Bot Reviews: Retro Revoltech Roundup

Let me take you back to an early time in collecting. Around 2008, after the first of the Michael Bay movies had dropped, Transformers were hotter amongst retro collectors than they’d been for a long time. I’d recently rejoined the hobby, looking for cool things to spend my money on. At that time, I went to a lot of conventions with my friends. Anime North, Toronto’s Fan Expo (before it became gigantic), and the Ontario Comic-Con were regular haunts of ours, and I’d always beeline for Transformers stuff to snap up. Over the course of a couple years, these Revoltechs would pop up for sale there, and I’d buy them all up as they came out.

These days, when I’m in the market for one of those high-end hyper-poseable hyper-detailed Japanese action figures, I’m usually going with Figma (makers of a lot of Nintendo stuff), or SH Figuarts (who did Super Mario, and handle most Tokusatsu stuff). But, apparently, Revoltech predates them all. Supposedly it’s still around, though I don’t hear about it as much nowadays. Still, these four Transformers figures, all released from ‘07 to ‘08 are from a much different, earlier era of high-end collectible, even if the basic premise was the same: Detailed, hyper-poseable, and loaded with optional parts.

These initial four toolings are a weird little time capsule in a few other ways, too: Some of them are based on how these characters were depicted in Dreamwave Comics, who held the Transformers license before IDW, losing it when they went bankrupt. That company’s art style gave its characters a unique, exaggerated, “manga-esque” look to them, one that’s often made fun of these days. Still, Dreamwave art was everywhere for a long time, even after the company went under around, like, 2005. Maybe that’s why these guys exist. Whatever the reason, too, these four molds were popular with collectors, at least in my neck of the woods, and it felt like everyone had them. I think it had to do with the fact that the massive Masterpiece-Third-Party-ThreeZero industrial complex didn’t really exist yet, so if you wanted something more “premium” than mainline stuff, this was one of the few games in town.

So, in the light of modern figures like the much-more-affordable RED series, or the much more expensive ThreeZero monstrosities, let’s take a look back at how these early efforts hold up in 2021.

Optimus Prime

An obvious choice for a first release in this line, Optimus is also one that I’ll use to talk about the ins and outs of the line in general. So, this Optimus is much smaller than modern high-end figures. At about four inches, he’s still taller than the classic Star Wars scale, or Core or Scout class, but smaller than a modern Deluxe Transformer. He feels about the same size as the Action Masters, which may have been a part of the appeal.

In terms of his aesthetic, this is a pure lift of Optimus’s design in the Dreamwave comics, with all of its exaggerations, complete with his oddly separated, thickly-bordered chest windows. If you ever looked at the cover of the old Ultimate Guide, you’ve seen this guy. Much as we make fun of Dreamwave (and there’s a lot to make fun of), divorced from the often-dodgy comic pages that spawned it, it’s not a bad look, even if I do question exactly what his truck mode would look like.

There’s two bits of the sculpt I don’t dig, though. One is the fact that his shoulders are sort of permanently shrugged (more on that when I get to articulation), and the other is that, thanks to how his head is constructed, he’s got a weirdly long, thick neck, though it blends with his slightly exaggerated proportions a bit. That being said, I’m fond of the headsculpt above it. It’s clearly Optimus, but it’s a little bit different, a bit rounder.

 

As expected for a high-end figure, no expense seems to have been spared on the paint job, though it’s still the familiar red, blue, and silvery-grey Optimus colors you know and love. Curiously, they went with an unusual choice of a darker, almost purple shade with the blues. Outside of that, he’s also got the Dreamwave-0specific deco choice of white stripes both beneath his shoulders, and on his wrists, and an interesting blue-to-white gradient on his truck windows.

Optimus, like the rest of these Revoltechs, has a sort of unique handfeel to them, different from Transformers, and most other action figures I’ve handled. His plastic has a sort of soft, mildly rubbery feel to it, but not too soft, just enough for his smokestacks to be able to lightly flex. It might turn some people off, but I appreciate that he doesn’t feel nearly as delicate and fragile as a modern Figma or SH Figuart. He does have stability problems, sadly, in that it’s a bit of effort to stand him up. But it’s possible if you try, and he does have holes beneath his feet, if you’ve got figure stands.

