The title says it all! The long awaited Netflix series that I first reported here is finally upon us.

The first chapter is Siege. It’s made up of 6 episodes, at 22 min each. How quickly will I watch through this? Possibly one day. I’m really gonna savor this experience, so maybe I’ll stretch it to two. If I can control myself.

Go watch it now!!! Transform and Roll Out!
 

So I finally watched this movie. And I’ll get straight to it: I was entertained, but this is not a good movie by any stretch of the imagination.

I watched Transformers the Last Knight with several others. We probably had more fun making fun of the movie than really trying to follow what’s going on. The Last Knight is filled with humorous and ridiculous sequences. One example is a scene where Cade Yeager had to jump off a building and onto some TFR automatons as if they’re platforms, like if he was playing Frogger or Pitfall. The Last Knight is the least successful of the 5 films, financially speaking. That’s no surprise. I watched the first 4 movies in the theater, but passed on this one. We rented the movie from iTunes, but only because we had free credits. So technically we spent no money on LK (not counting some figures I bought).

The Last Knight is going for a Arthurian knight motif. That’s obvious by looking at the trailers. Both Prime and Megs look more like knights in this one, and personally I think it’s kinda silly. Mark Wahlberg returns from the previous installment. Josh Duhamel, John Turturro, and Stanley Tucci come back for more as well (though Tucci as a different character). Anthony Hopkins joins the cast. Why someone of his caliber wants to lend his talents to this hot mess of a movie is beyond me. Tyrese wanted to come back, but he obviously wanted to spend his time in a superior franchise (FF8). Early reports were that Megan Fox would be back, but I’m guessing people got confused since Laura Haddock looks so similar in some early leaked shots. Good thing Peter Cullen and Frank Welker are both back as Prime and Megs.

LK is full of your usual Michael Bay movie mayhem. Big explosions, check. Bad editing that jumps for scene A to F to M, check. Immature, racist, and juvenile dialogue, check. Robots that all look the same, check. Uber male objectification of women, check. Plot that you can’t follow, check. And even if you could follow it you see that it makes no sense, check.

But believe it or not, I don’t think LK is the worst film in the franchise. Here’s how I rate the 5, from best to worst:

• Transformers
• Transformers: Dark of the Moon
• Transformers: The Last Knight
• Transformers: Age of Extinction
• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

As for the toys, LK is below average when compared to other movies. As of this writing I have bought 6 figures total from LK, and I feel like I have enough to rate the line as a whole. Here’s how I rate them, from best to worst:

• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
• Transformers: Dark of the Moon
• Transformers
• Transformers: The Last Knight
• Transformers: Age of Extinction

Both Michael Bay and Mark Wahlberg have said they are not coming back for more. I suppose that’s the good news in all of this. Bay must be sick of this franchise after 5 outings. Personally I feel like he never really cared for what Transformers represents to long-time fans that have supported it all these years through thick and thin. After the first movie, Bay has so thoroughly twisted the Transformers mythos that anything moving forward bear only a shallow semblance to the original source material. I actually like Mark Wahlberg as an actor, but I think he’s got better things to do. Wahlberg has complained about this franchise after LK hit theaters, including that he doesn’t like his haircut in part 5. I agree. Time for a new leading man.

It will be interesting to see how things wrap up in part 6, which is already confirmed for Summer 2019. I’m curious how the movie would feel without Bay’s influence. But before this, a Bumblebee spin off is slated for late 2018. I’m not sure where or when the story would take place in the TF Movie-verse. Hailee Steinfeld is confirmed to be in the movie.

I hope the Bumblebee movie will be better. New blood will be good for the franchise. Transform and Roll Out.
 

Michael Bay blow stuff up crapfest #5 will soon be upon us. The teaser trailer was released yesterday. Check it out.

I dunno. I have been excited and jaded by the past 3 movies. This article sums up how I feel. Still, that one shot of Unicron has me all giddy like I’m 12 again. Maybe… just maybe… this will be good. But in the end this movie will suck. And I will have paid to watch it in the theaters.

Every TF movie thus far has had an older white guy in a position of authority. Jon Voight in the original movie. Rainn Wilson in Revenge of the Fallen. John Malkovich in Dark of the Moon. Kelsey Grammer in Age of Extinction. And now we have Anthony Hopkins in The Last Knight??!! What’s with this weird trend? I do give credit to Michael Bay for attracting some big Hollywood talent. And it also looks like Megan Fox begged her way back to Bay’s good graces. I guess that’s not news considering she was in TMNT.

Let’s hope we at least get some good toys for TF5. Transform and Roll Out.

Halloween is upon us yet again! I can’t believe it has been two years already since my last Halloween post. Time sure flies when… well, it just flies. No matter what you’re doing.

