Images of Sen-Ti-Nel’s Gigantic Action Scorponok started showing up a couple of years ago, and my immediate thoughts were an unintelligible garble of the words “want,” “need,” and “gotta have” swirling together in a spastic soup. A non-transforming Transformer that was huge, looked perfect, and would tower over my other Transformer figures? Gah.
Unfortunately, the price of this behemoth was announced and those words started fading away. I resigned myself to the fact that I’d never own the blasted thing, because at 400 to 500 dollars — depending on where I did my shopping — I couldn’t justify plunking down half a grand on a toy.
But then time passed, and those magic words that toy fans have a Pavlovian reaction to rose from the mist of the Nevergonnahave swamp:
“Cleeeeaaaaaraaaaancccccceeee saaaaaallllllllle…”
And before you know it, I’m staring at a 75-dollar price tag for a toy the size of a black-market orphan. It didn’t take me long to pound the “add to cart” button hard enough to knock the letters off and secure one at that staggering price. Even with shipping from Japan being equal to the price of the figure itself the price was way too good to pass up. Within a short time period of time I became the proud owner of a toy I could strap into a shopping cart and wheel around while making my grocery rounds, accruing the wide-eyed stares of fellow shoppers that were clearly so jealous they couldn’t form words.
A short while later a box arrived that could adequately house a family of four hobos, and inside that box was a slightly smaller box, and inside THAT box was the first Scorponok figure I’ve ever managed to get. When I was a kid, Scorponok resided in that strange negative dimension that Fortress Maximus, Trypticon, and Omega Supreme lived in — figures I knew existed but never made an appearance at any store where I could purchase them and were probably too expensive anyway.
Tugging Scorponok out of that box was a little like when young Andy pulled Chucky out of that box when he was a kid, except without the ensuing homicidal mayhem. Yet. There are toys that make you feel like a kid, and then there are toys that literally make you feel like you’re kid-sized, and Scorponok did just that. I was instantly transported back to the Christmas of 1982 and opening an AT-AT I could have ridden like a horse.
If I’m being coy, let me say it clearly: Scorponok is huge. This is an insanely large and bulky chunk of candy-colored toy.
I had spent a long time ignoring any reviews of him, not wanting to feel like I was missing out on anything by not having him, and I didn’t bother reading reviews after the purchase, hoping I wouldn’t be saddled with a gigantic dud. But my fears were quickly silenced when I started moving him around. I was halfway worried I might have purchased an enormous hunk of statue with maybe 5 points of articulation, but Scorponok has as much as he needs, and if anybody knows my feelings on articulation, you know that’s a high compliment.
He has articulation at the neck, shoulder, bicep, arm, waist, hips, knees, and ankles, plus working pincers so he can grab things. And the best thing is all of his joints are fairly tight, so he can stay upright in the oddest poses and not flop around. It seems as though he’s mostly hollow, but he’s still a satisfyingly heavy and chunky figure. No poses in any of these pictures were aided in any way by trickery. He’s got the balance of a gymnast.
Scorponok’s height has fluctuated depending on his depiction. In the Transformers comics from Marvel he was portrayed as a larger ‘bot, but not gigantic, but then Fortress Maximus was never as big in those comics as his toy would suggest either. Scorponok showed up in the final episodes of the American Transformers cartoon and in that he was friggin’ ginormous, so essentially you’d have to dress up in a Scorponok costume in order to get one as large as that depiction. The same holds true for the Japanese Headmasters cartoon, where he was as large as Fortress Maximus, who blotted out the sun. So Scorponok strikes a happy medium between gigantic and oversized, meaning he respectably towers over Masterpiece Transformers, which means he will also tower over your CHUG-scaled TFs, and he also works great if you’re buying the Fewture Ex Ghokin figures, of which I only have Optimus, but they work very well together.
Scorponok’s design draws from his toy and his animated appearance, down to his shield and gun, which are straight toy replicas. I love that there was no attempt to dull down the greens and purples. They went for straight authenticism, and he looks great, like a big purple and green robot should. The sculpting all over him is fantastic, with no concessions to the need to transform. While I was unable to get the Black Zarak that uses this mold plus a new head, now I’m wishing he’d pop up on extreme clearance somewhere. It’s not a good sign that Scorponok was clearanced, since that usually means he’s not selling well, which is a damn shame because I’m dreaming of a Fortress Maximus at this size and crying invisible tears that it may not happen. 
Buy from AmiAmi (currently having a decent sale on him, 58 percent off)
