As most of you would know by now, I have a weekly radio show.The Big DJ Trev Show airs every Thursday night from 6 to 9pm on krrfm.org.au
Well Community Capers –the Rylstone-Kandos district newsletter – asked if they could write a short piece about me in my role as a ‘local radio personality’ for their publication. And what a callous sod would I be to disappoint my adoring fans, so I readily agreed.
Enjoy the short article from Community Capers (Octoboer issue 2021, Volume 274), which talks about my Transformatoriumalmost as much as it talks about my show!
I’ve always thought Tracks was a very underrated character. Despite getting a couple of spotlight episodes in season 2 of the Generation One cartoon, he’s never really done a lot otherwise. Has never been a stand-out in any of the comics and, with the exception of a cameo in Animated, has never cropped up in any other Transformer universes. Very odd considering how interesting he is; a vain, posh speaking narcissist yet still a warrior who took has taken on the likes of Megatron and Starscream. Add to that he had a very sexy alt-mode that could also become a flying car! His toy was my absolute favorite out of the 84/85 cars and I still love it to this day.
Tracks being underrated has been reflected in the amount of figures he has gotten over the years – maybe because it’s hard to get more uses out of a figure that has a flying-automobile mode. We haven’t had a Generations version since Reveal the Shield many, many years ago so he was well overdue.
Well Tracks has finally gotten another figure, in the Kingdom toyline, so let’s look at Deluxe Tracks.
Robot Mode
‘Indeed I am still most slim and pristine’
Probably the most show accurate Tracks figure we have had outside of the Masterpiece version. He looks good with his signature red face & white helmet, backpack guns and slim form. He certainly looks an improvement over the RTS version, though comparing the two you can see how much Hasbro has shrunken the Deluxe Class over the last decade. He has decent articulation and overall is a good representation of the character.
Vehicle Mode
Very nice looking, though getting everything to stay tabbed together can be very irritating. I would have liked to see some yellow in his hood flame rather than simply red like the cartoon. He lacks that certain sexiness that the G1 and Masterpiece toys have and the flashiness of the RTS toy. His weapons can be mounted on the back or the sides of the vehicle.
Flying Car Mode
Here is where the toy stands out – looks really good! The little tailfins that pop up are a nice addition, though it would have been good to have them and the guns slightly different shades of white so they don’t blend together so much. Cerainly better than the awful RTS version and even the MP version to my mind, coming in 2nd only to the original G1 toy itself.
Transformation
What a friggin pain in the arse this is! There have been QC issues reported with his legs and it is very evident here. Whilst you can transform him without making the necessary fixes, its very annoying to do and takes all the fun out of the conversion process.
Worth Getting?
This is a good rendition of Tracks, but it is not a stand out. As yet, for me at any rate, they have not made a Tracks toy that is able to pull off all 3 modes as well as the original. Whilst some of his modes are better than others, the whole toy is pulled down by the fiddly and annoying transformation sequence. Recommended only if you are not happy with your current Tracks figures.
Jerky – oh that sweet chewy bounty of the heavens!
Real jerky is awesome! Dehydrated meat, usually beef, cut into strips and flavoured to perfection. Unfortunately most people have not tried proper jerky. All they have tried is that awful rubbery crap you get in little packets at servo’s and bottle shops.
Well that jerky is the same to real jerky as powdered mashed potatoes is to real potatoes – a horrible aberration, a pale shade of what the good stuff really is.
When living in Melbourne there was a deli at the Vic Markets that did really good beef jerky and whenever I traveled to the big city I would buy up as much as possible. But now living in NSW, Melbourne is a long way away, especially during the pandemic.
So I’ve been learning to make my own – and I’ve gotten damn good at it! And because, like Rarity, I am the paragon of generosity I’m going to share that recipe with you now.
Ingredients
1.5kg slab of Beef
1/3 cup of Soy Sauce
1/3 cup of Worcestershire Sauce
1 tbsp of Minced Garlic
1 tbsp of Brown Sugar
1 tsp of Chilli Flakes
1 tsp of Smoked Paprika
½ tsp of Ground Black Pepper
Method
Trim all the fat from the beef, stick in the freezer for two hours
Easier to carve when slightly frozen
Remove beef from freezer, slice into strips 0.5cm thick
If too thick meat wont dehydrate inside properly
In a bowl mix the Soy Sauce, Worcestershire Sauce , Garlic, Brown Sugar, Chilli Flakes, Smoked Paprika and Black Pepper.
Ohhh that delicious smell!
