Sabrblade wrote:My copy arrived in the mail from HLJ last Friday, December 11, and only now have I had the chance to talk about it.
Before I get into the book itself, I gotta say that the preview pages seen earlier in this thread must have been very early production pages since none of them are in this book. The book's pages aren't even red, they're white. Some of the toys seen in those pages aren't even in the book either. Namely, of all those Blackarachnia toys, the Animated, Legends, Universe, and Binaltech ones are not in the book. In fact, that collection of Blackarachnia toys itself isn't present either. The ones from that group that are in the book are found in their respective sections instead of grouped together like that. Basically, none of the pages in this book look anything like those sample pages.
And now, onto the book.
The cover is as shown below, but printed in black-and-white. The colored version is included, but as a dust jacket over the book's actual cover.
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On the back is a list of all the series covered by this book: Beast Wars, Beast Wars II, Beast Wars Neo, Beast Wars Metals, Animorphs, Beast Machines "Transformers: Carrobot", Transformers: Robots in Disguise, Beast Wars Returns, "And… The Aftermath".
At the bottom is a row of eleven symbols, the same eleven seen on the front cover: Maximal, Predacon, Blentron, Animorph, Mutant, Technorganic Maximal, Vehicon, Dinobot, Autobot, Decepticon, and Combatron.
Like the front cover, the back is colorless in light gray while the back dust jacket is in green with a Beast Wars green eye surrounded by red scales.
The inside flaps of the dust jacket feature old advertisement text from the original Beast Wars toyline. On the front flap is the Japanese catalog text that translates as follows:
From beyond the end of the universe, in search of mysterious Power Energy, the super robot lifeform "Transformers" have arrived! The evil "Destron" Transformers who attempt to conquer the universe by abusing Power Energy, and the righteous "Cybertron" Transformers who fight to stop them. With special abilities, each transforms into a different creature! At last, a new battle has begun. Will it be the heroic Cybertrons or the evil Destrons that will win this battle!?
On the back flap is the classic English text from the 1996 Beast Wars packaging:
BIO-GENETIC ENGINEERING HAS ALLOWED THE TRANSFORMERS TO CREATE A PERFECT CYBERNETIC FUSION BETWEEN FEROCIOUS ANIMALS AND MECHANICAL TRANSFORMERS TECHNOLOGY. THE RESULT: HEROIC MAXIMALS VS. EVIL PREDACONS! ROBOT WARRIORS DISGUISED AS WILD ANIMALS IN AN EXPLOSIVE FIGHT TO THE FINISH! THE BEAST WARS HAVE BEGUN ...COLLECT THEM ALL!
The front flap also has a photo of all six deco releases of Transmetal Rattrap: Takara, Hasbro, Fox Kids, Walmart, 10th Anniversary, and the Japanese jigsaw puzzle one. Likewise, the back flap has a photo of seven versions of the Cheetor toy: Fox Kids, 10th Anniversary, Telemocha Series, Hasbro blue eyes, Hasbro red eyes, Hasbro green eyes, and Takara's second-run version with the green cheetah eyes and orange robot eyes.
Inside the front cover is a large photo of RID Air Attack Optimus Primal (not the Japanese Encore version, the Hasbro Toys'R'Us version). Behind this is an Introduction page written almost entirely in Japanese (as is every page in this book, which I'm saying now to avoid having to repeat it throughout). It appears to cover a brief overview of the Transformers brand's history, and contains a short timeline of events from 1984 to 2021, skipping over many years unrelated to the Beast Era.
The Table of Contents shows that the book is divided into three main parts:
- Part 1: Chronicle (pages 4 to 98)
- Part 2: Backstage (pages 99 to 129)
- Part 3: Documents (pages 130 to 143)
Part 1: Chronicle is the largest part of the book, containing a near-complete coverage of almost every single Beast Era toy ever produced (I say "near-complete" and "almost every" for reasons to be given later). Toys that had variants get coverage for most of those as well. For instance, the original Cheetor toy gets coverage for its original green-eyed version, its blue-eyed version, its red-eyed version, and the Japanese rerelease with green cheetah eyes and orange robot eyes. But in cases like Transmetal Rhinox having had dark teal and pale teal Hasbro variants, only Rhinox's darker Hasbro variant is shown alongside his pale gold Takara version.
