Dark of the Moon Shockwave

Prelude: Shockwave – the name of one oft he most devious, cunning, merciless, and brutal Transformers of all time. Lackey of Megatron, ruler of Cybertron in Megatron’s absence. Megatron’s right hand, with Soundwave to his left and Starscream at his feet, always scheming, but having lost sight of the goal. Shockwave was announced as the big bad for the third movie very early on and here now is his toy incarnation.

Alternate Mode: Shockwave transforms into a Cybertronian tank, but a very different looking one than the model Megatron used. For the movie I imagine Shockwave to be gigantic, bigger even than Brawl, and more dangerous, too. Pictures of the packaging lead to suspect that Shockwave’s cannon will be mounted in the middle rather than on the right side as it’s done here. At the front Shockwave has two mine sweepers on wheels or maybe some sort of barrels, as are used on Russian tanks. There seems to be some kind of deal in place for DOTM to include Russian details in the movie in return for being allowed to shoot on location in Moscow. It looks good, either way.

Just like Megatron did, Shockwave hides his face in alternate mode behind a kind of safety panel, right in the middle. On his left there is a kind of sword, meaning battles against Sentinel and Optimus Prime, and maybe even Megatron, Soundwave or Starscream, could turn interesting. There is the rumor, after all, that Shockwave will betray Megatron and create his own splinter group, which will attack the Earth.

Robot Mode: The robot mode somewhat reminds of the Power Rangers (greetings from Lord Z), but that’s not a bad thing. My figure features a lot more paint apps than were seen on the first pictures available. Parts that seemed to be silver to begin with are now a light purple. Could be because I asked to have my figure removed from the box to save on shipping costs. The figure features many moving parts, but does tend to topple over forwards or backwards. Also, the cannon on his arm is a bit too heavy for the joint. What’s great, on the other hand, is the tube connecting the cannon to Shockwave’s back. In my imagination his back starts to glow and spin before he fires, seeing as the back is formed from the mine sweepers and one of the barrels, making it look a bit like a turbine.

Shockwave has often been the Decepticons’ weapon smith, which would make him the opposite of the Autobot engineer “Q” aka “Wheeljack” and the one to introduce Mechtech to the Decepticon side. He also carries a sword on his left arm, giving him melee capabilities, which should make him a match for the likes of Optimus and Sentinel Prime, who’ll probably have to join up in order to take him down.

Gimmick: Shockwave’s Mechtech weapon is his arm blaster, which is fully integrated into his vehicle mode (just like it was with Megatron). Nicely done. The Mechtech gimmick unveils two additional small cannons, not all that spectacular and somewhat superfluous in my opinion. Shockwave is very suited for showing off the Mechtech principal, though: combining and swapping weapons. In the pics above I intentionally overdid it in order to show that there are no restrictions. This kind of overkill certainly doesn’t make a lot of sense, granted, but it was fun. In the pics I attached all my Mechtech weapons to Shockwave. The weapons of the Voyager class figures have their own Mechtech ports, which allows Shockwave’s tube to attach to them, too, making them (in my mind at least) even more powerful.

Conclusion: A great figure, though somewhat too small and in the wrong size class, just like The Fallen in ROTF. Recommended to Shockwave followers, Movieverse fanatics (like myself) and completists. Not really a must-have for anyone else.