Beast Wars Transmetal 2 Optimal Optimus and G1 Metroplex

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though, courage. Hello and welcome to the 40th,

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TFG1Mike and I am joined once again with Pecan

Court Michael. Hello. Hey, how's it going? Pretty

good, are you sir? I'm hanging in there. Yes.

Just barely though. Mm -hmm. Ah ha ha. Yes. You

and your little castration there. Severe groin

pain. Coming right up! Well, by the time this

episode airs, hopefully you will be fully recovered.

I'm back on the mend. I can walk now and everything's

fine. Just a little tender. I'll be alright.

We're kind of recording this one a little bit

early. Seeing as how I've got 38 and 39 on tap.

Which by the time this airs, those will have

already aired. But yeah, we just finished recording

Beast Unleashed Episode 2. I've got Secret Origins

coming up with Lupus Convoy on Tuesday. Not much

else is really going on. NYR, Tooncast, all the

usual. What's been going on with you other than

recovering? Well, in the midst of my recovery,

my wife took a three -day weekend. She's off

on a scrapbooking retreat. Because she digs that

kind of thing and you know I'm more than happy

to give her a little break considering she's

pretty much weighted on the entire family hand

and foot without my help for the last week. You

know it's a little hard because I got both kids

by myself for a couple of days in my less than

100 % condition. But, you know, I'm hanging in

there. Everything seems to be alright so far.

Other than that, not much. I mean, like I said,

the last week has just been relaxing with an

ice pack. So not a whole lot going on. Well,

I think we're going to get right into the toy

discussion. And I guess I will go first, and

I will be talking about a very large monkey.

a monkey that you actually sent me so yes I will

be talking about optimal optimus or optimal optimus

or however the hell you say his damn name that's

optimal optimus from the beast wars line I've

seen pictures of this thing before but I never

really got and I've seen reviews of it I never

really got the whole scope of it holy fuck this

thing is huge He's a good size. Yeah, good size,

nothing. He's huge. Well, you know, four modes,

he has to be huge. Well, I mean, yeah, I'd say

I was going to bring up some of the other multi

-changers, but no, I think those are roughly

the same size, except for like quick -switch.

And he's surprisingly small for a six changer.

Yeah, I, you know, I don't know. One of the reasons,

shut up, one of the reasons why I wanted this

toy was because I like the design of the cartoon.

I think it was cool. The toy is great. I'm not

a fan of the alt modes that much though. I basically

will keep him always in the actual robot mode,

not the ape robot mode. So, and I'm looking at

the other modes here on the TFWiki. No. No? No.

They're okay in the cartoon. I mean, they're

good in the cartoon. He only uses the car mode

like once or twice. I know he uses it at least

once. And then he uses the jet mode all the time,

but I prefer seeing the cartoon design rather

than the toy alt modes. I think my favorite use

of this model in the cartoon is when Megatron

takes it as his... robot mode in Beast Machines.

Yeah, that looks really good. I think I had mentioned

before in the Beast Unleashed, I believe episode

1, where I said if they would just revisit and

crank up the models a little bit and add some

better skins to the 3D animation models, they'd

be a lot cooler. I think it's maybe the last

couple of episodes of Beast Machines. You get

this model with a really nice CGI model and way

better skins. It makes all the difference. He

looks really, really good. And I believe he actually

shifts from car mode to plane mode to robot mode.

I would have to go back and watch, which I probably

won't until we get to that in the Beast Unleashed

podcast, but I'm going to have to go back and

watch Megatron in Optimal Optimus' body. No,

he does change into the jet mode because he flies

under water. He's a jet submarine. Yeah. There's

water on Cybertron? I don't remember that. Yeah,

the goopy thingamabuffer stuff. I don't know.

I could have sworn there was a water scene. I'm

gonna have to go back and watch it again. Well,

we're all gonna go back and watch it again for

Beast Unleashed, but eventually. But yeah, I

distinctly remember that being very cool. Yeah,

yeah it was. The only thing I found kind of disheartening,

even though I know it's Megatron, I didn't like

the... I would have liked if he fully took on

the optimal Optimus head and just been Megatron's

voice, because that would have been even more

jarring for Optimus Primal in Beast Machines.

Oh no, I like the head. I like the Megatron head.

I thought it was bad enough that he took his

form. It's like well now I'm gonna beat your

ass with your own body. How do you like them

apples? I thought that was very cool. Yeah, that

was that was a move worthy of Megatron Yeah,

or beast beast wars Megatron at least Well, you

know, you know the difference is I mean there

really isn't that much difference between beast

machines and beast wars Megatron Beast machines

Megatron was way more He was ten times darker

he was way more scheming and he didn't really

put it instead of having like people like waspinator

and terasaur he just had drones i mean yeah there

were a few like obsidian and strika and jet storm

and thrust and right right rhinox jr or tank

knocks or ryan tank or whatever there rhino or

they feel right now or uh... Whatever you want

to call them. But I mean, the way the toy looks,

it looks good, like if it was on display in all

four modes. I think the main one I don't like

at all is the ape mode. The ape robot. I don't

know why I don't like it. It's funny because

I like the ape mode better on the Transmetal

One. The blue one with the surfboard. The version

of Optimus right before this one. But I don't

like that robot mode. Just regular transmittal.

I'm not a big fan of ape modes, period. I never

liked just the way the ape modes work. They're

inherently hunched over. It's like, oh, look,

he stands up and he becomes the robot. Oh, big

deal. In this one, they look a lot different

in the sense that... you know the robot mode

has this cockpit on his chest and the uh you

know he's not just a monkey standing up you can

actually see something going on here um i i think

i like it a lot better if you if you turn his

hips around so that his he's got robot feet instead

of monkey feet but you know that really can't

i don't want to say that's not really canon Well,

it isn't canon, but... But it looks better that

way. At least that's how mine's displayed. Yeah,

well, it's fine. But just to show you the link

to the image, there's the link looking at the

image of Optimal Optimus on the TF wiki here.

And they display his robot mode with the ape

feet. With the ape feet, yeah. See, I don't like

that. And what's weird is that his heels are...

they look like robot feet. And so I'm almost

positive this is a fluke. I mean, because I've

got him displayed turned around, and the back

of his legs kind of look fine. You know, the

back of his feet, having robot feet looks better,

in my opinion. And, you know, just the way he's

set up, he looks a lot different in that form

from, I should say, beast mode. As far as I can

I'm concerned car mode and jet mode are damn

near the same thing Yeah, they are I mean it's

like yeah, it's like here's my arms together.

