COLLECTOR INTERVIEW #82: Paul Duggan aka Duggertron

We’re back for more Transformers collector interviews!

Today, we’re in the UK to chat with Duggertron, who is kindly taking us on a tour of his impressive vintage G1 collection, with every retail release represented in one form or another.

Who are you, and what do you collect? 

My name is Paul Duggan (aka Duggertron), and that is a question I often ask myself. By virtue of space, my shelves these days are 95% Generation 1 and 2.  However, I also have a collection of numbered plastic tubs in the loft spanning a good chunk of Beast Wars, Unicorn Trilogy, Binaltech and the various incarnations of generations. 

That said, in recent years, I have become much more focused on plugging the gaps in what I label “expanded G1” – all variations of commercially available G1 and G2 characters, including those that appeared in other toy lines or, in some cases, preceded Transformers.

While this may seem like a ridiculous undertaking, I have found this a better focus than just grasping randomly at the entirety of Transformers, which is probably what I was doing for a while. I realised I had reached a tipping point where I only needed certain figures to complete certain years, and it snowballed from there. Having a spreadsheet added to the compulsion.

What do you love most about Transformers and the hobby? 

For me, it is an intersection of four things: fiction, tactility, nostalgia, and community. I’ve deliberately ordered them that way as I think it reflects my journey as a fan.

Looking back, I feel like as a child I was looking for something to latch onto. I remember a scattering of Star Wars, He-Man and A-team toys, but then Transformers happened and… it just engulfed me. I don’t really recall what the initial hook was – maybe it was playground chatter, which obviously the coordinated comics/cartoon/advertising blitz was designed to elicit. 

I think what hooked me was the fusion of the fiction and play value, be it the tech specs, the box art or the UK comics, when you combine that with a toy that could turn from one thing to another, I found it irresistible. I was diagnosed a couple of years ago with ADHD, and this has helped contextualise my love of transformers – firstly as a hyper fixation, but also why a toy that can be repeatedly flipped from one mode to another connected so readily with a restless mind.

However, while I was very sure Transformers were my thing, my parents, at least initially, were not. It took a sustained campaign to get a standing order set up for the weekly comic, something I only achieved in 1986 at issue 70. Equally, as I am sure is true of many people, the first time I thought I had successfully managed to submit a request for a Transformer for my birthday… instead yielded Machine Robo (aka Gobots) Water Walk. Seeing my disappointment, this was quickly supplemented with Warpath, who was my first “real” Transformer and remains high in my affections.

Ironically, I think one of the things my mum objected to about Transformers was the perceived violence, but then she bought me the only minibot that had an aggressive alt mode. Either way, things snowballed from there and Transformers were, by and large, my primary request for Christmas and Birthdays from then on (although I do have a memory of looking at Jetfire in the Argos catalogue and deciding not to ask for it as it was too expensive…). I should also say in hindsight that Water Walk is an excellent toy, and I am glad I still have him.

I was very dogged in sticking with Transformers as a child – I persisted with the original comic and toy line until their respective demises despite most of my friends moving onto other things. This, of course, meant that as soon as I had access to the internet, one of the first things I searched for (probably via Ask Jeeves…) was Transformers, which brings me to nostalgia and community. Finding groups of people who shared what had sometimes felt like a solo obsession was a revelation. I started to meet, where geographically possible, with folk from the message board I was on (the long-defunct Transfans.net) and some lifelong friendships were made. I also found myself interacting with people from around the world, which at one point led to me attending the wedding of someone in Vegas I had never met in person prior to the night before the wedding (and surprising them with a video from Simon Furman wishing them all the best).

I drifted from the fandom and significantly slowed my collecting for a period due to life circumstances and some mental health challenges for a decade or so, but started to engage much more readily again from about ten years ago. This has led to another set of great friendships. My day job is in corporate health and well-being, and I’m very passionate about helping people get well and stay well. One of the things I have really noticed about the Transformers UK scene is how welcoming it is and how it provides a place for connection, something that can be increasingly hard in the world of hybrid working and social media. I’d particularly like to shout out Triple Takeover, TF Nation, Transformers The Show and The TF UK Guide for the inclusive communities they have created. I think there is something genuinely special and healthy about people forming friendships over the thing they love. Plus, my parents can’t complain now that I’m part of a motivational WhatsApp fitness group made up entirely of Transformers fans. See? It’s good for me.  

How has the collecting scene changed since you joined the fandom?

Well, notably, I can’t ask my friend’s parents to buy me Transformers for my birthday anymore, despite this proving to be a very effective way to get all the Seacons in 1988. 

When I first became “a collector” in the early 2000s, I feel like knowledge and news were much more compartmentalised and harder to access. Now there are so many places and such a volume of information that it can be hard to keep up. Overall, though, I think that’s a good thing – I didn’t know about G2 when it came out, as I wasn’t looking in the right places, and I only initially found out about Beast Wars through my local comic shop. 

Obviously, a big thing is that Transformers, along with other elements of nerd culture, have gone mainstream, so people now know what you are talking about when you mention the hobby. That said I don’t know if this makes a huge day to day difference to the experience of collecting (for me at least) as while lots more people now know what Transformers is or have a passing interest in it, they are not generally trying to score colour variations of the Firecons on Yahoo Japan. NB – This is not a criticism of those people. It may, however, be a criticism of me.

