Articulation

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Articulation commonly describes the number, position, and type of a Transformers toy's joints. "Posability" is a neologism often found in conjunction with mentions of articulation, although they are not necessarily interchangeable (see articulation vs. posability).

Levels of articulation

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Hun-Gurrr is one of the few The Transformers toys to possess knees, giving him articulated beast mode heads.

While modern collectors take it for granted, a high level of functioning joints for robot movement was by no means the standard in the early years of the Transformers franchise. Many Transformers toys up through the 1990s made do with simple swivel joints at their shoulders or elbows so they could at least point their guns at other toys. There were quite a few toys available at mass retail that had effectively zero points of articulation at all, including the Battlechargers, Throttlebots, and Duocons. Such toys are colloquially referred toy by fans as "bricks"... though the term has been applied to even those "just the arms" toys as well.

In the latter half of 1993's Generation 2 toyline, Hasbro began to push extra robot-mode articulation, soon settling on ball joints as a simple yet versatile standard for smaller toys, with the Cyberjets being the prime example. Ball joints would be used for many many many toys over the following decades at many scales, though the larger the toy, the more likely ball joints would be replaced with more sturdy multi-directional swivels.

Articulation is best understood as one of many potential toy gimmicks, and like all gimmicks they come with budgetary trade-offs: the higher parts count dedicated to jointed movement means that those same number of parts cannot go towards launching missiles or chomping mouths. Armada Hot Shot's shoulders, for example, are limited by how he transforms. A different transformation may have allowed his arms to move on an additional axis... however, as noted above, this would have also increased the toy's complexity and cost. Even when the needed articulation is present, posability can also be limited by kibble blocking a part's motion.

Conversely, sometimes a toy's posability is improved by its transformation, when the toy's required axes of movement wind up granting the robot mode extra flexibility. The original Galvatron toy has far higher articulation than typical for 1986 (or any other year in G1) because the transformation steps required movement at the waist, shoulders, elbows, wrists, and ankles.

Articulation can have a drawback if the figures are not properly balanced and have difficulty maintaining a pose or even standing upright at all (such as the original Omega Prime). Much-loved ball joints are especially susceptible to weight and play wear problems, and as such are generally not used on larger figures. A similar level of flexibility can be created with a combination of two swivels or ratcheted swivels.

Articulation as a feature

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As mentioned, for most of the Generation 1 era, articulation tended to be on the low side. Due to the relatively primitive engineering of the era, most toys featured what was necessary for their transformation and nothing more, which resulted in levels of articulation being highly inconsistent. Compare, for instance, Soundwave (useful movement at the neck, shoulders, elbows, and hips) to Megatron (basically just the shoulders). Many toys had just enough mobility to point their weapons forward.

In the mid 90s, Hasbro began introducing highly articulated toys and promoting their posability as a gimmick and selling point. In 1994, the Generation 2 Laser Rod cards advertised the toys as "Super Poseable!", and the Dreadwing and Smokescreen box described the toys as "Super Poseable Robots". Laser Optimus Prime's box notes the toy's "Fully poseable Laser Optimus Prime robot" mode. Other highly posable toys from the G2 era include the Cyberjets. Beast Wars (1996) was the first Transformers line to make a high degree of articulation standard across the toyline.

Posable figures and safety

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The Cyberjets were safer to play with than a brick?

Unlike what most people think, an articulated action figure passes the safety regulations better than a brick. During the time Hasbro started to make its own molds to represent characters as toys instead of importing from other toy lines, the company noticed that safety standards required a toy to withstand a pulling force of 20 pounds to deem them safe. Because most toys in those days had little to no outward movement in their legs or arms, they would rather quickly break with little force, so most figures were made with fused legs, preventing kids from pulling the legs apart. Because of this, most of the toys dropped articulation to make the figures stronger, turning a large amount of them into "bricks". During the time Takio Ejima started working on the brand, he noted that they could make the toys safer by the use of ball joints, making it easier for the toy to pass the test (ball joints simply pop off under stress and can subsequently be snapped back on, resulting in no breakage and thus no safety hazard), and have a full range of motion at the same time. This idea would even change the standard of articulation outside the Transformers brand.

Articulation vs. posability

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Official Hasbro sources have used the neologism posability (also spelled poseability) and the adjective form poseable at least as early as 1994 to describe highly articulated figures.<ref>Underwood, Bill. "Go Joe! // Doll Celebrates 30th Birthday". Tulsa World, 29 June 1994.</ref> The fandom often uses the term posability interchangeably with articulation; where a distinction is drawn, articulation refers to the number of joints and range of motion, while posability refers to a figure's ability to assume and hold poses (for instance, for display purposes). To illustrate the difference, Beast Machines Mega Cheetor has high articulation but poor posability due to its difficulty standing up and its arm gimmick.

Jargon

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Although Transformers toys' conversion schemes can vary immensely, most types of articulation are ubiquitous across all kinds of action figures, and so there are commonly-accepted terms for certain joints.

See also

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References

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