(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 Generations voyager Blitzwing. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of Generations voyager Blitzwing here.)
Doubledealer's color
scheme certainly looks like it came out of the late '80s (which it did--
this toy is an homage to the original G1 toy of the same name). Doubledealer's
on the "cool" side of the color wheel, with two excellent shades of blue--
one light, one dark and a bit more turquoise-- both complementing and contrasting
against each other, primarily on the legs/vehicle sides. There's also a
fair amount of light pale purple, more visible in his jet mode since it's
mostly used on his wings. For neutral colors for the others to play off
of, Doubledealer's also got a good amount of black and light gray-- though
thankfully, his light gray is more of a solid version of the color, not
the blah milky shade of the color that's common among TFs. Doubledealer's
also got surprisingly many accent colors-- there's patches of silver here
and there (as well as his sword blade), bits of metallic gold elsewhere,
some dark metallic blue on his chest, and some translucent red on his robot
eyes (good light piping, by the way) and cockpit. All in all Doubledealer's
color scheme looks very well-done, being very unique and diverse while
also not being overly clashy or loud. Despite Doubledealer's faction-switching
bit, he's definitely got a more Decepticon-y color scheme. This version
of Doubledealer takes a note from his G1 toy and has one "neutral" mode
and one mode for each faction. In jet mode, he's a Decepticon, with a "shark"
military-style paint deco on his nosecone, which looks pretty nice and
is a light homage to the fact that his original toy's Decepticon mode was
an animal-- a bird. His tank mode is identified as an Autobot, while his
robot mode doesn't have any readily visible allegiance insignia. This runs
contrary to his G1 toy, where his robot mode was an Autobot and his ground-based
mode (a mobile artillery vehicle) was neutral. To be honest, though, the
setup on this toy makes a lot more sense-- why would one of his VEHICLE
modes be the neutral one? You do all the haggling as a robot, after all.
All this said, Doubledealer works as a decent enough homage as a robot,
but equating a tank with a wheeled mobile missile launcher and a jet with
a bird is a bit of a stretch; I wish more remolding had been done to substantially
change one or both of his alt modes.
Doubledealer does have
one mold change, though-- a new robot head, which is a pretty good updated
version of his G1 head. The sculpt looks nice, and it does fit into the
bendy nosecone in jet mode easier than Blitzwing's head did; that said,
his "plain" head isn't nearly as fun as Blitzwing's three-faced head. (Doubledealer,
unfortunately, does have the same issues with his shoulders that Blitzwing
does.)
I'm a bit torn on whether
I'd recommend Doubledealer or Blitzwing more if you only want one version
of this mold. If you're simply in it for the color scheme, I think this
version wins, with its more varied, original color scheme. However, as
an update of a G1 character, Blitzwing wins hands down, clearly being who
this mold was originally intended for. If Doubledealer had Sandstorm-levels
of remolding to make his jet mode more like a bird and his tank mode more
like a mobile missile launcher, that would be one thing-- but with only
a new head, Doubledealer doesn't measure up in terms of the strength of
the homage.
Review by Beastbot