Beast Wars Inferno

I have mentioned before that I love the Beast Wars series. Last time, I showed a Transmetals toy. But now to show one of the figures of the '97 assortment, and one of the craziest characters to pop up in the show itself. I'm talking about Beast Wars Inferno!



Inferno's beast mode is of course a massive fire ant, being a Mega Class figure of the time. (the next step up from Deluxe) He's mostly translucent metallic red and red, with some black and grey in plastic colors. Paint is very sparse in this mode, with sea green patterns on the top of the abdomen and thorax behind the head and dark blue for the bug eyes. About the only things that stick out in this mode would be the halves of the robot mode pelvis to either side of where the abdomen meets the thorax. The mandibles are on springs for chomping action. I won't go into articulation here as he doesn't really support his own weight in this mode that well.

How about a size comparison?



Yeah, that's MP Sideswipe. Yeah, this guy is a pretty big fire ant.



The transformation is very simple, though the mandibles do need to be pulled out of the ant head. The robot mode looks ever so maniacal with that grin plastered on his face. The white and red for his chompers and eyes is about the only new colors revealed in this mode...from the front. Before we go there, let's cover articulation. He's got roughly ten points. It doesn't sound like much, but the waist is the ONLY point that ISN'T ball jointed. However...his hands are molded so that they're palm up when the elbow is positioned to bend forward. And his weapons plug on to the backs of his wrist. Wait. Weapons?



Why yes, of course he has two weapons! His ant mandibles form something of a pincher claw, and a spring loaded missile launcher comes out from inside there. And where are the missiles? Why, cleverly hidden in plain sight as the rear ant legs! It's not something you see much of anymore these days, although it does mean that without them the ant mode looks incomplete. You can leave the launcher inside the mandibles if you wish, and sliding it forward will force the mandibles to stay open. Pushing forward a little more will fire the missile, allowing this gimmick to work in ant mode too. But about that rear...



Some light blue shows up...along with roughly a ton of silver inside the abdomen which has opened up like a flower into a spinning jet thruster. All four pieces are merely clipped onto the spinning ring in case you try to fold them out too far, and peg together with little effort required. The bottom panel (the one with the hole for the plunger to fit through) has the energon chip, which is virtually the same thing as the rub symbols. In this case, the Predacon symbol should appear when a bit of heat is applied. The plunger can be pushed to let the panels spin like they do on the show when Inferno is flying, but there's a few problems with it. It only gets like one revolution before stopping dead, not unlike Movie Blackout's rotor gimmick. Also like Blackout's rotor gimmick, and even Incinerator's, trying to push it repeatedly as it's still spinning tends to make it skip and not actually make it spin longer. The plunger is also a bit too close to the spinning panels. (to the point where even a kid might have trouble) And finally, it's really uncomfortable to be pushing that plunger, as there's no pad at the end to distribute the pressure it puts back on the user's fingers. Still, it was a cool idea at the time. Robot mode size comparison GO!



Do I recommend this figure? For $30 or a bit more, YES. Assuming you're into Beast Wars figures, that is. If not, he's probably not gonna win nay-Sayers over. Back in the day, this figure shelfwarmed like crazy, enough to rename his Transmetal version Scavenger...who also shelfwarmed like crazy. Stores filled with colonies of Inferno and Transmetal Scavenger...heh. Point is, Inferno shouldn't be too hard to find, but try to get a complete one. And a Beast Wars Megatron of some sort for him to serve unquestioningly. And with that, I have just one more image to share...



 FOR THE ROYALTY!!!!

Nice review!   Pretty cool transformation and gimmicks too. Down where I live we have fire ants the size of MP Sideswipes missile launcher. Tough little bastards too. You can stomp on them and they keep on going.

I got a good deal on mine! Awesome character, great toy.