Galvatron's one of those guys who has been really hard to nail considering how there's either a compromised design trait or a gimmick that wasn't really needed for him. And on top of that, he's not as frequent as Optimus Prime or Megatron are, but now I feel the WFC line might give us a proper version of him that doesn't look like crap or compromise him entirely. Let's be real here, the fact that the WFC trilogy line exists to give us a version of him that works well is pretty cool, but there's one thing I want to know about when it comes to this specific release, is he, a Leader Class figure that's the size of a Voyager, actually worth the money he's going for? Let's find out.
Here we have Galvatron in his tank mode. It's the same futuristic design that he's taken form of in the 86 movie as well as Season 3. A barrel-shaped design with treads, a tail, and an orange tip that contrasts the purple and gray. It's got everything that Galvatron should have as far as being himself is concerned. I mean, it's one of those things about him that you can't really complain about. I will say that rolling him on all three tiny wheels can be annoying since the tail doesn't have the same level of height that the tank treads have, but it is manageable.
As far as the weapon storage is concerned, apart from putting the two pieces of his particle beam cannon on the vehicle to already complete his look, the two blasters that look like the space cruisers of Unicron can peg onto any parts of the vehicles with 5mm ports (though they're supposed to clip onto the gray barrel portion of the cannon mode). As for the Matrix, it has a small tab that goes around the chest while the chain looks like it can be held on the barrel.
For a comparison with his fellow Decepticons, you can see here that Galvatron is quite hefty in terms of size and height compared to the space cruiser Decepticons in the form of Cyclonus and Scourge. He's also the one who's taken the form of a land vehicle rather than a space ship, but it's fine with me, I supposed (Titans Return did make him a Triple Changer). You can also tell something I didn't know about until of late: the fact that the Decepticons have different colors from one another; Cyclonus is lavender instead of the normal purple of Galvatron while Scourge is in two shades of blue.
Galvatron's transformation is the traditional method he does, with the arms being made from the parts that have the treads to the core portion becoming the torso and the legs being made from the third leg of the tank mode. I have to give credit to the toy for making little to no hollow parts left from the transformation or from the toy in general, and it also has some heft to it as well. The only partsforming involves the assembly of the cannon. The resulting robot mode is certainly cartoon-accurate, from the proportions to the color scheme, though he weirdly brings back the battle damage that was common with Siege and with Earthrise's Hoist and Megatron. It's not hard to imagine this being the case given how 86 movie characters Springer and Ultra Magnus were with Season 1 and 2 characters, but the fact that it's here again in a toy this late is pretty odd. Generally speaking, Galvatron's robot mode captures the beefy, power-hungry design that he is known for in the series, and the color scheme is also nice and accurate, too. I love how the red and orange pop compared to the evil mix of purple, black, and gray/silver. All the Galvatron-specific traits found from the character, like the treads behind his arms and the three spikes on him, are nicely done and capture his look wonderfully.
Head sculpt is done rather nicely, from the stern glare on his face to the paint apps applied. The crown spikes being a separate piece as well as being a slightly different shade from the rest of his head is a little distracting but it's otherwise acceptable. His articulation is on-par with the rest of the WFC trilogy, with a few specific things worth mentioning. His head is on a ball joint, the shoulders move front and back as well as in and out (and we'll talk about those shoulders in a bit). The biceps swivel, the elbows bend at two points, and the hands can swivel at the wrists. There is a waist swivel (which has more range if you move the skirt panels aside), the hips move front and back (with the front cod piece hinging up and down if needed), in and out while the skirt pieces move out, thighs swivel, knees bend, and the ankles pivot but barely do so.
If the Particle Beam Cannon isn't enough to convince you of the firepower potential of this guy, he can also hold the two cruisers made for the HasLab Unicron and either sandwich them into an unwieldy gun (since holding them separately makes them look like he's holding two space ships) or have them mounted on his back. It weirdly works when they're mounted on his back!
