In vehicle mode, Berserker is a Chevrolet Suburban, and in fact is pretty much a direct copy of the Crankcase model from Dark of the Moon. Especially in this mode, there's no difference-- he's mostly black, with the proportions quite accurate to the actual vehicle. There are some sacrifices that were made, but they're honestly minor-- beyond the obvious telltale gaps that are a part of basically any Transformer alt mode, you can see Berserker's feet bottoms sticking out below the back end a bit, and a bit of his waist below the front section, between his tires (which are a little lower compared to their covers than on the actual vehicle). Given the robot mode though, this is incredibly minimal and easily overlooked. The vehicle mode details are all pretty accurate, with some basic lines on the hood, front section, and sides, with the grill having most of the actual mold detailing for this mode, with somewhat angled headlights and that all-important bronze Chevrolet symbol in the front. He does have an ALMOST complete back-end too, with license plate mold detailing and another bronze Chevrolet symbol back there-- only the bottom is "cut off" a bit because of the feet, with no exhaust nozzle present. There's a decent amount of paint on this mode to break up all the black plastic-- there's some dull blue paint on the windows, a bit darker than that usually used on windows, but still light enough to contrast well with the black; red on the sirens and taillights; white on the headlights; and light purple Decepticon symbols near the front of his side doors. Yes, there is an obvious bit of gray plastic in the middle of said side doors, but again, small downside given the robot mode. The toy's two weapons-- pikes fulla spikes, based off what Crankcase pulled out in DotM-- can be slotted in on the sides for storage, though they definitely look out of place here. Due to safety standards, the pikes are also made of soft plastic, which means they can bend easily if kept in one of his modes for long time, unfortunately.
    Berserker's transformation to robot mode involves folding parts of his roof and hood over themselves and onto the back of the robot, while the sides split apart and fold out to become the legs and arms. It's not difficult at all to get him to robot mode, but converting him back into vehicle mode can be a bit of a chore-- it's one of those transformations where you have to get everything lined up just right. The end result is quite impressive, especially compared to this design's freshman attempt. It really is sort of like you "peeled back" the vehicle mode bits and there's a completely different robot inside, which is a pretty cool feeling. Now, yes, there is some kibble-- most notably behind his body and head, but it stays out of the way of articulation for the most part and honestly compared to how much it covers up in vehicle mode, it's surprisingly small-looking here. There's also bits of the lower rear side sections on the sides of his lower arms, which to me are actually a bit more egregious since they don't fit with the overall slim, curvy, rather organic look of his arms and claws. There are little spike bits that flip out from the shoulders to make them more accurate to the CGI model, and they look great even if they're a bit small. The legs are pretty solid all-around, with only wheels on the back of the feet and some small side panels on the back of the middle portion. I especially like that he's got them in that "chicken-walker" stance, with large claws and a lithe design down there making him more stable on these legs than you'd think. His legs still look more organic, but there's some small "spring" details in the middle of the legs. His body is molded to look like carapace-like armor, while his face is VERY well-sculpted. I mean, he's got little horns, multiple sets of eyes, a long fanged Predator-like mouth, and robotic dreadlocks, all on one bendy piece of plastic. Beyond the eyes being red, there's some subtle dull silver detailing on the face, making it shine a bit and just look really, really nice. His two weapons can be held in either of his open claws, or can be kept in their vehicle mode slots, which put them underneath the lower arms in this mode. Berserker's color scheme trends more towards gray in this mode, with the black vehicle mode bits mostly being kept to his vehicle mode pieces and his middle legs. There are multiple hues of gray used, though-- a more straightforward gray plastic on his body, waist, upper legs, and feet; a very dark brownish gray (almost black) on his knees and upper arms; and a kind of middling dark brown shade used on the bendy plastic on his head and weapons. He's also got more colors of paint than you'd think-- beyond just the dull silver and red on the face already mentioned, there's also red on the knees and on the big "X" on his chest (the only thing that really calls this toy out as Berserker instead of Crankcase), a red spray paint app on his lower arms, and some light orangish-red on his claws. There's also some very dark brown paint used for his foot-claws. It's still a fairly dull movie color scheme, but at least the lighter colors add a bit of variety. For articulation in this mode, Berserker can move at the neck, at the shoulders (at three points-- four if you consider the rotation of the spike-piece a point), elbows, down slightly at the wrists, movement forward-and-back slightly at the waist, movement at the hips, knees (at two points), ankles, and at the rear toe piece. And for a deluxe toy, especially with this design, that's pretty darn good-- about the only thing he's reasonably missing is waist rotation, which would be pretty difficult with all those pieces on his back.
    TLK Premier Berserker isn't just a great toy if you want Berserker-- and who WOULDN'T want him, given he's a complete copy of an earlier design with like 3 seconds of screen time?-- but also makes a fantastic DotM Crankcase if you ignore that X on his chest. Yes he does have some minor kibble in both modes, but given what a feat of engineering it took to get two modes so completely dissimilar to each other onto a deluxe toy, they're MORE than easily overlooked. Just a great toy all-around, and one of the best things to come out of the truncated TLK line. Highly recommended.
 

Review by Beastbot

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