With the demise of Transformers Generation 2, the Transformers brand once again faced oblivion, and this time, it looked like Transformers might disappear from store shelves worldwide. Hasbro decided to take a gamble and hand the brand over to their subsidiary, Kenner, who had made the Star Wars and Super Powers lines in the 70s and 80s, and was doing well with Batman at the time. The result was a complete rebooting of the Transformers franchise. Cars, jets and other vehicles gave way to realistic animals with molded fur texture. Subgroups disappeared and line-wide size classes were established. Articulation on a level with the Cyberjets and other later Generation 2 designs became the norm.

The Beast Wars had begun. With the brand in Kenner’s hands, many changes were made to the Transformers line. The line became known as “Beast Wars: Transformers”. Autobots and Decepticons were replaced by Maximals and Predacons, a play on “Mammals” and “Predators” (although there were Generation 1 Predacons, these Predacons were canonically not related). Most importantly, Kenner introduced size classes for Beast Wars, named Basic, Deluxe, Mega and Ultra – these size classes, in one form or another, have carried forward for every Transformers line since.

Beast Wars toys from the 1996 lineup, including popular characters like Optimus Primal, Megatron, Cheetor, Rattrap, Rhinox, Waspinator and Dinobot

The Beast Wars line also went with size-class wide gimmicks at first. The initial Basics were “flip changers” – by lifting a part in the beast mode, usually a tail, the toy would automatically transform to robot mode. Deluxes tended to sport missile launchers or spinning weapons, unless you were Cheetor, in which case, you shot water out of your gun. Megas and Ultras were larger and more complex, incorporating more spring loaded missile launchers and other battle actions or weapons. Notably, all of the Beast Wars toys could store their weapons somewhere on the toy in their alternate modes – no more laying parts to one side when you transformed your robots! (This feature had existed earlier – Beast Wars simply applied it across the whole line)

The initial release of the Beast Wars line came in “rocky” packaging bubbles, and the bios set the story in the modern era. By the time that the second run of figures including the Ultra Class came out, the packaging had moved over to smooth bubbles, though the bios would not adopt the pre-history setting until the second year of toys arrived. The first year of the Beast Wars toys featured another quirk that dropped out fairly quickly – all of the robots in the Deluxe, Mega and Ultra classes featured “mutant” heads as well as robot heads. Some of these were battlemasks, pure and simple, while others were genuinely alternate heads.

The initial release of Optimus Prime – who in Beast Wars was a new character named Optimus Primal – and Megatron in the line was as a two pack of basic class toys. These initial toys made Optimus Primal a bat armed with twin swords, and made Megatron an alligator. This set was only ever available in the rocky bubble format, and included a comic telling a story involving the new Beast Wars characters – but like the early bios, the storyline was set in a contemporary, modern setting rather than the prehistory era shown in the cartoon.

Later in 1996, Optimus Primal and Megatron were released again, this time as the year’s two Ultra Class toys. Both got new beast forms which would be forever identified with the characters – Optimus Primal was a gorilla, while Megatron was a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Optimus Primal featured a lever-activated mechanism to allow him to beat his chest in beast mode, or swing his weapons around in robot mode. He also had two shoulder mounted missile launchers which could be folded away when not in use, a giant cannon tucked in one of his forearms, and a mace in the other, along with twin swords. Megatron got a water-squirting gimmick in his T-Rex head, and a “punching” action on his other arm, which incorporated his beast mode tail. He also had hip-mounted missiles. Both were excellent toys and a great showcase of what the Ultra class was all about.

The initial Mega class releases included Scorponok and Polar Claw. Polar Claw was a mighty polar bear, while Scorponok was a scorpion. Both feature spy drones that launched from their robot modes – when the trigger was pressed to launch the minion, they would fire off a spring-loaded launcher and transform automatically, which was a pretty cool touch, although the mechanisms are known for wearing out over time.

Stand out characters among the Deluxe class in the inaugural year of Beast Wars included Cheetor, Dinobot, Tarantulas and Waspinator. Each Deluxe could transform from a realistic beast to a fully articulated robot, and each featured some kind of special weapon, be it Cheetor’s water squirting gun, Rhinox’s spinning chaingun, or Tarantulas’ grappling hook. A trend that crept in with the Beast Wars series that the line would often have the robot modes use the animal’s claws / talons / paws as the robot hands. Sometimes actual robot hands were molded in, but others like Dinobot and Tarantulas featured claw hands.

The initial Basics were all pretty similar in terms of engineering, due to the nature of the flip-change gimmick, but they were all good fun toys along with it. Rattrap, Razorbeast and Insecticon all stand out among the initial releases.

1996 significantly also saw the first completely new Transformers cartoon on US networks in nearly 10 years. The Beast Wars series was a full CGI cartoon produced by Mainframe, a Canadian company who had also made the Reboot cartoon series. The show brought to life a small core cast of the wider Beast Wars characters and included the voice talents of Scott McNeil as Dinobot, Waspinator and Rattrap, Ian James Corlett as Cheetor, Garry Chalk as Optimus Primal and David Kaye as the suave, sophisticated Megatron.

The show’s premise saw a band of Predacon villains steal a Golden Disk. Optimus Primal’s exploration vessel the Axalon was the nearest ship in the sector and was sent to intercept the Predacons. The battle that followed saw both ships crash-land on an alien world, and both Maximals and Predacons adopted animal alternate forms in order to survive outside their ships, where Energon radiation would otherwise cause their robotic forms to short out.

At the outset, the premise seemed like a rehash of the classic Transformers story. But Beast Wars took its own path and developed an overarching storyline more like the Japanese series. The first season of 26 episodes was mostly episodic, with the occasional episodes such as Chain of Command dropping hints of a larger plot in motion. New characters were introduced as the season progressed by way of Maximals from the Axalon who were contained in stasis pods, which had been ejected when the Axalon began to crash and were left in orbit around the world. The Maximals in the pods were Protoforms, Transformers who had yet to scan alternate modes, which was a concept introduced by Beast Wars. As Protoforms, the stasis pod Transformers were vulnerable to reprogramming as Predacons – so when a pod crashed to the surface, both sides would mobilize to claim the Cybertronian within to swell their ranks.

The Beast Wars had begun – and Transformers had once again transformed. The Beast Wars kicked off a renaissance of the Transformers line – the new cartoon was written with whole family appeal in mind, much like other classic animated shows of the time such as Gargoyles and Batman the Animated Series. The show got the balance of action and comedy just right. The toys were simultaneously celebrated and derided – fans loved the fact that full articulation was the norm, but bewailed the “claw handed” designs. There was also some gnashing of teeth over the liberties taken with some classic characters, ultimately culminating in the meme “truk not munky” in relation to Optimus Primal.

