Unreleased Transformers Animated Toys and BotCon 2011 Review

Hey, Tara Strong here, and you're listening to

the Geekcast Radio Network. Hmm, podcast good!

With these infernal setbacks never end, the revolution

begins now! My name is optimus prime and this

episode of transformation animation podcast features

Mike Blanchard and Michael Wilson Hello and welcome

to episode 18 of transformation animation podcast

I am one of your host to you doing Mike and joining

me is pecan from Michael. Hello. Hey, how's it

going? It's going and spade of the belt matrix.

Hello. Oh Yo, and this time around we're gonna

talk. This is probably gonna be a very short

episode ladies and gentlemen we're gonna be talking

about the toys in the animated line that they

showed off at BotCon 2009 that we still have

never got. Probably will never get. These are

basically mostly all repaints. There are a couple

in here, stuff like Wingblade Optimus Prime,

Blackout, and Hydrodive Bumblebee did come out

in Japan, but we haven't got them here in the

US. So starting with the deluxes, we have Toxic

Oil Slick, Fugitive Vospinator, Vortex Blur,

and Mercenary Swindle. I would have loved...

to get my hands on a fugitive Waspinator because

he's a Bumblebee repaint but he's green and he's

awesome. That would have been a cool figure to

get a hold of. Yeah that figure was not going

to have the remolded head right? No it's just

Bumblebee's head but it's all it's all Waspinator

or Wasp colors yeah green and purple and all

that stuff and he was gonna have purple boosters

it was gonna be cool. I still would have bought

one. Yes. I think I'm at a bit of a disadvantage

here because my web browser isn't reacting very

well, so I'm not actually going to be able to

follow along with the issues. And the funny thing

is Toxic Oil Slick isn't that much different.

It's not that big of a repaint. No, it really

isn't. I mean, he... Yeah, it... They could have

done more with him. I mean, considering he's

a motorcycle, they could have done like a G1

retgar. Homage. Despite the fact that there's

already a wreck car out there, but I mean, he's

on a motorcycle. There's a couple different things

I could have done with him that would have been

really cool. I think they dropped the ball there.

Yes. I am looking at the two pictures side by

side. Deluxe oil slick on his motorcycle form

is more dark. Whereas the toxic oil slick that

we never got was was more of a lighter green.

Now remember the picture you're looking at has

the Hasbro shininess added to it. Right. Yeah,

that's true. Oh the Photoshopped? Yes. Yeah.

And then Vortex Blur was basically just a grayish

silverish blur, gray and black. That was a nice

looking figure though. yeah it would have been

cool and see that and the greatest thing about

the blur I think was the fact that I don't remember

this on the on the original toy if not but he

actually had a red elite guard symbol on his

chest so that was really cool and mercenary swindle

he's pretty much gunmetal yeah just you know

in insert G1 Megatron colors here pretty much

as far as the gunmetal see now there's another

drop ball because what really would have been

sweet here is a G2 swindle homage you know some

red and blue camo yeah that would have been sharp

and that's a color combination that you really

don't see in the animated line yeah for me out

of the deluxes the two that I would mainly want

is the blur and the fugitive waspinator what

about you Spada Just the Fugitive Waspinator.

Michael? I would have gone with the Fugitive

Waspinator as well. Moving on to the Voyagers.

As I said, we did get Hydrodive, Bumblebee, Blackout,

and Wingblade Optimus. In Japan? Yeah, in Japan.

Wingblade Optimus looks great, in theory, but...

in theory. He's got a trailer though. Come on.

Yeah, kind of. Kind of, yeah. And he's more translucent

than anything else, which I thought was kind

of cool. Because this isn't just the... I almost

said leader club. This isn't just the Voyager

class US version just repainted. for the wings.

They basically took the mold and just repainted

it in shiny red colors. Well, all of the Japanese

toys were repainted in shiny colors. That's true.

