Popular Mechanics takes on the AT-M6…

The venerable Popular Mechanics ran a piece which does a quick-take on the absurdity of the recently detailed AT-M6 (All-Terrain Megacaliber Six). Putting aside the silly G.I. Joe-ish name, the concept is ripped apart by PM. Using the AT-AT as their starting point for stupid military vehicle concepts:

The original Imperial Walker is a dreadful design. It must be the result of some patronage scheme involving a Sith-friendly robotics manufacturer. Walking robots have inherent stability problems, and in nearly any scenario, a tracked or wheeled vehicle is much, much better.

While acknowledging that the sheer visual and aural awesomeness of the AT-AT's, (especially when first revealed in 1980) cannot be denied, the vehicles actually lack any real-world logic. This is nothing new, of course, as we've all spent our fair share of time mocking the utility of the walkers on Hoth. Many fans agree that the military design aesthetic of the First Order, which is only about 30 years removed from The Galactic Empire of ROTJ, should not stray too far from the familiar without jarring the viewer. But many fans are also annoyed at the First Order's lack of originality, as their engineers apparently attended Family Guy's "Bigger Jaws School of Military Theory and Design."

So when the First Order doubled down on the technology used by their Imperial predecessors by developing a larger version of the AT-AT, Popular Mechanics took umbrage at the design:

Now let's move on to the new AT-M6, which is basically all the terrible tactical ideas we found in the AT-AT, but worse. Where The Force Awakens' Starkiller Base was just a super-sized version of the Death Star, the AT-M6 is the same formula applied to an AT-AT... even though making an AT-AT even bigger is a seriously dumb idea.

The author essentially blasts the design for looking like a gorilla for "reasons" that are easily debunked by military technology that we possess today, let alone in a galaxy with a civilization that can readily break the laws of physics and space travel. As the author suggests, all might be forgiven if the AT-M6 wows audiences and uses its gorilla-like attributes to climb vertically - which happens to be something we saw the AT-TE's do in The Clone Wars.

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