Transformation 324: Action Stations.

26/7/2018

This week, what's the brand new cool toy all the kids want? Action Master Grimlock of course!

Plus the secret identities of HiQ and Mutant Master revealed in my look at STILL LIFE PART 2!

Also, if you're going to TFNation and want to pick up either of the books for Transformation for £10 each, signed!, let me know in the comments.

10 Comments

Tim Roll-Pickering link

27/7/2018 11:10:49 pm

I think that final page is the only time in the series that the Action Masters' inability to transform is even mentioned. Given how much story is an important part of the toy appeal and the western market hadn't yet gone in for figure representations, I doubt Hasbro could have made the Action Masters work without explanation (although Takara might have had more success in Japan). Furman's gone on record as hating the concept, resisting it as much as possible, hoping it would have gone by the time he brought back Prime and of course he took the opportunity with Marvel UK to undo the effect even before this issue was published (having a transforming Grimlock re-released this year must have helped).

The Action Master impact here in the UK was odd. If memory serves they weren't the focus of the toyline (which still seemed to be the Classics rereleases), I don't think they had any adverts in the comic (my recollection is that of the new toys it was mainly the Micromasters and then Overlord who got all the ads), and many of the characters had had the original toys rereleased one way or another through the Classics and Woolworths suddenly releasing Constructions and Mini-Autobots. And of course the toyline carried on here. So the Action Masters never had all the same problems here as in the US and were mainly a curiosity plus a chance to get some characters who hadn't been reissued or even ever released here (hello Shockwave).

And Combat Colin is going all epic. I wonder just how much notice Lew Stringer got that things would be ending?

Ryan F

28/7/2018 06:35:54 pm

Hi Tim,

You are quite correct about the lack of Action Master ads!

Of the 1990 range, only the Micromaster Combiners (10 ads, between issues 270 and 299) and Classic Heroes (28 ads, between issues 258 and 332) were advertised within the comic. Overlord wasn’t advertised, but he was obviously showcased in the competition in issue 328 (incidentally, the final competition that the comic ever ran).

Jon Talpur

31/7/2018 05:52:50 pm

I also recall the Action Masters not being quite as prominent in the UK as some of the other figures released in 1990-1991. That being said, they must still have been slightly been more popular over here than in the US since we received a second year's worth of figures the US never saw (including Tracks, Bombshell, etc.). Even then, I was never able to find the Action Master Elites at retail. The larger gold-boxed and carded Classics were far more prominent, at least in my area.

The G1-carded Constructicons and Mini-Autobots that followed on as Woolworths exclusives were from the late 80s/early 90s Chinese run and were imported in by Hasbro UK in 1991/1992. A little later, in 1994/1995, I heard that The Jolly Giant chain of stores was receiving other figures from that Chinese run, such as the Autobot Cassettes and various 1987 Headmasters, but my local branch had closed by then so I never saw any of those.

I do still wonder if the continued presence of some of these older characters on UK shelves, through the backdoor, was a factor in Marvel UK continuing Transformers as a series of specials up to 1994 before the Generation 2 branding kicked in?

Tim Roll-Pickering link

31/7/2018 08:39:43 pm

The current opinion seems to be that the Action Master Elites weren't released in the UK. Action Masters had more prominence on the continent - I remember them being the focus of a huge display in a southern French hypermarket in the summer of 1991.

As the Marvel UK specials, I suspect they still had the licence, they had the inventory and the specials still sold well enough or perhaps the terms of the licence still required a minimal shelf presence. Maybe they were selling to the between generation buying the toys in those years or maybe they were selling to readers of the regular comic from whom it never ends?

Simon Tilley

22/10/2019 05:39:25 pm

I had never really linked together the Constructicons and mini-autobots with the last surge for the UK comic and never considered any alignment with marketing, but makes perfect sense.

I still have some of the boxes and figures from those Woolworths hauls and they seemed to be USA figures with a Pawtucket shipping address on them, I figured at the time (wrongly so) that Woolies had an American presence and simply shipped over excess old stock.

Given how the Constructicons, Predacons, Fort Max, Trypticon and Shockwave were never permitted to be sold in the UK it had a very criminal and wrong feel to be buying them, as though I alone was in the know and the police could swoop anytime to stop these US figures from being sold to us undeserving Brits.

Add to the fact that with die hard fans like me, the Constructicons were easily my favourite earlier childhood toys (probably due to not being sold here) so created a lovely nostalgia feel even to an 11 year old as I imagine it did for others, as well as being a product other parents would buy not knowing how dated they were.

Reading this blog has been a fascinating tale of rethinking the final few years of the comic and just how much fight was put in to keeping it alive when in today's market, a toyline comic would struggle to last half the time Transformers managed.

Chris Chapman

27/7/2018 11:24:49 pm

And yet... and yet... Furman may have been reluctant to advertise the Action Master concept, but I'd argue that the whole Grimlock/nucleon/new body arc is one of the most inventive, satisfying ways a new TF toy has ever been introduced. Furman takes it all with a pinch of salt and really hones in on the drama he can extract - and just walks away from all the other stuff. For me, it's the perfect approach to the eternal Hasbro obligation!

John D. link

31/7/2018 01:21:14 pm

I am struggling to remember any Action Master ads. I think "poseable figures" would have been a hard sell for kids back then. Furman deserves a lot of credit for the way he laid foundations and introduce the concept. As a concept, I think it was rubbish. It would have been nice to have figures with kibble removed, or finally own for example Shockwave or a Jazz who looked a lot more like the animation model, but who wants Transformers who can't transform! I only saw a few Action Masters in John Menzies, I think TF toys were well on their way out by then and hard to find. Does Overlord explain why Fort Max was made really big (and is a much bigger toy than Scorponok)? I am still really confused by the Galen/Spike/Cerebros thing, somebody must have been writing the Headmasters mini-series without having all the details..

Ryan F

31/7/2018 02:07:26 pm

I wouldn’t read too much into the lack of Action Master ads. They did get TV spots, and besides, there are many other sub-groups who didn’t get ads in the UK comic (Constructicons, Throttlebots, Seacons etc).

At this point, the Transformers line was dying on its feet in the US, being beaten by more traditional non-transforming lines like TMNT, Simpsons and Batman. The Action Masters were an attempt to put TF firmly within the trad “action figure” market, because the transforming ones definitely weren’t selling!!!

Galen was planned all along as a ‘stopgap’ head, a means by which Fort Max could get a proper Headmaster origin on Nebulos and yet still end up with Spike as his partner on Earth.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

31/7/2018 08:48:49 pm

None of those groups were central core parts of the toyline, instead they were each a single team (and in the case of the Constructions they may not have been released here in the mid 1980s). Plus they got some advertising in the strips fairly early on. By contrast the Action Masters were a major part of the US 1990 line - I think it was just them and the Micromasters - and so would normally have got a bigger boost.

Uraael

31/7/2018 09:47:58 pm

I've always loved Grimlock's metamorphosis in this issue. Furman handles it beautifully and Wildman doesn't disappoint. I've always loved that version of Grimlock's head best, too. The angled mouthpiece suits him so much.

Shame about the colouring error! I'm glad Hachette used a corrected version when they did Volume 19.

Transformation 324: Action Stations.

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