Tag Archives: My Little Pony

Ask Trev: Would you collect anything besides Transformers?

This question comes from master filmographer Pieter:

If The Transformers never existed do you think you would you have become a die hard collector of anything else like perhaps Robotech, Star Wars/Trek etc?

I’m going to have to give a big YES to that, though I’m sure never to the extent I have Transformers.  I’ve collected various other things over the course of my life, and if I didn’t have Transformers I think my collections of them would be a lot bigger than they are.  Given how much I spend per month on Transformers, the rest of my nerdy passions don’t get much of a look in.

 

Mid 90’s: Home Improvement Merchandise

Remember the 90’s sitcom Home Improvement?  Back in the day I LOVED that show!  Maybe it was because from 1987 onwards I lived away from my father, who had tried to be a good Dad in his way, but was 50 when I was born and already suffering from Paranoid Schizophrenia and Manic Depression.  Thus he wasn’t a father who was overtly loving or would play catch with me at the park.  So watching a TV Dad who openly loved, played and did activities with his sons, as well as being funny, perhaps was a substitute for something my own life was missing.

During the 90’s I wasn’t collecting Transformers as I wasn’t a big fan of Beast Wars, so for a while I collected Home Improvement merchandise.  This included everything from collector cards, posters, jumpers, t-shirts, socks and even a board game.

 

Mid 90’s:/2000’s: The Tick

I love The Tick!  He is by far and away my very favourite super hero and has been since the cartoon came out in the 90’s.  I don’t have a great deal of The Tick merchandise, but truthfully in part that’s because there isn’t that much out there, as super heroes go he is on the obscure side.

 

Late 90’s: X-Men Comics

I used to collect X-Men comics in the late 90’s.  Sadly when I moved in with a girl I gave a ton to a mate to hang onto who subsequently lost them, and now only have the special edition ones I kept for myself.

 

Early 2000’s: Men’s G-Strings

Wow – the ‘Censored’ sign somehow makes this photo look way worse than it actually is, you’d see worse at any swimming pool (maybe).

Hold up!  This isn’t as pervy as it sounds! And they were all mine, not someone else’s!

When backpacking around Europe in my mid 20’s I had to lug all the clothing I had in my backpack and didn’t get to wash clothes that often.  And two or 3 thongs would take up the same amount of space in my swag as one pair of boxer shorts would.  So by wearing mens g-strings I could triple the amount of underwear I had before I had to find a laundromat in whatever country I happened to be in – now that’s just good common sense for a world traveller.  As I traversed Europe I would occasionally pick up a new one at places like a fancy men’s underwear store in Florence.

When I arrived back in Australia I found I had accrued quite a few.  The oldest have been tossed now.  Back then I was young and very fit, these days it would look like wrapping a rubber band round the bottom of a pear.  Ah but back in the day, it was amazing how many bar patrons across Europe would buy drinks all night for a Mad Aussie dancing round in a blokes thong – a great money saver!

 

90’s/2000’s: Star Trek

Yes, VHS Tapes. Yes, I am that old.

I’ve seen most everything made in both franchises, though admit to being far more of a Trekkie than a Star Wars fan.  I bought nearly every Star Trek book written by Shatner, but never collected Star Trek merchandise in a huge way.  Back in the 90’s I collected the ‘Star Trek Fact Files’ that came out each week for $5 and could be put into associated binders.  Considering that there were a bit over 200 issues I guess that was a thousand bucks over 4 years which was a decent bit of cash.  Sadly I had them stored in a shed and mice got into them so they are pretty wrecked now.

Star Trek V: Kirk vs God

 

2000’s: Anime Statuettes

They’re from Japan – that makes them cultural instead of pervy.

For a while about 15 years ago I collected Anime Statuettes from some of my favourite Japanese cartoons and ended up with maybe a couple dozen.  However parenthood changes ones perspective, and given the… ahem… proportions of many anime girls, they didn’t seem appropriate to have on display anymore, so I stopped collecting and those I had got packed away and have spent a decade in a box in the storage shed.  I might get around to selling them off one day as I don’t think I’ll really ever want to display them again.

 

2010’s: My Little Pony

When I was the househusband and not working for 6 months when we first moved to NSW I used to watch My Little Pony with my young daughter each morning, and found it to be very entertaining and something we could share!  So both she and I started collecting MLP figures, myself specializing in Rarity figures since I found her hilarious!

