T is for Terrorsaur

The Winning Toy


Toyline: Armada

Generation: Unicron Trilogy

Size Class: Deluxe

Faction: Decepticon


Robot Mode



Terrorsaur's robot mode is different to most other Armada toys, mostly because he was modified from a Beast Wars toy, he shares this trait with Airazor, Cheetor, Rhinox and Predacon. Because of him being originally in a different toyline he has the aesthetic feel of the other line, in this case meaning that he has smooth lines, organic feel and musculature rather than being mostly boxy in appearance. His colour scheme is of course different to that of the original usage of the mold and is now orange and two shades of green along with some silver highlights, such as on his VTOL parts, screws and teeth.

Terrorsaur's upper arms are connected to the torso by a ball joint enabling it to have full articulation (as long as the arm kibble doesn't get in the way). The lower arm is connected to the upper arm by a hinge that enables it to bend forwards by about 90 degrees. His hands aren't articulated at all, but has three sculpted fingers. The wings on Terrorsaur's lower arms are able to be removed by folding them inwards and then slotting them out. These wings can be used as blade weapons by inserting the handle-like section in between the thumb and middle claw and then slotting a small clip into a small socket on his palms. The blades have the word "Terrorsaur" emblazoned on them (I guess so if they get lost then he can have them returned to him)

The upper leg is connected to the lower torso by a ball joint and pivot joint combination, giving it amazing articulation. The lower and upper leg are connected by a knee joint created by two hinges, this enables him to bend his knees fully backwards, to an extent where he could easily tuck his knees up against his chest. His feet are created by flattening out his beast mode feet-claws, however the entirety of the support for these feet is from a circular point between them, so the claws are just for aesthetic purposes.

In this mode Terrorsaur has a Mini-Con hard point on both shoulders and well as on the folded down panel on his back (which has to be lifted upwards to reveal the hard-point.

Terrorsaur's head is sculpted with a snarling expression revealing his teeth. He has a nose and two red eyes sculpted as well. Terrorsaur also has a Mohawk on top of his head.


Alternate Mode



Flip a chest backwards here, and fold some legs away there, and you can turn Terrorsaur into his alternate mode, a Mechanical Pteranodon (or Transmetal Pteranodon if you's prefer) This toy is of course the same colour scheme as his robot mode.

Luckily with this toy you can either have him in a flat on the ground or "flying" mode or have him in a perched mode (as I have photographed above). In his perched mode you can use the claws from his wings as an extra set of limbs to support him upright.

The wings are able to flap on a ball joint (as it is the same mechanism as his arms in robot mode). His legs aren't able to move, however the claws can be extended as needed, but don't actually affect anything.

The neck of this toy's beast mode enables him to bob it up and down for whatever pose you want him it, on top of that he has a beak that can be opened and closed, which reveals some hidden teeth (perfect for eating some fishes or small birdies). Terrorsaur also has a pair or orange eyes on either side of the head and ridges etc, and a small green piece at the back of the head balanced on a hinge.

The Mini-Con hard points are found on his back and the parts of his wings that are closest to his torso.



Because Terrorsaur is a slight remold of a Transmetal Beast Era toy, he does of course come with a third/power up mode. To convert to his jet mode you simple have to rotate the orange chest-connector pieces around to an upright position (and rotate his wings back to a spread out position of course) This enables you to open up the jet boosters at the back from the main rear torso of the beast mode to a full extent (you can leave the connector where it is, but you can't open the booster compartment up fully that way.

An extra thing you can do to make him different in this mode is opening up his VTOL jet cover, though that's totally up to you of course.


Ironhide



The Mini-Con that comes with Terrorsaur is Ironhide, whom is a repaint of the Adventure Team member Dune Runner (his team mates got repaints and were packaged with Cheetor and Rhinox). And to make things even more surprising, this Mini-Con is in fact a female....yeah...Ironhide's a girl....moving on!

Ironhide is a brown gun-mounted dune buggy with black wheels, seats, guns and guard rail. Her eyes are an orange colour, and she has silver hubcaps. The wheels are fully mobile and can allow her to roll along a floor unaided (yay!)