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1997 arrived and the Beast Wars entered their second year. The toys developed and became more complex, dropping some elements such as battlemasks and flip-changers, but also bringing back limited triple changing and combiners. Transformers returned to Japan once again with “Beast Wars: Super Robot Lifeform Transformer”, both as a toyline and also for the first time in seven years, a cartoon (albeit a dub of Mainframe’s work heavy on adlibbing). Amid all of this, the first Botcon Japan was held, and Kenner experimented with bringing back vehicle Transformers with the Machine Wars… Season 1 of the Beast Wars reached fever pitch in 1997, with several important and interesting episodes. One of these was Possession, which brought back Generation 1 Starscream – still a ghost after he died in Transformers the Movie – and firmly established that Beast Wars was in continuity with the Generation 1 Transformers series. The Spark was another important episode, as it introduced into the series the concept of sparks, the pulsing energy that made up the life force and the personalities of Transformers – a concept which has appeared in every iteration of Transformers fiction since its introduction in this episode.

While Beast Wars was mostly an episodic series throughout its first year, there were hints toward an overarching story. Some of those hints were dropped in episodes like Chain of Command and The Trigger, which had established that there was an alien intelligence with interests in the world where the Beast Wars were taking place. This thread was picked up again in the first episode airing in 1997, Spider’s Game. As well as introducing the popular Predacon fire ant Inferno, the episode established the aliens were on their way to intervene in the Beast Wars. And intervene they did in the explosive season finale, Other Voices, which is remembered and celebrated as one of the greatest episodes of the first season of the show. The aliens revealed they had seeded the world with Energon and other artifacts, and they were unhappy with the Maximals and Predacons interfering with their experiment – and so decided to purge the world with a huge moon-sized weapon. Optimus Primal flew a modified stasis pod into the heart of the weapon to destroy it, but died in the process. Season 1 of the Beast Wars ended with the laughter of Megatron and wreckage of Optimus Primal floating in space.

Season 2 of Beast Wars kicked off in late 1997 with Aftermath and the two part Coming of the Fuzors – essentially a three part story arc which resolved the cliffhanger from the end of Other Voices Part 2. The three part episode served to introduce the Transmetals and the Fuzors – the new product line for 1998 – as well as resurrect Optimus Primal in a new body. The year closed with Maximal No More, an episode focusing on Dinobot questioning his loyalties as he tried to come to terms with, as he saw it, his fate being sealed. Maximal No More marked a trend for season 2 of Beast Wars to be a darker and more introspective show, although the series never became so relentlessly dark that it lost its sense of humor, helped largely by new characters Silverbolt and Quickstrike.

The first half of Season 2 of Beast Wars introduced another important concept to the Transformers mythos, when Rhinox journeyed into the Transformers afterlife to retrieve the spark of Optimus Primal. At this time, this spiritual realm from which all Transformers’ sparks originate from and return to upon their death was referred to as “the Matrix”; however it would come to be known by a different name in Beast Machines – the Allspark.

Beast Wars toys from the 1997 assortments. 1997 added some interesting new beast modes included Retrax the pillbug, Manterror the praying mantis, Cybershark the hammerhead shark and Spittor the poisonous toad. It also added new Predacon villain Inferno and Maximal heroine Airazor, as well as some awesome new combiners.

The Beast Wars toyline continued onward through 1997, with the Deluxe size class getting some truly unique animals into the mix including a pillbug (Retrax) a buffalo (Bonecrusher) and even a hammerhead shark (Cybershark). The basic size class dropped the flip-changer auto transformation in favor of more involved transformations, and instead went with battle action weapons as a gimmick, such as spinning drills and slashing claws. The Mega size class dropped the deployable drone characters and went with triple changing instead – all three of the new releases had third modes (though Inferno’s was a bit questionable). The mandrill, B’Boom transformed into a gun platform, while Transquito changed into two different kinds of bugs. Infamously, both Transquito and Inferno were slow sellers, and Transquito particularly was a notorious “shelf-warmer” who was still being found on shelves more than five years later.

A small but nonetheless noteworthy addition to the 1997 Beast Wars releases were rubsigns, called “Energon Chips” on the packaging. Like the rubsigns featured on the original 1985 – 87 Transformers, these rubsigns were heat-activated and revealed the faction of the character. The Beast Wars toys kept their rubsigns for the 1998 Transmetal series, but dropped them in 1999 with the introduction of spark crystals.

The 1997 toyline assortment also brought back combiners. Magnaboss and Tripredacus were sold at the Ultra price point, and were boxed sets of three toys of roughly Basic to Deluxe size. The three individual toys were solid and poseable on their own, but together could merge into a single robot that was also very poseable – the first time a combiner had pulled off poseability in addition to combination.

While Beast Wars and animal Transformers were what the line was all about at this time, classic style vehicular Transformers, the Autobots and the Decepticons were not forgotten. Kenner tested the waters with a short-lived, Kay Bee exclusive series called Machine Wars, to see if there was a market for vehicle type Transformers. The line included four new Basic class molds – each repainted twice to bulk up the ranks of the Autobots and Decepticons. Four of the late international Generation 1 releases – Predators Stalker and Skyquake, and Turbomasters Rotorstorm and Thunder Clash – were also given new decos and incorporated into the line. The series did not perform strongly, but it shows that classic style Transformers were never completely forgotten.

In 1997, Kenner was also releasing some of its licensed franchises under a series called “Microverse”, to catch on the trend of pocket sized toys. A pair of Beast Wars sets, Orcanoch and Arachnid, were produced. Each one featured an organic “beast mode” when folded up, and unfolded into a base with multiple gunnery stations, minivehicles and other fun features. Each came with a miniature, non-transforming Maximal and Predacon. They were inoffensive little sets, though the Microverse concept as a whole never really caught on.

The Beast Wars videogame, for Playstation and PC, was released in 1997-98[/size]

Transformers returned to videogames in 1997, with a new game based on Beast Wars. The game let players choose from either Maximal or Predacon – the first time a Transformers game actually let you play as the bad guys – and gave you a choice of four characters from each faction. The idea of the game was simple – roam various 3D environments blasting through waves of enemies while evading hazards. Like in the show, you would periodically need to transform to your character’s beast mode to reduce your Energon buildup, and like the show, a new character for each faction could be recovered from a stasis pod part way through the game. If a character was defeated, they could be rescued in a bonus stage, where you got to play as one of two different Maximals or Predacons – one for each faction was only available in these stages.

The game, however, was not fantastic. It had poor controls and primitive graphics, even by contemporary standards. When in beast mode, your characters had no way of defending themselves from enemies – an oversight, considering the need to swap modes on the fly to counter the Energon radiation buildup. The voice acting was also weak, notably none of the TV show voice cast reprized their roles.

