Lucky Cat Micro Cosmos MC-03 Beast Lord
I've mentioned several times that I'm not a very nostalgic person. True, I can probably trace my hobbies and interests to things I was interested in or exposed to when I was a child, but the specific properties aren't what draw me in. I grew up with MMPR, but I don't think very highly of it now that I'm an adult. If anything, its overexposure turns me away from it. That being said, when someone does a release where they take something like the Dino Megazord and heavily stylize it, it peaks my interest, hence our topic of discussion today.
The Good: Let's start with design, because I think this thing looks very nice. It is obviously supposed to be Daijyujin, but there are a lot of subtle changes, like the chest plate being more teeth-like, or the hip skirt that make it feel much more stylized. Add in a brand new, upgraded pterodactyl, and a plethora of new weapons, and this little guy definitely feels like an "upgraded" Daijyujin in a lot of ways.
Speaking of upgrades, possibly as a way to get around copyright, this guy comes packaged in two boxes; one artistic and labeled black box, and a white one. Inside the white box are the small pterodactyl, the dino heads, and Daijyujin's head, while the toy in the black box comes pre-assembled as a Megazord with several unique parts attached. It feels reminiscent of some of the combinations seen in the comics, and I honestly love the look, especially the head. I may occasionally swap out which head I'm displaying it with.
Onto features, it has all the ones you'd expect, as well as a few new ones. Each Dino Zord is even more posable than even the ZAP, which translates to Daijyujin, as well. The dinos are also capable of turning into four separate cubes, and can combine into their artillery mode as well. For such small toys, they're really packed with features.
The Bad: As for issues, a lot of the transformation pieces have quite a bit of tightness to them. Some at first, other maintained through several transformations. I had/have to spudge a few of them out with a tool, and it even comes with one specifically for the knee joints.
The transformation, while similar, isn't as intuitive as the original, and the instructions it comes with aren't the best. Also, when it comes to putting things together, it comes with a series of clear boxes for storage, similar to a BeastBox, but you assemble them yourself. They're modular pieces, which is great, but I felt like my hands were going to bleed near the end of construction. They were that difficult to put together.
Overall, this is a great, pocket scale version of Daijyujin, with a ton of extra parts and features. It's also cheaper than the ZAP. I've heard rumblings of a possible Dragonzord, and I'd love to see how they'd add to that, and what its original armor parts would look like. But more than that, I wanna see them do a Titanus like this. What would they add? Its own robot mode? A limb mode for the T-Rex/Dragonzord? More integration into the Ultrazord? (I might be doing some art stuff related to those ideas at the moment...)
