Tag Archives: Cog

#3430: Zeo Cog

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

ZEO COG

POWER RANGERS: LIGHTNING COLLECTION (HASBRO)

Every iteration of Power Rangers gets its own set of faceless mooks for the teens with aititude to beat up. Well, okay, Morphin had a few different ones, what’ with it actually being a few different shows. But the others tend to narrow in on just one. Zeo had the Rangers facing off against the Machine Empire, whose particular brand of mooks were the Cogs.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

The Zeo Cog was released in Series 11 of Hasbro’s Power Rangers: Lightning Collection. The Cogs were initially added to the line as a Pulse-exclusive two-pack, before this slightly modified version was put out on his own. The figure stands just over 6 1/4 inches tall and he has 34 points of articulation. The Cog is built on the line’s generic spandex-clad body, with a new head, forearms, and boots, as well as an add-on piece for his belt. I find the head sculpt on this one particulariy impressive; it captures the signature elements of the show design, but cleans: them up just a bit, for that “the way you remember it looking” feel. The rest of the body is a bit more by the numbers, but generally works alright. He’s technically missing a pair of discs at the shoulders and elbows, but those are likely a symptom of the re-used body. The color work on this guy goes for the silver style of Cog, which is usually the one to get the marketing push. The silver is actually a semi-transparent plastic, which makes for a rather fun look. The painted elements are pretty ceanly handled, so he generally looks prestty sharp. The cog is packed with two sets of hands (gripping and a fist/open gesture combo), a staff in long and short configurations, and an alternate head with the face plate raised. Additinaly, the Cog gets two extra pieces that arent actualey for him: Zeo Blue’s tonfas! Since Rocky was the first Zeo Ranger, he was the only one not to get his power weapons, which was a definite bummer. So, Hasbro rounded out the team’s weapons via this release, which is honestly not the worst way to handle it. At least they didn’t make people buy Zeo Blue again.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I almost jumped on this figure right away when he was released, but I realized it was largely just for the tonfas, which is a hard justification, for buying a full priced figure. So, I held off, and, through a wacky set of circumstances that I can’t fully detail here, I got an incredibly good deal on one. He’s fun. Not as fun as the Rangers but still fun.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#2076: Cog

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

COG

TRANSFORMERS WAR FOR CYBERTRON: SIEGE (HASBRO)

Siege‘s (admittedly lax) gimmick of cross compatible pieces from one figure to the next is best manifested in the line’s “Weaponizer” figures, who are figures designed to be broken down and used to augment the other figures in the line.  I took a look at the second Weaponizer, Six-Gun, back at the beginning of May, and I’ll be following up with the third, Brunt, soon enough, but in-between the two I’m playing a catch-up and looking at the first of the Weaponizers, Cog!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Cog was another piece of the first deluxe assortment of Siege, and is the second to last figure contained therein.  The original Cog was included as an accessory with the large-scale Fortress Maximus figure, but he was absent from Fort Max’s update in 2016.  This one is designed to make up for that.  In his robot mode, Cog stands 5 1/2 inches tall and he has 20 points of articulation.  Cog’s original bot-mode was certainly more refined than Six-Gun’s, meaning that there’s a little bit less reworking necessary to make him into a standalone figure.  So, he’s a more straightforward recreation of the vintage figure.  Like Six-Gun, Cog is more robotic and inhuman than you tend to see for an Autobot, which is certainly a different set-up.  I was a little bit disappointed to find out how much of Cog’s construction was hollowed out, especially when compared to the other Deluxes I’ve looked at from this assortment.  It’s mostly confined to the back of the figure, so it’s not terrible, but I guess after Six-Gun, I just wasn’t expecting it to be that expansive.  The original Cog’s transformation split him into two different vehicles, Grommet and Gasket, and this update follows suit, although it also gives the two separate vehicles one combined form as an option.  As with Six-Gun the transformation is a fair bit different from your average Transformer conversion.  It’s more a reconfiguration, which counts on the figure being disassembled and put back together in a brand new form.  Additionally, in that disassembling, you have the option to use Cog to weaponize his fellow Autobots.  While I didn’t fall in love with any of Cog’s configurations the same way I did Six-Gun’s giant fighting fist, there are still a lot of fun layouts to mess with, and his color scheme pairs well with both Optimus and Ultra Magnus.  Generally, though, I find Cog works best in figure mode.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Like Hound, Cog is a figure that I passed on a number of times, and didn’t really know I wanted until he was gone.  But, just like Hound, Cog was traded into All Time loose, as part of the same collection, in fact.  Mostly, I picked him up because I had Six-Gun and was already planning to pick up Brunt, so I sort of wanted the full set.  He’s okay, but I don’t like him as much as I thought I would.  He’s still cool, but he’s the weakest Siege figure I’ve picked up to date.