Here we have Dropkick in his vehicle mode. It's a pretty slick car based on the one he took form of, what with the nice deco and hot rod engine. It's an altmode that would certainly look cool in a street-race along with Shatter and Clunkerbee. With all the details you'd expect from a custom vintage car, this could almost go so well with the colors used for Cybertron Downshift.
It's a pretty solid take on the character, and the robot mode kibble is thankfully less prominent from underneath than with Shatter.
Weapon storage has you put the gun on the spoiler, but I don't think it goes too well with the altmode. Also, note the skull tampograph on the sides of the hindquarters, which is carried over from the helicopter version.
Speaking of, here he is next to his helicopter form. Yeah, I don't really think it's possible to integrate two heavily distinct altmodes into a single triple changer, especially at a Deluxe price point. It's something that can really be pulled off if the vehicle designs look similar to one another, especially when it comes to not overly complicating the toy designs. Blitzwing and Springer have the best balance of altmode mass and design proportions between their ground and land vehicles.
Here he is next to Shatter and the VW Bumblebee. Funny how the three main Transformers of that Bumblebee flick are based on the primary colors.
Transforming Dropkick is almost like a version of the G1 Jazz/Movie Bumblebee/Cybertron Downshift, what with the hood chest and door wings. It does have the been-there-done-that element to it, but I do like how the front tires can be integrated with the rest of the torso while the rear tires don't look too out of place on the forearms. The rooftop doesn't make the back look bigger than it already is, and the door wings can be posed to look angled to give a bit of personality to the robot design.
Robot mode's certainly better proportioned than the crappy helicopter version of Dropkick. The head doesn't look as small, the arms don't look thin, the hips do not look too far apart from each other, and the torso, despite not having the same details of the 2018 figure, doesn't feel as frail in-hand as the previous figure was. While the design may not seem as groundbreaking as it's been seen already with the aforementioned characters, it at least manages to have some form of proportion accuracy. Only time will tell if someone will make a third-party upgrade kit for this figure to have the helicopter bits. At least he looks better from the side and back than he previously did.
Headsculpt looks even better than the older figure, with it not only being slightly bigger, but also having better details than before. The face paint may look darker than it should be, but at least the eyes don't look too tacky.
Articulation helps make the figure look even better than it previously did. Head is on a ball joint, shoulders move front and back as well as in and out on ball joints, elbows bend, hips move front and back as well as in and out on ball joints, swivel at the thighs, bend at the knees, and hinge at the ankles. You can curl the right hand in if you want to tab in the gun if you so choose, which was used to help melt some humans when popping them isn't enough. I wonder if he loves to see melting pics from DeviantArt or MeltBooru - uh, I mean it looks pretty cool, and certainly feels unique from the traditional 5mm weapons.
Here he is next to ChopDrop. Much like with Drift yesterday, Dropkick's figures are night and day in terms of how their robot modes look, and this is setting aside their altmodes. One looks a lot more refined while the other looks extremely amateur in design. Sure, the car version of Dropkick looks kind of basic, but I'll take that over a figure that's just as awful as ROTF Blazemaster.
Much like last time, this figure looks easily better than the Dropkick made in 2018, as the robot mode looks a lot better despite it not having the helicopter pieces included. It also doesn't feel like a flimsy piece of shit since the plastic doesn't want to fail at remaining stable.
Here we have Dropkick next to Shatter and VW Bumblebee. As seen in the Bumblingbee, Dropkick is shorter than Shatter while also being taller than Bumblebeetle. In terms of these figures alone, Dropkick is the best of the three, though I have to admit his hands do look thin compared to Shatter and Bumblebee, who not only have thicker hands but also have a more open look to their hands.
These two could easily bully Bumblebeetle, which doesn't help how Bumblebee acts more like a cliche shy 80s character from a different planet (setting aside the fact that Transformers was from the 80s) than act more like a capable warrior in this movie. Even G1 Bumblebee didn't act like a ripoff of Iron Giant (who was ironically not an 80s character since he had a book in 1968 and an animated movie in 1999), and why the fuck would Bee's eyes change red when it made less sense for him to do such a thing than it would to reassemble himself? Anyways, let's not get off-track.
Now let's see how they look next to Bumblebee from the Masterpiece line, shall we?
Shatter shatters and chains stop the Drop! As odd as it may seem to display the Decepticons as such in these images, I do recommend the car version of Dropkick a lot, setting aside my dislike on the Bumblebee movie. The car mode looks great, the transformation is basic but serviceable, and the robot mode, despite being a tired design, does look a lot better than the robot mode of the other figure. I do recommend getting it if you still see it on pegs, though be prepared to deal with some peg warming Cogmen, Shatters, Chopper Droppers, and either a Crankcase or a Hightower.
Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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