Brainstorm gets special marks for being the first-ever Transformers Exclusive figure for Walgreens. Walgreens and Hasbro have been making exclusives for a while now with Marvel Legends and Star Wars. Now they delve into the world of the endless battle between the Autobots and Decepticons.
Thankfully what we get is a figure we want, and not just a repaint of something we will be able to get somewhere else. He is a retool of Blurr, and shares a lot of the same parts, but he is his own guy. Basically if you combine Blurr (Titans Return) with Brainstorm (Thrilling 30), you will get the new Brainstorm Titans Return Figure.
Brainstrom’s colors have flexed a bit over the years, but mostly in G1 he was a baby blue color like the Thrilling 30 version that came out in 2014. This time around they went with a more teal color that matches his IDW comic color scheme.
When you put him side-by-side with Blurr, you can see just how much of their bodies are the same. Pretty much the only differences between the two are the shoulders, the heads, and the shield. That is pretty impressive, since they look fairly different. Shoulders say a lot about a Transformer apparently.
In 2014, Arcana, on the right became the first modern Headmaster. He had a ball joint head, so Brainstorm could actually move his head. He very much looked like the testbed for the Titan Masters to come in the Titans Return series. You can see Arcana is a lot taller than Teslor. That is of course due to the face that he is a Headmaster for a Voyager Class figure, as opposed to the Titan Masters that are made for Deluxe Class figures. Since Arcana is bigger, he cannot be used on the Titan Master figures, nor can the Titan Masters be used on the 2014 Brainstorm. I don’t think anyone would really want to anyway, since he would have a tiny pinhead. We are once again bitten by the copyright bug, since Arcana had to be renamed Teslor this time around.
When you are ready, go ahead and transform him into vehicle mode. It is not that hard to do, especially if you have Blurr. It will feel strangely similar. Well, not that strange, since we know the bodies are virtually the same.
Side by side, we can start to see the similarities and differences. Where Blurr has the long, flat nose , Brainstorm has a more tapered nose with guns added.
Brainstorm is supposed to be a space ship, but while he does have the overall design of his earlier G1 version in the wings and the nose, he still feels like a cruiser in many ways. He has wheels for rolling, and they don’t feel like landing gear. He also has an open top. While these guys are robots, thus not needing air, it does not go with general thinking of a space ship with an open canopy. Even Wheelie, built as a car, has a better canopy ( https://flic.kr/p/Kb7YTz ).
Overall, I think the robot was well executed. The body has great articulation, and has a great design nodding to the original G1 Brainstorm. He is built on nearly the same body as Blurr, but they are different enough not not just be a repaint.
The vehicle is also a nice homage to the G1 ship, with good design and matching touches like the wings. Since it was built on the Blurr body, it still has that ground vehicle feel, so some points off for that, but overall well done.
He is a nice addition to the second wave of the Deluxe series, with a nicely growing Autobot crew.
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