Transformers RID15 Soundwave review

Soundwave's return in Robots in Disguise 2015 was one of the surprise elements of the show itself. Considering how bland it was overall, I felt more interested in seeing who'd return to the series, and it was neat to have Bulkhead, Ratchet, Starscream, and now Soundwave return to be part of the show (this is excluding Optimus Prime and Bumblebee, who were already in the show). Now, RID15's toyline was fairly decent for the Warrior figures. They weren't all in scale and some had questionable design cues, but I thought they were cool from what I saw. Sadly, I missed out on all of them, but now I have at least one just to see what the experience was like. That one RID15 figure is Soundwave.

Here is Soundwave in his vehicle mode. It's back to the WFC aesthetics that kicked off the Aligned continuity. Yeah, the Aligned continuity may have had its clashing visions, but at least this is and Starscream are proof that the Movie & Animated esque TFP robots once were the G1-esque Cybertron characters. While it may have been impossible for some to make a character design that can't ditch the tapedeck aspects of its robot mode while giving it a different vehicle mode, RID15 Soundwave is one of the few examples of incarnations that works by changing up the style rather than remain too slavish to the blockiness of G1 Soundwave. For example, what resembles the door of the tapedeck is angular here than before, and the vehicle mode's a lot sharper instead of having to rely on making the robot mode look unchanged. This is one of the few Soundwaves that manages to be both familiar yet sleek than before. I do wish the hands weren't too visible and the nose of the altmode makes it look like it's blocking the windshield, but hey, at least it gives off a look of mass. Also, check out those red tires!

The cannon can be stored on one side of the altmode for a bit of an attack mode. I kind of wish it'd be possible to have a more symmetrical configuration.

While it's meaningless to do this now, this is the sticker that most RID figures have in the line. They either give people a character to play as for 24 hours or some Energon points from what I remember. I say it's meaningless because the game's now dead.

The transformation's not too shabby. Given how most RID Warrior figures have to stick with the size class, their transformations could be either barebones or fairly involved. Thankfully, Soundwave manages to have as much of a decent transformation schene as the like could give him. The only things I don't like are some aspects of the arms.

The robot mode is a nice mix of the RID15 aesthetics with the WFC design of Soundwave. This design works better as an upgrade for TFP Soundwave because if it was the other way around, it'd look as though he was downgraded from his WFC self. Next to the character model from the cartoon, it's somewhat close to how he appeared in the show. See, most RID character designs tend to be more stylized or sleek compared to their plastic counterparts, and this Soundwave figure, while not awfully inaccurate, could have a few more tweaks to keep him closer to the cartoon. A bit more beef around the arms would be nice, but what I would like to see a bit more of is a more saturated color scheme. The current color scheme isn't too bad, but the show gave him a deeper blue and some lighter grays.

The rest of the robot mode looks pretty good from the side, though the back looks kind of bad since you can see just how messy the back of the torso is. Also, it's odd how the thighs don't match up with the hips in terms of coloring.

Face sculpt is undeniably that of the TFP version, what with the full visor rather than it having the blockier G1 head with a mouthplate. It doesn't match what the box art was going for. Next to it is the fabled "variant" of the toy, coming with an unpainted mouthplate. While G1 fans may be interested in getting that one, not only is it a one-off factory mistake, but I feel that the full-visor head from TFP fits better given the continuity it's from. I mean, the design was already reminiscent of WFC/G1, does it really need to have a mouthplate?

Articulation's nice with this toy! Head is on a ball joint, shoulders move front and back as well as in and out, the elbows are on ball joints and can bend as well as swivel. A waist swivel is present, and the hips move front and back as well as in and out. The thighs swivel while the knees bend. Even if the ankles barely move, they at least are big enough to help this toy stand with no real issues, like when in a running pose!

Also, the shoulder cannon can swivel on the 5mm peg as well as hinge up and down. While you can use it as a normal gun, I feel it works best when it's attached near the head. It keeps the torso stable since it's not really attached to anything effectively.

As I mentioned, the Robots in Disguise 2015 line has the Warrior figures mostly remain on the same scale. Here he is next to Soundwave from the Siege line. While the RID15 Soundwave could be a bit closer to the height of a taller Deluxe, he could really go for a size upgrade to not have the same height of Bumblebee, Strongarm, Sideswipe, etc. 

While many won't care about the RID15 line due to its reception as being mixed in quality (and the show not having much going for it at times), I'd say this figure is still pretty good, all thing's considered. I wish the robot mode has a few improvements for the proportions, but beyond that, it's still a toy I'd recommend for fans that want to have a version of RID Soundwave.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