Grimlock

Him No Bozo, Him King

Hasbro, Transformers Toyline, 1984

No, you’re not reading this wrong. This isn’t a repeat of last week’s review; it’s an examination of a related toy. It would seem that in the closing months of the last year of the first decade of the new millennium, we’ve defined ourselves as a culture – at least from an entertainment standpoint – by how we’ve reimagined what we’ve enjoyed in the past. Last week’s entry was a discussion of a toy from a cartoon that was based partially off a movie a few years old and a cartoon series a few decades old (which the movie was ALSO based off). Dizzying, yes?

This isn’t to cast judgment on this phenomena. Personally speaking, I believe there have been some wonderful successes in this whole run of remakes and reimaginings. And while I won’t deny I grow weary of it, I also get super-psyched about some of the titles that are next up. Still, it’s fun to go back to the original inspirations and view them for what they are. In some ways, they don’t stand up to the test of time. And in some ways, they really do.

　

Background

I won’t rehash what we’ve already established about Grimlock as a character. He’s the leader of the Dinobots, which are giant robots that transform into dinosaurs. And that sentence is probably all you really need to know to establish this guy’s awesomeness. Oh, and he breathes fire.

Appearance – 3 out of 5

This is a pretty average toy. While this review is based off the Gen-2 line, it’s a near-carbon copy of the original Gen-1 line (the difference being the color – gun-metal gray traded for deep blue – and materials – die-cast metal traded for hard plastic). The character looks pleasantly similar to the character from the cartoon and is nicely proportioned. Screws and joints can be seen but they’re not garish and tend to be worked into the overall look and feel of the toy. There are some nice textures but nothing that truly stands out.

Construction – 2 out of 5

Once again, we have to confront an unpleasant truth about the Gen-1 Transformers toys which is that they were not the perfect toys overall. This toy is considerably top-heavy in robot mode and you find you have to extend his arms fully forward just to keep him from falling over. This lack of balance, coupled with some weak joints (principally the knees and the flaps of his dinosaur-mode torso), makes this toy a little unlikely to survive years and years of play.

Movement – 2 out of 5

Grimlock is deceptively disappointing when it comes to movement. At first, it appears like this toy has some pretty decent mobility. But upon inspection, most of the mobility is as much due to its transformation process as it is to simulate the movement in the robot mode. The hips and knees move only in line with their transformation process, the arms have no elbows, and there are no hip or neck rotators.

Fortunately, in Dinosaur mode, things improve. The tail doesn’t move and the head has a range of motion of maybe 15 degrees, but the legs (the arms in robot mode) sprout knee joints (that go both ways for some reason) that can simulate some varieties of walking and running.

Extras – 2 out of 5

Grimlock comes with two weapons: a gun and a sword. The weapons aren’t terribly well-made or uniquely designed which, when you consider that there’s nowhere for them to go when he’s in dinosaur mode, makes them feel sort of slapped onto the toy. The gun is pretty standard for Transformers (and most toys) of the era, but the sword is really kind of poor and is little more than a shard of plastic. Add these passingly adequate weapons to his lack of elbow or wrist joints and one almost asks ‘why bother’.

Packaging – 3 out of 5

Transformers packaging was the yardstick back in the day and many toy makers can (or at least should) still learn a lot from them. The ID card with a personal quote, character description, and stats was frickin’ brilliant. The beautiful artwork was just that; art. And the points that could (in theory) be redeemed to buy Reflector just added to the near-mythical nature of the packaging.

Overall – 3 out of 5

Like my Devastator review, I’m sure this will cause some controversy. Lord knows, I feel a little ashamed. But this toy, when viewed objectively, has its faults. Mostly in the form of its mobility, there’s a lot left wanting. My single biggest complaint might actually be a little surprising but it’s the lack of size. The Dinobots are supposed to be huge, even compared to the other giant robots they are surrounded by. And they turn into dinosaurs, with their leader being the king of the giants, the Tyrannosaur Rex. Grimlock doesn’t convey that sense of size here. True, most of the Transformers toys were originally fairly uniform in height, but I figure this should have been the first toy to break with that. Optimus Prime might be the beloved child of the Transformers franchise, but this is Grimlock we’re talking about here. This is the King. And the king should’ve been bigger, dammit.