It's been pretty obvious, especially with their Transformers brand, that Hasbro seems to think US parents and children are not very smart. That in the US, kids only want flashing lights and sounds, or shooting missiles, or basically anything they can print in big letters on the side of the box, or features that only sound good in a board room. "Kids like video games, right? Just make every figure talk and flash, like video games do!" Why not save yourself money, and families in the US insult- just import the Takara toys, like you did in the 1980's, and collect your money.

Now they've taken the US approach to animation- take a simple, easy to animate style they know financially works, and apply any old 80's cartoon to it; add computers and marketing department- and these new US designed toys are overly simplistic and pretty plain- especially for $40 a piece.

The design is interesting, despite being pretty plain. I like the helicopter design, but like a kid in my family said when he saw an episode of the show: "Isn't Megatron a jet? or a car? I don't know what he is besides a robot!" I always prefered the "jet" Megatron myself, but a little consistancy would be nice. Robot mode is very nice as well, I like the throwback design, but i think that i'm a little partial to the 80's designs, as i grew up with them.

The real question is: "But is this really a $40-50 toy?" and the answer all around is NO. It's a $15-20 figure, blown up a few inches, with added plastic and electronics, to "justify" the price. 5 to 8 years ago, this toy would have cost $20-25. Adding some weight, and flashing lights does not justify the addded expense.

While I'm usually a sucker for megatrons, and this does look kind of cool, this is one that i won't be purchasing, on the principal that it's too expensive and the transformation is far too simplistic for the price.

In short, I love this figure. I've had a good couple of hours of fun flying it around devastating various smaller aircraft and land-based artillery Transformers. And the robot mode looks great standing around giving orders and showing off his sweet weapons. When I can take a figure and honestly say that neither mode outshines the other and that they're BOTH awesome, that is quite a fine piece.

One thing I want to comment on that I couldn't really in the review was "...Animated" Megs as a whole. While I wait to pick up the Voyager-class figure, I think that his Cybertronian mode is still superior to his Earth Mode seen here. I mean, WHY would the All Spark chose a helicopter alt. mode over a jet/rocket-powered alt. mode? A helicopter just seems to weaken Megs' image overall versus his wickedly-dangerous Cybertron Mode.

Or rather, why did Takara, Hasbro, & Cartoon Network choose a helicopter over a jet- because we'd already seen that before in the Unicron Trilogy?
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CollectionDX Staff

If it's not Burton, than it's close. I'm fairly certain that the real voice actors were used in the Bumper Battlers, so it wouldn't surprise me if it was really him. And I agree, Megs is pretty simple, but he looks so bad ass! I think his robot and copter modes both look great, and for me, that's the point, so it's forgivable. It is kinda the opposite end of the spectrum when compared to Movie Leader Megs, but I'd take this one any day.

*Edit*
I also just want to mention that that is one drawback of the American style of large, expensive figures. Hasbro tends to include batteries and FX often to the detriment of their figures. I do tend to like the Japanese approach which is just make a nice, posable figure with lots of accessories. I do believe that Hasbro thinks that parents have to justify a $40 price tag on a figure, and having electronic gimmicks (ZOMG LIGHT AND SOUNDS!!) help do that. And for some, maybe they do, but often they do more harm than good.

Just kidding, of course.

Someone commented on YouTube- have you seen the video yet???- that Megatron's transformation is fairly simple. And I tend to agree with that- you move everything except his torso & head. To me, that's kinda cheap when you look at how intricate the Leader-class figures were from the movie's line-up; I think they could have done something different. I mean, you can get away with that on Bulkhead, but not Megs. (I'm hoping Ultra Magnus doesn't have a non-moving blocky torso like this either.) However, I will compliment Takara on giving Megs a waist joint; that was nice.
Perhaps they could have reduced him to a single AA- or a set of watch batteries instead. I mean, I like the SFX, but they could have kept this down to three LEDs (head, chest, cockpit) rather than five.

Oh, BTW, does that sound like Corey Burton to you in the SFX, or a sound-alike...? I'm still undecided on the matter.
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CollectionDX Staff