Wow, Super Bumblebee's
alt mode is... stupidly huge. Like you could ride a 1-year-old around on
it. WOW this thing is big, especially for a $50 toy. The RID style already
has fairly minimal detailing, and so at this scale there's very large areas
with no detailing at all. Thankfully the car mode is pretty accurate to
the source material (as it well should be for something this big), with
the only exception being that the rear bumper points are a bit smaller
than they should be and there being a bit of a rectangular "spoiler" at
the back since that's the rear of Bumblebee's feet. All of the necessary
mold details ARE here, with the basic angles there on the headlights, vents
on the front hood, windshield, and particularly on the wheels. The paint,
though, is sadly a bit more sparse than it should be-- Bumblebee doesn't
even have the full black stripes down his front hood, with only the area
around the hood vents painted black, along with the center of the headlights,
part of the side angular detailing on the doors, and the windows. There's
also some nice light metallic blue and dark red on the headlights for a
bit of color variety at least up front, but the rest of this entire huge
toy is solely black and pale yellow in this mode, which is not very eye-catching.
The taillights aren't even painted, which is inexcusable for a toy this
big. By pressing down on the square yellow button in the middle of the
hood, Bumblebee will make one of several sounds: an "engine roaring"; another
"engine roaring" sound, followed by a "tires screeching" sound; him saying
"Robots in Disguise!"; a quick little "rock jam" of a portion of the Transformers
theme song; "Maximum Velocity!"; "Let's catch some Decepticons!"; "Roll
up and roll out!"; and "Autobots!". The sounds are of decent quality, though
it's definitely not Will Friedle voicing 'Bee, but just a general "young-sounding"
voice. It should also be noted that the sound effects aren't affected at
all by the movement of the vehicle; there's no weight inside that determines
if you move him forward or anything.
Transforming Super Bumblebee
is... well, super easy. Pull out the arms from the sides (a transformation
sound effect is made when you do this, and visa versa when you're transforming
him back into car mode), separate the legs slightly, and fold back the
bit of the front bumper so it's behind Bumblebee's back instead of over
his head. Voila, it's his robot mode... which honestly is seriously, SERIOUSLY
disappointing and honestly less than I would expect even on a Legion-class
toy. For one thing, his legs and arms are almost entirely hollow, with
just details on the back and front. I mean, I don't really care that much
about a bit of hollow-ness here and there, but there are HUGE cavernous
bits that completely ruin the look of the arms especially. He also has
no articulation beyond back-and-forth at the shoulders. They're ratcheted
and solid at least, but that's it. The rest of the hollow appendages are
of thin plastic that honestly feels very low-quality and bendy; this is
easily the least sturdiest TF of this size that I've ever handled (he comes
up to the bottom of Metroplex's shoulder,
roughly, in case you're wondering how tall he is in robot mode). He does
have some moderately good mold detailing on his arms and legs, with the
usual RID divots as well as some basic angles, pistons, and the like molded
in, along with the basic details of the show model. There's some nice springs
and piston detailing on his abs, too, but otherwise it's pretty basic.
His face has an odd uneven "mouth open" expression, but otherwise the details
on it are pretty solid and show-accurate. He does have better paint detailing
in this mode, at least, with a good amount of black on nearly every major
area, as well as some silver on the face, waist, hips, and elbows. His
faux car headlights on his chest are also painted, but he still definitely
could've used more paint on his main body and shoulders especially. As
far as electronics, pressing in on the RID symbol in the center of his
chest will cause him to say one of several things, with the blue lights
coming on in his eyes/head and pulsating along with what he says-- "Let's
bug out!"; "Lieutenant Bumblebee!"; " "Time to bring the zoom and lower
the boom!"; "Transform!"; and the same phrases (but not sound effects)
he has in vehicle mode.
Super Bumblebee is a
super disappointment, being less complicated than your average Legion-class
figure but nearly at a Titan-class size, with nearly no articulation, cheap
plastic and a lot lot LOT of hollowness in robot mode. There was only one
reason this was made; so it could indeed be the "biggest Bumblebee toy
ever!" while also still being at a price that parents might consider getting.
But they shouldn't; it's just very cheap-looking and cheap-feeling and
a very lazy design with paint that can even scratch off kinda easily. Get
one of the 3-step changers instead if you want a fairly large RID2015 'Bee
toy that's simple to transform. Even completists might want to stay clear
of this one.
Review by Beastbot