Reviewer’s Note: We recently received 4 new Star Trek toys to coincide with the release of the new Star Trek Movie: The U.S.S. Enterprise Transporter Room, The Starfleet Phaser, The Starfeet Communicator and The Starfleet Tricorder from Playmates Toys. Rather than reviewing each toy individually, we’ve decided to group the toys into two categories, action figure play-set (Transporter Room) and away mission accoutrements (Communicator, Phaser, Tricorder), in order to focus our reviews.

In this review, we’ll be looking at what all fashionable Starfleet Officers will be sporting this year when they find themselves ‘planet-side’; we’re talking The Starfleet Tricorder, The Starfleet Communicator, and The Starfleet Phaser. When these toys arrived on our doorstep, my sons Nikolai (age 7) and Caleb (age 5) were a little confused as to their uses… Okay maybe they had the Starfleet Phaser figured out, but the other two were a bit of a mystery. I explained to them that these toys were essentially what Grandpa’s generation thought we’d be using for space exploration in the 23rd century. The boys hefted the bulky toys and then paused to eye my iPhone. Seeing their puzzled expressions I commented, “You have to remember that these ideas were born during the dawn of the integrated circuit over 43 years ago. In other words, the ‘micro’ in microchip was still an abstract concept.” Realizing that I only succeeded in confusing them more, I told them to go play with the toys and let me know what they thought.

The Starfleet Tricorder

In the Star Trek Universe, the Tricorder is the end-all, beat-all scanning/interpretation/recording device essential to all Starfleet Away Missions. It’s like a handheld computer that scans and interprets the environment, technology, life-forms, etc around it and provides that information to its user. The device is about the size of 3 iPhones stacked on top of one another. On its side is a button which one pushes causing the top half of its cover to flip up and the bottom half to flip down accompanied by an audio set of beeps and boops. Opening the cover gives a Starfleet Officer access to the display: flashing lights and two buttons labeled ‘Scan 1’ and ‘Scan 2’. Pressing Scan 1 gives the officer a series of 3 different beeps, boops, whirls, and flashing light patterns, while pressing Scan 2 results in a different series of 3 beeps, boops, whirls, and flashing light patterns. In a child’s hands, it’s up to their imagination to determine what all the beeps, boops, and flashes mean.

As for the toy itself, the chrome-plastic with the black-matted plastic accents makes it appear rather cool. However, after handling it for all of a few minutes, it feels rather cheaply made. The flip-open covers feel very flimsy, and they have to be worked into place to get them to shut properly. The flashing light patterns, beeps, and boops are pretty cool, and according to my wife, Tonya, from the other room, rather loud. Which means that this device would not be ideal for covert Away Missions. All in all, a Starfleet Officer may get years of service out of the device, but I can see a child requisitioning a new Tricorder within the month.

The Starfleet Communicator

Hailed as the forefather of the modern cell phone, the Communicator is the essential communication device for all Away Missions. Think of it as universal ‘phone’ with no roaming charges. The device is as thick as two iPhones, but with a smaller cross face section. It flips open like a clamshell cell phone with an accompanying ‘beep, beep, beep, beep.’ On its faceplate are two buttons. Press the left button and you’re greeted by Chris Pine as James T. Kirk saying, “Kirk to Enterprise, we’re falling without a chute. Beam us up!” Pressing the right button results in Zachary Quinto as Spock saying, “Spock to Enterprise, get us out now!” And that’s about it.

As a toy, the fact that one is limited to these two particular audio clips from the Star Trek Movie somewhat curtails the imagination as far as pretend play goes. In fact one would be hard pressed to figure out how to work these two audio bites into pretend play, seeing as both clips address the Enterprise by name. Look at it this way, if a Starfleet Officer is holding a Communicator, then 9 times outta 10, that officer is also on an away mission and therefore wouldn’t exactly be answering the Enterprise’s phone calls. A better set of audio clips would have been, “This is the Enterprise, we receive you.” or “Kirk here.” or “This is Spock, what is your status.” As far as aesthetics go, the Communicator lacks the shiny chrome-plastic, so that’s a negative, however it mercifully includes an on/off switch.

