UPDATE 02/10/2022: Legacy DK-2 Guard added in mold history.
Here we have Prowl in his vehicle mode, which will be fairly brief in terms of details. The lightbar is added on thanks to the 5mm hole while the front is retooled to have less of a bigger bumper. The design of the figure is pretty much close to the G1 vehicle mode's Nissan Fairlady Z, though a little more round.
I kind of wish there'd be a few more details, like a badge or Highway Patrol on the doors, but overall, it's not too shabby since there's some black to break up the white. The snap-on pegs could be painted black, though (or silver if you want to have silver rims!).
The gun can be attached to the top of the siren, as with most WFC toys.
Here he is with the Siege version, which is a more spacey take on the cop car design. IT's kind of funny to look back at how the Siege design looked, as while the clear tires and layered windows looked neat, it's pretty funny in terms of aesthetics considering how flat it looks next to the more traditional G1 appearance of the Earthrise guy.
Compared to Race Car Prowl and Casual Prowl Smokescreen and Bluestreak, Prowl definitely stands out as it's got a brighter color palette compared to the other uses of the mold. But yeah, it is kind of funny that each use of the mold so-far gives us different roles that'd make even more sense for Diaclone. All we need are some Autotrooper homages and the inevitable Barricade reuse.
The transformation is the same as with Smokescreen, and the robot mode has the same details that were worth mentioning like with the guy himself. Next to Siege Prowl, he definitely has a bit more bulk to him with the legs, which feel a little more balanced with the girth of his torso and arms. At the cost of those, you can see through his shins, unlike the Siege figure. His feet also look less like he's on his tippy toes. The arms are different from the Siege figure, even if they're similar at first glance.
Their heads may look the same at first glance, but the Earthrise figure's head is actually Bluestreak's painted to look like Prowl. Now while it may not seem like a bad thing, the Siege version of Prowl has the correct head, as his crescent or chevron looked more dynamic than on Bluestreak. Kinda funny how Siege Bluestreak has the Prowl head and now Earthrise Prowl has the Bluestreak head.
Their guns are also different from each other, with the Earthrise one having a more traditional look to the design rather than the Siege one. It should be worth mentioning that some fans had their Prowl guns broken out of the packaging because of how cheap it is. BE CAREFUL.
So the trio of Fairlady Z Autobot Cars is now complete. I liked the Smokescreen figure as he was, and Prowl's also pretty good; I won't review Bluestreak but I think he's nice to own and kinda reminds me of Alternators Grimlock for some reason. Some may wish he'd have the shoulder cannons like the G1 toy did (which was not present on the character model like they are with Bluestreak and Smokescreen), but I wish his head was the same as with the Siege one and that his deco would be more complete.
Now it's time to get to Ironhide. The Siege guy is given a heavy retool to better resemble his Earth mode, and it's a pretty neat idea at first, but the actual result is...not what I had in mind. Let's first start with the positives: I appreciate the new parts that are added for the vehicle mode. The new tooling of the figure now better resembles the Vanette of the original G1 vehicle mode; even if I don't like the vehicle that much, I do know that it fits G1 Ironhide. I also value that we have the yellow stripe, even if part of it is broken up. The top part of the vehicle mode is even nice to complete the shape of the car mode. The windows being solid red on the back is odd, but you can fix that with some Reprolabels.
Now it's time for the negatives! First of all, the tires are the same as the Siege one, only in black. I at least commend the color for being different, but it still looks out of place and doesn't mesh together well with the attempt at looking like the Earth design. Secondly, there are still parts of the Siege toy leftover that clash even more than the tires. The shoulders stick out and look like they broke part of the car mode, and the feet still stick out in the back, but the hindquarters have the same tooling from the Siege figure that have not just a different shade of red, but it also doesn't belong with the rest of the tooling. And finally, if you somehow lose the top part, then the vehicle mode's ruined. The attempt to make it look more like the Earth vehicle mode is noble, but it doesn't make it work as well as I'd hope.
The weapon attaches to the top of the vehicle mode like you'd expect it to, but it vaguely references the old missile of the G1 toy.
Next to the Siege version, you can tell that I actually painted his tires to look more complete since the solid gray looked a little odd and cheap, so not a fair comparison (Ratchet's tires in the ER version are the same color as the stock Siege Ironhide). I kinda like the Siege version now because of how unique it works for the G1 character compared to the G1 accurate Ironhide from Earthrise. Like it's funny how I was excited to see the Vanette look badass but now it's kinda worse than the Siege vehicle mode...
Transformation is exactly the same as with Siege Ironhide. The only difference is that the roof piece detaches and makes for a new accessory. The robot mode is once again a tougher G1 design, which isn't a bad thing, though the torso somehow looks a little flabbier than the Siege one. Maybe it's just me. The figure shares the same engineering choices, even the hollowed out parts. I think the robot mode does look better than the G1 version, but I still feel the Siege version worked better given how consistent the parts are with that figure than with this guy.
Head sculpt is nearly the same as the Siege version, though some details are removed to make the head smoother. Kinda unnecessary like that squiggly line on him. Articulation is once again the same as the Siege one.
His gun and shield can fit on his hand and other 5mm posts no problem. The handgun is kinda small but the shield is a nice size. You can even lift the barrels up to make it have the guns display. This is pretty neat but as mentioned previously, you should keep it with you at all times. At least it can be stored in the back and sort of hide when viewed from the front.
