Friday, February 20, 2015

Age Of Extinction Grimlock (Part 2)

http://toyspileup.blogspot.sg/2015/02/age-of-extinction-grimlock-part-2.html

Last week, we had seen Grimlock in his alternate dinosaur mode which wasn't quite up to the  hype. This week, let us see if things improve for this popular character in his robot mode.


At first glance, this voyager class AOE Grimlock looks different from the G1 version. He lost all the bulkiness and is replaced by a more refine outlook. The figure itself is quite movie accurate except for the colors which consist of gold, grey, chrome, black and green while the movie version is metallic finish.


A closer look at the figure and you notice he had layers and layers of armors throughout his body. Many said that the outlook concept is based on an armored knight but I think he resemble more like a samurai than a knight. This is evident from the design of the shoulder plates that looks very much like the 'sode' as well as the waist area that looks to be the 'Yurugai no Ito'. Even the helmet looks like one.


The rear of the figure is pretty neat. Many parts of the figure like the legs and the head are hollow probably to reduce material=$. 

Front and Back view:


From the front and back, you can see the well planned color scheme with the 'armors' in brown gold, the black which looks to be Grimlock's skin color and the grey/silver being the decos and boots. 

Head shot: 


As mentioned earlier, the helmet looks similar to a samurai's helmet. It is brown in color with a silver crescent deco at the center of the helmet that looks like the fin of a shark. This is followed by some silvery armor covering what looks like Grimlock's original face which is in black. Look further you see two rows of sharp teeth at both side of the face with the middle covered by something that looks like a mouth plate. His eyes are in green similar to what he had in his dinosaur mode.

Proportions:


Grimlock's proportion isn't that great with his body short and limbs long. It looks to me that these were done on purpose to make him look tough to compensate for the loss in his bulkiness. This is especially so for the arms which certainly looks bigger in proportion than any other parts of his body.

Details:


One thing that pleases me about this version are some of the details that really caught my eye. One particular area is the set of bones decoration around the chest. 


Behind his head is where the dinosaur head is spitted into three sections; the left face, the right face and the jaw.


Left: There is a small Autobot logo found on his torso.I don't remember seeing this in the movie.
Right: The lower arms looks bulky with the legs from his dinosaur mode.


The spitted dinosaurs head that double as his Armour in robot mode looks awesome. This is added by the tooth design and chrome finishing that really made them stand out. The web patterned green eyes can be clearly seen here.


The only part that might look like Armour Knight could be the leg. Love the pointed end that angled up at the tip of the feet.

Accessories and Gimmicks:



Grimlock doesn't come with any build-in gimmick. However, he does comes with a spiked maul weapon that was seen previously as the tail extension in his dinosaur mode.  

 

There is a handle in the mid section where Grimlock can hold. Initially, it makes me wonder why a handle is needed as they could easily replaced Grimlock's close fist to an open one so that he can hold the maul by the rod but I guess the handle had other purpose.


The purpose of the handle is actually for storing the maul at the back of the figure.


See how the spiked maul is stored away. The handle slots into a hole around the hip section.


 This is how it looks with the maul stored.


When needed, Grimlock will unleash the maul to devastating effect.

Articulation: 


Articulation is decent with ball joints at most pivot areas. They are all pretty solid and will not feel breaking when rotated. As this version of Grimlock is less bulky, the movement of the limbs are easy with no blocking of neighboring parts which makes posing easy.


Summary:

After four years of waiting, Grimlock had finally made it to the big screen but despite granting everyone's wish by releasing him in the AOE, reviews around the world hasn't been very pleasing. The main reason has to be the new look which for some are welcoming while others are not. In my case, a new look is always welcome but somehow, I do not like what they did. 

The movie series robots mode far too often depends on a fixated form. The first few movie bots progresses from insects to organic alien beings. When the fourth came, the bots took a new form switching from aliens to armored warriors. Transformers are robots not aliens!


This Grimlock may have some decent amount of details on him in robot mode but I had to say, the dinosaur mode is very disappointing. I felt they should at least put in some extra effort for this popular character. Until now, I'm still wondering how a fierce looking T-Rex can turn out to look like a puppy.

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