I think Sideswipe has been everyone’s favourite Autobot at one time or another.
And Takara’s Masterpiece line does an amazing work at capturing the alt mode. This is genuinely a model Lamborghini Countach LP500S. There are minor compromises, but overall a great attention to detail. The MP-12+ reissue has more accurate cartoon colors. I wasn’t necessarily choosing this version for this reason, but I am glad that the side windows are clearly split in two in this version.
I don’t usually spend so much time in car mode, but unavoidably Sideswipe has one of the best ones. I actually never cared very much for Sunstreaker, who’s supposedly his older “brother”. According to most of the canon (G1, Marvel, Dreamwave and IDW Publishing) they’ve always been brothers and Sideswipe is always trying to prove himself in battle while Sunstreaker is supposedly the better warrior. I’ve never been much a fun of this dynamic. I always saw Sideswipe as far more relatable, and was saddened by his fate in IDW Publishing, but as comics go you know characters tend to come back.
You won’t find this out until you handle him, but his legs are mostly hollow. He still balances quite nicely but I’d love some diecast for extra stability. There are small window panes that have to rotate a certain way into his legs that I’m kinda wary of breaking with time. He’s going to be posing on the shelf in robot mode for most of the time so it’s a minor concern and I hope to get better at avoiding.
If we want to do bottom line, the complaint that I’ve often read about is that he’s small compared to say, a lot of the main Decepticon cast. You’ll find that is true about almost every car mode Autobot because the cars in scale are much smaller than the planes. That’s the reason why the Seekers pretty much tower above most of these guys.
On a sidenote, I don’t have MP-10 Optimus Prime. I’m considering getting him. You might wonder why he’s never been in the top of my list. If I get the toy, I’ll let you know why I never subscribed to the church of Transformer Jesus, but you probably have already guessed that I always found the Decepticons more interesting.
A shot of the shelf where Sideswipe strikes a pose with his Autobot comrades. I know I am mixing classic G1 with IDW here but you can see they’re all of a comparable size. I might get an MP-10 to share the space. Don’t worry, I am getting back to the Lost Light crew soon.
That will do for now.
Never Think Impossible 