Combiner Wars Powerglide.

So I walked into a shop today with the sole intent of buying Fireflight and then saw this little beauty. I picked it up to have a closer look at it and haven't put the toy down since.

Nice touch with the card. No stats but lovely art (Box is ragged from a furious opening on the bus)

Now, I own the X-Transbots/Jizai designed figure and thought that would do me. That figure is ace. Admittedly it looks a little bit like a pig zipped up tightly in a cagoule but that's okay, it gives him cute points and he's a Minibot so that's fine. Isn't it?

Frankly.. no.

See, Powerglide set a precedent for the acceptance of interspecies relationships in the wonderful world of transforming robots and he did so by being the mouthy rough and tumble sort of guy who would begrudgingly take a young woman to the fair, ride the carousel with her then take on three Decepticons at the same time using just a vending machine and a marqee to ensure victory. And still manage to look all brooding and badass to the ladies when shrugging off a devastating attack from a merry go round horse.

Powerglide is ace. I wanna go drinking with him.

The overriding points here though are that Astoria Carlton-Ritz would not fall for a pig in a cagoule, you need to watch The Girl Who Loved Powerglide and we need this toy to meet some (possibly) serious criteria.

Ready to win the hearts of women who can rend metal with their bare hands everywhere

So let's have a look at him. Powerglide is small (Legends class, think Diet Scout) but packs a punch. Sculpt is great with surprising articulation. Ball joints, swivels and hinges are mostly where they need to be. He might lack a bicep swivel but it took me long enough to notice its absence that it isn't an issue. And they've nailed the head sculpt.

Sadly he doesn't come with a gun but then he flexes and you realise..

Ready for the new Powerglide Pow?

..the dude's got 10 missile pods in each forearm so **** all you gun toting hip gangsta wannabes. Attitude aplenty oozes from this tiny tough guy and this robot mode is a success through and through in my book.

An easy as pie transformation and we're into his alt mode.

It's a jet, it's a rocket, no..

Which is an okayish affair. The hands being the obvious offenders to decency but I'll give it a pass at this scale and there's some nice detailing and fold down landing gear. Crucially, it captures Powergide's alt mode well. You get there in seconds too so it's one of those things you constantly go back to because you can. Unlike in real life as that's when they show you the door.

It's POWERGLIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIDE!

You know when I said he didn't have a gun? This being a Combiner Wars figure, Powerglide can actually turn into a gun for Superion, the downside of which is that it might just be a little bit drivel. Worry not though, because even at the Legends scale it does not in any way cause a problem for robot or plane mode and kids will likely find it a great third mode where imagination takes precedent over flawless execution.

To be fair it has a viewfinder and is a fairly powerful looking bit of kit and.. Naaaah, it's rubbish

Bottom line, this is a winning return to the smaller size class for Hasbro. I haven't purchased any of these Legends class figures in quite some time as they've always looked compromised to me, but if they can keep making toys like this that literally leap off the peg and demand your damn attention then yeah, sold.

LegendARY class