I was kind of intrigued by the Infernac Universe Infernacs from a “Why would anyone do this?” standpoint, so I decided to dip my toes into the water at the $10 price point with Bouldercrash, a Stone Age Tricycle with a stabby blade.

The toy is … fine. A bit dull with his overwhelming reddish brown, but not as dull as I feared. And lumpy, as was the style at the time in the Infernal Empire of Infernac during the reign of Inferniac II (or whatever the backstory is). And the underlying toy is fine. A bit compromised by his rigid spine extending down from his butt to right above the ground to accommodate an unconvincing weapon mode.

But, he rolls and everything locks into place, and the robot looks fine. There’s also a nice play features like a 5mm long tab on the edge of his deployed blade that would allow a gun with a 5mm port to mount. I’d rather have a 5mm port on the toy, as that opens up a lot more possibilities, but the tab is nice and a lot easier to mold.

All around not bad, other than concept and deco. He didn’t leave me feeling empty inside.

And then it struck me that I wish he was a Stone Age Technobot.

From Kingdom on, we’ve been getting some new characters in the Fossilizers, Junkeons and whatever the current Reassemblers are, and I do like new characters but not when they all look alike and have no characterization.

We’ve also been getting new versions of existing characters that are pretty slavish reimagining of G1, and G1-ish versions of other characters from elsewhere in the franchise.

But we haven’t been getting reimaginings of classic characters. I don’t know if I would want the reassemblers to officially be classic characters or not, because this would be weird stuff that we don’t want to clutter the characters’ histories with, but very inspired by them.

And Bouldercrash would have made a pretty wild reimagining of Afterburner.

It seems obvious that the Fossilizers could have been inspired by Dinobots, but honestly that might be too obvious. Terrorcons and Monsterbots are a bit more fun.

I don’t know what they could have done with Junkeons if they are already releasing G1 Autobots. It would have been a nice way to give us Mad Max style main cast, but they were putting out some of those characters already.

And next year, when they are doing their next batch, I want them starting from the question “What if the Combaticons were roadkill?” Maybe zombie roadkill.

I’m thinking Vortex would be a dead elk with a loose, spinning neck that lets his head spin with the antlers being like helicopter blades. With a gray fungus growing on him to get a bit of the G1 color scheme in there, and maybe some more psychedelic dark teal or whatever fungal trim.

Blast Off could be an eagle of some form, with a less psychedelic fungus treatment.

Brawl would be a turtle, crushed with tire treads and a part of his spine sticking out of his shell to represent the barrel.

Swindle could be a coyote, both to get the general color and because the coyote is supposed to be a trickster.

Onslaught is tricky as he is blue and green, has the guns, and can carry Brawl. I’m thinking alligator, to carry a turtle on his back, but I don’t know what the guns would be.

It would also really encourage the disassemble and swap parts play pattern, and building a super robot out of them, which has kind of faded during the Junkeons. Who wouldn’t want to reassemble bits of roadkill into new animals and robots?

Ok, this might not be the right time for roadkillotrons. Kids seem a bit too earnest these days. But we are going to get back to kids liking gross-out stuff again, and Hasbro should just file this idea away until it is time.

Cryptids vs Zombie Roadkill would make a really interesting theme for a kids cartoon.

Anyway, Bouldercrash is fine or whatever. And inspiring a pointless ramble like this is a kind of play pattern.