So you're like Bumblebee with more of a gold

bug. They all had their shiny bits because that

was the thing they were doing in Japan at the

time. But the fact that he was translucent and

had shiny bits was terribly cool. Japan had a

lot of translucent figures for the that were

exclusive to the for the animated line as well

But I'm not sure if that that's gonna be included

in the scope of our conversation here Yeah, but

now wing blade was really sweet. I mean, I I

totally would have bought one if it wasn't 80

bucks on Big Bad Toy Store It's currently 60

If those are on sale effect, they're having a

clearance sale. I just I think that's its sale

price Yeah, they had Hydrodive Bumblebee for

like 20 bucks or something. I was so tempted

to buy it. Hydrodive Bumblebee? I just don't

get it. You know, I don't know if you'll remember

this, but the McFarland toys had a spawn... They

still have a spawn line. They're on like, you

know, the 50th run now or something, but back

in like the sixth or seventh run... It was like,

I wanna say 1997. They had a figure, it was like

space spawn or something. But it was literally

like a spawn, a mechanical spawn with a spaceship

on top of him. And the spaceship would fold over

the front of him and it was like a battle mech

type of thing. It looked like a spaceship with

legs. And it was terribly cool and that's what

this Hydrodive Bumblebee reminds me of. It's

like a bumblebee with a spaceship on his head

that folds over and becomes like a ship Here

reminds me of a shiny sea spray And Blackout

and overkill, huh? No, I said it seems like overkill

I mean, why would they why would they make a

toy like that when it didn't show up in the in

the show? And you know, it has no Has no relevance

anywhere. I mean that he he the Autobots were

in I want to say Lake Erie Yeah, any times and

never once did he break out, you know a scuba

gear or a little mini submarine or anything Yeah,

and The other ones like gold fire Grimlock. I

just They're just doing repaints for the sake

of repaints at this point. I mean the only the

only Three originals in here are Thundercracker,

Bulkhead, and Wingblade Optimus. Well, Wingblade

Optimus is a repaint, but at least it gave us

the Wingblade mode. In Japan, we finally got

Thundercracker so we can complete the Seekers

for the Voyagers. Right. See, I would have bought

that. Yeah. And you gotta think, that was an

activator. Originally, yes. Yeah, so I mean...

You know, for seven bucks? I would have bought

that up. Why not? But again, if it's a Japan

exclusive, that's 50 bucks. Yeah, that's true.

And then there's Mudbuster Bulkhead, which, as

we've said already, Bulkhead, he just doesn't...

That didn't look like a repaint to me. It kind

of looked like a bulkhead with black highlights.

It pretty much is I mean although all the bulkheads

are different shades of green or whatever but

yeah I wasn't terribly thrilled with that particular

color scheme, but the Yeah, the the Grimlock

repaint. I mean Grimlock's a popular character.

He sold really well, but With was that with that?

Be enough to sustain a complete different repaint.

I think that a Blitzwing repaint would have sold

really well The gold fire Grimlock basically

looks like a very dull Old Well, it is yeah,

but what I was gonna say was it it's a very dull

lucky draw colored gold I mean, it's not as shiny

as the lucky draw gold It's very dull and I just

I just don't care for it. I was thinking like

a like a gold lagoon homage Those are pretty

much the lucky draw colors. Yeah And that's pretty

much in for the unreleased stuff I guess we can

kind of use this to I was gonna do this last

episode but I guess we can kind of use this really

quickly to talk about the BotCon set for 2011

because we have Repainted animated molds in that

right and I know Michael wants to talk about

that Motor Masters should have been ret guard

not optimus You know, I don't own this set, so

it's hard for me to say either way. But when

it first came out, when I first started seeing

pictures of it, I liked the head. I was like,

that's a cool looking head. But I didn't like

the way that head looked on that figure. I thought

that that head looked a lot better on a boxier...

blockier, spulkier figure like retgar. And someone

did a digibash, or a Photoshop, you know, of

a purple colored retgar with that head on its

shoulders. And to me, it looked awesome. And

when you put it in truck mode, it looked like

kind of a boxy semi -truck. Optimus doesn't have

a trailer. It doesn't scream Motor Master to

me. Yes, Spada. Do you have any opinions on the

BotCon set from this shoot this past year? You

know, it's not a bad set. It really isn't a bad

set at all. I thought it was pretty cool My only

big issue was I really wish they combined Somehow

I just really wanted them to combine. Um, I was

anyone who complained about Drake's trip being

a girl There were complaints about it. I didn't

care. I would have rather drag strip has been

instead of the RC mold I would have liked that

to have been the oil slick mold. I think that

just would have worked better for the character

I'll buy that sure Yeah, I knew that I I figured

that they would have included the motor a motorcycle

mold in there somewhere That that was my only

complaint with the with the set is Don't think

the RC mold was the correct scale for for those

fake ears Hmm Well, I knew that they had to be

race cars and there were only so many race cars

in the line Yeah, yep So my thought was either

they're gonna go with a motorcycle or they're

gonna have to make one of them a girl and I didn't

mind the I mean animated has been known at this

point to gender bend I mean they made red alert

a girl in season 3 I don't really care about

that what really pissed me off was all the horrible

bad jokes people started making about Like after

the after the drag strip news came out. That's

really pissed me off was the fans making all

these jokes She's either a drag queen which means

she's a guy or she's a stripper which means she

comes to their own pole Yeah I was one of those

people faking the jokes. Yeah, no, no, there's

a difference between Like people like us who

are actually in the fandom and we take it, you

know, we can joke around but we also take it

seriously Whereas you have those half -assed

three post wannabes on on TFW That are just oh

it needs to be g1 or else it sucks. No those

those people i've only got three posts that you

have to be yeah well let's not even get there

we'd be that we'd be here for two hours complaining

about those people sorry i think this set is

very well done the exclusives The Tupac Exclo

- Well, besides the Galvatron and the Thundercracker.

The Tupac Exclusive of Toxitron and Sideswipe,

I really like that. The Physitron, the Iron Fist,

which uses Ratchet's - Stymatron mode, those

were cool! Yeah, those were very cool. The Auto

Troopers, that white one. Yeah, that was awesome.

