Welcome back to It Came from the Back of the Toybox, a segment where I take a look at the unknown, underrated, and unheard-of convertible robots in my collection!
Ah, McDonald’s Happy Meal toys. When I was growing up, there were always cool things like Toy Story action figures or Snoopys with interchangeable heads or Digimon plushies. But as I got older, the toys seemed to get crappier. Do you know what you can get in a Happy Meal today? A voucher for a book! There was none of this intellectual namby-pambyism in my day I tell you what.
At the other end of this imagined f(x) = 1/x of quality come Happy Meal toys from the mid-80s. I’m sure there were absolute turkeys we never get to hear about, but this was also a time where your free premium could be the same quality as a toy from a shelf. There were promotions for Playmobil figures and Hot Wheels cars. It was mad.
One such off-the-shelf promotion was Tomy’s Commandrons line. This line of small toy robots was first released in 1985 boxed up. Later, the McDonald’s versions, free with a Happy Meal, came on blister packs with one of a selection of DC comics! Talk about value for money. (Later still, in 1986, they were re-released as Super Alternators.)
Each Commandron was about the size of a GoBot, converting in two or three steps. While two of them were Earth vehicles - an F-15 and a LeMans racer - the other two were more nebulous alien vehicles described as a UFO and a drill. The line was united in its uniform red, white and blue colour scheme, and they all featured a pull-back-and-go motor that worked in both modes.
Above you see Solardyn, one of a string of toys repurposed as Alpha Trion during my childhood, despite absolutely no physical resemblance. With his claw hands and sticker face, I’d already decided he looked less humanoid than some of my Transformers - if only I’d known about Commander Magna, the good old nosecone face!
But this wouldn’t be the last time McDonald’s entered the convertible robot market…