Transformers Prime Beast Hunters Shockwave & Predaking (SDCC) review

We've done a couple of TFP reviews in hopes of catching up with any characters who had yet to receive the spotlight, and it's about time our cycloptic scientist, Shockwave, gets to have a review of his own. This time, he is accompanied by one of his creations, that being the dragon Transformer known as Predaking. While many would think Beast Hunters is where the Prime series started to get rough due to the toys barely getting representation on screen as well as the shorter episode count, the series still had a strong ending unlike what we later got with the rushed conclusion of the forgettable Earthspark. Now it's time to revisit 2013 and witness the big bad Shockwave and his little dragon pet for what may be my first SDCC-related review yet!

Here we have Shockwave and Predaking in their alternate modes. One is a Cybertronic tank, and the other is a dragon in an embryo-like state of early development. The tank mode for Shockwave looks very Movie esque with the alien aesthetics and the part layout. Many who still wish Shockwave was a gun so they could play with his inappropriately placed trigger always comment on how this looks like nothing, yet the same could be said for Shockwave in general. At least here, he has treads on the back of his altmode in addition to aiming for an H-tank motif that many probably find equally as lazy, but not to the same extent as barely tweaking Evergreen designs. I will agree that the cannon looks too high up without any real integration, the hand visible and scratching what will be the robot crotch is ugly, and the proportions could be refined. That being said, considering how weak a lot of Voyagers were for 2012, this felt more like a proper figure from that size class with some decent heft in the plastic. Little to no ball joints, no hollow spaces that are visible to the naked eye, and he isn't cheating like Beast Hunters Prime. Predaking, being a Cyberverse Commander Class figure, will have newer collectors confused because he is neither a $90 figure nor is he from the 2018 TV show. See, the original Cyberverse was a name used by Hasbro back in 2011 for the Dark of the Moon and Prime lines. They were taller than the Core Class dudes we got for a while, and they also had Legion Class figures to scale with as well as playsets incompatible with the Deluxes-upwards. Predaking, despite being cast in a bluish clear plastic with opaque plastics for the wings and most  joints, has a decent level of sculptwork at a smaller scale. It's mostly lost given the size and how soft the figure is, with the spikes being rounded off, but it can be excused as him being just a widdle baby dragon instead of being the king of the Predacons. He looks like he's doing push ups though.

Here we have Shockwave next to the BBM version from the Studio Series line. You can see how much influence the newer toy took from the 2013 offering, and I'd argue that for all it's flaws, the BBM version has a better tank mode than the TFP version. Also, the colors on this version of Shockwave are different because Hasbro went for a G1-accurate route. We'll discuss more about this later.

And here we have Predaking as a baby next to his larger, grown up self. Did you know that the same Cyberverse Commander figure was used as the basis for the upscaled Voyager, which is crazy for me to say given how much sharper and refined the bigger you ended up.

Transformation for Shockwave is a little asymmetrical, and that mostly applies to the arms. See, the right arm is meant to be stored underneath the altmode and thus can hinge back, while the cannon arm can hinge forwards to be the tank turret. The rest of the transformation is pretty straightforward, but the ratcheted knees make it a bit satisfying. The resulting robot mode looks very accurate to the show, though the colors featuring the brighter purples and mix.of light and dark greys and bits of yellow, are meant to evoke the G1 version. It's vaguely successful given you're turning a purple dude into a slightly different purple dude. Surprisingly, the colors work much better than I initially expected, though the light-piping for the eye is much darker than what his chest has. The light grey plastic could be painted silver, though I wish the same would be said for the PVC parts so they could be less prototypey. While his feet may not show it, they are meant to be sculpted in somewhat of a specific stance, yet the ratchets used for his hips are molded in a way where the space between his legs has fewer, larger increments to work with rather than a natural spread. I do like that he has the hose made from one of his tank treads, though it does flex a lot more than I'd be comfortable with, can be difficult to attach, and does make the arm slide off the bicep swivel. It is optional at least, and the same goes for the spikes on the back.

His head sculpt is shaped like in the show, though it suffers from having the light-piping for the eye so weak that he looks dead. He's supposed to have his eye glow yellow instead of red like in G1, but unlike most toys with light-piping, who can still look fine so long as the rest of their faces are painted, the lack of a proper face doesn't help his eye stand out any better. Though the gap below it looks too much like a mouth. That being said, his articulation is pretty good for a pre-Siege Voyager; unlike the PRID figures, which had ball joints to the shoulders and hips, he has one purely for the wrist. Swivels are used for the neck, shoulders (with the joints for moving in and out have spring loaded shoulder pads to bring them back in place), biceps, hips (front and back), thighs, and knees, while hinges are used for the elbows since ratchet joints are used for the knees. There are softer ratchets for the hips moving in and out, though as mentioned before, they do keep his feet from properly staying flat on the ground.

