Cliffbee.com Wreckloose Toy Review

Individual Review




Name: Wreckloose
Series: Cybertron
Allegiance: Decepticon
Alternate Mode: Lizard



LIZARD MODE
Height: 5.5cm Length: 16cm Width: 5cm

   A black and pea-soup green lizard with bronze here and there, Wreckloose has some silver and metallic orange painted highlights along with green eyes. The top of the lizard is mostly black while the underside is green. The front legs are pine green along with his optional battle helmet, which has bronze antlers. There's a painted Decepticon logo on the left side of the battle helmet, along with orange highlights. While it's a rather varied colour scheme, it works in the context of this monster-like beast.

   While many Transformers lizards have tried to fit every lizard stereotype into the one beast, Wreckloose avoids this temptation - and he's better for it. The neck curves up and is quite bulky, making me suspect that the Komodo Dragon was the original inspiration, although Wreckloose isn't quite a Komodo Dragon. At first glance he seems quite organic, but closer inspection reveals a very mechanical sculpt. The limbs and body are quite rounded which is what gives the illusion of an organic lizard, and the pea soup green also helps. The sculpt is quite detailed, but it's hard to see at a glance since from above the toy is largely black.

   The legs, which stick out to the sides and then down (as reptile legs should) are all ball jointed, both at the hips and knees. The lower jaw opens to reveal tiny unpainted teeth on both jaws. The tailtip can wiggle a little, but the body itself is pretty much fixed. The helmet attaches to the back of his neck, covering the crown on his head and the front of the back. There's a socket at the back, allowing you to plug in his green Planet Key (code: su39). Doing so will cause the antlers on either side of his helmet to pop out to the sides, showing off their spines.

   While I'm not entirely convinced the colours are the best they could have been, they fit in with the monster theme on this toy. The antlers, Komodo Dragon elements and some spines on the tail all help set this tone. Overall it's a pretty good lizard with a detailed sculpt and a nice gimmick. I actually prefer leaving the helmet off for display, but it still looks good attached. While it's not obvious until you transform the toy, they've done a great job of ensuring there is _no_ robot mode kibble here.

TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE

   Remove the helmet, rotate the back half 90° to the right, split the tail, rotate the ends to form the lower legs, flip up the feet. Split the head, swing out to the sides and rotate the halves to form shoulderpads. The head is hidden within the beast neck, and will now be visible. Rotate the forelegs to form robot arms, flip up the hands. You can attach the helmet to his back as a backpack or underneath either forearm as a shield.

ROBOT MODE
Height: 11.5cm Width: 10.5cm

   Again mainly black with the pea soup green also prominent. His head and right leg are sea soup green, while the groin and knees are bronze and the upper arms pine green. Wreckloose has an orange mouth and bronze crest, and his eyes are the same green as his beast eyes (which barely shows out - you have to look closely to see it. The beast head halves form shoulderpads, which stick out and up, giving him an impressive wingspan for a guy who doesn't actually have wings. The colour scheme is again quite disparate, and it doesn't work quite as well as I'd like.

   There are quite a few lizard elements here, aside from the head sticking out from his shoulders. The foreclaws are on his forearms while the tailtip is his feet. The hindlegs hang off his right thigh, and are pure kibble. The asymmetry in his legs is interesting, since it's so ridiculously obvious with one being green and the other black. While it's not a bad thing, it's a defining feature of this robot.

   The poseability is reasonably good, with some notable issues. The shoulders, elbows and hips are ball joints, the knees have hinges and rotators while the waist and head turn and the ankles are hinged. The shoulderpads also rotate, giving him useful shoulder movement, while the claws on his forearms get in the way of his elbows, which is rather annoying - especially if you have the shield attached, since it ends up being tucked away to some extent. The leg poseability isn't as hampered, although the beast legs on his right thigh can get in the way occasionally. The heelspurs aren't too much help, since his knees aren't as poseable as I'd like - the heelspurs make him stable in the limited poses you can achieve.

   The gimmick does still work, although the antlers don't have anywhere to go if you try activate it with the shield on his arm. The hands have fist holes, even though Wreckloose doesn't come with a handheld weapon (the shield has its own connector). Most of the play value is in the poseability.

   Despite the rather inventive aspects of this robot mode - namely the shoulderpads and the unusual leg configuration - this is Wreckloose's weaker mode. The poseability suffers a little and the weapon is a little too obstructed. The colours don't quite make sense, but the sculpt is again good. I don't dislike this robot mode since the creative aspects are enough to make it worthwhile, but I can't overlook the flaws here.

VARIATIONS

   None that I'm aware of. Unlike most Cybertron toys, Wreckloose was not released in Galaxy Force.

OVERALL

   Wreckloose has an unusual design, with an interesting transformation that gives him an asymmetric robot mode and surprisingly kibble free beast mode. The beast mode is good, with a detailed sculpt and good poseability. The robot mode isn't as strong, but has enough going for it to make him a decent toy - 6.5/10

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