The Cybertronian Enquirer 3.18.07

I don’t think I’ve ever really considered myself a true “Transfan.” Now, obviously I am a “Transfan,” but I don’t associate much with the community. Why? Because it’s honestly hard to differentiate between the “Capes” and the “Norms.” Anyone who has been to a convention knows what I mean. You’re either the guy on the floor playing with your toys or you’re the one hiding in the corner hoping you aren’t in a pic that will make a national mag.

However, I’ll be honest. My heart sunk when I read that “TF Master” died last weekend. I’ll be 100% honest…I didn’t know him that well. I met him this past year at Botcon when Team IP took on Transtopia. After our “victory” (we basically missed fewer questions than they did) Bill (TF Master) and I shot the shit a little bit. You guys remember the Alt Arcee I got? It was this guy who made it, He actually made a ton of customs, but at Botcon he had a huge Alternator display. He was selling each one for about a hundo. I fell in love with that Arcee and ended up buying it from him. I had to negotiate a bit, but it was worth it. I saw Bill a couple more times before the end of the convention. I kept joking with him that people thought Arcee was my creation. Besides the convention, I had seen his work on customs for years.

Was he a friend? He was barely an acquaintance to be honest. However, no one should pass away so young. If you get a chance, visit their site, Transtopia. It’s a great resource for kitbashing and it has tons of cool kitbashes up. You can also still make donations to his famil by clicking here.

I know that was a downer way to start the CE, but I wanted to say my piece on TF Master. He made some amazing kitbashes that will be missed by me and by the Kollection.

Back to the Intro…

I think I need a bit of a transition before we jump into the normal TF stuff. So what’s happening with your favorite TF journalist? We’ll, I had to hit up a wedding yesterday. It was my bud Albie from the MBA program down here. The funny thing was that we all go to dinner on Thursday night. Jen comes with me and so do his buds from Rhode Island (where he’s from). Jen and his wife to be start chatting about us coming to Rhode Island this summer. Normally I try and wait a bit before I tug on the suspenders, push up the glasses, and make sure my high waters are where they need to be. I didn’t get the chance. I just jumped right in since I knew the next question was “why?” Luckily, I turned on the charisma and tried to make the fact that I own about one hundred Gs worth of a children’s toy sound cool. Jen made friends with their little Asian girly, who actually seemed somewhat interested. However, the expected 40 Year Old Virgin comment was brought up…

Other than that, the wedding was pretty cool. I’ll probably be hanging with Albie when Jen and I head up to Botcon this year. Maybe I can even show him the insanity of Botcon for a day or something…

Ok, let’s get into some real news…

Kollector’s Korner

Botcon figures or Ironhide….Botcon…

Airazor and Astrotrain showed up this week. These would be the two Transformers Collectors’ Club figures. Airazor is a redeco and remold of Energon Slugslinger while Astrotrain is a redeco/remold of Armada Jetfire:

What? I dig Amazons…

So…Trypticon and Skylynx got together…and 9 months later you were built…? Thank God they only bleached my metal…

A plane, a crane, a boat, and a flaming named minicon walk into a bar…

I’ll admit, I forgot how…”challenging” Slugslinger’s transformation was. She’s a great looking figure, but a bit of a pain to transform. The landing gear prevents the shoulders from staying connected. I believe rI have her transformed right, but the instructions may be wrong. Regardless, I hope they continue with the “Pre-Beast Wars” Beast Wars figures. I know they’re going with the Classics for Botcon, but maybe they can continue to create them as store exclusives. How cool would it be for a Scorponok, Rampage, or maybe we could even see our first Botanica figure? Yeah, I know I’m the only one really wanting a new Beast Machines toy…

Now for Astrotrain. I find myself desperately wanting this Spacewarp figure. This was the original redeco that never made it to market. Savage picked it up, gave it a new head, and now we have Astrotrain. Anyway, the Jetfire mold makes for a nice sturdy figure. It was originally made to connect to Prime first and be its own figure later. This creates the “God Bomber” syndrome, but Hasbro/Takara has improved that over the years. I find myself wanting some more color on the legs/arms/body. It seems to be lacking some detail in robot mode as opposed to the tons of detail he has as a space ship. Maybe Reprolabels will make something cool for him. The minicons are a nice addition to the figure. (Astro) “Hook, Line, and Sinker” are great names that might be an allusion to the G1 comic characters. However, whoever came up with “Starcatcher” should serious considering their target demo.