The Starfleet Phaser

Okay, even though Starfleet’s mission is one of exploration and peace, it doesn’t hurt to pack a little heat in the form of a PHASed Energy Rectification weapon or Phaser when visiting a strange planet. As I mentioned earlier, Nikolai and Caleb picked up the logistics of this device rather quickly… Yeah, pride doesn’t begin to describe what I felt.

The Starfleet Phaser is decked out entirely in chrome-plastic… Oooh, shiny. As a weapon, the Phaser comes with two firing options: a Stun Setting, designated by the blue Phaser barrel, and a Kill Setting, designated by the red barrel. The way one switches between Stun and Kill is rather intriguing. To go from Kill to Stun, one rotates the spring-loaded Phaser barrel around an axis perpendicular to the Phaser barrel and locks the Phaser barrel into place so that the blue Stun barrel is pointing at the intended victim. Pulling the trigger results in a flashing blue light from the blue Phaser barrel and the ‘Stun’ sound effect. To switch to the Kill Setting, one pushes the silver button located just above of the trigger on the left side of the Phaser with the right thumb… If one is left handed and therefore holding the Phaser in the left hand, then you’re stuck with having to reach over the top of the Phaser with the right hand to push the button on the left side as the matching button on the right side of the Phaser is fake and therefore does nothing. The message here is that even though Starfleet professes to be tolerant of all forms of sentient life, what it really can’t stand are lefties.

Anyway, pressing the ‘functioning button’ with the thumb causes the Phaser barrel to snap around (due to the spring-loaded barrel) from the blue Stun one to the red Kill one. Pulling the trigger now results in a flashing red light from the red Phaser barrel accompanied by the ‘Kill’ sound effect. What intrigued me about this set-up is the fact that the Phaser uses a spring-loaded mechanism to spin the barrel from Stun to Kill mode. Now we haven’t seen the movie yet, so I don’t know if this little trick is standard on all Starfleet Phasers or just the toy ones, but as an engineer I see a potential design flaw. Imagine if you will that your are in a dire situation where diplomacy has failed and the only hope of survival is being able to mount a decisive blow with your trusty Phaser’s Kill Setting. Now imagine that when you push the ‘functioning button’, the barrel jams halfway through its rotation leaving you with a shiny chrome-plastic paperweight. Clearly, the Starfleet Engineers haven’t heard of K.I.S.S.

As far as a toy goes, well this Starfleet Phaser looks pretty much like that, a toy. Tonya has in her possession a toy Starfleet Phaser modeled after the Original Series and it beats this one hands down in the coolness category. I guess the best way to put it is, if you placed this ‘shiny’one on a store shelf with all of the other ‘toy laser guns’ to come from toy manufactures over the years, it would pretty much get lost in the crowd. In a word, meh.

Overall Impressions

After we played with these Starfleet accoutrements for a few days, we were at the store and discovered that these toys were going for around $18 a piece. Ouch! Personally, I think Playmates Toys would have done better to sell them all together as a package for around $30, but that could just be me. So, with of this in mind, Nikolai has decided to give the Starfleet Tricorder 90 out of 100 Thumbs-up because though it is fun, it is rather loud. As for the Starfleet Communicator and Starfleet Phaser, well they both get 100 out of 100 because they meet the child’s standard of cool. Caleb’s scorecard shows perfect 10 out of 10 Stars for all three toys. Why? Because they are toys. As for me, well unfortunately I just can’t get over how ‘cheap’ all three of them felt. It’s as if no forethought was made to produce something that could help fuel the Star Trek Movie Franchise. Instead, we’re handed something attempting to ride the movie’s coattails. Therefore, I’m giving all three toys 3 out of 8 Dancing Elephants.

Parting Thoughts… Know your Scifi Sidearms

Nikolai: In Star Wars, they’re call ‘Blasters’ and in Star Trek, they’re known as ‘Phasers.’