Transformers: Titans Return Weirdwolf

 

 

Weirdwolf is a character and toy that will always, always have a real special place in my heart. Originally characterized as just a strange dude who spoke in bizarre, rhythmic phrases and as a result was disliked by comrades, Dreamwave’s stellar More Than Meets The Eye guidebooks established Weirdwolf as a poet back in the old days on Cybertron. He has always been a strange, offbeat characterization, although never much of a character. I think the last fiction he appeared in was the Botcon comic from 2007, because a Botcon Weirdwolf was one of the “Games of Deception” set add-on figures. I remember, in 2006 or 2007, when the G1 Decepticon Headmasters were the figures I was actively hunting for, Weirdwolf was the last one I acquired, and was super excited to have finally done so.  Titans Return Weirdwolf, or “Wolfwire” as they have now branded him, was an anticipated figure here at the Coffin, and is maybe the one figure from Wave 2 that is good and fun and exciting from start to finish.

Man, that G1 version.

Weirdwolf is, as is expected by this point, a faithful update of the original toy, sharing much of the transformation scheme of the G1 toy as well. All except for the legs, which I have to say, are pretty ingeniously done. Of course the original scheme was upgraded and incorporates some new twists and turns, similar to Skullcruncher in that you already know how the transformation goes, but there is a minor new thing or step that makes a thirty year old toy feel brand new.  Clearly intended to be “the brightly colored one” in the wave, the figure is a bright yellow, and that looks good with the darker blue and plain white of the paintjob. The wolf head is nicely sculpted and has an opening jaw, which is always just a fun thing to include. 

Accessories here are a tail/sword and a large blaster, and they both suffer from the same issue: they are too large to be good. The sword is a large, curved job, sculpted with a lot of technorganic-looking details, also meant to elicit ideas of a wolf tail in full bristle. But when held, it resembles a club or bludgeoning weapon more than a sword, probably due to Weirdwolf’s lack of wrists. Perhaps if he could hold it at different angles, or pose with it better, the overall look would improve; but as it stands, swivel-less wrists and shoulder pads that limit mobility mean that Weirdwolf always looks like he’s going to clobber someone rather than pull off some wild sword work. The blaster is a problem because it is so big that it is just comical, an overlarge blaster made so as to be able to seat a Titanmaster figure; the playability gimmick ruins another weapon. The weapon does not look good being held by the figure, and it does not look good plugged into the back of the wolf mode. It can be pegged into sockets on the robot shoulders, and then it looks a bit nicer as a shoulder mounted gun; or it can be slung underneath the wolf mode, out of the way but kind of impractical. Either placement is basically just a slight step up the tolerability scale for the part, which is best just left off to the side. 

Weirdwolf does some interesting things during transformation. The first is the lengthening of the wolf body, achieved through a whole section that folds up inside the back of the robot torso, and then swings out to form the cockpit for the Titanmaster figure (“Monxo”). In wolf mode, this swing out piece forms the abdomen, and makes the wolf longer and leaner and more animalistic than would have been possible with just the stocky, compacted robot torso, which itself would have look awful elongated and tapering the way the wolf torso does. This is a pretty great example of a transformation step truly benefiting both modes. Monxo sits beneath a flip up canopy, not a very strong cockpit but essentially what the G1 toy had, and there are several reports online of this piece being particularly fragile and prone to breakage. I have had no issues with this, but apparently too much force can break this piece. 

 

The second, and truly excellent, transformation upgrade deals with the robot legs. They become, in standard beast alt mode figure fashion, the rear animal legs. However, Weirdwolfs’ robot legs are thick, sturdy ones, while the wolf legs are thinner, digitigrade, animal ones. The switch between the two is accomplished through the robot legs being essentially large grieves that Weirdwolf wears, and that flip outwards on hinges to move closer to the waist of the robot, exposing the thinner animal legs. While they don’t go anywhere and they don’t really sit flush against the body after being moved, they look good as legs in robot mode, are sturdy, and allow for the wolf to have wolf legs, and not just large blocky ones because the robot needs them, or thin weak ones because the wolf needs them. All in all, it is a really good design moment, one that is functional and aesthetically quality. 

This design element makes Weirdwolf a total win for me for one pretty simple reason: this is a nice looking, fun figure that is fun to transform. That’s it. The Titans Return line seems to be trying its best to turn out simply updated versions of late G1 figures, even trying to replicate transformation patterns and such, and has been doing so, in my opinion, to great effect thus far. I think the best thing that a toy can do, after thirty some years of exposure, is remind a person of playing with the toys in their youth. Sometimes, with Transformers, the complexity or whatnot spoils that feeling, as transformation becomes more a chore than an experience. I am not a fan of the movie lines because of many factors, but one of them is that I find them overly complicated to the point of not being at all enjoyable to manipulate. There is something about a figure like Weirdwolf, and a feature like his leg transformation, that takes me back to my youth and the feelings of amazement at figuring out how a car unfolded into a robot. I’m not particularly engineering-minded, and I can absolutely enjoy a toy without it having some complexity; and, I am a Seeker fanatic, which means I have several copies of the same, generally simple figure in different colors, every time a new iteration is released. But there was a real sense of interest for me transforming Weirdwolf the first few times.

The rear animal leg issue is something that absolutely plagues beast mode figures, since practically all of them are simply animals that stand up on their hind legs to become robots. This approach here is one that I’d like to see continued and improved.

Weirdwolf is not the most poseable toy, the arms at least impeded by the protruding shoulder stacks and lacking wrist swivels. The cool leg plate transformation unfortunately leaves the legs pretty unmovable. He kind of just stands there, but he looks good doing it. As such, it is difficult to get him into any poses or anything dynamic, but still, I like this toy a lot. He’s probably the best of the wave for me.

As one more reference to the original G1 Weirdwolf, this new versions’ Titanmaster Monxo grants Weirdwolf, or any Cybertronian but who cares, a pretty special ability. It appears Monxo grants a robot the ability to rewind time a few seconds, which could be an explanation for Weirdwolf’s strange, backwardish way of speaking. I think this is too tryhard of an explanation, too desperate to shoehorn in a bit of lore, but I’ll take it, because I do love the original characterization.