Hasbro closed out San Diego Comic-Con 2026 with a panel slate that delivered Age of the Primes Alpha Bravo and G2 Wild Rider for spring 2027, a 13.5-inch Studio Series Titan Class Dinobot Scorn for fall, IDW Nautica, a Beast Wars Maximal Collection multipack, and a full run of Monster Jam collaborations. The bigger conversation was Fathom Entertainment’s 40th anniversary theatrical release of The Transformers: The Movie, which now carries an all-new post-credits scene — and the panel spent twenty minutes deciding it will almost certainly make things worse. Studio Series Wave 32 Voyager Cyclonus turned up in hand with a new head sculpt Matt calls fantastic and a deco Chris considers close to the Unite Warriors gold standard. In What We Got This Week, Chris paid seven dollars for the Breakaway soccer ball and still felt overcharged, Don finally landed Onslaught in his Bruticus frame, and Brian opened a Mandarake box holding a Missing Link Ultra Magnus he calls the most gorgeous version of the character ever made.

History on the Fives lands on 2021 this week — the year Kingdom debuted alongside the War for Cybertron trilogy finale on Netflix. Brian’s verdict: great toys, hopes dashed on the rocks. Chris frames the Netflix run against the Prime Wars Trilogy web series, which was at least weird. The War for Cybertron cartoons were merely boring, and as Chris quotes listener HeyMickey, there is no worse sin for media than being boring.

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Transformers Studio Series Wave 32 Voyager Cyclonus First In-Hand Images

First in-hand photos of Studio Series 86 Cyclonus confirm this is a substantial retool of the Kingdom figure, not a straight repaint. Matt is buying it on the head sculpt alone — his one complaint about the Kingdom release was the face, and the new sculpt solves it. The figure also gains new elbow pieces, likely reinforced around the pin, and significantly longer thighs and lower legs that change the transformation. The cost is the jet thruster covers, which are gone. Chris calls that a material loss because the Kingdom vehicle mode was fantastic, and notes the longer legs leave the unchanged arms looking stubby. The colors are the win: very close to Unite Warriors Cyclonus, which Chris has treated as the gold standard for a Cyclonus deco ever since it shipped. He caught the $35 Walmart pre-order and points out that Kingdom Cyclonus has a known yellowing problem on the nylon sprues, so a fresh mold run is welcome. Don’s Kingdom gripe was the knees — either splayed too far out, or a gaping hole behind them, or a Rob Liefeld pose if you pushed them in. Matt confirms the new version adds an actual notch and peg. Source: TFW2005

SDCC 2026 – Transformers Panel Reveal Official Pics

Official images landed for everything Hasbro showed at the Transformers panel. Age of the Primes Deluxe Class Alpha Bravo and Deceptic0n Wild Rider both arrive spring 2027, with Studio Series Age of Extinction Titan Class Dinobot Scorn following in fall — a 13.5-inch Spinosaurus. Alpha Bravo drew the warmest reaction: Matt is thrilled the character is continuing forward and wants another shot at Combiner Wars Rook in this style. Chris likes the continuation but finds the deco too plain next to the Combiner Wars original, which had full black upper arms and more contrast; Matt adds that the orange forearm missiles are gone because the transformation changed, replaced by large white stabilizer parts. Brian loves it anyway. Wild Rider being real leaves G2 Menasor one figure short, and Matt notes the hard part is convincing a retailer to carry a Commander Class to finish the set. IDW Nautica, coming with her wrench, was the panel’s other big hit — Matt calls her absolutely fantastic. Scorn split the room: Chris wants the original toy’s red, and Diecast finds the release colors boring, though Rob credits it with conveying rust and corrosion better than Victorion did. The Beast Wars Maximal Collection multipack collects Optimus Primal, Cheetor, Rhinox, Dinobot, Airazor, Tigatron, and Rattrap — which Rob points out is basically every good Kingdom mold except Cyclonus in one box. On the Monster Jam side, the transforming Grim Ripper remains the highlight, alongside Megalodon, El Toro Loco, and a non-transforming 1:64 die-cast four-pack of Optimus Prime, Megatron, Starscream, and Bumblebee. Source: TFW2005

