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02/16/2006: New Beast Wars + The Giant LEGO Box!

There's no shame in saying that “Transformers: Beast Wars” was, pound for pound, my favorite chapter in TF lore. Revitalizing the thought-dead franchise in the 1990s, the series was just terrific: Great characters, awesome writing, a groundbreaking look and enough continuity between episodes to reward every viewer who bothered to watch them sequentially. I loved, loved, loved that show, and its ability to “re-geek” me in the mid-to-late '90s is one of the reasons there's an X-Entertainment today.

To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Beast Wars, Hasbro has re-released many of the original figures and, more or less, not changed a thing. Even the packaging is in most ways a throwback, right down to the tech specs. There are enough minute differences to keep collectors who've spent good money on the originals from feeling like dickheads, but the hot new addition for the anniversary figures is: TRANSMUTATE!

“Transmutate” is both the name of a special once-only-appearing Beast Wars character, and also the name of the episode she (he?) appeared in. Without going into great detail that would first require a Beast Wars refresher course for yours truly, the character was essentially a Transformer with severe birth defects, created all wrong but with indescribable raw power and a little baby voice that made you want to pinch her cute silver cheeks. Each of the new Beast Wars figures come with a different Transmutate body part, and only by collecting the whole set can you honestly claim to have a complete Transmutate – this is the character’s first go at becoming an action figure.

To begin my collection, I chose “Waspinator” first. He wasn't really my favorite character, but he's up there, and he's the one that comes packaged with Transmutate's most important part: His head. All this talk has me crazy-ready to plop on a couch and watch the entire series as soon as possible, a notion that doesn't at all destroy me because hey, I have off on Monday.

In other news, today at work I snuck outside for a cigarette, and when I returned four hours later, a gigantic box with a LEGO logo was sitting on my desk. I'd heard rumors of a thank-you gesture ever since I worked on those Exo-Force spots a while back (archival screenshot here), but I never expected this…

(click here to enlarge)

It's the entire freakin' collection of LEGO Exo-Force toys. Every last one. A couple of people at the office wondered if I was going to pass 'em off to a nephew or whatever…come on. Riiiight. You'd think the collection of Ghostbusters bobbleheads and Toddler Ninja Turtle figures would tip them off about my deep dark secrets, but I wasn't going to pull up the site and tell them that everything they know of me is bullshit. "Yeah, my nephew Tommy…big fan of Exo-Force!" Riiiight. My only regret is that there's far too many toys for me to even carry 'em home, meaning I'll have to mail them, meaning I'll have to wait a few days before I can bust open the ultra rad evil robot dude and give Knacks and Kuse an adversary they can yell at eye-to-eye.

It's been a really sucky stretch ever since Christmas, and I'm taking my glories wherever I can find 'em. So hello, LEGO. Will you be my lover?

There will definitely be a new article this weekend though, because I definitely can't wait to write about what I'm writing about next, even if only 10% of you will have any memory of it whatsoever. Oh well.

Damn, Matt…Free Legos….Why can't I get a job that grants you free cool stuff?

Can't wait for the article this weekend. Glad to hear you're getting back into the XE swing of things.

Wow- I am insanely jealous of your job. Why can't we high school teachers ever get free stuff?!? (besides crusty old muffins on Teacher Appreciation Day) We're kind of important…sort of. And LEGOS, too. Wow.

Matt, I'm curious- I know you had a link on XE to the Lego website a while back, but I forget- did you design some cover art designs? Help write the commercial? Write a piece on the Lego website? Whatever it was, it is definately an interesting day job you have there.

Due to the Danish cartoons published in some newspapers recently, a number of groups are now boycotting Danish products. Their most famous product? Yup- LEGO. Poor Lego.

In case nobody reads the last thread anymore…does anyone know if Joss Whedon has written a new installment for 'Astonishing X-Men' yet? The first 12 issues left me hungry for more. Between X-Men and Firefly, I love that man.

Waspinator was cool. Didn't he get Starsream's spark at some point or something?

You should just try to carry that box with you on the subway, and if somebody tries to help you with it (or tries to steal it), you can just say "Leggo my Legos!" Hi-larious.

Transformers get re-released…. where the hell are my Sweet Secrets? Oh well, they'd make them slut-ified if they came back, anyway. You boys get all the good shit.

Have you seen the upcoming Batman Legos? Are you a fan of Batman? I haven't heard you mention him much. Just wondering.

