Grimlock
I swore I`d only buy Slug, but after getting ol` Grimmy in my hands I`m ok with him.
Like my Slug review I`ll have my customized version after the retail version in pictures.
So, a big orange T-rex.
Even though all the trailers and even the box art shows a big pile of silver metal teeth attached to a dinosaur.
I can`t say I’m a fan of this paint job, I get that the orange is to reference Grimlocks usual gold chest, I feel it`s just a little TOO much.
The dino mode has a gimmick in that you press the button on the left of Grimlock`s neck and you can close the jaw.
Sadly my dodgy customizing damaged this feature when I painted it, but the switch still kinda works, it just closes the mouth and then sticks it closed, I`m ok with this as it gives me more posing options.
It may annoy my nephew however when he gets his hands on it, he`s just got into his dinosaur phase.
The back of the dino-mode has a little black detailing, almost like a tiger, for god knows why.
Beneath this is the orangey-gold chest for robot mode, it has the single Autobot symbol on the stomach area.
Under the dino you can see that the legs make up the lower body and tail, which doesn`t work too well.
The dino arms attach here and sit oddly low with the panels making up what appears to be ribs.
These are the weakest parts of the figure, it just doesn`t look right and feels like the designers did it because they couldn’t think of anything better in the 5 minutes they thought about it.
The dino mode has weapon storage!
And it`s utterly ridiculous!
The huge hammer-mace fits onto the tail via two sliding pegs on the end of the tail, it stretches the tail out to giant proportions!
The weapon itself is a glossy black mace with a plain grey shaft, as Grimlock cannot grip the shaft due to his closed fists there`s a little handle jutting out the middle, he can hold this in either hand but he has no weapon storage in robot mode.
Transformation is relatively simple, mostly as you`d expect.
Though the way the dino head attaches to his back and over his shoulders is quite good.
Those weird rib sections are better utilized on his hips to carry over the “Knight” look from the other dinobots.
On my first transformation I was upset that the hands couldn`t rotate due to the way the dino feet peg into the arms giving him the “curling arms” look, after unpegging the dino feet you can rotate the wrists and the feet are on a decent enough joint to stay where you place them without pegging them in.
Having a closer look at the head and torso, there`s a lot of details that just seem lost in the paint job.
Yes there`s some nice silver detailing on the face, head spike, chest and dino head, but it just seems meh.
Articulation is pretty good full range of motion in the shoulders and hips, single joints at the elbows and knees, wrist swivel, the head is on a weird ball joint that only allows him to look down or side to side.
the feet are on a single joint from transformation but there`s a side to side joint halfway down the lower leg, which is a little odd but works.
From behind you can see the lower dino jaw becomes a butt-flap, the lower jaw can still move and even the gimmick still works.
It seems like the back is full of kibble, but it hides well and doesn`t get in the way of articulation.
Enough of the “as it comes in package” stuff, I re-painted him to be more accurate to the film.
Like Slug I used metallic paint with a black wash, mostly silver with gold accents and a touch of black on the hands and thighs.
The hammer-mace still attaches to the tail, I`ve just made it look more metal and angry.
The dino head is mostly silver with a little gold under the eye, sadly the red paint I used for the eye has faded in these pictures, I`ve since fixed this but it hasn`t been sunny for a few days and I`ve been too sick to take pictures.
He looks good with the other two I’ve customized, Slug and Scorn.
In robot mode I kept the G1 look with the gold chest and added gold on the crotch plate (coz even robot junk needs bling).
The hammer-mace carries over with just metallic silver and black wash.
As with Slug and Scorn I`m much happier with my customized Dinobots, I think I`ll be getting the whole bunch, the only other figure in the line that interests me is Hound which I intend to customize also.
Grimmy doesn`t like getting the finger from Decepticons…
And even gets some help from friends.