Here Are All the SDCC 2026 Exclusives Coming Soon from Hasbro Pulse

Better in-hand looks arrived for the convention exclusives, including the Optimus Prime and Autobot Jazz cereal box two-pack and the Transformers × Jem and the Holograms Autobot Blaster set. Chris wants the Jem set specifically for the KP cassettes — Glit, Sundor, and Rosanna — representations collectors have wanted for a long time, and he worries the weirder concept piece will have a shorter run than the cereal box set with its broader appeal. Both go up on Hasbro Pulse around August 10 for Premium members, with everyone else a day behind if anything survives. Brian re-upped his Pulse Premium membership, noting the price has held at fifty dollars since the program launched, and that he buys enough across the year to justify it. Chris has different reasons for avoiding Pulse: customer service runs through Hasbro rather than the Pulse team, which makes defect returns far harder than at any ordinary retailer. Diecast’s objection is simpler — they take forever. Source: Bleeding Cool

Hasbro And Fathom Entertainment Reveal An All-New Chapter For The Transformers: The Movie

Hasbro and Fathom are bringing The Transformers: The Movie back to theaters in 4K for its 40th anniversary, and the release carries an all-new post-credits scene. Brian cares nothing about it. Rob, crediting a listener tip, reports that the UK leg of the Apology Tour teased a short called The Redemption of Optimus Prime, a few frames of which appear at the end of the event trailer. Matt believes the short and the post-credits scene are the same thing. The panel’s objection is twofold. First, the footage is entirely CG and makes no attempt to match the film’s animation. Rob is strict about appending existing animated work and has posted better and worse examples in the RFC Discord. Second, and worse, Rob suspects the short will try to reconcile Dark Awakening with Optimus Prime’s return — a continuity repair job he has no interest in. Matt’s summary is the segment’s best line: he floats out of one exploding ship into a non-exploding ship, and his face and arm grow back. Don then offers a theory the whole panel immediately adopts — the ship tears a hole in the universe, and the Optimus Prime who drifts through is a parallel-universe Optimus Prime. Chris draws the Star Wars Special Editions comparison: every pass added more, every pass made it worse, and what he wanted was the movie he watched at six. Brian is also cool on the Reformatted soundtrack and the SDCC celebration-of-life concert, and notes that the Knights of Unicron recordings turned up in his pinball machine because the original movie music could not be licensed for most of it. He would rather buy another copy of the original soundtrack with a random signature on it. Tickets go on sale August 7 with screenings beginning September 17. Source: TFW2005

Transformers Studio Series Deluxe Age Of Extinction Bumblebee In-Hand Images

The new Studio Series Age of Extinction Bumblebee gets an unusual transformation: the car body splits in half down the center line and unfolds, then the entire shell — everything but the grille — folds up into the legs, an approach Chris compares to the old Transformers Prime Vehicon. The result is an unusually clean robot mode for a Studio Series figure. It is also, in Brian’s word, boring. Diecast pinpoints why: there is no paint on the arms, midsection, or legs, and the figure needs far more yellow. Chris suggests it is an easy candidate for a customizer to grab five or six and up-detail for a TFcon table. Rob, who was comped the original Age of Extinction deluxe and reviewed it for Tformers, confirms the new one is more accurate — the original was built from concept art, as movie toys usually are, because production lead times outrun the film. His verdict: if Age of Extinction Bumblebee is your thing, and someone out there it must be, this is a better deluxe than the last one. Source: TFW2005

What We Got This Week

Diecast — Legacy United Animated Universe Motormaster, ordered from Walmart but shipped by The Toy Source, finally arrived. He fitted the DNA Design upgrade kit, which builds him out toward an Animated-style Menasor. He likes it.

Chris — The Breakaway soccer ball robot, found in a Walmart Transformers aisle with nothing else new on it, marked down to seven dollars. He stood there for five minutes trying to talk himself out of it and failed. He could not get it into ball mode by intuition; once he opened the badly printed instructions it went together easily. The verdict is brutal anyway. An entire contour plate has to be fully parts-formed because it attaches to the ball at one point and the robot at another. The included stand has no pegs to lock the ball down, so it just wobbles. The robot mode is mediocre at best. Somebody put real engineering hours into this and then stopped short of crossing the T’s. Chris is glad he only paid seven dollars and is insulted it ever sold for almost thirty. It does compress tightly — roughly the size of a large plum from a small deluxe robot mode — and he gives Don no grief at all for not getting it transformed.