This section begins with the year 1997, the year Beast Wars came out in Japan. All of the toys covered in this year are those released in Japan, which were first released in the West in 1996, as well as the overseas releases that Japan didn't get. 1998 covers the toys of Beast Wars II, the non-show Fuzors, and the Video Pack redecos of Airazor, Razorclaw, Claw Jaw, and Spittor. 1999 covers Beast Wars Neo's released toys, the unreleased Unicron prototype, the Beast Wars Metals toys, the non-show Transmetals 2 toys, and the entire Animorphs toyline.
Of note about these years is some selective coverage between certain toys that were unchanged between the Hasbro and Takara releases. For instance, B'Boom, Snarl, Claw Jaw, and Powerpinch are omitted from the book because of Apache, Tasmania Kid, Scuba, and Scissor Boy having identical toys, and yet, both Video Pack Razorclaw and Injector are individually covered in addition to the identical Rockbuster and Latolata. Also of note are the facts that the Japanese names of Razorbeast, Transquito, and Scarem are given in this part as レイザーバック ("Razorback"), トランスキュート ("Transcute"), and スクリーム ("Scream"), respectively. Iguanus is even given two Japanese names written as イグナー／イグアナス ("Igunar / Iguanus").
2000 covers Mutant Beast Wars, a number of the Lucky Draw figures for Beast Wars II, Neo and Metals, and the entire line of Car Robots (including Lucky Draw Black Super Fire Convoy and the complete version of Brave Maximus). The book then jumps ahead a few years to 2004 to cover the Japanese Beast Machines line, Beast Wars Returns. It then jumps backward to 1999-2000 to cover the Fox Kids Beast Wars redecos released in those years. It then progresses forward again to 2000 proper to cover the Hasbro Beast Machines and Dinobots lines. 2001 covers the Battle for the Spark subline of Beast Machines toys, and 2002 covers the Air Attack Optimus Primal and Megatron Megabolt toys from Robots in Disguise. A separate "2001-2003" section then covers the entire Robots in Disguise toyline from Hasbro, and I do mean the entire line: All of the same molds released in Car Robots plus all of the Hasbro-exclusive non-beast toys and redecos.
Following this is what the book refers to as "The Aftermath", Beast Era toys released after the era's end. Beast Wars Reborn, Beast Wars 10th Anniversary, Beast Wars Telemocha Series (including the super rare Mini-Con Dragoyell), the Beast Wars Masterpieces from MP-32 Convoy (Beast Wars) to MP-50 Tigatron (Beast Wars), and the five Wave 1 Beast Wars toys from the (as of this typing) forthcoming Kingdom line (though, sadly, Megatron uses the TakaraTomy stock photography with the orange face and other wrong colors).
Also in this Aftermath part are some things labeled as "Extra", which are additional Beast Era-related toys released in other lines. These include:
- RobotMasters Beast Convoy Black Version
- Universe (2003) Optimus Primal
- Microverse Orcanoch and Arachnid
- Titanium Series 6" Optimal Optimus, RID Optimus Prime, and BM Cheetor
There is also a short essay column about the Transmetal toys pictured with a purple-blue variant of Optimus Primal.
Now, of all of the toys covered in this part of the book, there are a few missing. In particular, none of the following are in this book:
- Any toys from BotCon or the Collectors Club; not even the BotCon Japan Grizzly-1 and Double Punch
- Any of the 2003 Universe toys (aside from the aforementioned Optimus Primal)
- RobotMasters Burning Beast Convoy and Beast Megatron Black Version (the normal RobotMasters Beast Convoy and Beast Magtron are included with their Telemocha Series redecos, but these two are not)
- RobotMasters Lio Convoy (either version), Bound Rogue, and Psycho-Orb
- Legend Commander Collection Convoy (Beast Wars) and Lio Convoy
- Any of the Lucky Draws from Beast Wars season 1
- About half of the Lucky Draws from Beast Wars II, Neo, and Metals
- Any of the Car Robots Lucky Draws (except for Black Super Fire Convoy and the complete version of Brave Maximus)
- Any of the 2009 Universe, 2014 Generations Thrilling 30, or 2014-2019 Legends toys of Beast Era characters
- Power of the Primes Optimal Optimus and Throne of the Primes
- Encore God Fire Convoy, Returns Convoy, and the two Big Convoys
- Masterpiece Burning Convoy and Shadow Panther
- And, as mentioned above, any secondary Hasbro variants of the Transmetal toys (aside from the aforementioned purplish Primal that's given its own essay column).