You deserve it homeslice!
Honestly though? I'm shocked that you keep the site on the DL from the coworks. I'd totally want to show it off all the time, even if it does skew dorky.
It's been a rough start to the year here too. Can't say the end of '05 was the hottest either but there's always Christmas (and the Advent/Advert) to look forward to. Today was quite the suckfest and I was half ready to blow off the 'noon and go see Kong again while I still can…in hindsight I probably should have, since I let the suckfest get the better of me. Man do I wish it was Friday already

I am so envious. When I become a real architect, I'm going to design buildings for Lego, and they better send me samples to build the models out of. Man, that would kick ass. Ok, desire to be an architect renewed

Some of my teachers tend to dampen that desire.

Give the credit for the Beast Wars show to the awesome writers and CGI workmen at Mainframe Entertainment of Canada. They produced this and ReBoot, and as of 2002 none of them work there anymore and Mainframe mostly makes Barbie videos. Shame, that.

Muppet Baby, apparently issue 13 hits the shelves on 02-22-2006… so close yet so far!

X-E is my crack. I love the frequent blog updates and new kool-aid and cereal prize reviews. Keep the articles coming.

Matt you are my hero. Your astounding toy collection puts mine to shame. But at least I don't feel bad or alone in my toy collecting frenzies thanks to you.
And Joss Whedon is my god, his shows and comics have kept me company for the past 8 years of my life.
Muppet Baby you wouldn't be part of the BDU forums by any chance?

Matt, have I got an idea for you. Those Legos are a sign. A sign that you should have a contest. A contest for which the prize will be the entire run of Exo-Force Legos. A contest which…

Crap, I'm too tired to come up with a contest which would result in me being the only possible winner. So come on. We're both businessmen. We can skip all this rigamarole and just have you ship the Legos to me. In fact, this is for your safety. A public figure of your standing should not be seen taking obvious bribes from the Danish in the current political climate. It's a powder keg, Matt. A powder keg whose fuse is made of Legos. Which is doubly dangerous, because it is both a fuse and a choking hazard.

Seriously, though. Free Legos? I got into the wrong gig. My only perks are that I don't have to pay library fines and that I don't have to talk to people very much if I don't want to. Which is, I suppose, nothing to sneeze at.

Hot damn, I want some free legos. The only free things I get at work are white-out and pens. Maybe if I tell people at work that I am holding a benefit of some sort, and the only donations needed and accepted are legos. . .

…and so begins the third day in a row of a killer toothache. No insurance or way to pay for a dentist appointment. Pray for me, peoples. Please? It's actually slightly less severe this morning.

Matt, congrats! Free stuff is always cool. My brother is his LEGO induced frenzy is probably going to be jealous beyond belief upon reading the linked article I emailed him. No real perks here, except getting my X-E on - let's hope that changes…the job, not the X-E…yeah, or something.

I absolutely love legos of all kinds too. I got my son a set of Spiderman legos and those are pretty fun, I'm more into the generic sets though.
Right now in my town the official weatherbug temp is -11 and the windchill is -37. MN is hell, and hell is cold.

Remember the Hugga Bunch? I had vague and scary memories of that movie and I finally found it at Goodwill the other day. It's just as scary as I remember - the puppets..or Huggas, I don't know…you can hear the animatronics in their voices, like grinding sheet metal.

At my last job, I got the reputation for being the one who enjoyed free crap - emphasis on the crap. Every few months, the office manager would get a big box of promotional item catalogs with a few samples thrown in that she'd give to me. A lot of it was junk that I kept for a little while and then threw away. However, I did get a really cool mini fridge for the car courtesy of Cox Communications. For those of you who have Cox cable/internet/life support, I can tell you part of the reason why your bills are so high. They send pretty high-end bribe…I mean, promotional items, to their potential advertisers, and they do it often. They were the only things our office manager tended to keep (like a nice desk lamp), but I guess she had no use for the mini fridge - or the Cox-logoed flip flops. Still, I never got Legos, and that hurts me a little.

Waspinator was my favorite Beast Wars Transformer. I was kind of ashamed when I saw him in the chi cartoon, I bought the figure first because he looked awesome, but once you’re committed, you’re committed. I'm going to have to buy every one and construct Transmutate.

I'm envious of your Lego haul Matt. I will strive to work with Lego just so I too can receive a Lego box o' goods.

Ha! I'm not huge on the TF lore so when Darth P said "chi cartoon" I was totally picturing little chibi style robot creatures.

Sweet! Beast Wars was pretty damn amazing, eh? I tried to make a statue of Transmutate using macaroni art but failed miserably.

And Chi just happens to be the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet (don't ask me how I came to this).