I'm a car And then I pull my arms apart. Oh look.

I'm a jet Yeah, no also. You know I'm starting

to cut you off there, but the jet mode also offered

the other Maximals a a riding seat or a riding

stair or riding stand so they can actually stand

on on his arms. Really? No, where? Not in the

toy, in the cartoon. Oh, okay. I was about to

say, because that would have been cool. Yeah,

not in the toy, in the cartoon. Yeah, oh. He

could have been like a chariot. You like gladiator

movies, cheater? Oh, boy. I don't understand

why now... I know this is the... Well, you sent

it to me, but I know this is the regular, original

Optimal Optimus, but I don't get why in the picture

here, it shows his arms, maybe that's why. Now

he's broke. No, he's not broke. I'm just holding

him. But no, I'm looking at the picture and wondering

why the hell is the thing Not supposed to be

like, because where I have it, it's got black

marks on his arms where the picture has it is

the arm is turned and the hand is then turned

so it shows the shot thing where you can shoot

the panel out. Yeah. Okay, I see what I did now.

So even though I'm not, and I refuse, I completely

refuse to transform this thing. It's staying

in the robot mode, that's the mode it's going

to stay in. It will never be transformed. Did

you fix his arms? So I fixed his arms. You know,

he has opposable thumbs, which is kind of weird.

Why? I don't know, it's just kind of weird, because

I looked at his hands and I'm like, wait. He

can either have two right hands or, well, one

backwards right hand and then one backward left

hand, or he can have regular, I don't know, it's

just weird that the thumb moves like, I don't

know, it's just weird to me. Okay. Oh, you're

talking about okay. I see what you're saying.

I'll have to show you on the video after yeah

Yeah, that is kind of funky, but I mean at least

he can hold his gun Well, no, yeah, yeah, yeah,

they don't have a gun sorry Yeah, I mean even

in my cabinet, I've got two of these I've got

one that's complete and I think one this I think

he's just missing the gun. I had two other incomplete

ones that I basically cobbled together, one that

was as complete as I could make him to send to

you, and the other one I think I chucked. I had

basically a big bin of stuff. I think I shipped

you the just the incomplete ones and then anything

that well the second optimal optimist and then

anything that was broken I think I just checked

it because you know I've tried selling just junk

lots on eBay before and people bid like 99 cents

for them and In the end, it's not even worth

it. Well, didn't you post on, yeah, you posted

on Twitter and Facebook a couple of weeks, because

again, this episode is being pre -recorded, so

a couple of weeks ago, posted on Twitter and

Facebook about how, what is it, the box of MicroMasters

won't make it to eBay because Aiden found them?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I had intended to sell

those off. I mean, they were... You know just

mismatched ones because they all the micro masters

came in sets of four and I think I had like the

complete set for the military set except a couple

of them were missing arms or something and a

complete set for a racetrack set except a couple

of more missing hoods and the missing ones the

missing bits I had already given to Aiden and

The ones that were intact I was going to keep

and just sell as incomplete sets And there were

maybe four incomplete sets, and then one, what

are they called? The Hot Rod ones with Big Daddy.

One Hot Rod set. So I kept the Hot Rod set out,

and I thought maybe eventually I'd sell it off

or trade it at BotCon or something. But the rest

of them, just let him play with. And he was really

happy. He was really upset that... Uh, the cement

mixer. The drum wouldn't rotate. And I'm like,

sorry, buddy, this is a 20 -year -old crappy

toy. You know what would have been really cool

if Optimal Optimus came with some sort of blue

spark thingy to put in his little cockpit in

robot mode to show that he had Prime's spark.

Oh, you know what's strange is, uh... the transmittal

to Megatron the giant red dragon he's got Like

a little thing in this chest that I think it

was supposed to be a chair But it kind of spins.

It's just it's like a big spark crystal And it's

been there's something in there that spins and

I want to say it's like a little chair Almost

as if it was designed of a person in there But

it's similar to, I mean, you can consider it

maybe like a little spark dancing in his chest.

But I was always surprised that Optimal Optimus

didn't have something like that too. That would

have been cool. Question, where the hell is the

missile button? Because I'm sitting here looking

at the missile, because you sent me, when you

sent him to me, he has one of his two missiles.

Yeah, I don't know. You don't know where the

missile button is? I don't know where the missile

button is now. I assume they eject somehow. I

don't know how to do it. This is not one of my

favorite toys, so I don't... Never spent a lot

of time with him. I had a friend of mine that

I used to work with long ago, and this was the

guy that really got me back in the Transformers

back in like 99. He had an Optimal Optimus and

the Transmetal 2 Megatron on his desk at work.

And he could put this guy in all the different

modes. I want to say like Steve where he grew

up with the cartoon. He really loved this character

and he just transformed this damn thing all the

time. I couldn't get heads or tails with it.

I never really liked the toy to be honest. I

dig the fact that he's big and yeah. And that's

about it. I've got two of them on my shelf and

that's about as far as it goes. You know what

the problem was when I picked this toy out of

the box? Those goddamn magnetizing peanuts were

inside his ape legs and inside his arms. Sorry.

They kept him from breaking. There you go. That's

about the only good thing you can say about them.

I might send that box back to you. You can keep

them. Actually, I kept the peanuts. I knew eventually

I'd be shipping something. I didn't want to just

throw them away because if I ship anything, I'd

want it to be packed right. Lo and behold, I

still had them when I sent you that box, so I'm

like, ha -ha! I didn't expect them to stick to

everything. God, dude, they do. You stick your

hand near them, and they shh right onto your

hand. Oh, exactly. And you shake it, and they

won't come off. You mean, you run water on your

hand, and they're stuck to you still. And you're

thinking, you know, with static electricity,

water should negate that, but it doesn't help.

They still stick to you. His head looks weird.

Looks like an Optimus. Well, I know, but, well,

no. Okay, I should rephrase. His face looks weird.

Because it's just... Like, in the cartoon, you

can see, like, his mouth. Like, it basically,

so, from... If you went from Transmetal One Optimus

to this one. The one in the cartoon basically

had the same design as the original Optimus had.

