Ever have one of those TFs with one great mode and one lousy mode? I've had plenty. And Razor Claw, I'm sorry to say, is one such toy.
Velociraptor Mode
Standing 9 cm (3.54") tall and measuring 19 cm (7.48") long, Razor Claw is a Velociraptor mongoliensis, the same as the ones in "Jurassic Park." He's coloured mostly a dark green with black and orange spots, white teeth, red eyes, and very light green arms, knees, and toes. His faction symbol is emblazoned on his left thigh. And his robot head is accessed by flipping back the rear part of his skull. Very clever how his eyes are actually part of antennae. Coloured metallic silver and black, with orange eyes, the robot head looks very much like one of those Andalite thingys from the infamous Animorphs line. Which shouldn't be surprising, since the Mutants were originally intended as Animorphs toys.
I have to say that this is probably the best raptor Hasbro's ever done, bar none. Unlike the rather blocky Dinobot, RC is very sleek and lanky, with long arms and legs, and a narrow skull. About the only thing wrong about him is his stumpy tail. RC is also wonderfully articulated, with moving shoulders (ball joints), hips, knees, second knees, toes, neck, and jaw. The toes are especially well done, even though he's got one too many on each foot. The large killing claws can rise up for savage attacks and the outer toe is, surprisingly, on a ball joint, allowing it to pivot outwards. This gives RC extra stability for action poses. Finally, RC has the same
excellent detailing that we've come to expect from Beast Wars toys. His entire body is covered in scales and wrinkles and his back and flanks have a sunken, gaunt look to them.
RC has a slight undercarriage garbage problem, in that the wolverine claws are clearly visible behind his legs. Overall however, a realistic and fearsome-looking Velociraptor.
Transformation
Okay, I actually checked the instructions after fiddling
around with this guy in my car outside of TRU. Basically the raptor flips over and around, with lots of rearranging and folding of parts. A true orgami puzzle.
Wolverine Mode
Here's where it's goes bad. As a wolverine, RC is
considerably smaller, only 7 cm (2.8") tall and 12 cm (4.7") long. And boy, does this wolverine have its problems! The most obvious one is, of course, its green colour. While I can accept Poison Bite's wild tropical scheme, RC looks plain silly this way. Wolverines are dark brown and black, with light patches. Hasbro could easily have painted RC these
colours, and the raptor mode wouldn't have suffered at all. Heck, it'd probably have looked even cooler that way.
Next there's his legs. Wolverines have short, powerful legs, like a bear's. RC, OTOH, has rather long and thin rear legs, and some dimbulb at Hasbro thought the claws would look good painted bright orange. And then there's his front limbs. Formed from the raptor's rear legs, they're ridiculously
huge. And no matter how much fiddling you do, there's no way to get them to look right. Also, while the designers succeeded in replacing most of the wrinkle patterns with fur ones, the feet are still scaly, making them look even worse. Heck, I can't imagine for the life out of me how RC's able to
run with such outlandish proportions.
Next, his tail. Instead of being located above his rump, it's sticking out from between his legs, allowing for all kinds of rude jokes which I won't bother to outline. At least they got the shape of it correct. They also got the shape of the head correct, and it certainly looks ferocious, with sharp teeth and narrowed eyes. The lower jaw moves slightly. RC's front legs have all the posability they had in raptor mode, and his rear legs are articulated at the hips, knees, and ankles. On that note, he's probably the first wolverine that can stand on his front paws and wiggle his back legs in the air. Perhaps that's how he runs?
Overall
Suspsy Sez: Razor Claw is like one of those exams where you do great on one essay question, and lousy on the other. He has an excellent raptor mode, but his wolverine mode blows big time. It's not just the green that does it, it's also those hideously shapen legs of his. The lack of a gimmick doesn't help his case either. Worth getting if you're a dinosaur nut like me, but no doubt disappointing for others.
Suspsy
| Reviewer | Suspsy |
| Date | January 30th 2002 |
| Score |  (7 out of 10) |
| Reads | 7544 |
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