Before this week, if you’d asked me if there was any benefit to being a Hasbro Pulse member, I would have shrugged and said “maybe?” You do get free shipping and emails notifying you when new items are available for pre-order. It’s possible that I’ve snagged a few exclusives that I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise, but there was nothing in the past 12 months that screamed at me “this is totally worth buying a membership.”

That is, until yesterday.

Membership Has Its Benefits

That’s when Hasbro revealed four of the new Transformers War for Cybertron: Earthrise figures debuting this weekend. And they let Pulse members know that, for the first time ever, they’ll be livestreaming the Entertainment Brand Preview just for them. This is a press-only event that fans normally have to experience vicariously through live-tweets. Even better? Pulse members will have exclusive access to the Hasbro Pulse site for a couple of hours after the event to immediately pre-order the items revealed during the preview!

I am jazzed to finally get to see the Entertainment Brand Preview live. I can never make it up to NYC to cover the event, so I’m always stuck refreshing Twitter to see what’s been revealed. What will be interesting is that, even if you’re not a Pulse member, you’ll still get more information than usual. It’s one thing to take surreptitious camera shots of a presentation slide. It’s another to grab a quick screenshot.

Incidentally, if you’re not a Pulse member and you’re looking for a livestream of the livestream, I’ll be lighting up TheRoarbots Twitter account (@roarworthy) starting around 1:15 Eastern.

New Earthrise Transformers

As exciting as that is, even more exciting are the new War for Cybertron: Earthrise Transformers that were revealed ahead of the livestream event. These (and whatever is revealed) will be what Pulse members have exclusive pre-order access to immediately after the stream.

Who wore it better? (ER Arcee left, Masterpiece Arcee on the right)

Arcee is, frankly, an incredibly faithful rendition of her G1 character. Unfortunately, that means that she shares the same problems as just about every other Arcee figure ever developed. With a slim body and long limbs, there just aren’t a lot of places for alt-mode parts to go or be deployed from. So, in order to preserve that hourglass silhouette, designers have large chunks of her alt mode hang off her back or even, as in this case, come off completely. That chunk of car she’s standing on is supposed to be a “hoverboard” by the way. I can only hope that it’s mistransformed. Other than those inevitable complaints, Arcee looks amazing. In fact, her bot-mode design is almost exactly the same as the recently revealed Masterpiece Arcee. I’m looking forward to seeing more in-hand shots this weekend.

Sings Taylor Swift’s “Me” without a hint of irony.

Next up is one of the redesigns that I’ve been most excited for. Sky Lynx is a weird bot. With origins from the same company that made Omega Supreme, he’s less a Transformer and more of a…well…he’s a space shuttle and transport, a jungle cat and a bird, a hybrid cat/bird and a launch base. He’s the Reese’s Peanut Butter cup of the Transformers world, where you’re taking two bots and mashing them together. We haven’t seen an attempt at ol’ Lynxey since Combiner Wars, where, sadly, he lost his separate components and just became a shuttle and cat/bird. Well the band is back together again in Earthrise and we’re getting two weird bots that look great together. All four modes from the G1 toy are present and the new base mode looks spectacular. The shuttle even has an opening cargo bay! For G1 fans, it’s a very weird, very deep cut, but I’m thrilled to see a proper Sky Lynx. Also, keen eyes spotted the shuttle name “Magnificence” in the press shots – appropriate for the most arrogant Transformer ever.

The orange guns are still removable. Don’t expect to hold on to them for long.

Deluxe Decepticon Fasttrack was also revealed. Why is this important? Because, much like Cog, Six Gun, and Brunt, Fasttrack continues the War for Cybertron tradition of giving city-bot partners their own separate releases. Fasttrack was a companion figure for the original Scorponok toy. The highly detailed deluxe figure is a fantastic update of the fairly basic original. Even better, he turns into a large staff for Scorponok, hopefully just like the one that he wielded in his Japanese release.

Just don’t ask where the ramp is stored and you’ll be OK.

That just leaves the big guy himself. Scorponok was revealed in all his eye-searing green and purple glory. A triple-changer, he transforms from bot to scorpion to base. And like Fortress Maximus, he’s a double-Headmaster, with the deluxe-sized Headmaster transforming into the head for the larger bot. The bot mode is insanely beefy, the scorpion mode is extremely questionable, and the base mode is pretty much Scorponok throwing up his arms and yelling WEEE as bots slide down his crotch ramp. In other words, he’s a faithful update of an extremely rare G1 toy. Hasbro’s designers have done what they do best, taken the masterpiece that we fans envision in our minds (that’s often shattered when we revisit those original figures) and brought it to life. Scorponok is extremely goofy, but he’s also a character that we’ve been clamoring for for years. I absolutely can’t wait to check him out.