(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 Ratchet. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of the original Prime deluxe Ratchet toy here.)

    Cannonball is an homage to one of the most (in?)famous redecoes of all time-- the redeco of the same name from the Cybertron line, to be precise. It was such a weird, funky redeco, you pretty knew he was gonna show up again at some point, and here he is! This version of Cannonball is a bit more angular than the original due to the Prime Ratchet aesthetic, but shares his original version's alt mode of a weird-looking ambulance, so it works pretty well. Pretty much everything you'd expect from the original Cannonball's paint job is replicated pretty faithfully on this version-- his main colors are black and silver, with a fair amount of bronzish gold plastic and paint-- the latter of which primarily shows itself in robot mode, on the shoulders, waist, upper legs and upper arms, and a few other minor parts. (It should be mentioned that the painted and plastic versions of the bronzish gold are noticeably different-- the paint is a bit duller, oddly--- but only just so. They both still look prety good, even next to each other.) All three colors go together exceptionaly well-- I particularly love how the molded-in lines are painted silver on the back top of the ambulance mode-- it looks quite nice and unexpected among Cannonball's myriad other paint apps. Cannonball also has silver all around his bottom rims and at the center of his tires, around the center middle of his vehicle mode in a way that mirrors his original paint scheme. Cannonball also has yellow headlights, purple sirens and purple paint on all the windows that aren't transparent. (That said, the windows that ARE transparent are a bit too light in terms of the shade of purple used-- I would've preferred a darker transparent color.) Of course, Cannonball also has-- VERY faithfully recreated-- the bizarre seafoam green "skeletron being run over" paint apps on the sides and the "flaming skull" paint on the roof, though given that there's less real estate on the top this time the latter looks just a TAD "cramped in". This seafoam green goes quite well with Cannonball's status as Star Seeker captain, given that that same color is the color of the emblem of the Star Seekers and is on Cannonball's collar in robot mode. There are also a couple other ingenious paint apps done; in particular I love how the robot chest details-- originally made to be miniatured versions of Prime Ratchet's side doors-- are here painted to look like Cannonball's front bumper and headlights. It's amazing how well that works. The bronzish gold on his waist also makes it look like he has a belt on-- certainly fitting for his character, as does the mold's collar around the head Making Cannonball's swords gold was a good call, as it emphasizes them more, which fit the character better than the original version's medic tools.
    Cannonball does have one mold change-- a new headsculpt based faithfully on Cybertron Red Alert's, and it's all quite crisp and well-done. No complaints about the headsculpt itself, but rather the usage of it on Cannonball. The original Cannonball had half of his face painted black to liken itself to an eyepatch because there wasn't budget for a new headsculpt; however, this time around Cannonball's head is the one and only use of this head mold, so why does he still have the full visor? FunPub missed a PERFECT opportunity to give him a "real" patch with a detail like a plate bolted over half of his visor or something. Additionally, Cannonball's upper leg pieces were unfortunately switched during assembly, and they can't be "made right" without taking out pins, a very risky proposition on a toy this expensive. For the most part it's not a huge deal, but this can cause the paint on these parts to slowly scrap off after multiple transformations/poses, so caution is recommended.
    BotCon Cannonball is pretty much a perfect example of what BotCon exclusives should be-- incredibly well-done redecoes of fairly obscure characters that probably wouldn't get a mass-release. Mold-wise this isn't the best toy in the 2014 boxset, but I absolutely LOVE his color scheme and all the paint on him-- color-wise this is my favorite from the boxset. The only real missed opportunity was his headsculpt.

Review by Beastbot

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