The Masterpiece line to me was pretty blah back a few years ago when all the toys were mostly the same height in robot mode. Optimus, Grimlock, Megatron, Rodimus, Optimus a few more dozen times... But these days, they're doing more than just Big Guys and they're trying to scale them according to how they appeared in the cartoon, which means you've got tall guys like Optimus, slightly less tall guys like Soundwave and the jets, medium-sized guys like Prowl and Wheeljack, and tiny guys like Bumblebee. Stretching out in the other direction is Ultra Magnus.
Ultra Magnus might be the first guy in this new paradigm that isn't scaled perfectly to how tall he is in the cartoon -- he's just a head or so taller than Optimus Prime, but this toy he's a few heads taller. This is because they seem to have wanted MP Magnus and MP Prime's truck cabs to be the same size. And when your entire body is the trailer of a car carrier, you're probably going to be way taller than the guy who's just a truck cab.
Speaking of which, unlike the original Ultra Magnus toy, which was really just a redecoed super robot trailer combiney thing for the original Optimus Prime, this new Ultra Magnus doesn't have an Optimus Prime robot inside him anywhere. The truck cab splits up completely differently to help complete the torso. It can remain attached during transformation or detach from the trailer hitch as needed. There being no white Optimus Prime involved makes me a little sad, but I guess engineering challenges may have gotten in the way of that. It probably would have involved taking the trailer apart, at any rate, if there was to be any leg articulation, while this toy manages to not need anything to separate during transformation. Even the missile launchers are on little arms so you don't have to unplug and plug them where they need to go in either mode.
Speaking of missile launchers, Masterpiece Ultra Magnus is also unique in Masterpiece in that his vehicle mode, at least from the back of the truck cab, is really obviously a bunch of Ultra Magnus robot parts rather than being based on any real-life car carrier trailer. It's accurate to the original toy and the cartoon, but it's still conspicious next to the Real Life Licensed Cars that have been the staple of the line for a while.
That said, it's a fun and hefty toy. It's not annoying to transform, and it's a fun process throughout. When I see him, I actively want to transform him -- even the part where you replace the real rubber tires in his feet with smaller fake plastic molded tires that match the animation model better. It's ridiculous and you don't really need to do it except for aesthetic reasons, but the change itself is fun to operate.
He comes with two faces which are interchangeable. One's a stoic face and one's a shouting face that's supposed to accompany use of his extra pair of Matrix-holding hands. (Matrix not included.) I love the shouting face, and interpret him as being angry at people for flouting technicalities of law. If you leave both faces off, there's a white Optimus Prime head sculpted underneath which harkens back to the original toy.
Magnus also comes with little figurines of Spike and Daniel Witwicky. They can ride inside his cab mode, if you want. More likely, you will lose them.
Masterpiece Ultra Magnus is a good purchase if you want a giant, hefty Magnus. He's really good at that. It may be the thing he's best at. It's not that he's bad at other things, it's just that he's... a really huge Magnus. It is a quality that overwhelms all the others.