The Beast Wars spread to Japan in 1997. Many of the 1996 releases and the 1997 releases who were featured in the show were released in Japan, both individually packed and in VS packs where a Maximal (or “Cybertron” in Japan) was pitted against a Predacon (or “Destron”, Japan retained the original faction names). A handful of the releases including Terrorsaur and Blackarachnia were redecoed to look more like their on-screen appearances. A VS playset was also released, featuring the Japanese release of Snapper and Armadillo, who were bundled with a volcano playset which was a Japan exclusive.

Beast Wars also aired in Japan at this time. The Japanese dub was overseen by Yoshikazu Iwanami, who would go on to oversee all future dubs of western produced Transformers cartoons for Japan, such as Transformers Animated and Transformers Prime. The dub added a lot of adlibbed sequences and gave many characters vocal tics. Megatron went from a suave supervillain into an uncharismatic, mood-swinging character who would shriek effeminately and make up lame excuses when running from battle. Most notably, Airazor was changed from a female character to a male character.

BotCon continued to expand, and 1997 notably was the year that “3H Enterprises” (later 3H Productions, commonly shortened to 3H) was formed and took the reins of organizing the convention. 3H at its inception consisted of the Hartmans and Glen Hallitt. 3H would continue to run the convention until 2004; during their run they would release a series of Beast Wars themed exclusives as a part of a storyline called “Reaching the Omega Point”, which introduced the villainous Shokaract. In 1997 the first international BotCon – BotCon Japan – was also held.

Beast Wars in 1997 really began to show audiences what it was made of, both as an engaging series with well-rounded and interesting characters, and as a toyline with all kinds of interesting beasts and robots. As 1997 ended and 1998 began, the future of Beast Wars began to emerge in all its Transmetalized glory.

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1998 arrived and Beast Wars entered its third year. This was the year that the Beast Wars series truly came of age, with episode after episode that continually show up on fan’s “favorite episode” lists, and some of the very best toys of the Beast era, the Transmetals. Japan meanwhile took their own path once again with a new cel-animated series “Beast Wars Second”, complete with some new Japan only toy releases. The second half of Beast Wars’ second season concluded in 1998 with a string of excellent episodes, including what is regarded by many fans as the 20 greatest minutes of a Transformers series ever. Code of Hero aired on March 9, 1998, and resolved Dinobot’s long-running existential crisis as he went down like a true hero, facing off against all of the Predacons and sacrificing himself to safeguard the future of all humanity from Megatron’s evil plan to change the future. Dinobot’s last words are some of the most poignant of the whole series, coupled with an excellent musical score accompanying his funeral. While he was not the first Transformer to have died during the run of a series, the way the final battle and death were handled set the episode apart.

Other significant episodes in the run included Bad Spark, which introduced the Predacon Rampage, a sociopathic monster with a mutant spark that made him extremely powerful and resilient. It was revealed he was a result of a Maximal experiment to try to recreate Starscream’s unique spark, casting some shadows over the supposed “good guy” faction of the Maximals. The resolution of the episode was quite dark, with Megatron cutting out a bit of Rampage’s spark and using it to induce pain and force loyalty from the newly-recruited Predacon.

Another significant – and tragic – episode in the latter part of the second season was Transmutate. Transmutate dealt with a Protoform Maximal who was heavily damaged, and awakened as a mentally and physically challenged robot. A huge amount of the episode dealt with the cast accepting – or not – Transmutate even in her disabled form, with Silverbolt and Rampage getting a good amount of screen time as they came to understand Transmutate.

The season 2 finale was a three part story titled The Agenda. Possession set out that Beast Wars took place in the same continuity as the Generation 1 Transformers show – The Agenda drew those connections together in three different, and very awesome, ways. It introduced a survivor of the Great War – a Decepticon, upgraded and rebuilt as a Predacon – Soundwave’s former minion, Ravage! Ravage intervened in the Beast Wars and assisted the Maximals, helping them capture Megatron. But then in the three-part story’s second major connection with Generation 1, Beast Wars Megatron produced a shattered piece of the Golden Disk and revealed the whole time he had been acting under the orders of the original Generation 1 Megatron! This prompted one of the biggest and best battle sequences of the whole series, complete with – for the first time in ten years – the Generation 1 transforming sound effect being played when Ravage transformed. The tension kept ratcheting up as The Agenda continued, with its cliffhanger finale providing a third reference to Generation 1 – and one of the greatest cliffhanger endings in Transformers history. The Beast Wars were taking place on Earth – and the original Autobots and Decepticons were in stasis on board the crash-landed Ark, awaiting their awakening in the distant future of 1984. Beast Wars Megatron sought to change the future, to ensure a Decepticon victory – and to achieve that goal, he shot Generation 1 Optimus Prime in the head. The Maximals were too late, and as the episode ended a time storm erupted, consuming the entire Solar System before the scene faded out to “to be continued?”

Fortunately, there was not too long to wait for the continuation, as on October 24 1998 the third season began with Optimal Situation. Optimus Primal took Optimus Prime’s spark inside himself and gained a new “Optimal” Optimus form, and the Maximals managed to save Optimus Prime, putting him back into stasis so that time would again take its correct course – but not before Optimus Prime and Optimus Primal briefly met eyes. The Maximal’s base, the Axalon, was destroyed in the course of the episode – with the Beast Wars taking a new turn in its third season – safeguarding the sleeping Autobots and Decepticons from Megatron’s attempts to rewrite time – the Maximals moved into a new base outside of the Ark. A new ally joined the Maximal side shortly after in the form of Depth Charge, a hard-edged Maximal warrior out to exterminate Protoform X, aka Rampage. He did not see eye to eye with the other Maximals for many of his appearances. Blackarachnia’s character development also culminated in her defecting to the Maximal side, though she still called herself a Predacon.

1998’s Beast Wars line introduced the Transmetals, mechanical beasts with organic styled robot modes. Most of the core cast from the cartoon got Transmetal updates including Rattrap, Cheetor, Tarantulas, Megatron and Optimus Primal, seen here. The big guy in the back is Rampage – an all-new Transmetal added to the Predacon ranks.

The Beast Wars toyline underwent a reinvention for 1998, changing over to “Transmetals”. Many of the core characters got new Transmetalized forms – including those like Rhinox and Waspinator who did not get their new bodies in the show. The initial Transmetals were released at Deluxe and Mega class sizes, with two Ultra class toys coming later. All three size classes featured similar gimmicks – the beast forms, rather than the organic ones featured in the first two years of the line, were fully mechanical and featured vacuum metalized parts, which gave the toys an excellent metallic finish, though in the longer term, the chromed parts are notorious for chipping and flaking. The robot modes, to continue the inversion, were now more organic in appearance, to varying degrees – some like Transmetal Optimus Primal were very organic, while others like Scavenger or Transmetal Waspinator seemed almost wholly mechanical. The main gimmick across all three Transmetal size classes was that the characters could transform not only from robot to beast, but that the beast mode could transform further into a third “transport” mode. These were not true triple changers in the style of Blitzwing or Springer, but more like alternate configurations of alternate forms, like Generation 2 Dreadwing’s tank mode. Some of the third modes, like Cheetor or Optimus Primal, were merely deploying “transport” forms – rocket jets and a jet-powered surfboard, respectively. Others though, like Waspinator and Rattrap, got more involved transformations for their third modes.

