Titans Return Scourge

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Titans Return Scourge

Scourge hasn't had a lot of luck with updates to his character. The first was the 2006 Titanium in a not terribly well liked line. The second, the 2011 Generations Deluxe, doesn't look too much like his robot, has a new more Earth like vehicle mode and didn't get a general UK release but was grey imported in mid 2011. His brother Cyclonus has done rather better with the much admired 2009 Universe 2 version, it's 2011 Reveal The Shield repaint and 2015 Generations Voyager all making it to the UK.

Both Scourge & Cyclonus were available in 1987 as Targetmasters and while the Universe 2 Cyclonus maintains that gimmick here Scourge finds himself as a Titanmaster, effectively a Headmaster. His Titanmaster is Fracas, the same name used for his 1987 Targetmaster. Moulded throughout in blue plastic he transforms & has similar articulation to all the other Titanmasters. Like Blurr's Titanmaster Hyperfire when in head mode he has a little extendable piece on top, this time shaped like the tube seen on top of the rear of Scourge's original vehicle mode and his head.

The robot itself is quite rounded, with effectively ball like shoulders and looks a decent interpretation of the look Scourge has in the 1986 movie. A certain proportion of his spaceship mode is on his back, as it's always been, which as usual provides the hint of him wearing a robotic cloak. Articulation is good: ball jointed head, provided by the Titanmaster, shoulders that shrug, stiffly, up at the body & are ball jointed at the arm, bicep swivels, bending elbows, universal hips, thigh swivels and bending knee. He comes armed with two guns, a short single barrelled one, little more than a detailed pipe, and a larger double barrelled one, which contains a seat for a Titanmaster in front of which is a peg hole so the guns can be combined into a triple barrelled weapon. The two barrels on the dual cannon both end in a 3mm peg hole which lets you plug Cyberverse weapons into it.

Transformation: pop the Titanmaster head off and unfold it into robot mode. Remove all weapons, fold the hands into the forearms and straighten the arms at the sides. Shrug the shoulders up and lock the arms onto the body courtesy of a tab on the body fitting a slot beneath the bicep joint. Now we get something a little innovative: pull down on the legs, revealing the spine. Fold the feet & heel spurs together so they point down out the bottom of the leg, Open the doors on the leg fronts, folding them round onto the inside of each leg. Rotate the legs round 180° via a waist joint on the spine, previously locked off inside the body. Rotate each leg in 90° at the thigh joint. Bend each hip joint up 180°, bringing the upper legs alongside the extended spine, and at the same time fold the knees down 180°covering the legs up and forming the front of the spaceship. Fold the "cape" panels down to the sides tabbing into the shoulders & what was the rear of the leg. By default the Titanmaster sits in the cockpit at the rear of the vehicle, the small gun mounts on the cockpit and the large double gun mounts in front of the cockpit but, as we'll see, all three are up for negotiation!

Scourge's vehicle mode is his classic Spaceship/Hovercraft/Soapdish design with a few extra fins and details on it. It's a pretty good update of the original design done in blue and pale blue. The illusion is only really broken when you turn the vehicle over and you see the folded back leg doors and exposed robot chest. But even then the leg doors have moulding on them for guns while the shape resembles landing gear.

One of the real joys of this mode is the ability to customise it's look. Both the dual cannon and smaller gun mount on 5mm peg holes so they can be swapped round or even combined onto the same post. There's two 5mm peg holes on each side of the vehicles which can also take the weapons. The Titanmaster is tucked away at the moment inside the cockpit but can be seated outside the vehicle on dual cannon. Finally if you look at the 5mm socket on top of the cockpit you'll see it's a slightly odd shape, square at the front. This enables you to plug the Titanmaster in head mode into the top of the Spaceship just like cartoon Scourge extending his head in spaceship mode.

I'm quite taken with Scourge: both modes are fun, and the interchangeability & combination of weapons & Titanmaster add significantly to it's play value.