Swelter is the last original Decepticon torpedo Mini-Con mold, though "original" may be a technicality in this case (more on this later). In torpedo mode, Swelter (COOL name, by the way) is fairly convincing. The toes out front are quite obvious, but otherwise he fits the general silouhette of the torpedo Mini-Cons pretty well. If you look at this mode from the top-down, you can see small gaps in between what become the robot arms and waist, but they're fairly small and not that huge of a deal. Now, I will grant that a lot of the "solid-ness" of this mode comes from the color scheme-- that is, almost the entire mode is black, with a bit of silver in the center (what becomes the robot abs) and dull yellow toes, which makes the latter stick out so much. There is some more dull yellow on the toy, but it's on the bottom of this mode/back of the robot mode, so it's not readily visible. Other than that, all black, so the various robot parts seem to "merge" together into the general torpedo form without any color differentiation. Unfortunately, the downside of this is that a lot of Swelter's mold detailing is washed out from all that black-- there's some really cool dual guns molded on the sides of this mode, as well as a cockpit molded in the front center portion; but again, no paint. Beyond that, Swelter has some slightly pointy detailing on his knees and toes, but is otherwise less "pointy" and more simply "angular" with some minor angular features on the arms, waist, abs, and the "fin"-like parts near the back that become the robot chest.
    In the transformation to robot mode, it becomes immediately obvious that Swelter has the same transformation and design as Divebomb; he's got the same proportions, as well, so many of my comments about Divebomb's robot mode apply to Swelter; there's obvious and rather ugly little gaps and bits behind the robot head that are a side effect of the transformation, and the legs are molded at a bit of a wide stance. That said, Swelter "refines" the design a bit by not having the appendages be quite so long and spindly, so the wide stance doesn't look quite as odd. I love the headsculpt; Swelter has a little "punk" hairdo, with a sneering face (painted silver w/ red eyes, the only new paint visible in this mode). It's a really unique, evil "punk" look, though I wish the hair was painted too. The way the chest slides down also tends to obfuscate the silver paint on the abs, unfortunately. In one more unique twist, Swelter has a little tail behind him, made out of the yellow dull plastic. Sadly, as with many RID2015 Mini-Cons, Swelter has no articulation in this mode; if you try to move the arms or legs inward, it starts the auto-transformation. Swelter's armor bits are-- as usual-- pretty darn cool, and are all transparent yellow, which looks good against the black but I wish was a slightly different color to add more variety to Swelter's color scheme. Nearly all of the armor bits have intricate "flame" detailing, which of course matches his name. He's got fiery chest armor with a flip-up fiery mask, little fire bits that stick onto his lower legs, "exhaust pipes" that stick behind his fists, and the coolest-- flamethrower effects that attach to the front of his side hand-guns along with a "pipe" that extends to his upper arms, making it look like he's carrying some kind of flamethrower backpack. It's a really thoughtful addition, but unfortunately it's also the most annoying of all his armor pieces, as the peg holes for them are VERY shallow. They fall off at the drop of a hat, which is a real shame (along with his lack of ability to actually point the throwers forward). All of Swelter's armor pieces, thankfully, stay on in torpedo mode.
    Swelter is the same mediocre Mini-Con design (but NOT mold) of Divebomb, but done a bit better. The uniform black-ness of the figure-- while blotting out some of the details-- helps unify the torpedo mode much better, and although the transformation is the same, the appendages in robot mode aren't as long so his stance isn't quite as odd. The armor pieces look killer, though the flamethrower pieces fall off probably the easiest out of any RID2015 Mini-Con I own. Still, this is a decent option if you want to beef up Fracture's army.
 

Review by Beastbot

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