Let's first take a look at the five vehicles, with a nice amount of variety between the main trio's Beast-X components and the brothers' crane and jet. No Zord feels redundant from one another, and no Zord feels too similar, which was a thing we've gotten quite a bit with Auxilary Zords for the past few years. Here, the Zords look unique from one another, and I like them each for what they have to offer, even if there are a few nitpicks.
The Beast Modes are also pretty good for these five, though the legs of the Cheetah mode are skinnier than I'd like, and I still find the insect renaming odd. Even if the jackrabbit and scarab/stag beetle are smaller than the others, at least they don't feel undersized compared to, say, the MMPR Cranezord, the Hawkzord from Ninja Storm, or the Mystic Sprite. I feel that it's something Dino seasons tend to suffer from, as Mighty Morphin's Zords didn't feel too unbalanced with the sizes, while Dino Thunder did make the Tyrannozord larger than the right-arm Tricerazord and the chest shield Pterazord. Dino Charge and the Season 28 Zords both made their smaller Zords a lot smaller than they need to be, with the latter being the worse offender.
Our two Megazords may be from the same series, but the height difference makes you think they're made by companies different from one another. Beast-X Megazord certainly got an upgrade compared to the Striker Megazord, as the former looks closer to the in-show Megazord suit and is a lot more poseable. The Striker Megazord just doesn't have much going for him, be it articulation or any size change, resulting in him feeling unaltered from Buster Hercules.
But now it's time to get this show on the road, as we have to disassemble the Striker Megazord and strip parts of the Beast-X Megazord to make the five-piece combination culminating the main Beast Morphers Zords...
And that is the Beast-X Ultrazord! Getting all the pieces together felt pretty lengthy, especially when some connections would be more annoying than others. I personally haven't dealt with a combination this large for a Megazord aside from the Delta Max Megazord, but even that didn't feel as hard as this. Still, once completed, the end result is quite impressive. The Beast-X Ultrazord's design is quite involved due to the part layout from the five Zords, yet it manages to be easier on the eyes than the RPM Ultrazord and the Samurai Gigazord. I also like how nothing feels compromised from this version aside from the less metallic colors. There is one problem with this version of the combination compared to Great Go-Buster Oh, that being the stability. In one image, the figure leans back because of the weight made by parts of the Wrecker and Chopper Zords, leaving it in the same kind of problem that the Legacy Megazord has when it was holding the weight of the Dragonzord and Titanus's paws. At least the feet are big enough to keep it stable for the most part, though the feet are more like being glued onto blocks. Also, those arms are pretty short compared to the Beast-X configuration. I also appreciate that no part is left over.
The faceplate used for this combination is a lot different than what we got before. It kind of looks more Kamen Rider than Power Rangers, what with the eyes, the spikes for the head, and the multi-colored nature overall. Some paint doesn't look quite applied right, but it still looks good.
Despite the height and weight of this toy, you can still pull off at least one action pose, though it really depends on how careful you are. He comes with two weapons, and they both keep the toy stable decently. One is a staff, comprised of the Wrecker Zord arms along with both the helmet and the sword of the Beast-X Megazord. The other is the gun portion of the Jet Zord. I do wish that the pieces on the chest wouldn't come off whenever you tried to pose the figure to stab an enemy with the staff. Pointing the gun is easy, though.
For anyone that didn't want to buy them individually, or have struggled to find all five in stores (which is thanks to Red and Gold not showing up at stores, not even Target), there is an ultimate set of the Beast-X Ultrazord, which puts the entire Ultrazord in a massive package that replicates the hangar bay seen in the Zord footage, along with some Grid Battleforce logos added to some of the Zords, and an elevating base that lets you add five pre-posed figurines that are somewhat in scale with the massive robot. Sadly, it doesn't come in the metallic deco that the Zords were known to have, but considering how hard the Zords are, it's safe to say that there's no need to get the individual Zords if you got this set instead.
Here is a comparison between the Hasbro Beast-X Ultrazord along with the nontransforming version, Bandai Japan's Great Go-Buster Oh, and the Super Mini-Pla version. The nontransforming version has electronics made for lights, sounds, and is motion-activated when in flight mode and in combat mode. It's the best proportioned of the four mentioned, though it does come at the cost of not being able to transform. The colors aren't quite as varied as the transforming version, but at least it's not woefully lacking. It should have the gun that was stolen from the nontransforming Wrecker Zord. The Bandai Japan version isn't the best proportioned, but at least it's more stable than the Hasbro version. I think the Mini-Pla version has some problems.
Here is a size comparison with the Legacy Megazord and MPM-4 Optimus Prime. Beast-X Megazord was bigger than both toys were, but seeing the Ultrazord tower over these two even further is impressive.
And finally, here we have the Beast-X Ultrazord taking on Evox like in the Season 1 finale, and a shot featuring the five Rangers. Despite Evox destroying the Ultrazord in the show, it survived in my review table. As for the Rangers, it feels quite satisfying to have the entire unit along with the five Rangers piloting it.
This new breed of Zords is pretty interesting overall. While not quite on the same level as the Generations engineering of Transformers (in terms of Siege/Earthrise, not Studio Series), this line at least feels more ambitious with the engineering that the Bandai Japan version had while also adding new features. There are some flaws with some of the Zords, mainly some of the looser than anticipated connections and the plastic is not quite as dense as previous Bandai America Megazords, but at least it's great to have a fulfilling Ultrazord that doesn't face the cop-out nature of previous Ultrazords from the past few years (Samurai Gigazord's ape arm, Dino Charge's molded batteries, Ninja Steel's Lion Fortress High Chair), and I'm quite happy with owning these versions despite the stupid distribution issues that most stores suffered from. Seriously, It's been half a year since we got the Zords released in the places that do have them, but why are the dual changers physically at Targets and the other two online-only? Maybe you should get the multipack if you're not like me and got the Racer Zord at Mexico, the Wheeler and Chopper Zords at Target, and the beetle brother Zords from Amazon.
Overall ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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