UPDATED: 07.07.24 (Scroll down to bottom for DX9 Upgrade Kit section)

Love this guy. Megs is back to his old G1 self again with this release, with a head sculpt that most closely resembles his cartoon face (not to be confused with his “O” face).  Looks like he’s been working out his upper body a lot, but really should think about squats for those dinky twig legs.  Luckily, there’s an upgrade kit for that (read on).  That’s about the only gripe I have with this otherwise amazing robot form.  It’s a shame that he is still stuck as a tank in alt mode and not a gun – thanks to all the gun problems in America, which means that I’m probably never changing him out of robot mode. I mean, just look. Why would I?

DX9 UPGRADE KIT

This kit is a nicely packaged set that includes new calf sections, feet, poseable hands, cannon extension, and a faux barrel (to simulate Meg’s G1 look). It consists of eight pieces total. Look at Meg’s skinny ass legs – he’s clearly been skipping leg day, but man oh man when you put all the pieces on, you can see that he really needed this upgrade in a bad way.

The hands aren’t plug and play, so I went the whole process of unscrewing the arm panels on each side, only to totally give up because their poseable hands wouldn’t fit into the original slots. The pegs are too thick for the holes, and when I shaved it down a bit, the peg for one of the fists broke off completely. So I gave up on the upgraded fists. The articulated index finger is nice, but I usually keep Megatron with fists clenched, ready to rock. The level of detail that they added to each piece is pretty neat, and stays in line with the original aesthetic.

The “shoes” have nice details on the inside platform, that you can’t even see once his feet are pegged into place, but they add a bit of elegance to the parts. The calves clamp onto his pencil legs and have grip marks that resemble the handle of a gun, evoking Megatron’s G1 form. And even if the gun barrel is just an add-on for looks, it does add a little more flavor to the final look:

Now he looks right. I really love the red highlights on the inner calves. The feet are huge now, but it works in proportion to the rest of his body. He’s just so much more “hench”. The cannon extension looks like a silencer or a compressor for a gun, and while it doesn’t look exactly like Megatron’s G1 fusion cannon, it does look more like it and better overall. I don’t even bother to use any of these pieces for his tank mode as they just don’t really add anything for me. But after putting these on and comparing to his default stick legs, I just can’t envision Megatron without these upgrades. Now if they could only do something about those red shoulder joints…

Never skip leg day again!!!