Impactor. What is this??

I am not sure if I am getting too cynical, or Hasbro is just floundering with ideas for my beloved Transformers line.  Here I have Impactor, a character originally from the UK Marvel G1 comics and was the leader of the Wreckers.

While I think it’s nice to get a toy of the guy, I am a bit saddened by the fact the Wreckers (for all intents and purposes a type of SAS for the Autobots) have been relegated to a recolour of the unfulfilled Fall of Cybertron Bruticus.  The Wreckers didn’t combine either, which makes this a bit odd.  More dissappointingly o i that as the leader of the Wreckers, Impactor has been made a recolour of the most horrid of the 5 toys, using the Onslaught body. 

I think you may have guessed that things aren’t going so well for Impactor, do they get better?


Well, first off I’ll start with an image I stole off the interwebs of Impactor’s comic look.

That’s him in the middle.  He has a harpoon in his left arm, I can’t remember if he transforms, but he is pretty hard-core.

Old Impactor here looks very little like the source material.  No surprises there since he is a clone of Onslaught.  He does come with a new weapon that is meant to be a harpoon gun, which is pretty cool.

Time to break him out for the disappointment.

And there he is.  Not too bad I must say.  Not terribly good either though, so a bit of melancholy sets in when looking at this guy.  It’s not even like his colours match all that well.  One thing that annoyed me and therefore inspired me to get creative was his gun.  Sitting in his hand, it was too long.  So since Impactor has a gun for his arm, I got a drill and did some operating for improvements.

Taking a hack saw, I chopped his hand off and drilled a hole towards the back if the forearm and now he actually has his harpoon for an arm.  I also drilled a hole on the back to place the twin cannons on the back to fill the gap.  Since I haven't actually glued them in place, I could still remove them and transform him, but the peg on his forearm that 'holds' the double cannon in place, thereby 'hiding' the gap in vehicle mode is gone so the double cannon won't stay in place.  Not that it did so very well in the first place...

Why am I so happy to drill and chop?  Because I don’t want the other “Wreckers” and am not bothered about them forming Ruination.  I’d rather have better version of the characters that don’t combine for example.

What I DO like however is his head sculpt.  It is very nice indeed with a nice Roman soldier look to it.  The face in the helmet is rather well done.  I also quite like the blue insignia just by his neck, which I assume is meant to be a Wreckers insignia.  It’s  slightly different take on the Autobot insignia which is pretty cool and a nice touch, like FOC Grimlock’s.

In another nice little twist, the head for the combined mode is based on Emirate Xaaron.  Therefore if you were that way inclined, you can have a funny stanced, big headed Xaaron if you wish.

Once again, emirate Xaaron has a nicely sculpted head as well.  Or should that be Ruination has a nicely sculpted head.

There we have it, Impactor has a nice face but it’s a shame that he didn’t get a better body and more accurate colours.  I feel a bit happier now that I have modified his arm to have the harpoon as a part of his arm, especially since when I was transforming him to vehicle mode the damn arm kept popping off at the ball jointed elbow. 

That is also part of the reason there is no vehicle mode part to this page.  I really hated the vehicle mode for Onslaught, it was weedy, unfinished and looked nothing like the game version.  I eventually managed to get to clip together properly once, and it still wasn’t worth the effort.  The robot mode isn't too bad with some nice articulated points, but the looseness of his elbow really got up my nose.  After sort of getting this guy to vehicle mode, and the arm dropping off all the time, I decided I didn’t care anymore and thought up the harpoon connection.

I wouldn’t have bothered with this toy normally, but being Impactor swayed me enough to buy it.  About the only redeeming feature of this figure is the new head and maybe the harpoon. 

Avoid.