The majority of the Transmetal releases were upgraded forms of the existing main cast – Scavenger in the Mega class is in fact the only non-Ultra class Transmetal to not be based on an existing Beast Wars character, and he was originally conceived as an updated Inferno before slow sales of Inferno led to his name change. However, there were a pair of Ultra class Transmetals, and both of these were new characters. Maximal Depth Charge was a manta ray, one of the few themed Beast Wars characters, and featured a disk launcher in his chest, plus a sword and a missile launcher designed to look like a fish. His robot mode used part of his manta ray tail to balance himself, which limited his poseability – but it was necessary due to his huge backpack. His rival, Rampage, was the Predacon Ultra class Transmetal. Rampage was a crab who turned into a tank, one of the more convincing Transmetal third modes. His main weapon was a triple barreled missile launcher that rotated and fired missiles as the tank mode was rolled forward. Rampage was a particularly excellent release due to his size, which was emphasized with the massive crab claws.

Optimal Optimus was the largest Beast Wars toy made, with light up eyes and cannons, as well as three distinct alternate modes.[/size]

The Beast Wars line also added a new size class in the form of the “Super class” Optimal Optimus. Optimal Optimus was the single largest Beast Wars toy released. A member of the Transmetal series, he featured four distinct modes – robot, ape, jet and tank. He also featured light-up details on his cannons and “blast apart” armor on his arms. Optimal Optimus was later redecoed as Primal Prime, a red, white and blue version of the toy, in the Beast Machines line.

The Fuzors were a second subset of the 1998 Beast Wars line, and featured characters with two different alternate modes that were blended – or fused – into a single creature. Released in the series included Silverbolt, Torca, Quickstrike, Terragator, Noctorro and Buzzclaw[/size]

The Fuzors were the other subset of Beast Wars toys released in 1998. The Fuzors covered the Basic and Deluxe size classes, and ten different Fuzors were released across four different assortments, two per size class. The Fuzors were, as the name implied, fusions of two different animal forms, such as the eagle-wolf hybrid Silverbolt or the cobra-scorpion fusion Quickstrike. The end results were very hit-or-miss compared to the almost universally excellent Transmetal series – one of the most notoriously bad Beast Wars toys, Injector, was a Fuzor, but on the other hand, Torca, an orca whale-elephant hybrid, was released in the same assortment, and he was one of the better Fuzors. Much like the 1997 series, the Basic Fuzors had gimmicks that were fairly simple – lever-activated punching or spring loaded snapping jaws – while the Deluxes featured spring loaded missile launchers or water shooting guns (though Quickstrike also shot water…)

Meanwhile in Japan, Takara once again went down their own path and introduced Beast Wars Second, also known as Beast Wars II. This series was a side story to the main Beast Wars and told the story of a different crew of Cybertrons, led by Lioconvoy, arriving on the mysterious planet Gaia to counter the Destrons, led by Galvatron, in their quest to obtain the powerful Angolmois energy found on the planet. The plot of the series was very episodic, with brief arcs scattered throughout, until the finale when Galvatron brought his space fortress, the artificial planet Nemesis, to Gaia to drain the planet of all the Angolmois energy. The final battle fell to Lioconvoy and the youthful Cybertron Liojunior to fuse into the “Green Warrior”, guardian of Gaia, and bring an end to Galvatron and his wicked plan.

Much like the Japanese dub of Beast Wars, Beast Wars Second was largely played for laughs. For example the aforementioned Liojunior called Lioconvoy “mama” because he was created through the sharing of Lioconvoy’s Energon Matrix. An early episode also featured Galvatron getting drunk on “bad oil” and going on a rampage. The Japanese version of Tripredacus featured in the series, Tripledacus, were written as Mexican stereotypes. However, the series also had its epic moments, prominent among them a theatrical feature “Lioconvoy’s Crisis” which teamed up Lioconvoy and Beast Wars Convoy / Optimus Primal to face off against a huge war machine called Maijin Zarak.

A selection of the toys released in Japan for the Beast Wars Second series, including new mold leaders Lio Convoy and Galvatron, re-released Generation 1 Seacon combiner God Neptune, Japan-exclusive cyborg beasts Dirgegun, Max B and Thrustor, Flipchanger jet recolors Dirge and Thrust, unreleased Generation 2 Autoroller Autostinger and another new mold, Moon.

For the toyline, Takara released most of the remaining 1997 Beast Wars releases, some with new paint decos, to fill out the Maximal side, with Lioconvoy being the main new mold. Lioconvoy was an Ultra class white lion, whose features included a spinning mane “Lio Typhoon”, blades located in the front beast mode legs, and a large amount of missile launchers. The Destrons though were not Beast Wars toys – Takara opted to go with a “nature VS technology” theme and brought back some vehicular Transformers for the BWII Destrons! The Destron side included a selection of Generation 2 toys including the large Generation 2 tank Megatron as Megastorm, Galvatron’s second-in-command. The Generation 2 Autorollers, Dirtbag and Roadblock, were released in Japan as a part of the Destron troops – with two more that were presumably designed, but never released in Generation 2 bringing the Autoroller team up to four members. The Dreadwing ATB set from Generation 2 was released in a variant of its Megatron & Starscream ATB colors as Starscream & BB. Rounding out the molds reused in the Destron troops were Thrust and Dirge, redecoed versions of the Machine Wars flipchanger jets.

Beast Wars Second’s big bad, Galvatron, got a complete new mold. He was a triple changer – a true triple changer too, unlike the Transmetal toys that featured a “third mode”. He transformed into both a drilltank mode, and a dragon mode. Galvatron featured a variety of weapons, including slashing scythe-like weapons on his detachable backpack and hatchets which could be fired like missiles. Other notable new molds in the lineup included a Cybertron vehicle the Takotank, a giant octopus vehicle which came with a redeco of the Basic class squid Clawjaw. A base playset, the Niagara base, was also released. Rounding out the new, Japan only, releases was Moon. Moon was the sidekick of the robot girl Artemis who watched the events of the series and the pair acted as something like narrators, commentating on the action. Moon was a basic sized toy and transformed from a cutesy cartoon bunny into a cutesy little robot. You could look through his stomach to view scenes from the series – a bit like the Megavisor gimmick on the 1993 Predator series releases.

