General Information:
Release Date: May 2009
Price Point: $22.99 (varies depending on retailer)
Retailer: General (Toys R Us, Target, Wal-Mart etc.)
Accessories: None
*Images and text from Hasbrotoyshop.com:
For millennia, he has waited. Thousands of years have dragged by as he recruited proxies, one by one, to scour the cosmos for the artifact he required. Now he finds he must return to the primitive, flesh-slug infected planet on which his quest began. Nothing will stand in his way this time. If need be, he will scour the surface of this disgusting world clean in the fire of his rage, and search through the blasted rubble for that which he seeks.
Recreate exciting movie scenes or stage your own living room battles with this fierce-looking figure! With slide-out energy absorption panels in robot mode, this DECEPTICON warrior will stop at nothing to defeat the AUTOBOT forces! In vehicle mode, unleash a Cybertronian Destroyer that’s ready for action!
Detailed robot-to-vehicle figure features slide-out energy absorption panels in robot mode and converts to a Cybertronian Destroyer in vehicle mode!
Ages 5 and up.
The Fallen is a character concept that borrows from one introduced in Dreamwave Comics' "War Within: The Dark Ages" story where we learn one of the first thirteen Transformers created by Primus went rogue and became evil. His hulking form was constantly ablaze with fire and provided a cool villain for Autobots and Decepticons alike to contend with. In this film, The Fallen takes on a similar role as an ancient Transformer who defied his peers and thus ends up "banished". It's not often that the Transformers line has figures of "god-like" characters in its roster, so it's cool to see another one with an "ancient" aesthetic to boot.
Unlike most Voyager Class figures, The Fallen was packaged in robot mode, most likely since it looks much more impressive in the box that way so I'll be reviewing his robot mode first.
Robot Mode:
In "Revenge of the Fallen", we learn that ancient Transformers visited Earth in 17,000 BC. These ancient Transformers had very different stylings than "modern day" Transformers. To create these robots, the designers extrapolated backwards, creating a design that is both familiar and alien at the same time. The design's more familiar designs begin with the head. With crests that angle out to the sides and a roll of frills on either side, The Fallen's head resembles that of an Egyptian Phaoroh's head dress. The beauty of this design is that it evokes something from ancient Egypt (a major setting in the film) while also incorporating some of the sharp angles and designs of the Decepticon symbol. In the film, The Fallen calls Megatron his "disciple", so it is pretty certain that his likeness informed the design of the symbol that the Decepticons would all wear generations later.
The rest of The Fallen's design definitely hints at designs that would come later, with armor panels layered over machinery underneath, some exposed. However, many of these details use designs informed by the head design. For instance, his shoulder joints have horizontal rows of lines that seem to extend from the horizontal frills on his head. On his shoulder and wait are segmented sections of armor where each part is separated by a vertical line. Following this segmented look, his lower leg armor looks like several panels of armor layered over each other in a horizontal pattern. The Fallen definitely has some organic looking design elements, something a few of the "modern day" Transformers in the movie universe have as well. In this case, his hands have a layered, organic look to them while tubes on the sides of his waist area seem to resemble organs inside a humanoid body.
Of course, The Fallen is an alien, and an ancient one at that. He's going to show off some alien features, and perhaps the two parts that drive this home the most are his hands and feet. His feet are claw like, with each end coming to three smaller claws. His hands are super funky, with eight fingers on each, including four thumbs on each hand. In the CGI model, the character has a horizontal piece running from the middle of his torso to the back connected to his arms. To recreate this look, there are horizontal pieces on his mid-body that connect to soft plastic pieces on his arms, a surprising detail considering how much it restricts his articulation. I prefer not to use it, but it looks great if you're just displaying the piece. While The Fallen is a Transformer, and hence a mechanical being, he ha a lot of organic looking details. Look closely and you'll see shapes resembling horns on his shoulders, legs and forearms. A His waist has ridged sections connected to each other that look like wrinkled skin and he has lines of what look like muscle fiber on his forearms. I love these details since they add a more complex and creepy look to the figure all at the same time.
The Fallen is cast in grey, silver and metallic green color. The green makes up most of the body of the robot, with grey and silver used for smaller parts such as his feet and wrists respectively. He also has several parts cast in translucent red plastic including his eyes and "solar" panels built into the body (more on those in a bit). Orange and silver paint are used for his details, mirroring the look of "glowing" energy in his body and also paying homage to the original "Fallen" character who was dark colored and constantly on fire. Silver details can be found on his shoulders, waist and legs including a Decepticon symbol on the center of his body. Of all these details, my favorite are the orange lines of paint since they contrast so nicely against the green, and they make for a nice homage to the Fallen from "War Within".
