Transformers Power of the Primes Wreck-Gar review

Wreck-Gar is one of the better aspects of the 1986 movie in my opinion, though it mainly has to do with the fact that he's not really a rip off of a Star Wars character. He's otherwise a decent character to see in the G1 cartoon despite its animations and stories getting worse over time, and I quite like his design. He has kind of a Viking look to him that makes me wish his Animated counterpart was a little more badass. I once wanted to get his Reveal the Shield figure, but never found it in the first place. It was a neat looking figure, though. The bike mode was the best part. Does the Power of the Primes version make for a good substitute?

Here is Wreck-Gar in his bike-mode. It's a pretty decent take on his usual altmode, what with the boxiness of his old bike being carried over for this design. I do wish it wasn't just a straight repaint in this mode. At least the deco is different to match Wreck-Gar, but a little more remolding could go a long way. Wreck-Gar's altmode isn't like the most dynamic figure in his bike mode, but it could go for a bit more of a Junkion vibe than what he currently has.

You can store the weapons as such, but it looks kind of cluttered. Almost like it's an afterthought of weapon storage.

Transforming Wreck-Gar is pretty easy. The process is on par with most Combiner Wars figures, with little change to the torso. If you've handled at least one limb, you'll know what I'm talking about.

Robot mode does look like Wreck-Gar wearing Groove's body. That's the sad part of the Combiner Wars line, where some bodies could barely look unchanged with the main differences being the head, colors, and potentially any weapons they come with. At least the toy is decently painted to look like Wreck-Gar, but not as successfully as it would be if he was retooled to better resemble his design. Being the groove mold, his combiner joint sticks out like a sore thumb, what with it being a fat, gray chonk breaking up his otherwise colorful body. At least his side and back kibble don't look awful.

Head sculpt is sort of a weak part for this guy. It gets the points right for Wreck-Gar, but because it aims for being accurate, the head ends up looking puny by comparison; it's all thanks to the tight space used for the combiner joint. Also the eye holes look hollow while the facial hair needs more paint.

Articulation is the same as with most Combiner Wars/Power of the Primes Deluxes. Head is on a ball joint, shoulders move front and back as well as in and out on ball joints. Biceps swivel and the elbows bend. Hips are also on ball joints, with the same kind of range as the shoulders. Waist swivels and the knees bend.

He has a few weapons: one decent axe, and one boring gray gun that looks more like a price gun. The axe doesn't go all the way in his hand, but at least jt looks fine. Also has a pretty neat spike form that has the blades go from disk to ninja star. The gun looks lame, though.

Here are his combiner forms that he uses. The arm and leg modes certainly look like what Groove would take form of. He looks fine as a leg, but he needs a Voyager's foot to make the context of the mode a bit better. The hand looks better, but only because he has hands that are somewhat better than what the Combiner Wars version did. Annoyingly, you can see the safety labels on this toy.

Funny enough, this is the latest version of the mold that I got. Here is Groove, the true user of this mold. He looks pretty good in this color scheme, though it mainly has to do with just how much more the altmode fits better than with Wreck-Gar. The blue windshield, red translucent plastic, and the gun he comes with are the nicest parts of this toy. The Hasbro Combiner Wars version and the Takara Tomy Unite Warriors version are almost identical, so you don't need to buy a stupidly expensive set of Defensor (or the less cool-sounding Guardian) just for a single figure.

This is the Hasbro Afterbreaker used for Combiner Wars Computron. He's toy accurate but I kind of like the deco he has. His guns look kind of neat, and check out the green light-pipin!

Finally, this is the Takara Afterburner. He's cartoon accurate, but I kind of like the deco on the Hasbro version more since it doesn't look too "been there, done that" (even if an orange motorbike was done again with Wreck-Gar, despite him using Groove's tooling). At least his weapons are different.

Here he is with Siege Magnus behind him, Titans Return Hot Rod on his right, and Legends Arcee on the left, all for an idea on the scale. I do apologize for the image quality (I'll thankfully take better images with more 1986 Autobots in the near future, don't worry). The scale is fine overall, even if this is a line consisting of a hodgepodge of figures from varying parts of the Generations line. All in all, Wreck-Gar's an alright figure. For a Walgreens exclusive, this guy's fine for what he is as a retool. I do wish he had more going on with the retooling so he wouldn't be just a head swap of Groove with new colors, but such is with the Power of the Primes line. I wouldn't suggest getting him as your de facto Wreck-Gar (unless you're don't want to get the Reveal the Shield version), but he's a good figure overall despite being an example of why Power of the Primes (and Combiner Wars) are lines that are full of hype yet will drive you nuts with needing to complete specific gestalts.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