And finally, you can have the Matrix of Leadership hung around his neck, much like in the 86 movie when he killed Ultra Magnus and stole the ancient artifact from him! It's the same mold as the Earthrise one but is not cast in clear plastic and is glued onto the chain. Also, notice the shoulders on the on the figure in this pic; The right shoulder is oriented the same way it was when I took the toy out of the box, and the other shoulder is a rearranged position of it with the rivet exposed. Apparently, Hasbro did not leave the toy with properly assembled shoulders on some copies, meaning that they since lower if the small slot is facing the front. You can either reposition the shoulder like I did on the left shoulder OR use a soldering iron to detach the parts while rotating the swivel so the smooth part of the shoulder hinge can be on top and the bumpy side can be on the bottom. Be warned that it will be a somewhat risky task.
The only reuse of the guy so far is the toy-accurate take on the guy, which is available from the Generations Selects line. Galvatron's given not just a recolor of himself but also additional stickers that further make him closer to the old toy, including a rubsign! If a toy-accurate Galvatron isn't exactly what you want from this guy, you can use him as Galvatron II thanks to the green Matrix he comes with! And in cas e you're wondering, no, he doesn't have a gun mode (but fan modes are going to happen).
And after that, Galvatron loved being purple, but not just purple, translucent purple with white panel-lines representing his reformatting in the movie! He came with a bunch of accessories that are meant to go with Unicron and probably the Ark.
And of course, Legacy gave fans who were ungrateful with the Kingdom release interested in a cleaner version of Galvatron got the battle damage removed, and properly assembled shoulders. So yeah get that one if you are that picky.
For a comparison with his previous releases, here he is next to the Deluxe Universe 2008 version of the character and the Titans Return version made 5 years ago. I think we all know that the Universe version holds up poorly, so let's move on from that thing. As for Titans Return Galvatron, he s certainly a toy that has flaws, from the somewhat intrusive cannon to the shoddy mask that goes over the Titan Master, but I think this guy was close to being a great take on the guy. I honestly like his design more than I do the Kingdom one, just because it doesn't feel entirely slavish to G1, but I still don't like the gimmicks it has.
For a size comparison, here he is with Kingdom Ultra Magnus and Studio Series 86 Hot Rod. Heis more of a traditional height of a Voyager compared to Ultra Magnus, who is sorta kinda maybe a Leader Class figure height despite him being shorter than the POTP Leaders. Galvatron is also taller than Hot Rod, who is more of a height of a Deluxe but makes up for that with his engineering and accessories, a trait that Galvatron shares...more on that in a bit.
And here he is with fellow Leader Class figure, Optimus Prime, and his old self, Megatron. He is taller than both of them, so I guess Unicron added Galvatron a new body and a size class that is more of a slight height bump. Yeah, it's coming together...
And finally, here he is Cyclonus and Scourge! He's pretty much around the same height of Cyclonus (who may have an edge over Galvatron due to his bunny ears), and while he looks nice with his Decepticon buddies, there's a problem with this guy: the price. I get it, Hasbro can't do Leader Class Transformers the same way they used to. We're no longer in the days of Hasbro making Leader Class Transformers at the same height of Cybertron Megatron, Animated Ultra Magnus, ROTF Optimus Prime, etc, but even the AOE-POTP era Leaders were able to be acceptable with the prices they went for. I miss when Leader Class Transformers felt like the flagship toys of their respective lines. They were the perfect intermediate step between mainline toys and the Masterpiece toys, especially seen with ROTF Optimus and HFTD Starscream.
Sure, the economy's to blame, and while the WFC Trilogy's been a great line to delve into, I still miss when we were creative and had toys that, even if they weren't the most accurate, were glorious additions to the lines they came from. Galvatron is good, but not Leader Class good. Same goes for Earthrise Optimus. Some figures like Doubledealer and Beast Wars Megatron would probably deserve the same level of criticism, but at least their engineering was able to make them justified for the price tag. Galvatron feels like he was made for the price tag just because it's a way for Hasbro to milk the figure more off of a popular character. Pretty much the toy industry in a nutshell, but my point is that he is good but not at the price he has.
Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐(in terms of purchasing it at a cheaper price)
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