Movie Review – My Little Pony

However the cartoon came to an end and she got older and lost all interest.  She actually donated her MLP toys to me and I was a bit sad to see something we had enjoyed together cast aside.  I kept a bunch of the Rarity ones, the rest went to goodwill as the joy for me came from collecting them with my daughter and sharing the hobby rather than the figures themselves.

Pictorial Toys Review – My Little Prime & Plasmane

Now my daughter is into Lilo & Stitch and I do try to share the hobby with her as best I can, but for my money the Ponies were more fun.

Video – Stitch: Toys and Facts with Acacia!

 

80’s/90’s/2000’s: Ghostbusters

‘Who ya gonna call? A middle-aged man cosplaying!’

If I didn’t collect Transformers, I think this would be mainly what I would collect now.  I adore Ghostbusters, it is definitely my No.2 pop culture love.  I’ve got a full uniform (gets busted out once a year to take my kids Trick’or’Treating), a few toys, DVD’s, video games, a board game etc.

Though nothing will ever equal the the first two movies for me, I love that the franchise is still kicking strong today.

Ghostbusters Movies: All 5 ranked from Worst to Best!

 

Hooray for Crossovers!

Two times the fun, wrapped up and rolled into one!

So while I may not be able to afford to collect much outside of Transformers, luckily there are Transformer Crossovers!  Between comics and toys Transformers has crossed over with the likes of Star Wars, Star Trek, Jurassic Park, Avengers, X-Men, Mr. Potato Head, Ghostbusters, Street Fighter, Back to the Future, Terminator….  heck, even Angry Birds!  

So these crossovers have enabled me to dip my toe into other sci-fi genre’s without having to compromise my Transformers budget.

Toys Review – Street Fighter Transformers

Toy Review – Ectotron

So yep Pieter, I would definitely still collect something.  And maybe its in the blood because my son also collects Transformers and my daughter collects Stuffed Animals & Stich merchandise.  But would I have a Ghostbustertorium Shed or MyLittlePony Stable?  Probably not.  Transformers have been producing toys for the last 40 years and never so much as in the past 20, and with dozens of different cartoons and movies, hundreds of different characters and thousands upon thousands of different toys, I don’t know how many other passions could have offered so much variety – it’s a lot of fun!  But there will always be one small cabinet in the corner of The Transformatorium for those little extra’s from my other nerdy loves.

Thank you Pieter for your question.

If you would like to see some of Pieter’s great work, check out the short film he did about my Transformatorium! 

Video: The Transformatorium: EXTENDED CUT

Do you collect something interesting?  Why not tell us about it in the comments section below!

Pictorial Toys Review – My Little Prime & Plasmane

What a wonderful time to be a toy collector eh?  Figures we only used to dream of in our geekiest fantasies are being trotted out right left and center!  A lot of that can be put down to people who loved things in their youth during the 80’s now being (supposedly) grown-ups with disposable income on their hands.

 

Well My Little Pony is happy to jump on that cash-in bandwagon with a new line of Crossover collectible figures.  These range from Dungeons and Dragons to even Power Rangers.  But today we are going to look at by far the two best of the crossover figures, because they cross over with two of the best franchises in history – Ghostbusters and Transformers.

As the only feature of these toys, besides their cool looks and packaging (I love the fact that on the boxes it says ‘approved by Optimus Prime and Peter Venkman respectively), is the fact you can move their tails, there is not really much to review here.  So enjoy the photo’s and hopefully they will help you decide if you would like these awesome figures for your collection.

 

My Little Prime

 

 

 

Plasmane

 

Friendship is Magic!

 

So do you think you will pick up these figures?  Do you love the nostalgia or would prefer the takes be more modern?  Let us know in the comments below.

 

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Crossover Toy Review – Ectotron

Movie Review – My Little Pony

Can the Transformers fandom just chill out a bit?

Living in the bush I don’t get to see other Transformer fans very often.  I don’t get to pop over to a mate’s house to see his latest acquisitions.  I don’t attend meets, I don’t go to pop culture conventions, hell I don’t even get to visit toy stores.  So when it comes to talking to others about a shared hobby I have to rely almost solely on the internet.

But the way a large segment of the fandom has been going in the last few years, I find myself thinking more often than not why I bother.

The default expression of an online Transformers fan

I don’t know when this all started.  Maybe it was the live action Transformer movies.  Most people seemed to like, or at least tolerate, the first movie in 2007.  Those raising very vocal hatred for it being largely groups of GeeWunners who wanted it to look like the 1984 cartoon.

