Thanks to 2005 Boards member Nevermore for giving us the heads up of the Cyber Commander Optimus Prime and Bumblebee Available via Amazon website.
These figures are simple but but big 11-inch tall toys that transform in easy 6 steps. They are quite old in fact, Bumblebee was released while back in 2015 and Optimus Prime is a redeco of the 2015 figure that was first found at retail in Taiwan last year. Both have been available only in some international markets, and this is our first proper release of these molds in the US.
You can find Cyber Commander Bumblebee and Optimus Prime via Amazon.com for $19.90. You can check out all the images attached to this news post after the jump.
Purple Heart
First month of Prime is usually free, so try that.
Chaos Muffin
These look cool. Would pay 20 on site but that's borderline.
Not a Prime member, so the shipping kills the deal.
W-P38
I spent a couple of months devoted to finding all of these guys. Got my hands on all of them (including Megatron), except for Starscream.
I sold most on eBay, other than the big Prime, Sideswipe, Shockwave, and Megatron. I'm now selling all of them, if anyone is interested.
Prime is like an oversized tinker toy. He's an absolute brick. What stands out is his head mold – pretty dope, but hard to appreciate in pictures.
Dachande
Because references in other shows is General TF Discussion fodder at best and is not news. I honestly don't see why it's still in the news section.
On topic, I actually enjoy the Cyber Battalion stuff. I'm disappointed iissed out on Grimlock, though.
I had passed on this Optimus a few times, but may bite this time. Really like the overall design.
HunterGreen2005
Whats wrong with all the "Bumblebee lampshade found at Walmart" or "studio series wave one found at Easter Island"?
WishfulThinking
I can second this, although my copy is this second edition. At $35 shipped, I felt like I overpaid a bit but $20 is a much better price. Very worth it if you want a cheap, big Optimus Prime in your collection that doesn't have any gimmicks and is fun to fiddle with while watching a ball game or something.
JomasterII
I have Prowl and he's a pretty damned good figure for the price. Just be careful about the paint.
Rewind
I’ve got Prime in his original deco from a few years back. While it’s not an essential or especially great figure, and suffers greatly from a lack of knees, I do actually really like it. The transformation is quick and fun, it’s a solid toy and most of all that totally wackadoo truck mode just does it for me. It’s a big sucker too. Totally worth the $20. I’m tempted to get one in the new deco.
slochmoeller
I used to have that OP.
If he had some panels to fill in the side of the truck mode, he wouldn't be half bad.
Nevermore
Yes.
NickLaPlante
So are these figures new to Canada? We’ve had them in our system at Canadian tire for a little while and we just received a dozen of these last week
JomasterII
You can actually get these from the official Transformers Outlet eBay store if you're 'strayan.
Purple Heart
So I was wrong about Sunbow, my bad, but I was right about it being animated by a Japanese company.
NathimusPrime
Sunbow was an American based company and I believe they didnt do any in house animation. Animation for g1 was outsourced to toei(which is a japanese company) and Akom (a Korean company)
Jakedc1997
Ok since very few others are talking about the actual toys. POOP! JK I like the asthetics but man articulation and less hollow versions of these would be interesting. Like a Hotrod from that Bumble Bee design
Deadend
Doesn't exactly work like that. Anime is by intended audience demographic because of the high amounts of animation duties that were outsourced over long stretches of periods. Many areas animated Transformers. Toei Dagda for example and other companies. (Referring to G1.)
Sunbow was an American company based in New York. And those "directions" you speak of were non-existent. Outsourced animation works from production designs and other material to adhere to. Outsourced animation is still produced and designed and scripted by the main production side normally, and more involved in that, but I really don't feel like doing the entire explanation of the animation industry and what outsourcing animation means other than hiring a company to animate everything between key frames or animatics etc.
Animation is animation though(a medium to tell a story). But more directly, only select areas of Transformers fall under anime. Not all of it as a whole in G1. Same as technically GI Joe Sigma 6 isn't an anime(out sourced animation, never intended for Asian region audiences), and The Last Airbender/Korra aren't, but Oban Star Racers is(co-production aired in both markets intended for both markets simultaneously). The term "anime" is used to denote intended audience originally as an import. The word's origins stem from the concept of using imported material's original language word to denote origin. Same for comics where we use "manga" for imported comics of certain regions, and graphic novel for others.
It's since been butchered to mean more than that because it became the "it" word thanks to the various booms. So there's been a lot of pollution of the words because they are "hip" and "eye-catching" buzzwords for hype. Same as "cartoon" has been mis-used a lot since all it all means is "satirical comic or animation". So many Anime titles fall under that header too because of how wide the genres are between forms of animation.
More accurately, Transformers falls under "animated series" or can be considered a cartoon because of its internal satirical commentary on the nature of various topics ingrained in it (same as original GI Joe ARAH).
But technically, S1-4 of G1 aren't anime. JG1 is. Season 3 is debatable(though not really), TFTM isn't anime either, but Scramble City is. It's an American produced product with animation duties outsourced is all(which is very common for animation in general). Granted based on an imported Japanese toy line and figures renamed. It wasn't imported to Japan until later.
dCon
Thats awesome i never knew thats how the dates work. And i been adult collecting since 1996 when i graduated high school. Righteous broh, thanks for explaining that..
Heres a playlist of short reviews of all of the Cyber Battalion figures sans Commander Bumblebee (who i never wanted). Commander Prime & all the Cyber Battalion figures are here. Please excuse the camera quality for the 1st wave that dates back to 2015 before i bought a Galaxy.
Transformers Cyber Battalion – YouTube
Purple Heart
There are people that use that image and that arguement unironically though. I’ve had people tear into when I state my opinion on something using that as an arguement before. It’s never pretty, and it’s usually five to ten members ganging up on another and trying to put them down as person as much as possible, and they believe their justified in every way. So I’m not hesitant with it anymore.
If you didn’t mean it though, then I’m sorry. But just remember that there are other people out there that do mean it seriously.
Anyways though, Might as well get this Optimus. I have Shockwave and I want Prowl and Megatron,