Masterpiece MP-22 Ultra Magnus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKO-eMIuol4
It's Mother F'N ULTRA MAGNUS! Whoa! Takara have hit this release way out of the park, with an awesomely accurate and badass Masterpiece of the City commander himself; Ultra Magnus.
As I write this, I have just received both Masterpiece Ultra Magnus and Masterpiece Bumblebee (Bumble). Both releases are incredible (more coverage on bumble soon). Magnus is a massive beefcake of beefynus, he hits the animation model perfectly with many improvements of course.
With both complex and quite simple engineering incorporated, magnus is quite intuitive to transform to and from both modes, the cab transformation may give you a little grief initially but then its a piece of cake. The biggest things to watch whilst transforming are to be careful when rotating the smoke stacks. But the biggest thing to be very careful and mindful is transforming the pelvis plate back and forth as it easily is stressed and in some instances it has broken on copies of the toy. My advice is applying even and gradual pressure whiles rotating the joint as close to the hinge as possible. Stress marks may still appear but it should help in the long run. One tip is leave the plate in its robot mode position permanently as it doesn't overly affect the overall aesthetics. See the tutorial video below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6o7-K1Rd9w
Overall articulation is great considering how big and blocky Magnus is, the only thing he is really 'missing' is a waist rotation but that is really nit picking. Also with big slabs or diecast for his feet, Magnus is ULTRA stable. See what I did there haha. In truck mode, the car carrier is fully functional just the its G1 predecessor as well as a detachable cab with spots for Spike and Daniel to ride along. The carrier mode is capable of carrying four masterpiece cars (with the exception of hotrod/rodimus) or similar sized transformers.
One let down of a figure of this kind and price is the visible sprue marks in various place of Magnus body, most egregious being on his forearms. It may have been unavoidable but I wish more care was taken in removing them from the injection moulded sprue.
Overall Ultra Magnus is an A1 release and well worth picking up. I personally thing at a sub $200 price tag, he is great value for your dollars.
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