Animated Freeway Jazz

Series: Animated
Allegiance: Autobot
Categories: Deluxe
Year: 2009

With Decepticon activity at its peak near the galactic rim, rumors begin to circulate that Earth may be getting more evil visitors as well. In anticipation of incoming Decepticons, Jazz goes undercover, immersing himself in Earth culture. From where he hides in plain sight, he can enjoy the sights and sounds of Earth while planning the perfect moment to strike.
> Extensive and growing MP3 collection
> Superior sound system
> Uses energy-chucks to bang out a good beat on Decepticon bad guys.

Remarks: This is actually the fourth time I am doing a review for this particular mold. I did the original Animated Jazz in 2008, followed by Botcon Dead End in 2011, and just a few months ago the TF Club Jackpot, too. So, since I don’t intend to copy and paste past reviews, only a few words on the differences here. In 2007 the first live-action Transformers movie was a huge success and unsurprisingly the Transformers toyline directly following it, Animated, revisited several beats from it. We had the Allspark as the main McGuffin, we had Bumblebee as the cute yellow guy (originally Hotshot was intended for that role), a Megatron who ended up captured and reverse-engineered by humans, the list goes on. And we also got a Jazz repaint in the grey colors of Movie Jazz.

Interesting side note, since someone on Facebook commented on it: yes, you can swivel the plates and exhaust pipes on Jazz’ arms forward, essentially giving him Wolverine claws. I’ve actually been aware of this feature for years (since 2008 Animated Jazz), but I’ve noticed I never included a pic of it in my galleries before and didn’t mention it in the reviews, either. So consider it photographed and reviewed now: Animated Jazz can turn his exhaust pipes / nun chucks into Wolverine claws. And it looks really cool, too.

Not really a whole lot more I can write here, to be honest. Toyhax offers a sticker set to turn this guy into an Animated version of Bluestreak, which would go with the grey coloring, and I might give that a try before too long. Bottom line for this figure: a great mold, no doubt, but if you already own the white Jazz, there really is no need beyond being a completist to get this one here, too. Being an Animated completist myself, I bought him.

Rating: B+