When the cartoon first started with the the two

plates above his above and below his mouth And

then the face mask would come up, and he would

look like g1 prime in the face Okay on the toy

it just he looks like he has a goatee almost

like he could be on version You know I'm sorely

tempted to go like, crawl over and look on my

bottom shelf to see if I can see his face right

now. I'm not gonna do it. Like I said, he's way

in the back of my shelf and the shelf is two

feet deep. Again, on the bottom shelf and I literally

have to like, crawl over there and push all the

other toys out of the way to see him. No, not

gonna do it. I'll take your word for it. One

thing I don't like about the Apehead Looking

at the picture It's got this like giant friggin

cheesy grin on his face. I mean, it's so it's

not a grin That's like he's growling. He's showing

his teeth. Oh, yeah the whole point he's sure

But to me it looks like a big cheesy He's like

walk a walk a walk. Ah, yeah, really Fuzzy's

he's a monkey. Yeah. Oh not a bear. Yeah Fuzzy.

Okay I like the fact that you can remove the

missiles and store them on his legs. Wait, clear

missiles? Yeah. There's storage on the yellow

foldback pieces on his legs. Yeah, okay. There's

slots there where you can store the missiles.

He's not supposed to have the missiles in when

he's in robot or beast mode. They're supposed

to store on his legs. The missiles really come

into play when he's in vehicle mode. Right, but

see the difference was between the cartoon and

the toy is these guns and this little laser sighter,

they were machine guns weren't they? They weren't

missile blasters in the cartoon. Again I'm gonna

have to go back and watch the situation but I

could have sworn these are guns that he's got

in front of his head. I'm not sure. I don't know.

Can I have to go back and look it's been a few

years since I've seen that episode and you know

I I Want to say in preparation for you know beasts

unleashed episodes I only watch the ones that

we're gonna review again And I'll take notes

and but I mean I haven't watched the whole series

over again yet I kind of I kind of want to experience

each each couple of episodes fresh Yeah, almost

as if I haven't seen them before yeah That's

understandable. Yeah, overall, I'm really glad

that you sent it to me. Thank you very much.

It's one of my favorite characters from the Beast

era. I mean, one of my favorite versions of Primal

from the Beast era. I think where they went kind

of downhill with design, both in toys and the

cartoon, is Beast Machines. Because I don't like...

I'm sorry, that's one fucking ugly monkey in

Beast Machines. Oh, you just don't like the...

Yeah. I like... How should I put it? I understand

where they were going. And I like the design

for that. I know that they were trying to kind

of get a hybrid between the technological and

the organic. And I think they did a really good

job. I mean, it's not for everybody, granted.

But I suppose some people aren't going to like

it. i was gonna say uh... i don't know but then

i have to drink well you just said i don't know

so i don't know if you're right but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but but but but but but but but but but

but but but in preparation for your pick I have

an image of your pick up here and yeah and they

I almost wonder who could win in any toy fight

your or my pick cuz wow what are you gonna be

talking about? G1 Metroplex. You showed me on

the video before we started recording this they're

pretty much almost the same size yeah Back in

the G1 days, they didn't have supreme class toys.

I think this might be considered a leader class

toy at this point. Or Optimal Optimus might be

considered a leader class toy as well. They change

class sizes every couple of series. But yeah,

I think they would both be around that leader

class. But back then... You didn't have a whole

lot of leader class. I mean, maybe six shot might

be considered leader class. Trypticon, Scorponok

was huge, actually. See, I'm saying Scorponok

and Fortress Maximus. I would say those are,

say, supreme type class, like the supreme TFA

Optimus. No. Yeah, no, I would say if you hold

up Let's say Primus. G1 Scorponok is about the

same size as Primus. Unicron is still bigger

than both of them. But he's still smaller than

Fort Max. Fort Max is literally twice the size,

or at least twice the height, of Scorponok. He's

just huge. But as far as G1 goes, you might have

Oh, let me see here. I would probably say, you

know, Tripticon, Omega Supreme is almost as tall.

And, you know, you might factor in Predaking

in combined mode. Yeah. Roughly, you know, about

that size. But there weren't a whole lot of toys

this big back then. And, you know, Fort Max is

just a fluke. Fort Max probably should never

have been. He's just too damn big. Yeah, Fort

Max is huge. Two and a half feet tall is ridiculous

how big this guy is. Now I'm looking at the picture

on the wiki here for Metroplex. I know his city

mode. What is the other mode? That's a battle

station mode. That's kind of weird. Well, it's

kind of like... The easiest way to transform

him from a robot into something else is battle

station mode Because the battle station mode

is literally you pull his legs out in front of

him and fold out the front of his legs and The

backs of the underside of his legs are just full

of wheels, you know, so I mean he can roll in

that mode. Yeah And you pull his arms back And

point his shoulders forward and tuck his head

down, and that's pretty much it. So he particularly

tucks and rolls. Yeah, tuck and roll, Metroplex.

Yeah, I had read a fan fiction once, and Brian

Kilbeal will know more about it than I can remember,

but I believe it was... not Cosmic Rust, but

Rust, The War Without End, or The War Without

End, something Rust. I think that was it. But

they all rode around in a giant battleship that

was literally... Well, it wasn't named Metroplex,

but it was Metroplex, but it was in battleship

mode. And that's what they flew around the galaxy

in. I thought that was such a cool idea because

the battle station mode, you don't see a whole

lot of fiction using the battle station mode.

He's always either in robot mode or city mode.

And the battle station mode is kind of an afterthought.

But the idea that somewhere there's a band of

Autobots who fly around the universe in this

giant Metroplex in battle station mode is just

terribly, terribly cool. I think we covered this.

I'm trying to remember if we did or not if we

covered it in TFG -1. I forget what the episode

is, but there's an episode where, oh yeah, it

was crap, one of your favorite ones too. Headmasters?

No, no, no. G1. Not freakin' Japanese G1. Oh.

