Nothing new in particular for the box, we have a couple new emblems, a rust themed backround, and what is perhaps not new but some of the front wraps around to the edges, much like the Toa MAHRI canisters. We see the other two titans, kanoka point code. It lists six ammo on the back for the cordak but I think it means so say it fires six, since we get three spare shots in the box. Which we do need. We need a twenty pack refill box…

New Parts

A majority of the new parts are recolor older ones, the dark silver/gun metal parts like the Metru toa foot, mask of life, and Lehvahk Kal parts in particular, as well as the bladed Hordika foot found on his chest which is also located on Barraki Kalmah. I’ll also point out, if you don’t have Kalmah to compare the bladed Hordika foot to the non bladed original, the recent LEGO® catalog shows him with the older foot without the proper bladed Hordika foot he is supposed to have. The sword seems to have the tool that Hewkii Mahri uses, with the Matoro claw making up the hilt of the blade. The tubing on the sword and mask/back is in there as a new part too. This might not really be new but the thicker version of the throwbot foot, also seen in a Barraki set or two is part of his ankle connected by a plus peg. The front most end of this part has a plus peg hole while the back two holes use the regular round pegs. Hmm, I seem to have cut off part of one of the pictures, so some of the parts might not be in the picture below but I dont think it’s anything major.

Spinax

Maxilos’ pet boasts an interesting body with an amazingly simple design, I don’t like the style of limbs but this creature is a work of art. The Bordakk staff from the blue Vahki blends well with the silver spines (which are not green mixed, just plain silver, the Spinax at Toyfair had a makeshift silver painted spine while he was in development and the paint chipped off a bit). And it matches the skull of the set itself pretty well. The skull is like that of a Barraki, maybe you could use it as a mask, but it doesn’t look like it could be, there’s not even a plug for a toa to where it unless you adapt it, on the other hand the Movie Edition Kranhkan (MEK0 wasn’t a traditional mask either, and if this set where to combine to form some deity, Spinax’s skull would surely be part of the head as a mask, or should in my opinion. The construction of the head is also simple, a Hordika neck with a plus peg closer to the socket ball has the friction peg to hold his end of the chain/leash and then two parts extend to plug in the friction pegs that hold the skull in place, while the same part that holds the skull holds a single friction peg which holds the hinge the Onua claw attaches to make his jaws, which open and close at about a 90′ range of motion, and aligns up PERFECTLY with the two teeth on the skull to form a jaw. The skull was designed specifically to match the Onua claws, and it looks great. The jaw can close to the point that they would block Spinax’s vision, but the manual seems to indicate a recommended “closed” position. You’ll see a picture of the jaw centered, which is the recommended position, in between the closed all the way picture and a partially opened math picture, which doesn’t quite show the full range of motion, it opens enough and many fans will find there is room in his jaws to hold a good variety of objects, masks, or limbs …

Maxilos

While he lacks a traditional mechanism, he instead has a rather clever piston support system in his torso, giving him a total of four for those of you specifically looking for a set with a bunch of these and other good parts. You can see the stripped down version which demonstrates hoe his arms and legs are supported, which breaks the past couple years of “Y” shaped torso frames on titans. Also I should not that when he is stripped down, he does look disgustingly simple, but with his proper parts in place, the set design plays together so well that he doesn’t look hallow or much like an armored frame at all, in fact, he looks quite robotic, and he is a robot after all. his shoulders are a mixed blessing, two dark colored masks of life (Which oddly is what he is after, the mask of life that is, so you can see the irony of having two of them on his shoulders..) the masks look great as shoulders, but they limit his range of motion and make that portion more clunky. Sometimes the tube from his mask even gets caught on the right shoulders mask. I also dislike that the right shoulder is attached be little more that the plus peg that attaches to the toa wearing it, and at that its attached o a part that doesn’t seem the best choice to firmly hold it, but it does the job. If the right shoulder/mask didn’t have the cordak mounted to it, this wouldn’t be a problem, and the “bolt” coming out of it is just to hold the socket the cordak is attached to, it doesn’t hold that mask onto the arm itself. As for the cordak, it’s well positioned and has a great range, which I’m happy to see. The new mask in this set will leave you a tad surprised, where normally a mask has some kind of peg to attach to; (ignoring the Inika masks) this one has a port for you to attach the peg, rather than the peg itself. You will also find the same plug holes for stuff like the blue “eye” parts and tubing that the other Mahri masks share. You could if you wanted to plug the cable or other parts into the front or back of these plug holes, since the holes go through to the other side of the mask. While the lower port for the “oxygen cable” only has room for one thing to be plugged in, the ports that hold the blue eye things have enough extra space to fit both the cable and the eye in the same hole, maybe not all the way but enough to hold both parts in place. Maxilos’ neck consists of a short double socket, the same grey part that makes up the Toa Metru upper legs, which connects to another Hordika neck. From the front no matter where you pose his head, it looks aright, but from the back the exposed neck is the only spot that could use a bit more armor or covering. Seeing how this is the only hallow spot that looks ugly, that’s really impressive for this set assuming your alright with the legs, though I find they play well with the set despite this.

