Intro:
Now,
before I go any further with this review, I do have one confession to make:
ever since the G1 days, the Terrorcons and the Aerialbots were probably my
least favorites of the gestalt teams. The Aerialbots were a bit too boring for
my liking, and as for the Terrorcons, their alternate modes didn’t really work
for me.
Yes,
some of you may instead ask, if I don’t like the Terrorcons for their weird
alternate modes, then why am I fond of the Seacons? Well, that’s simple,
because if you read my earlier review of them, they epitomize the culmination
of various Transformers gimmicks, i.e. gestalts, Targetmasters, Triple Changers
and of course, Scramble City.
Anyways,
so far, I haven’t been collecting most of the Beast Hunters line yet, only
coming as far as 3 to 4 figures. It was only recently that a friend of mine,
Big Daddy V, highlighted to me these Legion-class Terrorcons and their hidden
ability to actually combine with one another and form Abominus, just like their
G1 namesake.
Being
a sucker for gestalts that I am, I immediately sought them out. I was kind of
lucky, if I should say so myself. It took me a merely ½ hour to collect all
five figures, which were sold separately, whereas ol’ BDV needed
10-friggin-months!!!
*Bluek*!
Anyways,
*ehem*, back to the matters at hand, all of these figures were released in 3
separate waves, and you’d probably need to ride on your luck to collect all
five figures.
However,
just in case if you do not want to take unnecessary risk, you can either wait
for the Target/ Tesco exclusive (for us in Malaysia, that means we have to go
to eBay again, folks!) or the Takara-Tomy box-set.
Anyways,
let’s not waste time yapping and get on to the meats and potatoes.
The
original G1 Terrorcons consisted of 5 members, i.e. Hun-Gurrr, Blot, Cutthroat,
Rippersnapper and Sinnertwin. Honestly, apart from Hun-Gurrr, who is the leader
of the pack, I can’t remember every other members of the group. They lack
personalities, as well as memorable moulds. I don’t really dig monster-modes.
The
original G1 Abominus is probably one of my least favorite gestalts, and to me
at least, nothing really stood out.
This
time around, all the way from the Beast Hunters line, we find that the Terrorcons
are minions of Predaking. For some odd reasons, which is most likely due to
copyrights reasons, there have been changes to the Terrorcons’ names. They are
now known as, Hun-Gurrr, Blight, Rippersnapper, Twinstrike and Windrazor.
In
this review, we will review each of them one-by-one.
Hun-Gurrr:
Hun-Gurrr
is the leader of the pack, though he’s never mentioned as so on the packaging.
In fact, he is only ranked as a Berserker Infantry – whatever that is.
On
the card, he’s supposed to be able to transform into a double-headed dragon. In
fact, let me just get this out of the way, the Terrorcons this time around do
not transform into monsters, but rather dragons – different types of dragons.
In
his alternate mode, the hips move front and back, swivel out and back in. There
are two smaller arms that move in tandem.
The
lower necks are on ball joints, while the upper neck allows the heads to tilt
up and down.
In
robot mode, his articulations are pretty darn basic. The shoulders and hips are
on ball joints, and then the feet can actually tilt up and back down – even
that is because of the transformations – and that’s just it!
The
little robot looks kinda neat and it’s probably one of the better looking robots
of the pack.
Hun-Gurrr
also comes with his weapon called the Dragontooth Saw, which is literally a
dagger or a saw, attached to the bottom-half of a blaster. While he can
obviously wield his weapons in robot mode, he can also wield it in his
alternate mode by plugging it to one of the numerous holes on the body, or even
have one of the heads hold it in his mouth.
Hun-Gurrr
is easily one of the better ones in this set.
Windrazor:
Now,
despite the name, I would think that he is actually the spiritual successor to
Cutthroat, despite being a dragon instead of a pterosaur-like beast. Well, in
all honesty, he looks more like a pterosaur rather than a dragon.
He
is ranked as an Inferno Stormer – whatever that is.
Anyways,
the alternate mode looks absolutely fantastic and is easily one of the best
among the five, and definitely the most realistic one.
The
robot mode is kinda cool-looking, especially with the wings attached to the
back of the arms.
The
shoulders, elbows and hips are on ball-joints, and that’s practically it.
Windrazor
also comes with the Tornado Bow. Just like Hun-Gurrr, you can mount the weapon
either on the port on his legs or his mouth in robot mode, and of course, even
in robot mode.
He
is easily my most favorite figure in the group. He looks cool!