Ah, crap. Star... See, they're Ghost in the Machine

or Starscream's Ghost, where he has to steal

Metroplex's eyes. Oh, okay, yeah. And Metroplex

is in city mode, and all of a sudden, when Scourge

steals his eye, Starts transforming and everybody

inside the damn city starts falling down which

way and falling There's no way you could fly

around in him in robot mode through space. There's

just no way maybe city mode you could That would

be a little bit I like to think of it that as

he transforms the rooms reorient Well I mean

seriously, technically you could be somewhere

in his chest standing upright and as he transforms

that room goes from an upright room to a vertical

room. Now if you're standing in it, yeah you're

going to fall on the wall, but if you're in between

modes that wall becomes the floor. You know,

so everything stays the same. It's just the rooms

are reorienting themselves Oh, I understand that

but it's but technically if you were in space

flying around in the battleship mode You could

just turn off gravity and at that point doesn't

matter what you oriented to Because you're free

floating. There's no gravity. Mm -hmm Haha, there

you go. Yeah, but not this particular toy This

is the original one that I had as a kid. Out

of my thousands of Transformers, maybe a dozen

of them survived from my childhood that were

actually mine, that I didn't buy off eBay or

get from some other means or buy at a BotCon

or something. This one is actually one that I

picked up at the store. It's one of the few childhood

memories that I still have. Let's face it, my

childhood sucked ass and it's mostly repressed.

I remember going to Toys R Us with my dad and

picking this out and the box was huge and I think

it was probably, I want to say like 35 bucks

and due to inflation that was probably worth

well over 50 in today's dollars, right? Because

I was 12, this is a long time ago. And God, like

close to 25 years ago. But my dad got it for

me. And I was eternally grateful. I loved this

toy. I took him everywhere. He's like teddy bear

size for a 12 -year -old. So literally just had

an arm around his waist and carried him everywhere.

Loved this toy. Yeah, he is pretty awesome. I

would love to have him just for the robot mode.

Yeah, he's he's a I want to say you know if you

go to a bot con He's he's a pretty common site

Yeah, well I've seen just rows of Metroplex and

again you're gonna find them with no stickers

and no accessories and in various states of repair

right I know his waist joint at least in the

first run what was a a sore spot where it would

break a lot and you'd end up with the upper half

of a of a metroplex and the lower half of a metroplex

that and never the twain shall meet uh and i've

seen a lot of those at bot cons but you know

the hard part gets to be when you you know tracking

down his his individual pieces like uh the missiles

well the missiles yeah but i'm looking more like

a scamper he came with a little black car Oh

yeah. Yeah, he came with a little black car and

his arms came off and became guns kind of attached

to the roof of the car. And the robot itself

had a little tiny black gun that you could put

in one of the hands and then would become a third

gun on the roof when he became a car. And it

was neat because when he transforms, you open

up his chest on his... Right side and it pulls

out and becomes a ramp and then scamper can live

in there and he just kind of slides out now I

have no idea how much scampers gun goes for on

eBay, but if you can find one at all I'm assuming

they're they're really tough to find. Yeah But

you know, it's a little tiny tiny little piece

and you're you know, probably if you don't have

one, but we're never gonna find one Yeah, mine's

a little dusty but yeah, so I keep scamper in

in that little chest cavity there along with

his two arms on his roof of his car and the gun.

Let me seal that back up with a satisfying click.

But I mean, the robot itself has a lot of cool

stuff going on in that on the front of his chest,

on his left side, he's got pop -out missile batteries

and they're silver. On his shoulder, just above

the missile batteries, there's a... It's almost

like a trapdoor. It flip -flops, but he's got

a shoulder one second, and then the trapdoor

flips, and lo and behold, there's a laser cannon

under it. And the thing's almost as big as his

head. It's a big old cannon. Does he have a rub

sign? He does. It's... Well, I want to say on

his neck. It's kind of in between his two chest

portions just below his head. Yeah, I see it

now No, I wasn't I wasn't really looking for

it because I mean You know honestly that outside

of the fact that he has two giant tits on his

on his chest What I noticed was the giant red

Autobot symbol on the left on the well as you're

looking at it It's the left hand side of the

chest, but yeah his right yeah, yeah I don't

think I've ever seen an Autobot symbol that big

on a g1 toy before He's a big toy. I know he's

a big toy. What are you saying? I was going to

say maybe Omega Supreme on Omega Supreme's chest.

Wasn't that on his rocket or is that just in

the cartoon? Just on his cartoon, yeah. I don't

think he actually had one on his rocket. Oh,

now that I'm thinking about it. Let me see here.

I've got... I was going to say I've got Micromaster

Countdown. He's got a big rocket, and there's

a huge Autobot symbol on the rocket, and it's

not even that big. So yeah, I guess that's a

rarity, the size there. But he's got two great

big guns, two great big red guns, and they're

oddly shaped like somebody's feet and legs, which

kind of comes into play later. If you're looking

at the picture, you can see When he goes into

battle station mode, how he's got black cannons

on either shoulder. And then he's got another

cannon that kind of mounts onto his back. It's

the red one that mounts behind the missile bay.

The neat thing about this is that you can take...

There's a tower in... In city mode, there's a

tower that sits next to the helipad. Yeah, I

see it. It's a red tower with white parts on

top. Those pieces then combine with the two black

guns and his red guns and become another robot.

I think his name is Sixgun. Do they have a picture

of him on the wiki? Yeah, I got it. Yeah, so

a sixth gun is literally made up of six of Metroplex's

guns. It's kind of cool. But I keep the black

guns on his arms and the other ones on his back.

And then I keep the legs in his hands so he holds

onto those at all times. He just never lets them

go. Where are the black guns in the robot mode

I see them on the on the on the the attack or

the Not the city mode the other the third mode

the battle station. Yeah, yeah in battle station

They attach to the I see that but where are they

on the robot mode because it the same place on

the sides of the arms Well, they're not showing

it on here. It's just no they don't they don't

yeah, I mean again not cannon, but I mean if

If I want my Metroplex to be powerful enough

to defeat your optimal optimus, he's going to

have guns on both shoulders and both hands. He's

going to have dual missile launchers on his shoulders

and on his boob launchers. And then the red cannons

on his back. He's loaded for bear here. Literally

optimal optimus all he's got to do is just take

his giant ape foot and just smash your head right

in No, can't you can't get his foot that high?

