The Transformers: Generation One Commemorative Series

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Dirge is playing air guitar. No, really.

The Transformers: Generation One Commemorative Series was a line of Toys"R"Us exclusive reissues of early Transformers toys. Series I and II were released in traditional window box packaging. Series III and beyond were available in "book box" packaging which vaguely mirrored the style of Takara's contemporary The Transformers Collection reissue series.

The Commemorative Series line, in its initial release, lasted from 2002 to 2004, but there have been extra figures added since then. Astrotrain, an already produced but unreleased toy, was eventually released as a Hasbro Toy Shop exclusive in 2005. Soundwave was released in 2007 as an un-numbered figure in packaging that mirrored the style of the Classics line. In 2009, two new "Commemorative Edition" reissues were released as part of the Universe line, both as Toys"R"Us exclusives again.

In addition, several of the figures previously released in the United States were later also made available in other international markets after the line had been ended in the United States, usually in slightly altered packaging lacking the "Commemorative Series" moniker.

Commemorative Series

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United States market

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Series I Series II Series III Series IV
Ricochet is shocked to learn he's a choking hazard.
Series V Series VI Series VII Series VIII
Series IX


International releases and re-releases

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Canada

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In Canada, (almost) all of the figures listed above were released around the same time they came out in the United States, sometimes even predating the US release. Unusually for Canadian releases, they were not sold in trilingual packaging, but in the same English-only packaging also used for the United States market releases.

Side Swipe was released as a Toys"R"Us exclusive together with Skids around the same time he also showed up in the United States, but here his distribution wasn't affected by Toys"R"Us's decision to discontinue the Commemorative Series line.

Astrotrain was never officially made available in Canada.

Australia

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Just like in Canada, all the figures listed above were also released in Australia, also close to their respective United States release dates. Supposedly, the packaging was also identical to the packaging used for the US releases, although it appears Series 1 was released in multilingual packaging intended for the European market (see below) instead.<ref name="auseuro">Tformers.com news story about the Australian release of Commemorative Series I in Australia, in multilingual packaging.</ref>

Side Swipe was released as a Toys"R"Us exclusive half a year later than in Canada.

Astrotrain was released in Australia as a Kmart exclusive (for a deep discount price). Despite being an exclusive, he could also be found clogging up shelves in smaller, privately owned toy shops.

United Kingdom

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The Commemorative Series figures were also released as Toys"R"Us exclusives in the United Kingdom, but (unusually) not anywhere else in Europe.

Series I, II and III
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The Series I, II and III figures were sold in standard multilingual packaging (with texts in English, French, Dutch, German, Italian and Spanish, including translations of the names "Generation One" and "Commemorative Series") around the same time they were released in other markets:

Later figures
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Changing the packaging design for an English-only UK release. Hasbro UK, you are weird.

In 2006, long after even Sideswipe and Astrotrain had been made available in the United States, Hasbro UK released several figures that hadn't been available in the United Kingdom before. Unusually, these figures now came in English-only packaging, but lacked the US packaging's "Commemorative Series" labels, the "choking hazard" safety warning labels and all trademark ™ and ® markings:


Asian Hasbro markets re-releases

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Let's complicate things further. Why not?

Several Commemorative Series figures were also re-released in Hasbro's Asian markets in 2012, in slightly altered English-only packaging that, for the most part, also lacked the "Commemorative Series" labels, featured different age labels for some figures (5+ instead of 8+), some altered fonts, text sizes and colors for the "choking hazard" safety warning labels, and occasionally sported updated trademark ™ and ® markings (most notable in the case of Ultra Magnus; Astrotrain's name was changed to "Decepticon Astrotrain", while Powermaster Optimus Prime lost the "Powermaster" prefix and no longer acknowledged the existence of Apex Bomber at all), as well as then-modern cardboard ties instead of the pre-2010 twist ties. Additionally, (Powermaster) Optimus Prime completely lost the box flap that featured the package art. Additionally, the 2012 releases featured the logo of the Transformers Collectors' Club on the back of their packaging, as did all Hasbro releases of that era. (Despite what some uninformed eBay sellers claim, though, these reissues were not distributed by the Collectors' Club—it's merely an ad, nothing more.)

Also among this production run for the Hasbro's Asian markets was a re-release of Soundwave (see below).

Optimus Prime was actually a re-release of the Universe 25th Anniversary reissue of the figure, with tampographed insignias instead of stickers, in a variation of the older Commemorative Series packaging.
Unlike the first four figures on the list, the packaging for Rodimus Prime and Side Swipe retained the Commemorative Series labels including their respective numbers. The only differences are the updated Hasbro logos, black "choking hazard" safety warning labels (the original release of Side Swipe had sported a red label, whereas Rodimus Prime hadn't sported such a label at all) and the size of the "+" after the age recommendation. Oddly, Side Swipe's name was not changed to "Sideswipe", which Hasbro had started using again in 2008.
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Classics (2006)

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"Commemorative Edition" Soundwave was a Toys"R"Us exclusive released in early 2007, available in packaging based on the template for the Classics line. He was also available as a Toys"R"Us exclusive in the United Kingdom around the same time, in unaltered United States packaging, and was later re-released in Hasbro's Asian markets in 2012, in slightly altered packaging.

Universe (2008)

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Notes

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What could have been.
  • The original packaging for the Series III figures Thundercracker, Silverstreak, and Autobot Jazz declares all three figures "adult collectables". This can be seen in official stock photos for the toys that depict sample packaging, as well as in a Toys"R"Us print ad published in issue 6 of Dreamwave's first The War Within mini-series<ref name="truad">2003 ToysRUs Transformers Toy Reissue Advertisement at Battlegrip.com.</ref>, but is actually still present on the final packaging—it's simply covered with stickers containing choking hazard safety warnings, in addition to stickers containing "Ages 5+" labels.
  • Series IX Ricochet was originally listed under the placeholder name "Sunstreaker" in Canadian and Australian Toys"R"Us computers. What's worse, the public Canadian Toys"R"Us website even illustrated their listing with a non-official photo of the Generation 1 Sunstreaker toy lifted straight off a fan's website, complete with watermark. Ultimately, however, the listings for "Sunstreaker" transformed into listings for Ricochet, leading to some confusion among fans.
  • Had the original Commemorative Series line not been canceled by Toys"R"Us, it would have continued with several figures that were found as listings in Canadian and Australian Toys"R"Us computers. One of these unreleased reissues even made it to the prototype stage:


Foreign names

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  • French: Premiere Generation/Commémoratif de la Série
  • Dutch: Eerste Generatie/Klassiekers Serie
  • German: Erste Generation/Klassik-Serie
  • Italian: Generation One/Serie Classica
  • Spanish: Generación Uno/Series Commemorativas
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References

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<references />
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