Beast Machines Silverbolt
Gah. I'm not sure what to say about this toy. Of course coming relatively late in the
Beast Machines line, he's somewhat hard to obtain (a carded one on eBay usually fetches
around $12, give or take), so when I stumbled across an auction for a loose one for $4, I
snatched it up (along with a Striker, who I've been meaning to get for a while). Well,
let me just say I'm glad I never paid more than that for one, because he's only worth about
four bucks. Maybe not even that much.
Since he's packaged in robot mode (even though I didn't get a packaged one, but that's not
the point) I'll review that first. Okay, robot mode isn't horrible. Aside from the colors,
he's pretty show accurate looking, which is a plus after horrors like deluxe Primal and the
Vehicon generals (by the way, the Vehicon generals were good toys, just not very much looking
like their show counterparts). I know, toys first, then show, but I won't get into that right
now.
The major problems with robot mode lie in the joints. His legs have ball jointed thighs, double ball
knees and hinge ankles, which normally would be cool. However, his legs are rather limited in
their range of movement, so there aren't a good number of poses he can carry out. His arms fare a lot
better, but his hands (which double as his beast feet) are horrible looking and just executed bad all
around. They remind me more of early Beast Wars toys, which weren't necessarily bad, per say, it's just
that by the time this toy was being made they should have gone another route.
He also has one of the most horrible weapons in the world. His wing mechanism detaches from
his back (or falls off) and he can hold it in his hand. The look is that of a short sword with
wings, and it's not very menacing at all. You can also attach the wings to his back as a cape,
but the way they're curved interferes with his legs. You can also open the wings (via a spring loaded
mechanism, the toy's lone gimmick) which would be cool if they weren't upside down. Oh, but hang on,
it only gets worse from here.
Transformation is pretty much a laugh, and very reminiscent of Op Minor. However, where Op Minor has two
fun and poseable modes (well, some will argue about the fun part, but I stand by my opinions of
little Optimus), Silverbolt has two modes of craptacularness.
Beast mode is a laughable pile of garbage, to be frank. First off, he's giving birth to himself
(or passing himself, depending on your opinion) and the toy makes no attempt to hide the head at all. The legs are
stupid looking, the body is shaped all wrong and looks stupid as a result and the arms or whatever
they're supposed to be just sort of sit there and make it look even more horrible. Man, I'm very
tired of looking at it, and beast mode is probably the only thing that keeps me from hating robot mode
since it's so much more worse by comparison. Quite possibly this is the worst Transformer ever, or at least
the worst beast era guy.
Going by the worst toy I rated so far, TM2 Scourge, at least I liked his beast mode, but there's
little to enjoy about either mode in Silverbolt. If you absolutely must own one, please, I beg you, don't
pay more than $5 for it, because it's really a very bad toy. Robot mode has it's charm, but it has a
crappy weapon, blah transformation and the most horrible beast mode to ever grace the Earth. Good thing
I got Striker along with him, because otherwise it would have marked the first time I got a new
Transformer and I wasn't happy.
