Noisy, irritates all nearby. Hair-trigger temper, blusteringly belligerent... a terrifyingly effective warrior. Enormously strong, resistant to most conventional artillery. As tank, goes 45mph, range 600 miles. Turret mounted gun shoots 200lbs TNT-equivalent shells, twin sonic cannon shoots powerful, ear-splitting 300-decibel bursts of concentrated sound energy in stereo. In robot Mode, has 10-Megawatt electron gun. Combines with fellow Combaticons to form "Bruticus".
First/Last Comic Appearance (US) - Issue 24, January 1987 / Issue 43, August 1988
First/Last Comic Appearance (UK) - Issue 63, May 31st 1986 / Issue 137, October 31st 1987
First/Last Cartoon Appearance - Episode 58 (Season 2 #42), December 10th 1985 / Episode 98 (Season 4 #3), November 11th 1987
Figure Details
Manufacturer - Hasbro
Toyline - ROTF
Additions/Mods:
- Added a Decepticon symbol to the shoulder
- Added a Decepticon symbol to the tank body
- Added various Reprolabels
Review
Brawl is the left peg of
Bruticus and other than that importand fact he is a big, green tank. That's about all I can remember of Brawl, he lacked the personality of his 'leg mate'
Swindle, and was little more than a blunt instrument used to blow stuff up and presumably kick some
Autobot tail in his combined form. In the repainted
Energon set, the figure used to represent Brawl was at least a tank, and was the right colour, too. But is this similarity enough to convey the character of old?
Appearance (Robot Mode) 4/10
I'm going to be 'brutally' honest and tell you that this robot looks
dreadful. There is no way that I would have this abomination of a figure in my collection if it wasn't for the integral part he plays in forming Bruticus. Firstly, he resembles a grasshopper more than a humanoid robot, thanks to his stupid feet and enormous back kibble which resembles wings more than anything else. Brawl should be short and squat, powerfully built and angular. What we have here is a skinny, insectoid mess who looks unpalatable from any angle at which you choose to display him. His head sculpt is utterly daft, with huge protuding 'ears'. The light-piping is nice but that's about it.
FansProject provide a large gun for him to hold but unfortunately that is insufficient to obscure the entire figure. I decided to add some feet which I stole from a spare
Air Raid to redress the ski feet issue, but there's only so much feet can do to rescue a poor robot.
Appearance (Alternate Mode) 6/10
Thankfully the tank isn't nearly so dire as the robot mode, but that's only because so many concessions were made with the robot to keep the tank looking decent-ish. The distinctive single barrel sported by Brawl has been replaced by a twin barreled configuration, which looks ok, but again isn't Brawl as we would know him. The turret does offer a good range of movement and the guns can be adjusted vertically too. The colour scheme is 2 vaguely clashing shades of green and grey which look OK, but not particularly impressive.
Transformation 6/10
This figure looks damn ugly due in some part to the overly-simplistic transformation. The figure may be scout sized but it is inexcusable that the entire length of the tank is left to just dangle off the back of the robot, like a pair of deflated wings. Surely, these treads could have had a split in the middle and end up being stowed in a more elegant way. The head is obscured by the chest area, and the stupid 'ears' of the head are in fact guns that add nothing to the figure at all. The rest of the turret is formed by the arms, which are tabbed together, and the guns are then reversed to obscure the arms somewhat.
Poseability 6/10
Articulation on this figure isn't bad with neck swivel, ball-jointed shoulders, hips, elbows and knees. The feet also have limited ankle articulation. There is no waist swivel however, but this figure should still be able to pose pretty well if it were not for the stupid kibble weighing the back of the figure down. Basically, despite the fact that this figure has ridiculously enormous skis for feet, he finds it rather difficult to stand up without having the tank kibble also in contact with the ground. And why would you want to pose a figure who looks so daft, anyway.
Quality 7/10
Unfortunately this figure is quite robust so will probably survive a nuclear winter unscathed, not that you would want it to.
Overall - 29/50
In truth, this is a ghastly looking figure which no-one would have in their collection, were it not for the absolute necessity of it to create Bruticus. I really hope that one day FansProject replace this silly-looking thing with their own take on Brawl, which does the character justice. This is a terrible, yet utterly essential figure.