Later in the Beast Wars Second line, Takara reached back to Generation 1 for new releases. They released a giftset of five out of the six Seacons – Nautilator was omitted – as God Neptune, a majestic looking white version of Piranacon. This was followed up with a new release of Generation 1 Trypticon, remolded with a new horn on his head, as Gigastorm, an upgraded Megastorm. Both of these releases omitted many of the smaller accessories from the original releases – Gigastorm did not include Brunt or the other city parts from Trypticon, and God Neptune only included the combiner parts – the individual guns for the four smaller Seacons were not included.

The last four Beast Wars Second Destrons were the Cyborg Beasts. In the latter part of the series, Galvatron’s four soldiers Starscream, BB, Thrust and Dirge were exposed to concentrated Angolmois energy and upgraded into cyborg beast forms, and became known as Hellscream, Max B, Thrustor and Dirgegun. The four all extensively remolded Deluxe class toys from the 1996-97 series of Beast Wars releases, adding new weapons and mechanical parts giving a truly cybernetic feel to their beast modes, like they were some kind of cross between Beast Wars and the Borg from Star Trek. Only Hellscream was ever released in the US – the other three remained in Japan, which is surprising considering how similar they are to the Transmetal 2 series that would be released in 1999. The likely explanation is that the extra tooling pushed them past the threshold for what Kenner was able to release at the Deluxe pricepoint – Takara had no such restriction.

In many ways, Beast Wars Second was foreshadowing – the release of the Cyborg Beasts would look forward towards the Transmetal 2 series, and the idea of a faction of beasts facing a faction of machines was one that would be returned to more than once during the years to follow.

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1999 was the fifteenth anniversary of the Transformers brand, an occasion that went largely unmarked save for a recognition at Botcon 1999 (which was also the fifth anniversary of Botcon). Beast Wars reached its climax, concluding with a finale written by long time Transformers comics scribe Simon Furman, and the toyline carried on and developed the Transmetals theme with Transmetal 2s. Japan meanwhile got a double-whammy of new series this year with a dub of Beast Wars seasons 2 and 3 as “Beast Wars Metals” as well as the Japan-only series Beast Wars Neo, which had its own toyline populated almost exclusively with new and Japan-only toys. Also this year saw the debut of a little thing called Beast Machines, though – in the first instance of a rather unfortunate trend – the toys for this new toyline would not hit shelves until the first season of the show was almost done.

But before we throw ourselves into the Beast Wars sequel there is the small matter of the final year of Beast Wars to talk about! Beast Wars season 3’s final episodes aired in 1999, kicking off in the last week of January 1999 with Feral Scream Part 1. Feral Scream was the episode which debuted the new Transmetal 2 Transformers in the show. It kicked off with Megatron resurrecting the deceased Dinobot as a cyborg raptor – something hinted at in the previous episode, Cutting Edge. Cheetor, who was investigating with Depth Charge, was exposed to the energies of the mysterious “Transmetal 2 driver” Megatron used to create his Dinobot clone and began an evolution of his own. By the time the episode concluded, Cheetor was also a Transmetal 2 and the Maximals had a new foe in the form of a fully Predacon clone of their old friend.

In Crossing the Rubicon, it was the turn of Blackarachnia to undergo a Transmetal 2 evolution. She was one of the first Protoforms to have been “turned” by a Predacon shell program, and as a result of her leaving the Predacons for the Maximals, the shell program was beginning to malfunction and endanger her life. In one of the darkest moments of the season – notable considering this season was lighter hearted than season 2 – Silverbolt, believing Blackarachnia to be dead, went out to murder Tarantulas in cold blood. Blackarachnia however survived, revived by the Transmetal 2 driver she had retrieved and transformed into a Transmetal 2. Megatron would follow suit in the next episode, Master Blaster, where he absorbed the spark of the original (Generation 1) Megatron and underwent an evolution into a Transmetal 2 “Dragon Megatron” form.

The series concluded with Other Victories and the two-part Nemesis. In Other Victories the aliens who had been recurring antagonists throughout the series, using the bodies of Tigatron and Airazor, forged an avatar for themselves, named Tigerhawk. Tigerhawk’s arrival led to the destruction of the Predacon base, and by the time the episode concluded, Tarantulas had been destroyed – by his own weapon intended to kill the aliens no less. His legacy endured, though, as before his death he had found the warship used by Generation 1 Megatron, the Nemesis. In the finale, Megatron took to the ship and set about destroying the Ark with its firepower. The Maximals raced to stop the ship – with Depth Charge and Rampage killing each other in a savage final duel, and Tigerhawk sacrificing himself to buy time for the Maximals. In the end it was the Dinobot clone – who was restored to the original Dinobot’s personality with the death of Rampage – who saved the day and destroyed the Nemesis bridge, but not before Optimus Primal and Megatron had one last duel.

These final episodes were progressively more epic as the tension mounted, but there is one episode that was alleged to be planned, but dropped because it was considered to be too dark. That episode was Dark Glass, wherein Rattrap tried to install a backup of the original Dinobot’s personality in the evil clone, and would have helped explain where the sudden shift in Dinobot 2’s personality came from in the finale. It was not the only thing that was cut, though, as Simon Furman indicated that in Nemesis it was originally intended to have had the Decepticons Thrust, Dirge and Ramjet join the fray. Alas this was not to be, and we would have to wait a few more years to see Decepticons taking flight once more.

1999 introduced the cyborg Transmetal 2s, including a healthy mix of existing characters upgraded such as Dinobot II, Cheetor, Blackarachnia and a dragon Megatron. They shared the line with all-new additions like Jawbreaker the hyena, Scarem the beetle and Optimus Minor. Scarem here demonstrates the “spark crystal” gimmick added to these releases.[/size]

The Beast Wars toyline rebranded again for 1999, this time introducing Transmetal 2’s across all four size classes – Basic, Deluxe, Mega and Ultra. There were a mix of existing characters upgraded with new forms and all-new characters introduced in this series. The Transmetal 2’s dropped the third modes from the Transmetals and instead introduced “spark crystals” – concealed panels on each toy could be opened to expose a clear plastic dome with the faction symbol of the robot on it, with Maximals getting green sparks and Predacons getting purple ones. This concept would endure through the Beast Machines line.

The Transmetal 2 toys were all cyborg beasts and were some of the most asymmetrical robots released in the Transformers line ever, due to the blending of organic and mechanical parts in both modes. While largely fun releases, they never quite captured the sheer essence of coolness that came with the Transmetals. The larger toys of the year included a Mega class Blackarachnia, and Ultra class releases Tigerhawk (a Transmetal 2 Fuzor) and Dragon Megatron. The dragon Megatron was a particular awesome piece – he had an impressive wingspan and was the only mythical creature in the line (though the Dr Moreau-ish Fuzors could be considered to be like chimeras).

