Dave's DinoZaurs Rant:

     8" Giganodragon

     The 8" figures showed up at Toys R Us in Columbus this week, and I
decided to just get Giganodragon, figuring Dino T.rex and Dino Brachio would
just end up in storage within days.

CAPSULE

     Giganodragon: Okay robot mode, simple but fun transformation, pretty
nifty beast mode.  Recommended.  $12.99 at Toys R Us.

RANT

DRAGOZAUR: Giganodragon
Beast Mode: Serpentine (Chinese) Dragon

     Packaging: The 8" figures come in boxes rather than blister packs.  The
removable inner bubble forms part of the exterior of the box, in much the
same way the BWII and BWNeo boxes work (in fact, the box style feels like a
deliberate riff on the BWII boxes).  Giganodragon was secured by 5 twist-
ties, twisted in a new way that makes them a LOT harder to remove by hand.
Instructions are a separate sheet inside the box, although they assume the
default mode is the dragon...the toy is actually packaged in robot mode,
since it's more compact and requires fewer twist-ties to secure.

     Robot Mode: 7.5" tall, continuing the line's streak of using anything
but the right measurements for the classification scheme.  They shoulda just
gone with "Big/Medium/Small" or something like that.  The main color is
silver chrome that has been "washed" with a greenish black paint to bring out
the cracks in the bony structure and generally make it look old.  The face is
a flatter silver color, with red eyes.  A few bits of green are on the chest
and the eyes of the helmet...this appears to be a thin layer of translucent
green paint over the chrome, rather than green vac-metal.  The arms have
purple translucent paint over the chrome in places to match up with the
colors of the rest of the body in beast mode.  Dragon-head's eyes are red (as
is the inside of the lower jaw, nice touch), and the joints and feet are flat
dark gray.  There's very little in the way of obvious seams, although you can
*just barely* see daylight through the gap running down his torso.
     The shoulders and elbows are "universal joints," a hinge and a swivel
combined to give ball-joint-like poseability.  The left fist can swing into
the forearm and allow the "bone club" (really a sword) formed by the tail tip
to swing forward over the wrist.  The hips and knees only have about 30
degrees of freedom, and most of that is the wrong way on the knees.  This is
because each of the leg joints is a pair of ball joints limited by the tight
seams of the body.  This makes dynamic poses impossible, but you can get some
decent stances.  The ankles are limited ball joints, helping with stable
standing.  Trying to force the hips or knees can cause the balls to pop out
of their sockets...in fact, the whole toy has something of a problem with
joints popping, although this is more pronounced in beast mode.
     Giganodragon's right hand is his dragon head.  It's jointed in such a
way that moving it forward causes the jaws to open and then close again.  A
lever under the head lets you do this rapidly, for jaw-snapping action.

     Transformation: Almost as simple as grabbing both arms and pulling, then
twisting the body parts around so they all face the right direction.  But
there's some tricky bits around the robot head, and parts easily pop apart
but are sometimes harder to put back together.

     Beast Mode: Okay, time to go look for a meter stick.  Fully stretched
out and then put back together (a few joints pop if you pull it out too
hard), it's a very respectable 35" (88cm) long.  Not quite a meter of dragony
goodness, but close.  It drapes nicely about the shoulders as a scarf, which
is how I have it at the moment, since there's not enough room on my desk to
leave it in beast mode (might arrange something with wall hooks, though).
     It's a little lumpy in places, as the parts which become the chest
aren't symmetric, and the head doesn't hide all that well...but where could
it hide?  The underside of each body segment is a translucent purple plastic,
although this translucence isn't very obvious in most places.
     Tons and tons of ball joints connecting the 12 central body segments
(plus 4 more segments made from the arms), but it's kinda hard to get it into
any pose that can support itself.  Plus, if you turn one segment, you turn
the others connected to it, as some joints are stiffer than others.  It's
best at draping along a surface or constricting some hapless robot.

     Overall: Taking on a snake-like body is a major challenge, and
Giganodragon rises to meet that challenge.  It's not the best toy I've seen,
and it has some serius flaws (largely related to cheap production), but it's
pretty good.  And for thirteen bucks, it's pretty kickin.

     Dave Van Domelen, also bought Ultra Visser-3 today, but will wait until
tomorrow to open that box and review it....