Set Price: $30 U.S.
Series: War Within
 

Springer

Allegiance: Autobot
Size: Voyager
Difficulty of Transformation: Medium
Color Scheme: Gray, jungle green, and some light pale gray, pale yellow, red, and transparent  blue
Rating: 9.4

(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 Cybertron Evac. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of Cybertron Evac here.)

    Springer here is an homage to the G1 character of the same name, who was a triple changer and could become either a futuristic helicopter or an armored vehicle. This version of Springer can just become a helicopter, but the color scheme is spot-on springer-- the green and gray, as well as the bits of yellow, make for a great homage. However, as a color scheme in and of itself, it's not all that great. It really needs more dark colors to contrast the pale gray & light gray, as well as the pale yellow. The green isn't really what I'd call bright, but it's not dark either, so that doesn't really do the job. The only "dark" color on Springer is the transparent blue, but that's used pretty sparingly. Replacing some of the gray with more of the blue-- or perhaps even red, though that would have lessened the homage a bit-- might have helped some. Still, Springer has plenty of paint apps, even if they aren't all used to the best effect when it comes to contrast-- decorative stripes and details abound, particularly when it comes to the yellow.
    No mold changes have been made to Universe 2.0 Springer, though the mold's Cyber Key has been replaced with the standard transparent red Autobot Cyber Key that has been used for recent Cybertron repaints.

Ratbat

Allegiance: Decepticon/Ultracon
Size: Deluxe
Difficulty of Transformation: Medium
Color Scheme: Black, dull glittery fuchsia, and some dull purplish gray, dull metallic gold, metallic fuchsia, and dull transparent yellow
Rating: 9.6

(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 Cybertron Sideways. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of Cybertron Sideways here.)

    We haven't really had a new Ratbat for some time now, and for good reason-- no mold has really fit the cassette-bat. This one is quite an ingenious pick for the character, though, as it's a "pre-Earth" form, so an outright bat form doesn't make any sense-- instead, Ratbat's got a normal mode and an alternate mode that looks both rodent-ish (around the cockpit "face") and bat-like (the wings in vehicle mode and on the sides of the head in robot mode). It definitely looks evil, too, which certainly fits the character. It's almost hard to believe that this wasn't the mold's original use. Ratbat's overall color scheme is quite good-- he keeps the nice black-and-fuchsia color scheme of the G1 toy, and adds in quite a good amount of gold for a nice contrasting color. Using a grayish purple for some small parts of the robot mode was also a nice choice, as it fits in well against both the black and fuchsia. Ratbat also has plenty of paint apps-- you won't find any large areas of plastic unpainted on this guy-- the number of gold and black paint apps is particularly impressive. What I think is the most ingenious thing done to this repaint, though, is how they implemented Cybertron Sideways' faction-switching Cyber Key gimmick to make perfect sense-- when you put in the Cyber Key, Ratbat's faction symbol changes to the Ultracon symbol, a sub-faction of Decepticons during the War Within comic miniseries. Nice obscure nod, there, and it works since Ratbat's obviously both a Decepticon and, more specifically, an Ultracon.
    No mold changes have been made to Universe 2.0 Ratbat.

    Springer and Ratbat are both great molds, and Ratbat is a particularly ingenious homage, so if you don't have any prior versions of these molds, go for this 2-pack if you can find it. Color-wise, I think Ratbat is slightly inferior to Cybertron Sideways, however, and though I think Springer is better than Cybertron Evac, he falls short of Universe 2.0 Blades in terms of colors.

Reviews by Beastbot

(NOTE: In the U.S., this was supposed to come with a reprinted Transformers: The War Within #2 comic, but many packages have the comic for the other Vs. pack in the assortment instead, the Transformers: Target: 2006 #3 comic. Outside of the U.S., even though the package indicated that a comic was included, it was in fact not for some legal reasons.)

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