Mixmaster is probably my favourite Constructicon, I always loved Cement Mixers as a youth and the personality of a insane chemist is great.

Mixmaster is the second best proportioned G1 Constructicon, behind Scrapper. even though most of it is just a block of purple plastic. The Head is nice looking but because it's so deep into his body you can't see the molded detail in there.

His Animation Model splits his truck cab into two feet and that's understandable but I think I prefer the single giant stomper of a cab.

Posability, much like almost all the Constructicons, is shoulders, and unlike Scrapper or Long Haul, you can't cheat to get knees out of him.

He comes with his Laser Pistol (which is the same name as Scrappers gun) Devastators Gun, and some bits for the launcher in his head, I've always put the Twin Blaster in there, not helped by the fact that I lost the other bits.

Transformations great, has a lot of satisfying clicks and I always liked how the cab works. However this Transformation is hell on his stickers when going into leg mode.

Cement Mixer mode is small, and has a spinning cylinder (is it called a cylinder? I don't know Construction vehicles) it's very well accompanied by molded detail on the back. The chromed grill is very good looking.

He's got a port in front of the cylinder that you can mount his gun on and I think that's where they got his chemical gun in the cartoon model.

Swivelbot (his Animation Model also includes the screw holes on his chest)

Nice review! I always liked the creative accessories that came with Mixmaster, and you're right - he has great proportions. A very cool toy. (Plus, I liked that his drum actually spins).

JB

Swivelbot wrote:

> Mixmaster is probably my favourite Constructicon, I always loved Cement Mixers as a youth and the personality of a insane chemist is great.

I think Bob Budiansky did a killer job of taking these fairly ordinary toys and injecting life and personality into them. What he did with the characters seems so obvious in retrospect, but I think that's because a lot of us grew up with these characters and so we just accepted it.

But, Mixmaster is a great example of this. So Hasbro presents Budiansky with a toy, and it's a cement mixer, and they tell him it's a bad guy character. So how do you take this toy and Transformerize it? Well, what if instead of mixing together cement, he can mix together all sorts of chemicals, and he's this veritable chemistry lab on wheels? And what if (perhaps from the fumes from all the chemicals) he's just a little bit crazy? What if he cackles like a witch while he mixes his concoctions together? Like, that's brilliant. It makes the character so interesting and charismatic.

He ended up basically repeating the same idea for Quickmix, a cement mixer who was also a chemist. I guess certain concepts just made sense in Budiansky's mind.

> His Animation Model splits his truck cab into two feet and that's understandable but I think I prefer the single giant stomper of a cab.

See, I think he's actually my least favorite of the six Constructicon toys, and it's mainly because of his gigantic block-for-legs. Even the Tonka GoBots managed to have an unspoken design rule that everybody got separate legs, and everybody had the ability to raise their arms. (I think. Somebody please correct me if I'm wrong about this.)

Mixmaster would have benefited enormously from something approaching actual feet. Even if the cab section didn't rotate at all, and he just had little foot plates that swung down like Jazz or Counterpunch, that would have been slightly better.

> Posability, much like almost all the Constructicons, is shoulders, and unlike Scrapper or Long Haul, you can't cheat to get knees out of him.

But you can artificially extend his legs and give him stilts! It's absurd and disproportionate, but you can totally do it.

> He comes with his Laser Pistol (which is the same name as Scrappers gun) Devastators Gun, and some bits for the launcher in his head, I've always put the Twin Blaster in there, not helped by the fact that I lost the other bits.

Well, the twin launcher is what he wears in the cartoon (or, at least, a scaled-down nubby version of it) so this is clearly the correct choice.

> Cement Mixer mode is small, and has a spinning cylinder (is it called a cylinder? I don't know Construction vehicles) it's very well accompanied by molded detail on the back. The chromed grill is very good looking.

I think it's called a mixing drum, if I'm not very much mistaken. I love the very specific 1980's aesthetic of the early Diaclone toys, and that includes the vehicle mode styling. I hated when they tried to modernize Mixmaster for Combiner Wars. That's not what he's supposed to look like. For better or for worse, these characters are stuck in this era. Soundwave and Blaster need to be cassette players, and Mixmaster needs to be a construction vehicle from 40 years ago.

> He's got a port in front of the cylinder that you can mount his gun on and I think that's where they got his chemical gun in the cartoon model.

I love that some thought was given by Takara to allowing the Constructicons to wear their Devastator combiner parts, even in vehicle mode. It ranges from practical (Mixmaster's gun) to very silly (Hook wearing Devastator's head, and will you please just fold it down and pretend you don't notice it), but at least you didn't end up with a pile of parts that didn't go anywhere, like you did with the later Scramble City teams.

> Swivelbot (his Animation Model also includes the screw holes on his chest)

The animation models for the Constructicons mighty actually based on their Hasbro box art. So, basically, whatever details Mark Watts thought to include, those were the design elements that informed Floro Dery's final design. (The vehicle-mode designs were based on mistransformed toys, so we're honestly lucky they even look like construction vehicles at all.)

Zob (seriously, they missed like three steps to get Long Haul into dump truck mode)