But then Revenge of the Fallen came out and a massive amount of the fandom started bitching, and it seems they have never stopped.  It’s been  years since a Transformers movie directed by Michael Bay (The Last Knight) has been released, and you still can’t surf a Transformers site without there being negative comments and memes threaded throughout screaming about how people hated them and it ‘raped their childhood’.  Now in 2024, it’s the same arguments and complaints about the new Transformers One trailer: “Why isn’t this part of the G1 cartoon universe?!  It’s a kick in the teeth to all the fans who carried the franchise for 40 years – Habro owes us!”  Fans treating it as a personal insult that an animated movie designed to sell children’s toys isn’t aimed soley at middle-aged men – the sense of entitlement is staggering.

‘I was created not for entertainment, but to piss off fans. Didn’t you know that?’

And it seems this negativity of the fandom has spread from the movies to encompass any and everything Transformers.  Be it comics, cartoons, toys – whatever.  If it’s toys it’s all nitpicking about release times, non screen accurate figures and online retailers.  If it’s the cartoons then it’s that the cartoon isn’t specifically aimed at demographic X – and if it IS aimed at demographic X then demographic Y kicks up a fuss.

When it’s about the comics people seem to get the most vocal of all (at least in years where a new movie hasn’t been released).  Pre the reboot at IDW it was all about the writers having an agenda and virtue signalling and what have you.  Now it’s about crossovers.  The amount of hatred on the internet about the My Little Pony crossover coming up has been frankly disgusting. Anyone who isn’t hating on the idea getting accused of being a homosexual or engaging in bestiality.  Grown men – grown men – talking about how they despise My Little Pony.  Why any grown man without a daughter has watched enough episodes to form such a strong opinion on a cartoon aimed at little girls is beyond me – but they must have watched it because they all seem to be experts on it and hate it.  Even one of the artists that did one of the front covers for the upcoming crossover comics has received enough abuse to comment about it publicly.  People abusing someone for doing their job and daring to draw a fictional horse on the same page as a fictional robot – way to make the fandom look good fellas.

‘You are destroying my franchise and deserve to die…. apparently’

Now bear in mind I don’t have a problem with people who have a genuine complaint.  If you’ve bought a figure that snapped the moment you tried to transform it, despite you being gentle and following the instructions precisely, then damn right you are valid in being pissed off about it.  Complain away and you will find a sympathetic ear in me.  You got ripped off by an ebay seller and your TR Trypticon turns out to be a pack of beach towels – yell to high heaven!  Preach brother!  And if you didn’t like a comic or cartoon or movie or toy, then I’ll happily read your opinion if you keep it civil, logical, factual and state your opinion once.

Like Insecticons, angry posts like to clone themselves over and over and over

But it’s the constant bitching I can’t hack anymore.  The people who didn’t like a movie and then years later are still writing post after post about how they hated it.  People talking about how much a toy or movie sucks before they have even been  released yet, like their opinion on something they have yet to personally experience makes it fact.  People acting like so-called experts when they know little more than someone who has just entered a toyshop for the first time.

And the bitching about nothing!  Sexuality in Transformers?  Seriously?  That is what brings people to boiling point?  People lost their shit when the first wrist-rest mouse pads were released, like the manufactures had made booby pads based on their mothers instead of fictional shape-shifting alien robots.  People scream abuse at each other over whether it is valid for Transformers to feel romantic affection for each other since they don’t breed.  Is such a thing really worth calling a stranger a ‘f**king c**t’ over?

‘Why does our love cause you such hate?’

So it’s sad to say I’m feeling pretty done right now.  I’m sick of clicking on a link or a FB post or a thread on a fansite to find out about some of the latest Transformer news and being confronted with a wall of vitriolic shit.  I’m sick of saying I like something and having a dozen people call me an idiot or a faggot or worse for daring to have an opinion different to theirs.  Sick of clicking to see if a toy is available only to see the people that got their toys and the people that didn’t, who ordered from the same online retailer, tearing each other a new one.

I know this kind of behaviour is not solely related to the Transformers fandom, it certainly happened in the Ghostbusters fandom with Frozen Empire.  Some days it seems it’s the whole internet in general.  Maybe I’m too old for the digital world.  Whenever I converse online I try to think about, if I said this to a bloke in the pub, would it earn me a punch in the face?  Because that was the reality I grew up with, with no internet and texting being easily accessible until I was in my 20’s. When you said something to someone you were saying it to their face.  But now we have people who have done nearly all of their socialization their whole lives online, and have grown up in a world where you can say whatever hateful shit you like to someone because chances are that person is on the other side of the planet and you will never have to face consequences for your actions.   Yes, the internet is getting too angry for even Big Angry Trev.