Missiles Behind his head that kind of look like

ears the two red ones. Yeah Are those just turned

around in? In battle station mode because they

look like it's the same thing. Yeah, I mean though

you can either point those forward or turn them

around and point them back, but then when you

push his head down, those lay flat. But then

when his head comes up, you just pick him straight

up. Now, I like to lean them forward a little

bit so that they kind of look like cannons, but

I think as far as... They almost look like shoulder

-mounted cannons. They're on either side of his

head, but I think that they're kind of... I want

to say, like, Nightbeat, where he kind of looks

like he's got guns mounted on his head that just

kind of point up. Yeah. That's okay. But yeah,

when I was little, I kept him mostly in city

mode, because I like to put all my toys on him.

And, I mean, he's made almost like a diorama.

He comes with a tank. called a scamper. And a

scamper unfolds into a tower that you can plug

into him in city mode. He's got, I want to say,

a skyscraper. It's like a big chunk of plastic

that's molded like a building. And you plug that

in behind him on his back. And then his legs

open up, his arms swivel around, and he's got

giant antenna. One that comes out of one arm

and the other one that's the antenna is actually

a another piece that plugs in it doesn't pop

out But he's got an antenna on both arms And

then his legs just unfold twice. So he actually

ends up with four Landing bay. Yeah, I should

say landing bay car bays two of them have Skids

so you can drive a car right up into them And

then the other two, you can't really drive the

cars out of because he's got his feet in the

way, but you can park them in there. And I kind

of thought of those as like repair bays when

I was little. His kneecaps, and this is interesting,

the kneecaps have holes in the front and you

can see them in robot mode, where the holes are,

and his knees. He's also got the same size holes

underneath his repair bays in battle station

mode. And the idea there is that you can actually

plug his guns into them. So if you're in city

mode and you don't have six gun assembled, well

you wouldn't because his chest and his shoulders

become a tower itself, but if you don't have

six gun assembled you can then take those guns,

the big red ones plug directly into his Knees

to act as like perimeter defense and then you

can take the black ones and plug them right back

into the arms And then you have even more firepower.

So even as a peaceful luck, you know Autobot

City he's still Pretty well defended, you know,

and then if you really want to get into it, then

you can always you know pop out those rocket

launchers out of his out of his chest in City

mode to So he's got a lot of stuff going on in

city mode, a lot of stuff going on in robot mode.

The thing I couldn't figure out when I was little

is that he's got kind of almost a button in his

chest, right in the middle of his chest. And

it doesn't push in or do anything, but it always

made me wonder if maybe it was supposed to. You

know, like maybe, maybe, you know, he's got a

button on his back. that makes his head pop up

and down, because his head is bloated on a spring.

And you can push it down, and then hit the spring,

and it pops back up. But there's really no use

for that thing. I think somewhere I saw him use

that as a gun. It might have been on the wiki

somewhere, or in a comic or something where that

was a gun. But I'm not entirely sure. It looks

like it should have been or could have been a

button at one point. that I don't know. And a

cool thing that I found out years later, I never

knew this as a kid, but in Japan, Metroplex was

part of the Scramble City line. And Scramble

City was all about the combiners. Not so much

the Constructicons, but the Aerobots, the Combaticons,

pretty much the Limformers. The ones where you

had a body and then you know like onslaught was

the body for the combaticons and everybody else

was just an arm and a leg and the premise for

Scramble City was that Any arm or leg could become

the arm or leg of a different combiner? So if

for some reason Metroplex and or I should not

Metroplex, but you know met Metroplex was part

of the line but if I don't know. Defensor was

fighting Menasaur. And Menasaur took his sword

and cut off an arm. Then one of the aerial bots

could fly in and replace that arm on Defensor.

And it wasn't considered, oh, what the heck?

He's not part of that team. It didn't matter.

I mean, technically you could have a Decepticon

come and plug himself into Defensor, and all

would have been well and good. But Metroplex,

interestingly enough, too many big words this

episode, sorry, he could combine with them as

well. So you could take one of the limbs and

plug them into the arms. Either like the arms

that I currently have, six gun guns plugged into.

There's like a universal slot there on either

side of his arm. And it's pretty much the same

connector that Silverbolt would have on his shoulders

to accept the Aerobots. So, and he's got, or

I should say Metroplex has two more under his

kneecaps. So if you remove his knees, Which I'm

going to do now. He's got two more connectors

under there. And you can plug Scramble City combiners

in there. Right. Well, you know, you're talking

about Scramble City. As far as the cartoon goes,

I have the art, because I'm on Metroplex's TFWiki

page. To complete the Scramble City project,

the Autobots move their operation to a secret

underground cavern, but the Decepticons spy cassettes

Located, the subterranean base and an all -out

Decepticon attack was initiated. Minasaur and

Bruticus had Superion outnumbered, but the heroic

combiner was able to hold the line long enough

until Metroplex's construction was finally completed.

Emerging from his underground birthplace, Metroplex

transformed from city to battle station mode

and took off for the battleground, crushing all

in his path. The titanic Autobot transformed

into robot mode and took out the Decepticon combiners

with one colossal blast. However, as the Autobots

celebrated their victory, the ocean nearby parted

and Trypticon emerged from his first battle with

Metroplex. Note, the battle never happened because

the second part of Scramble City never got made.

Nice. Well, I mean, still, that would be epic.

Oh yeah, very much. I truly wish... Now, I know

it's probably never gonna happen. I truly wish

whoever Hasbro or whoever's doing the new cartoon,

I know again this probably won't happen, I wish

they would go back to a full -on G1 cartoon.

Yeah, never happened. I know! Wishful thinking,

but I wish that they would with the remaining

voice actors that are still alive today, because

I know some of them have passed away, or some

of them choose not to work on it anymore. Hello,

Clip Jumper. Casey Kasich was standing there

dead. What are you talking about? Well, like,

Michael Bell is so much as begging them to let

the G1 actors come back. And I stand by him 100%.

I would love to see the G1 actors come back.

And if not, do their same voices for, like, Prowl

or Hound or whoever, but at least be involved.

But I don't think we're going to see that. With

the new video game coming out, War for Cybertron,

I was chatting with Malunas on Twitter or Facebook

about this. Malunas had said that he was upset

that there were some people that were saying,

oh, we shouldn't be making movie toys, and we

shouldn't be making toys for War for Cybertron,

we should only be making toys for the cartoon

line. And we don't even know what the cartoon

line is going to be. And Willowness was making

that point. But I had mentioned what if, we don't

know, but what if the new toy line that nobody

knows anything about and probably won't know

anything about until BotCon comes up. But what

if the cartoon is actually based on The war for

Cybertron Video game, maybe it's the video game

is a cartoon tie -in And we're actually getting

buttloads of spoilers Yeah, I am because we know

they're making toys for the video game now right

I You know I've said before I know we've only

seen one animatic scene of war for Cybertron,

and it probably isn't going to be That much graphically

inclined. I mean, you know full -on animatic.

