Arms Micron AM-22 Dreadwing

Transformers Prime's Voyager price-point kind of got off to a less than pleasing start for many fans. The first two waves contained Optimus, Bulkhead, Megatron, and Starscream. They already had figures in the First Edition line, and the former two were Voyagers in that line. Then along came Dreadwing. Since you've read the title by now, you know that this is going to be a review on Takara's take on the mold.



First up though is Dreadwing's Arms Micron buddy, Jigu. Instead of the sword and Powerizer cannon...thing, you get to build Jigu! He's a blue plastic robotic shark with a translucent aqua-blue 'Mystic' SP energon crystal. The rest is stickers, and thankfully almost all go on flat surfaces so they should stay put. Hopefully. Jigu converts into a gun that vaguely resembles his cannon in the show. The instructions and box show him combining with Ida (from Airachnid) and Gra (from Knock Out) to make the Claw Spear Combo weapon. I have neither of them. He can also combine with Magi (from Cylas Breakdown) and either Dago R or Dago F (from Rumble and Frenzy respectively) for the Astro Blaster Super Combo...which I can't do either.



On a side note, officially the bottom part of the tail is supposed to swing down to the position you see here. Problem is, with any figure aside from maybe a Vehicon, a little something called their forearm gets in the way of that and them holding it straight. Oh well.



Now for Dreadwing himself! His alternate mode I believe is based on the F-35 Lightning fighter jet...if said jets had bulky robot arms and legs shoved underneath them. Cast in lighter blue and darker grey than his Hasbro counterpart, he seems to still have the same translucent yellow and midnight blue bendy plastic bits. For paint, he's got some silver and gold meant for robot mode. Everything else is stickers that you apply yourself. Oddly, they ask you to sticker up the top and bottom of the wing and stabilizer flaps even though the underside isn't easily visible in robot mode. There's also a bonus sticker in the form of Autobot kills. I haven't found a good place for it to go, so I've left it off. There's a 5 mm port under each wing if you feel like arming him up, and the port on the top of the fuselage behind the canopy offers a great spot to stick Jigu so he doesn't get lost.

...Wait. A blue and gold character with a 'shark' gun? I swear I've heard of a character like this before... Must be imagining things. Better do a size comparison.



That's First Edition Voyager Optimus, by the way. Dreadwing also has a fold down landing gear in the nose. The other two are molded in under the legs. He can sit there like a rock and that's it. Yay! /mock enthusiasm

Let's get into the transformation. It's pretty straightforward with his arms and legs folding out from underneath, meaning you can indeed do a 'gerwalk' mode. Do I have a pic of that? No. But I do have a pic of the robot mode.



Dreadwing's robot mode comes off as very clean. Wings? They've condensed a bit, and I would expect a flyer to have them. Where did the thruster/rudders go? That folded up along the back for a little jetpack. The only new color here is red on the eyes. He's supposed to get black stickers to go on the top of his feet...but mine ended up with two right feet and I frankly wouldn't know how long the stickers would stay there even if I did apply them. As the mold was unchanged from the Hasbro release, there's still the translucent yellow in the forearms for the Powerizer gimmick of letting an LED shine through the weapon and into the forearm, going up to point to the front of the gun as it deploys to give the idea of power flowing from the body into the weapon. I guess. A new port is revealed on the back to do the same thing except make the chest glow, but is just as good at storing Jigu or the Hasbro version's sword, which has a peg on the side to do just that. With a reasonable 15 points of articulation, plus the ability to adjust the shoulder armor to follow the arm a bit, Dreadwing doesn't slouch in the ability to pose...although his hands do appear a bit awkward when holding something.

You know, I still can't get over the idea that I've seen a blue winged robot with a thirst for 'justice' (read: vengeance) with a gold face and a fish gun... And I'd swear that the voice actor for that character was in the cartoon where Dreadwing came from... Anyway, size comparison time again, this time with another big blue bruiser!



I would recommend a Voyager Dreadwing, yes. But would I recommend Arms Micron Dreadwing? Only if you really need Jigu, and don't mind hunting down a sword for him to use. Or you can't find the Hasbro version for less. Skyquake appears to have a little more love put into his deco, but may be harder to track down whether you want the spark twins to be reunited or just want one version of this cool mold.

Good review, thou my computer not picking up your comparison pic for some reason! Anyway, personally I kind of like Hasbro colouring on Dreadwing but that's just me since I look at him quite often, plus the fact I have two of him, not sure why, don't really care either!