Pushed around by paperwork

I fully intended to sit down and convert all of my Alternator figures from vehicle to robot mode this weekend, then get them onto the shelves. However, after pulling all the vehicles out and setting them on the table, I realized that I probably needed the instructions for some of them. That led me to the cardboard box full of instruction manuals, and from there I ended up spending close to an hour sorting all of them out into their respective toylines/series.

By the time I finished sorting through them, I was running out of time for the evening. My wife and I are still working on the exterior of the house, and evenings and early mornings are the only times we can work without a heat advisory making it dangerous this time of the year. So rather than start the Transformation process for a bunch of fairly complex figures, I went the opposite direction. I opened up and displayed some of the simplest figures I own:


The Mighty Muggs Transformers figures are an artistic rendering of some of the more popular figures in the shows and movies. They don't transform into anything. They're just short, vinyl figures, all the same shape (with minor variations like Bumblebee's horns) with paint used to make them look like their toy counterparts. They've been out in stores for a year or more now, but at least half of them had never been removed from their packaging until yesterday. I've been collecting them because they remind me of my own Cuboyd Transformers customs. I don't think there are any plans for new Mighty Muggs Transformers figures at this point, though. So, this particular collection may be complete already. (NOTE: From this point forward, I'll be adding clickable images with a red border for photos that have larger versions you can preview.)

I did finally open up my last two Starscream toys from their boxes, to complete their lineup on my top shelf. I had the Leader class movie figure and the Alternity figure still waiting for display until the past weekend. It isn't a complete representation of all the figures ever released, but it's a pretty good grouping of them.


Since the latest "Hunt for the Decepticons" and "Generations" toy lines have started hitting stores, I've been picking up more new figures. I'm still trying to limit myself to just those that look interesting, since I still have hundreds of other figures that still need my attention... but there are quite a few interesting figures in this series, so I'm sure I'll be adding quite a few in the next month. I also finally have my hands on the Japanese Takara/Tomy release of Blaster as a fully-functional USB hub! This guy was announced over a year ago, got canceled, then re-scheduled and finally released.


So the original figure (on the left) turned into a ghetto blaster. The USB hub turns into a laptop computer that works as a real USB hub. You can see the ports on the robot's legs in the photo above. What I think is the coolest part is the fact that any of the old cassette figures that fit in the original Blaster will also fit in the chest compartment of the new figure! I've also confirmed that the new figure can hold the original Blaster's rifle just fine. It looks huge, but the holes in the fists are identical sizes.

So, that's the collection status as of now. The Alternators will definitely be next, then we'll see what else presents itself from the tubs.