Monday 28 January 2008

Terrahawks - Battlehawk

Just received a nice package in the post with the two Battlehawks I won on ebay.

I've never had one of these before, and I am more than a little impressed. To start with, it's big, and very heavy! A large chunk of the toy is Die cast which you don't often get with toys like this. I have the large Hawkwing as well and this is completely made out of plastic.



(These are the images from the Auction, I will add some better ones soon.)

It also has lots of things you can do, buttons to press, access ramps, doors, vehicles that drop out. Press a button on the side and a small battletank drops out. Another on the top fires a battlehawk (sadly missing). And a final button opens a hatch on the back. There is also and access ramp on the nose section.

I think I was pretty lucky to get two in one auction as they seem to go for quite a price. And it has also meant that I have been able to take the best bits from each and create a near mint toy. That's what I like about old toys, they are always screwed together so you can easily get them apart. Transformers are another line that are easily repaired this way.

It would have been nice with this range if the ships were a little more to scale with each other, but I guess that would have meant having a much larger battlehawk. And I would have had no where to display that!

Tuesday 15 January 2008

Blackout - Voyager version


I had to get a few of the new Movie figures and thought I would do some reviews of the ones I get. As quite often with transformers, there not always great.

Blackout - Voyager version, bought for £19.99 from woolworths. You get a free radio when you spend more the £10 on Tf's so not bad.

This figure is pretty good, looks great as a vehicle and not at all bad in robot mode. My only gripe in robot mode is the large backpack he ends up with. It's made of all the bits they didn't use for the robot, and is rather large. You can remove it, but then what do you do with it.

He also comes with a small scorponok that fits in the tail section of the helicopter.

The figure has lots of panels and detail so looks much more advanced than it is. It's a fairly hard one to transform as the head section is spring loaded and just won't sit in place without a lot of fiddling.

There are a couple of clips that hold the sides in place in vehicle mode that already had stress marks on them when I took this figure out of the box. So I'm guessing for most kids they will snap off quite quickly. The blades of the copter also come off very easily.

Overall, not bad for the price.

Monday 14 January 2008

Transformers Real Gear Speed Dial 800




Transformers Real Gear Speed Dial 800 bought for £6.75 from Asda.

I think this is the first time Hasbro have done figures that are the correct size to be real world objects. My girlfriend thought this was a phone.

Overall this is the cheapest looking of the figures I bought, and a little over priced for what it is. It has very few parts and is a very simple figure to transform, but it does look kinda cool.

It would have been very simple for Hasbro to improve this figure, just by replacing the 2 really cheap looking screen stickers with lenticular ones, the ones that change when you tilt them. The stickers they have put on just make it look cheap. And at £6.75, it's not that cheap. Considering you can get the deluxe figures for £9.99.

It also has a small camera lens, which they could have made work like in the old six million dollar man. Hasbro should have asked me before making this!! ; )

Scorponock - Not really a Transformer


I picked up one of the new Transformers Scorponock figures from the movie the other week. Mainly because I thought it worked really well in the film and it looks like a pretty detailed toy, which it is.

But the transformation of the toy is a real disappointment. It's almost as though the toy designers couldn't be bothered to think of anything for him to do. Fold his arms down, that'll be enough to keep people happy.


I guess they didn't have much to go on from the film as you only ever see him in scorpion mode. But when you are paying £10 for a 'Transformer' The least you can expect is that in actually transforms.

Overall the toy is actually pretty neat. The sculpt is really nice and detailed and looks very accurate to the film. The tail has a firing missile of sorts as the missile is not able to leave the body, it just fires forward. There is also a mechanism that makes the claws spin when you push the figure forward.

Not the best figure, but a nice addition to my collection.

Primeval - Back for seconds

The second second series of Primeval started on ITV this weekend, and already it was so much better than Dr. Who. There is just something about the pace of the show that keeps you on the edge of your seat, unlike 'Who' were I struggle to stay awake.

The stories are still not the best in the world, but they work well enough. And the characters are more likable and believable than Dr Who. And as there are four main characters, if you don't like one, you know they will cut to one of the others quick enough.

You also don't have to put up with the constant Gay overtones that Russel T Davis puts in. There is a bit of sexual tension going on, but only in a childish way.

I was quite amused by this first episode as it was mainly filmed in the Bental's Centre in Kingston. I've not been there for many years, but used to hand out there when I was at college. It is easily recognisable by the bridge that runs from the shopping centre to the car park.

Unfortunately there were no shots of Abby's Bum this week, so I thought I would post a classic from the last series. Enjoy!

Saturday 5 January 2008

Dr Poo



Were do I start. Boy did the Christmas Dr Who suck big time. The BBC and Russel T Davis seem hell bent on taking Dr Who and making it the biggest pile of S**t on TV. I know it was never a really top class show, but it did have a certain quality to it. The BBC do like to turn everything the have into unwatchable drivel. They normally manage this by messing around with the schedule and replacing whatever you were waiting to watch with Darts or Snooker. But this time they are taking it to a new level.

Dr Who has very quickly gone from a quite entertaining Sci-fi show to a dumbed down parody of itself.

Every assistant has to fall in love with the Dr. Why? Can't they think of something else for them to do. It's just a very lazy thing to do.

The Stories, I think that may be an over statement, are so basic you might as well not have them. The Tardis gets hit by the Titanic in space? What the hell is that all about.

It has also become a very Gay orientated show. This is the only reason I can see for having Kylie in it as it certainly wasn't for her acting ability. She was as wooden as the backdrops. If she had had less Botox in her face she might have been able bring the script to life! And in the new series they have Catherine Tate which is only going to make it even more unwatchable.

I doubt I will bother watching any of the next series as the trailer at the end really didn't show anything that looked good. But maybe this is what the BBC has been planning for. Once they have lost all there viewers they can stop making them again for another ten years until they run out of Strictly Dancing spin offs to waste the license fee on then bring it out again for another ever so brief outing. Let's face it, it's all they have.

On the other hand ITV have got a new series of Primeval coming soon and that looks great. The trailers they have been showing are looking really cool. Itv always seem to do this sort of thing much better than the BBC.