Major Mayhem

Allegiance: Decepticon
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Dark milky military green, light brown, and some silver and pale metallic red
Individual Rating: 6.3

    Major Mayhem's another ball Mini-Con, and like most ball Mini-Cons he's a Decepticon. In ball mode, he's mostly solid, with him being fairly round overall with relatively little mold detailing for a Mini-Con. He's got some armor plating details that are curved so that they don't bust out of the general round ball form, but Major Mayhem's not completely round-- there's some "shoulder-pad-like" details that stick out of the top that make him from being a completely 360-round ball. Still, even with these curved details, they end in rather angular points, so that's an interesting contrast stylistically. Some of the robot bits, unfortunately, are fairly obvious-- the tips of the robot feet are the most blatant, just sticking out there and keeping Major Mayhem from rolling much. He's also got claw-like details on the lower front quarters of the toy, which normally wouldn't stick out too much except for the fact that they're both painted a light brown, which kinda highlights the fact that they're for a different mode. That said, the brown paint and dark milky miltary green plastic used for the rest of the mode gives Major Mayhem a very... well... military feel, which of course fits his name. They contrast against each other quite nicely. Finally, as one last piece of kinda-kibble there's oddly a cavity on the top front of this mode that lets the top of Major Mayhem's head poke out. Kind of a weird decision, I'm not sure why they didn't cover that up better-- there's nothing in Major Mayhem's transformation that would prevent something like that.
    To transform Major Mayhem, you take the legs and fold them down, which causes the head to move forward a bit as the shoulders splay out to the side. You also then fold down a little lizard-like tail on the back end-- it's a totally unnecessary detail, but helps make him a bit more unique, and the green coloration of the toy works such a tail. The overall look of the robot mode is similar to Undertone's, as he's got big, bulky shoulders, relatively small lower arms, and a somewhat "deformed" body, with relatively small legs, body, and feet. The mold detailing on the legs is angular and kind of a cross between looking like armor and being reptilian, what with the two-toed claw feet. The body is fairly nondescript, with some generic curved detailing and a colored (brown) bar across the chest like a lot of RID2015 figures. There's some minor ball kibble behind his body, but given the size it doesn't stick out that much. The shoulders are generally good and give him a bit of a "tough guy" personality, but putting the Decepticon emblem on the middle of the area that splits apart means that his shoulders are asymmetrical; having the round Decepticon emblem above part of his head on one side but not on the other looks kinda off. This is also odd since Major Mayhem's head can rotate up and back, but at a point near the back of his hunched neck-- some kind of abandoned part of his transformation? It's pretty weird. Anyways, the head design itself is quite mischevious, with some spiky headcrests and large toothy-jaw like details below his silver face and light red eyes. Regarding the lower arms-- I like the claw details that make him look more beastly again, but they are only painted on the outside of the arm, not the inside, which makes those parts look only half-finished in this mode-- I wish a bit more tan paint had been added to the toy. For articulation in this mode, Major Mayhem can move forward-and-back a bit at the elbows, and his tail can move up-and-down. (His aforementioned rear-neck articulation doesn't have any purpose in terms of poseability.)
 

Bumblebee

Allegiance: Autobot
Difficulty of Transformation: Easy
Color Scheme: Yellow, black, transparent aquamarine, and some metallic black and moderately light blue
Individual Rating: 8.5

    By this point, I'd imagine you're pretty well-acquainted with RID2015 Bumblebee's vehicle mode; this version isn't that different, in most respects. The proportions are pretty much spot-on, and there's no robot mode extras whatsoever-- always a big plus. Bumblebee has his usual yellow-and-black color scheme, with black paint on the windows (including the rear one!), the diagonal bits on his front hood, and some fairly light blue paint on the headlights. Unfortunately, that's it as far as paint apps, and although Bumblebee's mold detailing is fairly sparse as befits both a sportscar and a RID2015 toy, there's still areas that really need some paint, such as the taillights and bumper details on the back end; the grill and other headlight details on the front; and, of course, the stripes, because Bumblebee just ain't Bumblebee anymore without stripes, folks. Because of the armor-up gimmick and all, there are also more pegs and holes and the like that do detract from the look of this mode some. The rectangular pegs on the front hood are rather unsightly, and because of the transformation, the hinge near the back end and the little circular peg-like details on the car doors (due to how they rotate for transformation) are also minor eyesores.
    Bumblebee's transformation to robot mode is MOSTLY the same as his Warrior-class version, with the front end becoming the legs and most of the car bits going on the back while his main body is revealed as part of the car main body; meanwhile, the side back ends form the shoulders and the arms are juust inside the car doors. A big difference here is that the windows from the legs on the Warrior class toy have been moved onto a backpack; the car doors rotate around with them. This has the net effect of having his legs look better than the Warrior class version's, but 'Bee's now got a bigger backpack. The rear car section also doesn't fold back behind his head well enough and sticks up some. Otherwise, he looks great in this mode; well-proportioned arms, nice legs (though the lower legs could stand to be a bit smaller), and decent (black-painted) feet with heels this time. The chest details are definitely different this time around, with them being a bit more simplistic, looking less like a compressed car front and instead there's just a black arrow-like detail around an otherwise sparsely-detailed, fairly round chest. The head unfortunately is a bit small proportionally, likely because of his armor gimmick. Otherwise it looks good, with a round head with a vent on the forehead and an otherwise regular face with silver paint and light blue paint on the eyes and forehead vent. For articulation in this mode, Bumblebee can move at the neck, shoulders (at two points), elbows, waist rotation, hips, knees, and back-and-forward a bit at the ankles. Given that many of these joints are ball joints, this means he's quite poseable.
    As with the other Mini-Con Battle Packs, Bumblebee comes with armor bits instead of the Mini-Con. He's got a rifle; a really intricately-designed and honestly quite wicked-looking spiky helmet piece with a bit of armor on the top of his chest; similiar spiky bits that go on his shoulders; and two square bits that go on his lower legs, each with a massive spike coming out of them. All of his bits are a transparent aquamarine, which contrasts extremely well with the yellow and helps make his color scheme a bit more varied and interesting. So, all together, he looks quite mean and ready to impale and shoot some Decepticons-- the helmet in particular really adds to this mode. The armor pieces can also form a weapon; the rifle forms the core, the leg bits form a sort of large "disc launcher barrel", the shoulder bits form wings to the back of the weapon, and the helmet piece sort of connects the parts together. All in all it's a very solid, mean-looking weapon-- the best out of this subline, if you ask me-- and there's a hole on the roof of the vehicle mode for him to wield it there to boot! So nothing to complain about here.

    Yeah, I know it's "another Bumblebee toy", but this is one of the best RID2015 'Bee toys there is, especially if you want an added gimmick beyond your basic transformation. The core toy itself shares most of the positives of the Warrior class toy at a bit smaller of a scale, with better legs but with a larger backpack and more visible pegs and hinges in vehicle mode. The armor/weapon pieces are VERY cool and add a lot to the figure, and Major Mayhem-- while not the best Mini-Con-- certainly isn't the worst either, and has a very unique look. Recommended.
 

Reviews by Beastbot

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