As far as the reuses for the Ironhide tooling are concerned, this is the DK-2 Guard, which is nearly a reverse color swap of Ironhide himself. Most of the red is now black, and vice versa. It is a Hasbro Pule exclusive repaint and may be the most-accessible version of the mold you'll get because the distribution of the Amazon sets sucks.
For a comparison with the Siege version, it's pretty noble for Hasbro to make the ER version have an Earth-like design while being a retool. Other characters with toys from the Siege and Earthrise line include Optimus Prime, Prowl, Megatron, Starscream, and Soundwave. Everyone listed did a great job by either being new molds or sharing little to no reused parts. Ironhide ends up being a retool that doesn't entirely change some of the details that were left on the Siege version. The arms, thighs, and feet are the same from the Siege version, but with slightly darker shades of red and black replacing the gray. Not awful, but I kind of wish Hasbro would have come up with a way to make them a little more different from the Siege guy.
The head-sculpts are an example of this design, which kind of baffles me because they chose to leave the arms and feet as body parts that are the same as the Siege guy but they change his head? Either way, these heads do the same goal: be's G1 Ironhide head.
Siege Ironhide had a bitchin' rocket that turned into a hammer while Earthrise Ironhide has a black pistol to go with the shield. Not much to write home about.
That being said, Crosshairs from the Siege line can let Ironhide borrow his own copy, especially with the paint apps matching his body much like how they did with Crosshairs. Also, not having the blue from Crosshairs makes it fit even better!
Now with the Autobot Alliance set covered, let's go to the Paradron Medics set. This is Lifeline, a reuse of the Arcee mold that I covered twice. I won't go over too much, so I will say that she has the same tooling as with Arcee, her translucent plastic is much clearer like with Elita-1 (mostly a clear version of Arcee's cloudy plastic), and she has gray panels on her painted on. That's it.
Despite being a teal Arcee, her head has some added paint apps to make the face a little more distinct (notice the face, lips, and lines on the hair). Otherwise, she is the same as Arcee.
The functionality is even the same, but that's all she wrote (geddit?)...oh wait, my copy of Lifeline's got a loose hip! It can't even be fixed easily because of it being a hinge, so it rubs salt on the wound with a toy that I was already mad about! Sure, it's cool to have an accessible Lifeline compared to the TFCC/TFSS/FunPub repaint, but the sad thing is that the T30 mold has better attributes than the Earthrise one!
Now let's move onto Ratchet. He's got the same things that make him the same with Ironhide, though the white shoulder does stick out less, the tires are the same gray like with Ironhide, the siren is added, and the Autobot insignia on the top is pretty much an inverted deco compared to the Siege one. Siege Ratchet has plenty of retooling to make it a little more distinct from Ironhide, such as the bumper, the molded siren, etc.
The transformation is the same once again as with Ironhide, so let's get straight to the robot mode. The figure has more white present than the Siege version, with his shoulders, wrist cuffs, and feet not having any red. The most noticeable differences include the gray hands, the white plastic not looking too cheap, and the head being a new sculpt (which is nice of Hasbro to do). I kind of wish he has similar versions of the weapons that the Siege figure has.
Since I already covered the Smokescreen reuses in the line as well as the Arcee reuses, I'll mention that Ratchet was repainted in a Shattered Glass-themed 2-pack. While Optimus Prime has a striking new paint job with the purple and black replacing the red and blue, Ratchet has most of his colors replaced with teal and has a few purple details. Nothing that significant, but it kind of works. At least his gun is painted silver and looks nicer than the plain white.
And here we have the 2-packs together. I want to like these two-packs, but I just don't feel too satisfied with the end result of the figures. Prowl is the best figure of the bunch but only because the Smokescreen figure was already good (though there should be new decals and a proper Prowl head). The Arcee mold already sucked and the loose hip on Lifeline made it even worse so let's move on to the Vanettes. They could have been the perfect G1-style Ironhide and Ratchet figures for a CHUG display. Sure, they beat the Universe versions and the Combiner Wars ones, but that doesn't mean that these two are flawless. The Siege ones worked because they were designed first that way and knew how to get away from having leftover kibble that would plague their bland body designs. Siege Ironhide was great even if he felt a little cheap. Siege Ratchet was good even with the cheaper feel than with Ironhide, but the retooling and different accessories made me like him. These two feel like they were the perfect ways to go out with the Earthrise line, but I don't get that feel from their incomplete retooling and the overall quality they possess. I'm not embarrassed to own them, but I know they could have been so good if Hasbro went all out with retooling them or improving them even further.
The worst part of the sets is the price each one has. They should be worth 44.09 for each one, right? Well, if you haven't heard, many fans and/or bot accounts ordered too many copies, resulting in Hasbro and Amazon being unable to fulfill some people's orders while also pushing back the orders of others, and to further make matters worse, fans that lost their orders had to resort with eBay bidding wars, which is not a good thing when it comes to figures that have no right to be worth more than 44.09 per 2-pack. These aren't TakaraTomy Lucky Draw prizes, nor are they convention exclusives. These are Amazon-exclusives, which should be more accessible than they currently are!
I guess I rambled on a lot about the quality, so just let me get to the final ranking for the two sets combined: ⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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