Transformers: Titans Return Hot Rod

 

In my article on Breakaway, I said I was going to review the Titans Return Wave 3 Deluxes in order from least to best. Trust and believe, Hot Rod coming in third place is not an indication of weakness or inadequacy on the part of this figure.

The other toy that I had no strong interest in until the price checker verified its $9.99 price tag, Hot Rod is far, far better than I’d initially believed. He’s long and thin, quite a different look from the rest of the Deluxes in the line, maybe slanting towards something like the Animated aesthetic moreso than a more traditional G1 update kind of figure. He is a tall figure, and not just because of the shoulder parts, but this is legitimately a hair taller than other Titans Return Deluxes, most probably to help him scale with Galvatron from the same line and the Leader Ultra Magnusfrom Combiner Wars.

The articulation is pretty basic, and while it is functional and everything, the elbows seem to be limited. They make the standard 90 degree bend, but the elbow and upper arm are squared edges, so they seem like the conflict with each other during movement. In actuality they do not, and the arm once again moves a full 90 degree bend at the elbow joint, but it looks like there should be some issue there. The legs and hips on mine are pretty loose, especially the hips, so Hot Rod can pose quite a lot thanks to his lanky design but doesn’t hold them very well because of looseness. This may be a QC issue that is not widespread, but it does make the figure a lot more floppy and a bit less fun.

The colors on robot mode are strong and bright, and nowhere is this better exemplified than on the chest. Hot Rod sports his traditional flame hood design, and it is beautifully rendered on the toy. The engine block stands out very nicely and is a classy ornament on the red, orange and yellow canvass. Some white paint on the tops of the shoulders helps to break up the red. The robot feet are simply flat plastic planks, but they are long enough that they help balance the figure, which is really backheavy due to so much of the car folding up as a backpack. The backpack is a really well engineered set of parts though, as the spoiler spins around and pegs down and things, so it may be a backpack, but it is a secure backpack.

The weapons line wide seem to have taken a turn towards the Highbrowstyle of weapons, where they are two similar and compatible parts that snap together to form a gun emplacement, rather than the Chromedome style that I can’t seem to come to terms with. Hot Rod (which I have now mistyped as Hot Rob several times, for your information) has blasters that are nice looking but too large both in robot, vehicle and combined form to do anything other than stand out comically. The space for the Titanmaster is designed to let that figure sit down with its legs extended, you know, so it’s comfortable, but this contributes to an elongated accessory that looks off in all configurations. On the plus side however, the connection between halves is nice and strong, so when they do plug together it has the feeling of being one single piece; again, a huge improvement over parts like Chromedomes’. 

The Titan Master is Firedrive, theorized to be some trademark lost alteration of Firebolt, G1 Targetmaster Hot Rods’ Targetmaster partner. The robot face is generally nice, but it looks like a young robot, like real young, giving Hot Rod a sort of child-esque appearance. I know the lore well enough, so I know that Hot Rod is not only a younger Cybertronian but is also intended to be immature and young in demeanor and approach, but this head makes him look like a kid, in the way that someone like Wheelie is supposed to be an actual child. All told, the face works out fine, but it contributes to a look of being out of place with the other figures in the line.

Vehicle mode is what has totally sold me on this figure. Hot Rod has had some attempted updates over the years, but this one gets his car mode the closest to the animation model. The car is sleek and futuristic, looking cool and sporty. The cockpit opens, naturally, to seat the Titanmaster, and the combined blasters peg into the slots on the engine block, a reference to the Targetmaster placement of the G1 Targetmaster Hot Rod. This figure seems to be trying its best to reference all G1 Hot Rod iterations that it can, and it’s pretty much succeeding. It turns out that those white blocks on the top of the robot arms are supposed to be headlights of some kind, as they are easily seen in vehicle mode. The exhaust pipes along the arms and legs of the robot plug together on the vehicle mode, giving a smooth and functional look. Vehicle mode is really nice, and the transformation is pretty satisfying as well. The legs fold around the back of the vehicle, the large backpack swivels and unfurls to form the top of the vehicle, the chest folds out to form the front of the vehicle. It’s simple, and it makes sense, and it is fun to do. Vehicle mode is an absolute winner for me.

Hot Rod is all around good, but aside from the aesthetic making him seem a bit out of place, there is a second factor that is hard to overlook, and that is the quality of the plastic. The plastic feels cheap and thin, to the point that this is visible on sight. Hot Rod looks like a knock off, and truth be told, feels like one as well. It feels like the same kind of plastic that Robots in Disguise Starscream is made from, and not at all like the other Titans Return Deluxes. I don’t honestly know how I feel about this: I like the toy, and I think it’s a good toy. But the plastic here is not to my liking. We can go back and forth over worn out roads of argument over the quality and cost and density of Hasbro plastic again and again and again, but if you don’t acknowledge and recognize that there is a clear and obvious difference between the plastic of Hot Rod and the other figures in this Wave, you are being willfully ignorant. I’d thought at first that maybe this visual difference was caused by the very bright red of the figure, buying in to that Bayverse lie that red is somehow a difficult or visually bamboozling color; but it’s not. The plastic here is simply not as good as I would prefer, and honestly expect, it to be.

But, Hot Rod is not the third place winner of Wave 3 for any real faults, as I am truly happy with and amused by this figure. I think, were it not for the amazing transformation scheme of a figure yet to be examined, Hot Rod probably would have the best and most satisfying transformation of the Wave, and were it not for the overall plastic, he’d be the second best toy in the group. He is up against some stiff competition however. I was surprised how much I enjoyed this figure, and, as was the case with wave mate Breakaway and line mate Blur, realized that my collection does not need a Hot Rod other than this one, and so my 2007 “Classics” Rodimus was sold off. I like that ’07 mold honestly, and think it has the best car mode of any updated Hot Rods, but I own the Henkei! Wildrider exclusive, and am not a Hot Rod fan enough to feel the need to own several versions of him. But the Titans Return version is a great, fun toy that should do a lot to satisfy the need of a “Classics” Hot Rod in your collection.