The Fallen has nineteen points of articulation in robot mode. This includes six points of articulation in each arm and surprisingly, torso articulation. I had not expected the center of his body to be able to turn at all since parts of his alternate form wind up on his back right around where he would turn, so this was a nice surprise. His ankles are on ball joints and can turn in and out while his feet have an action feature where the claws on his feet are attached to springs, giving them the ability to "grasp" objects like a bird. They're not quite strong enough to pick up say, a deluxe figure, but you may get away with a light weight Scout Class figure.
In a reference to the movie plot point involving power from Earth's sun, The Fallen has several "solar panels" that fold out of his body. Swing his head forward and two panels flip out from the back. On both of his upper arms, panels swing out to the sides, and his forearm armor swings forward to reveal hidden panels underneath. The panels on the sides of his head are particularly nice. Their angular deisgn looks sharp and the insides have circuit like details, driving home the mechanical nature of this alien.
The big draw backs to this figure are the lack of weaponry and a some quality assurance issues. In the "Revenge of The Fallen", the character wields a staff as his weapon, something I would have liked to see included here. However, the worst part is that on my figure, the right forearm pops off at the shoulder joint far too easily, as does his left foot. The right foot and left arm however are tight and don't pop off easily, leading me to believe it may just be an issue with my particular Fallen figure, but it's still disappointing in such a nicely sculpted and posable figure.
Transformation to Vehicle Mode:
- Fold in all of The Fallen's solar panels if they are deployed.
- Detach his arms from the connective parts in the middle of the waist.
- Swing down the cockpit section on his back.
- Swing the pointed parts on the top of the shoulders in.
- Rotate each arm so the pointed parts on the shoulders face forward.
- Swing each arm up.
- Swing each elbow in and attach it to the shoulder using the pegs on the forearms.
- Swing in each robot hand.
- Rotate the upper body around.
- Rotate the robot arm pieces around so the forearms are on the top of the vehicle, forming the rear section.
- Swing the panel on the lower body with the translucent red piece over the robot head.
- Rotate the lower robot legs in so the knees face each other, then rotate each foot so they face outwards.
- Attach the clips on the shoulder pieces to the rectangular holes on each lower leg armor piece.
Vehicle Mode:
There are some alternate forms in the Transformers line that are referred to as "because they say so" modes by fans. I was tempted to call The Fallen's alternate form one such mode, and to a degree it is. The vehicle mode looks very alien, and it can be easy to look at this and just think "It's just his limbs slapped on top of each other with a cockpit", and indeed there's validity to that. Unlike many jet mode/spaceship mode Transformers, there aren't a whole lot of parts here to cover the robot bits. Nothing flattens out. Indeed, the jumble of organic and bio-mechanical looking bits that make up The Fallen compress here, so it looks even freakier than his robot mode. However, if you consider the origin of the character and his design aesthetic, this mode makes perfect sense. The way his parts work out should be a bit less sophisticated than modern day Transformers and since disguise is not an issue, The Fallen actually represents perhaps the most pure iteration of a Cybertronian vehicle mode we've seen so far in the movie universe, especially if you consider he predates other characters such as Megatron who retained their Cybertronian forms.
The newly revealed parts here are the cockpit and the piece which covers the robot head. The beauty of the design is its shape and those pieces. The Fallen is roughly triangular in shape. The piece covering his face has a translucent red piece in the center and then three translucent red pieces angling outwards and upwards. The cockpit is pointed with two curved, pointed "eyes" on it. The result? The Fallen looks like the vehicle mode incarnation of the Decepticon symbol. It's a beautifully conceived design that really drives home that this is the guy who began the Decepticon movement and he embodies it down to his vehicle mode. These newly revealed parts are very well sculpted. The nosecone has beveled sections leading to the cockpit windows, each of which has lines etched into it, making them look like eyes. The panel covering the face has two horizontal wings in fthe front and vent lines in the center.
Another nice design touch is the way his various robot mode parts double as parts of his vehicle mode. They look strange, but with enough imagination it's not hard to imagine the rows of tubes on his forearm armor as a row of lights and the long tube on the side of each forearm as a cannon. The way the robot feet are set in this form, they look a lot like flames on the end of the vehicle which fits the character and the vehicle mode at the same time.
The newly revealed pieces are cast in the same green as the rest of the robot mode. The cockpit has orange and silver painte details. I really like the orange patterns which consist of a series of pointed lines in the center curving back to the sides. On the panel covering the robot head, the wings are painted silver.
Final Thoughts:
The Fallen is a really cool figure with a fascinating design aesthetic. Since he is not tethered by the need to look like a modern day Transformer or transform into an Earth vehicle, the designers were able to let their imaginations roam on the design of this figure. I really like the look of this figure and it represents the character's CGI appearance very well. However, it does have its limitations. There are no real action features to speak of so kids may wonder what to do with this guy other than have his feet grasp things and flip solar panels out. This figure seems geared more towards older collectors who want a good representation of the "big bad" in the movie. Also, taking the parts popping off into account, I have to bump this guy down to a simple 'recommended" instead of highly recommended.
