Saturday, July 9, 2016

FansToys Willis - Hound

If I had to only collect one line of third party or official figures, I would probably go with FansToys and hope that they do the entire cartoon cast.

The jeep looks very good. There is nice line work throughout the body, cab, and bed. The windshield and headlights are transparent plastic. The rear lights are painted on, as are some decals on the side panels. The winch mechanism on the grill seems to have had a lot of attention paid in its sculpting. Sadly, the winch and the steering wheel are not functional. I have the same complaint as I did with Maketoys Gundog - there is no floorboard so the ground is visible through the top of the vehicle. He rolls really well on rubber tires, but lost to my daughter's Kinex buggy on a downhill slope.

Transforming the the top half of the robot to make the front half of the jeep is not the easiest thing in the world. The grill pegs to both the panel that the head sits on as well as his abdomen, just above the silver part. Once you separate the grill from the head plate and the abdomen, it's just a matter of getting the arms and tires past each other. The legs are a little easier to mange, but the process involves lining up a few tabs and pegs. Despite the front grill and several rear panels actually falling off, I found it a lot easier than transforming Maketoys Gundog. My only trouble spot was the right front fender, which wouldn't tab together. Transforming back to robot mode is less complicated since you're just unfolding the robot.

His default head has blue eyes and a silver face, with some line work. A good portion of his upper torso is die-cast. The line work and paint application are very clean. He's a smidge taller than Masterpiece Sideswipe and Prowl and Maketoys Gundog, but that's fine by me.

His head and shoulders are on swivels and hinges. He swivels at the biceps, wrists, waist and thighs. His thumbs are fixed and his fingers are single pinned. He has single-jointed elbows and double-jointed knees. His hips are on universal joints. He has ankle rockers and toe tilts. His entire foot can rock backward by using the transformation joint.

His accessories include a rifle, a shoulder-mounted missile launcher, two mounted rifles, a spare tire, a gas can, an alternate head, a clear visor, a pluggable panel, and an adaptor. The rifle has some line work and is covered in silver paint. It uses a Masterpiece-style tab and sits securely in his hands. The missile launcher is green while the missile itself is silver. The missile is not removable. The launcher can fit over either shoulder and has a hinge for some articulation. One mounted rifle is silver and the other is black. Both are hinged with pegs for mounting on the jeep. The silver rifle also has a Masterpiece-style tab. The spare tire has no detail on the side facing outward. The underside is hollow, but has ridges simulating tire treads. The gas can is better detailed. Both clip to the bottom of his front windshield in robot mode. In vehicle mode, they clip to the rear, but are not very secure. The extra head has blue eyes and a white face. Both have a somewhat neutral expression, but the lips on the extra head are more pronounced. The clear visor fits over either face, but I had trouble keeping it on. It kept popping off from the friction. I plugged the panel into the middle of his back where I found a corresponding port for its pegs. The adaptor is for the missile launcher for vehicle mode.

I'll probably use Willis in my Masterpiece collection. I'm moving Maketoys Gundog to another shelf to go with their Striker Manus, ironically anchored by the FansToys Dinobots. Neither figure really looks better or worse than the other. Willis is probably closer to the animation model, especially in the feet. His spare tire is less prone to falling off in robot mode, but doesn't stay on securely in vehicle mode. Unlike Gundog, Willis' top half pegs securely to his lower half. Both figures are awesome and neither should result in buyer's remorse.









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