Roses are red, violets are blue, Titans Return Deluxe Highbrow review.
Yes indeed, it's finally time for a 21st century classically-styled Highbrow figure!
Come at me, brow.
Now, Highbrow's another one of those G1 fellas with a fast-track ticket straight to the front seat of my heart
'cos he just so perfectly fulfils the Thew favourite criteria:
like, he's chunky and blue, I had him when I was five, he's never in anything, love it.
But while I love Highbrow, I get that he's probably the least cool of the Autobot Ladmasters?
Like, you got Hardhead, who's a badass green tank bro; Brainstorm, the rock star spaceship scientist;
Chromedome's like a comic book megastar now and he's weirdly big in Japan;
and Highbrow's also there.
But he's just always done it for me because I love how sort of square and righteously regular he is
with his perfect classy blueness and tasteful metal sheen.
So, as seems to be the standard with the Titans, Highbrow's almost precisely the same as the old guy
with just the regulation posing power-up.
Check out his lumpy-ass arms here, with these mountainous constructs of kibble,
free-wobblin' rotors and a pair of friggin' medical frigates hangin' off him.
Plus they're like, boring flat grey, and they even look a little droopy when they're just dangling there.
But then you just move them the tiniest bit, and there he is!
Kinda the same with his legs - like, they're ostensibly quite boring and blocky
but then the mega stompy feet are so bluntly endearing!
Not totally sure what the crack is with the chestplate -
like, it doesn't open like it used to but it does kind of come out a bit and I don't know why, or what to do with it.
Is that what's cool now? I don't know. But what I do love is all the gratuitous detail on the go!
Like, did he need the belly microwave or the pervy pelvic control panel or like, all these blips and chits up here?
No, he objectively didn't, but he brought them anyway! Treat yourself!
So, offensively speaking, Highbro's packed a pair of pointy pistols which bodge together for a bitchin' double time weapon jam
with seating for one, which honestly is one of the badder-ass ones of these sorta pseudo-Targetmaster dealios
and who better to hang out in there but Highbrow's dedicated robo face representative - the bewilderingly named Xort
who's tragically been demoted from a sci-fi reference all the way down to a KMFDM record, almost.
Klaatu barada (coughs)
But anyway, he's a suitably straightforward grey-and-blue-bloke boasting some ballin' Marvel UK Ultra Magnus shades
and the squad's only visible mouth, which you can then jam into this distressingly exposed and slightly wibbly neck hole
to complete this wonderfully stately all-business fellacopter!
So he's a bit by-the-book, but he's a superbly statuesque style queen of a bot who just oozes orderly robotic charm
and awesomely unabashed G1-itude!
Maybe I'm biased because the original holds a lot of powerful childhood memories for me, but like, I don't think so?
I think it's mostly just because he's good?
Chopalopadopdop!
# I was gonna do Computron, but then I got Highbrow #
# I was gonna do Choro-Q Megatron, but I got Highbrow #
# I'm doing them in 2019 and I know why now #
# Yeah, 'cos I got Highbrow, 'cos I got Highbrow #
# Invisible eyebrows, la-da-da-da-da-da #
Transformation's just a precise tracing of the old fellow apart from a bonus groin yank
and it actually seems extraordinarily short-form? Like, nothing clever happens?
But I suppose it's refreshingly no-nonsense and it lets you just get to the -
no, something cleverer than "get to the chopper".
It lets you arrive at the whirlbird.
(Arnold voice) Arrive at the whirlbird!
Is it 2006? Come on, me! You're better than that.
Yeah, the cool backwards effect! Woo woo woo! Yeah.
So check out this sweet heli fella!
It's just a sweet square cyber copter with an awesome chunk factor and nothing to prove!
God, I want a Decepticon repaint of this!
I mean, look at the crimson cubist cockpit and the weird lumpy rump end.
It's almost like it's made out of Lego! It's just G1 Highbrow again, isn't it?
Just an implausibly angular chopper lad with the guns on the go and the shonky shape and the skinny Louisiana wings.
Just the two rotors this time, and sadly a combination of wimpy material and super tight packaging
has given him a case of the old rotor rickets, so careful out there, kids!
So while it is all a bit obvious, Highbrow's still a total trip, man!
Like he's neither the most intricately engineered action figure or even the coolest character,
but he's a ruddy good lark and just a satisfyingly solid package. Top of the choppers!
Just time now to squeeze in a shorty.
Yes indeed, this is Titan Master Brawn, who's a tiny head-shaped version of the old minivan skinny man.
Titan Master itself's a bit of a cheapo-lookin' unpainted snoozefest
but he's clearly just a thinly-veiled excuse to give anybody an angry shiny dome face.
I love this! It's such a dumb idea, and this head probably works better than most because it's neutrally-coloured and always funny
and check out this cheeky little dune crawler! Just a perfect Autoboty off-roader with like triangle treads and a little windscreen.
You can even flip it over into a sort of space scooter that he can awkwardly mount.
Colours muddy it up a bit though - like, the heavy-ass green and overbearing black just annihilate all this lovely detail.
I'm sure we'll get like six repaints of it, but couldn't this one have been good? It just doesn't seem finished.
But I'd say it's probably still worth a go! Come for the head swap bants, stay for the obscenely hardcore rifle mode!
So we're two Titan reviews in, and I can't help but notice it's a bit more difficult than usual for me to
separate these guys from the old ones?
I guess because the memories are so ingrained in there and it's been such a long time since we've seen these characters
and they're the same. They are the same.
So it is kinda hard for a dinosaur like me to gauge how these would look to a TF newbie
but I have to believe they're some of the more accessible ones out there right now
'cos like, the designs are still cool somehow, they're neither too cartoonified nor too complex,
and they probably represent Transformers as an entity better than most mainlines!
They're like a nice plush welcome mat into the fandom.
Just make sure you palm the bouncer 20 quid and get ready for a bloody good judging.
And that's all for Highbrow. Goodbyebrow! Like, share, and subscribrow!
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Limited appeal, keepin' it real.
(Arnold voice) Arrive at the whirlbird!
Shortcut to vehicle!
Approach the lander!
Gain access to the copter!
(general Arnold noises)
This is painful. This hurts. This hurts me.