Look here, upon this picture, and on this,
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.

On the left, a glum, grumbly, gloomy, grouchy grouse: GEARS by name, a truck by game, one tasked with material transport and reconnaissance. He was released in 1984 along with the rest of the very first Autobots, though with less fanfare than most, I would be greatly surprised to hear anyone call him their favorite. He was the star of only one cartoon episode, "Changing Gears", wherein the Decepticons' fiendish plot relied upon altering Gears' disposition from rain to shine. He was the star of only one comic book (US issue #3) wherein he teamed up with Spider-Man to infiltrate Decepticon headquarters. (Though the web-slinger is the one featured on the cover, Gears was at least awarded the comic's upper-left corner box beside the masthead, a distinction usually reserved for Autobot leaders.) These distinctions may not amount to much, but compared to some of the later, lesser-known Transformers, Gears is practically royalty.

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Consider with me now our mutual friend, the pre-eminent Autobot scientist: PERCEPTOR. He's not just the only Transformer who turned into a working microscope with the ability to magnify objects by a factor of 14. He also appeared in 30 of the original 98 episodes of the cartoon, and he and Grimlock were the only Season Two Autobots to be grandfathered into the Season Three regular cast. In addition to being super-smart, he's brave, self-sacrificing, and not afraid to shoot back. So sit up and take notice of our updated box art for Perceptor. This image was edited by Nailbomb and scanned from the Japanese laserdiscs box sets.

And speaking of updating Perceptor... There have been two other "updates" of this character recently. One was his introduction as an infrequent supporting character in the greatly-missed Transformers: Animated series, the other was in the pages of the ongoing IDW comics. Let's compare.

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I know I'm in the minority here, but I like the twin toy versions of Ironhide (left) and Ratchet (right) better than the cartoon versions. As is always the case, the toys are the model for the (new) box art, as featured on either side of this paragraph. Respectively transforming and un-combining from a van/ambulance mode, both lanky robots stand atop their mobile platform of instruments and weaponry, their "faces" shielded by an immense window guard.

In other words, this:

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Look at this, look at this, we have two much-improved entries for Kup and Blurr, two members of the "Scooby Gang" that was the 1986 movie and third season of the cartoon. True blue good guys, these bots. Kup, the ancient and crusty war-horse, survivor of a thousand battles; Blurr, the fastest Autobot alive, good-natured motormouth and data courier. Both new edits were done by long-time friend Slim. Thanks again, man!

I've actually had Kup since I was a kid, but for the life of me I can't recall the circumstances by which I got him. In truth, the "grandpa" Autobot was not one of the ones I was begging for in my youth. However, the recent Transformers Spotlight: Kup comic was one of the best of the spotlight series. It's too bad they couldn't just leave him a deranged legend, rather than resurrecting him as a "cy-gar"-chomping joke.

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I love my Robot Heroes! Cute, happy, lovable Autobots and Decepticons, chasing each other around the playground with their little fusion cannons and flamethrowers. So adorable. As such I was really disappointed when several G1 characters slated for release were canceled in favor of movie characters instead. (Yet another reason to hate the Bay movies.) Fortunately, some enterprising individual managed to snag a few pre-production prototypes of these little guys and auction them on eBay. (It was big news.) My bank account was unable to afford the Prowl/Laserbeak pair, but I managed to score the Robot Heroes versions of Victory Saber and Deszaras!

The attention to detail and faithfulness to the original toys is really impressive, and since I haven't seen many photos of these little dudes, I decided to take some myself. Enjoy, internet people!

Victory Saber

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Her Majesty's favorite band, The Soundwaves !!!

From left to right: Electrostatic Soundwave with Ratbat keytar (TF: Animated); Robot Heroes Soundwave (top); my original G1 Soundwave (with Buzzsaw cassette); Soundwave with Laserbeak guitar (TF: Animated). Not pictured: Titanium Soundwave; dignity.

What I didn't mention in my recent "Ode to the Cassette" post was that I finally received my 2GB USB thumb drive Ravage. It is every bit as awesome as I had hoped. It's relatively sturdy, it transforms easily, the jaguar mode is very posable, and the design is slick. It even comes with a program you can install so that when you plug the USB drive into your machine, an animated Ravage stalks your desktop. They went the extra mile.

The absolute best part about this device is that the USB thumb drive is a perfect update to the original microcassette mode! It's the modern portable information storage device! Plus, unlike the original cassettes, this USB drive actually works. I've been using it to transport MP3's from home to work and back. As brilliant as the cassette/boombox idea was for the early 1980's Transformers, those "disguises" are no longer viable; in fact, a boombox or a microcassette would really stand out in 2009 as a technological anachronism. As if to drive home that point, when Hasbro recently released their re-imagined Hound/Ravage pairing, Hasbro apparently wanted to market Ravage's disguise as his "capture" mode, fearing that today's kids wouldn't know what the hell a "cassette" was. (The final packaging, however, consistently refers to Ravage's "tape mode".) In my "updated" G1 collection (of mostly Classics and Universe toys), this USB Ravage definitely replaces the "tape" one that came with Hound.

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What the hell is up with the dentist? I mean, who the hell wants to be a dentist. Frankly, I don't get it. Why would you want to stare at this all day?

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OK, this should be a straightforward post. Basically, just in case anyone reading this still thinks otherwise, I want to emphasize that American law is not based on the Ten Commandments. The fundamental root of American law is based on liberty, freedom and -- like most the world -- the golden rule of "do unto others as you would have done unto yourself". Not religion. Don't believe me? Let's look at the Ten Commandments:

"I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me." -- Well, it's certainly not a law in America that you have to believe in the Judeo-Christian god. You can believe in Zeus if you want.

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I love lists. I love them. I love itemization, quantification, prioritization. I love efficiency and thoroughness and accomplishment. I try to resist absent-mindedness, forgetfulness and especially slothfulness, and lists help me do that. Online lists of music recommendations compete with the stack of CDs on my desk; a small collection of to-watch DVDs are outgunned by my Netflix queue. To-read books are a foot thick, to-read comics as long as my arm. Emails that need attention are starred or labeled PRIORITY or both.

But it's my personal To-Do list that intimidates and exhilarates me. Historically I've maintained several lists in several places, presumably because I just jot down reminders on whatever's handy, electronic or otherwise. Now I'm trying to keep everything in my Google Tasks list, accessible on iGoogle, Google Calendar, and Chrome extension. Gawk in horror as I share some of these items with you. :)

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