Age of the Primes Voyager Swindle’s stock images land, and the crew calls him a deluxe padded out to a $43 Voyager price. Robosen’s Flagship Soundwave arrives at $1,399, and new photos confirm Age of the Primes Sideways needs partsforming to wear his Mini-Con heads. Blokees teases a Defender Beast Wars Megatron, and Amalgamous Prime shows up in hand. In What We Got This Week, Don calls Quickstrike the best Beast Wars homage yet, and Brian finally assembles his orange G2 Devastator.

News

RFC Fans’ Choice Awards 2025 Voting Opens

Chris says the third annual RFC Fans’ Choice Awards ballot is open through the end of December 2025. Listeners can find the ballot in the RFC Discord at tfradio.net/discord or in the show notes at tfradio.net/965. The RFC Awards stream live on the first Wednesday of January. The podcast version of that episode adds a pre-recorded news recap.

Age of the Primes Voyager Swindle Stock Images Spark a Price Debate

Matt is largely happy with Swindle, since the Jeep-front torso is cartoon accurate. His big complaint is the grille and tow winch kibble pinned to each forearm. One host blames the hinges spent on Swindle’s artillery trailer, which becomes Bruticus’s rifle. The crew would have preferred removable parts, like Vortex’s arm kibble. Swindle’s face also needs gray paint to pick out details. The crew agrees Swindle is a deluxe sold as a $43 Voyager, padded out with the cannon. Brian says the real sting is realizing Voyagers now cost over $40. One host hopes to find Swindle for $25 to $30 someday. One host loves the stock photo of the Bruticus gun mounted on Swindle as a ridiculous shoulder cannon. [Source: TFW2005]

Robosen Reveals Its Flagship Auto-Converting G1 Soundwave

Robosen’s Flagship Soundwave turned out exactly as the crew expected. One host likes the look but notes it does little beyond being a Bluetooth speaker. Early-bird pricing was $999, and the full price is $1,399. Chat called it the most expensive novelty Bluetooth speaker available. One host chuckled at the promo’s “lifelike walking,” with Soundwave shuffling along on bent knees. [Source: TFW2005]

Age of the Primes Sideways Mini-Con Heads Confirmed, With Partsforming

Chris says the new photos confirm what he suspected about Age of the Primes Sideways. Nate Purswell posted an Instagram reel showing the Mini-Cons becoming Sideways’s heads, but only after removing parts. None of the official stock photos or packaging show the head feature. One photo shows the leftover Mini-Con limbs attached to the motorcycle as guns. Chris preordered at $35 so he keeps the option to refuse it. Walmart now lists it at $34.97. One host predicts a huge “Ross-Con” next year from Transformers that don’t sell at these prices. [Source: TFW2005]

Stranger Things Collaborative Freakwency and 8-Trax Shown In Hand

New in-hand images of the Stranger Things collaborative Freakwency and 8-Trax include a size comparison with last year’s Cliffjumper. The crew says the figure is decently sized but still pricey at $58. One host still likes the look and hopes to find it at half price or less in a Target sale. [Source: TFW2005]

Blokees Shows Defender Beast Wars Megatron and Action Edition Tarn at CCXP

Blokees showed a tiny Defender Beast Wars Megatron in T. rex mode at CCXP 2025. Blade Raider had leaked it and Optimus Primal during last week’s show. The display also included Action Edition Tarn, an assembled Defender Bruticus prototype and a Galaxy Version G1 Megatron. The crew likes everything it sees. The crew hopes a robot-mode Beast Wars Megatron or Transmetal Megatron follows in the Galaxy line. [Source: TFW2005]

Age of the Primes Voyager Amalgamous Prime In-Hand Images

In-hand photos show Amalgamous Prime standing about as tall as a deluxe in robot mode, though he has many more moving parts. One host finds the figure undefined, while another will buy it to complete the Thirteen Primes. Rob notes one alt mode looks like a Magella Attack tank, and the figure works as a big weaponizer. One host says he will not pay $43 for it, until he does. [Source: TFW2005]

Shelf Mishap

While organizing his office, Brian shattered the left fist of his reissue Super Ginrai. He was plugging in Powermaster Optimus Prime’s black cannon, and the aged plastic simply exploded. He can live with it, since he owns at least two vintage Super Ginrais.

What We Got This Week

Diecast

Diecast’s Amazon preorder of Studio Series The Last Knight Barricade shipped before he could cancel, so he returned it. Going forward he plans to focus on G1 Studio Series figures and is done with the Michael Bay movie line. At Ross he found the Walmart Thundertron set with Calcitron and a pirate flag Ratbat for $20. He calls Calcitron the star, with BotCon-style paint.

Don

Don got Quickstrike from Amazon and calls him one of the best-feeling toys in a while. Quickstrike has blast effect ports, a six-segment ball-jointed tail and gorgeous colors. Don rates him the best-executed Beast Wars homage yet, even over Silverbolt. Thanks to Donanomics, he also picked up a second Transformers Sonic the Hedgehog and Tails crossover set for about $10, so he can keep one boxed.

Matt

Matt had nothing this week.

Rob

Rob got the Flame Toys IDW Rodimus model kit from Big Bad Toy Store before it sold out everywhere else. He also opened his Naruto collaboration figures. Kurama is not bad, though it is clearly built on Kingdom Cheetor engineering. Gamakichi is the star of the set, much like a Basic Beast, with great head sculpts on both figures.

Brian

Brian finally assembled his orange G2 Devastator, and he realized he owns four yellow G2 Scrappers. He repaired his broken G2 Slingshot with hot glue so he can display G2 Superion. He also hot-glued his G1 Shockwave’s legs so they stop sliding down. A sealed Japanese Constructicon release with a trailer arrived in a badly worn box. His Dramatic Capture Decepticon Part 1 set shipped from Amazon Japan before he could cancel, and he says Reflector has never looked nicer. Last, he got a knockoff Black Zarak from Show-Z Store for about $90 and calls the plastic near parity with his Scorponok.

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