FOC Grimlock

Ok at the request of Six shot, I review, FOC Grimlock



This is, Grimlock's second time as a voyager class figure, the last one being TFA

Robot mode, fairly nice, at first, I was a little disappointed in his colours, mainly to the yellow, I think its because I am use to looking at MP Grimlock more than TFA! In size, he quite large in robot mode, I don't know how he stacks up against other voyagers beyond TFA Grimlock because I not had him out of his packing long! He has a gimmick of a light up chest in robot mode, the light doesn't do the head, but he has great light piping in his head, better than some of the other figures in like the Deluxe class, where its clear they are meant to have light piping but someone suddenly went and painted over their eyes for no reason at all and that takes away from the toy!



The light is a powerful LED that's stored in the Dino mode head and I mean powerful because it lights up the chest but shines through the grey plastic of the Dino head!



Thou he is nice, he is far from a prefect toy because, his back is completely hollow and despite having the Dinohead in there, for robot mode, there are still holes where you can peer into his body!



The Dino mode, he shrinks a bit, the transformation, is fairly simple, yet it can be a little troublesome on one of his legs from robot to Dino because of the connectors for making his tail, it takes a bit of fiddling to get it to move!



The details on Grimlock is good, along his tail there is good details same goes for his legs and arms!



Movement for Dinomode, isn't as great as TFA's due to the way he been designed, the part that sticks up on his back by his head, that is the switch for the light gimmick, it also triggers his jaw to move a bit! The dino arms are on ball joints, what is his elbows in robot mode, are his knees, but due to how he transforms, the upper parts of his legs don't move, so stop motion, in this mode, is limited unless you wish to disconnect the legs from the body, but then he goes down a notch more in size and looks silly!



His underbelly is hollow, thou you can see the robot mode head, it faces away so a bit of a lesson from TFA has been learned!



He comes with a sword and shield, there are four places they can attach but two are suited to robot mode only as they are right down by his feet, thou if you have him, your welcome to put them there but they'll be in the way there! What I would of loved to have seen with the shield, is like DOTM leader Sentinel's shield handle that lets him hold it in robot mode, in his hand, but a last, he can only have it on his arms! The sword on the other hand, can go in his hands or on his arms but neither weapon can be combined or combined with any other weapon that I know of!



Ok, time to put him to the comparison against TFA



TFA Dino mode is taller, but FOC is longer and a lot more sleek



Robot mode, FOC wins the height contest



Final thoughts, he is a good attempt at Grimlock but, there are issues and really, Hasbro & Takara should learn lessons from this one and TFA, example, TFA you have a lot of movement in Dino mode leg, where's FOC doesn't have that! One of the things they could of done, is make the shield, his dino mode chest plate to hide the insides, also, I prefer TFA tail end over FOC because it just folds up onto the side of his legs, where's FOC has some trouble with it! The Dino mode arms, placement is down to you, really, I didn't bother to look at the instructions when I got him out of his packing, he that simple to transform, but then, most of the time, beastformers are simple transformations! Personally, in terms of looks, FOC is the second best Grimlock after MP, at least that's what I think, I never had the alt one of him! I give Grimlock a 4 out of five, good, but could of been better, a hybrid of ideas from TFA and FOC would give us a near prefect Grimlock as a general toy but a last! Anyway, want him, get him before he gets you!

Nice review as always, SOP! Mine came in the mail yesterday. I'm not too crazy about the peach? beige? or whatever color they used that's obviously supposed to be gold. A metallic, gold flake enamel would have been perfect in those spots. If Takara makes a better version (and I'm sure they will) I might just spring for that one instead.

The transformation is really simple. At least Hasbro bothered to tuck away the dinosaur head this time and not try and pass off the tail as a weapon (see: Classics Grimlock). Overall, it's a really aesthetically pleasing figure to look at. I'd have preferred the head be more G1'sh. But I'm sure some 3rd party company is working overtime now trying to get one into production. Head kits seem to get made 5-1 by these 3rd party companies over any other add on part.

Dino mode....I'm not really going to get into. Not really all that impressive. As SOP mentioned, the lower dino legs are stationary and have no range of motion. There's probably not a lot of good poses you'd be able to pull off anyways with that huge ass tail, though....But, I can live with an inferior dino mode as long as the robot mode kills it.

Looking forward to the "rumored" deluxe dinobots: Slug, Snarl, Sludge and Swoop. I hope they don't get cancelled. Hasbro's engineering team hasn't instilled a lot of faith in me over the last several years. And with less toy to work with...I can easily see QC concerns sidelining the rest of these....or worse yet, outright cancelled.

I can't wait to see what Takara does with Grimlock, I hope they don't plan to make him a Arms micron figure because he should stay as a Generations line one, I'm not very keen on the arms micron because the plastic can be weak in places!

Heads, I hope a third party gives him a more G1ish head but with optional eye colours, I mean, on the MP toy, I keep robot mode with red and Dino with his baby blues , so I hope to see a more G1 look about his head if a third party takes up the challenge!

I also hope Hasbro makes the rest of the Dinobots, thou I hope Sludge is a voyager because other wise, the whole of Grimlock's boys will most likely end up looking rather small and out of scale with their boss! The TFA ones are ok, thou I say out of the TFA Dinobots, Swoop is about the best, thou that's my personal view!