As per tradition here at TFMatrix, I assemble my orange TFs for a pic with my stuffed pumpkin.

I try to use the orange TFs that I haven’t used before. There has actually been quite a few orange figs acquired in the last two years, a lot of them in 2016. Clockwise from top left:

• Combiner Wars Wheelie
• Combiner Wars Wreck-Gar
• Titans Return Sentinel Prime
• Mastermind Creations Tigris (Rampage)
• Robots in Disguise Drift
• Thrilling 30 Jhiaxus
• Titans Return Stripes
• Combiner Wars Huffer

There are probably a few more orange figures that got left out of the group shot. Smart readers will notice that I included Tigris (Rampage), but left out Talon and Bovis (Divebomb and Tantrum). I really wanted to include the rest of the orange Feralcons (Predacons), but I only had Tigris handy. I will include them in the next Halloween special.

Also of note is that all the deluxe or larger figs in the pic are using twin weapons, one in each hand.

Here are links to previous Halloween posts.
Cybertronian Halloween 2014
Cybertronian Halloween 2012 (scroll down to last pic)

Have a safe and happy Halloween! Transform and Roll Out!

It is that time again my friends! Halloween is upon us. Do Tranformers celebrate Halloween? Probably not, since they can transcan and transform, it’s like everyday is Halloween.

Here is another pic where I take my orange plush pumpkin with some orange Transformers.

Click here for the 2012 version. Scroll to the bottom for the pic.

Honestly, there just ain’t that many orange TFs. I tried to find some other than ones I already used in 2012. What you see in the pic is all I can come up with: Generations Scoop, Generations Sandstorm, G1 Wideload, and Prime Voyager Predaking. Some of these are even questionable as orange. Sandstorm is actually mostly yellow, but with enough orange bits. Predaking is probably about half orange and half black.

And of course I gotta mention that the San Francisco Giants is once again world champs! The Angry Bird plush with the Giants cap is to help celebrate that fact. In the last 5 years, Giants win the whole thing every time on the even number years. So are they gonna be champs again in 2016? And it’s always so fitting they win it around Halloween. The Orange and Black is oh so fitting!

Happy Halloween! Transform and Roll Out!

Continuing with the tradition of this blog, I will still document what I am buying each month. I am now back-posting what I bought per month since the start of 2014.

• Mastermind Creations Fortis, tfsource.com, $89.99

• Generations Thrilling 30 Dreading, Target, $17.99

• FansProject Diesel, tfsource.com, $119.95

I have opened all of these. Fortis (not Headstrong) is almost exactly like Bovis, which I was not expecting. I thought MMC would do more to distinguish between the 2 figures which forms the legs of Predaking. Dreadwing is a redeco of Generations Thrilling 30 Megatron. Only differences between these 2 figs are the paint job and the head mold.

Diesel (not Motormaster) is a complicated piece to say the least. He’s packaged in truck mode like you see in the pic above. In the pics below, I have him transformed to his robot mode, with and without armor.

And for course the real reason we hardcore collectors all get this figure is so we can form the mighty Intimidator (not Menasor)!

Intimidator looks totally kick-ass when combined! The limb components were bought in March and August of last year.

So that’s 3 figures for the month, two 3rd party figs and one generations figs. Not a bad way to start the new year.

Transform and Roll Out!

Welcome to the Transformation of this blog! After about a seven month hiatus, I’m back! You are looking at the first post of TFMatrix.com.

I had been blogging on WordPress.com for over 4 years, which was great. But it was time I moved off their site and went to my own self hosted blog. So in January of 2014, I registered for a new domain. I meant to transfer the old content here as soon as I could, but of course life gets in the way. Many things delayed the launch of TF Matrix, including work, going on vacation (multiple times), getting sick (multiple times), researching just exactly how to transfer content off of WordPress.com, and other personal obligations. Before you knew it, half the year has passed. I did not mean to be away from blogging for so long.

But now I’m back and better than ever! In my last post I said I have “big changes planned for this blog in early 2014,” and you are looking at it. It took longer than I thought it would, but better late than never. Moving forward, I have even more planned for TF Matrix. As a lifelong TransFan, I promise to keep the Spark alive for eons to come.

Coincidentally, this is the 200th post of this blog. I’m glad this milestone celebrates the launching of TF Matrix. Transformers are constantly changing and evolving like their namesake, so it’s only fair that my blog emulates this behavior. Look for more great TF content in the future. Long live Transformers! Now and forever… Transform and Roll Out!

