Of all the Voyager and Deluxe GDO repaints, Hot Spot here is the one that makes the most sense. It’s a no-brainer — the original G1 Hot Spot was a blue firetruck and this new GDO/Generations Hot Spot is a blue firetruck, so there’s no need to try to play the “why the heck did they choose this mold for this character?” game because, unlike many of his assortment-mates, this actually is a decent representation of the character. He’s not perfect, mind you, but he’s darn close, and he’s as good as these Asian-market/Toys R Us exclusives are going to get.
The Protectobots were always one of my favorite combiner teams because they were all emergency and rescue vehicles that combined to form Defensor. Something about that just made sense. There was a cohesiveness to their look and purpose that appealed to me, and for years I’ve been hoping Hasbro — or someone — would take on the task of giving us a modern interpretation of the team. There have been rumblings from the third party world, but so far all we’ve gotten has been a Voyager-class Blades and now Hot Spot here. I originally passed on Blades because it made no sense to me to just own him by himself, and I was going to pass on Hot Spot for the same reason (not to mention I already own two versions of this mold), but the blue proved to be very hard to resist. So now I’ve got a Hot Spot on my shelf without a team to lead. It’s the blue’s fault. I couldn’t resist the blue.
Like every one of the GDO releases, this is not the first time we’ve seen this mold. It debuted with Inferno from the Universe line in ’08 and we saw it again with Solar Storm Grapple (sorry, I’m not calling him “Grappel” as Hasbro chose to name him) from the Reveal the Shield line. It’s an awesome mold and one I’m happy to buy multiple times over as long as it makes sense for the character. Fortunately, this mold is three for three so far and works well for each character, including Hot Spot.
While the blue is a very appealing color, Hot Spot’s bot mode does seem a bit plain. This is most evident when comparing him side-by-side with Inferno. Somehow the mold just seems to work better with Inferno’s deep red color scheme; the sculpt’s details tend to stand out more. With Hot Spot, there’s just too much solid blue plastic with little to no paint detail, which make the sculpt’s details seem a bit soft. He looks a bit boring as a result. Reprolabels wasted no time in seizing this opportunity and have already put together some decals to give Hot Spot some more personality (and to improve the G1 accuracy even more), so I may be placing an order soon. I definitely think he needs it.
Despite being a repaint, Hot Spot does have a couple features that make him unique. He’s got a new head sculpt that does resemble the original G1 toy well enough. I’m a big fan of it, personally, and, as was the case with the GDO G2 Megatron, the head sculpt was a major selling point for me. His windows also help set him apart from Inferno and Grapple. They’re molded in a very dark plastic, almost totally opaque. When I first saw them, I could have sworn they were simply molded in solid black plastic, but upon closer inspection, I found that in the right light it is possible to see through them, but not well enough for it to be useful or meaningful. I have to wonder why Hasbro chose to do this, but I can only assume it was in an effort to maintain as much G1 accuracy as possible since the original had black windows (the original’s size made clear windows impossible). It looks OK in bot mode, but in his alt mode it just looks plain silly. A firetruck with tinted windows? Who’s driving it? Tony Montana? As odd as it is, I can’t say I don’t like it because it does succeed in further distinguishing Hot Spot from Inferno and Grapple. Now that I own three versions of this mold, I’ll take every unique characteristic I can get.
Aside from the head sculpt and the dark windows, there’s nothing else that’s new to this figure, so if you own Inferno, then you know exactly what you’re getting. This is definitely one of the more popular molds to come around in years, so Hot Spot here is arguably the most sought-after figure from the GDO assortments. He’s a character that doesn’t see release that often, so I am happy I did finally decide to pick him up and add him to my shelves, even though I have no other Protectobots. So, for now, he’s a leader waiting for his squad.
If you’re on the hunt for him, be aware that he is one-per-case, and he does seem to be the one most people are after. He’s a Toys R Us exclusive, so hopefully he’ll be more readily available as we get closer to the holidays and Toys R Us gets more aggressive with the amount of cases they get at a time.
