Sunday, March 22, 2020

Transformers Studio Series Long Haul review

Long Haul is one of the few Constructicons carried over from the G1 crew to the ROTF lineup, but instead of becoming a crotch and butt, he becomes a leg. Not much else can be said about this big guy, but I always liked how massive he was, and even being an evil robotic Hulk makes him stand out physically from the rest. Of course, being a fanmade design turned canon is something most fans talk about when they act like they try to search for Movie positives. Of course, I would love to see this guy kick Autobot ass in ROTF proper, but the stupid Writers Guild messed things up, sadly. Still, it's neat that this guy got a good amount of figures to help fill in the void, and now I have one of my own after not owning the 2009 figure years ago. Is this Green Giant a great entry as both a Constructicon member and an entry for the Studio Series line?


Here we have Long Haul in his dump truck mode. Its design may not be what he would normally be associated with, as the dump truck this is based on is actually one that belonged to the unit that combined with Devastator, not the one that was the individual robot that was seen as Long Haul. ROTF made it so we can have both Decepticons fighting in Cairo while the Devastator components went up to the Sun Harvester. This is why Long Haul's vehicle isn't accurate to the ROTF toy. The vehicle itself is not awful, as it's got some nice details found on the front thanks to the grill, ladders, headlights, and cabin. The rims of the vehicle being green might have been intentional, though it does feel odd that the front rims look like they have holes larger than 5mm while the rear wheels look more complete. If there is an issue I do have with this toy, it's the way the rear portion of the vehicle mode doesn't look like it's flush with the rest of the altmode, leaving it to look pretty uneven when viewed from the side. Beyond that, it does a good job of capturing the look of the vehicle it's based off of.


The dump bed is sadly not usable since it's both unable to hinge back and also house really anything that would fill up the dump truck nicely. Of course, I wouldn't use this at a sandbox, but for those that want to pretend they're at a construction site using Lego bricks for example, still wouldn't be the best.


Here is a vehicle mode comparison with the current Constructicons I have so far, and he doesn't look too out of place next to the yellow Hightower and Scrapmetal, but Rampage is a bit too big than he needs to be in vehicle mode. Beyond that, we're not quite on the same level of Constructicon intimidation yet, so be sure to wait for any reviews consisting of Mixmaster and Scavenger at some point.


Long Haul's transformation is a bit easier than I anticipated. The thing that makes the conversion less complex is how parts of the dump truck go on the back, which is done to make the robot mode screen accurate than it was previously. While it may seem like it'll result in the figure becoming a shell former, the rest of the figure maintains less of an issue, since parts of the figure are oriented as such due to the way they are in the design. So those big chunks of plastic on his forearms, for example, are supposed to look like that. The tires may not seem like they're 100% integrated with the toy, but you'll get used to it.

The robot mode certainly looks a lot bulkier than the ROTF figure, though if you have both figures in hand, you'd notice how short the new figure is compared to the original. Not an awful revelation, as some of the plastic used for the new toy helps in making it work as a piece of the combined mode, but you do get just how small the latest figures have become than they were in the past 10 years. I also like the shade of green used for the new figure, which feels a lot less pale than it was 10 years ago. Though whereas the original figure's proportions looked pretty gorilla-esque, these new proportions feel more teddy bear-esque.


The side looks fine despite it looking pretty clunky with the vehicle chunks, but the back does look pretty smooth and featureless.


The head sculpt looks good for the most part, yet the eyes don't look quite as sharp as I wanted. They almost have that rough look that most older Movie figures were known to have. The attempt at making the eyes look good is there, but they look more like > < than they really need to.


Articulation is almost on par with the Siege line. Head is on a ball joint that can move left and right, shoulders move front and back, in and out, thigh swivel, bend at the elbow, swivel at the biceps, and while the wrists don't swivel, that was a feature almost half of the Siege molds didn't get. Waist swivel is present, though it ratchets rather than spin freely due to this figure serving as a leg. Hips are on ratchets moving front and back, but they are a bit limited in and out, due to how the thighs are shaped. You have to move parts of the thighs out of the way, but moving them in and out isn't much of a problem. Knees bend and swivel, and the feet pivot nicely, too.


Here we have Long Haul with the other four Constructicons. It's weird seeing how he's shorter than Rampage, even though Rampage didn't stand on his legs like Long Haul did. Still, it is nice to add a bit more color to the team since most of the members are yellow.


Having these four is pretty neat and all, but I do want to look forward to getting the rest of the line. Here's hoping I get Mixmaster, Scavenger, and the rest!


Transforming the figure into the leg mode is sort of like reconfiguring parts of the vehicle mode into a foot. It's not as involved as Rampage's transformation, but it does at least leave him with a stomper with a boot-like footprint. A footprint? It looks pretty good from the front, but the back does have the tires look a little like they're dangling on his body while the head is facing down. Not the best look.


Here are the two legs together. I should have them switched around, but I'm interested in seeing just how the legs would combine with Overload in the near future.


Let's conclude the review with the inclusion of Igor, who sort of looks like him. This figure is one of the hardest entries to find in the line since he popped up once, then he disappeared and forced me to find him across 5 Targets in one day. Yes, that happened once and I hated it. Thankfully, I paid less for the toy at Walmart.com, picked it up at a Neighborhood Market version in N. Clark, and it saved me from the trouble of looking for the damn thing even more. That aside, this figure has a few issues, mainly the clunkiness making articulation a bit hard to do, and I don't like how the figure's dump truck mode doesn't quite look like it's lined up as well as it should, but beyond that, this is a figure you should get if you want to complete the rest of the Constructicons. Even if you're not going for Devastator, he at least is a nice, chunky figure to mess around with.


Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

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