Name: Razorclaw
Series: Generation 1
Allegiance: Decepticon
Function: Predacon Leader
Alternate Mode: Lion
LION MODE
Height: 9.5cm Length: 14cm Width: 11cm
A predominantly black lion, Razorclaw has red legs, a yellow rump, orange tail, a yellow head with red eyes and an orange mane - so he's the stereotypical alpha male usually used to represent lions. I'm fine with the choice in this case - he _is_ the Predacon leader, so he should be the dominant member of his group. There are gold stickers on his back, mane and shoulders, and the overall effect is pretty good, even if the stickers on his shoulders have _upside down_ Decepticon logos on them. There is a Decepticon logo (right way up) on his nose, and a rubsign indent (maybe a rubsign too!) on his back. On the whole, this is a very cool colour scheme. He's got a lot more black than any of the other Predacons, but it works really well with the limited bright colours.
For 1986, this is a fairly good lion mode. The mane isn't the only thing that distinguish this as a lion, the head is very much that of a lion, with the broad, slightly flattened face. He has big fangs hanging from his upper jaw, which are nice, but would be cooler if they were painted black or something. The lower jaw opens, and reveals two smaller teeth (also unpainted). The tail curls up to a little ball, which is also lion-like - although I use the term "ball" loosely - it's not actually ball, just moulded to look like one. But he gets points for the simulation.
Articulation is about as good as I could possibly expect from a toy of this age that's burdened with being the central body of a Gestalt. The head can rotate 360° (in case he's possessed by Starscream's ghost...) the ankles wiggle a little and the hindlegs have some wiggle in them also. The waist also rotates, but this doesn't provide any meaningful poseability.
You can attach Predaking's giant cannon on Razorclaw's back, which makes him disproportionately well armed, not that he'd complain. This provides the real play value of this mode. He's not quite as poseable as Rampage, who has the same basic bodyplan, but Rampage doesn't have to allow four others to link up while forming a torso, so I'll forgive Razorclaw.
On balance, this is good lion mode. Razorclaw looks good, and since he's got to do all his Predaking stuff, the fact that he's essentially a statue is excusable. My only real complaint is the fact that they didn't hide his _yellow_ robot mode head better, considering it's against a black body.
TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE
Fold in the tail (if you don't, it'll be a phallus in robot mode!). Swing up the red parts of the hindlegs, and stow them on the rump of the animal, which lifts up to become the robot thighs. Swing down the black casing on the rump to form the shins, flip out his feet. Rotate the waist, rotate the lion head and slide down onto the robot chest, flip out the robot head. Swing the front legs of the beast down slightly, which will unlock the robot arms, then slide out the robot arms and swing the cat legs up into his back. Slide out his fists and give him his weaponry if you want.
ROBOT MODE
Height: 17cm Width: 12.5cm
There's still a lot of black in this mode, but the yellow really comes to the fore now. His chest block is black, but the yellow and orange lion head covers most of it. The arms, thighs and head are all yellow, the groin, shins and fists black, while he has red feet. There are big shoulderpads - which are the sockets into which Divebomb and Rampage attach when forming Predaking. His face is painted red and has a very low level of detail - just a mouthplate and eyevisor.
This colour scheme isn't quite as nice as his lion mode, but it's still pretty good. The gold stickers are still fairly prominent, except for those stickers that gave him upside down Decepticon stickers in lion mode - what the hell do these stickers have logos for? They're sideways logos now, and align the same way for Predaking. Anyway, he has a visible Decepticon logo on his chest, which looks pretty good with the lion head ad mane forming a great centrepiece. The mane covers the rubsign, but it doesn't really matter.
The thing that really bugs me about this robot mode is the really short arms that Razorclaw has, which are made to look worse with the big black attachment sockets on them. Rampage has much longer arms, and he has the same bodyplan - I'm sure they could have given Razorclaw longer arms without too much effort. The stubbly arms are really the only blight on this mode, but they do stand out.
Razorclaw has good poseability for a G1 combiner - the shoulders rotate 360°, as does the waist, the hips swing (although only about 80° forward) and the knees bend. He can't stand in too poses since he has no heelspurs, but is perfectly stable at attention.
About average as Predacon robot modes go. There are some really cool things here - notably the lion chest on his chest, but the short arms really bring him down.
VARIATIONS
There's a plastic chest version and a rarer metal version, which has a die cast groin.
OVERALL
A great lion mode with awesome colours is held back somewhat by avoidable robot mode flaws. He does a fairly good job of being Razorclaw considering he forms the core of Predaking. I do recommend Razorclaw, especially if you want Predaking. Having said that, Predacons are often quite pricey, so whether or not you're willing to lay out the money is up to you - 6.5/10
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