Takara has a long history of taking existing Transformers figures and giving them a fresh coat of black paint. Sometimes it's to make a new character like when Jazz was repainted to make Targetmaster Stepper. Sometimes it's to show a character has been upgraded like when Soundwave became Soundblaster. And sometimes it's an evil (or occasionally good) clone of a character like Nemesis Prime. It's a good safety net, a way to extend the use of a mold, and really, it's hard to mess up black. They started this in the '80s and there's no reason to stop now.

First case in point is the figure that was formerly Gaia Unicron in the Takara's Transformers Prime line. He was already a menacing character in his original form, but paint him black and now he's Nightmare Unicron! Same figure, but he sure looks good in the new colors. Likewise Masterpiece MP-10 is getting his unsurprising black repaint as MP-10B Black Convoy previewed once again. Most Convoy/Optimus Prime figures get a black repaint of some sort so pretty much everyone saw this coming. Third piece of our tinted triad is Transformers Generations TG-14 Soundblaster, a black version of TG-13 Soundwave. Here's the kicker: Both Hasbro and Takara decided that rather than wait to do the repaint they'd just release them both at the same exact time. No kidding, the Hasbro version is in stores right now. It's actually really fun figure, I've got one on my desk right now. 

What is new (mostly) is Super GT-03 Megatron. We haven't talked much, if at all, about the Super GT series. They're a line of transforming scale race cars based on real world racers. They're something of an evolution of the Alternity line, but at a larger scale similar to Alternators/Binaltech. Each figure is also accompanied by a fully articulated race queen figure based on a real person from the officially licensed race teams. I don't know much of anything about Super GT racing, but this is the #1 S Road REITO MOLA GT-R and is a remold of other figures in the series. We've seen art for the figure before, but this is our first look at the real thing. 

The rest of the lineup for these scans include another look at MP-16 Frenzy & Buzzsaw, several new BeCool (Bot Shots) figures, some Arms Microns translucent redecos, and one more look at Encore 23 Fortress Maximus to remind you he's one big figure! Surprisingly absent are the upcoming Deluxe Generations figures, but there's always next month.

[via Planet Iacon on Facebook, Seibertron.com]