And yet, despite all of these omissions, this section does feature a ton of obscure Japanese merchandise, such as:
- Collection Figure and Metal Monument Convoy and Megatron
- Cybertron Buster role play gun
- Cybertron Mobile Base playset
- Laser Light Yo-Yo
- Lots and lots of mini-figure series for Beast Wars season 1 and Beast Wars II
- Matrix Cannon role play gun
- Spy Shot & Claw Gun (or Crow Gun) role play gun
- PVC figurines for Beast Wars Neo
- The Spark driver figures that were originally going to be included in the cockpits of Optimal Optimus, Tigerhawk, and Dragon Megatron
- A Japanese cover for the first Animorphs novel "The Invasion"
Part 2: Backstage contains concept sketches for toys both released and unreleased, as well as interviews with seven people involved with the Japanese Beast Era.
The released toys whose concept sketches are featured are:
- Bat Optimus Primal
- Alligator Megatron
- Razorbeast
- Iguanus
- Terrorsaur
- Dinobot
- Waspinator
- Tarantulas
- Gorilla Optimus Primal
- Rhinox
- Airazor
- T-Rex Megatron (with an actual left hand inside his tail weapon)
- Scorponok
- Transmetal Optimus Primal
- Transmetal Rattrap
- Transmetal Cheetor
- Transmetal Megatron
- Transmetal Tarantulas
- Transmetal Ravage
- Animorphs Jake/Tiger
- Mutant Soundwave (originally meant to be Animorphs Marco)
- Mutant Icebird (originally meant to be Animorphs Jake)
- Mutant Poison Bite (originally meant to be Animorphs Rachel)
- Beast Machines Supreme class Cheetor
- Beast Machines Megatron
- Microverse Orcanoch, Arachnid, and their mini-figures
Among the unreleased concepts included are:
- Early designs of Cheetor as a cougar (often mistaken for a wolf) and a lion
- Several early designs for Depth Charge that look drastically different from the final version, some of which are even completely organic, non-Transmetal versions
- A triple-changer Optimus Primal that changes into a gorilla and an eagle
- A triple-changer Cheetor that changes into either a cheetah and a shark
- A triple-changer Dinobot that changes into either a raptor and a cobra; all three of these were proposed "power up" forms for the three
- An early design for Lio Convoy that more greatly resembles Optimus Primal, has a big axe weapon, and a small bat companion
- An early concept for the Animorphs toyline that involved not transforming toys but instead articulated endoskeleton figures that could be covered with human and animal skins to change them between each form
- Early concepts for Animorphs Tri-Rex that, while functionally similar to the final version, somehow look even more freakishly disturbing than the final version
- "Mutant Beast Wars"-style Animorphs animal-to-animal concepts for a "Bee Frog" (either Ax or Visser Three) a "Piranha Condor" (one of the boys), and a "Ram Dragon" (a Komodo dragon, that is, also one of the boys)
There are also concepts for some gimmicks that never happened.