‘Can’t we all just peace out?’

Now people who live in GlassGas houses shouldn’t throw Cyberstones, and there are undoubtedly people out there that I have gotten into heated online arguments with over the years over very silly issues.  So I am guilty too.  But I pride myself that each year I get into less online fights, get into less pointless arguments and get better at cyber-walking away.  I’m not perfect but I’m getting better.  And maybe that it a goal we could all aim for – to improve our skill of walking away from the keyboard or smartphone when the blood begins to boil, and go play with our Technobots for a while.

So when I go home tonight, I won’t be surfing the big Transformer sites.  I’m going to try my best to practice what I’m preaching and be a chilled out fan.  I’m going to open up a bunch of new figures I just got and play with them with my son, as a reminder to myself that this hobby should be positive, should be fun, and in the end is about plastic toy robots.

 

Hey!  If you are a positive person who loves talking about all the things they LIKE about Transformers? Why not restore my faith and write something happy in the comments below!

 

Related Article:

Hard Times for Aussie Collectors

Big Angry Trev visits Hasbro Australia!

On Monday, myself and 14 other lucky fellows were treated to a behind the scenes look at the offices of Hasbro Australia, located in Sydney.  Organized by the operator of Ozformers, this was for a hands-on experience with the newest Transformers toyline: Power of the Primes.

My Graceland!

After a short wait, myself and my compatriots were ushered up to the fourth floor of the Hasbro offices where a space had been prepared.  Scattered around various parts of the room were examples of some of the great Transformer products that have come out of recent.

 

Of course there was one other major Hasbro product on show and that was My Little Pony.  Whilst this was largely ignored by the Transfans I couldn’t help but have a good look.  I loved the huge Pinkie Pie – if it had been Rarity I would have forgotten the TF’s altogether and tried to work out a way to smuggle her out of the building for me to ride whenever I saw fit (sounds kinda dirty I know but Rarity – I loves ya!).

 

 

Power of the Primes

Of course the main point of the day was to give fans a hands-on experience with the new toyline.  This consisted mainly of Wave 1 which has been released in the USA already and is due out in Australia within the next few months.  Whilst this is all the same toyline, it can be broken into different groups.

The Dinobots

Something that has all the fans excited is that for most of the Dinobot characters this is their first Generations treatment.  On display was the latest (of many) Grimlock‘s as well as Slug and Swoop.  Also on display was the newest addition to the classic Dinobot team – a female raptor named Slash.

POTP Slug meets G1 Slag

Of course, without Sludge and Snarl we couldn’t see the fully combined form of the Dinobot gestalt but I will say that what we could put together did look a lot better than what I had seen in photos to date.

 

The Original 13 & Pretenders

Now I’ll admit – I was not a fan of the Pretenders from G1, not particularly liking organic modes.  But many of these characters have been brought back and in a bizarre twist, has been combined with the characters from TF lore which constitute the first 13 Primes.  The classic Pretender shell characters are used to ensconse the mini-Primes within.  Rather odd, but I know when they hit the shelves I wont be able to resist.

Apparently Landmine & Alpha Trion were the same dude

 

The Primes

A rather interesting concept that has been done here is with Optimus Prime and Rodimus Prime.  Not only do both transform from Truck/Cybertronic Winnebago to robot, but you can remove a smaller robot which transforms into their pre-evolved forms – Orion Pax and Hot Rod.  I  really dig this concept and both toys looked great!  Both also came with a Matrix of Leadership.

The evolution of a hot head

 

And the others…

There were several other figures on show from the new line.  These included Beachcomber, Windcharger and a Dreadwind which is based on an older Combiner Wars figure.  The Ozformer owner was also kind enough to bring a couple of figures that were US exclusives that not many Aussies would have touched – Arcee and Grotusque.

 

So overall it was a very interesting hands-on experience and behind-the-scenes look at Hasbro.  I’d like to thank Hasbro for the opportunity – I’m sure my fellow 14 fans had as much fun as I did!  And to top it off, in the raffle at the end I scored a The Last Knight Hot Rod to take home!

Free toy!

 

Got anything to say about this visit to Hasbro?  Would love to read it in the comments section below!

 

Movie Review – My Little Pony

My Little Pony, much like its boyish counterpart – The Transformers, has a generations spanning popularity.  Despite the 5 to 12 age range on the boxes, just as Transformers is not just for little boys, My Little Pony is not just for little girls.  And now, like The Transformers, My Little Pony has hit the big screen!

