Image : Hasbro HasLab

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Just before San Diego Comic-Con, Hasbro’s HasLab—a crowdfunding platform it uses to bring its most elaborate toy creations to life—revealed a towering 27-inch tall Transformers Unicron toy. With over 50 points of articulation, transforming the world-destroying planet to a massive bot is an arduous task, as demonstrated in this exclusive video we’re revealing to fans today.


The dapper tuxedoed gentleman in the video who unboxes, assembles, and then transforms HasLab’s Unicron prototype from planet to robot mode is Takashi Kunihiro, who has been designing Transformers characters and toys for Takara Tomy since 1984. Check it out:

Kunihiro has helped create such iconic Autobots and Decepticons as Hot Rod, Astrotrain, and Jetfire. He also joined the company as it was designing the new bots that would appear in the 1986 animated feature, and has undoubtedly been with Unicron since the character’s earliest beginnings.




The video also comes as a reminder that the new Unicron figure’s existence isn’t a sure thing. HasLab needs 8,000 collectors to pre-order its $575 Transformers: War For Cybertron Unicron before the company will actually put it into production. With a deadline of August 31, the crowdfunding campaign is only about a quarter of the way to its goal. Just over 2,000 backers have pledged support so far, leaving only 25 days for the remaining units to be claimed.

Optimus Prime has finally met his match. Photo : Hasbro HasLab

Last year Hasbro’s HasLab successfully crowdfunded a 49-inch long replica of Jabba’s Sail Barge from Return of the Jedi, but that collectible was a little cheaper at $500, and the campaign was only seeking 5,000 backers before it went into production. This year, Unicron is also joined by a fully posable plush life-size replica of Sesame Street’s Cookie Monster on the HasLab platform, but with 19 days left until its funding deadline, a little over 400 of the 3,000 required backers have pre-ordered that toy.


As premium collectibles go, HasLab’s offerings have so far fallen on the pricier end of the spectrum, and it remains to be seen if crowdfunding these items, and passing the risk onto fans and collectors, has been the best approach.



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