That was so awesome. The Auto Trooper looks so

good. Yeah. So awesome. I was really regretting

not going. Did your friend Octobotomus end up

with like four or five of them? I think so. I

don't remember what he ended up with. Wow. So,

but yeah, uh, and, and Toxitron green repaint

of Optimus. That's awesome to me. That was a

very, very cool figure. Yes. My only, I would

buy them, but I'm sorry, $80 for, for one of

those figures. I think it's a big punch. Plus,

if you go on eBay and look for a full set aftermarket

value on any BotCon set is going to be $500 or

over. Well, I can't say I would go to BotCon

and not buy them and then possibly resell them.

I can't say I wouldn't do that because you would

make your investment back. Well, Michael does

that every year. Yeah, well every year except

for Disney, right? Yeah, I mean we would I would

go and Christy would go and we would both get

the Primus package and Then I'd keep my set and

as soon as we got back to the hotel room After

picking up, you know after registering basically

she would her son exactly right up on eBay and

I mean literally she would put it on You can't

wait. It has to be one of the first up there

and you get top dollar because people will Jump

on the buy it now price from the first one they

see and if you put buy it now for 750 bucks Within

minutes of purchasing it someone is gonna buy

it Yeah, and that's easily your trip. We may

like a thousand dollars easily I want to say

Lexington and and the year we went to Cincinnati,

yeah easily made a thousand bucks on our figures

on her set. I kept mine But yeah, I mean it was

it literally paid for the trip In minutes you

paid for the trip. Oh, yeah Now that wasn't so

much the case for Disney because you know, we

brought kids and we hung out Yeah, that was more

of a family vacation. It was a vacation. Yeah

Now, I would have loved to have seen what if

they switched the... Originally, Wild Rider was

going to be a Rodimus repaint and Breakdown was

going to be a lockdown repaint. I would have

loved to have seen that, but I still like what

we got with Breakdown as Rodimus and Wild Rider

as Blazing Lockdown. Again... For blazing for

the blazing lockdown mold as wild rider those

spikes on the side of his neck those make it

look awesome This is a cool look you still got

the spikes on the side of his neck in there the

original mold Yeah, well the blazing lockdown

mold. Yeah. Yep. Um, so I think that's going

to do it for us. We're going to head to some

ads really quickly and we'll come back to close

the show. No, there will be no Operation Interference.

I am TFG1Mike and you should be listening to

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when you register. You forced me to make the

ultimate sacrifice. To do the one thing that

requires more courage than anything I've ever

had to do in my entire Autobot career. I... apologize.

Come again? I take back every mean thing I ever

said about you. Don't let others tell you what

you are. You can be any bot you wanna be. You

mean... I can be... a hero? Yes. And you can

start by saving this city from being consumed

by a swarm of out -of -control microbots. Yes!

I am Wreck -Gar! I am... a hero! That's a direct

order, Optimus. It's Optimus Prime. I may be

an elite guard washout in a glitched detail flunky,

but the last time I checked, you and I still

have equal rank. So, Sentinel Prime... Take your

order and your condescending attitude and stick

in your hard drive! You're on my turf now! Organic

contamination alert! Contamination located. Who

are you calling a contamination? Stay cool and

roll back off the ship nice and easy like. And

don't even think of spewing any of your slime

at me! So final thoughts on the unreleased stuff

and the BotCon set. I absolutely love the BotCon

set. I wish I could actually have bought those

toys but sadly because of the price I would rather

just spend something to have somebody customize

them in Puggle form so I have BotCon toys in

the Puggle form. Significantly less expensive

that way. Yes, exactly I have dead -end Dead

-end breakdown drag strip while rider motor master

toxitron and sites like the spade of final thoughts

on the unreleased stuff in the BotCon stuff I

really wish they released the wing blade prime

here Yeah, that was that was the one figure that

I went I said I Really am sad that they didn't

release that here now. I know you could get it

for a reasonable price imported, but I'm done

with the line. I don't want to get in line anymore.

Yeah. I mean, kind of dead now. Yeah. Everybody's

pretty much done with animated. Everybody's moved

on to prime toys that are coming out. Except

in my area. I haven't seen him yet either. Not

that I'll be buying them. I think I'm going to

pass on those. They don't look good, but I don't

think I'm going to collect anymore. Yeah, you

know, I wanted to get them. I thought, OK, sure,

I could start collecting the Prime toys. That

would be kind of cool. And then I watched a bunch

of people's video reviews. And although I love

the toys, I love the way they look, I just don't

care enough to own them. So I promptly canceled

all the pre -orders I put up. So I think that's

gonna do it for this toy episode Spada, do you

want to pimp out your YouTube channel? Yeah,

you could go ahead and check me out at youtube

.com slash bolt matrix Hopefully having a bunch

of new reviews going up gonna look at us at the

Japanese brave figures maybe some more Lego and

HALA or Lego and Mega Bloks stuff and just uh

As much as I could get up there Transformers

wise before the TF Prime figures hit. Thank you

for listening to Transformation Animation Podcast.

If there are some ways to get in contact with

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for now I am TFG1 Mike with Spade of the Bolt

Matrix and Michael Wilson We'll tap you again

next week. See you later