Grimlock

“Me Grimlock like to munch metal!” Grimlock was always one of my favorite Transformers back when I was a kid. It’s funny that my other favorite was Skyfire, the complete opposite. Grimlock is a big, dumb monster while Skyfire is a gentle genius. But it’s easy to have a character who is tough, cruel, and stupid. What’s not easy to is to make the dope charming, and that’s where Grimlock in the cartoon succeeds. He’s not just a stupid, angry beast, he’s also child-like and that’s why he’s endearing. Oddly, both characters had the same voice actor.

So how’s the toy? Pretty nice! I’m a big fan of the Diaclone-derived early Transformers and the Dinobots, like Grimlock here, are no exception. This is a robot based on a decidedly outdated interpretation of what the prehistoric animal probably looked like, but that’s cool with me.

One of the strengths of these Diaclone-based toys is their level of detail. Grimlock is covered in neat little circuits and panels and the stickers really help the look. I especially like the clear plastic with the mechanical detail visible underneath. Very Henshin Cyborg. The toy has a cockpit where a Diaclone “Inchman” driver figure can fit comfortably. While I like the cartoon version of Grimlock quite a lot, I still really love the human pilot functionality of these toys.

There are a few changes from the original Diaclone Dinosaur Robo incarnation, but the most obvious is that the blue crotch on the Diaclone toy is changed to red for the Transformers version. I don’t have strong feelings either way, but the red diecast crotch looks nice with the robot’s eyes. Another change is that the teeth of the American release are not as sharp as on the Diaclone original.

The transformation is simple enough but fun to perform. The toy comes weapons including a blaster, missile launcher, and sword. The sword is a little shorter than I’d like and with its red color, reminds me strongly of Jumbo Machinder Great Mazinger’s little red butter knives, but the actual sculpting is pretty good.

While this is definitely one of the nicer toys from the original Transformers line, it’s always bugged me that the robot’s head looks like it is too far back. I really think it would help the toy a lot of there were a way to slide his robo noggin forward about a centimeter, but oh well. Another flaw to watch out for is that like most of the Diaclone-based Transformers, Grimlock is fairly easy to break if you are not careful. The toy has looks, personality, and a lot of features later Transformers in the original line were lacking. Though its legs are completely immobile in robot mode, there’s some decent poseability in dinosaur mode and I especially like the chomping jaws. Is the original Grimlock as nice as Masterpiece Grimlock? Probably not, but it’s still a classy toy and one of the best of the early Transformers. Worth tracking down, even if you end up grabbing one of the funny colored reissues from Transformers Generation 2. 

(C) 2010 Jeremy W. Kaufmann & CollectionDX