I eat only cake.
Power Core Combiners are Hasbro’s new push for combiner team toys. The problem with combiners in the past is that they cost a lot to collect all the guys, and so kids rarely manage to get a whole team. So Hasbro’s trying a smaller kind of combiner where you get the whole set for $20. This means the limbs are just drones instead of separate robot guys, but it at least gives kids what they want for an affordable price. Toy interchangeability is also the rule of the day, so there’s smaller Power Core Combiners two-packs with just a torso and a Mini-Con partner. The idea is that the more guys you buy, the more ways you can swap an increasing number of limbs around an increasing number of torsos.
Smolder is one of those sold-separately torsos. What initially hooked me was his basic character conceit. He’s a Decepticon fire engine. A villainous rescue vehicle. That’s pretty fun, and has been done exactly once before in Transformers as far as my memory allows. (Barricade.) His name, Smolder, sweetened the deal. That’s new, great name, not recycled from anybody previous.
Birthday cake with a candle of me on the top, because it is my favorite food.
And his Mini-Con partner is an axe.
An axe named Chopster.
See how the layers of awesome are being set before us, one by one? This veritable house of awesome? Yeah, I see it too. Part of my brain is demanding of me that Smolder, the emergency officer with an axe, be characterized as Axe Cop. It kinda works! Except for the whole “he’s a bad guy” thing. And the “he’s the wrong colors” thing. Well, maybe Shattered Glass Smolder would be Axe Cop…
Our worst enemy is a lamp that comes alive early in the morning.
Anyway, the toys themselves… they’re okay! It should come as no surprise, looking at him, that none of Chopster’s modes are particularly fully-realized. He has four of them, after all! He transforms into an axe, a robot, a flame cannon, and chest armor for Smolder. All of them look like a dude folded up, save the dude mode. Chopster is saved by the awesome name and the whole being-an-axe thing.
I guess I'll marry some lady now.
Smolder’s much better, but not fantastic. He has a pretty conventional transformation from vehicle to robot, and it leaves him with super-long and massive arms. Either you position his hands down by his knees or you put his elbows up at his collarbone. Those are your choices. They’re really, really long arms.
Since he’s a Power Core Combiner torso, Smolder combines with the limbs that come with the $20 full-combiner toys. This means he has a third torso mode with a second, bigger head that flips out. He’s not terribly stable in this mode, but it’s fun to put together. When you plug in the vehicles for his limbs, they automatically convert into arms or legs. It’s pretty neat to see.
In a weird convergence of reality, the “Cyber Missions” episode with Smolder and Chopster went online today. Chopster screams like a little girl and runs away.
I like this guy too. I like to keep his big noggin’ out to match with the funky giant arms. It makes for a more cartoony set of proportions that work quite well.
His vehicle mode is nicely solid and that flaming decepticon logo is fun.
I really love the concept of PCC’s but have yet to purchase any for 2 reasons.
1. I worry about the stability. the combined modes all look really floppy.
2. I’m waiting for wave 2 and Grimstone the Dinobot Combiner!
I was hooked when I got Huffer and the Combaticon team. The others (rest of Wave 1)should be in any day now. I also enjoy having the affordable combiners, I just want more parts to mess around with!
Huffer? What’s his altmode, a trailer home?
Tow truck actually. I’ll probably get it next myself.
Ya know I have yet to see a full on combiner team around here. i hope to get the aerial bot one myself.
I haven’t seen any at retail yet…the local stores cleared out their TF sections and haven’t gotten any new stock in. I actually JUST got in the rest of Wave 1 of the PCC, straight from Hasbro.
according to the instructions (I know, who reads those, am I right?) that is the correct transformation for vehicle weapon mode.
No. It’s really not. Look at them again, the instructions tell you to transform the legs. They’re not transformed in this picture.
According to the cyber missions, these guys are movie characters, I guess?
Well, to keep in line with the rich mythology of Axe Cop, you could just have SG Barricade just find Chopster sitting around the same way in the first Axe Cop comic “One day at the scene of a fire, a cop found the perfect fire axe. He became Axe Cop.”
An evil fire engine is a lot more novel than an evil police car, I’d say. We all have plenty of mental images to go along with evil police officers, but evil fire fighters? The best thing I’m coming up with is Fahrenheit 451 – and by best, I mean only.
If he’s an evil fire engine, does that mean he sneaks into your house at night and replaces your good batteries in your smoke dector with dead batteries
I guess he could be a firefighter in the Fahrenheit 451 sense.
He’s mistransformed in all those pics except the one of Chopster in bot mode.
You can put him in a gorilla pose for a “TRUKK NOT MONKEY” photo op.
Gosh, I love Smolder and Chopster – they’re the only PCCs I have, but mostly I love them because for once Hasbro managed a more or less accurate fire rig altmode. Also I just heard about the value 7-packs that TRU is going to put out, so I’ll get Searchlight and some limbs with that.
In addition – did you know that your blog posts no longer show up on your LJ RSS feed? This is most vexing, since I like your toy posts best.