TRANSFORMERS TOYS AND MERCHANDISE SECTION

Robot Mode:
Alternate Mode:
Box Art:
Technical Specifications:
STR
INT
SPD
END
RNK
CRG
FPR
SKL

Wildfire's review of: Dinobot

Faction: Maximal
Generation: Beast Wars
First cartoon appearance: Beast Wars pt1

"As if torn from the pages of earth's prehistoric past, a vicious velociraptor breathes again! But Dinobot is no ordinary 'raptor, he's a robot in disguise battling beside his heroic teammates, the Maximals! Armed with a spinning cyber-slash tail weapon and always hungry for battle, Optimus Primal considers him a natural combat expert who has clawed his way to the top one victory after another! "

Beast Mode: Dinobot's beast mode is a Velociraptor, no doubt inspired by the Jurassic Park series of films. He's primarily a light pinkish tan with dark brown tiger stripes running the length of his body and along his lower rear legs. His eyes are yellow with slit brown pupils, his teeth are white and the inside of his mouth is painted red, the underside of his body reveals some of the metallic sheened translucent brown plastic his robot mode uses more of. In beast mode he has roughly eleven points of articulation, not counting his toes. Dinobot's forearms arm ball jointed, his jaw opens and closes, and his legs can kick outward, forward, backward, bend at the knees, and swivel mid-thigh. As far as looks go, Dinobot isn't perfect, but he could be worse. There are two major drawbacks to this mode. The first is his robot legs hang very visibly from his underside, some attempt was made to make his feet resemble the raptor's neck, but overall, the legs make him look rather chunky. The other problem I have is the feet, there are three forward pointing toes and two backward pointing ones, where at tops there should be one. The figure does depend on these for balance however, so I guess it's a necessary evil and can be overlooked.

Robot Mode: Ok, here we go again. First, remove the raptor tail by pulling back on it and set it aside for now. Now, pull up on the panel the tail was attached to and fold it up over the raptor's back. Pull on the roughly wedge shaped pieces right under the raptor head to detach the robot legs from the dino chest, fold them all the way down to where the back panel was, then rotate them at the knees, push the feet all the way forward and the edge of the back toes should poke out of them, pull these back and the robot legs are formed. Rotate both the raptor body halves up until the tiger stripes are facing you and the best mode legs are pointed backwards. Tuck the beast mode forearms around the back and rotate the beast mode rear legs (now the robot arms) down and turn them around at the elbows. Looking on the back of the robot, lift up the light pinkish at the back of the dino head and push the head down to form the robot chest, push the panel back down once you have. Now, pick up the tail section again and spilt it down the middle to form the spinning shield/weapon and attach it via the peg on the end to the hole in Dinobot's hand, or remove the inner piece to form the sword and place that in his other hand. Finally, like our buddy Waspinator, Dinobot has an alternate head, sort of. When you transform him, he has a skull-like "helmet" over his head, complete with teeth and eye holes, fold these halves down to the sides to reveal a head closer to one we know and love from the show. In Robot Mode, Dinobot has roughly fifteen points of articulation, again not counting his fingers, including ball jointed knees and hips. Again, Dinobot is mainly light pinkish tan though some of his tiger stripes and some more of the metallic translucent brown is visible like this. His robot head is mainly the same dark brown as his stripes with a blue faceplate and yellow eyes (it looks as though his eyes were originally designed to have light piping but the designers changed their minds as the back of his head is painted the same color as his eyes.) The inside sections of his tail weapon are painted red. The tail weapon can spin like on the show, press down on the button at it's base and spins nicely. Dinobot has a nice mix of organic and mechanical detailing on him, his lower legs are patterned to look like dinosaur ribs and vertebrae, while his upper legs have panels and buttons molded on them. His upper body is mainly the skin pattern of the raptor as the robot mode incorporates much of the raptor's body. Another point of note is that one or both of his weapons can be stored if your Dinobot isn't feeling very warlike. The observant (all two of you) may have noticed a peg on the raptor's back and a hole in the base of it's tail. In robot mode, these can be used to hold his weapons. First, fold the back panel down so it's horizontal instead of vertical, push down on the double hinge so it's completely pointing down (the joint and panel should form a capital "L" shape.) Close the tail weapon up and if you want insert the sword in it as well. Put the tail back into the panel base and push the hole on the tail into the peg on the robot back and Dinobot's weapons are stored.

Transformation:5 - Not that bad, tough compared to the basics of early Beast Wars, but that’s
another story.
Durability: 10 - Never once have I had a piece break or pop off this guy, and he’s had a few falls
in his time.
Fun: 8 - A really great figure with a gimmick we’d never seen before as opposed to another spring
loaded missile, his beast mode lacks a bit but that can be overlooked in the long run.
Price: 10 Oh boy, pull out your wallets for this one folks. Being one of the first Beast Wars Deluxes AND being a very, very popular character on the show, you can expect to pay a lot for a MOC version, though a loose version may turn up in Beast Wars lot on Ebay every once in awhile. You're better off trying to find his Fox Kids Repaint version, but even that will cost you.
Overall: 9 Fan favorite, fairly poseable, very durable, the only thing that will hit you hard is the price.