Preamble
Look, I had not intended upon getting a Masterpiece Blaster, that’s the truth. He’s not a character that I was overly bothered about to be honest. Being a resident of the UK, I wasn’t aware of Blaster until June of 1986 when he made his first appearance in the UK Marvel Transformers comic, a full 6 months after his first appearance in the cartoon which was in September of 1985.
I didn’t see Blaster in his animated form until going to the cinema in December 1986 to watch the movie. It’s important to remember that to my knowledge, non of the second season of the cartoon aired on terrestrial TV, we just had sporadic re-runs of the first season on WACADAY! And the Blaster of the comics bore no real resemblance to the one portrayed on the screen, or so I believed at the time of seeing the Movie.
So when I pulled the trigger on Deformation Space it was for two reasons, well one reason and one reasoning. Firstly he was cheap, which is a bone of contention when it comes to Deformation Space, I’ll discuss that in my final thoughts. And secondly I reasoned that he could earn a place on my shelf by keeping Janssen company. I’d limited myself to the main ‘86 Movie characters intentionally, but with being impressed with Janssen it kind of opened the door to Recording Alliance and shortly, Ollie too. That then will finalise my ‘86 roll call, seriously…
Deformation Space’s previous release, Crimson Wings, had a really nice box. This time round it’s all a bit ‘meh’. It’s not a bad box, it’s just that it looks rather mundane, ‘box standard’ if you will. There’s nothing really that sets it apart like the prior release did. I know some out there don’t really care about the packaging, but me, I do like a nice tidy looking box! Moving on, Blaster is contained within a two part clam with his accessories and instruction sheet. These accessories consist of the following: Gun, 2x Speakers, Alt Face Sculpt and Ramhorn (with side mounted guns). Not much I know when compared to more recent releases from other 3rd Party companies, however to memory, Blaster wasn’t really heavy on the accessories or gimmicks in the comics or cartoon. Potentially they could’ve included another cassette or two but this would’ve more than likely raised the price and reduced the possibility of a separate cassette team release further down the road.
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Unlike his nemesis Soundwave who is a micro cassette recorder, Blasters alt mode is intended as a full on Boombox or Ghetto Blaster (clue’s in the name), even though for play value their tapes are sized accordingly and are interchangeable. This was on their original Generation 1 release, these 3rd Party offerings don’t tend to stay as true to scaling, though they do try their best. Lets just say, I’d not like to try put Ramhorn in Acoustic Wave as he doesn’t really fit in Recording Alliance, of which he is intended to do. Seriously, it’s a very tight fit, so much so that it could get stuck and need some prising out. Because of this I did not place it in for the review and have no intentions of doing so for display etc.
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My indifference to the character of Blaster is pretty much silenced by the robot mode. It looks great and the proportions I mentioned earlier and good. There’s more than enough articulation on offer here and this allows some dynamic poses to be achieved. As of writing, I cannot decide if the figure is fully painted or not. I know certain areas are but as for the whole I’m really not sure. To the touch, the figure feels like Crimson Wings, which I’d fully expect but there is a hint of the feel of Light of Freedom from Magic Square. There’s a certain pastel pallet to the colours and feel of the paint application. Most of the joints are quite stiff, needing some moderate force to manipulate, but at no point did I feel any danger of breakage or stress. There is some noticeable screw points on the back of the figure which has drawn some negative commenting, but again it’s nothing I personally have issue with. It’s a necessary evil at times and in all honesty, who displays their figures with their backs facing out? The robot mode feels solid with some heft and there is die-cast content to the feet and I also believe the cassette door to be die-cast also. I’ll make brief mention of Ramhorn, the accessory cassette-bot. It’s well made and the transformation is good, it’s all plastic but does not feel cheap or brittle. Minimal paint application restricted to the eyes, cassette spools and some torso detailing. Articulation is minimal, neck, tail and legs, which limits the posing potential. I’m sure at some point in the future MMC will release this character as part of their remix line, which will compliment Recording Alliance well just as Riot and Furor do with Acoustic Wave.
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So as I’ve mentioned, for a character that I’m not overly bothered about, I am impressed with this figure and plan to keep him on my shelf, if only to keep Janssen company in my expanded ‘86 Movie character line. Look, in my opinion Deformation Space have done two great figures, that being this and Crimson Wings. It’s still early days but I do hope to see more releases from them in the future, and all being well it will be characters that have as yet been untouched by other 3rd Party companies. However, they’d need to get a shift on as the two big hitters (Fans Toys & X-Transbots) are ramping up their roster of characters. I’d also suggest they address the price structure, meaning the higher initial price point then lowered substantially for the second run. Balance this out between the two so as to ensure steady sales and return custom for subsequent product.
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Things I don’t like or have slight issue with are: paint rub and marking when transforming, poor internal cassette mechanism and overly tight fitting cassette, tight fitting face swap out feature (I trimmed my peg to make it easier), choice of cassette character accessory, lack of G1 toy version head option and bland looking neutral face sculpt.
I cannot make comment as to how it compares to Fans Toys Recorder, it’s not out yet, but looking at the images I’ve seen so far, I’m leaning towards Deformation Space. I have had KFC Transistor on loan and while it’s not a bad figure, again I feel it looses out to Deformation Space. Transistor is a more stylised representation where Recorder and Recording Alliance are very much in that animation aesthetic.
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