I ended up with a couple extra. I normally grab two of a figure so I have one loose and one MISB, but Savage’s figures don’t require that. Most are in non-sealed boxes and in Styrofoam, which allows you to take them in and out easily. On that note, Botcon is coming up soon. If anyone wants something pre-ordered then let me know. I probably won’t have Tim and Sal this year, so I’ll be limited to one or two items I can sell. Let me know if you’re interested and let the bidding begin!

Now for Ironhide. I got Ironhide on a whim a week or so ago. I really don’t regret it. However, It doesn’t have the “not for sale” stamp on it. That basically means that mine isn’t going to be much different than the stuff out in a month or two. However, your Primates are my witness that this was a “pre-bought-on-eBay-from-a-shady-ass-Asian-who-stole-it- from-a-factory-at-lunch-time-and-sold- it-on-eBay-to-a-dumb-American-willing- to-pay-too-much-for-a-toy-out- in-a-couple-months” Transformer.


Ironhide Smash Scrawny Protoforms!

Pre-Movie Headshot

You’ve seen about a hundred and fifty pics of this guy, but I don’t thin anyone has shown off his big gun or “Automorph Technology”

Hey….Arcee…C’mere…

Automorph:

Step 1: Pull Down the Feet

Step 2: Top plate moves to inside of leg, wheels flips behind leg, and back heel flips down

Step 3: Finished look

And the back…


I have to say, the Automorph is cool and tough at the same time. It reminds me a bit of Armada Prime’s auto-transform feature. However, I feel like I’m going to break it every time I do it.

The face looks like it can use some more detail (and may since this was bought as a “test shot). It’s pretty dark and the blue eye crystal in the back of his head doesn’t seem to transfer light well.

Regardless of those features, it’s a great looking figure. It reminds me a lot of RiD, which most of you know if my favorite line. It just looks very similar to “organic metal.” Is it as detailed as the CGI movie characters? No, but it is very detailed. I’ll say I’m a fan so far. I was shocked at the size though. He’s right around the size of Classics Megatron. That’s not horribly small, but not as big as I thought he’d be.

I’m pissed that the Megatron I’m getting is all over the net now. I was hoping to be the one to break all those pics, but shit happens. I’ll hopefully have them this week, so expect my next column to have the Megs/Blackout pics. TFW2005 is confirming what I said before…it’s not a Fast Action Battler. It’s the Voyager size figure according to SPX

We’re also at the two week count down to Masterpiece Megatron. I found this site that has NO MODIFICATIONS! Nice huh?

TNN Headlines
The news articles and pictures come from multiple sources including Transfandom.com, TFW2005, eBay, FantoFan, The All Spark, TFormers, Big Bot, Seibertron, among others. Give these sites a look if you get a chance.

Hello Mike Kaye!

Please post this out on the boards:

If you are late bird and still want to renew or sign up for the Transformers Collectors’ Club and receive this year’s free Breakaway Transformers figure, you have a little more time! You can still join over the web provided that it is processed by midnight Sunday.

http://www.transformersclub.com/shop/index.cfm?do=subscribe&productid=681

You can use the above link to join or renew. Your figure will ship in the late spring.

Thanks for your support,

Brian

I do what I can for the fans…

This dude has put up a ton of “cel art” from the TF movie. I might grab one of those painted Megs pics for my office…

Alternator Rumble and Ravage are due out in stores soon. I have Ravage on pre-order, but I’m still waiting to grab a couple of those bad ass rumble figures.

Target is having a huge sale on its Cybertron figures. They’re up to 75% off, so go grab the big ones if you need to. They also have lounge pants too…nice

MTV has up an interview with Robert Orci and Alex Kurtman about the TF movie. God, if they really want to alienate fanboys then they’re doing a good job. The title is “Transformers writers talk Fanboy Pressure” and then go on to say “Cybertron is in, Soundwave is out.”

