Star Raider Filch Walmart Exclusive Retool of Kingdom Airazor Transformers Legacy United Target Exclusive Star Raider Capsule Item No.: Asst. G0200 No. G0234 Manufacturer: Hasbro Includes: 2 wing/blades Action Feature: Transforms from robot to bird Retail: $24.96 Availability: September 2024 Other: First transforming toy for Robots in Disguise Decepticon
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The underrated/underappreciated/underbought line from 2015 was Robots in Disguise, a kid range which had some pretty good toys that got lost in the shuffle against Combiner Wars and Titans Return - many of which will now cost you a pretty penny. But not Filch, Hasbro skipped her. The only Filch toy before this 2024 release was a blind-packed mini figure.

By using Airazor parts, you get a pretty good start - but not an exact Robots in Disguise toy, as those were smoother and much simpler. I don't know what fans would prefer - a hypothetical Warrior-class toy, or the slightly more articulated Deluxe-class toy that we got?

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Much like me, the character appreciates shiny things - and she's got a little shine. The figure's head is close to the cartoon model, minus the gold in the eyes and the painted lips, but gets the shape down right. The body does seem a lot more like a 2024 version of a 1980s or 1990s toy, but that's mostly what you want - metal "feathers," bird claws, and an obscene amount of articulation. It is possible you could imagine more, but given the toy's budget and heritage, the hinged wrists and ball-jointed ankles mean you can get a lot of cool action poses out of her. She can even stand on one foot without much of a fight! If you like the character design, the toy is probably going to delight you with its successful execution of decent joints and a slight stylistic departure from the rest of the line. And I mean the whole line for Legacy, which has other cartoony characters but her bird and robot heads stand out as particularly cartoony. I'd like to see if they can do other Decepticons from her era in this style.

Deco is good, but might be a little too subtle. The colors Hasbro selected are all good ones that mimic the animation models, but I do miss the splashes of blue and gold, and the Star Raider symbol is black on dark purple. I completely missed it when I was shooting the pictures for robot mode, it blends in so well - other figures in this line share this problem. With pirates, having a faction symbol a bit more in your face would seem to be good to sell the cohesive theme, but I suspect the theme was secondary to delivering a figure that collectors might squeeze in alongside Thermidor and Scorponok. It was a great era for new characters, and the collector market prices seem to agree with that opinion.

The conversion is similar to other figures - if you've got Terrorsaur or Airazor, this isn't all that much different. The legs become the legs, the wings become the wings, the heads flip over, the arms tuck in... you can do this one. It's not a hassle.

I wasn't sold on this figure as I was picky with Robots in Disguise stuff, but I was taken with the colors. When I started seeing people taking pictures of the bird mode, I got interested - the colorful eyes, the opening beak, the personality was enough to get me to say "yes." I'm also generally interested in robot animal toys, and Hasbro delivered - mostly - by replacing many of the feathery bits with robotic ones. The wings are now removable to use as weapons in robot mode, and stay connected to her bird wings nicely. She can be in a flight mode, or look like she's perching, and Hasbro baked in enough articulation that you'll probably have a lot of fun with her in either mode. While Hasbro nailed the eyes, and the purple parts, some of other color flourishes were left out - so you might not be completely in love with the final product, but I think it's pretty good given the budget and the limitations on putting a "new" character in an exclusive capsule program.

If you need that skinny, smooth, simplified look of the 2015 series, this may not do it for you - but it's close. As a G1-iffied, Beast Wars-infused new take on the character? She's great. I'm curious if she'll sell well given her relative obscurity, but it's great to see her and it gives me hope that just because a beloved cartoon character missed a toy, it won't necessarily go without one forever. For $25, I think she's good enough and worth picking up so we'll see more figures like her. I could be wrong, but I assume this may well be the final toy we get of this character in this style as there's been minimal returning to non-G1 toy styles in recent years.

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