Toy Bender

Fairly recently a Fwoosh.com poster made one of the coolest Transformers customs of all time. Combine one concept that’s cool, transforming robots, and one that’s ultra cool, a talking super car, and you get a Transformer named K.I.T.T.

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I don’t normally like to take a dump on other collectors, especially when they didn’t do anything to me (although I’m sure there’s at least one person who would think differently), but I recently ran across a website that features A) Some of the coolest custom paint apps I’ve ever seen on a Transformer and B) Some of the worst web design I’ve ever encountered.

I urge you to go check out the Devastator and I also challenge you to try to navigate your way around that flash enabled nightmare. Be especially careful f you have a slow connection the site is packed with so much junk to load at once that it may bring your sad connection to it’s knees from the Flash masturbation. Still, the stuff that you’ll find there is so insanely cool that it’s worth attempting to make your way around. Seriously, it’s totally Airwolf.

And before you guys take a knock at some of the design decisions around this blog, need I remind you that I’m only the writer monkey?

Reading through Mark Bellomo’s Transformers Identification and Price Guide made me nostalgic for my younger days of loving Transformers. I never had a lot of Transformers, but I had some damn good ones. Still there was one Transformer that was my favorite that I never got, despite desperately wanting him. It was Soundwave, the most competent and coolest of the G1 Decepticons.

What’s funny is that I’m not sure if I actually told my parents how bad I wanted him. In fact, I’m pretty sure I never even mentioned him. I guess that’s the danger when you make your kid think that Santa is real and that he knows everything, your child might just skip the middle man and try to go right to the source. Hell, I remember talking to my friend Jeremy about it and he said that one time that he wanted a toy for Christmas he wished really hard and got it. After I heard that I wished so hard I nearly blew my brain muscle, but I still didn’t get him from that bearded fat man.

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I can’t say that I’m a huge Transformers fan, in fact I really don’t give a damn about most new Transfomers merchandise and I practically have zero interest in collecting the vintage toys. However, I do have very fond memories of the toys from my youth so I do have a soft spot in my heart for Transformers. That’s why I initially started looking at Bellomo’s Transformers Identification and Price Guide, for a quick trip back while in the book store and nothing more. A funny thing happened though, just like in Bellomo’s G.I. Joe guide, The Ultimate Guide to G.I. Joe 1982-1994, I became captivated by the tidbits of info he was dropping so I broke down and picked up the book.

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On Toy News International I saw an interesting news item that said that Hasbro was reissuing the planet devouring Transformer known as Unicron. While this is decent news if you’re a Transformers fan and missed him the first time around, it’s not really big news to get into a tizzy over (at least for me). However, there was another angle to this story that I found quite amusing… the annoying NERD angle.

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Transformers fans, begin to poop your pants… or not. I’m not sure how desirable the Transformers exclusive at Comic Con is, but to me it’s pretty neat looking. It’s the super duper evil version of Optimus Prime, Snidely Nemesis Prime. You can tell he’s evil because of his black paint scheme and his goatee. Ask anyone who knows how to identify evil twin robots, they always are painted black and they have facial hair of some sort.

Transformers fans, is this a big deal? I never know what’s going on with you guys. I see certain Transformers pics and think it’s cool and then find out that it’s an exclusive that is worth hundreds of dollars. Is this going to be of that ilk? Your ways confuse and frighten me sometimes.

According to the Associated Press, a Los Vegas man took one kick ass mustang and turned it into a replica of Barricade from the live action Transformers film. Jessie Vigil made customized his car after returning home from Iraq (and the story mentions that he’s disabled in passing) and wanted to spoil the hell out of his son.

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Talk about serendipity. When I asked for clarification on just what the Lunch Time Special Optimus Prime was last week, little did I know that we had a mega-qualified expert in our ranks. Evil King Macrocranios (who has one of the best names ever) left this super long, yet highly interesting and informative comment:

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It is well known that I enjoy clear figures. That’s why I thought it was so interesting that a number of bootleg clear Optimus Prime Transformers were being sold on eBay for the low, low price of 119 dollars.

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A while back it was revealed that Japan was going to get a reissue of the G1 Transformer Sky Lynx. Tformers.com recently posted an scan of the Japanese magazine Dengeki Hobby that shows the final production model in great detail. Here’s a preview image, head on over to TFormers.com to check out the image in it’s full glory.

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Every once in awhile a toy collector will rise above the rest and inspire us with some cool custom. The guy over at KingBotz.com has certainly done this, because he’s created one of the coolest Transformer customs I’ve ever seen. It’s a five foot tall Devastator made from Tonka trucks:

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Way back in the long, long ago, otherwise known as 1990, the once enormously successful Transformers line had become an empty shell of it’s former self. In fact it was dead. The line had lost all it’s momentum and the Transformers era known as Generation One was over. Not content to let a good, money making property stay dead, Hasbro let Transformers rest for a couple of years and reintroduced them in 1992. What’s the best way to bring back beloved toys? With commercials featuring terrible, terrible rap songs. But first, here’s a straight commercial featuring some two beloved Transformers characters:

This commercial features the return of Optimus Prime and it had been a long time for those kids (like me) who had wanted the original but never could get their hands on it. Megatron came back too, but as you can see he was a tank. Somehow that never sat right with me. I realize a tank makes a little more sense than a pistol that can shrink to fit into the hands of another Transformer, but having been raised seeing him as either a gun or cannon (as Galvatron), it’s a bit odd for a impressionable mind to handle.

Now for the advertisement you’ve been waiting for. A Transformers G2 commercial with rapping:

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When I first reported that Masterpiece Megatron would be available via Big Bad Toy Store with a slight adjustment which made him legal in the United States, nerds rejoiced! Now Big Bad Toy store is offering an accessory set for Megatron to make him look even more like his classic alternate form.

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I feel as I must address the live action, Michael Bay Transformers film because I have just returned from watching it. I was avoiding talking about the Transformers film because a) I focus my coverage here on toys and not films themselves and b) I’m not a big nut for the design of the Transformers and I have no interest in any of the toys that come from it.

Still, this must be said: Transformers rocked my balls off.

Now… discuss.

toy, toy collecting, action figure, Transformers, film, movie

It looks like Transformers fans who aren’t hip to buying imported bots are in for a treat, Hasbro is bringing everyone’s favorite jerk stateside.

Start lurking in Wal-Mart aisles in September, because he’s an exclusive to the big blue box. I’m not sure if anyone refers to Wal-Mart as the big blue box, but I think we should start. Anyway, Starscream rules so I’m pretty happy to see this guy head on over here. Sure he was a ginormous dick, but he was such a lovable dick. It was also sweet that he got turned to dust in the film just when he finally usurped Megatron. Poor guy never caught a break.

toy, toy collecting, action figure, Transformer, Wal-Mart