainted several times. But IMHO the Cyclonus mold is better than both. I'd be stamping out repaints.

 

I'd give the jet more than a 3/10 just because of how it was willing to stick to the original wild comic design. But I agree that Jhiaxus is a toy that you buy because it's an AWESOME robot and make your peace with what that meant for it's alt.

Tarn pulls off the 10/10 bot mode but also has a fantastic alt mode. But I give the design team a big round of applause both for tackling those characters and going hard on the bot modes.

 

It depends on how one judges these things. Jhiaxus captures Derek Yaniger's drawing nearly perfectly. Tarn is also pretty good. So yeah, there's that.

[Edit to add] On my scoring sheet for a figure, I have a list of 1-10 of how it channels the original character as conceived. For both, they likely seem nearly 10. (Don't have either in hand.) But I have a separate scoring of 1-10 for "alt mode" of whether the alt mode looks itself any good. And I also have a "toyetic" score for whether the toy as a whole works as a toy without context to the source material or other considerations like intricate articulation or scale or original character homages, etc. Both seem highly toyetic, too, but a little imperfect, maybe, with the awkward alt modes.

In my opinion both of their alt modes are just terrible even as first conceived in the comics. So I don't consider them good as stand-alone designs out of context for the original character homage. That would make them poor bases for repaints. Re-tools, sure, if they fix some of the wonkiness.

And the Jhiaxus toy has extra kibble under the jet, and Tarn's hands are visible(!), so they still don't fully capture the comic designs, either.

 

But, at the same time, both execute the "alien vehicle" concept better than anything we got out of the Siege line.

 

Oops.

 

Right. Fair enough. I would grade them generously as "toyetic." They work as toys regardless of the source material, too.

But hard disagree that they look better as alien vehicles than the Siege line. Their alt modes don't fully pass the rule of cool to me. Which is why I don't think repaints can be stamped out as easily from their molds. Which lowers their toyetic appeal. Which is subjective.

 

I never thought of Metalhawk so much as being "sci fi futuristic" but rather more generic. Like how so many TF's have car modes that aren't specific cars, yet still look like cars. That's how Metalhawk looks to me. When I think "sci fi futuristic" jet, I think something more along the lines of Armada Starscream.

 

Well, I have no idea who Metalhawk is. And kids likely won't. So whatever he turns into will depend on the rule of cool for how he's received outside of the small fanbase outside Japan that knows him. And he looks to be a good design.

For using Cyclonus as a basis for Seekers, in theory, I'm saying it could work if they have a really loose interpretation of what Seekers turn into, anyway. And besides, it's really the engineering of the disappearing nosecone into the chest that gets an eyebrow rise from me. Once they have that figured out, it really opens up how they could even plug it into other molds.

[Edit to add] Now that I've seen Metalhawk, OH YES. This is a better Seeker mold than the recent Seeker molds. They definitely could have done the original trio out of this design. Pity they didn't.

 

Metalhawk's alt looks like it could translate in to a pretty good Cyberverse Meteorfire.

 

Kudos to the Takara/Hasbro team for creating a G1 inspired Metalhawk toy. Thanks!

 

AHJAHAHAHAAHA THEY ACTYUALLY DID IT
THEY MADE A GOOD PRETENDER UPDATE

 

Okay, it has the sword, and pistols, but no rifle.

 

I have that Scout Class Rewind next to my TR Chromedome. I never have them separated.

 

[cant believe im asking this]
so uh chug collectors
when do the amazon uk preorders go up  

 

Same, would have really loved to see it

 

Not quite as different a transformation as I imagined, but cool.
At least I was right about the wings indicating something about the new configuration.
Love it!

 

I get people being conflicted about Rewind...but odds are pretty good if Core Rumble sells well enough they'll do more tapes at the Core price.

 

I swear I just have Yosuga no Sora on Blu-ray for the funny "Nimu nimu nimu nimu" meme scene...!

 

Bye everyone, I'm going into storage now