Dave's Shape Shifters Rant:

     Rhino

     Saw most of them at Toys R Us today, passed on the weak-looking
Spider-Man to bat one and the Sabretooth (didn't see Hulk).  The packaging
has changed so that it's not just a recycle of the Secret Weapon Force
blister packs, and it stands out nicely.

CAPSULE

     Humanoid mode looks good aside from a lot of seams.  Rather involving
transformation to an okay-looking beast mode (which is a little unstable).
Moderately poseable in both modes.  Nowhere near as good as the Beast Wars
toys its size, but a lot cheaper.  Recommended.  $5.99 at Toys R Us.

RANT

     It looks like they're sticking with exclusively beast transforms in this
assortment, and Rhino's a good choice, since he's already got a rhinohide
pattern on his costume.  The toy is made of a mix of rigid plastic, slightly
flexible plastic (especially on parts that need to take a peg) and the horns
are made fom very flexible plastic.
     
     Humanoid Mode: Stands 6" (15cm) tall not counting his horn, which adds
almost another inch.  Arms only move at the shoulders, and poorly because the
joint is too low in the armpit.  The legs have good poseability, with ball
joint hips, limited knees and ankles.  The head turns, but is stuck in a
looking-down pose.  The "beast kibble" has very little impact on this mode,
which is to be expected since he already wears a rhino costume.  The biggest
thing is that he has rhino feet, plus toes on the crooks of his elbows.
There's lots and lots of seams on the toy, as well as some big hinge joints,
but he's generally pretty good-looking in this mode.  And the weird groin
resulting from his hip joints is minimal (unlike Hulk's, which is not only
pretty bad, but highlighted by his shorts).
     Transformation: Reminds me of, appropriately, Ironhide the elephant from
Magnaboss.  He basically turns inside out.  You have to transform him just
right, however, or the backplate won't stay pegged onto the sides, and the
toy will pop apart when handled.  The pectoral plates on the humanoid mode
are cleverly used as upper foreleg covers, and the shins of the humanoid's
legs become th ebelly of the beast.
     Beast Mode: Very compact, 5" (13cm) long, 3" (8cm) wide and 3" high.  It
has big gaps, weird curves and a big "undercarriage garbage" problem, but the
appearance isn't all that bad when you consider the design was optimized for
the humanoid mode.  It's held together by small pegs (about 1mm long and
thinner than that), so it pops apart easily.  There's not much poseability,
just mouth and tail really.  The mouth opens a bit far back, much like with
the original Rhinox toy.  In this mode, however, the missile launcher becomes
usable.  It looks like all of this line of Shape Shifters uses the nifty
foil-coil missiles first seen on Secret Weapons Apocalypse, where a springy
coil of metal (shaped like a Chinese Yo-Yo) pushes back into the head of the
weapon.  Since the missile is self-launching, it needs only a small box to
hide in, eliminating the need to work a bulky launcher into the design.

     For six bucks, it's a pretty good toy, and it shows that ToyBiz is
taking its entry into the transforming toy game seriously.  And for those
with a penchant for kitbashing, it could probably be made into a Transmetal
II Rhinox pretty easily.  Paint one of the pecs chrome green, paint the face
green with gold trim, maybe draw some circuitry on the back in silver and
gold paint, etc.  The only possible problem is that the pecs tend to scrape a
bit while flipping around.

     Dave Van Domelen, off to review lots and lots of Mystic Knights toys....