And because I work at KB Toys, I too have seen the Exo-Force legos AND yesterday we got the new 10th Anniversary Beast Wars in. Only Waspinator, Rhinox and Cheetor out now, but wave 2 will have Tarantulus, Rattrap, and I think Dinobot. I'm definately getting them because from the first time around, I only got the originals of Cheetor & Rhinox and the recolors of Waspinator & Dinobot. And I have a LOT of the BW toys, but not many of the older ones. My favorite BW Character? Inferno. Now he had some "birth defects" as well: He was originally supposed to be a spider (like Tarantulus & Blackarachnia), but became a Fire Ant instead, belived his Stasis Pod was his Colony, and refers to Megatron as "The Royalty" (and on a few occaisions, called him "My Queen")

The Transmutate episode was very weird and kind of sad (s/he made friends with Silverbolt if memory serves me right), and it's pretty awesome that it's a figure now in the vein of the recent Marvel Legends series where you had to collect all the figures to construct Galacticus, Sentinel, and Apocalypse. And yes, there was an awesome episode where Starscream's spark infests Waspinator. (I have no idea if the original voice actor for him was dead yet)

Mara: When I become a real architect, I'm going to design buildings for Lego

All hail the late, great Chris Latta, the original voice of Starscream, Cobra Commander, and Mr. Burns! If it wasn't Latta on Beast Wars, somebody sure did a great imitation. I recently bought CyberTron Starscream, and in my mind, he has the G1 voice. Will BlackArachnia be part of the anniversary collection? Because I will run over old ladies and orphans to get one if that is the case. I still need to get the Galactus figures, to get not only the eater of Worlds to be Unicron's little buddy, but also a gaggle of Marvel characters that are greatly underrepresented due to my more primal urges for Japanese robots. I have TransMetal Waspy, though. That's the one they should have had in the show, during the intro to the TM/Fuzor techniques. Then his vehicle mode could have been blamed on the influence from once housing 'Scream's unextinguishable Spark.

Where the hell do you work? No offense intended, but I kind of thought you were a king of the X-E empire, not required to perform menial labor for cash. I cannot imagine, as a new reader of your site, where you could possibly work.

Stacy, Matt works for Nick, though I believe that once upon a yesteryear X-E was the day job. Do a site search for "ebay auctions" for some historical perspective.

I have you all beat…my place of employment is giving out contact lenses in a Smallville package. We're supposed to give them out to customers, but I snagged one.

I'm not entirely sure what Smallville or contact lenses have to do with a movie theater, at any rate.

I work with special needs kids, and the main perks, besides all the gooey good feelings that come from making a difference, are exposure to EVERY common and easily communicable disease, and getting to hear people go "Wow, I could never do that" when I tell them what I do. And sometimes I used to get cute notes back when I worked with kids who could write. But no free legos. Although I occasionally get to *play* with legos at work…

mtrox: Man, I just read through that four or five times, and I'm still not sure I got it right. Contact lenses? Like, the kind you stick in your eyes? Maybe I've missed out on some keen new fad, but I was under the impression that you were supposed to get that sort of thing from your eye doctor. Or in a pinch, that place in Wal-Mart. Not, for example, movie theaters. Unless they make your irises look like the Superman shield. Then that's pretty hip, and I want a pair.

No joke. It's a sample of some over-the-counter disposable contact. For no explicable reason, Smallville is on the package.

There was a disabled Transformer? Cool for disabled people like me. I just wish I got watched the show more frequently than I did.

I LOVE those Marvel Legends figures (even though they are difficult to pose) and have the completed Galactus. Haven't got any of the Sentinel series though. Although, to be truthful, I collect them more because of the comic books and assortment (same with Mattel's new DC figures) than to put together a giant figure. I'm running out of room though and am slowing down on buying them (plus, I'm broke no matter how cheap they are).

Thanks to those wacky inmates over at Art Asylum, MadBalls is making a come back. Same great MAD-ness, but now with better sculpting!

Man. I've been looking around, and from the looks of it, Acuvue is about two steps away from purchasing the Smallville television show outright. You've got fans being pissed off in forums about blatant and uncomfortable product placement in the show, followed by Acuvue commercials during every break. And Smallville is apparently having a sweepstakes where you can win a year's supply of Acuvue contact lenses. If I ever win a contest, it's going to be something like that. Because I don't require corrective lenses of any kind. In fact, fully fifty percent of all Americans would have positively no use for a year's supply of contact lenses. And of all the possible products for a Superman television show to sell out to, contact lenses has to be one of the least suitable. I mean, think about it. The only reason Supes was ever able to have a normal alter ego was those Buddy Holly dork-goggles. If he'd done something stupid like switching to contact lenses, he'd have supervillains and space aliens carpet bombing the Kent homestead by suppertime. My new goal is to land a job as a script writer for Smallville just so I can submit a scene where Clark switches to his stylish, comfortable new Acuvue(TM) contact lenses, forgets he has them in, attempts to ignite a bloated cow from fifty yards, and inadvertantly fuses them to his corneas. "Oh, sweet Jesus-El, I'm blind! Bliiiiiiind!" And then he goes into a complete panic and humorously runs into a bridge piling at Mach 2. And then Braniac realizes he's Superman because he's not wearing his bottle-bottoms and sets Lana on fire. But then Jimmy Olsen inexplicably gains superpowers and takes over Clark's gig. Take a shot.

