Backstop
Backstop's alternate
mode is a rhino. (Why they named a rhino Backstop, I'll never know.) This
mode is pretty good-- the color scheme fits together pretty good, even
if the red and the yellow are rather primary. The gray and fleshy brownish
purple make great realistic colors for the rhino main body (though I would
have preferred just one of the two colors for the main body, not both)
and the gunmetal gray makes a good "armor plating" color. It's not exactly
the most eye-catching scheme, but it definitely works for the mode. The
mold detailing is also great-- nice little flesh bits mixed with robotic
bits everywhere. I especially like the technorganic-looking muscles behind
the rear legs. The paint detailing is also fairly good, though some should've
been used on his back or tail. The proportions are also pretty spot-on,
except for the head-- Backstop doesn't have enough of a rhino neck, it
looks more like just one huge chunk of flab between his ears and his main
body. (This is largely due to the Cyber Key gimmick, I assume.) Another
plus of this mode is that this rhino has pretty good articulation-- all
of his legs have hip and knee articulation, and his tail can move up and
down and his head can move around in a circle. No mouth articulation, but
that's the only thing missing, really. There is one noticeable robot extra
in this mode-- the hand underneath the rhino head sticks out a little,
though it's not too incredibly distracting. Backstop's Cyber Key gimmick
is also pretty lame-- if you insert his key into the slot behind his head,
his horn pops out about an inch. Umm, hard to see how having horns sticking
out a little farther directly in front of you would really help you that
much in battle, considering the horns themselves aren't actually any bigger...
Backstop's robot mode,
well... every line has its turd or two, and Backstop just happens to be
Cybertron's. But GEEZ, I haven't seen a robot mode this bad since before
Beast Wars... This mode is downright sad, there's NO part of it I like.
So I guess I'll just start from the legs and work up. The legs are made
of the rhino legs combined together sideways, and they look REALLY odd.
They look like Backstop is walking sideways or something, and practically
no attempt was made to make them look otherwise. Because of the way his
legs combine, this also means Backstop has no knee articulation and only
back-and-forth hip articulation in this mode. (And speaking of his hips,
they really jut right out from his waist piece really far-- another real
oddity of this toy.) The main body is also far too wide, and Backstop again
has no real neck to speak off- his robot head is a piece that flips around
the middle of said body and looks really doofy. The overly fat-looking
face also doesn't look too great, either. The left arm is a big "scoop"-like
claw, but with no thumbs and considering hos large the scoop is compared
to the right hand, it just looks weird. This arm has two points of articulation
at the shoulder, but can only move in one direction at the elbow, which
prevents you from putting the scoop into a... well, a position to scoop
things up, which pretty much negates the purpose of having a scoop. The
right arm is probably the closest to "good" this mode ges, as the rhino-head
for a shoulder doesn't look too bad, but the lower arm and hand is pitifully
small (and chubby) when compared to the huge shoulder. Plus, the articulation
on this arm is limited as well-- he can move his shoulders around in a
circle, but he can only move his elbow inwards on this arm.
Backstop's rhino mode
is fairly good, but dear PRIMUS, his robot mode is awful in practically
every way-- it looks like a glorified McDonald's toy in this mode, which
is an absolute travesty for a mainline toy. The worst toy I've seen yet
in Cybertron-- you might want to reconsider getting this toy even if you're
a completist.
Review by Beastbot