Grave Consideration: Transformers Titans Return Titanmasters

By now we’ve had months to experience the Titans Return line and its gimmick of everyone being a Headmaster. I have repeatedly said that I have no interest in head swapping among these figures, as the idea of it doesn’t make sense. I’m not current on the lore of this line, if any exists, and so I don’t know if there has been an official address of this, but what are the Titanmasters?

In the US G1 continuity, the brief appearance of the *-masters established them as being separate entities attached to a pre-existing Cybertronian. Stylor was a separate, individual person who bonded with Chromedome, himself a separate, individual robot. The amalgam was Chromedome, with the understanding that he functioned in a partnership with Stylor. In the Japanese series Headmasters, Chromedome was the name of the small Headmaster robot, who united with the large robot body called a Transtector, and essentially rode it around like a giant suit. The issue arises across continuities when we examine the idea at the heart of the play pattern in Titans Return: the interchangeability of the Titanmasters.

In Japan, since each of the Titanmasters are the actual character, this is a simple issue. Chromedome is the name of the Titanmaster, and so the combined robot form would be Chromedome whether it was attached to the Chromedome body or what we know as Hardhead’s body or even a Decepticon body. The bodies are just upgrades, like mech suits to ride. In the US continuity, things are more complicated. Stylor is the name of the Titanmaster, while the then headless robot body is a separate entity known as Chromedome. For the greater good, the combination of the two results in Chromedome; but what if Stylor bonded with the robot body we know as Hardhead. Who is the resulting robot? Harddome? Chromehead? Someone else entirely? And sort of, why? This last piece is an issue that I’ve always had, not anything specific to the concept or line or fiction. Even in the Headmasters series I don’t recall instances of the Masters swapping Transtectors; the card backs for the Titans Return line mention that the Titanmasters grant specific ability enhancements to their large Cybertronians. So, if Firedrive makes Hot Rod faster, it would grant that same speed boost to Brainstorm; but then, Brainstorm would have Hot Rod’s head and face, and so would, to some degree at least, cease to be Brainstorm.

I never understood this, even as a child with the first iteration of the concept. Variations on the theme, such as the Targetmasters, made sense, because the partners simply turned into weapons. Anyone could use anyone else’s weapon. Targetmasters presented a wholly separate logic problem. But the Headmasters formed bonds with their partners, so a different partner would upset that bond, right? If Mindwipe and Monzo combined, wouldn’t that upset the bond between Mindwipe and Vorath? If you think of the combiner teams, how many missions would have been easier for the Stunticons if they’d have had an airborne component? Yet Vortex never pinch hit for Drag Strip on the team. Wouldn’t the Stunticons have generally worked out better for a little bit of strategy and direction? Yet Hook or Scrapper or Onslaught never subbed for Motormaster. If just a little bit of smarts would have made Menasor so much more effective, why didn’t the guys ever merge with Razorclaw to form a menacing, calculating and intelligent force as opposed to the raving mess that they effect with Motormaster?

The short answer is that in some of those cases the toys were incompatible, so they couldn’t. But this team jumping was never explored between comparable figures either, in the US. Of course Japan has “Scramble City” which displays this idea as a possibility, but it never went any farther than that one-off. We’ve never had it here in the US. But Titans Return openly advertises this function, to the degree that an entire price point in the line is just extra heads who are established as actual Transformer characters (hello, Fangry and Apeface). So, if that separate Apeface combines with Skullcruncher, is the robot Apeface now, despite having no actual connection to Apeface other than the Titanmaster being named Apeface? If so, why are the unified forms of the figures that come packaged together not referred to by the names of the Titanmasters? Broadside comes with Blunderbuss, but the name of the unified form is Broadside. By this rationale, if the Apeface Titanmaster were attached to Broadside, the resulting combo would be Broadside. Which for me at least, begs the question of why bother exchanging heads at all.

Now, I know. I know all the things you’re thinking in response to this. Just toys, only fiction, simply a gimmick. And all of these responses are correct. I don’t have any problem with the gimmick, and on many occasions I’ve been free with my praise of the entire line not only incorporating the gimmick but also making it non-obtrusive for figures that aren’t traditional employers of the gimmick such as Blur or Hot Rod or Broadside. I suppose I’m just confused as to the narrative behind this gimmick. I’m totally cool with the functionality of the gimmick, but I don’t understand what it is supposed to mean.

If we take the Japanese model and say that the Titanmaster is the character this concept makes pretty immediate sense. But if we go the Western route and say that the two entities are two distinct entities, the gimmick of interchangeability becomes problematic. Then we have Cybertronians who are more like Jaegers in Pacific Rim or EVAs, where their ability to function is directly related to the symbiosis between personas. Any pilot can operate a Gundam suit, but only Shinji Ikari can operate EVA Unit 01. Japan’s Headmasters approximate Gundams then, while the US’ are more like EVAs minus the critical narrative elements.