Beast Machines Complete Series coming out on dvd February 28th. I'm assuming since you loved loved loved Beast Wars you'd share an afinity for BM as well.

Jedoc: That wsn't terrible. I literally laughed out loud at the contacts fusing to Clark's corneas.

Someone said madballs were coming back? Guess what I saw at work the other day… Freakin' Pogo Balls!

I don't understand the heavily pushed Smallvile-Acuvue coupling either. My best guess: Acuvue determined through a wacky statistics process that nobody who watches Smalville can see.

I can see perfectly. In fact, I can see so well, I can see how useless Lana is on the show. The writers cannot.

I used to watch Beast Wars with my friend when it aired daily on Fox. Mostly, we'd just make fun of Rat-Trap for having his exposed brain in his head, and his butt…

I was leaving work today pretty pleased with myself as I had gotten a large chunk of getting my resume completed.

A few rows into the parking lot, I heard some shuffling behind me. It was a bird that was flapping along the ground after me. Something was broken on it, so it's head and wing/shoulder where pushing up against the concrete of the lot.

So, I tried to talk to it a little bit. Followed it a little bit, to which it would try to fly, just make it a little bit, and then land; eye-first into the concrete. At this point I decided to pick it up. Twice I got a hold of it, but it got out of my hands and landed in the awkward way. Finally I got a good gentle grip around it. At this point, though I didn't know what to do.

Yeah, I knew I should have put it out of it's misery, and I wanted to stop it's suffering. But, what would you have done? I didn't want to kick it or step on it… that's horrible just to read, isn't it? So is running it over in my car.

Eventually, I walked it over to the fence where there are woods on the other side, and let it loose through the fence. It landed pretty okay (not awkwardly like before) in a pile of leaves that it wound up camafloging in really well. It was breathing pretty heavily, I hope from just being scared.

I left it there hoping it would die peacefully there. On the way home I remembered that it will be freezing here tonight, and hoped that the bird would go that way, as I've heard freezing to death feels like you are going to sleep.

I feel really bad about it, and it makes me sad that this bird came to me and I couldn't do anything to help it. Do you guys think I did the right thing? What should I have done?

IMDB says Beast Wars ran 1996-1999. And goes on to say Doug Parker was the voice of Starscream on the show. (He also voiced Terrorsaur until 97.)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0115108/fullcredits

I prefer action figures than Legos, but receiving free toys is the most wonderful thing that can happen to you

I was happy last Xmas 'coz my uncle gave me a large box of Dino Valley 2 (Chap Mei)

For real, a 25 years old girl has no a lot of posibilities of receiving toys in Xmas…
:(

Awesome awesome awesome, I now know where all my money is going. Beast Wars action figures. I only got into that series after it had finished up so I never got the opportunity to buy more than a few third season toys.

Finally! After two months of dealing with a dead computer, I can visit this site as rabidly as I used to. Its good to be back…

Yay! I just got my shipment of 10 Black Cherry Koll-aid Packets today. They don't sell them around here so I had to get them off ebay. That means my PS-rex should be comming Monday! My Kool-Aid collection will be as good as yours someday Matt. Watch out, there's a new Kool-Aid collecter in town! What I'm still looking for is Great Bluedini, Berry Blue, Rock-a-dile red, Rainbow punch. Rarities I have now: Ghoul-aid, PS-Rex and Sharkleberry Fin.

Still, I really want this one. I might have to break down and pull out the credit card to buy it though.

Of the three Beast Wars figures I saw in the store, Waspinator was the instant sell for me as well. He has to be the figure I wanted the most out of all of the origionals, even more than Megatron or Optimus Primal. Of course, now I have to buy the other five, because I don't want my Transmutate to be a cripple. just my luck I'll probably be unable to pick up whatever figure has his torso.
Glad to see someone else has Beast Wars as their favorite TF cartoon.

I can't believe it hasn't been mentioned yet on here. Beast Wars is being shown daily on G4 as part of "Action Blast!" at 8am along with Kaiju Big Battel (and BDman)

I second all of those who have utter disbelief that you don't show off this site. I think if anyone would appreciate it, it'd be the people of Nick.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, February 16th, 2006 at 10:05 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.