Anyway, onto the fabled articulation. The main selling point of this line was its special “revolver joints,” essentially black (or grey) balls of varying sizes, that could spin somewhat freely, with rods on either end of them to secure his body parts. These joints can also be easily popped out of his body, and limb-swapping is entirely possible. In practice, these revolver joints operate like clicky ratchets, and this can be a good, or bad thing. On one hand, they do have a fairly impressive range of motion, but on the other hand, they have to adhere to clicked-in ratchet positions, and it can sometimes feel like the clicks are way too far apart, or not where you want them, or that the ratchets are a bit overly stiff.. Still, it mostly works, and between the sculpt, and the range of the jointage, this figure feels like it’s asking to be posed in particularly exaggerated ways.

There’s a specific shame with this Optimus’s articulation, though, and it’s that they actually don’t use those fabled joints on his shoulders, which are just plain-vanilla swivels (with a second swivel inside his shoulder for outward motion), which makes them feel a bit limited, not to mention the fact that they can’t really rest straight, but are stuck in that aforementioned shrugging position. All told, I’d say that his articulation, in practice, is on par with a good, Voyager-class 2021 War for Cybertron Trilogy figure (Wrist swivels! Ankle tilts!), which doesn’t sound impressive, but it helps that this guy’s a) almost 15 years older than them, and b) a third of their size. His weirdest joint is his ab crunch, which can really only move up or down about a single click, making it not terribly useful, were it not also serving as a displaced waist joint.

Like any high-end figure, Optimus has some option parts, in the form of spare hands that you can pop on and off of his wrists, though they’re tight enough that it’s a bit of a struggle.

We’ve got closed fists, a splayed-open left hand, a pointing right hand (Optimus pointing at stuff was a weirdly big thing in the ‘00s), and a right hand for holding his gun. Speaking of that, he comes with a solid black ion blaster to hold, albeit one that looks kind of puffy in person (appropriate for Dreamwave).

His last accessory is a Matrix of Leadership, one that’s nice and detailed, with a grey handle, gold core, and a crystal painted in that same gradient as his chest.

Unfortunately, Optimus doesn’t have hands to properly hold it, and the best you can do is rest it in that splayed hand of his.

Optimus would actually get a repaint after this, doing him in white and blue as Ultra Magnus, but it was something I never picked up at the time.

The next new mold in the line, would, of course, make the next obvious character choice.

Megatron

The second new-mold release in this little subline, Megatron doesn’t seem to be specifically based on his Dreamwave appearance, but is noticeably stylized and exaggerated the same way Optimus was.

Still, they didn’t reinvent the wheel here, this is clearly a G1 Megatron out of the cartoons or comics, including the familiar fusion cannon on the arm, gun-holster shins, barrel over his left shoulder, and all the other relevant details, just not quite 100 percent the same as any one specific version. I dig the way that he looks a bit more bulky and chunky than Optimus, like a stomping bruiser.

It’s a good-looking body, but one point on the sculpt brings the whole thing down to me: His head just doesn’t look like Megatron.

Sure, he’s got the familiar bucket helmet, and the face with the red eyes, but the whole thing looks off in a way that’s hard to place. It’s too squashed, the face feels wrong, it’s like someone tried to draw him from a faulty memory, or after a secondhand description. It’s not even a bad look, it just doesn’t quite feel right (and still has that odd, thick neck that Optimus had)

That’s a shame, because the rest of his sculpt looks wonderful, and it’s complemented by a lush paint job. He’s got a lot of very shiny silver on him, with bits of grey and black, and accents of red, orange, yellow, and purple where appropriate. I particularly appreciate that they made his revolver joints grey, so they blend better than Optimus’s black ones would have.

Speaking of revolver joints, while Megatron mostly has the same pretty great articulation as Optimus, it’s actually been upgraded thanks to the decision to give each of his shoulders a revolver joint, too, which vastly improves the range and expression of his arms. Again, he’s got a sculpt that combines with this articulation nicely, really making him feel dynamic. It helps that he’s got larger feet than Optimus, so he stays standing up a lot easier.

For accessories, Megatron’s got the least stuff out of anything in this line, simply coming with some extra hands. He’s got the requisite closed fists, a pair of splayed hands, and a left hand designed to hold weapons which he doesn’t come with, though he can steal from the rest of the line.

Finally, he comes with an entire second head, which….is just as baffling as his default one. It’s not sculpted any better, but instead gives his mouth a toothy, lopsided expression that might be a snarl, or might be a smile, it’s really unclear, and doesn’t really fit Megatron.

