Took delivery of this 6-inch plastic crack beauty this morning. Anti-woe is me!
For those not versed in Transformers nerd: Ultra Magnus is the interim Autobot leader chap in the 1986 animated MASTERPIECE Transformers The Movie. Given a brief crack at leadership, Magnus makes a decent fist of it, but is undone by crippling self-doubt and having to fight against a reborn space P.38 bot who is drawing power from a giant Satan planet. Ouch unt ouch!
The Ultra Magnus toy was yet another play-set originating in the Japanese Diaclone line (early Transformers toys are almost entirely culled from two disparate Japanese toylines by Takara: Diaclone and Micro Man /Change). Magnus was originally a variation on the toy that would later become Optimus Prime: Battle Convoy. Magnus is derived from a ultra combat centric deviation called Powered Convoy. The trailer set reassembles into an armour that houses the cab figure in its chest. Exciting!
Powered Convoy - original Diaclone colours
To pad out the Movie toyline, the above set was recoloured. White for the cab; and red, white and blue for the trailer. Hasbro also saw fit to gift it a new name /identity: Ultra Magnus.
Although an integral part of the figure, the white standalone 'Prime' cab was entirely ignored in the variety of then-current Transformers spin-offs. Only the Powered armoured version ever appeared in the animated movie / series / comics, giving rise to a sneaky whiff of nepotism on this child's nose: "Prime just handed his Robo-crown over to some chap who has the same basic body as him! The fallible cad!"
This pretend-it-ain't-there party line continued until the early 2000s Transformers comics renaissance at Dreamwave Productions. White cab Magnus popped up to give his de-facto bro Prime a helping hand trashing cycloptic tyrant Shockwave. White Magnus was out the cupboard. Fanboy imagination captured - "it's directly referencing MY TOY!" - a slew of Prime palette swap cash-in variants followed. Got a Prime figure? Paint him White and release an 'Ultra Magnus'! People will lap this up!
White Ultra Magnus variant of Masterpiece Convoy / Optimus Prime alongside the original 1986 Ultra Magnus Movie toy. I dearly wish I had both.
Masterpiece figure aside though, this is the only one that counts: Revoltech's ultra poseable dropkick fun-stick. But what is Revoltech you might be pondering? Well! Revoltech is a super articulated posedown line of toys from Japanese independent-shop-gone-manufacturer Kaiyodo. Mainly sculpted by Katsuhisa Yamaguchi, the figures feature the (possibly) patented revolver joint, allowing you to twist and squash your figure into any number of speed-line dynamic poses. The vast majority of the line are robots.
I am in love with Revoltech.
Now for God's sake, make me a Galvatron!
No comments:
Post a Comment