Hasbro’s new wave of toys from its Transformers: War For Cybertron Trilogy: Siege series are starting to roll out this month, based on an original 22-episode Netflix Series that’s expected to release at some point later this year.
First in line is the Ultra Magnus “Spoiler Pack”. As you can tell from the packaging design, there is no indication of what its contents are, other than an artwork of Ultra Magnus on the side, and a warning of “spoilers inside”. The battered and worn ammo box-inspired packaging even shows hints of Energon through its cracks and tears. Check out the rest of this series here.
Upon opening up the box, you’re immediately presented with the supposed “spoiler content” for the upcoming Netflix series, which comes in the form of printed messages in Autobot and Decepticon Cybertronian text. If you don’t mind getting spoiled, go right ahead and decode the text to uncover key events from the show. Or, we have done it for you, in the black block of text below.
Go ahead and highlight them at your own risk:
“I ULTRA MAGNUS IN GOOD FAITH HEREBY SURRENDER TO YOU”
“THIS CAN ONLY MEAN ONE THING ULTRA MAGNUS IS DEAD”
Yup, that’s pretty much it for the spoilers.
As for the mysterious black compound in the middle, it looks (and smells) like black Playdoh. Digging through it uncovers a pack of three Energon cubes. Just the accessory every G1 Transformers fan needs! We’re not quite sure why Hasbro went with such an odd choice of “hiding” the Energon cubes. It’s not as though there is a random element involved or perhaps it might have some significance to the show, guess we’ll have to find out when it eventually lands on Netflix. As for now, it comes across as rather gimmicky, especially when such a product is targeted more at the older demographic and not the kids who enjoy digging through random blind bags.
On to the figure itself, what we have in the package is a redecoration of the Leader Class 7-inch scale Siege Ultra Magnus (released last year). Check out more of the Seige: War for Cybertron range that released last year. The key difference here comes in the form of additional battle-damage details and gray weathering, on both the power up outer armour and the inner white Optimus Prime.
Ultra Magnus transforms from robot to armoured truck mode in 26 steps. This version of Ultra Magnus is what Hasbro claims to be “the most series-accurate version of the character”. We’ll have to take their work for now, but judging from the overall paintwork, the gray accents does a pretty good job at making it look less plasticky, especially the matt finishing on the red portions. Other than that, it’s pretty much the same Ultra Magnus mould from previous releases.
The other extra bonus content is a translucent pink Battlefield Rung Autobot. Rung transforms in 4 steps into a blaster for Ultra Magnus, and comes with a pair of pretty sweet looking Energon-infused blast effects.
Transformers fans would probably have expected more from this, especially with how Hasbro went with the whole ammo box-inspired packaging and spoiler warnings. Ultimately, there really isn’t much of a reason to get this if you already have an Ultra Magnus from the earlier Seige series. If you don’t, then this is THE version to get, which comes with a nice collectible box. And hey, it’s always nice to have extra Energon cube accessories for the figures to fuel themselves with before the next battle.
The Ultra Magnus Spoiler Pack is available now at three select retailers in Singapore: The Falcon’s Hangar, Robo Robo and Unrivalled Collectibles.
Yonk is a geek who is fortunate enough to have an equally geeky Star Wars fan for a wife, who owns a LEGO Millennium Falcon encased in a glass coffee table as their home’s centre-piece.
Si Jia
