TRANSFORMERS TOYS AND MERCHANDISE SECTION

Robot Mode:

Alternate Mode:

Additional Image:

Additional Image:

Box Art:

Clay's review of: RM-24 Reverse Convoy / Rebirth Megatron

Name: Reverse Convoy/Rebirth Megatron
Group: Cyberton/Destron

Well, after a delayed absence, the original Megatron character has finally arrived in Robot Masters, with a stolen Convoy body to boot. I suck at suspense building, don't I?

On the bright side, Takara decided to use the Generation Two Megatron "Hero" mold for this release, and fixed a couple of its old problems while they were at it.

Tank mode

The tank is... blue. There are a couple of silver details here and there, but this camoflage's ideal working conditions would be flying in the sky. With the sun behind it. There's probably another explanation for the drab paint job, but all I can figure is that they blew all the R&D money on the new parts and didn't have any left to pay an artist for a decent color scheme. Given Takara's recent budget problems, that's not an entirely implausible scenario, but I have no idea how their development works, so I'm just taking pot-shots at it.

Of course, it's not purple-with-black-spots bad...

The biggest change from the previous version is obviously the cannon. Instead of the dinky air-pump design, the new gun is fully molded from front to back, and fires a missle propelled by a spring instead of pneumatic mojo. While perhaps not as fun as violently smashing your fist on the tabel to fire the missles on the old model, it does look a whole hell of a lot better. Also, there's a little missle six-pack at the end of the cannon that can flip up. (No, they can't fire.)

Robot mode

The robot mode definately offers a couple of new developments. The most obvious is the dual-headed-ness. Occupying the spot of the original head is that of some sort of Convoy (he was from the planet "Vehicon" I believe, according the translated bio). But, as the story goes, this Convoy used his black hole generation magic a little poorly and his body was taken over by the original Megatron. In order to change the "character" of the toy, simply flip the Convoy head down, and then rotate the Megatron out (it's snuggled away in the middle of the tank cannon). Presto! Instant Megatron. Both of the heads are scuplted really well, and they share a certain 'evil' look to them. I keep mine as Megatron, because that's who he is, dang it!

The little missle six pack from the rear of the cannon comes off and makes the robot's hand weapon, and once that's removed, the cannon itself can flip up to a 45 degree angle. This reminds me more of the big G2 Megatron toy than the smaller one (I suppose it's the lack of the air pump).

A shining improvement is the waist. The biggest problem of the previous releases was that the waist would flip-flop around because it would not securely attach to anything in robot mode. While they were remolding the cannon, Takara must've thought to fix this problem as a couple of the internal pieces have been altered and now sport a couple of locking grooves. Hooray for no more flip-flopping waists!

Oh yeah... it has articulation out the wazoo. Did I mention that?

Transformation: 9. Wonderful way to turn a tank into a robot.
Durability: 10. I've already dropped it several times, and it's just fine.
Fun: 10. G1 Megs AND a Convoy rolled into one highly-articulated toy? How can you NOT have fun with this?
Price: 8. Around $20, give or take. It's a modern deluxe-sized transformer, but it is an import of an old, great mold made better.
Overall: 9. If you don't have any other copy of the mold, or if you don't like the air pump, get it. You can always paint it...