The thing I do think makes a difference is that these days, with the communities in place, it’s much easier to buy, trade, and sell with other fans, which has helped me acquire some great pieces at rates far better than you would see on eBay.

Lastly, while there have been “collector” targeted toys pretty much from the early 2000s, this feels like a much more ongoing and prominent element of the franchise than it used to be. I’m a bit torn on whether this is a positive. I think long-term, it might be better for Transformers’ longevity if great toys primarily aimed at children remain the focus.  

How do you see, or hope to see, the scene changing over the next 5 years? 

I realise some people love it, but I would be very keen to see the more collector-oriented side of the franchise move away from slavishness to cartoon accuracy. I worry that this is both reducing creativity and prioritising aesthetics over play value. I was a big fan of Generations when they took inspiration from multiple sources across the fiction and original toys and came up with something new, but clearly inspired by the past. I feel that creativity has been stifled somewhat with a fixation on one reference point.

Equally, toys should first and foremost be fun in my opinion, and in some cases, cartoon accuracy is, for me at least, leading to some (admittedly clever) fiddling and unintuitive transformations. Per my prior comments about tactility, this robs the toys of something for me. I want to be able to flip them back and forth and enjoy doing it.

Conversely, I am looking forward to seeing more non-G1 come to the fore as different generations of the fandom grow up. There are so many amazing toys in, for example, the Unicron Trilogy that I would love to see modern versions of. Imagine an Energon Wing Saber with… any articulation whatsoever. 

I also predict that by 2030, every single TF fan will have their own podcast and/or YouTube channel.

What is the most surprising or outrageous collecting story you have heard? 

The one that always kills me is that apparently in the early late 90s people were finding crates of Battle Gaias and Guard Cities, and because of their relative obscurity, assuming they were knock-offs. Given how rare (and pricey) these figures are now, the idea of opening up an entire box of them, let alone then dismissing them, blows my mind. This one has probably particularly stuck with me as Guard City has, until very recently, been my longest-standing grail. Because, as everyone knows, Defensor is the best combiner (don’t @ me). Ultimately, though, I think it speaks to most outrageous collecting stories, which generally boil down to ‘right place, right time’.

What has been your single most significant success as a collector, or your greatest ever find? 

I think my greatest success is that I now own a version (there are a few KOs and lots of reissues in there) of every single G1 retail toy, across the US, Europe and Japan (except for the watches).  I literally only achieved this last week with the arrival of a few stragglers. I feel a little wary typing this, though, as inevitably I will now look on TF Wiki and realise I have missed something.

This also doesn’t mean I’m done with my G1-centric goals, as there are variations from later lines like RID and related ones like Brave and Dorvack. I am still keen to add to the collection, as well as a few other curiosities. And I’ll probably get the watches at some point.

If you could pick one item from your collection to keep, what would it be? 

Despite my love of the toys, I am equally attached to the original Transformers comic, specifically the UK incarnation. I am part of a spectacularly well-run Transformers Book Group where we are currently rereading the entire 332-issue run, and it’s giving me a lot of joy.

Going back to what I love about Transformers, I think the comic, which rarely felt like it was pitched to kids, very much fired my imagination and built a universe around the toys that I love. I’m therefore very lucky that at a convention in (I think) 2001, I was able to pick up original artwork of the very first appearance of the legendary Ultra Magnus (and as a bonus featuring UK mainstays Emirate Xaaron and Impactor), which now hangs proudly on the wall. So that’s what I’d keep. 

But if you want a toy, it would be G1 Pipes, as he is the best. 

If you could have one item out of someone else’s collection, what would that be? 

Four things spring to mind, three of which are owned by the same collector – if I’m hypothetically breaking into people’s houses, I might as well grab the lot.

Firstly, I’ll have Sixo’s Black Tracks, please. He won’t miss it, seeing as it is an established fact that he owns all of Transformers.

Then it’s off to pilfer the following from wonderful collector DiaBrave Sid; his custom G2 Defensor (like I said – the best), his Brave Gōryū and last but not least his Machine Robo R JeTan. I didn’t even know about the last one until about a month ago, but now I’m rather keen on one.

Don’t look it up, though – you wouldn’t be interested.

What advice would you give a new collector starting out today?

Three things spring to mind. 

Firstly, ask for help. There are so many kind and helpful people in the fandom who will happily share their knowledge on where the best places to buy things are. 

Secondly, and this is very much a personal learning for me, savour each purchase. Whether it’s grouping things for shipping, buying toys at a convention or just the rate at which things come out, it’s very easy to end up with a pile of toys and tearing them open one after another. I learned that this squanders the joy of each toy, and I am now much more disciplined at pacing myself, even if I get several things at once. The most aggressive example of this is that I opened the last of my haul from TFNation 2024 this morning, with only a month to go until TFNation 2025. 

Lastly, and most importantly, understand your motivations. It’s very easy to get swept up in other perspectives of what toys you should buy, what is going to generate likes on social media or keeping up with the robo-jonses. Having a strong sense of what you enjoy about collecting will help the hobby from going from fun to burdensome and allow you to chart your own path through the vastness of Transformers in a way that both works for your wallet and brings you happiness.

Which, at the end of the day, is what it is all about.

Special thanks to Duggertron for his words & photos! Be sure to give him a shout on Bluesky!