There's no way gameplay is gonna be like that

But unless you know that right? Well, unless

they found the missing link or something. Well,

I mean if you play Gears of War Okay, well, it's

it looks that good. Okay. Well, I haven't so

Yeah, um, they could definitely make gameplay

that looks very similar to that animatic Okay,

so put it that way, you know, I am super stoked

for war for Cybertron I can't wait for the new

cartoon. Supposedly, according to Brian Kilby

of Radio Free Cybertron, Power Core Combiners

is, quote -unquote, potentially the new toyline

for transfer. Right. I don't know if it... I

mean... And Power... The Power Core Combiners

look like vehicle... Earth vehicle modes. Yeah.

So that... I don't want to say it tosses out

completely, but... And, you know, to kind of

argue against what I just said, Hasbro isn't

against having multiple toy lines. You can have

the movie line and the universe line side by

side. Or a horrendously truncated, Toys R Us

exclusive only animated line side by side. There's

only one Transformers line that I will, outside

of one toy that I bought from it, that I will

never buy anything from. And that's the movie

line. My one exception, said plenty of times

before in the past, I don't know, 15 or so episodes

on this show, was Ravage. Because I like the

design in the movie and I wanted that toy. Other

than that, the movie line can go to hell and

die for all I care. That is just my personal

opinion. Now if people like it fun they Your

own personal protest against Michael Bay, but

I'm not but I'm not suck Bay Thanks for raping

my childhood you bastard like Starscream raves

metal bugs You know, I think it's funny that

we have our own private jokes I don't want to

get too private jokey here or else we'll end

up liking TFW. us fanboys or us transformers

fanboys morons but there are some moron fanboys

out there who are like oh my god it has to be

this or it has to be that or it can't be this

or it can't be that or this you know there's

a lot of opinionated people who just have shitty

opinions exactly there you go um but for me it's

like you know okay i grew up on g1 i've read

some of the comics haven't read them all, and

that's not something I'm going to be spending

my money on anytime soon. Well, I know that some

people will download those from the internet

for free. People have been known to do that.

I'm not saying it's a good thing. I'm not saying

that we condone it. No, we don't condone it.

I'm just saying it has been known to happen.

I've got so much other collecting between DVDs

and Mighty Mugs and just Transformers lines in

general that I've never had toys of, like the

BotCon toys or you know, whatever. I just can't

get invested in comics, you know, as far as Transformers

comics and even comics in general. I think over

the past year and a half, I've bought... Well...

four individual comic books and one set of seven

or eight comic books. I bought Green Arrow, Black

Canary, I think there's like seven in the set

that I bought, the BotCon 2008 comic, the animated

movie, trade paperback, and Daredevil, Guardian

Devil. Other than that, Yeah, well that's understandable.

But at the same time, you know, I've come, you

know, in the beginning I was always, you know,

the G1 fanboy. Oh my God, if it's not G1, fuck

it, screw it, you know, whatever, you know. You

know, but, you know, now that I've come to, like,

Beast Wars, I mean, you know, I've said before

that, you know, when I first heard about a new

Transformers cartoon back in 1996, I thought

the Transformers cartoon was really good. You

know, but once I came... to know the stores and

i eventually now have all the dvd have watched

them all and will continue to watch them as we

do the best ones broadcast i'm not just a g one

van boyd however when i draw the line is the

movie that's where you know it's cut it's like

bugs bunny drawing the line in the sand or the

or the rock for yourself there across this line

across the Sorry, I'm not crossing that line.

That last one, no, I'm not. You know, but I am

open -minded to a new toy line. I kind of like

the War for Cybertron toy image I saw of the

Optimus Prime. I wish that they would adapt the

video game to be the new cartoon. I don't think

that's what's gonna happen. But I wish that that,

because, you know, like I said a little while

ago, the video game looks awesome. Yeah. It just,

it looks fucking awesome. And I know there isn't

a lot of competition for this title, but War

for Cybertron is most likely going to be the

best Transformers game ever. I have trouble saying

that, to be honest. I think that it'll be awesome.

You know, I really like the Armada game, to be

honest. Set the Armada game aside though. Okay,

the Amar - the armada game was awesome the armada

game was probably the only awesome game we've

had you know up to that point okay okay you know

the armada game can be also classified as one

of the best transformers games ever but compared

everything else and then you have okay you have

everything else on the left you have war for

cybertron on the right yeah you're gonna go towards

war for cybertron versus 64 version of text transformers

there was back in 1777. You know, whatever. I

don't know. Again, let's wait and see what happens.

I'm a big advocate of wait and see. Yeah, I am

too, but just from what I've seen so far, yeah.

Dick, I mean... Patience, young one. Yeah. This

is not Star Wars. You are not my pet on. I'm

just saying. I'm not one of those that's going

to run out on eBay and buy toys that haven't

been released yet. I'm not one of those that's

going to speculate wildly on what's coming next.

I'm not one of those that's going to publicly

damn whatever comes next if it's not exactly

what I want. It bothers me when people do that.

Again, if you just be patient, wait and see,

Hasbro has a habit of, you know, amazing us with

the exception of, you know, maybe Energon, you

know, Unicron Trilogy. You know, they have a

unique ability to impress us with, you know,

whatever they're going to come out with. Right,

but you gotta wait a minute here though, you

really can't say the whole Unicron trilogy as

far as the toys go because if the Cybertron line

didn't happen, we wouldn't have half SpotCon

toys that we have. Oh, they would have hit down

something else. I mean, I don't know how much

you know about the TransTech line. Not a lot.

TransTech was a line of transformers that were...

