PROJECT ELITE GUARD - WINGS OF HONOR (ONGOING)

It was around the middle of 2013 that my dad decided to pay my sister a visit in Adelaide, Australia during her university break. I took advantage of that time frame to see what I could hunt on eBay Australia for my dad to bring home. So happened, during that time, there we a couple of great, & I mean great deals! However, due to baggage space restriction I decided to settle on ordering 2 items. The first item was a loose but complete supreme class Constructicon Devastator from the Transformers ROTF line. The second item was a deal too sweet to miss. It was the 2009 Wings of Honor BotCon box set.

A few months thereafter, I started doing my own research on "Wings of Honor" (WoH) & found out that it was actually the term for this particular Autobot insignia. The emblem consists of an Autobot logo, followed by 3 red wings at the side. Soon, I discovered that this insignia was worn by the Transformers Elite Guards (EG). Not long after that, the addiction to hunt down the members of the Elite Guards bearing the WoH insignia kicked in.

To make things easier, this major project is being split into three smaller parts. First I'll be looking at Transformers Animated, then Wings Universe & finally other aligned universes (currently only Transformers Prime).


1.0 Transformers Animated

Theoretically speaking, the EG first appeared in the Transformers Animated series, a series that I was never fond of, no offense to my readers. I just didn't like the anime-styled designs as I prefer the figures to look more robotic. However, my findings showed that the EG timeline was later on expanded to the Wings Universe line & has also spilled over to the latest Transformers Prime series.

In the midst of all this research, I dug up some of my TF Animated toys that I have just to take a closer look. Much to my amazement, I saw the huge WoH insignia sticking out like a sore thumb from Ultra Magnus! In addition I also had the jet twins Jetstorm & Jetfire. They too had the WoH logo on! Since I already had some head start, I decided to hunt down the EG one by one, to find the robots bearing the WoH emblem. I reckon this would be a mid to long term project to complete depending on how good of a deal I can find for each of the WoH bots, so stay tuned.

2.0 Wings Universe

The Wings Universe series is a documentation of events that occurred loosely around the early G1 cartoon continuity. The comics were published by Fun Publications. In the comics, this special task force was originally founded by Magnum, a member of the Autobot High Council to be a special strike force within the Autobot army.

Having said so, the hunt started to get a little complicated. As I look through the list of the EG members, not all toys are currently available. Also, not all EG members that are available in the market bear the WoH insignia. Based on comic pictures from IDW Publishing & Fun Publications the search just expanded into a whole new world. Hence, this would have to be a long term bot-hunt for me to get hold of the pieces required.

Take a look at what I mean below:

With the help of another blogger, the names of all 31 Elite Guard members are as follows:

From the pictures, you can see that there are a handful of familiar faces. The entire EG crew is actually made of a combination of robots from various past series such as Action Masters, G1, Robot Masters, Universe, Fall of Cybertron, Victory, TFCC, BotCon & a few that have yet been ever produced.

I actually researched further & found that there are numerous EG teams. They are as follows:

Main Officers -
Big Bang, Sentinel Major

Alpha Team [BotCon WoH box set] - COMPLETE
Thunder Clash (leader), Flak, Kup, Landshark

201st division Strike Team - WIP
Metalhawk (leader), Dion, Iron Fist, Over-Run

Special Ops Team (Combaticons) [Universe & Fall of Cybertron]  - COMPLETE
Onslaught (leader), Blast Off, Brawl, Swindle, Vortex

45th division Stealth Team [Action Masters] - WIP
Powerflash (leader), Rumbler, Sprocket, Tap-Out

116th division Artillery Team [Figure's don't exist yet] -
Halonix Maximus, Windsail, Clear Out, Paddock

Fast Attack Team [Victory] -
Ranger, Blacker, Braver, Laster

349th division Recon Team - 
Crosscut, Delta Seeker, Rest-Q, Roadfire

If you're interested to find out more, you can also look out for this:

3.0 Other Aligned Universes

i. TF Prime-

In the cartoon series, both Smokescreen & Ultra Magnus are depicted as being members of the Elite Guard while they were still on Cybertron. Smokescreen is seen with the WoH insignia on the shoulder (ep. 44) while Ultra Magnus reflects on the past military ways back in Cybertron as an EG (ep. 61).


I would like to share this ongoing project of mine with my readers as part of the fun in collecting them. In order to limit & simplify my current project, I have narrowed my search down to a few criteria:

i.    Complete the Transformers Animated EG line
ii.   Collect the other toys from various lines with the WoH insignia
iii.  Attempt to collect all the other 31 bots from the EG poster above

I'm assuming that not many people are keen on the Transformers Animated line. Hence I should be able to find some of the WoH easily. There are still plenty of Animated Sentinel Primes, Blurr & Jazz lying around in the market, so I'll keep these aside for now & hunt for the harder ones first. My main concern for now would be Animated EG Prowl & OP. TFCC's Dion was not in my list back then due to the rarity & price of the figure.

