Legend Movie Ratchet's
vehicle mode, while still fair for a toy of its teeny size, is a bit below-average
when compared to the other Movie Legends' vehicle modes. There is a complete
lack of a rear end to the ambulance mode, and the robot arms, which are
folded up under the front half of this mode, don't mesh all that well with
their surrounding parts and make Ratchet look a little skinnier in the
front than he otherwise would have. Other than those two things, though,
this mode is pretty good, with pretty nice proportions and a fair number
of nicely-done paint apps (such as the red "heartbeat" line on the sides
of the back half). I also like the green on this version of Ratchet better
than on any other version of his movie self-- it's considerably less yellow
and more of a solid, foilage-esque green, which I think just looks better
than green with yellow mixed in. Ratchet is rather lacking in mold detailing
in this mode, however-- there's just a bare minimum of it on his back half
especially, where it really could use some more on the sides and roof.
Ratchet's robot mode
doesn't LOOK half bad, but it's mostly just a lot of robot mode detailing
molded on the underside or inside of his vehicle parts, with little functional
purpose-- Ratchet can only move at his shoulders (at two points) and ankles,
and that's it. No other movement, due to his construction. Obviously, this
greatly limits his playability in this mode, which is my biggest beef with
him. Most of his vehicle mode extras do stay out of the way or complement
the look of the mode, though, which is fairly rare among Legends figures.
As mentioned earlier, he has quite a lot of mold detailing on his robot
parts and it looks great, but he barely has any paint apps to show them
off-- he really REALLY needs more paint apps in this mode, especially on
his legs and lower chest. He also has rather noticeable square chunks of
plastic hanging off the ends of his fists-- they're used as tabs to keep
a few parts together in vehicle mode, but they look really odd in this
mode as a result.
Legend class Ratchet
is one of the weaker Legends class figures, with a "just okay" vehicle
mode and a robot mode that is extremely limited in its playability, even
taking into account the limited budget and size that factor into these
figures' limitations. I'd recommend you just pay another $15 or so and
get the Voyager class Ratchet instead, unless
you have a particular soft spot for really small Transformers.
Review by Beastbot
*NOTE: Later releases of this toy had a slightly more yellowish, and therefore more movie-accurate, green. I don't think it looks as good at the green on the initial releases of this figure, though, hence the slightly lower rating.