Retro Bot Reviews: Transformers: Titans Return Leader Overlord

Out of all of the Prime Wars Trilogy, 2016-2017’s Titans Return was by far my favorite, striking a good balance of solid, poseable updates of classic characters, mixed in with a gimmick that added to them without being too obtrusive. The line’s main feature was the Titan Masters, minifigures who transformed into each robot’s head, and when they weren’t doing that, could pilot their vehicle modes, and hang out in their base modes.

Beyond the gimmick, the mix of updated characters was a big part of the appeal for me. Between the North American line, and its Japanese Legends counterpart, we saw the best non-Masterpiece versions of characters like Kup, Windblade, and Hot Rod that money can buy. It was an eclectic mix of late 80’s bots, movie characters, IDW Comics originals, and a few long-standing fan demands, of which Overlord was one.

This giant Decepticon has an odd history. His original late 80’s toy was never released in North America, only showing up in Japan and Europe, making him a collector’s white whale to begin with. In Japan, he had a starring role in the Masterforce anime, where, instead of being his own Transformer, he was a mech powered and controlled by two villainous humans. In Europe, he didn’t appear in any fiction except for promotional writeups, where he was instead a dangerous warlord from another dimension.

As if this didn’t make him popular enough, the real mania over the character began in 2010, when he was introduced into IDW’s Transformers comics as the main villain in the fan-favorite miniseries Last Stand of the Wreckers. Frighteningly powerful, with a twisted, sadistic personality, and a fixation on challenging, or just getting noticed by Megatron, he’d become a favorite to a new generation of fans, and go on to reappear several more times in the IDW-Verse. In response to this, he finally received a new, Leader-class toy in the Titans Return line. His updated figure is an outstanding example of how solid, straightforward, and playably fun the whole line was, as well as an excellent representation of the villain.

Base Mode

Just like the original toy, Overlord has a base mode for smaller figures, though this release decided to put its own spin on it, rather than meticulously copy the original. Simple in design, it’s basically a tower, two turrets, and a pair of ramps on either side, with a gun in the middle. The spire in the middle of the base, and the two turrets on either end suggest a castle to me.

His colors are typically late 80s Decepticon: Black, two kinds of blue, off-white, some purple, and a few clear orange bits, subdued, but still very retro-looking. One source of controversy is the fact that a number of his details are provided not by paint, but by pre-applied foil stickers. I’ve heard reports of them easily flaking off, or being improperly applied in-box. This wasn’t a problem with the one I got, but it’s something to look out for. Toyhax makes a sticker set for him that you can use to upgrade him, if you don’t like these stickers.

In terms of what he does, the real fun comes from the base’s Titan Master pegs, but before that, let’s talk about the one he comes with. His own Titan Master is called Dreadnaught, and is designed after one of the two Powermasters the original toy came with. Some of the line’s Titan Masters come rather under-painted, but not this guy, who balances out a black and grey body with a blue and yellow face. Like all Titan masters, he’s got poseable shoulders, a neck, and fused-but-movable knees and hips. He’s also got an upside-down face on his back, since he becomes a head.

Most importantly, his feet have two tiny holes in them, which interact with pegs throughout the base, letting him stand securely on it. Each Titan Master has these holes, and the idea is that if you have a bunch, your base becomes a staging ground for miniature battles and dioramas. Really, this also works for any other small figures, too, like Micro Machines Star Wars figurines. For best effect, Dreadnaught can be placed at the very top of the base’s tower, on top of a transparent orange platform.

 

Transformation to Vehicles

Overlord’s a unique design, in that he splits into two vehicles, a tank and a jet. He’s also pretty easy to transform, and I was able to figure it out just from looking at photos. That being said, he’s not too simple. Instead, it’s straightforward and fun to collapse the base’s ramps into a whole tank, and unfold the castle towers into a jet. The jet does engage in some straight-up partsforming, though, with you having to manually remove and replace the cockpit into a new position.