I got done setting up my Christmas Tree sometime this week. It’s a small manufactured tree, just to make my place look a little more festive. The GF bought me some ornaments to put up. I thought I give this tree a little more Cybertron flair, so some of my legends class Transformers are going up as ornaments!

Can you identify how many TFs are on here?

Happy Cybertronian Christmas! Transform and Roll Out.

More goodies from my childhood. I have some G1 Micromasters. Only the most hardcore of TransFans would know of Micromasters. They came around at a time when G1 was on its last legs. At the time, Micro Machines were all the rage. I think Hasbro wanted to capitalize on the trend, and thus came up with Micromasters. Basically, these are extremely small Transformers. Think Micro Machines that transform, which is essentially what they are. The G1 Marvel Transformers comics did come up with a backstory for them.

Micromasters came in packs of 4. For most of my G1 Transformers, I still have a fairly vivid recollection of how it came into my collection. Like where I bought it, who and what I traded for it, or who gave it to me as a gift. That’s not the case with my Micromasters. I have absolutely no memory of how I acquired them. I guess even at the time, I was not too impressed. Either that, or my focus has been shifted entirely away from Transformers (the original NES was big at the time). Anyway, here they are. I don’t remember their names at all. Had to Google them. And sorry for the crappy pics. My camera just can’t take pics this close.

Autobots- Off-Road Patrol

Tote, Powertrain, Mudslinger, Highjump

Like I said, these came in packs of 4. The above are the Off-Road Patrol. Mudslinger is probably my favorite out of these 4. That’s not saying much though.

Decepticons – Air Strike Patrol

Tailwind, Storm Cloud, Whisper, Nightflight

These 4 Decepticon jets make up the Air Strike Patrol. They are ok. Some of these remind me of G.I.Joe vehicles from Real American Heroes. Tailwind reminds me of the Cobra Rattler, which I did have at one time in my youth. Whisper looks like the original Cobra Night Raven. BTW, I played with that Raven extensively, since I gave one to a friend for his b-day. In 2011 I bought the Raven from Rise of Cobra, and IMO the original Raven is better. Nightflight looks like the Joe Sky Striker. I never played with the Sky Striker when I was a kid, but I did buy the re-issue at Target for $17 this past summer. Regardless, Nightflight seems like an odd name for this character. I keep thinking that must be the black jet in the bunch.

OK, now for some G1 Transformers Decoys. These are rubber figures that came with some G1 figures, I think in Seasons 3 and 4. I have 4 of these.

Windcharger, Bumblebee, Grapple, Skywarp

These are kinda cool. I remember distinctly that the Grapple decoy came with my Technobot Afterburner figure. Don’t remember where the rest came from. I saw more of these when I went to BotCon. I wanted to get more, but must have forgot from seeing all the other TF craziness at BotCon.

Above is all of them in one shot. I put a AA battery in there for size comparison to note their extreme smallness.

Transform and Roll Out.

Happy Holidays! I’m back home again for Christmas in SoCal. Time to dig out more treasures from my childhood. So today I think I will feature the Targetmasters.

In G1, Targetmasters came around in Season 4 and continued into Season 5. The gimmick here is the weapons of the main figure will transform into mini figures. Targetmasters came at the same time as Headmasters. I always felt that Hasbro gave the Headmasters top billing, and that Targetmasters got gypped by being the secondary citizens in the grand scheme of Master Technology. I dunno, personally I liked the Targetmasters better. I think having the weapon transform is cooler than the head transform, but that’s me.

The Autobots

Scoop with Holepunch and Tracer, Crosshairs with Pinpointer, Hot Rod with Firebolt

The Decepticons

Quake with Tiptop and Heater, Misfire with Aimless

All my Targetmasters are in great shape. They are all complete too, with the manual, but no box. The Season 4 figures (Hot Rod, Crosshairs, and Misfire) I played with extensively so I remember them well. The Season 5 figs I didn’t play with as much, probably because that’s about the time I felt that G1 figs were starting to lose their quality (not to mention the US cartoon ended). Oh yeah, the Season 5 Targetmasters are all “double” Targetmasters. That means they come with 2 Nebulan guns. Each gun transforms into a figure, and the guns can combine into a larger rifle type weapon. I know that sounds cool in theory, but in actuality the Season 5 weapon figures aren’t that good. They pale in comparison to the Season 4 weapon figs.

But as I look at them now, I’m liking the Quake figure quite a bit. He’s much better than I remembered. The rest of them is about how I remembered.

It’s too bad I didn’t have a bigger allowance back then. I probably would have bought even more Targetmasters. Come and think of it, I didn’t even buy Hot Rod and Misfire. Those were b-day presents from my cousin.

I might do a few more G1 nostalgic posts before this holiday season is over. Targetmasters… Transform and Roll Out!