Finished my Lego armoury! I tiled the entire floor, added a few decorative bits and details and made sure the engineering was up to scratch.
I think this is the final stage of my ever evolving armoury, until we get a Baxter Building at least. I’ve also started adding extra floors to my Turtles’ lair, I gave it a test and it can hold Avengers Tower so it’ll be able to hold pretty much any building. I might just add a couple more supports though.
My Transformers collecting is now pretty simple - every character from ‘84 to ‘95. One toy per character. There are five sub-collections as well - Diaclone repaints, certain comics characters (Impactor, Rack’n’Ruin, Jhiaxus, Sunstorm, Drift, Rung, Nautica, etc), the main cartoons cast (which is essentially a catch all collection for Beast Wars and new evergreen characters), Dinobots/cassettes, and leaders. That’s most of it, there’s a few exceptions here and there.
I got the new Sabretooth, he looks great. The old figure was the character I most wanted a new version of so got what I wanted.
Have developed my upstairs for the Turtles’ lair a bit further. I’ve added a staircase! It’s funny, I started the year really focused on the Lego, had a brief stop where I spent a stupid amount of money in a small amount of time on Transformers and now have gone back to Lego. Put in a another load of orders for parts.
Squeezeplay! Really wasn’t expecting him to get a figure. Good to get another ‘88 figure though as I think that’s the year with the most gaps. Got a preorder in as well as for Swoop. The 2025 lineup has been further confirmed as well. Think Sureshot, Overcharge, Venom and possibly Alchemist Prime are the ones I’m excited about. I’ll get the combiners but really not as exciting.
Got me some Gears, wasn’t too bothered about him but I like him in person a lot more than I was expecting. Makes the old one look very undersized, especially the head. I would like a new Windcharger, but I think Powerglide needs an update more.
Been spending quite a lot of time thinking about my ‘leaders’ collection, I went through all the releases for each year (‘84 - ‘95) and identified the leaders (plus gave some consideration to Beast Wars and the comics). Decided to get Legacy Transmetal Megatron, then Power of the Primes Optimal Optimus. Potentially Hero G2 and the original Transmetals versions of Prime, Megatron, Primal and the other Megatron are fair game. There are a few versions of Hero Megatron but whilst a Prime version doesn’t exist, as well as trying not to be too crazy about my spending, I’ll pass. I did think about the Unicron trilogy leaders (and beyond), but at that point it’s constant Optimus and Megatron - essentially it just turns into collections of those characters and I’m keen to avoid that.
I’ve also thought about what cartoons I need the main cast of (currently G1/Beast Wars/II/Neo/Car Robots/Cyberverse). I decided to include Animated as well so picked up Legacy Bulkhead - I don’t need them to be Animated style (similarly to I like X-Men Evolution but I don’t need figures of those characters to be in the same style). I think really I’m picking which ‘continuity families’ I follow - G1, Animated and Cyberverse are all good. Unicron Trilogy, Movie and Aligned are out. (G1 includes Beast Wars, Car Robots and IDW). Rumours for 2025 suggest that we’re getting figures of the ‘13’ so will need to do some thinking about that, as I said before, could be down for an Alchemist Prime.
I have bought several slightly expensive things but my to get list is almost crossed off now. I got Botcon figures!!! Pyro and Clench. I really like that they’re old molds that I used to have and was fairly reluctant to replace. I also got a Unite Warriors Baldigus. Whoops. Right, I really am going to stop now. There isn’t too much stuff coming out for the rest of the year so really really need to stay away from eBay. In the process of writing this I bought and then cancelled again a deluxe Combiner Wars Groove…… Right, deep breath……
I’ve come up with a couple of (Transformers) collecting rules for myself: only replacing a figure if the size/scale doesn’t work for me, or the gimmick is wrong (has a gimmick when it shouldn’t or should have a gimmick and doesn’t). I’ve got a spreadsheet of characters I want to replace or add so I can only buy new figures if they’re on that list. The only way I can add more characters to the list is if I start watching a new cartoon or read a new comic with that character in. Otherwise I need to get rid of a figure for any new one.
I’ve finished watching Ahsoka and Echo, have to admit put off watching them both as a bit bored of both franchises but glad gave them a go, both really good. Definitely enjoyed Asoka more than the other Star Wars series - I find the Jedi more interesting than bounty hunters. Am wondering now whether to give some of the cartoons a go. Will watch X-Men ‘97 first though. It’s great! All the characters are great, I’m enjoying Morph. Weirdly I find myself agreeing with Cyclops more and finding Wolverine the more annoying. Must be old age.