- Bat Optimus Primal with flapping wings
- Insecticon with a pullback motor in beast mode
- Tarantulas with a spring-loaded autotransformation that bounces up with the push of a button
- Gator Megatron with a button-activated chomping gator mouth
- T-Rex Megatron with a projectile-launching T-Rex head that fires like a missile from its neck with a pull of its beast mode tail
- Gorilla Optimus Primal with two flails and a set of two spiked clubs that he holds and spins around in beast mode
- Scorponok's Cyberbee drone originally being a little scorpion drone
- T-Rex Megatron with an extending T-Rex head much like the extending tail arm that his final toy had
- A sort of "Pretender"/Super Mode" version of T-Rex Megatron where a small kibble-less robot figure compacts into a torso mode while a large T-Rex toy turns into a humanoid suit of armor for the torso figure to slot into, and armed with a large trident weapon; think Powermaster Optimus Prime or Star Saber for this gimmick
- A G1 Optimus Prime figure that turns into an Army truck and combines with an organic lion figure that forms armor for Optimus to wear
- One of Depth Charge's early concepts has little shark minions that shoot out of his beast mode mouth and transform into their own robot modes, making Depth Charge a sort of Beast Wars version of Soundwave/Blaster. One of these concepts even has the little shark minion as a dolphin instead
- A triple-changer "Buffalo Crab" Fuzor with two beast modes: a water buffalo and a fiddler crab
- A triple-changer "Shark Mantis" Fuzor with two beast modes:a hammerhead shark and praying mantis
- A Fuzor combiner formed by an eagle and an ostrich fusing to make a "Bigbird" (kind of a large bird with arms; funnily enough, this is the same descriptor for G1 Deathsaurus's altmode)
- A Fuzor combiner formed by a frilled lizard and a rhinoceros fusing to make a Triceratops
- A Fuzor combiner formed by a spider and an ant fusing to make a scorpion
- Early concepts for triple-changer "Beast Machines" that have an organic beast mode and a mechanical vehicle mode: One that turns into a helicopter and a dragonfly, one that turns into a racecar and a crab, and one (that looks a lot like Optimus Primal) that turns into a four-legged cannon tank and a gorilla
- A "Battle for the Spark" bird with a wind-up wing-flapping gimmick in its Spark
- A "Battle for the Spark" figure of Obsidian with a wind-up propeller-spinning gimmick in its Spark
- Wind-up Spark boxes that could be inserted into Vehicon figures to unlock pop-out weapon gimmicks (sort of like what Mini-Cons and Cyber Keys would later do in Armada and Cybertron) or inserted into Cheetor for a beast mode head-turning gimmick
- Spark Crystals that resemble little Matrix cores and could be pushed to activate either a pop-out weapon on an early Optimus Primal design or a spinning rotor and lights and sounds cannon on an early Vehicon design
- A removal Matrix core-looking Spark Crystal that could be inserted into the hips of a very early Maximal design that would later become Cheetor, with the Spark Crystal activating pop-out cannons on its thighs
- A removal Matrix LED battery that could be inserted into an early Vehicon design's chest or arm to activate lights and deploy an arm blade
The rest of this section contains lengthy Q&A interviews with the following people:
- Hideaki Yoke (餘家英昭) – toy development
- Kozo Itagaki (板垣 耕三) – toy marketing / producer
- Takio Ejima (江島多規男) – toy development
- Hisashi Yuki (幸 日佐志) – toy development
- Kōjin Ōno (大野 光仁) – toy development
- Ryōka Yuzuki (柚木 涼香) – Voice actor for Blackwidow (Blackarachnia)
- Yoshikazu Iwanami (岩浪美和 ) – Japanese version director / story editor
Part 3: Documents features the Beast Wars Data Box with lists of all the toys, episodes and movies. In particular, the specific Japanese toys that were sold in the U.S. through HasbroCollectors.com and Target are given their names written in English: Lio Convoy, Galvatron, Shadow Panther/Tripredacus Agent (both names, yes), Magmatron, Stampy, Saberback, Longrack, Archadis, Mach Kick, and… Colada! Yep, "Colada" finally has an official source for his name spelled as such, rather than the longstanding Engrishy "Cohrada" spelling.
Likewise, Razorbeast, Transquito, Iguanus and Scarem have their name written in Japanese as レイザーバック ("Razorback"), トランスキュート ("Transcute"), イグアナス (イグナー) ("Iguanus (Igunar)"), and スクリーム ("Scream"), just like in Part 1. Though, of further note is that Wolfang's name is spelled correctly in English, when in Part 1 his English name was misspelled as "Wolfgang". A similar typo appears in Part 3's list of the Beast Machines toys where the word "Heroic" in "Heroic Maximals" misspelled as "Hiroic". Other small typos like this appear throughout the book, but nothing too major and only noticeable if one is actively looking for them.
Finally, the episode guides for each series/movie arrange them in accordance to their Japanese airdates, so they are given in the following order:
- Beast Wars season 1
- Beast Wars II
- Beast Wars Special
- Beast Wars Neo
- Beast Wars Metals: Convoy's Great Transformation (the Japanese theatrical release of "Cutting Edge")
- Beast Wars Metals/Beast Wars seasons 2 & 3
- Car Robots/Robots in Disguise
- Beast Wars Returns/Beast Machines
All in all, the most interesting stuff in this book for me is all of the unreleased concepts for figures and gimmicks, but as a fan of the entire Beast Era, this book is a fine overview for much of the era's toy history.
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