Ultra Magnus and Ironhide seem to be two characters in the Transformers Prime toyline who weren’t slotted to appear in the television show, but got multiple toys as if they were important characters anyway. (Well, okay, we didn’t get Ironhide’s larger toy as himself, but as Kup, but the concept still stands.) That Ultra Magnus got two toys caused some folks to speculate that he’d show up in Season 2, but SPOILERS: he did not.
Now that I have Ultra Magnus’s Voyager Class toy, I dunno if I’m sad that this awesome design isn’t in the show or grateful that a non-show character has a toy strong enough to make me like it this much. ’Cuz I do. Like it this much, that is. It’s a charismatic chunk of fossil fuels. If he were real, I’d follow him anywhere. It doesn’t hurt that Ultra Magnus borrows pretty heavily from the Animated version of the character, with his big truck-front shoulderpads and the massive hammer. And it super-doesn’t hurt that this Ultra Magnus is founder of the Wreckers, and you know me and my Wreckers. (The massive hammer really helps him fit in with the iconography of that group.)
His transformation is pretty simple, but clever enough that Magnus doesn’t look simple. Magnus basically lies down and stuff folds around his robot parts to form a truck. My favorite part is the two pairs of rear wheels which unfold from vehicle mode to wrap around his shins. The only annoying part are his fairly loose shoulders. They’re not quite stiff enough, and so they easily sag under the weight of his large weapon.
His large weapon, as I mentioned, is a giant hammer, but its default mode is an equally-large gun. Like the other electronic-light-up weapons of the Transformers Prime Voyager Class toys, one mode is transformed into the other through spring-lever action. Unlike the other weapons, though, Magnus has a latch that locks the weapon into his ax mode so it can stay there without you having to hold it in place with your fingers. This is very good, ‘cuz Magnus needs his friggin’ hammer and I care much less about the gun. It can also stow on his back if you want to keep his hands free.
There’s a second accessory, a missile launcher with a red missile that looks like a call-out to the missile launchers of the original Ultra Magnus. You can peg it wherever.
I imagine Magnus knows Bulkhead, the former Wrecker. I wanna know more details of their shared history, though I doubt we’ll get any anytime soon. We’re also expecting a whole combiner team of Wreckers soon, too, so Magnus won’t always be so lonely. (Of course, before then we’ll get a Fall of Cybertron Magnus toy which will probably work better aesthetically with them, but meh.)
How big does he end up being? He looks really nice, but Ultra Magnus should be big.
He’s the same size as the other Voyagers of the line.
Me want it!!
Hmmm. On the one hand, I don’t really dig his vehicle mode.
On the other, I don’t actually display any of my TFs in vehicle mode (only leaving them there for short periods while playing with them), and I do really like his bot mode…
Walky, try using clear nail polish on the shoulders. Worked like a charm on mine and now he can properly hold his hammer.
Minus a few areas that sorely need paint I am loving this guy. He needs a new weapon though, that gun/hammer is just too unweildly. I’m going to try reinforcing his shoulders with some super glue but that weapon is just so massive I don’t think it’ll manage to do the trick for long.
The super glue trick actually does wonders for the shoulders, they’ve ended up far sturdier than I thought they would. By the way, you have Magnus slightly mistransformed, the truck roof backpack actually has tabs that peg into the notches on the shoulder struts that joint out from his chest. This will result in the backpack being higher and up behind his head, which admittedly doesn’t look as good, but it will help lock those shoulder struts in place. It does however result in the peg hole on his back being perpendicular to the ground so if you do use the back to store the weapon so it might look a little better in that regard.
I find that the backpack pegs into the shoulder struts when it is in the lower, angled position – that is, with the base of it right against his butt. You have to push up on it a little while pushing diagonally down on the struts to get it to peg in (this is easiest done before rotating the bumpers down), but then after that it’s solid. I actually haven’t been able to get it pegged in while perpendicular to the ground.
I can try and take a pic when I get home from work later; it certainly works on mine. I’ll have to see if I can get it pegged in the angled position, but the perpendicular to the ground position also frees up room for the waist joint and creates line of sight light piping for the chest.
I get line of sight light piping on the chest too, but his waist and hips are a bit restricted. Not much though; when there’s a conflict they just shove the backpack backwards a bit without disengaging it from the shoulders. Personally I like it in the angled position; besides being lower behind the head, it also looks a bit sleeker.
This toy looks great! I’m looking forward to finding one eventually. Things like this make me hope that the rumors are true and Disney buys out Hasbro. Disney money will get us bigger casts in animated productions.
I wish I could be impressed by him, but I dislike his big gun’s gun mode and without it on him it’s even more clear that he doesn’t know what he transforms into. The mini-him clearly transforms into a flatbed truck carrying a very nice-looking artillery cannon; this one looks more like it transforms into 3/4 of a bus. With obvious visible legs.
On the other hand he looks great in robot mode, and he’s quite fun to transform back and forth for a shellformer. It’s just a shame that his vehicle mode is so weak.
So, I got all the Bots (and Cons) from the first season I wanted and I said to myself “My Prime-Collection is complete now.” and what does Hasbro? Making a whole bunch of awesome toy-only characters.
Damnit, I really want Ultra Magnus. He looks awesome.
Ax mode!
He might still show up in season 3.
He’s apparently getting a Weaponizer in the Beast Hunters line. Meaning Aligned Ultra Magnus will have a figure in four out of five size classes.
Ultra Magnus (alongside with Dreadwing, Starscream and Bulkhead) finally hit German shelves, today I finally got the time to pick him up.
And I aside from his slightly loose shoulders, he’s a pretty fantastic voyager.
What is up with the mount points on the truck bed? Do you only plug one in at a time or what? They’re too close together to plug them in at the same time, unless you angle them out and then it doesn’t grip very well. Am I doing something wrong?