You have to Google it they were terribly cool

-looking I mean they were they were different

in a way where they kind of looked almost like

if you take some Robo tech and you mix it with

some g1 That's about what you would get and they

were they were different But they were all vehicle

vehicle modes, I mean it was kind of like They

took Beast War characters like Cheetor and they

turned them into vehicles. And then they took

G1 characters like Optimus Prime and Starscream

and just made them painfully badass. Almost War

Within -like. In fact, I think some of the War

Within designs came from, they had a little TransTech

-inspiring going on there. But the TransTech

line... What has been released as far as concept

art was very, very cool. And there's still people

out there who wished that they had released trans

tech instead of Armada. And as kid -friendly

and, you know, Play school for like a better

term as our motto was in some regards Trans tech

was the exact opposite and I think that's why

you know adult collectors are more drawn to trans

tech and wonder Why didn't they go with that?

I'm looking at trans tech cheeto right now And

I can just tell you just by these initial designs,

which obviously they'll never happen because

the line never happened Yeah, I don't like I

don't like the cheeto one. I can send you the

link. It's on his his toy page on the wiki yeah

but you know it's funny though you look at you

look at the robot mode concept art and you like

look at the feet look at the you know just just

the general body shape and hold that up next

to uh animated blur yeah true you can see the

homage there you see where it comes through But

no, I think that I liked the designs. I thought

they were really nice and was kind of bummed

out, you know, as well as as much as everybody

else that that they weren't used. But, you know,

again, which can do right exactly. I want to

actually I don't know how we fell down the rat's

nest. I was going to mention one more thing about

G1 Metroplex. And that is that not only can he

combine with Scramble City limbs, he can also

combine with these Scramble City bodies. Like

if you take Silverbolt and HotSpot and you put

them in ramp mode, I'm not sure exactly what

mode that's called, but each combiner came with

a ramp. And a lot of people wonder what the hell

the ramp was for. And I mean, if you've got onslaught,

OK, the ramp makes sense because you can kind

of put it there and have a car drive up onto

his back. Or if you split his legs apart, his

tractor bed, trailer bed, if you split that apart,

you can put the ramp between them. You know,

a lot of times you're wondering, well, how does

this ramp come into play? And the ramps were

there to make each one a platform. And then that

platform would then fit snugly next to one of

Metroplex's repair base. Oh, cool. Yeah. So maybe

that combined in the sense that there was a snap

or a plug or an outlet for them to snap into.

But you know, you could kind of sit them next

to them and make them look like they were in

an entire One piece now Hotspot has a mode that's

it's kind of like a repair bay mode and he can

he can fold in the repair bay mode with a little

ramp on him and that will plug in next to Next

to Metroplex and the silver bolt has His ramp

mode like you know that kind of looks like half

a plane half a ramp And that will plug in next

to next to one of the repair bays nicely I mean

and and you know plus you can also do the same

thing with onslaught or Menasaur What's his name?

Menasaur Bruticus No King of the Road Oh, um,

um shit the optimus prime ripoff. Yeah help me

here. Oh crap motor man. Oh motor master motor

master. Damn it All right had a brain freeze

there. Yeah motor master has a ramp mode and

onslaught has a ramp mode. Those are a little

more obvious, but Yeah, those can plug you right

next to Metroplex or Metro Titan as well Metro

Titan was the Japanese repaint of Metroplex.

He came, I want to say, closer to the Micromaster

releases because Metrotitan has a Micromaster

and Metroplex doesn't. Oh, okay. Yeah, which

is kind of neat, but I want to say Metrotitan

also came with a connector piece that would allow

him to plug into the Micromaster bases. Which

would have been terribly cool because I've got

a couple of those Yeah, that would have been

pretty cool. Yeah, I have a knockoff Metro Titan

Except he's a little more pinkish than red which

is a letdown but you know, it's there's no other

way I want to get a Metro Titan. I've seen Metro

Titan once at a BotCon once years ago and he

was I think like $350 What and that's roughly

what I bought my fort max for so I'm not Probably

not in the market for a metro Titan But yeah,

he is cool. He's terribly cool, and it would

be it would be nice to have one But the knockoff

is probably about as close as I'm gonna get and

the knockoff didn't come with the micro master

So but he's still cool looking He's a he has

a worthy space on my shelf right next to Metroplex

Cool. I just sent you a link in Skype. I want

that. Are we changing topics again? Oh, jeez.

You are not going to get a Lucky Draw Gold Prime

anything. The only people I know that have these

are the TF on the Moon people, or TF at the Moon.

And they somehow end up with one of each. Don't

know how they manage that but these things you

find them on eBay the lucky gold or the lucky

draw gold figures You know and there's always

a prime. There's always a Megatron I think I

even saw an Omega Supreme once or something and

they coat the whole damn thing in gold plastic

And they sell them for like seven or eight hundred

dollars on eBay. It's ridiculous I've seen Again,

I've seen the pictures of them at TF at the moon

or on the moon. And again, somehow they get one

of each of these damn things. Lucky Draw will

either come in like black chrome or gold chrome

or silver chrome. They're sharp. They're very

cool to look at. But they're rare. They make

like five of them. And I don't even know how

you go about getting them. I think you like have

to be in some kind of lottery in Japan. And then,

you know, again, it's a lucky draw. It's a lottery

type thing. But again, somehow the TF at the

Moon people get them. You know, God bless them

for it because they put out pictures of these

rare ass items that you're never going to find

anywhere else. But they're cool. Yeah. But no,

you'll never own one. Very cool. Can always have

somebody do a custom one for me like just buy

the by the figure the regular optimus prime Classics

figure and just have somebody paint it gold Damn

that looks awesome as tempting as that is Yeah,

I got an extra classics optimus, I think I'm

just gonna spray paint them cold why not p0k3smot42oF

But I don't know you know I mean for all we know

you could win the lottery and suddenly decide

you want to own them all and You know there are

people who have and I'm assuming the people at

TF at the moon or you know there are people who

have just a lot of time and a lot of money and

Nothing better to do with it then track these

damn things down and buy them See but I I can't

imagine I mean literally if you're looking at

seven eight hundred dollars a pop Yeah. It would

get fairly ridiculous. And it's not like there's

not a lot of these. Again, they make, what, five

of them at a time? But they release a lot of

them. Right. Just for fun, I'm on TFWiki. I was

going to do a search for Lucky Draw. And maybe

they have pictures of them. No, they have a list

of them. Yeah. Yeah, look at that. I mean, there's

your gold Rodimus Prime. Yeah, there's a black

Armada Megatron. Yeah, gold Grand Convoy. Gold

Rodimus Convoy. Silver Rodimus Convoy. Gold Omega

Supreme. Red metal fire kicker. I mean, kicker.

