Toy review - Studio Series 34 Megatron (leader)

[Magnus]

Series - Generations
Sub-line - Studio Series
Size/class - Leader
New/remould/redeco - New
Wave - 2
Released here - June 2020
Approximate Retail Price - $49 (Big W Toy Mania 2020 sale price)
Approximate Size - 19cm
Allegiance - Decepticon
Alt-mode - Mack Granite semi-trailer
Main Features/Gimmicks - Screen accuracy; licensed vehicle mode
Main Colours - Beige, brown, grey
Main Accessories - shotgun, cloth cloak, rubberised straps, Igor


Vehicle mode







Looking like he drove off the set of a Mad Max movie, Megatron is a customised Mack Granite truck towing a tank semi-trailer. The entire rig is 34.5cm long.

The tractor is moulded in beige-grey plastic, with metallic brown paint applied to simulate dirt. The grille and its spikes are moulded in soft plastic. The truck cab otherwise seems a bit plain, but this is because the on-screen truck had more details, such as the four rear view mirrors and some netting.

The trailer is partly moulded in the same beige-grey, with some darker grey and a bit of painted silver. There are moulded chains to add detail to the trailer, but its appearance is somewhat uneven, with one section showing curved parts that clearly belong to the robot mode. This is where the cloth cloak comes in - you're meant to drape it over this section of the trailer as a tarp and secure it with the rubberised straps, which resemble several chains braided together. The straps hook onto the underside of the trailer.







Ground clearance for some robot parts under the trailer is an issue, so not all ten wheels may roll.

Igor



Megatron includes his little minion, Igor. A head with arms and legs, Igor is cast in grey plastic with a painted green face. His shoulders have ball-and-socket joints, while his legs are joined and pivot back and forth on a common axis. He stands a little under 3cm tall.

Transformation

Somewhat involved, but not too complex. The upper torso is simple enough, but the lower legs are surprisingly complex, as the entire truck cab twists and collapses to form them.

Robot mode









Megatron stands at about 19cm to the top of the head. This is with the correct, screen-accurate digitigrade legs, which are bent back at the knees and forward again at a second joint below; if you stretch them out fully, he stands at just under 20cm.

Megatron's articulation is fairly good - the head is mounted on a ball joint, but sideways rotation is hindered by the shape of the collar.

The shoulders rotate forwards and backwards and abduct/adduct in and out, so he can raise his arms up to create a T-pose. There is a rotator that gives limited outward movement just below the shoulder, as well as a rotator between the two joints of the dual-jointed elbow. There is a wrist hinge that gives deviation, so his hands can be 'cocked' up or down relative to the forearm.

The hips rotate the legs in two axes, the knees ratchet, and the second joint below the knee also ratchets. There are rotators just above the knee and below the second joint, and the 'toes' have a rotator that simulates inversion.



The 'chains' wrap around his torso, with the hooks now on his backpack.



The cloth cloak really adds to the look. The idea of a robot wearing a cloak is one that by all rights should not work, yet the concept artists for Dark of the Moon managed to make it work.





Megatron is armed with his distinctive shotgun-like weapon, moulded in grey plastic with some silver paint. This weapon can tab into a port on his back for storage. However, it suffers the same issue a lot of Transformers' weapons have of only being fully sculpted on one side and partially 'hollowed out' on the other due to the way it was moulded.

There are some small ports on Megatron that Igor can peg onto in both modes.





I'm glad to finally have a nice, larger scale version of this iteration of Megatron, but that doesn't mean it's without issues. The torso has similar 'hollowness' issues to the voyager figure from RotF, but these aren't noticeable unless you're looking at the figure side-on with both arms stretched behind his back, or looking down directly from above. In the case of the latter, it's a non-issue if you have the cloak on, since the shoulders are covered.

It's a little disappointing to see that his back is basically a single large slab with some detail moulded into it, instead of something that has a bit more definition and shape, but it's not as if people will be displaying him with his back out.





The package insert is an image of Megatron's African hideout in the Serengeti.

Verdict



I've waited eight years for a leader-class DotM Megatron, with his shotgun and a cloth cloak. While he's a bit smaller than I'd like and has a couple of issues, Hasbro/TakaraTOMY have delivered. Recommended if you like movieverse Megatron in general and DotM Megatron in particular.