 

It doesn’t help that swapping his head is a pain. Tearing it off typically takes the entire neck joint with it, and replacing the head involves forcing it down in a way that takes excessive force to make it look normal again.

Starscream

The third tooling in this line, everyone’s favorite evil schemer, Starscream again doesn’t seem to be specifically Dreamwave-inspired, but rather, generically exaggerated-G1, the same way Megatron is.

Again, they haven’t reinvented the wheel with this Seeker’s design, and he contains all the familiar hallmarks of the G1 character. On this one, in particular, they definitely didn’t tone down his fake-altmode kibble. He’s got big wings on his shoulders, long null-rays on his arms, almost comically oversized intake vents on either side of his head, a big jet cockpit on his chest, and even tiny little wings on his ankles.

Like the rest of the line, I dig the exaggeration going on here with his proportions, and it looks particularly good when applied to a flying character. I’d say the only part of his body that looks a bit odd is his stomach, which contains an unusually large field of white beneath his cockpit, entirely to accommodate his ab crunch.

His headsculpt’s interesting in a few ways. One is that it’s a good deal wider than Starscream’s usual head, though, unlike Megatron, it still manages to look correct for the character. Another is his choice of expression, an eager, lopsided smile. I’m not sure it’s totally right for the character (it feels too genuine, not mischievous enough), but again, looks better than his faction leader. Finally, they simplified how his neck works, so it’s a sculpted part of his head, instead of a separate panel. I still think it looks way too thick, but it’s a marginal visual improvement. What isn’t is the fact that his head’s a bit smaller than Optimus or Megatron’s, making him look slightly pinheaded, though it’s just on the verge of what can pass as stylization.

For colors, Starscream’s basically still got his classic G1 scheme of off-white, blue, and red, with a lot of the latter two cast in pleasing metallics, like Megatron. He’s also got tiny bits of orangey-yellow, black, grey, and purple, as appropriate. I really appreciate the detail that went into painting the back of his wings (complete with a second set of Decepticon symbols), something they could have comfortably left out of this set, but didn’t.

Starscream’s articulation is about on-par with Megatron’s upgraded range, though his wings and shoulder vents do tend to get in the way of some more elaborate poses, but it’s not nearly as troublesome as it was on, say, the Classics 2006 Seeker tooling. Still, it’s enough to make me wish he had a joint in his wings, too, which are just one sculpted block. I appreciate the fact that his null-rays are additionally on swivels, so you can move them around as necessary. He continues to be even more stable than the last Revoltech, combining bigger feet with heel spurs based on his jet form’s engines.

That extra stability is funny, because one of Starscream’s accessories is that he finally comes with a figure stand, something standard on every high-end figure these days. It’s a three-piece black affair, containing a v-shaped base with a peg you can insert into his foot, an arm, and an entire extra revolver joint on the end of the arm, that you can plug into his back. It’s a welcome addition.

Aside from that, Starscream, again, comes with a pile of fists. He’s got the same two closed ones, a single splayed-open right hand, a pointing left hand (very Starscreammy, somehow), and an accessory-holding right hand. This time, he’s got an accessory to hold in the form of Megatron.

This small-scale gun-mode version of Megatron is impressively sculpted for the size, and gets to keep his realistic pistol details, unlike the modern version in the Centurion Upgrade kit.

He’s cast in black, with his gun parts painted silver, and features a removable stock in his handle, allowing it to slide in and out of an accessory-holding-hand.

Hot Rod

The final release in this original run of Revoltechs, Hot Rod takes cues from Optimus, and is specifically styled after their Dreamwave comics design. What this means is, unlike the other three, Hot Rod takes a number of visual cues specifically from their G1 toy, rather than their altered cartoon design, including molded-on sticker detailing on their shoulders and boots, visible vehicle-mode wheels sticking out sideways on those shoulders, and a back-mounted spoiler that’s less pointy and angular, and more solid and chunky.

That being said, their overall silhouette still matches the “cartoon model but kind of stylized” look the rest of this line has going, and they didn’t go as all-in on the toy look as they could have (i.e. there’s no exhaust pipes on Rod’s boods, just their forearms).

It’s an unusual look for the character, and I’m not sure if it totally works for me, but I do like the extra visual flair it gives them.

