8 Gobots That Will Shut Your Whore Mouth
Gobots. We all know the jokes - K-Mart Transformers, stupid names, those ones with windshields for heads, the dodgy cartoon, Robot Chicken lol etc, etc and so on. But belatedly a lot of toy fans have grown up and realised there were diamonds in the rough of the line; it's helped that Hasbro have allowed some references to the series (the rights of which they brought up during a takeover of Tonka in the nineties) to begin to bleed back into Transformers, with several recoloured toys referencing Gobots with similar alt modes and there being the odd cameo of a character or two in various comics. But the line at its' best merits a genuine re-evaluation beyond just being another ancillary of the Transformers tentacle monster. Diecast parts and rubber tyres stayed central to the line for much of its' life, the base line of Machine Robo specialised in finding interesting ways of getting figures the size of the primitive Minibots into all variety of vehicles and often articulation was miles better, several featuring ball-joints more than a decade before they were seen regularly on Transformers. Not convinced? Here are eight figures that I feel showcase the line's merits; not the eight best Gobots ever as that would include a few pricey and/or imported toys. No, these are guys you can pick up secondhand on ebay for less than the price of those dreadful plastic Legends things that look like Happy Meal toys.
SPOONS
Spoons has a lot going for him. He's a forklift truck, a mode vintage Transformers never got round to despite numerous construction-based teams; when Hasbro did for the video game-based Movieverse figure Dirt Boss (later turned into a limp homage to Spoons by adding a little bit of orange) they couldn't get the toy to actually lift anything but Spoons has a simple but working mechanism. He also has some very neat engineering work to blend this into the legs, reassuringly chunky arms and tyres, a nice head design and some fun details like the flip-up seat.
DIVE-DIVE
One of Bandai's coolest recurring tricks in Machine Robo was making a tiny compact vehicle into a decent robot. There are several dramatic examples like Loco or Apollo Robo but the best is probably Dive-Dive. Realistic submarines are a difficult thing to turn into robots due to the narrow cigar shape and general lack of mass but Dive-Dive is not only a passable model of a nuclear sub but turns into a decently-proportioned robot due to some very inventive work around the hips and shoulders giving him a mass and profile you'd never guess at, while retaining key hull parts (such as the rear fins for feet) so it doesn't feel like you've just peeled a shell apart.
SCRATCH
Gobots wasn't a flop from the start; part of the line's decline was due to a simple lack of product as Bandai kept a more sedate pace with Machine Robo than Tonka did with the Western line. The American company tried several approaches to combat this, making a few playset-type items in house and later producing figures Bandai rejected at the prototype stage. One approach was commissioning brand new figures; five of these were released in 1985, unofficially (by me and I've yet to be told off by anyone important) known as the MRT series due to their modified codes. These had American vehicle modes, which explains Scratch's dull Ford Bronco alternate mode. However, under that flat grey exterior lurks a dynamo of a robot; the fun transformation includes a rotating waist and leg flip movement the feels 20 years ahead of its' time, result in a robot with ball-jointed arms, a freely rotating waist and movement at the hips and knees, all beautifully balanced and about the same size as bloody Seaspray.
ROYAL-T
While Hasbro were knocking out identical Seekers and later Aerialbots Bandai were putting the effort into robots who turned into jets; alternate modes were more accurate, transformations were different, robot modes didn't have backpacks made up of aircraft parts all squished up. Look at Royal-T; the colour scheme's off but that's a smashing replica of a Harrier at something like 1:144 scale. Put him alongside Slingshot, a box with some plane bits stuck on. Transform Royal T, revel in the splitting tail that turns around to form the legs, the neat way the cockpit nestles perfectly into the chest, the wings slipping unobtrusively onto the back. Fold Slingshot's parts away onto his back, stand him on the end and weep. Then take in Royal-T's majestic robot mode. Look at Slingshot and the way you wouldn't be able to guess what he turned into if you looked at him from dead-on. Smash the orange-headed bastard with a hammer.
SCOOTER
The - fair - hatred for Scooter due to the Gobots cartoon masks what a great toy he had. Firstly it's a scooter, a funny everyday vehicle HasTak would never have dared put out when they could do yet another bloody sportscar; it took them 10 years to do a motorcycle Transformer that wasn't terrible and when they did finally pluck up the courage to do a scooter the result was the appalling Mini-Con Sureshock. And it's a good scooter mode too, no face on the front or anything. There's another mass-displacement transformation into a tall, impressive robot that once again has ball-jointed shoulders and surprising presence.
CREEPY
Don't like cars and planes? More of a Beast Wars type? Deviant. No, obviously all lifestyle choices are acceptable in the 21st century and if your choice is ugly, ugly toys Gobots has you all covered there too thanks to the monster-style figures that were the bad guys in Japan; Vamp, Pincher and Scorp were the three most famous but they were topped by the later Creepy, who turns from a killer crab into a robot with killer crab claws for arms. Again articulation is great and he's all covered with mandibles and insect legs and lurid colours, all that freaky stuff.
WATER WALK
We've talked about how there are more than two ways to turn a plane into a robot - it's not just "put everything on the robot's back" or "knob the Macross Valkyrie design". A case in point is Water Walk, who transforms nothing like Royal-T or any other Gobot aircraft. His plane mode itself is a bit special as well, a neat seaplane, and it leads to some interesting work with the floats swinging down to become the legs and the wings partly containing the arms, with the rest forming neat coat-tails behind rather than an ugly mass of cluttered parts. Look how clean that robot mode is. You could own that if you could get over your brand myopia, you bloody spanner.
TURBO
Maybe you don't like complicated toys is all. Maybe you like the simplicity of Windcharger or Swindle or whatever. It's okay, it's okay. You want simple? Gobots can do simple, it can do simple till the cows come home, put slippers on and crack out a DVD box set. And it can do it without making the toys repulsive. Take Turbo - look at that car mode, it's so sleek it'd make Pininfarina cry, years ahead of the divine Ferrari F40. Three steps and you've got a neat, impressive robot without taxing yourself - all with chrome, diecast, rubber tyres and all that good stuff. Simple can be beautiful.
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