They make a red metal kicker. What the hell?

And it looks like each line gets what half a

dozen maybe roughly on average they're gold or

they're silver this one's a oh god blue flame

convoy from galaxy force oh that's the blue scourge

yeah yeah that one wasn't even wasn't even a

prime that was a scourge and again each one looks

very very cool but Again, they're very hard to

find. I'm sure they are. They're very rare. But

really, honestly, when you were talking about,

I don't know, talking about something about Optimus

or something or other, or Metroplex, I went to,

oh, I was reading through the Metroplex fiction,

and I went to go look at, oh, we're talking about

TransTech. And they had a thing with, they had

listed the characters that were supposed to be

in TransTech. and Optimus was one of them, so

I went to see if there was a TransTech Optimus

design like we saw the Cheetor one. Couldn't

find one yet, but as soon as I ran across that

image, the gold image, I was like, oh must have.

Yeah, you know, I've seen pictures of the TransTech

Optimus. I'm sure they're out there. I just didn't

find it yet when I was scrolling down here through

Through the things there Well, yeah, like optimus's

wiki page is you know, like a book. Yeah, good

luck finding it there, but Yeah, I've seen pictures

and I can't really say where tech because it

looks like It looks like his alt mode looks like

it's a it's a gray wheelie Which one the trans

tech cheetor oh He looks, his alt mode looks

like he's a grey wheelie. No, no, I thought he

looked more like a, like a Formula One racer.

No, Formula... Like an alien Formula One racer,

let's say. Alright, well... Yeah, could happen.

Sure! I'm just waiting to see if the TFWiki are

gonna pick up the, um... the news about the on

on on the regular Wikipedia and when I looked

up Mighty mugs Oh the regular Wikipedia lists

all of the all of the lines Including you know

all five lines transformers gi Joe You know all

that stuff And yeah, but that's not the, yeah,

I just found that, the link you just sent me.

Oh, yeah, the Transtech Optimus Prime. It's not

a toy, though. That's a character design. If

you look at that, I mean, if you look at the

Transtech Optimus Prime in the vehicle mode,

let's say, and you stand that next to War Within

Optimus Prime, Yeah, very actually, you know

actually the more I look at it if you take that

model and you stand it up next to War for Cybertron

Optimus Prime. It looks kind of similar very

similar. Yeah. Oh What if oh my god? I don't

know if anyone else in transformers fandom has

this realization But I just it just hit me since

we're talking about trans tech What if trans

tech? Is the long -forgotten line that's gonna

be a bot con Actually if anything it's gonna

end up being G2 I know they're gonna end well

what they'll end up doing is taking like classics

and Repainting them in G2 colors, so you'll they'll

have a black side swipe with a Blue day glow

gun or something or a black classic sites what

yeah? I know those lines. Oh, I know, but I mean

it'll still be cool right, but but I mean come

on Yeah, okay when you think of transformers

toy lines Yeah What do you think is lost and

forgotten or a long forgotten toy line you either

think g2 or now that we've been talking about

it trans tech Well Maybe But I honestly don't

know how you would do that. I mean, we don't

have any current molds that look anything like

Transtek. And literally, the Transtek toys, you

really couldn't see them as even being related

slightly to G1 if they didn't have the same colors

and the same names. I mean, you couldn't look

at Transec Optimus Prime and go, oh, clearly

that's Optimus Prime unless he was red and blue

and white, or red and blue and silver, let's

say. I mean, honestly, it's like Bayformers.

I wouldn't look at Bayformer Optimus Prime and

go, oh, clearly this is Optimus Prime, in robot

mode at least, if he wasn't red and blue. Just

I just couldn't see it Megatron you can't look

at Bay for a Megatron and go clearly that's Megatron

No, it looks like a couple of piece of tinfoil

You know the fact that he's silver and they call

him Megatron is you know the only? The closest

you're gonna get let's say Do we have any other

thoughts on? The toys we were supposed to be

talking about this. Oh, yeah after after our

giant rat hole No, you know, I think I covered

Metroplex about as much as I wanted to. I dig

him. You know, again, I have a lot of love for

these older toys that I had when I was 12. You

know, I had like him and Optimus Prime, my G1

Prime I had when I was 12. Thrust I had when

I was 12. Can't even remember maybe a handful

of my ratchet I had when I was 12 and my cassette

box and Soundwave and that's about it You know

from when I was younger and those are You know

near and dear to me If my entire house burned

up in a fire those few would be the ones that

I'd be tossing out the window first um It's a

good thing your family doesn't listen to this

show Well, you know, aside from my kids, sure,

yeah, but if the kids were thrown out the window,

I'd be tossing as many transformers as I could

out the window. Just your kids, huh? So I guess

you're full -on scorning your wife for castrating

you. That's what she gets for castrating me.

No, I mean, granted, she would be the one outside

catching the kids as they flew out the window.

Wait, wait, wait. You guys gave me such grief

in Beast Wars Episode 2 for calling it circumcision.

You just said crastrating. What? Crastrating.

It's a cross between castration and procrastination.

Because I waited a long time for it to get done.

Okay, on that note, I think we're going to end

this episode. Thank you for joining us here on

Tonycast. Oh, fuck it. You know where to go.

You know where to go. Get your ass out there.

Look on our web pages. Be sure to give us good

feedback. We'll find you. And we will castrate

you. And trust me, you don't want that happening.

Okay. We stopped short of threatening our listeners

with castration. Is that it? We're sorry. Due

to circumstances beyond our control, the script

to the rest of the episode was lost on its way

overseas. Luckily, the episode was finished by

the Korean animators. We hope you enjoy the new

ending. This is Toycast, episode 40. Be sure

to visit our sponsors, www .bigbadtoystore .com.

You can find all the other podcasts at geekcastradio

.com. You can call the voicemail line, leave

us your feedback on each episode of the podcast.

Be sure to say what show you're leaving a message

for and your name. The number is 502 -526 -5821.

You can follow us on Twitter at tf .toycast.

Mine is TFG1Mike. And Mr. Wilson, what is your

Twitter, sir? Pecan Court Michael. Yes, we will

see you next time on Toycast. Hey, this is Sari,

and you're listening to the GeekCast Radio Network

of podcasts. and fall