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Manticore Megazord
The Manticore Megazord was released in 2006 and comes from the show "Power Rangers Mystic Force". I decided to take the plunge and pick one up when seeing on clearance at Toys R Us, marked down from $49.99, all the way to $10.98. I figured that at those savings it was worth a look. But unfortunately the reason it was on sale was simply that it's not a very good toy. 
The Manticore Megazord is the result of the combination of a Phoenix Zord and a Lion Zord. Taken on their own, each Zord is really pretty boring and neither has much individual play value.
It is only when they are combined do they start to get even a little bit interesting. The Phoenix Zord is able to sort of "dock" with the Lion Zord and connect to it's back via three magnets. 
Believe it or not, I actually prefer displaying the toy in this fashion instead of in Megazord mode. That does not bode well for any toy when it's main attraction is not shelf worthy. Now, when you want to transform to Megazord mode, the toy features a battery operated "Auto-Morph Action". Basically, this means it transforms by itself. To do this, you have to turn the wings of the Phoenix Zord down so that it can stand upright, allowing the Lion Zord to roll along the ground until they connect. When they do, the tail of the Phoenix Zord will compress a small button on the Lion Zord, alerting it to stop rolling and start transforming. Phoenix Zord prepared for docking
One of the biggest problems with this feature is how difficult it actually is to get the two toys to line up properly. Bandai included a thin cardboard placemat that you can use a starting reference point, but even with it's help, the transformation does not always work. Of course, that doesn't stop the toy from continuing to roll along, knocking over the Phoenix Zord and running into it on the ground and basically being a pain in the neck. So, it's difficult to do. But even when it works, the robot does not completely transform. You still have to rotate the Lion Zord's paws into order to reveal the robots fists. And then you have to remove the Phoenix Zord's tail and transform it into a weapon. 
Of course, perhaps the most visually obvious downfall of this gimmick is how badly the Manticore Megazod ends up looking because of it. Everything beneath the waist is just one big lump of plastic, with no articulation or play value whatsoever. Frankly, it just looks AWFUL. So the main featured gimmick barely works, doesn't work completely and makes the toy look terrible. Great. Just great. I know I would give up an action feature in favor of a nicer looking design and some poseability. The only thing on the Megazord that can be posed is the arms. They move up and down and side to side (a little). 
The completed weapon is pretty stupid, too. The robot really can't even hold it. Instead, it holds a small handle that is connected to it and the bottom rests on his right foot, often falling out of the hole it's meant for anyway. The weapon does spin around when the Manticore Megazord rolls forward. 
When finally completed, the Manticore Megazord has a big space in between it's head and chest. There is a small black panel that you can use to fill in this space, but when it's in place, you are unable to transform it back into the separate Zords. So I just leave it down. You barely notice the emptiness from the front anyway. The lion head can also be pulled out and placed onto the separately sold Titan Megazord to form the "Ultimate Titan Mode". The black panel on the inside front rotates up
So, what exactly does this toy have going for it? Well, it's colors are sort of unique for a robot. And....uhhhmm... that's about it. Unless you are just a total Power Ranger or Sentai completist, I can't recommend that you buy this one. Even for the $11 I paid. $11 will get you a large cheese pizza in most places. And if I could swap this thing for a large cheese pizza right now, I'd do it in a heartbeat. (Thanks to Eva_Unit 4A", for reminding me of a couple of features I forgot about!) Submitted by NekroDave on 14 June, 2008 - 09:29. Click on a thumbnail to enlarge
 Oh, one other thing I forgot that's a bit on the glaring side... The bird sittin' on top of the Mystic Lion here is actually called the Mystic Firebird; the Red Ranger himself (in his regular form) becomes the humanoid-shaped Mystic Phoenix Titanzord that is part of the Titan Megazord. Here, in Legend mode, he creates the Mystic Firebird. (In "MagiRanger", they were MagiFirebird and MagiLion, respectively.)  Look at you go. :) I'd really like to see you do more videos in the future. :) Either way a great unbiased review as always. ___________________  Thanks guys, for your compliments/help, guys. Unfortunately, the space between my buying this toy/playing with it/taking the pics for the review and when I actually wrote the review and shot the video was too long so I forgot a couple things in the meantime. When I inherited the camera from my brother, I looked around at all my toys to find something that actually had something worth showing on video and this was all I could find! Hahaha. I've since acquired a Five Robo Jumbo Machinder (which you can actually see for a split second at the very end of the video here. I decided to add the failed transformation attempts at the last second and didn't notice it) and I've got a video review for that ready to go. Just have to write the actual text review before I upload it. "This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"  Does anyone know if this guy is different from the magilegend, since both the magilegend and Travelion came to our shores untouched ? "Awww man, that's one ugly zord..." Tommy about BA Drivemax Megazord. Off the top of my head (having seen only photos of both), there's a lot of gold paint missing from the megazord; mostly because the plastic was already gold-colored when made. If you look closely, you can see a single colored stripe for each of the four Rangers that make up the Mystic Lion Zord; while that is the same, oddly Yellow's (on the right shoulder) is painted gold! And both the coloring [and possibly materials] for the chains beneath the Megazord's arms were changed to black instead of the original [die-cast metal?] gold. But features- and molds-wise (much as both of those sucketh), they seem to be the same. ... Oh BTW, Christopher, that is a great signature you have; Tommy commenting on the DMM. :D  11 $ and lot of complains??? Wow, this thing mus be really bad! Out here, the toy still at 60$ mark!  