Megatron in Transformers Prime loved Unicron immensely, while his past self in the Cybertron games (yes, the games are connected to the show) led a revolution towards the caste system after years of being an energon miner named D-16 before becoming a gladiator in Kaon with the name Megatronus taken from a member of the Thirteen. Megatron was once friends with Optimus Prime before their opposing views made them clash with each other, leading to numerous losses and soon their way making its way to Earth. And after 13 years of not having a figure in this design, we have a new Voyager Megatron in our possession, so let's see if he's worth it or not.
Here is Megatron in his tank mode, and it is only able to assume the hover mode instead of deploy tank treads like the old Deluxe. I mean, I guess you could fold them away somewhat, but they aren't supposed to function like that. The tank mode we do have continues the trend of being Cybertronian like the rest of the WFC guys, but while the old Deluxe looked great in vehicle mode, this guy feels unfinished. Between the gaps all around, the fusion cannon looking slapped on rather than being properly integrated, and I cannot help but feel this guy was put with the same kind of lackluster engineering that plagued Barricade, only in vehicle mode rather than bot mode.
You can store the melee weapon on top, and sort of try to give him tank treads, but the result simply won't work at all. Not like it matters since they lack wheels.
For a vehicle mode size comparison, this feels quite all over the place. Prime and Bee seem right, but Megatron seems a bit undersized and Barricade a bit oversized. Had Megatron been a bit bigger than he currently is, I'd appreciate that.
Transformation is fairly easy for a Voyager, as a lot of the parts for the robot mode are just rearranged to make something vaguely resembling a tank rather than how an Earth mode Megatron would work with his tank mode. The only partsforming necessary is the fusion cannon. The robot mode is certainly accurate to the source material, much like Prime and unlike the two Deluxes in the subline. He could be painted in metallic silver, but at least the asymmetrical arms and the red with purple break up the dark gray plastic (which is a decent shade). It should come as no surprise that Megatron's robot mode is the better of the two, as it tried to maintain the G1 aesthetic while being entirely original, thanks to the red being more prominent. Despite the curved nature of the legs, he is standing straight. His fusion cannon looks pretty bad overall. It looks nothing like the old toy's or the game model's, both in girth, detail, and accuracy. It looks like it's reversed! Also no Decepticon insignia on his back.
His head sculpt is well sculpted and painted, down to the tiny crevices in the forehead and the purple in his cheeks. It's small but still a great level of detail that we would probably not get. His articulation consists of said head moving on a limited ball joint, shoulders that rotate 360 degrees and hinge in and out, double-jointed elbows, bicep swivels in-between them, a waist swivel, hips that move front and back, in and out, swivels above the knees, less than 45 degree knee bends, and ankles that hinge and pivot.
If you really want to, you can swap the right arm with another weapon. Which is not a traditional Megatron thing to do but there you go. He can also hold his mace but only at the bottom of the handle.
For some reason, the top part can come off, but it makes no sense because the hands can't even hold any other part of it like with Prime's axe. Also the head is half-painted so shrug.
For a robot mode size comparison, he is just slightly bigger than Prime when his height should be a head or two taller than he currently is. Barely a difference between this and his old Deluxe.
Despite their faults, the Autobots are the clear winners in the subline, and I fear the quality will be all iver the place past these five.
Now commenting on Megatron's knees, the reason why the range sucks is due to these spikes that are not even crucial to the articulation. They should be angled upwards rather than downwards, but the sculpter forgot that detail and as such, they are stuck like this. You COULD clip them off to restore the articulation, byt you SHOULDN'T have to! This isn't a model kit you can pry parts off from a sprue, this is an action figure that should work out of the box!
This guy could have been so much better, but combining the poor knees with the fusion cannon, lousy altmode, no tank tread option, and small size bump, he isn't worth the full price. If this was the old Deluxe from 2010, exactly unchanged, he'd still suck but I'd be more forgiving given how unrefined older Megatron toys were vs now, but the old Deluxe was worlds better than thus guy in terms of play features and articulation. If you still want the new figure, get it on sale. Otherwise, pass on it.
Final ranking: ⭐⭐ and a half out of⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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