Series: Beast Wars
Allegiance: Maximal
Categories: Deluxe
Year: 1997
As stubborn as he is strong, nothing can stop the brawny Bonecrusher when he charges into battle to crack some skulls! Like a living locomotive with a one-track mind, all he wants to do is fight, fight, fight! Optimus Primal tries to get him to lighten up, if only to prevent him from overheating an internal coolant co-processor, but Bonecrusher would rather be out pounding his enemies into cyber scrap. His favorite attack strategy is to stun opponents with a dizzying head-butt, and then finish them off with a fast firing missile shot straight from his mouth!
Robot Mode: Even in robot mode it isn't hard to see what Bonecrusher transforms into. The head of the buffalo is his chest and pretty much the entire top of the animal forms his head and shoulders. That part of his anatomy actually extends pretty far out back, even longer if you count the tail. The reason for that is, of course, the missile launcher that is hidden there. It runs the entire length of the buffalo body and fires out of Bonecrusher's mouth. Meaning the tip of the missile actually is Bonecrusher's mouth. Either that or the empty muzzle of the launcher. Either way doesn't look too hot.
The rest of Bonecrusher's body is rather posable, at least in theory, but both the huge head/shoulder section and the big plates hanging off his shoulders restrict him a lot. He's also prone to toppling over backwards, so you always need to pose him in a slightly crouched, bent over forward posture. Lookwise he isn't too bad, but nothing extraordinary, either.
All in all Bonecrusher is an example of how a gimmick can drag down a figure pretty badly. If not for that giant missile launcher that he needs to incorporate, he'd be a much better robot, I'd guess.
Alternate Mode: Bonecrusher transforms into a buffalo. He does look pretty realistic, too, with the huge back, the relatively short legs, and the nicely done black and silver colour scheme. Posability is relatively limited. He can move his legs a bit, but that's it. You can also flip up the missile launcher in this mode and fire it by pulling Bonecrusher's tail. That's pretty much it, though. Can't think of anything else to write. A decent beast mode, but nothing spectacular.
Remarks: Bonecrusher was one of those Beast Wars figures that never appeared in the TV series, but in his Japanese identity of Bighorn he was one of the main cast of the Japanese Beast Wars II series. He also appeared in the IDW Beast Wars comic series under his own name as one of the Maximals helping Razorbeast in his mission against Magmatron.
The toy version of Bonecrusher sadly isn't among the best Beast Wars figures ever. His somewhat misshapen torso and the huge backpack he carries make him hard to balance and limit his posability. I also wouldn't put him among the best-looking Transformers ever. So all in all he's the kind of figure you might get to complete your Beast Wars line, but I can't think of any other reason.
Rating: C-
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