Here is the current status of the project:

Aug '13: 

AM-26 Arms Micron Smokescreen

Animated EG Bumblebee (Picked it up at dirt cheap price)

Animated TA-01 EG Optimus Prime (Going on clearance price at BBTS)

Sept '13:

Beast Hunter Smokescreen (VHTF alternate mold, found it at the airport! In the near future I plan to get the WoH decals from Reprolabels to revamp this figure)

Oct '13: 

TFCC Dion & Mini-Con Cop-Tur (Going at a great deal on eBay)
TA-05 Animated EG Prowl (By luck, I stumbled upon this at a local store. I calmly asked for a discount & the guy agreed. Double jackpot!)
Striked a deal with an old time seller for the following 2 items:
TA-30 Animated Blurr
TA-14 Animated Decepticon Shockwave

Nov '13:
Action Masters Over-Run (Loose but complete, minor restoration needed)
Animated Roadbuster Ultra Magnus (Going on clearance)

 

With that, stay tuned for future updates on this project. There will come a day where I will be able to snap a group picture of all my Elite Guards together!

GOLD BUMBLEBEE

Today let's take a look at Gold Bumblebee from Reveal The Shield (RTS) series.

This is a legend class figure & instead of the usual bright yellow, Bumblebee comes in dark gold.

The transformation process is too easy & here we have a close up of the face.

There is only six point of articulation & this was part of a set of other legend class (RTS) series that I purchased.

This toy would go well with large diorama bases such as the all new Metroplex, or compliment older base series such as Micromasters.

OCT 2013 SPOOKY HAUL-OWEEN

Let's see what we have here for the month of October. Hmm, now wasn't I suppose to have cut down on my hauling this final quarter? 

 

At the beginning of the month, it appeared that there was a restock on TG-20 Ratbat. I intend to cut down on my hauls by avoiding deluxe class figures for now, but since Ratbat was a limited run item, I though it would be a good to watch the price go up in the future.

Then, the long awaited limited edition Linkin Park Soundwave finally arrived in October. Initially a friend & myself were waiting for our stock from Singapore. Since it arrived on home ground first we decided to pick the stock up locally, hence the 3 boxes.

Another item that arrived in October was Masterpiece Prowl. Since most of us have already seen the molds of upcoming Sreak (Silverstreak) & Smokescreen, I decided long ago that I would only go for Prowl & Smokescreen. To me, Silverstreak is just like MP-10 Masterpiece Lambor, they're just made up of solid colour.

A couple of dudes started posting some pictures of the latest Custom Kreons on Facebook. Apparently, they were being sold in some of the Tesco hyper marts. Boy did I hunt for them high & low. It was a pity that I couldn't find them. What's great is that the full set of 6 Custom Kreons were seen shortly thereafter in Toys R Us! The funny thing however, was I didn't have my Toys R Us Star card with me that day & I wanted to convert some of my existing points for vouchers. So I told the staff to reserve the items for me & that I would come a couple of days later to pick them up.  

Somewhere around the middle of the month, Isetan had a Japanese fair & not many people knew about it yet. I read on a Facebook thread that there were a couple of good offers going on. At first, I headed over to the Bandar Utama outlet, but couldn't find anything. The deals were only available at the main Isetan outlet in KLCC. When I made my way there, I was surprised at some of the great deals that were on offer. Since I didn't want to overspend, I only picked up a few items. I settle for the Platinum Series Year of the Snake Optimus Prime that was going for over 50% off, Arms Micron Stunt Wildwider for the unique 'elephant shaped' Arms Micron & Arms Micron Final Battle Megatron for the Dark Energon Saber combination.

One evening while doing grocery shopping with my wife in Tesco, I stumbled upon the full FOC Ruination set. I was hesitating intially, but then I casually took 1 out of the 5 to the nearest bar-code scanner. The scanner showed that it was going for 30% off. What else can I say right?

My sister's coming back from Adelaide for a short break sometime in November so I had to make use of the opportunity. I found a good deal for a G1 Action Masters Over-Run on eBay Australia. It needs to be fixed & has some minor paint chip, but I know what I want to do with it.

The TFCC Timelines Dion that I ordered last month finally arrived.

Met a fellow collector for a drink last month & decided to check on some stuff at one of the toy shops. To my surprise I found an Animated Prowl (white edition) which was becoming more rare, something I must have.

I've been hunting for some Transformers Animated & found Blurr & Shockwave being sold by an old supplier of mine. I negotiated for a lower price since this line is dwindling away & not many people are after these anymore. 

Towards the end of the month, the G1 Megazarak (KO Version) finally reached our shores. You don't really need to think twice to purchase these things. The first time I saw the actual thing was back in September when I was in Beijing. To date, I have to say that this figure is a great replica of the original one that I have. The only setback is that it comes with a missing piece. I've spoken with the toy store owner to request the said parts from the supplier. We'll just have to see what he can do for me.

Finally, on the last day of October I managed to pick up the 3 Kreon Micro Changers Wave 2 (Defensor, Abominus, Piranacon) that was going on sale.

Well that sums up how I ended up with all these hauls for the month of October.

ARCEE WITH ARMS MICRON ARC

Today, let's take a look at Arcee, from the Arms Micron (TF Prime) line.

Next to Arcee, is First Edition Arcee from the Transformers Prime line. Both of these figures look very identical, however their transformation style & end result is slightly different.

This is Arcee up close.

  

This robot looks very sleek & aerodynamic in robot mode. The mold is in proportion & the rear wings aren't heavy at all. There are two pegs at the rear of both wings for you to attach more Arms Micron onto.

Here we have Arcee with Arms Micron Arc.

 
In weapon mode, Arc comes in the shape of a blade.

Arc's alternate mode is of course a miniature robot.

   

Lastly, here we have a sample of Arcee with a bunch of additional Arms Micron weapons. The figure is very sleek & lightweight. Besides, the joints are not obstructed & this gives Arcee ample movement.