Japan meanwhile was pressing ahead with their Beast Wars sidestory with a cel-animated series, Beast Wars Neo. Neo was a sequel to Beast Wars Second, picking up on the quest to recover the Angolmois energy. Following the events of Beast Wars Second the Angolmois energy was sealed into capsules which were scattered across the galaxy. A Cybertron force of new recruits was placed under the command of a one-robot army Big Convoy and were tasked with recovering the Angolmois capsules. Opposing with the Cybertrons were a new force of Destrons, under the command of Magmatron. As the series progressed both sides came into contact with a third faction, the Blentrons – the first time a third faction was depicted in the fiction. The Blentrons, it was revealed, were heralds of Unicron, and Angolmois energy was Unicron’s very lifeforce. Unicron himself arrived, having taken over the body of Galvatron as a new vessel for his evil essence. Cybertron and Destron alike teamed up in the face of their common enemy, whose ultimate goal was to seize control of Seibertron itself as his new, planet-sized body. In the end the united forces of the Cybertrons and Destrons – including a few returning allies from Beast Wars Second – were able to defeat Unicron, with Big Convoy using his Matrix to charge up his Big Cannon and deliver the final blow.

Beast Wars Neo featured an eccentric selection of beast modes. Shown here are the toys for Destorons Sling, Bazooka, Saberback, Dead End and Magmatron, who all turned into dinosaurs or other prehistoric creatures, and Cybertrons Break, Stampy, Corhadra, Big Convoy, Longrack and Mach Kick.[/size]

The Beast Wars Neo show was accompanied by a toyline. Unlike Beast Wars Second, which mostly released non-show toys from the US Beast Wars line, Beast Wars Neo went largely with all-new molds including some very eclectic beast mode choices, such as a rabbit, a giraffe, a penguin and a horse on the Cybertron side, and on the Destron side a slew of prehistoric creatures and dinosaurs including a triceratops, an archaeopteryx, an ammonite, and an ankylosaurus. The leaders of each side, Big Convoy and Magmatron, were Ultra class sized releases. Big Convoy was a woolly mammoth, who was the first Convoy / Optimus Prime toy to feature a removable Matrix. He also featured his signature Big Cannon, a huge weapon that made up the trunk and most of the back of his mammoth mode. Magmatron was an unusual design – he had a single robot mode but like the Duocons and Overlord from Generation 1, he divided into three dinosaurs for his beast mode – Skysaur the Quetzalcoatlus, Landsaur the Giganotosaurus, and Seasaur the Elasmosaurus. The three beast modes could merge into a single, nightmarish Fuzor beast mode as well as the Magmatron robot mode.

Notably, the Beast Wars Neo series were some of the first toys to feature on a line-wide basis the trick of having a robot “skeleton” fold up within a beast mode “shell”, the resulting robots earning the derisive nickname “shellformers”. Many of the releases such as Guiledart the Triceratops had some of the beast mode parts left over, hanging from the robot’s shoulders or back. Like the term shellformers, the left over parts were derisively called “kibble”; and while both terms had likely been coined before Beast Wars Neo, it was at this time that the terms started to enter into the Transformers fandom’s lexicon.

Beast Wars Neo was also the line with the greatest “almost got him” of Transformers history, because it was revealed that a toy of the big villain Unicron had been prototyped for the line. Never produced as the lackluster performance of Transformers in Japan at the time would not have made the cost of production viable, the Beast Wars Neo Unicron (or “Neocron”) would have transformed into the classic planet mode and been around the size of Optimal Optimus. He would, however, have had significant portions of the planet shell on his body including half of his planet mode as a backpack, although this did not stop fans petitioning for the toy’s release.

Beast Wars Metals X-9 Jaguar, aka Ravage, is one of the most sought-after releases from the Metals line.[/size]

Takara followed up the conclusion of Beast Wars Neo in 1999 with Beast Wars Metals, the Japanese dub of Beast Wars seasons 2 and 3. The dub was accompanied by the release of the whole 1998 Transmetals line, along with Fuzors Silverbolt and Quickstrike and the Transmetal 2 characters that were featured in the show, some of them with alternate decos to reflect the on-show appearance. One all-new Japan-only toy was also released – Jaguar, aka Ravage. Like his show model, he was a retool of Transmetal Cheetor with a new head, chest and arms. He stands as one of the most desirable releases from the line, due to the character not getting a release in the US toyline and collectors wanting to finish off their TV show casts.

A trio of videogames were produced in Japan alongside the Japanese shows and toylines. Both the Nintendo 64 and the Playstation got versions of a 3D fighting game based on the Beast Wars Transmetals, while for Japanese fans who wanted some Transformers action on the go, a 2D Transformers fighting game was released for the Game Boy Color.

The Game Boy Color title was only released in Japan. Titled the tongue-twisting “Duel Fight Transformers Beast Wars: Beast Warriors’ Strongest Decisive Battle” it was a 2D one-on-one fighting game, featuring characters from Beast Wars, Beast Wars Second and Beast Wars Neo. There were ten fighters in total, including two secret ones – Beast Wars Convoy, Cheetor and Megatron, Beast Wars Second Lioconvoy, Scuba, Galvatron and Megastorm and Beast Wars Neo Guiledart. A tag-team of Artemis and Moon from Beast Wars Second and Star Upper, a boxing kangaroo Cybertron featured in the Beast Wars Neo manga, were the secret fighters. Star Upper was the winner of a “design a Transformer” contest. It was a fun and easy to pick up game, with the main gimmick being all fighters could transform between modes at the touch of a button, and the characters’ moves and attacks varied based on their alternate forms. The characters also featured super attacks, and notably Megatron, who acted as the game’s boss, would summon most of the season 1 Predacons as a part of his super move. The game also featured some additional mini-games, with other characters like Starscream and BB available to play as in these modes.

The other two games released in 1999 were Transformers: Beast Wars Transmetals. The game was released on both Playstation and Nintendo 64, and while the basic gameplay of the games was the same – both were arena-based 3D one-on-one fighting games – the specifics of each game differed, both in story modes and in selection of characters available. Both games were based on the cast and characters of Beast Wars season 2, and were produced to coincide with the Japanese Beast Wars Metals series. However, the Nintendo 64 version featured individual ending stories for all the characters, rather than an ambiguous faction-specific one for the Playstation version of the game. Both games gave players a selection of Maximals and Predacons to play as, with both versions letting players unlock Blackarachnia, Ravage and Tigatron as secret characters. The Playstation version had Rampage, Quickstrike and Silverbolt among the characters exclusive to it, while the Nintendo 64 version got playable characters including Transmetals Waspinator, Airazor, Terrorsaur and “Starscream” (based on when he possessed Waspinator in Possession). The Nintendo 64 game also had an exclusive end-boss named Megatron X, a chrome, dragon-winged Transmetal Megatron. Both games were fun to play, and both were greatly enhanced when they were released in English by the majority of the voice actors from the show reprising their roles.