In robot mode Ironhide has limited articulation (as you should realise by now with Mini-Cons) she can move her arms on a pivot at the shoulders. The legs are connected to the lower torso by a pivot again, which is then connected to his lower leg by another pivot, giving her the ability to sit down. Her head is able to move on a pivot to the left or right, which is quite uncommon for Mini-Cons, and is only possible due to her transformation sequence really.

Her Mini-Con socket s located on the back of her head, which enables her to connect to any Mini-Con hard point.

Ironhide and the other Adventure Tea repaints have quite a rare feature actually, they have a suqare peg system on the undersides of their vehicle modes which enable them to combine with Cyclonus in his Helicopter mode at the exposed gear section beneath his cockpit, which enables the gun on Ironhide's vehicle mode to move by just pushing the trigger on Cyclonus' tail. (This trait of also shared by the Destruction Team and Refute, plus any repaints).


Legacy

Terrorsaur appeared at the end of the Armada comic where he, along with Cheetor, Rhinox and Airazor were abducted by Unicron in the final moments of the war and he, along with the other abductees were twisted into Unicron's Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Terrorsaur was turned into "Famine" and helped in an attack on Cybertron during the start of the Energon comic series, until they were chased off by Optimus Prime in his new upgraded form, thanks to Cybertron itself. The Horsemen later retrieved the Terrorcons after they failed in a mission. The Horsemen remained inside Unicron after that until the series was cancelled due to Dreamwave's collapse, but were due to appear again. Most likely the group would have been destroyed by the end of the series. Terrorsaur never appeared in the Armada cartoon.

Ironhide never appeared in the comics or cartoons, but is mentioned as now missing Terrorsaur after he got abducted by Unicron, despite how Terrorsaur stole her a long time ago.

Terrorsaur's toy mold was of course originally used by Beast Wars Terrorsaur in his Transmetal body, which, whilst he only appeared in the series in his organic mode, upon his death he began to morph into his Transmetal body, but was never seen again (the only fictional appearance of this version of his body was in the Beast Wars Sourcebook. Obviously this toy had the Mini-Con hard points and Ironhide added especially for the Armada line.

This toy mold is also used for the beast Machines toy Terranotron (the pre-Mini-Con version obviously) and was also used for the fiction only bodies for Fractyl's Transmetal mode, and Ravenus' first body. Interestingly both of the latter two mold mates have had multiple bodies. Fractyl's was a physical toy and was a repaint of Terrorsaur's first body, his toy however was originally planned to be made as well. Meanwhile Ravenus' second body was actually based on G1 Swoop, using his Diaclone pre-Transformer colours. A version of Ravenus using this mold was considered for the Linkage series' exclusive figures as a mail-away toy, but this idea was cancelled after the original conception. (Though you could juts repaint an Armada Terrorsaur into Ravenus' colours honestly!)

As mentioned before Ironhide is a repaint of the Adventure team figure Dune Runner, and retains all the features from the original version. The name Ironhide is of course re-purposed from the G1 and Beast Wars character as well as being reused again for several newer characters in pretty much every continuity since.


Is he Cool?

Honestly, when I first put him up for an option I'd say no, but after reviewing him, and playing with the toy in the run up for the review itself, I have changed my mind. His articulation is quite high for an older figure, despite obviously having some signs of age compared to most of the newer figures (ie the general feel of the figure, colour scheme etc) but he still looks good regardless.

His robot mode looks like he's designed to emulate Starscream from the G1 series (cockpit on his chest, the general shape, the attitude of the character and the kibble on his shoulders).

My main complaint about the figure is that his hard points are added on as an extra feature, which doesn't activate any added features (totally understandable due to him being remolded from a previous toyline) And his Mini-Con doesn't really fit with Terrorsaur in terms of design, again because it was reassigned from another set, this is made even more obvious due to Ironhide's gear gimmick not being compatible with Terrorsaur at all.

All in all, I'd say the best reason to buy Terrorsaur would be to complete a set of the Four Horsemen, otherwise it's probably more worthwhile just getting the Beast Era toy. Of course, even saying that, if you like Mini-Cons like I do, then it's probably worth getting the toy purely for Ironhide, since she is one of the few female Mini-Cons available.