The few complaints:

Both Maxilos and Spinax lack a traditional mechanism, and have some more generic styles of arms and legs, nothing really new in concept but on Maxilos at least its suiting to his overall design, the torso on each character is really where the best of the design is. Spinax is designed to walk low to the ground, or at least the manual indicates that low stance, and I think this really is the best pose. But, Maxilos’ leash is too short… As with Vezon and Fenrakk, I think he needs a longer chain, easily fixed if you have a spare Hewkii Inika and don’t mind changing the actual set a little. I’d like to say that the chain just means a lower stance for Maxilos or a higher one for Spinax, and with Vezon you wanted him to have a crouched stance when on the Fenrakk spider, but it’s just a pain to work with and especially limits actual play. So, the chain in my views doesn’t augment the feel of the set, and leads me to think its more for show when displaying the set, otherwise if you were to play with it you will find yourself detaching it from the blue friction peg that connects the two.

Mechanisms

On Spinax, the only real mechanism is the moving jaw, or the “tail” that can be twisted a bit, which I don’t really recommend from my fear that it may damage the plugs; it doesn’t appear to be an intentional part of the design. On Maxilos, the cordak and articulated torso can be called a mechanism. On the cordak, simple press the button as fast and quickly as you can of course. For the torso, the arms are interlinked with the hip, which means moving the hip to pose him also forces the arms to move in sync unless you hold the parts right so the piston adjusts rather than the shoulders. When moving the arm/shoulder I find it doesn’t affect the rest of the sets as much as when moving him at the hip, which essentially makes him shrug. You could call that actions feature though, karate shrug action! His overall hip articulation is okay, but with all that armor, specifically the Hordika chest plate on his back, he cant twist too far side to side but the overall range is decent. I’m certain many of you will appreciate the designs articulation and recommend recreating it in one of your MoCs just to see how well designed it is.

Color scheme

Spinax looks a bit monochrome colored with black, silver and grey parts, and the only contrasting colors being the red eyes and blue of a couple friction pegs, but it’s not bad. Maxilos on the other hand has reg, grey, silver, black and gun-metal grey. The cordak looks like it was made for his color scheme and blends in perfectly, and the set itself has very good color placement, I may have tweaked some spots myself but the colors in general are especially good on Maxilos

Tool

The black-fire sword is interesting, maybe the pole could have been that grey color to match the silver blades and the end better, but it’s very nice, not too bulky to work with and pose, and blends into the set’s design very well as a whole.

Overall

Maxilos and Spinax is a very well designed set as a whole, its good aspects greatly outweigh my complaints and just looks cool. I my not like a limb or two by itself but when looking at the whole set it just is allot of fun and is a great piece to display from your collection

Recommendations?

If your looking for a recommendations, I’d say get Maxilos and Spinax or Hydraxon first, they are definitely the cooler of the titans out there, and Maxilos out does Hydraxon just barely by his support system, though I’m not finding them in my local stores reports say they are around somewhere, and I have to remind you, I don’t actually have Hydraxon yet to really compare the two. If you’re thinking about the Toa sets, it’s worth it to put off buying them for this spectacular set, or maybe grab one or two of your favorites rather than grab all six toa and have to wait. If you’re a particular fan of the playsets, go for Toa Terrain Crawler first, I can vouch, I’ve seen the prototype at toyfair, and pictures of the final version, both look like a work of art, and I find it more desirable than the rest of the playsets.

General gibberish and review plan…

I have some sets ordered while others are being pushed to the back of the list, the sets I have ordered are below with what I plan to order next under that. Otakon is being held early this year so I have to set an amount to the side for this event…(To buy about every Tachikoma related product I find) so I’ll have to order the rest with what I have left. If you can even call this a costume, look for the guy with a video screen on his back if your going and plan to find me. I hear Omicron from BZPower might be lurking around so I’ll be wearing my Anti-Omi helmet (a paintball mask). He seems to like sneaking pictures of me from conventions onto the web, and I’m one of those people who avoid pictures, but it’s sort of a joke so Im not really complaining.

*Maxilos and Spinax

*Toa Lesovikk (Yay for mini Usanuni with Cordak cannon!)

*Karzahni

*Hydraxon

*Gadunka

To be ordered:

*Barraki Deepsea Patrol

*Toa Terrain Crawler

*Toa Undersea Attack

*Toa Mahri Kongu

*Toa Mahri Hewkii

*Toa Mahri Jaller

Credit to Kopaka Lady for spell checking this for me, though I did add stuff after she edited it, so I don’t discredit her.