Death's Head
22-08-11, 09:30 AM
The choice of key 1980s characters to be reissued as part of the initial flurry of Generation 2 toys seems to have been a slightly haphazard affair. As well as previous strong sellers such as the Dinobots and Optimus Prime you also got er, Inferno, Hubcap and um, Ramjet. Not really characters at the top of anyone’s priority for a reissue in the cold light of day, but there you have it. Perhaps those were the only moulds Takara could lay their hands on at the time.
As with the other original Transformers, a fair bit of tinkering has been done to Ramjet in a slightly futile attempt to modernise the character. A strange thing happened as the 1980s gave way to the 1990s. I don’t think any other period in time has felt like such a radical departure from what came before as the 1990s did. I mention that because looking back on Generation 2 now, the older toys in the line do look quite tired and very much the product of a bygone era. Some of them get away with it (notably Sideswipe and Optimus), but the rest just look like old people in shell suits. Particularly as Hasbro have not even bothered to fork out on replacement faction symbols for the 1980s figures (all of whom bear the original Autobot/ Decepticon insignias, rather than the sexy new ones) reused for Genertation 2.
So Ramjet has had a couple of alterations to his mould. Three posts have been added to the back of the jet to accommodate the sound effects box (makes tinny space noises of varying degrees of irritation) and he has also lost those big round (non-firing) missiles. As a jet, he still looks nice enough, but the purple is quite pale and not as strong as the black and turquoise which makes him look a little washed out. There’s also the unfortunate nonsense of having his name slapped on by his cockpit (is this in case it gets lost at school?), as well as the ‘DC’ on the tail fins. In place of those huge barrel missiles are two (more exciting, presumably) kid-safe missile launchers. In one of the great ironies of toy collecting, having for years been without one of Ramjet’s launchers I finally tracked one down on ebay, only to fire out the missiles and loose one of them instantly. Well done me. It would seem that powerful missile launchers are okay, so long as they are firing out missiles the size of javelins.
The robot mode and transformation are as unimpressive as ever with this mould. The blacks and purples that make up his robot mode do give him a bit more presence and interest than perhaps the character deserves. Comparing him to his 1985 toy, there’s very little to have stopped Hasbro from giving the Generation 2 version a completely different name, as both only have that distinctive wing design to relate them. Not a successful ‘modernising’ of the toy then, really.
282283
As with the other original Transformers, a fair bit of tinkering has been done to Ramjet in a slightly futile attempt to modernise the character. A strange thing happened as the 1980s gave way to the 1990s. I don’t think any other period in time has felt like such a radical departure from what came before as the 1990s did. I mention that because looking back on Generation 2 now, the older toys in the line do look quite tired and very much the product of a bygone era. Some of them get away with it (notably Sideswipe and Optimus), but the rest just look like old people in shell suits. Particularly as Hasbro have not even bothered to fork out on replacement faction symbols for the 1980s figures (all of whom bear the original Autobot/ Decepticon insignias, rather than the sexy new ones) reused for Genertation 2.
So Ramjet has had a couple of alterations to his mould. Three posts have been added to the back of the jet to accommodate the sound effects box (makes tinny space noises of varying degrees of irritation) and he has also lost those big round (non-firing) missiles. As a jet, he still looks nice enough, but the purple is quite pale and not as strong as the black and turquoise which makes him look a little washed out. There’s also the unfortunate nonsense of having his name slapped on by his cockpit (is this in case it gets lost at school?), as well as the ‘DC’ on the tail fins. In place of those huge barrel missiles are two (more exciting, presumably) kid-safe missile launchers. In one of the great ironies of toy collecting, having for years been without one of Ramjet’s launchers I finally tracked one down on ebay, only to fire out the missiles and loose one of them instantly. Well done me. It would seem that powerful missile launchers are okay, so long as they are firing out missiles the size of javelins.
The robot mode and transformation are as unimpressive as ever with this mould. The blacks and purples that make up his robot mode do give him a bit more presence and interest than perhaps the character deserves. Comparing him to his 1985 toy, there’s very little to have stopped Hasbro from giving the Generation 2 version a completely different name, as both only have that distinctive wing design to relate them. Not a successful ‘modernising’ of the toy then, really.
282283