This toy was originally meant for the Buzzworthy Bumblebee line, which has since been abolished. While he ended up being marketed in the standard United trade dress, this toy remains a Target exclusive, with limited quantities available through Hasbro Pulse.

I got mine from the Target web site, but I had also ordered from Hasbro... and got a shipping notification for both on the same day. Oops! So, I've got an extra coming, if anybody needs this guy.

A few years ago, back when I realized the Siege toy line was going to consist largely of characters in their Cybertronic forms, I was hoping we'd see Wheeljack as part of that series. We didn't get to see what every single character transformed into prior to getting their familiar Earth modes, but Wheeljack was one of them, so he seemed like a natural addition to Siege. The fact that we didn't get him was a travesty! I've been waiting a long time for them to produce this version of the character. In fact, his release effectively marks the completion of all the characters from the "More Than Meets the Eye" pilot episode whose Cybertron vehicle forms we actually saw.

Wheeljack comes packaged in robot mode, a comparatively tiny Deluxe-sized toy in a Voyager-sized box, with his various accessories tied down with stretchy ties to the front of the inner cardboard tray. No tissue paper to mess around with, this time. The intended purpose for his accessories are a) a shield for vehicle mode, b) buzzsaw blades for vehicle mode, and c) his shoulder launcher. All of these parts have alternate uses, however.

As a robot, Wheeljack stands at exactly five inches in height, making him the same height as the Earthrise toy. His proportions are a little different, with shorter arms, a smaller upper torso, and some, big, bulky boots and a very large backpack. The cockpit on his chest has a translucent green window, which is accurate to the animation. I'm not sure why, but Wheeljack has always had green-tinted windows in the G1 cartoon. He's a bright white with a medium grey as his secondary color, and has a silver-painted mask and helmet prongs and fins on the side of his head. His eyes are painted a deep blue, arguably a bit too dark to be Autobot blue.

I was hoping perhaps that the backpack could pop off in some capacity, but it's pinned in place. You just sort of have to look at him from only certain angles, and pretend it's not there. The boots also have a lot of folded-up flaps that are kind of unavoidably there. But, in the show, he transforms into an improbably large box-shaped vehicle, and there's no real way to get that out of his existing robot parts.

He's got a dedicated mounting spot on his right shoulder for his shoulder cannon, and like the Takara SCF figure from years ago, you can only mount it on the one shoulder. His blast shield is three pieces of translucent dark blue plastic, and it comes as a straight piece, but if you disassemble it and rebuild it into a V-shape, you can mount it to his back as a set of preposterously huge wings. It's great that they found a way to connect it to his robot mode, but this isn't really its intended use. The buzzsaw blades can mount on his back for storage, but they can also be plugged into his shoulder cannon (which he can also hold in his hand if you want). Mark Maher of Hasbro said in a recent livestream that the buzzsaw blades can double as the magnetic dominator disks, as seen in "The Core," which the Autobots secretly attached to the Constructicons in order to override their programming. (I hope the Studio Series '86 Constructicons have spots to attach them!)

His transformation is crazy and complicated, and involves lots of panels unfolding from the legs to build the sides of the vehicle, with the backpack forming the roof and windshield. The robot arms are the only robot parts that are still visible in vehicle form, as they plug together to become the front bumper. It's supported by undercarriage struts that lift it off the ground and make him look like he's hovering in this form.

The vehicle form is about 4.5" in length, and around three inches tall at the spoiler. You can tell it's based directly on his screen appearance from "More Than Meets the Eye," but put through a Hasbrofication filter. There are more surface details and greeblies, the "vacuum cleaner" bumper isn't quite as smooth, and the side windows cheat a bit. In the show, he had side windows that wrapped around the sides of the vehicle and part of the roof, but on this toy, only a piece of each side window is translucent plastic, with the rest being painted a light sea green. He has no visible Autobot symbols in this mode, which is also screen accurate. (I'm honestly surprised they didn't include a dashboard with the little blinky light that flashed when Wheeljack talked. The toy is already so rich in authentic detail that it would have fit right in!)

While it's not in his instructions, the toy is designed to interact with Origin Bumblebee in a couple of different ways. For one, the energy conductors that came with Bumblebee are designed to clip to the sides of Wheeljack's spoiler for transport, which is why Wheeljack's got those C-shaped clips on the sides. Also, Origin Bumblebee can actually fit inside Wheeljack's vehicle mode, as seen in the cartoon! The back panel of Wheeljack's vehicle mode can, indeed, fold down to act as a ramp, and Bumblebee can be tucked inside. You have to cheat a little and fold in Bumblebee's side wings to get it to work, but the fact that you can still stuff the entire Bumblebee toy inside of him is kind of amazing. (I imagine the main reason it's not mentioned in the instructions is because Bumblebee is from 2021, so Hasbro would be advertising a feature for a toy that's no longer in production.)

There's a scene from the episode when Wheeljack is ambushed by Decepticon weaponsfire, and he raises a blast shield that covers a good chunk of his vehicle mode. The shield will snap to his vehicle mode in its V-shaped configuration. The buzzsaw blades can also plug into the front of the vehicle bumper, so Wheeljack can burrow his way through Decepticon blockades. "Mind if I cut in?"

Finally, the shield can also act as a piece of the road to the Autobot city-base Iacon, if you build it into its straight configuration and place Wheeljack on top of it. There are so many great tributes to the G1 cartoon, all contained within this single toy. Hasbro absolutely did not have to go this hard, but they did, and I love them for it.

As a Voyager-class toy, Wheeljack sold for $34.99, which is a little pricy, but there's a lot of complexity and engineering that went into his construction, which wouldn't have been possible at a Deluxe-class price point. And he's so damn cool that I don't even care. We are so spoiled as a fandom, with all these incredible tributes and homage toys that would have been a pipe dream even a few short years ago. The Transformers team loves Transformers and it shows, and they also love the fans, considering how hard they work to bring us such cool toys.

Zob (also found the Playmates reissue classic Voltron lions at Target yesterday, and I'm extremely pleased about it)