[Toys] Transformers 2007: Deluxe Premium Bumblebee

Images provided by Seibertron.

Till now, I've never owned a Bumblebee throughout the movie trilogy. I honestly couldn't think of how to review this one, because... I got two Bumblebees from GeneralTekno here. One from the first movie, one from the next. So, I'll throw in a mention of how the latter one makes changes to the figure. Seems fair. That said, onto the review!

Back in 2007 when the first movie was already out and the toyline was attempting to squeak its last breath of content before moving onto other things, they started to do a "Premium" series of the main characters, where they upped the paint quality and I guess made some tweaks, I dunno exactly since I only own this one. I just know of one particular head change here.

Ah, the first Concept Camaro Bumblebee... This was always the one I liked the look of best. It's got a lot of transformation lines on it, sure, but it looks nice. I think given they were still finding their footing with the movie line, it looks great.

I don't know exactly what changes the alt mode has aside from maybe a change in the shade of yellow, but I do like the tinted windows, they're nice. That's all I gotta say on this guy, I see the vehicle enough to not have too much of an attachment to it, sadly.

In robot mode we are introduced to the big change on the Premium treatment; The new head. The original head was fairly round and was based on concept art, so it didn't match the movie much. Post-movie, this was modeled after his battle mask. I do like that they made a variant, it's cool for those who like the mask. The only nitpick about it is, that's all you get. There is no alternate head, and I feel like this one makes his body look bigger than it should be. But again, nitpicks.

The transformation is very simple considering it's a movie figure, which I LOVE, because I was getting annoyed by those figures which can take up to a dozen of your precious minutes to transform because one part just wouldn't peg in right and another part doesn't have enough clearance or causes the vehicle to be lopsided. Rambles. Anyway, it's nice, and I like the robot mode. While some joints have some clearance issues due to the kibble, given the time of his release he's a solid figure.

One particular reason I wanted this version of Bumblebee is the fact that he has two free hands! I dunno why but the idea of one hand being a cannon at all times was just kinda not working for me. This guy comes with a weapon which sorta acts as a canon; He can hold it, and if you open up the front of it, a blade comes out. Odd choice of weapon but I like how it looks.

RIGHT, I should mention the other figure I got at this point. With the coming of Revenge Of The Fallen, a preview wave was introduced to start us out with. Included in the wave was the much anticipated Soundwave, and the much less anticipated remold of the 2007 Bumblebee. This took the Premium paintjob approach - making it a regular thing and not just special treatment - and gave it a VERY well done head sculpt. It also replaced the one arm with a proper canon, with a missile firing gimmick. The front grill is also altered. Apart from that and some minor paintjob touchups here and there, it's the same figure from 2007. In the same movie line another, entirely new Bumblebee was made, three in fact. It snowballed from there.

So, how do I put this... Overall, this is a Bumblebee! This is the first one with a better paintjob and battlemask head. I think that as far as owning a Bumblebee figure goes, this is good if you want something simple and don't mind the head of choice or the lack of model-accuracy. There's plenty of better ones, like the Battle Blade version which heavily matches the model, as well as features a good amount of weaponry and an optional battlemask. There's plenty of Bumblebees out there that better portray the character, this is probably the second least accurate of them. Get it if you like what you read above.