I wonder if we will be able to see big scaled sentai mechas that don't need their legs to be fused... Even with the $11 price tag, I still prefer buying MagiKing over this. That really isn't all that uncommon with big/carrier-type Super Sentai mecha. Most of them weren't designed to walk around on-screen in the earlier series; being designed to remain in place, fly/hover, or use wheels/tractor treads to get about. The problem in recent years, however, is that the big mecha now have the need to walk about with their legs rather than roll or fly-
That is what's wrong with these toys nowadays- they're being designed with legs that aren't utilized or apparent in toy form. Notice, also, that it's just bang-bang-bang-bang one right after the other for the last five years. The Revolver Mammoth from "Hurricanger" did have wheels in the series, but it also had moving armored sections that looked like legs; which carried over to the toy. All before this, if a carrier had a humanoid-shaped form, there was an indent to imply a split between legs, but they were non-functional and couldn't move. I do have to wonder why it is that they've been doing this lately... ... Dude, MagiKing pwnes more than a few of first lead mecha from some of the other series!  Does anyone else find it odd that this was put out by Bandai Creation, and not just plain old Bandai? They are 2 distinct branches of a parent company, ------------------------------ I was under the impression that BCreation was a US branch-only, and that they're the ones who come up with stuff that either that appears only in PR or wasn't in Super Sentai. Y'know, I did notice that but I wasn't sure if it was significant since all the Power Ranger toys I'd actually bought in a store previous to this one were Jumbos, and hence also from Bandai Creation. "This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"  Thanks for the review. I did see one at my local Toys R Us for about £25, I considered taking the plunge myself but in the end opted against it. Quite glad I made that choice now. Personally I think the other problem with a lot of the larger mecha these days is that they don't serve a purpose within the line as a whole. Aside from the chest swapping this toy doesn't interact with any of the other Magiranger/Mystic Force toys, and even the chest swapping doesn't really make sense for this toy. The same goes for Dekabase Robo, aside from storage functions it had no interactivity with any of the Dekaranger line (I must say that I did like this one on the show though). If they're going to keep releasing these it's time for a return to the 90s style carrier mecha that actually brought together all the component mecha, or at least something that feels like a key part of the line rather than something that was thrown in at the last minute for the sake of it. We might have a REAL ultrazord-like formation, since saidai-oh combines with the wolf, cheeta, jaguar, lion, chameleon and tiger gekibeast to form a new combination. "Awww man, that's one ugly zord..." Tommy about BA Drivemax Megazord. I've been praying for a new Ultra-class combo since 1996 when the Zeo Ultrazord graced the small screen. We've had wanna-bes like the Riding TimeRobo Alpha, Ultimate DaiBouken, and SaiDaiGeki Fire & SaiDaiGeki Touja, but none of them has ever come close, IMHO, to the original Ultrazord/Kyuukyoku Daizyujin (which remains the standard by which I judge all others). (Ya know, I take that back- the Revolver Gourai-Senpuujin & Revolver Tenrai-Senpuujin were pretty damed close, in my mind.) BTW, Christopher, we didn't see RinLion and RinChameleon combine with any GekiBeasts other than when Geki-Rin Touja was formed. While the DX toys could certainly do it, they only did it just once in both the series and the movie. In lesson 47 (Pika-Pika! My Path), both "teams" team up to form SaiDaiGekiRinTouja. This was its first and last appearence |
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Oy- two shout-outs in the same review... what are the odds of that happening again? Mwa-ha-ha-ha.
In my opinion, the DX Chouzetsu Gougou Gattai DaiVoyager/Deluxe Battlefleet Megazord from the following year's "Boukenger"/"PROO" ranks only slightly above the MagiLegend/Manticore Megazord here. Though I think I might put the DX Kinkyuu Gougou Gattai Siren Builder (no US-release for this one) slightly above that; both did very little for a lot of money. But surely the DX Jyuken Kyojin SaiDaiOh from "GekiRanger" (2007) (not named yet in "PR Jungle Fury") is on the same rung as MagiLegend- it has an automated transformation (which use magnets to activate), its inarticulate, not very poseable, has a motorized walking action (with legs that move in both modes, which is new), and is basically another big expensive lump of plastic that breaks the trend set by earlier mecha in the series (which is why I won't be covering it for CDX either).
Speaking of things forgotten, I don't know about the "PRMF" version of things (I only saw, like, the first three episodes just to see what was going on), but in "MagiRanger", the MagiLegend here could use the lion paws in robot mode as well, and then switch over to the hands for hanging on to the spear-like Screw Calibur.
The question should really be: "Is this a good deal on a piece of garbage?" ^_^
Good review, NekroDave. I bow in honor of your $11 sacrifice so that we may also not be led astray.
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CollectionDX Staff