Twinstrike:
Twinstrike
is literally the spiritual successor to Sinnertwin and ranked as an Assault
Infantry. Whereas his predecessor was an orthrus, i.e. a double-headed dog ala
Cerberus (the three-headed hell hound in Greek mythology), Twinstrike is now a
double-headed dragon ala Hun-Gurrr, except that he’s on all fours instead of
being bipedal.
The
alternate mode looks okay, though not really stellar. I’d ranked him on the
same level as Hun-Gurrr’s alternate mode.
The
robot mode is kinda both wicked and weird-looking at the same time. I kinda dig
that he has both of his dragon-heads as arms, but I don’t really dig that he
has two smaller legs sticking out of his back like an eyesore.
In
this mode, he has ball-jointed shoulders, hips and ankles.
Twinstrike
comes with Mjolnir, uhm, I mean Piston Hammer. You could mount it as a blaster
on his back in beast mode, or just wield the thunderous hammer (pun intended)
in his robot mode.
Not
a bad little figure.
Blight:
Blight
– the spiritual successor to the G1 Terrorcon Blot, and ranked as a Savage
Destroyer. Instead of being an ogre/ mole-like creature, he’s now an ogre/
mole-like dragon!
Come
on, you people at HasTak, surely you guys must know how a dragon looks like! This
is definitely not a dragon. If it is, it is probably the most butt-ugly dragon
ever depicted in any media. Maybe mama-dragon have been doing some naughty
things with Shrek behind Donkey’s back(?).
Anyways,
let’s not get sidetracked here.
In
robot mode, the head sculpt kind of reminded of Soundwave, and that head is
stuck on a body that kinda resembles an ape with stuff protruding.
Articulation-wise,
he has ball-jointed shoulders and hips.
He
wields his Affliction Hammer to destroy… stuffs…
A
very weak mould. If it weren’t for its final gimmick, I’d probably wou;dn’t
have gotten him at all.
Rippersnapper:
Rippersnapper
is ranked as a Predacon Grunt… hmm… who the heck is responsible for giving
these guys ranks and roles anyways???? It sucks, man… it really does.
In
G1, he’s supposed to be this shark creature kinda thing, and now he is a
shark-looking dragon ala the fellow from the Seacons. Oh boy, I wonder if
whoever’s in charge really can’t differentiate between a dragon and a monster
that well.
Oi…
Anyways,
he’s a shark-like drrrrragon, and he’s pretty darn ugly.
In
robot mode, he looks kinda short and stout – really tough-looking, especially
when he’s carrying his Electrocharge Bow. His shoulders consist of a hinge
joint and a ball joint, while the hips are on ball joints.
This
is definitely one of the Terrorcons that really sucks and if you don’t plan to
get the final gimmick, then forget about him.
Abominus:
Now,
I don’t know about you guys, but the reason I bought this set was because of
this gimmick. Like I said a few hundred times before, I am a sucker for
gestalts and thus, I knew I just had to grab them.
There
are basically no instructions given inside the individual boxes. In fact, there
isn’t even the slightest hint that the five of them could combine. I have to
admit, I was at first quite skeptical, but in the end, I love it.
Abominus
isn’t exactly the greatest of all gestalts, but for this scale , he’s okay.
I
don’t know about you guys, the concept of combining Legends-class figures kind
of reminded me of ROTF Devastator set. I don’t really have my Devastator with
me right now, so I can’t really compare them to one another. Still, I reckoned
both of them are about the same size and that they are both about the size of a
Deluxe-class figure.
The
combination, while intuitive, isn’t exactly perfect. Due to the upper legs
being formed by Hun-Gurrr’s dragon necks, Abominus seems to be a bit
chest-forward.
Also,
since his shoulders and hips are all heavily dependent on Hun-Gurrr’s
ball-joints, the poses you can make are quite limited.
The
head sculpt itself is kind of generic and seems to be constantly looking up.
The
arms especially really do require some imaginations. Abominus has no hands,
thus relied heavily on the dragons’ mouth to hold things, such as his guns…
Accessories:
Yup,
all 5 weapons do combine and they can form a type of power ranger-esque super
weapons. There isn’t any instruction on how to put them up together, but it is
quite intuitive.
Overall:
I
really like the idea of combining robot, even in this scale. However, being a
combination of 5 different Legends-class figures (now known as Cyberverse), you
can’t really expect much from the end results.
There
is playability here. Most kids would probably enjoy him, but definitely not all
adult collectors would like him. The designs are a bit shabby, but in the end
it’s still okay.
Final
verdict: 7.5/10
