General Information Images:
One of the things that the Transformers Collector's Club tries to do is bring together elements form different parts of Transformers history into one narrative. In the current "Wings of Honor" storyline, characters from many eras of Transformers history have been brought together into one "Generation One" styled storyline, and now Sideburn has joined the fray as a redeco of the Classics Rodimus figure. This figure was reviewed previously as part of the Classics toy line as well as a Botcon 2008 exclusive. Check out those reviews for a detailed look at the design of the figure. This review will focus on the changes made to the figure for this release.
Vehicle Mode: Sideburn has a very different deco than other iterations of this sculpt. His primary plastic colors are metallic blue, white, translucent yellow and white. All of these colors are inspired by those found on the original Sideburn. Note however that the metallic blue color is noticably lighter in tone than that of the original Sideburn. Most of the body is cast in metallic blue. The spoiler is white, which is just as bold set against the blue as Hot Rod's yellow spoiler is against his red colors. The windows are cast in translucent yellow, very similar in tone to the translucent color found on Sideburn. This same yellow is used for his "flame/missile" that sticks out the back in this mode. As you would expect, the wheels are all cast in black, but black is also used for the interior of the vehicle, where you'll find two seats and a steering wheel. I don't recall these details being as obvious on previous iterations of this design, so they definitely add an awesome touch. The paint deco on this vehicle is where a lot of inspiration truly comes into play. Like Generation One Hot Rod, "Robots in Disguise" Sideburn had flame patterns on his vehicle and robot modes, so it would have been very easy to just repeat the flame patterns from the previous Rodimus figures. However, the flame pattern on the front of this figure and the sides are patterns that are not only different than the Rodimus pattern, but also inspired by the original Sideburn as well. These flame patterns are also metallic blue in color, but a lighter tone with white borders. Yellow paint is used to color the headlights in the front. The canopy in the middle is painted metallic blue to match the plastic on the rest of the figure. A bit of metallic blue also shows up on the back, right near the spoiler. Silver paint is used to paint the engine that sticks out of the hood in the front. That detail alone isn't particularly surprising, but what does deserve some praise is the touch of metallic red used on the raised sections of the engines, which calls back to a very similar deco scheme on the original Sideburn's engines. Red is also found on the back, near the spoiler in a row of five rectangles. A touch more of silver is used on the sides of the wheels. Finally, there is a big, bold Autobot symbol tampographed on the top of the vehicle, in the spot analagous to where Sideburn had his own large Autobot symbol. The fact that I just went on and on for the last paragraph about Sideburn's deco speaks to how detailed and intricate it is. These are a lot of individual deco points for this figure, and they're not there just to make the vehicle look good but also to pay proper homage to similar details/elements on the original Sideburn. On both counts this figure succeeds incredibly well. This is about the fourth time this particular sculpt has been released, and I tend to worry once you hit that number as tooling sometimes begins to show wear and tear. I am happy to report however that everything in this mode feels tight and together. The missile launcher mounted on the underside of the vehicle holds tightly and the missile stays in the launcher without a problem. Transformation to Robot Mode:
Robot Mode: Let's start with an area I usually don't focus on so much when it comes to a deco: the robot head. The "Robots in Disguise" version of Sideburn had a very distinct, asymmetrical head design. While his face was a regular Transformers robot face, the "helmet" portion looked like part of it was designed as a device to help him target enemies, complete with a clear panel that came over one eye. Since the Rodimus head sculpt is not designed that way, Fun Publications created a deco that would do the job instead. The head is cast in metallic blue, with the face painted silver. His eyes translucent yellow, with a light piping piece on the back of the head. The vent pieces on either side of the face are white, bringing in more of the other colors from the vehicle mode. Now, to simulate the original Sideburn's head sculpt, the right side and crest of the helmet section have yellow paint details, but on the left side, the same area is not painted yellow. Instead, the horizontal edge near the eye is painted yellow, with the deco continuing around the left eye, simulating the "eye piece" mentioned earlier. This is a really intricate bit of paint work and the designers deserve a lot of praise for not only wanting to pay proper homage but also doing it in such a creative way without a whole new head sculpt. The rest of the deco on this figure is no less impressive. The front of the arms and lower legs both have white sections painted on. This is intended to reflect similar sections on the original Sideburn that were cast in white plastic. On his left forearm you'll find a small Autobot symbol. This symbol is a callback to the original Sideburn's left arm, which had a sculpted Autobot symbol on its forearm. In a wonderful bit of design alignment, the engine from the vehicle mode winds up on the chest here in a very similar position to the original Sideburn (part of the inspiration for choosing this sculpt of course) so the red on the engine piece stands out boldly against the blue colors on the rest of th efigure. On top of all this, you'll find additional blue decos on the hip area and shoulders and a bit more white and red in the area between the legs. This is a very intricately designed paint deco that pays perfect homage to the source character. All the joints on this figure are tight, and in fact the arm joints are actually a bit tighter than the ones on my "Reveal the Shield" Rodimus figure (pictured above with Sideburn). The missile launcher still works without a problem as well.
Final Thoughts:
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In the late 1990's to the early 2000's, the Transformers line was largely dominated by beast mode-based Transformers via the "Beast Wars" and "Beast Machines" series. By 2001 however, Takara had decided to take the Transformers back to its roots with a line of Transformers called "Car Robots" which focused on Transformers that primarily had vehicle modes. This line would later be brought into the United States as "Robots in Disguise". Among these Transformers were Generation One styled cars that transformed into robots. The young, hot headed character among the Autobots was Sideburn, who transformed into a Dodge Viper.
