Dirt Boss

Height: 9cm to top of head and overall vehicle length.

Articulation: 14 total points - 3 points each arm: ball joint shoulder, ball joint elbow, hinge wrist; 4 points each leg: ball join hip, ball joint knee, double hinged ankle.

Colors: Molded tennis ball green, medium grey, green-yellow; Painted tennis ball green, bronze, red.

Accessories: N/A

Release Data: Released on May 30th, 2009 with the first assortment of ROTF Scouts at a price of US$7.99.

Author: ExVee

(more...)


Though he is usually occupied acting as a servant to larger, more powerful Decepticons, Dirt Boss has big plans. He constantly schemes to acquire more power, laying plans to betray or discredit his competitors and superiors in the hope of taking their positions. In combat, his body is as surprisingly agile as his mind. It's not uncommon to see him leaping through the air towards the enemy, with all his weapons blazing.

Dirt Boss may have the unique quality of having been homaged in another TF series before his toy was even close to being released. The the final season of Transformers Animated, a third Constructicon was introduced - Dirt Boss, the fork lift. Too strange I think to be a coincidence, even though this Dirt Boss doesn't use a Core Drill to mind control other Transformers, at least not according to the bio note...



Robot Mode

Dirt Boss has probably one of the least extreme examples of the movie styling of any of the current round of toys. If not for the design of the face and shape of the lower legs to give it away, you could pretty easily pass this off as something Universey.

Dirt Boss has a great deal of his vehicle mode not especially hidden in robot mode. The canopy over the operator's seat rises up several centimeters above the head, and the forklift's lifter unit is plainly visible on either arm. Plus a folded up mass of vehicle remnants on the back and wheels set on the legs, and little or nothing is especially incorporated or integrated into the robot itself. It is just a Scout, afterall.

The blades of the forklift are hinged and can be pointed straight out from the arms, or folded down to sort of get out of the way. In both placement and how they can position, I'm strongly reminded of Energon Jetfire, who would end up with similar arm-mounted projections in one of that toy's combination modes.

Articulation and design have been prioritized over gimmick or handheld weaponry, which seems a common choice among the ROTF Scouts. Of particular note among the typical series of ball joints is hinges at the wrists, which really have an altogether different purpose, plus the double-jointed ankles. In truth, I'm finding those ankles to hurt the toy's stability somewhat. The joints are not as tight as I'd like, and so it seems that one or the other ankle joint will slip out of place and unbalance the whole toy. In fact, looseness in the joints seems to be a problem in general for Dirt Boss. Thankfully the legs suffer much less from this, but the arms have considerable issues. It may be a blessing that the toy has no extra bits to try to hold, as I'm unsure how much weight these arms might support without firming up the ball joints. I can't say whether this is an issue of individual variance, or a general matter of the tolerance of the plastic, but I do wish the arms were a little sturdier.

Though not intended at all, I can't help but see the face of a washing machine whenever I glance at the circular design on the toy's already boxy torso. The package photo shows this with a great deal more paint, but in either case it's not apparent what this is supposed to be. As I noted already, the typical movie style influences are on the weak side in this toy (for contrast, just wait for the gallery of Ransack...). The face shows it pretty strongly, but skews more toward human appearance rather than the much more alien qualities typical to the movie style. The head has no neck joint, though it looks like there should be one. It's just an illusion from the slightly odd construction where the front and sides of the head are a separate piece that attaches to the comparatively small back side.




Transformation

A little more fiddly and complicated than I'd like for a toy at this size. In particular the arm and leg ball joints make problems locking the main body of the vehicle mode together. Plus when you get it locked together certain other pieces don't want to fit together as they appear to be meant to.




Vehicle Mode

As I believe I mentioned in the review of Henkei Ironhide, I'm wary of pieces having to move in ways they don't feel intended to. Dirt Boss also has one of these intuitive stopping points that by all appearances you're supposed to go past to make it all work. But whether you go that way or not, you can't make every single part line up in a way that looks correct. Tabbing the arms and legs together as the toy is designed makes the steering wheel push up from the position depicted on the package. If you massage all the hinged panels so the steering wheel returns to more or less it's correct placement, you push the engine cover out of alignment. Go past the stop point in the hinge and the steering wheel and engine cover fit their intended places just right. But now the seat is out of place. And if you don't tab together the arms and legs, pretty much all stability of the vehicle mode goes. Like I said, it's fiddly. Not to mention that you might have to work at getting the wheels to align. Not nearly such a headache as the rest of it, but it's another victim of all the ball joints absolutely having to work together perfectly.

Getting past that, though, it's a nice little vehicle mode. A forklift has rarely been visited in the realm of Transformer alternate modes. To memory there may have been two prior, and both were Mini-Cons - one of those was more like some kind of hot rod forklift, so getting a normal piece of construction yard equipment is really neat for me. I'm pretty sure Dirt Boss is designed after gasoline fueled forklifts, rather than electric or propane such as would be used in a warehouse to avoid emissions toxic to the workers. Not that a Decepticon would concern himself with the respiratory welfare of a human.

Dirt Boss looks like he could be in a vague scale with Deluxe size cars. Setting him with Universe Hot Shot for example and the sizes don't immediately appear incompatible. If that's the case, this toy could be good accompanyment to at least the 1/32-ish scale driver figures from the Human Alliance toys.

Dirt Boss has some really nice details that prove the designers really pay attention to the real vehicles when planning out the toys. First, remember I mentioned hinged wrists in robot mode. The true purpose for those joints is in vehicle mode, as a pitch joint for the lifter unit. Real forklifts can angle their forks and lifters forward and backward a little ways to carry or offload their cargo, and this is excellently represented in this toy. Of course, the small size and relative lack of complexity of a Scout prevent the forks from being able to raise and lower, but this is a good substitute movement. Alas, I've yet to find an object light enough to be carried. Dirt Boss does have such a saddening lack of mass compared to the real deal. The other detail is less prominent or amazing comparatively, but I thought it neat. The steering wheel has a little knob near the bottom edge, just as real forklifts often do for when a driver must steer with one hand. It's a very small thing, but as you may have noticed in the past, I really enjoy little bits of accuracy like that.


Closing Remarks

For me, this seems like a good way to gradually work my way in to movie styled toys. It has much of the appearance and to a degree the feel of a more traditional Transformer. And in my case it was an unusual vehicle mode to help draw my interest.

Considering that I still remember the earliest Beast Wars Basics being around $5, it's a little hard to take the $8-9 price level Scouts are at today. Basics and Scouts have always been the first to show price increases among all Transformers pricepoints, though. Had the increase continued to be gradual from the $7 level at the end of Cybertron, I don't think I'd be feeling the sticker shock so acutely.

If the novelty of the vehicle mode isn't enough to catch your interest, and you're not drawn just by high articulation, Dirt Boss may not be the right choice for you with its lack of any sort of gimmick or accessory. I can appreciate the vehicle mode, but I wouldn't mind something for the toy do be able to do. Still, for what it sets out to do, I'd say it's Very Good at it.

I have a hard time passing up unusual alternate modes, and I think Dirt Boss and Herr Biplane are going to be just the start where that's concerned...