For anyone wondering why his arm cannon has a seam in the middle and a giant button sticking out, that is due to a spring loaded gimmick where pressing the button causes it to open up and spin rapidly, revealing an admittedly phallic tip that almost looks like a missile. It's not helpful that it's molded in piss yellow plastic, which makes the chest being pink all the more confusing. The gimmick is comparable to the cannons on Beast Machines Tankor, but Shockwave never had his cannon work like this. Still, not a bad gimmick, and it kind of fits him if we're not going to give him a missile launcher.

As far as prior uses are concerned, the Hasbro version is the one most fans would have. He and the Takara version came with PVC armor pieces that go in the chest and shoulders (or the feet in tank mode). While he is a bit drab, and I never like the shades of grey used for how inconsistent his shades of grey are in addition to the silver and light grey clashing, at least this one is somewhat closer to the show. I have the Hasbro one but I kind of failed to customize him to be show accurate.

As for the Takara version, his color scheme is more metallic and closer to how he appeared in the Prime series. He still has the light grey, but it doesn't clash as badly, and the rubber armor is now black. I still want to get this version in spite of owning the SDCC set.

For a size comparison, here he is with APC Toys Dark Master, aka Megatron, and First Edition Optimus Prime. While Prime and Shocko never shared any screentime together, using scenes from when Megatron is with either character can confirm that this scale is right. Both of them appear to be a similar height when put next to the Decepticon leader.

As for Protoking, transforming him is almost similar to the larger scale figure, only with ball joints and a worryingly fragile plastic quality given how frail translucent parts are. The arms transform a bit differently, with a swivel for the forearm and different hinges to orient the shoulders, the wings don't fold down, and the head doesn't split in half. His tail is also now made from the gun since he doesn't have the sword. This bot mode suffers from having a softer sculpt once again due to the limitations figures had at the time, though it is at least commendable they were able to do his bot mode a bit of justice. That and it can be a bit forgivable that he doesn't look too sharp given he was meant to be a tiny, barely developed being in this stage of his creation. While he lacks any major paint apps, he does at least have a pink Predacon insignia on his left shoulder. I am worried about how brittle the plastic is, with stress marks on the very tight hind legs combined with the back piece already crooked due to the poor molding making me very wary with handling him. His articulation consists of ball joints for the shoulders and hips hinges for the elbows and knees, and a swivel for the neck. His gun can be held in his c-joint hands, and it is pressure launch.

As for the other versions of this mold, the original Predaking is bright orange with some black, grey, and yellow for his color palette, a far cry from his darker color scheme in the show. At least being opaque and painted gives you a better idea of what the sculpt is supposed to look like.  

This is a repaint that loosely homages RID 2001 Megatron (or Car Robots Gigatron if you're a sub purist). He came in a 2-pack with a Thunderclash-themed Optimus Prime for the Predacons Rising subline.

Certain Asian countries received a Cybertron Con 2013 variant of Predaking cast in clear orange plastic, which I think I'd prefer over the one SDCC got. Just something about it feels more appropriate. It should be worth mentioning that not all of him is opaque.

For a Predaking comparison, need I say more with the scale difference? They grow up so fast...

For anyone wondering, this set was named as such because it came with a display base for Shockwave to work on the embryo of the Predacon as it starts to grow in size. I don't have this with me, but I'm sure it will be easy to recreate with a metal or cave-like diorama with a third party container meant to store action figures and house water to give a proper sci-fi cryo chamber.

Overall, this set is mostly solid for an SDCC release. While the G1 homage for Shockwave feels a bit needless given he's already purple, the figure still looks good overall, on top of being a pretty underrated Voyager mold comparable to the First Edition offerings of Prime and Bulkhead (same way I feel about Breakdown). Predaking is kind of neat for a clear plastic figure, but I'm so scared of transforming certain areas of him if they risk breakage. He certainly lasted longer 12 years later than those Minicons that came with AOTP Nemesis Prime, but ShartimusPrime's copy of the set had his Predaking break quickly and he cried. I still recommend getting this set, but be sure that you have everything included while nothing's broken.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

S.H. Figuarts DragonBall Z Majin Buu review

Majin Buu is one of those characters who would totally come out of left field when you think of the later stages of Dragonball Z, especially given how much he visually has in common with the wacky, earlier eras of the series. He's a big, punk chocolate lover who was once resurrected by Bidibi as a force of destruction and was later bosses around by Badibi. This pink weirdo would later turn people into chocolate, absorb those who fought against him, and later try turning people into clay for his house. Certainly he has inspired some DeviantArt fetishes that he regrets doing. His skinnier, muscular forms were later destroyed, and he would later live with Mr. Satan and keeping the prefix of Videl's father himself. Thankfully, not much trouble arose from him since, so now let's see what he's like as a Figuart for today's review!