Unfortunately, both Megatron and Starscream’s head-related problems combine to give Rod the weakest headsculpt of the four. First of all, this is the tiniest head of the bunch, and it really sticks out, given how puny it is compared to Rod’s arms and hands. Secondly, while they did try to style it after Rod’s cartoon appearance, they’ve got an incredibly mushy, indistinct face on them, with a vague attempt at a lopsided grin. It just doesn’t look great compared to the other four heads in the line. They did my fave dirty.

On the positive side, those toy-based details meant that they got to go equally elaborate with Rod’s colors and paintwork. Their main colors are a toy-style deep red and orange, with tons of accent colors, like yellow, grey, and silver. The stickers on their shins and shoulders are fully painted, as are those arm wheels, amongst other details.

Rod’s revolver-joint articulation may also be the best of the four sculpts. On top of the same joints shared by the other three, we’ve got the proper revolver-joint shoulders from Megatron and Starscream, without any of Starscream’s sculpt blockage, and, unlike the other three molds, the ab crunch has been upgraded, letting it have more than one ratchet-click of use upwards and downwards. And while Rod doesn’t have any heel spurs, their feet are big enough to support plenty of poses.

I think Hot Rod’s got the most accessories out of this group. For hands, we’ve got those now-familiar closed fists, a pointing right hand, and, best of all, a thumbs-up left hand. There’s an additional two accessory-holding hands, designed for a pair of accessories: Two dark-grey pistols.

While the idea seems to be that they’re based on the ones the original toy came with (and some of their asymmetrical details loosely line up with those two weapons), they’re much shorter and thicker than the originals. But doing them as smaller pistols really works, and it’s fun to put Rod in dual-wielding John Woo-type situations, which is even easier since Rod also comes with the same three-part figure stand as Starscream.

Lastly, Rod’s got an alternate head, with shades over their eyes, like the “lookout mountain” scene from the original movie, with the shades being colored in a nice blue-to-white gradient.

However, it’s still the same too-small, mushy-looking headsculpt as their main head, and it’s also unbelievably difficult to swap Rod’s heads, harder than Megatron was, thanks to that post-Starscream sculpted-in thick neck. Seriously, I needed tweezers to separate the neck from the tiny revolver joint.

Overall

These four figures are all definitely showing their age in terms of design, sculpt (even putting aside the Dreamwave influences) and engineering, and it’s true that modern high-end figures can definitely do and be more. That being said, I think they do have a charm all of their own in 2021, helped by how unique they are, in a sea of more slavish G1 cartoon homages.

The smaller size, plus the fact that they all feel really sturdy and durable puts them in a different category than your Figmas and Figuarts to me, one that’s still above your rank and file Hasbro 6-inchers in terms of quality. They make good desk toys, and they have a knock-about feeling to them that makes me pick them up and fiddle with them a lot more than some more modern items. Plus, they’re a charming callback to a time when Masterpieces, unofficial Third Party, and general licensed stuff was much less frequent, before today’s RED, ReAction, Super 7, Flame Toys and so forth segmented the market for pricey, collector-oriented Transformers figures.

I don’t know if I can recommend these Revoltechs over one of those, but I will say that directly comparing them to more modern offerings is very apples and oranges, and that these four are doing something unique and charming all to themselves. That being said, I don’t think they’re worth high-end-figure prices in this day and age. Luckily, the secondary market seems to provide, as I sometimes see them go for about 30 or 40 Canadian on eBay, which may be just about right (and I’ve seen them go for a bit less at toy shows, when they pop up). As a historical curiosity, novelty, or desk toy, they might just be worth that tag. Out of all four, I’d say Starscream turned out the best, so if only one’s on the table, I’d go with that one.

To tie the historical part of this up, there were a few more Revoltechs after this, albeit released sporadically. From 2011-2012, three were produced based on Dark of the Moon: Optimus, Bumblebee, and a deluxe Optimus with his jetpack from that film. These were at a slightly larger scale, and were more screen-accurate than the previous G1 crop. I had the non-jetpacked Optimus for awhile, and appreciated his details and articulation, but wasn’t as enamored with him as these earlier ones.

Much later, in 2019, a new G1 Optimus was produced (from the “Amazing Yamaguchi” series, if you’re looking it up) that was more G1 cartoon-accurate, and was at a third, even larger scale (around the size of a mainline Deluxe). I’ll admit I was always a bit curious to see how the line had changed in over a decade, but its high price tag, and the fact that I have way more options for a G1 Optimus these days, kept me clinging to these four more unique, stylized, older ones.