General Information:
Release Date: 2008
Price Point: Boxed set item, $285 for club members, $335 for non-members.
Retailer: Botcon 2008 Exclusive
Accessories: Gun, Missile, Tail/Weapon
Box Set Image from the official Botcon web site.
When we envisioned "Shattered Glass", we knew that the universe would be populated by the counterparts of almost all the Transformers fans have come to know over the years. However, to sell a good toy set, we needed to focus on iconic characters. Clearly vehicles were well represented in this set, but having a beast would help mix things up, and what better beast to include than the leader of the Dinobots himself, Grimlock?
The genesis for this deco was actually a leaked prototype that made its way to ebay some time ago. This redeco of Classics Grimlock featured a dark, almost black deco which was very reminscent of Trypticon, the G1 Decepticon city that would also pop up as a redeco of Cybertron Legends Class Scourge. The story parallel was not very obvious at first. Sure both Trypticon and Grimlock were T-Rex type dinosaurs, but that's a stretch. Instead, I went back to one of my favorite issues of the G1 comic book where the Dinobots take on Trypticon and actually manage to do some damage before he beats a hasty retreat. The imagery of having two "T-Rex robots" of such varying scales take each other on was always awesome to me, and this drew from that concept.
Shattered Glass Grimlock is a redeco of Classics Grimlock. This review will focus on the changes made to the figure for this release.
Beast Mode:
When you're creating an "alternate universe evil" set of robots, it is very easy to fall into the trap of using black on everything. Having already used black on both Goldbug and Rodimus from this set, we knew we couldn't go slapping the color on yet another figure. Instead, we moved away from black a few shades and instead wound up with a base color of dark grey. It is lighter than the dark grey used on the original Trypticon, but it gets the point across when combined with the other colors on this figure. The other twoplastic colors used on this figure are black (barely seen in this form) and translucent orange which replaces the translucent red from Classics Grimlock. The orange is seen most prominantly in this mode on his head and eyes. It is also seen on the weapon as the missile, while the launcher itself is cast in black.
Paint decos are done up in green, orange, silver and purple - all key colors used on the original Trypticon figure. When we plan these decos, and he often strives to provide either more detail than the figure the exclusive the figure is based on or in such a different pattern that it looks dramatically different from the original figure. This is definitely the case with Grimlock. The only thing I stressed was the use of colors where we could to be analagous to their physical placements on G1 Trypticon. This translated into certain color placements such as the vent lines on Grimlock's thighs being painted orange (equivalent to where G1 Trypticon has orange circles on his thighs). The other was a natural fit, silver being used on the claws of his feet (G1 Trypticon's feet had silver on them as well).
The rest of the color arrangements are original and look fantastic. Te orange is used on the tube that runs from the center of the body to the head. Purple is found on the sides of hinges on his legs and head. Green is used on the vent details on his back, both towards the front and back of the figure. The same green can also be found on the top sections of each leg. Silver is found on the collar area under his head and his teeth. I'm especially glad for the silver colors around the head and the orange on the tube running along the sides. These colors are bright enough to break the monotony of the grey without being harsh on the eyes at all.
The last of Grimlock's details are the Autobot symbols found on the top sections of his legs. I think it was obvious to us that we wanted to make the Autobot symbol purple from the outset of this concept, and the result is a tampographed Autobot symbol that looks slightly "off" somehow, which is the effect we were going for. The color plays against your expectations which was part of the entire "Shattered" concept.
All of Grimlock's joints are still tight and his weapon still figures the missile rather far. I did notice on my Grimlock the lower right leg was cut off its plastic tree a bit rough but this is not something I saw in other Grimlock figures during Botcon 2008 so I'll chalk it up to just my figure having this issue.
Robot Mode:
Since G1 Trypticon's robot mode was his beast mode, there was a lot more freedom when putting the deco pattern onto the robot mode of this figure. So long as the basic "Trypticon colors" were kept intact, savvy fans would understand the source of this Grimlock's colors.
Most of the newly revealed parts including his head, waist, mid-section and part of his upper legs are all cast in black plastic. The rest are grey including his fists, chest and the ball joint connectors on his upper legs. The translucent orange plastic is quite prominant in this form, making up both the light piping eyes on his head and the circle on the left side of his chest.
The green and silver colors used in the beast mode figure prominantly here on his body. On Classics Grimlock, his shoulders in robot mode were conspicuously left without deco on the sections that angle upward. Here that section is filled in with green, and the Autobot symbols on them are not the same ones that face front in beast mode, which was part of the trick of this figure, getting decos to match up when different parts wind up facing forward in the two separate modes. The green is also used on his waist section, where it almost seems to glow against the black color, a really nice touch.
The chest panel is painted mostly purple but the machinery that surrounds the trnaslucent orange circle is painted black. some of the raised details on his arms are painted silver such as the raised horizontal lines. You'll also find silver on the robot head on the mouthplate. In an attempt to give more deco for your buck, the vents on the side of his head and the crest at the top are colored purple. Silver is used on the edge of his blade weapon, which definitely works nicely with the colors of this robot mode. I also like the way the silver form the collar section of the best mode winds up on the ankles here, looking almost like some type of lower leg armor.
As with the beast mode, all the joints here are tight. Indeed, I think the leg joints on my "Shattered Glass" Grimlock is actually slightly tighter than the legs on my Classics Grimlock. He can still hold both weapons tightly in each fist as well.
Final Thoughts:
This is a pricey Botcon exclusive, so I would not recommend this for the casual fan (unless you simply have that much money to throw around, in which case kudos to you!). I have to say this is one of my favorite decos in the entire set, and if you are going to hunt down individual figures from this set, Shattered Glass Grimlock is a worthy addition to any Transformers collection. Highly recommended for hardcore collectors and enthusiasts.