Here we have Majin Buu in-hand. He's a big, chunky dude who could give Patrick Star a run for his money by 5 years! The outfit of this dude almost makes me thing of the Toads from the Mario series, with the big white pants and the vest, though he has yellow boots to go with his boxing gloves. He also has a cape wrapped over his neck, though there are three holes meant for the cape pieces proper to tab in. Not much paint is used on the figure, though thankfully the plastic has a matte finish and isn't glossy, which is always appreciative compared to many Hasbro Legends. We do have some gold paint for the vest and buckle as well as black for the surrounding areas on those parts. The aesthetics are pretty good for a dude who's blobby in shape, and thankfully the pants look fine despite being broken up for articulation. 

His head sculpt has the eyes and blush lines painted on while the mouth is a slight recess as well as the dots near his antenna. Pretty good attention to detail overall. His alternate accessories include a two alternate heads (one with the tongue out and one with a devious smile), two pointing hands, two open hands, and three cape parts on a separate tray.

His articulation includes a double ball joint with a hinge for the neck, shoulder rotation, outward arm movement, butterfly joints, bicep swivels, double jointed elbows, ball jointed wrists, a ball joint for the torso, hips that can move front and back as well as in and out (thankfully without the hips being limited like on the Mario Bros), rotation at where the legs connect, hinged knees, and ball jointed ankles. Being somewhat hollow, he can at least balance on single leg without the aid of a flight stand.

His chocolate bar accessory will go great with other figures that want to have some delicious candy for toy photography. I like that the wrapper is white on the outside while it's silver on the inside to represent the foil it's made of. The shiny brown paint works perfectly to represent chocolate despite being made of plastic.

Here he is with Vegeta, a Saiyan who got the Majin treatment at one point in the series. They both really look like they're gonna beat some poor sucker's ass. There isn't much else to say about Majin Buu, but he's just so one of a kind that I highly recommend him immensely. He may be my favorite Figuart I own from the DBZ line in terms of non-Saiyans and in regards to villains. I hope to get Mr. Satan at some point.

And now we close this review off, here is an old photo taken from when Buu met Boo. My longtime friend I've known since we went to high school together hung out with me at a hotel and we bought these plushies if you're wondering about our lore.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

McFarlane DC Multiverse Eradicator & Superboy review

Cyborg Superman wasn't the only character I got that represents Reign of the Supermen. Three other identities attempted to take the mantle once held by the Man of Steel himself. Eradicator was once an AI superweapon that made the Fortress of Solitude and later tried to turn Earth into a new Krypton, but it wasn't until the Death of Superman where he took a form similar to his but with the help of David Connor as a base. Meanwhile, Superboy is a clone using the DNA of Superman and Lex Luthor who would eventually age into maturity during the 90s before leading the Young Justice. We have a regular McFarlane DC Multiverse figure and a Page Puncher to cover in this review, so let's see if both are worth getting as we complete the ROTS lineup. 

Here we have the Eradicator in-hand. The one on the left is the recent version while the one on the right is the previously released Shockwave version. Differences include black for the neck and face, a darker blue, and a presumably different shade of red. The reason why one of them has more black is because it represents a version of the character that served as part of Zod's family during the Rebirth era of DC. It's funny how the classic version is the true definition of a repaint, and one that is more desirable than the original version since we can see his face. Both figures are retools of the Hush Superman buck, itself a retool of the Rebirth version. Traits of this include the wider upper body, the molding for the boot tops (which shouldn't be on this toy btw), and an embossed chest symbol. The logo is sculpted to be less squished at the bottom tip, and while I would like to see some lines to designate where the blue stripe down the middle of the costume goes, the deco is mostly clean...apart from the visible black on top of the blue within the diaper piece. Both figures gave a cape sculpted to look dynamic and flowing in the air, yet while it helps make for great photography, it will always look awkward for anything else. In fact, it only ranks second to most display-specific cape next to the optional one that came with Night People Batman. I guess having it be wired and cloth goods is possible, though how good it would look depends on the execution, especially given how specific the way his cape attaches works compared to any other Superman. Retooling is possible after all. As for the head, boy is the jawline wider than normal. I never liked how the face on Hush Superman looked, and this is even worse when viewed from the front. He's less Eradicator and more Square-radicator; it stands out worse on the painted face version than on the Shockwave version. One positive is that the shades are painted gold, and they did at least try to continue the detailing on the sculpted parts for the hair. Some would say that they should be clear to make the eyes visible, but in some panels, the shades were drawn opaque, so it makes sense McFarlane Toys went with what was already available to them.