MTV: Transformers fans have been all over you from almost the moment you signed on to write. Are you still feeling the heat?

Roberto Orci: When some of the early designs were leaked, some of the die-hard fans felt the integrity of the Transformers had been betrayed. Then when they saw some of the footage, they started to say, “I understand now. They’re doing the movie version. It totally retains the integrity of what we love, but it’s a whole other level.”

Umm…I got news for you guys. I’m sold and more people are coming around, but you still have some angry Transfans out there. Mostly the Capes, but still…
This is also interesting:

MTV: The scene we’ve seen shows just that: Bumblebee only communicating through songs.

Kurtzman: The inspiration for that was the first time Elliott and E.T. have a conversation. E.T. doesn’t say a word, and the scene is so emotional. The communication between them is so crystal clear. We felt that in order to really feel the wonder of the experience Sam (Shia LaBeouf) is going through, we wanted to find a way for them to communicate that wasn’t direct.

So…we’d rather have E.T. than gay rights activist Bumblebee…hmmm…that’s a toss up for me

Anyway, the guys sound better than the title makes it seem. They go on to say they want to do Soundwave right and just couldn’t do it in this picture. They want to save him for a better film. Yes, this coincides with Cullen saying he had a three movie deal.

Shia also says he’d do a sequel…and that the movie was a pain in the ass…

There’s things you f*cking hate in that type of movie, and there’s things that you do enjoy,” said LaBeouf of acting in a heavy effects film. “But it’s a totally different thing. You show up [for Disturbia] and you have David Morse to act off of. There’s a security to it as opposed to [acting opposite] a ball and stick [in Transformers]. There’s no way of telling if you and this robot — even after you’ve gotten your performance down, you’ve got animators that are going to take the robot and animate it. So it’s a 50/50 play and you don’t really know how it’s going to turn out. Where as in Disturbia you could go back and look at the monitor and see if you felt it or not; in Transformers, we never had that. It was always this ambiguous ‘maybe it’ll work, maybe it won’t’ through the whole production. There was no security. And the relationship I had with [director Michael] Bay was not this nurturing, pat on the back [thing]. He was General Patton and you kind of have to be to make those movies.

Prior to the interview, LaBeouf was discussing his new physical training program — one designed to help the young actor “bulk up.” Ironically enough, that nondescript conversation led to an exciting revelation.

That’s part of the bulk-up; they talk about the sequels,” said LaBeouf of his role in Transformers. “I’m signed up if they do them, yeah.

Ha…a Transformer Super Soaker…sure

K’s Konundrum

Q: Shockwave was supposed to have been shown getting killed in the movie. What other TF death didn’t make it in the film?

A: Red Alert; Ultra Magnus finds Sideswipe, Tracks and Red Alert to fight Devastator, but Red Alert got shot and killed. Bummer, but if I had to kill one character then it’d probably be Red.

This Week’s Q: What did the Gnaw Prototype look like?

Pimp my Mechanical Sentient Being

Ok, so our Archives got smashed in the switch to V.3. However, they still exist with different locations. I’ll start a few each week to savor the history of Inside Pulse

My babies:
Kaye’s Kollection
Kaye’s Kollection 2

Masterpiece Nemesis

InsidePULSE’s Botcon Spectacular

The Inside Pulse on…Transformers Alternators

Inside Pulse On…Transformers Cybertron; Speed Planet.

Alessandro “Rikkomba” Riccombeni: Cybertron Wingsaber, Cybertron Menasor,
Galaxy Force Soundblaster

And in closing arguments…

That was a bit shorter than my last column, but there wasn’t much news to go off of. Plus, how do you beat a column with that many spoilers?

Yeah…I’m out. ‘till next week Primates

Stealin’ Toy Fair Tag Lines,
K

Transformers Kollector Extraordinaire. Mike originally wrote a weekly article called the Cybertronian Enquirer for Inside Pulse, but now does special events such as SDCC, Botcon, and other conventions. Mike has one of the largest Transformers collections ranging from G1 to Power of the Primes including Japanese, European, 3rd Party, prototypes (G2 Stunticons!), and Lucky draws.