Mastermind Creations Acinonyx & Simphony

Prelude: Remember the time when Cheetor, still in vehicle form, teamed up with Cybertronian pop singer Rosanna in order to… do something? No? Well, that might be because it never happened. The closest they ever came was to appear together in single panel in a club-exclusive comic book. Still, Mastermind Creations Reformatted brought out a two-pack of figures resembling these two and we’re looking at them today. So let’s say go!

Prelude 2: The real reason why these two characters go together is, of course, because they are both repaints. The original figures were based on the IDW Lost Light versions of Chromedome and Rewind, who were lovers (or Conjux Endura as they call it on Cybertron). Lacking any real interest in the originals, I was happy to get these repaints for a cheap price.

Acinonyx - Robot Mode: Now remember, this robot here was originally intended to resemble Chromedome as he appeared in the pages of the IDW comics, specifically the “More than Meets the Eye” / “Lost Light” series. Acinonyx has received both a new paintjob and a new head, new hands, and those blades on his forearms, too. The paint is blue and gold, naturally, and with plenty of spots on the yellow part, the resemblance to Cheetor is already present. The new head is based on the concept drawings of Transtech Cheetor, who never received a toy before.

The figure itself is very slim with very, very broad shoulders thanks to the big wheels. Articulation is nothing short of spectacular, including articulated hands and tilting ankles. Despite having wheels for feet, the figure has a solid stance, even if you forget (like I did when I took the pictures) to flip out the heel spurs. The joints are nice and tight and the colors pop nicely. 

Acinonyx’ only weapons are the two blades on his arms, which can flip out (a bit) and you can imagine him speeding past enemies and slicing them open as he passes. The blades are on individual rotating cuffs, so you can position them pretty much any away to you want in relation to hands and forearms.

So really, is there anything worth complaining about here? Well, there is one thing. If you look closely at the pictures, you see that my Acinonyx has a stress mark on his forehead where the big spike stands up. The reason for that is that, in order to transform properly, Acinonyx has to flip in said spike, otherwise the head won’t fit. The problem is, at least on my version, that the spike WON’T flip in. And pressing on it too hard immediately led to said stress marks. Not sure if that is a general problem, but it really took some fun out of it for me.

So bottom line: apart from the head spike thing, a very nice robot mode, probably the closest we will ever come to having an actual Transtech Cheetor. 

Acinonyx - Alternate Mode: Acinonyx transforms into a Cybertronian H-shaped racing car. The transformation isn’t terribly complicated apart from the above-mentioned issue with the non-retracting head spike. In order to properly transform my version here, I had to remove the head entirely, otherwise it would not have fit. Assuming the spike would retract properly, though, the transformation would be pretty straightforward. Acinonyx basically lies down on his back.

The resulting car looks nicely fast and alien. Not really like Transtech Cheetor’s concept drawings, mind you, but again, it’s just a repaint. I like the car mode and it just looks extremely fast, too, which is fitting for Cheetor. The car can be somewhat modified into an “attack mode” by moving the rear wheels to the side (where they are in robot mode, too), giving the vehicle a broader silhouette. 

Bottom line: a very nice vehicle mode. If the head spike properly folds away, then there is no problem at all.

Symphony – Robot Mode: Symphony is based on the Animated character Rosanna, who appeared in the Allspark Almanach book, a TF Club exclusive comic book, and might have appeared in the never-produced fourth season of Transformers Animated. She was (liberally) based on the same cassette type figure that was used for Eject and Rewind, so it wasn’t much of a stretch to turn a third party figure based on Rewind into a third party version of her. 

In robot mode Symphony still very much looks like Rewind, lacking the somewhat modified proportions and silhouette that was used for the Animated character. The colors have changed, though, as Symphony is now colored a pale pink and a deep, nearly red pink. There are some silver highlights, including the two guns Symphony carries on her back. She can take them in hand, of course, and adopt various shooting poses. Articulation is very good, nearly equal to that of Acinonyx, only missing the articulated hands. 

So bottom line for the robot mode: the figure itself is very nice, but even with the changed colors it doesn’t really look like Rosanna from Animated. It still looks like Rewind or Eject, just pink. 

Symphony – Alternate Mode: Now the original Rewind transformed into an 80s style cassette, but by the time he starred in the More than Meets the Eye comic series, he had returned to his original Cybertronian alternate mode, which was a kind of datastick. Essentially it’s still a square, though somewhat rounded.

 And… yeah, that’s pretty much it, really. Symphony transforms into a mostly light pink square which fits into no tape deck nor can it in any other way interact with other figures.

Remarks: Acinonyx is the Latin name for the Felidae genus that the cheetah belongs to. As a matter of fact the cheetah is the only living species of Felidae within that genus. What drove the other members of the genus into extinction? Three guesses and the first two don’t count.

So as mentioned above, there is really no in-universe reason for these two figures to come together in a two-pack and if I’m honest, I only got it for Acinonyx. The pink Rewind has since been relocated into the shelves of my Barbie-collecting wife, since Barbie dolls can use it as a sort of tablet.

As for Acinonyx, if I assume that the non-retracting head spike is only a problem on my version, then there is very little wrong with this figure. It’s a great version of Transtech Cheetor and we don’t really have many figures of that particular version of the little cat. Animated Cheetor is probably the closest we got before. So bottom line: if you like Cheetor and enjoy the Cybertronian aesthetic of the figure, then he’s well worth a look. And some people will probably enjoy a pink Rewind, too, I figure.

Rating: B+ (Acinonyx) / C (Symphony)