Frenzy

Allegiance: Decepticon
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Light milky gray and some silver and clear plastic
Individual Rating: 6.0

    Given that this is a more "normal" Barricade in terms of Transformers aesthetics, it only makes sense that his little buddy Frenzy gets a similar treatment as well! For this version, Frenzy is a Mini-Con-- and like all FunPub toys, he's a redeco, but of a previously Japanese-only "Arms Micron" (Mini-Con) named Sou. Thus, this portion of the review will be as if Frenzy is a new mold-- since, for the purposes of this site, he is.
    Frenzy's weapon mode (see the picture of Barricade's robot mode below) is a sawblade with a buncha junk in the trunk. Ths sawblade is certainly the big connection here to Movie Frenzy, given that the latter fired saws out of his chest, and the saw rotates quite freely in this mode. That said, Frenzy is almost entirely that boring light milky gray-- not something I want in an expensive exclusive, even if he's merely more of an accessory. The only part that isn't unpainted light milky gray is a bit of clear plastic in the center of the saw blade, which has a silver Decepticon symbol painted on it. That's it-- not even any paint on the robot face, or on the saw. As for the overall structure of this mode... well, as I said, the sawblade parts look nice, but Frenzy's entire robot mode is just folded up a bit in the back. Granted, the legs make for a nice "armguard" for whatever TF is holding him, but the arms on the sides are really blatantly obvious, as are the upper legs. On the plus side, there's plenty of connection points, with standard connection pegs on the sides of the upper section of this mode, a long peg on the bottom, another shorter peg on the right arm, and corresponding connection holes on the left arm and on the underside of the saw extension, so there's a ton of ways you can mount Frenzy on larger TFs.
    Frenzy's transformation is very pretty straightforward-- just unfolded the robot parts and bend the sawblade behind the back. The sawblade makes for a rather significant extra on the back, but it stays out of the way so it's not that bad, particularly considering the small size and simplicity of the Arms Micron toys. The core robot mode for Frenzy looks quite well-done and well-proportioned, with a good amount of mold detailing-- he's got some quite intricate detailing on some parts such as his arms where they almost look like treads or belts, but he also has some nice detailing otherwise, like vents on his chest and shoulders, some asymmetrical detailing on his chest, and a rounded face with two eyes and a Prime-esque faceplate. This robot mode really has pretty much no visual relation to Movie Frenzy beyond the color, though. The pegs on the knees, the back of the head, and the side of one arm also look a bit odd, too. As for articulation, Frenzy can move back-and-forth at the shoulders, back-and-forth at the hips (both legs move as one), his knees can rotate, and his head can actually look down a little bit because of his transformation, making him one of the more articulated Arms Micron toys. I certainly would've liked some elbow movement, but overall it's pretty adequate for the size. Of one note is that Frenzy is slightly misassembled-- his hips are on backwards. This is easily fixed just by applying a bit of pressure; you can pop the hip piece out, reverse it, pop it back in, and then swap the shins, but if this makes you uncomfortable on something like a Club exclusive it's no biggie, as all you'll just have to deal with are hollow-looking hips.
 

Barricade

Allegiance: Decepticon
Size: Deluxe
Difficulty of Transformation: Medium
Color Scheme: Black, moderately dark purple, and some clear plastic, white, silver, dark blue, and red
Individual Rating: 8.7

(NOTE: Because this is a repaint, this is not a full-blown review. This mainly covers any changes made to the mold and the color scheme, and merely compares it to the original Prime deluxe Smokescreen toy. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of the original Prime deluxe Smokescreen here.)

    Barricade's vehicle mode is rendered incredibly faithfully to his initial movie design; he's mostly black with white doors, and the fonts of his various logos-- from "POLICE" to the 643s to his Decepticon blue police emblem to his infamous "To punish and enslave..." logos are all spot-on taken from the movie toys. His transparent plastic is also clear-- as is the case with pretty much every one of his movie toys. He's also got nice silver paint on his rear vents and wheel hubs, as well as red headlights, though his taillights/back bumper are sadly unpainted. Oddly, his siren is painted about two-thirds red and one-third blue, whereas the center part SHOULD be clear plastic or some neutral color like white. My guess is some kind of miscommunication with the factory, but it's easily overlooked. In robot mode is where Barricade breaks much more obviously from his movie counterpart, with a good amount of moderately dark purple entering the mix-- particularly on his shoulders and upper arms, but also on his headcrest, waist, and a few paint apps on his legs and feet. He has the faux car chest details painted well with a good amount of silver, and I love the callback to his police siren in that half of the faux headlights on his chest are red while the other half are blue. This all helps break up his colors considerably more and makes his robot mode look more catchy color-wise than his movie counterpart (even though his movie counterpart DID often have at least have a little bit of purple on him).
    However, even though I'd expect some changes to his movie look given that this Barricade is supposed to have more of a "traditional" look for this version, no mold change has been made to his face-- he has the same face sculpt (and lack of Beast Hunters accessories) as Beast Hunters Prowl did. With the red optics, the face can look evil enough, but he REALLY needed a new head to more obviously link him to Barricade in robot mode, like perhaps a similar face outline or perhaps teeth in his mouth. The spiky Beast Hunters accessories that came with Smokescreen also would've worked perfectly with Barricade, and it's another major bummer that these weren't included; even with the awesome color scheme, tha lack of mold changes here brings down Barricade's score more than you'd think from a simple description.

    TFSS "Prime" Barricade & Frenzy is a neat little duo, with Barricade being about as fine of a redeco for the character that you can get out of a Prime toy without remolding the head, and Frenzy being one of the nicer Japanese Arms Microns molds, even if he has basically no paint, little visual relation to Movie Frenzy, and is all light gray. That said, this release probably applies to a rather niche audience even for a Club toy, only really being a recommended purchase if you both A. really want a toy of Barricade but B. hate the movie style. Otherwise, there's several Movie Barricade toys that are better and considerably less expensive. I'm a fan of the "bad cop" character so I enjoy having both, but I don't see a lot of similar love coming from other fans-- and I can't deny Barricade DESPERATELY needed a new headsculpt, and the Beast Hunters armor would have been nice as well. The lack of either of those take TFSS Barricade from what could have been one of the best exclusives from the TFSS 2.0 lineup to merely a middle-of-the-pack release.
 

Reviews by Beastbot

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