Titans Return

Review – Transformers – Titans Return – Chromedome

Wave 2 of the Titans Returns line wraps up the redesigned versions of the original 7 Headmasters from G1. Today’s review is for Titans Return Chromedome with Stylor. There haven’t been a whole lot of easy to get options for an updated Chromedome since the original Generation One release. There was a repaint of Transformers Prime Wheeljack for the Collectors Club, and at least one 3rd Party figure in Fansproject CODE. He’s a fairly popular character in the IDW comics but he is admittedly kind of a bland design with all of his squareishness and brown shades. It’s understandable that he’s not the first choice for a toy.

If you’re familiar with the previous Transformers line, Combiner Wars, you might look at this figure and see it as a remold of the overused Breakdown/Prowl mold. While Chromedome certainly has a lot of design queues from that figure and a very similar Transformation, he is a very different figure and doesn’t seem to actually share any parts with that older mold. It’s an understandable mistake, but it’s not an accurate one.

The differences are kind of similar to the old complain that Transformers Cybertron Starscream was the same toy as G2 Smokejumper, which share a transformation but are totally different figures. I feel like Hasbro does such a good job of making every transformation unique despite how many Transformers there are, it tends to just stick out on the rare occasion that they reuse a Transformation.

He’s a nice solid toy as well, there have been some budget cuts on the Transformers design process in the last few years (mentioned by the design team) which resulted in a lot of hollowness and weirdness for a few years but it’s starting to really be apparent with this line that the designers have managed to get a good hold on working within these confines. It kind of feels like it’s helped the line as well, we’re starting to get a lot of good designs that still have simpler transformations with less random flippy bits.

The headmaster Stylor is identical to all of the other Headmasters. The fit on the head peg is solid, which tends to be the biggest issue on some of these figures (say hello Scourge). The fit of the smaller robot in Chromedome’s cockpit is nice and solid as well, the cars are particularly great for the little guys to drive around in.

The colors are definitely Chromedome’s colors, but it does make him pretty bland. He’s not a flashy sports car, he’s not a sleek looking car, he’s just a very, brown car. There is a bit of an issue with his hood being a little tricky to get lines up but otherwise it’s an alright design and rolls along easily.

Titans Return Chromedome isn’t an amazing entry to the Transformers line but he’s not a bad one at all either. He’s pretty middle of the road with no major flaws but nothing that makes him stand out.

Review – Transformers – Titans Return – Hardhead

Jan 12th, 2017

by Ramen Junkie.

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Of all the Headmasters, Hardhead is one that’s really been hurting for an update for a good while. There was a repaint of the old SWAT truck Onslaught that looks nothing like Hardhead. Not much else other than the original toy. Part of the travesty of his lack of an update is that Hardhead was a major player during the early runs of IDW’s Transformers comics, back during the time they were on Earth. He was one of the core handful of Autobots on earth, though he wasn’t a headmaster in that storyline. That was back before Hasbro constantly made direct nods, or any reference really, to the IDW books. These days the two run together pretty heavily both in general plot and design queues.

We almost got an updated Hardhead a few years ago as a remold of Generations Warpath. Occasionally leaks or mistakes are made, around the time of Generations Warpath, there were instructions being leaked, with alternative heads, one was Warpath as Hardhead. It would have been a pretty good use of the mold too, they have similar vehicle modes and transformations, the turret chest doesn’t quite match but it would have been forgivable.

All that’s moot now though, we have a real update to a pretty popular character. It’s one of the better Titans Returns figures for sure as well. The design is right out of the comic and essentially is an update to the original with modern engineering. Plus he’s a headmaster again.

Part of what makes this figure one of the best is the overall solid playability of both modes. A lot of this comes from the large cannon. It moves up and down, springs up to rotate, in robot mode, it can convert to be a shoulder canon, it’s removable, it opens up and converts into a seat for a Titan Master. It’s even removable to be held or attached in other ways. This seems a bit mundane on paper but it really makes both modes a lot more interesting since it can be adjusted for a lot of variety in poses.

It helps that the robot mode is also really solid despite the simple transformation. He’s well articulated without any major hindering factors. He doesn’t seem to be plagued by any of the looseness issues on joints or the head attachment that other figures in this line seem to have.

It feels a bit like cheating talking about a toy that has no major issues, but sometimes it happens, and Titans Return Hardhead is one of those times. He’s just a good solid figure all around.

Review – Transformers – Titans Return – Skullcruncher (Skullsmasher)

Jan 5th, 2017

by Ramen Junkie.

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For the titans Returns line, Hasbro has opted to revisit the Headmasters gimmick of G1. There are some other nods to the Target Masters and Power Masters, but the actual gimmick is heads that come off and turn into smaller robots that interact with the larger vehicles. In the original run of Headmasters, there were 7 original toys, Skullcruncher, Mindwipe, Weirdwolf, Chromedome, Hardhead, Highbrow and Brainstorm. Thankfully, for the updated designs, they dove right in nd gave us all 7, across the first two haves (one figure being a store exclusive). There are also some other characters who were not originally Headmasters thrown in for filler.

Today I’m going to start off on these original 7 with Skullcruncher. All three of the original Decepticon Headmasters were animals, Skullcruncher being a robotic Crocodile. I wanted to start with Skullcruncher because while he has some neat tricks and a fun design, he’s got a lot of flaws that really make him one of the weaker toys in the line.

I’m going to start with the good points. The crocodile mode is really nicely sized. Granted a chunk of the length is the tail bit which parts forms into a gun, but fully stretched out he is easily 10″ long. There isn’t a ton of leg articulation, though that’s kind of to be expected for a crocodile, his tail and head and flex side to side a bit giving him some expressiveness in beast mode. The mouth of the croc opens up as well.

The Transformation is pretty basic but the neck and shoulders form up in a neat way to form the front croc legs, which earns Skullcruncher a few points for being interesting. Basically the shoulders flip up and land at an angle while the croc head folds over and pegs it all into place.

Unfortunately, he kind of falls apart a bit in robot mode. The basic robot is all right and he has one of the more interesting looking faces on his Titan Master, but his hips are extremely loose. Like, he’s going to just do the splits and fall over loose. I have heard of numerous reports of this issue across the board on this figure so I can’t say my toy is a 1 off problem. The hips have also gotten much looser over time, I can barely keep him standing now where originally it was loose but doable.

Each of these figures has a cockpit for the Titan Master in their vehicle/beast mode as well. Skullcruncher loses out again, for some reason his cockpit uses a flimsy rubbery flap for it’s cover, something none of the other figures (so far) do. The others all have hard plastic. The soft plastic is tricky to get open and is easily, accidentally pushed down into the cavity. I’m not entirely sure why they went with this weird other plastic for the cockpit cover, the location and set up doesn’t have any need for it.

On one last side note, he has a pretty neat Crocodile man mode than can be made halfway through transformation.

All in all, Titans Return Skullcruncher is a nice looking update to an old figure, but it’s a severely flawed toy in a lot of ways that feel like they would have been easily fixable with a bit more design work by Hasbro.