Megatron is a recreation of the G2 tank Megatron, and as such it's the first Classics toy not to be from G1. It makes sense as a deluxe sized Gun Megs wouldn't be holdable. The design is broadly similar to the previous versions with the front of the tank forming the chest, the sides of the turret the arms and the back of the tank the legs. Most of the visible tank armour is green, with some a sort of sandy olive. I've tried to resist the urge to say "This should have been Combat hero Megatron in green" but I'm afraid I can't. It needs to be made !
Let's get the action feature out the way first as it's by far the worst thing about this toy - the right arm ends in a stub and attached to the side is an attachment with the gun barrel at one end and a fold out claw in the other. There's a clear red button on the arm - if you extend the arm in front of him and crank the button the attachment spins round. Truly awful. Ending the arm in a hand and making the tank barrel/turret centre a clip on/holdable weapon would have made for a much better toy. This apart the figure isn't bad at all - lots of moulded detail in the toy makes it aesthetically different to G2 Megs while being similar. Since G2 Megs was a big plastic toy with lots of smooth panels I can cope with this here. The articulation is excellent - similar to Prime's - with bendable ankles and knees, swivel below the hips, ball jointed hips, a waist, shoulders that move backwards & forwards and swing to the sides, bicep, elbow on the lest arm and neck. The ankles enable you to get some superb walking poses out of the toy. I've read some stuff online about Megs having his feet on backwards - I can see the point the people are making but I'm not sure they're right. The feet look fine in robot mode, just a little odd when TFing to tank. The head is noticeably Megatron - no real complaints there unlike Prime - and he's gifted with bright red lightpipe eyes. The hand gun is interesting - vaguely resembling previous G2 Megs guns this one features a fold out stock - a first for a TF toy ?
The TF is reasonably simple - remove the gun, clip the legs together, fold feet & heel spur together and bend back. Bend the waist back so the legs are the rear of the tank. Bend both arms back 90 degrees, and rotate the left at the bicep so the hole in the armour is facing down. On the other arm fold so the crank faces down, the gun barrel point backwards along the tank and the claw is folded over the top of the base of the gun barrel. Fold both arms up onto the other shoulder and peg into place both on the tank and together. Fold down the gun stock, peg into the turret and rotate the turret to face forwards - this has been previously limited by the shoulders clipping into the sides of the tank.
Tank mode isn't bad - it's a tank - but it's a tank with the benefit of a raising and lowering gun barrel and a rotating turret beating several other TF tanks. I mentioned previously the feet stick out the back a bit - we'll have a go at fixing this later I think. One brief dismantle and reassembly later....... yes it is possible to fix the feet: There's 2 screws in each leg that need to come out. The legs then need to be separated in 2 as much as possible - on one of my legs the kneecap was glued together but I had enough space down the bottom to lever the foot off. The feet need to be swapped to the other leg and turned round - they aren't the same shape on each side and the inner edge of the old foot won't go along the outer side - so you'll need both legs unscrewed at once. Huge improvement in tank mode - yes the gun turret will still turn the full way even though it looks like it will catch on the newly raised back - the larger pieces recess into the tank body and the smaller pieces sit on top of them. In robot mode the feet are now the heel spurs and vice versa so this gives the robot higher boots at the front. I'm indifferent to the improvement here but the changes to the tank mode make it worth doing.
Overall - not bad. Eliminate the gimmick and replace with another hand and a removable cannon and there'd be few complaints I think. Possibly a Bludgeon repaint to be had here ?
To the great surprise of many Optimus Prime and Megatron did later show up as individually carded items in TRU UK nearly a year after the Classics line ended !