Phil's
Cybertron Clocker & Swerve,
Galaxy Force Skids,
Movie Clocker
and
Botcon Cheetor & Tigatron
Review

Clocker

Clocker was originally available as the Galaxy Force toy GC-12: Skids, and it was this version I initially reviewed.

He's a basic sized sports car with a Speedia chip (Cybertron key# s129). Insert the chip in the back and up from the sides pop 2 fins. You can fold gun barrels out from these to form a car mounted weapon. He's got a nice clear windscreen and silvered exhaust pipes running down the side which resemble G1 Hotrod's. In fact if you thought of Hotrod with an open roof that wouldn't be too far away from what you've got here.

To transform open the underside of the back to fold the legs out - think Predator Stalker. Completely unnecessary on a toy this size. Pull the front of the car back over the top, flip the arms out from the side. Fold the head down and peg into the chest.

Simple basic with knee, ball jointed hips, WAIST - a rarity this year !, ball jointed shoulders, elbow and neck. The weapon from the rear of the car can be held in the hand ala Nitro Convoy. The exhaust pipes from the sides of the car can be held as weapons. Sadly the colour scheme lets it down again - the pale blue, orange and pearl clashes, and the huge unadorned area of pearl chest doesn't help.

OK, but really nothing special.

Swerve

Clocker's had a new paint job and boy does it make a difference, the toy has gone from being a train wreck of a colour scheme to something that looks like it works !The toy has basically swapped grey plastic for pale blue, a lovely red for the orange and a sunglasses tint for the clear blue. Spray Ops are similar - aside from his new Silver Autobot symbol on the bonnet and the silver paint applied to his exhausts. So you're looking at something that is vaguely Sideswipeish/vaguely Hot Rod without the flames - in fact change the bonnet detail, paint the robot chest right & make the weapons pack yellow and you'd be nearly there. Red Sportscars work well for TFs and this is no exception. If you get one of the Cybertron versions of this mould get this one. The only mild nag is the eyes have lost the lightpipe. The key is now numbered s12r.

Clocker

Clocker is a wave 3 Sector 7 Movie basic repaint exclusive to Target in the USA and released through Woolworths in the UK.

The first version - Clocker/GF Skids - is a truly horrendous colour scheme disguising what is quite a nice toy - I mention the fold out panels to pass the legs through is obscene detail on a basic toy.

Waves 2 & 3 came back in stock at my local Woolworths after their initial release so I picked a Clocker up as the paint scheme had been bugging me since I first saw it and I couldn't work out why..... The dark blue and black of the car mode made for a very dark repaint but there was just something about them that reminded me of something. Then it hit me - Clocker has G1 Skid's colour scheme ! See http://www.tfu.info/1985/Autobot/Skids/skids.htm Since Clocker was originally Skids in Japan this makes a very nice little in joke by the designers. TFing the car adds a little grey into the mix - maybe keeping that blue as well would be nice - and sadly the lightpipe eyes are painted over. The Speed Planet key - like the windows is cast in a rather fetching almost clear black.

Nice repaint. Like it.

Cheetor

Clocker returns at Botcon 2006. The theme that year was Cybertron vehicle versions of Beast Wars characters so he repainted in the colours used by Beast Wars Cheetor and given a new head resembling Cheetor. It's not the worst repaint on the planet - almost entirely moulded in yellow with blue paint and a clear blue windscreen. The sports car mode suits the character's personality too.

It won't take a genius to figure out what happened next ....

Tigatron

.... as the mould is instantly repainted in white with green paint and a grey windscreen as Tigatron. While I can see the theory - Tigatron = repaint of Cheetor therefore* pre BW Tigatron = repaint of pre BW Cheetor - I'm not sure it's worked so well in practice.

* anyone know how to do a therefore symbol in html ?

Though I am surprised they didn't go the whole hog and do an all black version as a pre BW Shadow Panther !

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