The articulation is the same for both figures, and while they both come with alternate open hands, Shockradicator has his painted to simulate his powers. They look more like amateur attempts at a custom flesh tone paint job, and they make me wish he had glowing energy effect pieces like the ones that came with Starfire. They also have a third variant of the character made in the form of a Platinum translucent plastic version, with bone white skin, a purple cape and logo, a two tone blue look, and opaque joints that may look out of place but thankfully do not make the figure fragile. I heard this was an issue with a digital version of The Flash, and it sucks to hear what happened to those who had their copies' ankles break. This appears to be a made up repaint at first, but it could be based on the retro DC toylines Kenner used to make. I wish they clarified that much like how they should have done with those Task Force figures to explain the video game decos.

As for Superboy, this figure is a retool of the 2023 version, with a more classic look to his body this time around. Whereas the previous toy was more based on his Rebirth look, this is how he appeared in Reign of the Supermen proper. The yellow on the forearms, belt, boot tops, and right thigh are painted on, and the logo is also tampo'd on. While the paint apps are thankfully crisp and have no alignment issues, I can't help but wonder if making the details painted on is due to McFarlane not wanting to make any new tooling. And of course, we need to mention the lack of a leather jacket. That piece of clothing is one of the signature design traits of the character, but he has been seen without the jacket at times. I do wish that the black on the shoulders went down further to fill in the subtle seam line. 

His head sculpt is mostly good, though I wish he had some optional shades to wear like the ones that came with the Retro Card Peter Parker. Just remove the white paint and put them on him after adding a shiny coat of black for the lenses! Also, I get that he has a bit of a fade at the bottom area of his hair, but would it have hurt them to make it look less like a sharpie job? His alternate hands, aka the sole accessories he has beyond the stand and trading card (which we'll go back to), is the right thumbs up hand and a left fist. For some reason, the right hand is painted despite already being molded red plastic.

As for the comic book he comes with, it is a reprint of Superboy Vol 4 #1, and you can already tell what's missing from the figure it comes with. I always preferred this version of Superboy more than I did the concept of Kal-El being a superhero before he got the name Superman.

This comic has the same vibes as a anime beach episode, from the slice of life elements mixed with a bit of plot relevancy thrown in. No doubt many bikini drawings of all the babes in the story, including Roxanne Leech, were hidden by using Hawaii as an excuse to for a setting in the Superboy comics. If you set aside the curves, cleavage, and even sneaky butt crack of Roxy, you'll be able to read the story and focus on the Superboy World Tour going haywire as a villain named Sidearm targets the boy of steel and his group. Sidearm has a cybernetic arm with firepower for anyone still distracted by the fanservice.

That being said, the card art we got for him is reused from Rebirth Superboy instead of a reprint of the comic cover. Sadly hurts that it is another reminder of his lack of a jacket. That and the hair not being 1:1. The figure comes with a Platinum variant based on his appearance in the New 52. Honestly, with the tooling applied on Rebirth Superman, he may not be entirely 90s accurate, but you could stick with him if you're fine with how he turned out compared to the deco-only details on this Superboy.

Here we have Eradicator and Superboy with Cyborg Supes and the original Man of Steel. They all have shades of blue that don't match the version of the character I use for my display, so you may want to stick with the Hush version and do some part swaps if you're interested in some consistency. Honestly, Eradicator is the better of the review duo, what with the traditional Superman colors and some paint for the face going a long way to fix a figure's presentation. He could still use an S shield in the cape, or at least a wired cape like with the Cyborg and Monsterverse Supermen. Superboy could have been a slam dunk if they just gave him either three dimensional tooling instead of paint apps or an optional leather jacket he can wear like what we got with Captain Boomerang. At least the comic is still better than the Supergirl one. Now to get Steel, even if his design is more modern.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Eradicator)

⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Superboy)

If you're still here, allow me to go over a neck swap if you want your Eradicator to have a less square face. I also have Batfleck here so we can shorten his neck. I know I don't need the McFarlane version anymore if I have the one made by FondJoy, but those that only collect McFarlane should use these two for a fix.

The heads have to be removed, and the neck pegs are next. The black peg on Eradicator matches Batfleck, and those who fear his gray peg won't match the Superman look-alike will sigh in relief knowing that the head will conceal it without issue.

And there we go. Eradicator should have a more visible neck (and hopefully have a less square jawline), while Batfleck's head shape and neck are more accurate to the movie. Idk if I would do the same to Shockwavicator, but only if I get the Justice is Grey version that comes with the Snyderverse Batmobile despite me not funding for it (because I never funded for any toys by either Hasbro, McFarlane, etc).