Vehicle Mode, Tank Half

This boxy tank is roughly the size of a chunky deluxe Transformer, and out of all of his forms, oozes “this is a retro toy from the late 80s” more than anything else in this set. One clever thing about his design is that the balance of his colors actually winds up being quite different between his two vehicles. The tank is mostly composed of his lighter blue and off-white colors, with a purple gun barrel made from plugging the base’s gun emplacement in, and a clear orange cockpit hatch on top. One bit of functionality that, unfortunately, gets sacrificed due to the transformation is that the tank turret doesn’t rotate, and the barrel doesn’t raise or lower. In terms of playability, though, Dreadnaught or another Titan Master can ride in the clear orange cockpit, and the tank can roll on three tiny wheels underneath.

Vehicle Mode, Jet Half

Also roughly deluxe-scaled, this scifi jet inherits almost all of the black from the toy, with only its side boosters inheriting the off-white and purple on him. It manages to look advanced and imposing, reminding me a bit of an angular, boxy version of the X-Men’s Blackbird.

Of course, like many Jetformers, looking underneath him exposes what’s clearly a folded up robot torso, but that’s the laws of mass for you. In terms of gimmickery, he also has a cockpit for a Titan Master to ride in, as well as deployable landing gear. His purple gun can be mounted on the back of the jet for a weapon, though that leaves the tank itself without its barrel.

Transformation to Robot

This is another easy, intuitive transformation, where, basically, the tank splits and unfolds into legs, the jet unfolds into a torso, and they connect at the waist. Dreadnaught balls up to form a head, which goes inside his helmet. Finally, the jet cockpit pops off, and where you put it depends on what feature you want to use.

Robot Mode

Overlord’s IDW comics design wasn’t a big departure from his original toy, so this towering, Leader-class figure is a pretty faithful rendition of both iterations of the character at once. His colors skew mostly towards blue in this mode, and he’s got a lot more painted detail exposed (which was obviously the priority deco-wise) thanks to his armored torso’s grey and blue accents, which even features molded missiles next to his abs. Underneath his blue helmet, the Titan Master face is painted silver with red eyes, and, to the disappointment of some, but the relief of others, doesn’t feature the same oddly full lips of his comics iteration.

Titans Return always featured great poseability on its robots, and this guy’s no exception, with fully poseable hips, knees, feet with Ankle Tilts, shoulders, elbows, and a neck. The one thing he feels like he’s missing, unfortunately, is a waist joint, thanks to that being the connecting point between his two vehicles. Aside from that, though, he’s very poseable, and thanks to his large, fold out feet, very stable as well.

In terms of accessories, that purble base cannon/tank barrel weapon now becomes a modestly-sized hand weapon, and the jet cockpit clips onto his arm to serve as a shield. If you want, the jet cockpit can also clip onto his back for storage.

For gimmicks, he’s got a weird, funny play feature that calls back to his original toy: The two Powermaster figures the original Overlord came with changed into engines that plugged into his chest in robot mode, and hid under a pair of panels. Flipping those same panels open on this figure reveals a couple of holes designed to hold Titan Masters when they’re in their head modes. In other words, you can attach a pair of heads to his chest. If you haven’t read the IDW comics, decapitating his enemies and wearing their faces on him is totally something Overlord would do. Just be careful, as not all Titan Masters are exactly the same size, so some will fit better than others.

While we didn’t know this at the time of his release, this feature also seemed to look forward to the Power of the Primes line, where the Titan Masters were re-imagined as Prime Masters, turning into abstract power cores instead of heads. If you have some of those, you can also plug them into his chest, more closely replicating that feature on the original toy.

The other gimmick is, of course, central to the Titans Return toyline: Any Titan Master can be used on Overlord’s head, be it something that seriously looks like it can fit, or something a bit more funny, like shown below. That level of customization was always really fun.

 

Overall

Overlord represents a faithful update of both the original toy and a faithful update of the IDW Comics character. Outside of that, he’s solid, poseable, playable, and just a good figure in general, the best official update to the character you can get. This is also a backdoor endorsement of the entire Titans Return toyline, which can be had for cheap nowadays, and which featured a lot of solid updates like this one. He’s more fun with a few Titan Masters to interact with, after all. However, if you don’t have any, or don’t plan on getting any, don’t let that stop you. He’s a solid robot on his own, a modern classic, and a worthwhile addition to anyone’s collection, if you don’t already have one.