1999 saw the end of the Beast Wars – but the beast era was far from over! In September 1999 the next part of the Beast era, Beast Machines, began. Beast Machines was set some time after the conclusion of the Beast Wars. The Maximals had returned to Cybertron – but on their return they found the planet deserted, populated only by sparkless Vehicon drones. The Maximals were split up and infected with a virus that mode-locked them in their beast modes. In their efforts to escape, Optimus Primal, Cheetor, Rattrap and Blackarachnia found their way beneath the surface of Cybertron and found the mysterious Oracle, which reformatted the four into new techno-organic forms. It was soon revealed that Megatron had escaped the Maximals and returned to Cybertron first, and had become the leader of the Vehicon army.

At the heart of the series was a clash of ideologies – Megatron’s goal was to create a “perfect” mechanical world, free of organic influence and presumably also free of free will. Optimus Primal on the other hand was steadfast in the duties assigned to him by the Oracle – to establish a balance between organic and mechanical, and bring about the evolution of the Transformers race. The two were both fanatical in their devotion to their goals – to the point where Optimus Primal was endangering Cybertron by unleashing the power of the Plasma Energy Chamber in an attempt to purge the Vehicons. Never before or since had the actions of a protagonist of a Transformers cartoon been so morally grey!

Another key plot point in the first season involved Megatron’s three Vehicon generals, and the missing Maximals Rhinox and Silverbolt. Megatron, finding he needed sparked soldiers to outwit the Maximals, created three Vehicon generals using three of the sparks he had obtained during his campaign – the brutal, thuggish Tankor, the haughty and sadistic Jetstorm, and the brooding Thrust. The Maximal’s quest to find their lost friends led to the discovery that the three generals were in fact corrupted versions of Rhinox, Silverbolt and Waspinator (the latter of whom had found his way back to Cybertron post Beast Wars). The awakening of the dormant Rhinox personality within Tankor led to Tankor’s evolution into a bigger villain rivaling Megatron, as Tankor / Rhinox fully embraced his new dark side and set out to destroy both Megatron and the Maximals.

Season 1 of Beast Machines had a mixed reception – fans did not react well to the way the Maximals “morphed” rather than transformed, and had to learn how to transform. The darker tone with more sparse humorous interludes and the deeper storytelling made the show much less accessible for younger audiences, and fans of Beast Wars were upset by the sometimes radical re-interpretations of their favorite characters from Beast Wars, including a more cowardly Rattrap and Megatron’s shift of goals. The series was notorious for its in media res beginning, and the promise that “all would be revealed”, which again made the story hard to follow. Looking back now, though, fifteen years and several series later, it is easier to appreciate Beast Machines for being a different take on the Transformers story – and a more mature one at that, tackling some deeper themes than your average Transformers show.

Beast Machines Wave 1 – these are all of the toys which were released as a part of the Beast Machines line late in 1999, and included versions of Beast Machines Optimus Primal, Cheetor, Tankor, Jetstorm, Mirage, Scavenger and Buzzsaw[/size]

The first season of Beast Machines did not have a toyline to accompany it when it first started to air – the first time the ugly trend of the toyline being late cropped up. The first waves of the Basic, Deluxe and Mega size classes were released in late 1999, when season 1 of the cartoon was nearly finished, although the line did not hit its stride until 2000.

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Hisashi Yuki has shared a real blast from the past on his Twitter account, TFYuki. He’s posted up some of the original pen concept sketches for Beast Wars Second Galvatron. Beast Wars Second (or BWII as some know it) diverged from the US Beast Wars continuity and introduced a host of new characters. Galvatron was the Destron leader in this series, a triple changer who possessed dragon and drill tank forms. These sketches show the earliest ideas of Galvatron, from the first concepts that Galvatron with the drill as one of his arms to the finalized design. Check them » Continue Reading.

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David Kaye is back as the voice of Beast Wars Megatron to wish Transformers Fans a Merry Christmas. This time Tara Strong joins him as Bubbles from Power Puff Girls (although this newsie secretly wish that she was the Rubber Ducky).

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As we approach that last quarter of 2015, big ticket items are starting to appear in stores. One of such items found on store shelves in Taiwan is the Year Of The Monkey Platinum Edition Optimus Primal (as reported earlier here).

Thanks to an article from Autobase Aichi, we get a glimpse of the release’s actual packaging and the figure’s final product paint scheme from photos shared by a Taiwanese Transformers Fan group on Facebook. Interestingly, there appears to be a sticker depicting the 20th anniversary of Beast Wars. Will this mean more products from Hasbro in celebration for this anniversary? Only time will tell. In the mean time, check out the images after the break.

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Coming off of our news regarding Platinum Edition Optimus Primal being sighted at retail, we’ve received our first in-hand images of the newest Year Of The Monkey figure via Snakas Blog. The images showcase the figure in both modes, as well as being compared to the original mold’s use: Air Attack Optimus Primal.

Do the in-hand images win you over yet? Sound off after the jump!

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With the news that the 2016 Botcon exclusives would include show inspired versions of the Tripredacus Council – based on their cameo in the Beast Wars season 2 finale, The Agenda Part 1 – TFW2005 member Verno reached out to Cal Shumiatcher, who directed the episode. Cal was kind enough to share a very detailed answer on the origins of the scene – an answer which we have reproduced here for the enjoyment of our fellow fans of Beast Wars, and all those curious about how things worked behind the scenes on the show.

Read on for Cal’s full response.

Original message from Cal Shumiatcher
Wow – this really came out of the blue. And you’ve picked one of my favourite scenes from the point of view of innovation on a limited budget. One of the great things about Beast Wars was the creative freedom afforded to directors on the show. And of course the amazing scripts made working on this show so rewarding.
This scene was a typical production challenge and I’m very proud of the results.

Here’s what I was given:

1) the design of a massive spaceship – exterior only. Because this was the only scene that ever takes place within the ship, no interior set was ever designed.
2) Three rough character models that had virtually no moving parts.
3) a three page dialogue scene that was important but virtually all exposition. no action.

Hmmm. How to keep the audience awake? As I recall, the Tripredacus Council were essentially putting a hit out on one of our good guys. So I decided to play them like film noir gangsters, sitting in a smoke filled room under a swinging ‘china hat’ lamp. The swinging lamp was supposed to be the only light source in the room and there was to be virtually no ambient light. I was looking for the super high contrast, film noir look – partially because I love the look and partly because there was no set! So I decided that we’d play the interior of the spaceship like a huge cavernous empty space – almost a bottomless pit with the council members floating in space.

