Bumblebee (Titans Return)
Vehicle ModeRobot Mode
Allegiance: Autobot
Size: Legend
Difficulty of Transformation: Easy
Color Scheme: Yellow, black, and some silver, moderately dark milky gray, light blue, red, and very light milky gray
Rating: 7.5

    Bumblebee may be omnipresent in the more "mainstream", kid-oriented lines, but that doesn't mean ol' Bee doesn't make an appearance now and then in mainline Generations, as well. This version of Bumblebee is more of a compact car compared to the sportscars he's been depicted as recently, which hearkens back to this more strictly being a G1 update and not a "modernized" version. The proportions of this mode are MOSTLY solid, but a bit off when you compare the height of the door to the height of the windows; 'Bee looks a bit chunky down on the bottom half of this mode, though to be fair this does make the kid-friendly 'Bot look more... well... kid-friendly without having him cross into Rescue Bots territory. He also has a spoiler that's a bit too undersized on the back (though this is mostly due to his transformation). There's no extras in this mode at all, which is a big plus, though there's some mildly distracting cracks in his front hood because of the transformation. The mold detailing is fairly minimal beyond what's required-- which mostly fits him being a fairly sleek car -- but most of his major details are highlighted with paint, which is always good. (One detail that sadly ISN'T highlighted with paint but should be is his license plate, which reads 100STRA-- close to his Movieverse license plate.) He's got some silver on the headlights, as well as some moderately dark milky gray on the front grill and on small details in front of the rear wheels. His taillights are painted red-- something I'm rather grateful for, given how often taillights are overlooked in the paint department. Of course, there's some black paint, used for a stripe along each side. (It would APPEAR that the windows are painted black, but actually the rest of that central section is painted yellow-- the shade of the yellow paint is pretty darned close to the yellow plastic for once, always a plus.) The dull gray and red contrast well against Bumblebee's usual yellow-and-black scheme-- there's nothing majorly new here in terms of colors, though, so you're probably pretty familiar with whether you like this color scheme or not by now. The big draw for this 'Bee when compared with the many other Bumblebee toys out there is that you can actually have a Titan Master ride in him in this mode-- if you pull open the roof from the back end, you'll find a nice cavity in there for a Titan Master to sit. Given that the windows are opaque, though, it's not like you can see it in there when 'Bee's all closed up.
    Bumblebee's transformation hearkens back to his G1 form, with the legs extending out from the front, the roof becoming his chest, and the sides becoming the arms. The whole back section folds up quite nicely behind his chest panel, though, which is pretty cool. Thus, he has very little kibble in this mode, with basically all of it being bits on his arms-- I don't mind the shoulders being made of sections of the rear sides of his vehicle mode, but the shoulders point forward a bit too much because of the window halves on top of them, and this doesn't look that great. What looks worse are the side panels bolted to the bottom of his somewhat flat, undersized lower arms, which is the weakest part of this mode, if you ask me. His head is well-sculpted, being pretty much perfectly G1, along with a light milky gray color on his face and friendly light blue eyes. However, it's a bit undersized, particularly in comparison to that wide hood-chest. He's got big, clunky feet made up of the front sections of his vehicle mode, but his legs are a bit skinny and short, even given that Bumblebee's not supposed to be a big guy-- his legs really should've been a bit bulkier and longer. For articulation in this mode, Bumblebee can move at the neck, shoulders (at two points), elbows, hips, and knees (at two points). Most of these are ball joints, so he's got a pretty decent range of motion in his legs, though given the structure of his arms he's a bit limited there.
    The main draw of Titans Return Bumblebee when compared to his myriad toys is that you can have a Titan Master ride inside of him. Otherwise, though his car mode is pretty solid, his robot mode has some proportional issues, with legs and a head that are too small and some minor kibble on his arms. He's still a decent toy, don't get me wrong, but with this character in particular you've got a lot of better choices out there unless you're adamant about wanting a Bumblebee toy that can hold a Titan Master.



Bumblebee Bio:
The least likely can be the most dangerous.
Strength: 2.0
Intelligence: 8.0
Speed: 4.0
Fireblast: 1.0

Review by Beastbot

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