User blog comment:RA2/Robot Wars Rankdown: Series 1/@comment-1011118-20180213010457

12) Barry. Barry does get a lot of sympathy for being in the same heat as a stock bot, and I really like its cool design that had a great deal more character & aesthetic than many Series 1 bots.  That being said, any of its theoretical battle success can be attributed to its weight advantage, which doesn't actually correlate with bot quality.  Would've been hella funny to see a house bot lose at Sumo in the very first episode, but Grunt didn't force Barry to try & fail the ramp in the gauntlet 11)  Cruella. Cruella may annoy me with its Dalmatian colours being the inverse of what they should, but it was a solid contender and effective wedge that dogged Robot The Bruce for a while. 10) Nemesis. They were kind of setting themselves up for failure since being on fire meant instant loss.  But they brought something to the table in Series 1 that few people did - character.  The majority of teams were - through no fault of their own - just plain people in t-shirts with wooden personalities.  9) Plunderbird 1. This is the absolute max I can give to a robot that fell in the gauntlet, Plunderbird is the coolest of them all. They made it colourful, they were animated, they had that really unique pop-out saw that we were robbed of seeing. 8) Bodyhammer. They have great legacy thanks to their successor robot, but that's not relevant here.  Being mounted so low, the hammer would struggle to hit anything even if it worked.  They were pretty fortunate to get two middleweight fights in its heat, and even moreso to get some assistance off the grille.  In the grand final, it seemed to have trouble against bots of its own weight, which is telling 7) Killertron. Picking up points for its ability to stand out, Killertron had great synergy between battle & gauntlet suitability 6) TRACIE is saved from being the worst grand finalist because of its Prince of Darkness kill, and because they were prudent enough to be invertible. The factor that prevents it from being the best grand finalist was how easily it got stuck.  The Mouse, being a stock bot was meant to lose Snooker, but on the back of TRACIE's performance, I could get behind them making an exception.  They went out of the Grand Final in the worst way possible. 5) Cunning Plan. I've chosen to not ding Cunning plan for its weight disadvantage that meant it couldn't win. I have no complaints about it, there were just 4 robots that were better. 4) Mortis. Clearly the best robot to lose in the heats, its weapon was one of the few that could take advantage of the highly-weighted damage category in judges' decisions. 3)  Robot The Bruce. Sure it was boring, but it got the push-bot design just right. It could've been a contender for the title if not for the one unfortunate moment. 2) Roadblock. Not much to say about the champion - they knew what they had to do, and they did it. 1) Recyclopse. Recyclopse gets my #1 vote for having by far the most inventive weapon in the series, and having it work to such a great degree. I loved the design and I loved watching it fight, and I'm ranking it at #1 for that, and because it was the most capable of KO'ing another without any assistance from hazards.