So we set it up, and everything was great, except you couldn’t see the character’s faces. The overhead light was casting such hard shadows. So the supervising animator, Eric Reynolds – (who has gone on to supervise animation on movies like Avatar, The Hobbit and The Hunger Games), suggested the Council kind of ‘sign in’ when they arrived at the table by touching a palm reading pad that would illuminate when their identity was confirmed. The glowing pad provided a soft red light on the bodies. Now you have to remember that these were very rudimentary models that were quickly finished and textured. So I can only imagine that some parts of the characters were more reflective than others. We didn’t really plan it, but it looked really cool when parts of them glowed with red, so we went with it. Sorry, that’s pretty much all there is to it.

I love how the scene ends – one character grabs the lamp to stop it swinging and delivers a line I still remember well – “Terminate, with extreme prejudice”. It was so camp, and so cool all at once.

Thanks for your enquiry – and for picking a scene that I remember so well.

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For our next Transformers gallery update, we’re staying in Japan but coming right up to date, with a look at a recent Japanese release. Takara-Tomy last month released a set of three female Transformers as a part of their Generations line, Transformers Legends, and one of these was a pseuso-Beast Wars Classics release, Blackarachnia.

Blackarachnia is a remolded version of Transformers Animated Blackarachnia, with a new head and chest designed to emulate the look of the character in the Beast Wars series in both of her modes. Even though the mold on the toy remains about 80% the same as the Animated character, the remolding makes it easy to look past this. The robot mode is not completely accurate to the Beast Wars show model, but it comes incredibly close, and it is nice to see Blackarachnia given the Classics treatment.

Check out our full gallery of Blackarachnia for over 100 pics of this great new release from Takara-Tomy:

Transformers Legends Blackarachnia Gallery

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Courtesy of TF Upgrader on Facebook, we have our first look at a render of the upcoming Masterpiece Optimus Primal.  This figure was announced back in June, but thanks to this new magazine scan, we see a more accurate depiction of what is coming for this first Beast Wars Masterpiece figure!

Check out the image after the break!

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Takara-Tomy’s Hisashi Yuki has announced that Takara-Tomy has something suitably grand in store for this year, which is the 20th anniversary of Beast Wars.

According to TFW2005 member Darkstone, the tweet reads, “Happy New Year! This year is the start of BW20th Year! BW -related events and toys launch is also planned , but since you are waiting the usual TF us to be great deployment , thank you Nya ♪”

What it sounds like, is that Takara-Tomy has something very special in mind for the anniversary of Beast Wars, which will include some toy releases. The previously-announced Masterpiece Optimus Primal seems to be a fairly safe bet for a toy to headline the celebration – but could we also see some reissues to go along with this? As always, we will update you when more information is available.

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Earlier today we received an announcement hinting towards a combination of Q-Transformers and the 20th Anniversary of Beast Wars. It was easy to jump to conclusions and assume we’d be seeing Beast Wars characters in the Q-Transformers styling. Unfortunately for now, it looks like we are not seeing merchandise in this form. Although our hopes were high, the announcement was rather a short video of Beast Wars history presented by Q-Transformers Arcee.

The short video can be found on Nicovideo, although we do not have a thorough translation at this time. Given the popularity of Q-Transformers, is it possible we’ll see Beast Wars introduced to the line during its 20th Anniversary celebration? Time will tell, head on over to the discussion thread to discuss!

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Thanks to the Twitter feed of @tagoal, we’ve received a silhouette teaser of Masterpiece Optimus Primal! We’re starting to see the news pick up speed for this figure, which will be one of the top sought after releases this year for Beast Wars fans as we celebrate its 20th anniversary.

The tweet mentions that we should “Wait for next week!”, suggesting we may see more of this Masterpiece. Perhaps a full reveal? Head into the discussion thread to continue to speculation!

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Thanks once again to the Twitter profile of Tagoal, we’ve received new images of Masterpiece Optimus Primal that show off the toy design of this planned Masterpiece release. These new images show off the possibilities of the toy in detail and start to paint the picture of how Optimus Primal will transform, what potential features/accessories will be included, while being compared to screen grabs taken from the Beast Wars show.

As news continues to roll in, we’ll update you as quickly as we can. Fingers crossed for a prototype figure shortly!

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Hot on the heels of all our Takara Unite Warriors Bruticus and Blast Off news, TFW2005 boards member aniline has just dropped by with an image from Figure King magazine of yet another upcoming figure – one that many of us Beast Wars aficionados have been waiting with bated breath to see: the prototype of Masterpiece Optimus Primal! From what we can see here, Primal will contain many features, including show-accurate swords, arm blasters, and back cannons. Surprisingly, the boss monkey also appears to have alternate beast mode facial expressions – and also light-up eyes in robot mode! You can » Continue Reading.

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Botcon has posted on Youtube this morning a commercial for their show coming up in a couple months. The video features David Kaye reprising his role as Megatron talking about the characters featured in this year’s boxset. The most exciting part of the video is in the last few moments of the video we see Megatron as the canceled Official Transformers Collector’s Convention Robots In Disguise Megatron repaint!

Do you guys think this is an official confirmation as Botcon 2016 exclusive figure, or just a small homage? Discuss your thought in the discussion.

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Twitter user @tagoal has tweeted out a few new images of the Masterpiece Optimus Primal prototype, giving us what is possibly our best look at the figure yet! These pictures show us some nice closeups of both his beast and robot modes, a pose that seems to be emulating the original Ultra class figure’s “chest-beating” feature in gorilla mode, and also his shoulder and arm-mounted cannons in robot mode. We also see him posed standing up and on all fours in gorilla mode as well. What are your thoughts on this upcoming Beast Wars Masterpiece figure? Sound off after » Continue Reading.

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Hat tip to TFW2005 member Monrai, we’ve received even more prototype images of Masterpiece Optimus Primal! Coming from the Hyper Hobby magazine, we can see Primal pictured here showing off a massive amount of accessories, including his faceplate gimmick!

Some other key highlights from the images mirrored for you include:

• Articulation in both beast mode and robot mode
• Beast mode facial expressions
• Robot mode head sculpt with light up eye gimmick and faceplate
• Weapon accessories
• Transformation steps

These fantastic prototype shots are after the jump for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

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Via TFW2005 boards member Type-R, we’re just now starting to get photos in from Wonder Festival 2016!

Shown off here is, at last, the fully-colored version of Masterpiece Optimus Primal’s robot mode! We also see him in beast mode, but once again only as a grey prototype.

We also get a look at the grey prototype of Unite Warriors Bruticus and the individual Combaticons – plus a few more pictures of the fully-colored set.

We have a ton of images for you to check out after the break – be sure to let us know your thoughts on these upcoming products in their individual discussion threads on the boards (Optimus Primal and Bruticus), and watch this space for more as it rolls in.

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