I like the simplicity of the Japanese idea of the whole being the head, but I love the idea of combining personalities that the US version situationally employs. That is one of the things that I am fascinated by with combiner teams: five or six individuals merging into a single, physically and mentally. The Head- and Powermasters in the US represent this idea as well. I don’t look at Hardhead and say “this is Hardhead and Duros,” no more than I would look at Superion and say “this is Silverbolt and Skydive and Slingshot and . . .”.  I look at them and say “that’s Hardhead” or “that’s Superion.” This makes me, on a fundamental level, reject the gimmick of head swapping: Highbrow wearing Blunderbuss isn’t Highbrow; it isn’t Broadside or Blunderbuss; and if it’s someone new, who is it? There isn’t a narrative answer for this that doesn’t render one of the two parts largely unnecessary. If Highbrow plus Blunderbuss is Highbrow, then Blunderbuss or any other Titanmaster isn’t important. If Highbrow plus Blunderbuss is Blunderbuss, then Highbrow or any other body figure doesn’t matter. If Highbrow plus Blunderbuss is someone new, some third option, then neither Highbrow nor Blunderbuss matter.

Energon flited with this idea with Powerlinxing. Autobot figures would combine with each other to become “Powerlinx” whoever was the top half: Inferno legs and Hot Shot upper body was Powerlinx Hot Shot, but it was clear that this was a powered up Hot Shot, not some new guy. Titans Return, and in fact the entire Headmaster concept, doesn’t account for this. There is no new nomenclature for the newly formed combo. In terms of a smaller robot granting an advantage or upgrade to a larger one, the A/E/C trilogy did this with Minicons, who were add on parts, not the literal face of the character. Armada Optimus Prime linked with his Minicon, but that Minicon didn’t make Armada Optimus Prime look like Optimus Prime.

The result of this gap in the narrative is that I have not tried switching heads around with different figures. I don’t have much interest in doing so in the first place, and never liked the idea in the late 80’s either. As a kid, I had Skorpanok and Snapdragon, and never felt the urge to exchange their Headmasters. (My Skorpanok remains at the home I lived in as a child, a casualty of my flight when I hurriedly moved away, regrettably left behind because I could only convince friends to make so many trips back and forth with me as I tried to move as much of my life away from there as I could in two cars and an afternoon of frenzied activity. It is one of the pieces of my collection that I lament having to leave behind, to be reclaimed at some later date.) I never felt that I couldn’t do this; I was just never interested in doing it. I suppose I didn’t see the point in it. I’ve carried this over to Titans Return, just not seeing the value in doing this.

I think to some large degree this reticence is due to the distinctive look of the Titanmasters. The original cast of Headmaster characters have Titanmasters that all look like the characters they’re supposed to be: the robot face on Duros looks like Hardhead, even though it’s kind of a generic-y faceplate and visor. But what about the faces of non-traditional Headmasters; what about Hot Rod or Blur, or Optimus Prime? There are a few bland, basic type faces, such as Sixshot’s partner Revolver or Twinferno’s dude Dabura, but those faces are those guys’ faces, as generic as they may be. Each Titanmaster grants some special boost or upgrade to the larger robot, reminiscent of the Minicons during the Unicron Trilogy, but those Minicons were unattached in the integral, individual way that Titanmasters are. And I like the idea of granting some power up. But the exchange of faces just doesn’t work for me.

So I tried it, finally. I switched the heads on Blitzwing and Octane, because they two share purple in their paint schemes, and because they were both sitting on my desk at the time. I exchanged heads and let them sit there for a while as I was working on some other things, so I’d only occasionally glance over at them as opposed to be confronted with them, like if I were doing this head swap as an active thing. They look pretty decent: dare I say, they look like they could be brand new bots. Further swapping with Titanmasters within reach did not yield such positive results, so I think the key to this is matching up Titanmasters with robots that have commonalities, like unity in color or something, as Blitzwing’s head on Topspin’s body isn’t very nice looking.

I get it, in that I understand the gimmick and I guess I can see why people would like it (not kids: I’m talking about collectors). And I’m not trying to give the impression that I hate this idea or can’t have fun; I just don’t understand the gimmick on a narrative, fiction level. I can see this being awesome for customizers or if you wanted to buy figures and then implant your own fan made characters or personas onto them. Or maybe I’m the problem, not wanting to head swap. That could certainly be it as well.

Ultimately I think something like the head swap works best when we’re dealing with characters that aren’t normally saddled with the gimmick, or characters who have never done *this* before, like Combiner Wars Sky Lynx or Trailbreaker: characters who are not taking places in established teams or something. I can’t imagine people being upset that Trailbreaker can now be part of Sky Reign (another previously uncharacter), but look how frazzled people were by new team members like Rook and Off Road upsetting the established group. I think the head swapping gimmick isn’t for me because I can’t make it make sense in a narrative sense. After having tried it, I think it can result in some cool new or different looks, but I can’t rationalize it, apparently.