Over the last few years, Hasbro has started doing special licensed Transformers toys that fall outside of the regular lines, which are usually tied to whatever TV show or movie is out at the time. Instead, these toys are robots that convert (not “transform,” as per Hasbro’s official style) into things from other TV shows or movies, like the Back To The Future DeLorean, the Blackbird from the X-Men cartoon, and (just announced this week) a dinosaur and Ford Explorer from Jurassic Park. Today, Hasbro revealed another mash-up toy, but rather than a tie-in with a movie, it’s a tie-in with a real guy: J Balvin, who evidently has now reached a level of fame where he can just call up Hasbro and have somebody make him into a Transformer.
Called J Balvintron, naturally, the J Balvin Transformer will be available exclusively on the NTWRK “livestream shopping platform” (It’s QVC or HSN but on a phone) on October 1 for $70. It appears to be based on the original G1 Soundwave mold, but with a new yellow paint job that’s designed to look like Balvin’s smiley face logo. It also comes with cassette Transformers, since it is a Soundwave toy, with Buzzsaw and Stripes getting new paint jobs based on Balvin’s Energia and Vibras albums. Weirdly, the packaging indicates that J Balvintron is a Decepticon, like Soundwave and Buzzsaw, but Stripes is an Autobot cassette. That obviously has all sorts of exciting plot implications if you decide to buy and play with this thing!
It’s surprisingly rare, but this isn’t the first time Hasbro has done a special Soundwave variation for a musical artist. In 2013, it put out an all-gold version of G1 Soundwave (with four cassettes!) for Linkin Park. It’s apparently worth at least double what the J Balvin toy is going to be selling for, so this might end up being a somewhat wise investment.