Don — Mini Tobot figures, four in a pack for around forty-five dollars, after the full-size versions failed to justify their price. He got the shuttle, a futuristic police car, a monster truck, and a very Blurr-looking race car; the plastic quality is surprising for a budget line, though the promo photos show stickers that arrive unapplied. A Culture Fly Megatron statue with gun and flail, found at Ross for about a quarter of retail, headed for the statue shelf alongside his Super7 and Hard Hero pieces. The Reformatted soundtrack on CD, purchased probably to his regret, though a few tracks aren’t horrible. Age of the Primes Starscream, finally, after three delivery delays put it a month past release. His own Motormaster for $3.34 plus the DNA Design kit from Toy Dojo, which he’d skipped originally when Motormaster was still full Voyager price. Onslaught in his Bruticus frame is the standout — he loves the proportions and the size, had a little more trouble than Motormaster getting him into torso mode, and spent ten minutes fighting the pegs, but cannot wait for Swindle. He’d like paint on the outside of the arms, though he understands why it isn’t there. And Timelines Megatron as a boar with a flying-squirrel Bumblebee, still sealed — the transformation looks insane, but it works as a Megatron once you read the mythology behind the animals. Later in the segment he circles back to Blue Cop W, the most deluxe version of the character across all three seasons, which combines with the Blastion he showed a couple of weeks ago and carries a wolf-head Justice Blaster with a giant fist and built-in gun.

Matt — Matt had nothing in Transformers this week.

Rob — His first Metal Cardbot toy, which cost him $3.85 before any Donanomics. It came via Sembo Block, a Chinese competitor to Blokees whose last release was essentially a Gundam kit on runners in a bag. This one is the equivalent of a Blokees Defender class figure — a two-inch guy, the Blue Cop, with a card weapon that appears to be a big punchy glove. The tampograph work on something that small is good and the deco is nice. His summary: if you care about Metal Cardbot characters, they’re cheap, available on AliExpress, and not bad.

John — Onslaught, mentioned unopened last time and now open. The core robot mode is excellent with no complaints — sort of going for the animation model, but with enough gribbly detail to stay interesting and avoid the cartoon model’s worst habits. The one oddity is the lack of a handgun, which leaves him feeling naked. He also picked up Gold Rush, the 49ers helmet Transformer, as a 49ers fan — one and done on that mold. It’s a very typical collaboration mold, perfectly fine, transformation is fine, and it comes with a genuinely nifty in-scale football, probably a first for the brand. He’s impressed by the paint apps and detail on the 49ers color scheme; collaboration figures can go either way on budget and this one didn’t cheap out. Thumbs up if they make a team you’re even halfway interested in.

Brian — Another green G2 Slag for about fifteen dollars, continuing the running joke about buying up all the internet’s G2 Dinobots — the cheap ones are the ones missing accessories. Then a large Mandarake box, helped along by a weak yen even with the de minimis exemption ending. Inside: a couple of Super Artfires, a Super Ox, and a Super Counterarrow — the clear Mirage, rarer than the rest — from the lottery Super Spy Changers. The Takara Generations 2013 Ratbat, whose head was already tooled on the mold, which is why Scourge came first and this came much later. The Robot Masters Psycho Orb repaint of Armordillo, loose and missing its shield. An original Rattrap. A Takara Tigatron, whiter than the Hasbro version and just beautiful — the same deco Hasbro used for the reissue a few years back. Beast Wars II Bighorn, the Bonecrusher repaint. Mach Kick, a toy he may already own boxed but had never handled, and he was shocked to find soft goods on the tail and mane. Henkei Ramjet and Henkei Thrust — Dirge wasn’t in stock at Mandarake Grand Chaos. The original Beast Wars Quickstrike, sharp-looking, though Chris notes the only difference from the Metals release is painted eyes. Wild King W Rex Blade with Silver Tail, missed on pre-order and picked up through eBay — a flipping dinosaur car thing Brian calls amazing, and Wild King the best toy line going; he’s consolidating the whole line onto one shelf this weekend and has found a couple of repaints he’s missing. Last is Missing Link Ultra Magnus, the Takara Powered Convoy, ordered from TFSource because Pulse was never going to get it. Out of the box you can’t quite be fooled into thinking it’s the G1 toy, but transformed, with the joints kept honest, it looks like the G1 toy. Brian calls it the most gorgeous version of the character ever made and the centerpiece of his Missing Link shelf.

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