My daughters wall

Now let me start off by saying I know waaaay more about MLP than any self-respecting 40 year old male should.  As the househusband I watch it with my two kids when it comes on TV at 8.30am every morning after their mother goes to work. In fact I probably know almost every episode from Season 4 onwards off by heart!    Whilst my daughter loves Fluttershy and my son and wife both love Pinkie Pie, I’m most definitely a Rarity man, whom I find really sexy amusing, especially when she throws a drama queen fit.  I also really like DJ Pon3 for some reason, she is just so cool!  The cartoon itself is really well done, it’s thoroughly amusing on many levels and I defy anyone to watch the 100th episode special from season 5 and not crack up laughing!  Fantastic battle scenes, great music, an interesting and ever expanding cast – in fact I can confidently say it’s probably one of the best kids cartoons out there today.  As such I was hoping for a lot from the movie when I took my family to see it …

 

But it looked so cheerful!

… but sadly it did not deliver.

Don’t get me wrong – it’s certainly not a bad movie.  But if you are familiar with the cartoon this feels like they have watered it down for the movie rather than beefing it up.  A good way would be to compare them to ice cream.  The cartoon is triple-raspberry swirl with rainbow sprinkles – delicious and exciting!  The movie is a bowl of vanilla – certainly nice enough and you may even want a second helping but you aren’t going to rave about it to your friends.

The storyline is very formulaic, but given the target audience for this flick that is forgivable.  All the ponies are gathered for a giant party being organised by the heroine of the show Twilight Sparkle, when the bad guys turn up, capture the other 3 Princesses of Equestria and enslave the Pony race. Cue Twilight and her friends escaping, meeting new comrades in their search for help, then returning to defeat the big bad, turn an enemy into a friend (cause Friendship is Magic dontcha know) and bring freedom back to the land.  I think even most young kids, whom this movie is primarily aimed at, could predict what would happen next in a very by-the-numbers plot.

 

Sadly, everything that happens feels like a sanitized version of the cartoon, designed to have the broadest appeal by ‘playing it safe’ .  The one argument between friends (Twilight finally after all these years gets a gutful of Pinkie Pie) is very short and undramatic, as opposed to some of the larger Rarity & Applejack spats from television.  Likewise the music, which should be a major highlight in a movie like this, lacks punch and is not particularly catchy.  The 2014 Equestria Girls Rainbow Rocks has far superior music that sticks in the head and keeps you humming for days.  The animation, which given the world the storyline is set in had the potential to dazzle, suffers from bland backgrounds, though these are necessitated by the storyline sending the ponies through deserts and other sparse locals.  Tempest Shadow is a pretty cool bad guy with her sparking broken horn and is rounded out fairly well on the whole.  However her boss, The Storm King, is a predictable character who is frankly neither scary or amusing, despite the writers trying to portray him as both.

 

There is not much character development here.  Given the cartoon is in its seventh season perhaps it was felt there is not much more for the 7 stars of the show to grow into.  It would have been nice for the girls to at least use their different abilities in significant ways to aid the plot.  Rarity’s entire contribution consists of performing a 2 second fix on a coat, earning them a friend in a roguish cat which in turn ends up giving Spike his only interesting thing to do in the movie – being used by said cat as a flamethrower.  Rainbow Dash awakens the buccaneering spirit of some air pirates, but her signature sonic-rainboom does nothing but give their position away to the bad guys.  Applejack and Fluttershy sadly bring nothing at all to the plot and in fact the movie could have easily been done without them.  None of the characters really engage in the kind of humorous banter that makes the cartoon so funny and don’t really bounce off each other, mainly they just react to events and – in the case of Fluttershy at least – look scared.

(my t-shirt) Should have just let these two handle the problem

The two stars of the movie from the regular cast are Pinkie Pie and Twilight SparklePinkie serves as the anchor of the group, being too silly-headed to have her spirit brought low by the various precarious predicaments. Meanwhile Twilight allows herself to lose hope but in the end, predictably, uses the spirit of Friendship to win Tempest Shadow over the side of good and defeat The Storm King.

 

So is this movie worth watching?  Well again, it’s like a bowl of vanilla ice cream.  You will enjoy it but you will soon forget you consumed it afterwards.  I laughed out loud a couple of times but sadly my two young kids never did.  Given the price of a movie ticket these days you can easily wait for this to be released on DVD and in the meantime get your MLP on with the brilliant cartoon instead.

One day Rarity my sweet, one day we will be together!

This movie gets 3 out of 5 party cannons.

 

 

Got something to say about this movie?  Would love to read it in the comments section below!

 

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