Massage meat strips thoroughly through the mix. Cover with cling wrap and marinate overnight
Meat should have absorbed the mixture
Take marinated beef strips, put in food dehydrator set on high for 9 hours. If you don’t own a food dehydrator either go buy one (they are worth it!) or else stick in the oven on low for 6 hours.
Space evenlyRotate racks if meat is not drying evenly
And now you have jerky! EAT!
So damn good!
And that’s it – simple as! Follow Big Angry Trev’s Jerky Recipe and you will get brilliant meat every time!
As the years progress, we are getting more and more obscure characters from Generation 1 turn up in the Transformers Generations toyline. Characters such as Greenlight and Lifeline who were non-speaking background femmebot characters from single episodes, Zetar & Chromar who were mail-away figures from 1984 that never showed up in any media, and even characters like Scrounge who appeared in a single comic 30 years previously only to die.
Well today we are looking at character/s, who while certainly not obscure, has never really been characters. And they’ve gotten their first transforming toy in a big way! So let’s look at, from the Kingdom line, the Titan-Class Autobot Ark with Teletraan-1.
The Ark
Ship Mode
Perhaps the most recognisable ship in all of Transformers lore, The Ark has been in everything from multiple different comics to multiple different cartoon series to video games. It’s the legendary ship that first transported the Autobots from Cybertron to Earth. And it’s been lovingly recreated here. It’s very big and bulky as befits a ship that is meant to be able to carry 300 Autobots across the galaxy. The details on it are beautiful, if somewhat plain due to the overriding orange colour scheme.
Time for take off!
The Ark comes with different play features such as an opening loading ramp and fold down landing gear. You are able to open up the front to put the tiny Optimus Prime that comes with the figure onto the bridge, which you can then see by looking through the front window.
It is covered in gun ports but sadly none of these are able to rotate. Also disappointing is the lack of paint apps on the ship. It certainly would have helped to break up the orange to have the windows in the observation tower at the back painted blue and for there to be more colour on the internal bridge. However these minor detractions aside, this is truly the ship we all know and love.
Robot Mode
I must admit I would have much preferred the Ark to be able to open up and become an interactive play set, much like the DOTM Ark, than turn into a robot. Don’t get me wrong, the robot/transformation gimmick is cool, and it has been explained in the Kingdom Cartoon, but it still seems odd. However this is a very nice looking Titan-class toy with good articulation, though no individually articulated fingers and the ratchet joints in the shoulders and arms really grind.
Some detractors from the robot mode are the once-again plain orange and grey colour scheme and the fact the gun ports can’t rotate. Since there are some located on each forearm it would have been great to be able to rotate them so as to blast his enemies instead of his own elbow joint. He scales very nicely with Titan-Class Omega Supreme, and one could imagine in fiction that in size they would be on par with each other.
‘Us giant Spaceship bots got ta stick together!’
Teletraan-1
Computer Mode
Teletraan-1 – the famous computer of The Ark, who was consulted episode after episode in the first two seasons of the G1 cartoon. Like The Ark, Teletraan has shown up in various media over the years but as a computer rather than a character.
The figure starts off life as the bridge of The Ark (with a BIG cube of kibble underneath) but can be removed in both modes.
Transformation to the Teletraan-1 computer is basically folding out of panels to make a hollow display, but it looks the business and is infinitely cool. Makes for a lot of play value with your Deluxe-class Autobot figures.
Perceptor goes to look up Femmebot pics, totally unaware that Teletraan is now Mainframe in disguise
It also comes with some very well-known accessories, such as Sky Spy which was the probe used by The Ark and controlled by Teletraan back in the G1 cartoon, and the Golden Disks that make up a hefty portion of the plot in the Beast Wars and Kingdom cartoons.
Yeeesssss
Mainframe
This…. is an interesting choice. The original Mainframe was a non-transforming G1 Action Master character whose bio described him as ‘a walking talking computer terminal’ rather than a regular Transformer. So making him the robot mode of Teletraan-1 is a kinda cool concept. However the two have always been distinct entities to each other so making them one and the same doesn’t really seem to sit right canonically. Still, it’s a nice enough robot mode, though like The Ark itself suffers from being one big blob of orange when it comes to the colour scheme, and he comes with no weapon.
I bulked up
Worth Getting?
For the spaceship mode of The Ark and the computer mode of Teletraan-1 one I’d have to say yes. These are by far the best representations of these iconic mainstays of the franchise we have ever had. The robot modes add some play value too and of course make the Transformer toys actually transform. However the uninspiring colour scheme and the lack of rotating turrets prevent this figure from being a must have. Personally, I’d recommend grabbing as long as you can find it as a reasonable price and have room on your shelf.
Got something to say about this Titan-Class toy? Pop it in the comments section below!
