Post by Philip Ayres on Nov 3, 2010 16:51:06 GMT
Finding I needed to write a new addition to my Classics Jet reviews for Generations Dirge I decided to unite & update both the Starscream and Ramjet reviews into one massive missive.
So for your pleasure and enjoyment:
Classics Starscream
I am not a big Starscream fan either as a character or as a toy - both of which were hideously overused. The original toy has robot parts that can't be stored in vehicle mode and vice versa, is horribly proportioned and is a brick below the waist in robot mode. Starscream has been back as a Classic pretender, Action Master, reissue, Beast Wars II toy, Robot Master, in all 3 of the modern TF series - Armada, Energon and Cybertron, in the Movies and in Animated all of which have been repainted to death. So I'm not approaching this toy with a whole lot of love for it's history. But on the other hand I am very pro Hasbro putting out affordable (deluxe or smaller) jets and believe that Starscream as a main character aught to be offered on a card every year - rather than a more expensive boxed toy - as a counterpart to the main Autobot hero "Hot Rod" character
Starscream is an F-15 Eagle jet almost entirely moulded in grey plastic. The classic version is the same shape as the original toy but with a different deco - the wings, tailfins and tail wings are mostly painted red and there's a blue stripe along the middle of the jet. A Decepticon symbol is on the right wing looking from the front. There are 2 large missile launchers under each wings. There's no front landing gear as such, but the sides of the front of the jet's undercarriage fold down as wheels, with wheel on the back of the plane, none of which move. The cockpit does not open. I think that's all I can say about the jet - it's good enough shape wise, your appreciation of it comes down to what you think of the deco changes and the lack of a proper front landing gear.
The TF is where it gets interesting as there's a lot that's different to G1 Starscream - pull back on the rear of the jet, rotate the tailfins and tail wings down and lower the feet. Remove the missile launchers. The wings - courtesy of a double hinge - fold so they are the other way round. Holding to he undercarriage pull up on the nosecone - the entire back of the plane will fold up just above the robot's upper legs. Fold the arms out to the sides of the body and fold the hands out of the forearms. Pull down on the rear of the cockpit - it's attached to the rest of the plane by a long plastic strut hinged at both ends. Rotate the cockpit round the end of the strut. Fold the jet end of the strut down into the body while folding the cockpit end ender the cockpit. Pull and fold back on the nosecone exposing the robot head. Put the front and the back halves of the toy back together and you have the robot. Mount weapons on shoulders or as hand weapons.
I've got to give it to Hasbro, the changes to the TF make all the difference to the finished robot producing a toy that's fully articulated, looks like the cartoon/comic version of the robot and still is the original jet. We've got a rotating joint below the knee, knee, ball jointed hip, shoulders that swing out to the sides as if he was puffing his chest up and ball joints in the actual shoulders, elbows and neck. An added paint application to the sides of the boxes on the chest would have helped here as the grey breaks up the red chest. The robot mode reveals some pieces moulded in a different colour of plastic: the feet, lower arms, hands & the bulk of the missile launchers are all dark blue plastic which indicates that they're probably moulded together.
I don't think Starscream could have been realised in plastic any better - although the deco changes weren't necessary I can see why the landing gear was omitted and the weapons are so large. Excellent stuff, this should be your one toy Starscream (Masterpiece ain't a toy !)
Repaints - duh. You could fund the rest of the line just by periodically repainting Starscream. Skywarp is already on the way (and looks very nifty too) in a box with a white Prime repaint as Ultra Magnus. I'm sure Thundercracker and Sunstorm will follow somehow. Ramjet has been shown reworking the toy and looks to be a great success which gives me high hopes for Dirge and Thrust too.
Starscream is a Wave 1 classics deluxe toy shipping in the USA with Astrotrain, Bumblebee and Rodimus where all four toys were packed at 2 per case. In the UK the same assortment was sold without Astrotrain creating an unevenly packed case.
Classics Skywarp
Skywarp appears in the Battle for Autobot City 2-pack with Ultra Magnus.
Both are much as you'd expect - Magnus is mainly white in both forms, while Skywarp is Black, for Starscream's grey with Purple highlights and swaps purple plastic for blue. For my money Skywarp is miles better than Starscream. It stays a lot closer to the original Skywarp colour arrangements than Starscream's slightly altered appearance.
Seeing as the original versions of these two toys would have set you back £30 - £20 for Optimus Prime and £10 for Starscream, the £20 Woolworths were asking for the set is a good deal.
Ramjet
Ramjet is a remould of the Classics Starscream toy, which give him an advantage over his case brother Cliffjumper who's merely a recolour of Bumblebee. Remoulds are rare - the Beasts and Skywarp in Armada, Roadblock in Energon, the Armada toys, Dark Skorponok and Dark Crumplezone in Energon. Remoulding makes me feel I get more for my money when I buy a toy a second time!
Gone are Starscream's wings, tail fins, missiles, nose and head - later multicoloured repaints of Starscream indicate that these are moulded together all on the same parts tree. In its place we have Generation 1 Ramjet style wings attached to the holes at the back previously used for the tail fins. The very front of each wing is a separate piece attached to where Starscream's wings are. The nose cone is considerably shorter in jet mode on Ramjet. The missiles are larger than Starscream's and look more like missiles than the gun like ones included with the earlier toy. All of these parts appear to be the same colour plastic so probably are found on the same frame.
The TF is the almost the same as on Starscream - I'd advise flipping the little wing stubs round like the larger Starscream wings so the arms have more space to move, but the main wing pieces are left sticking out to the sides even though they can be folded down. There's no fold down nose to the plane here.
Ramjet is a coneheaded jet with a new face that looks great. The robot mode paint scheme is really very nice with the dark grey, both on the new parts and those which were blue on Starscream, and the white, for the remaining grey parts from Starscream, a nice contrast against each other. Once again the side of the folding panel on his chest box is unpainted, yet the fan/wheel within has been painted. The gold highlights work well too. Starscream was good, but Ramjet is a big improvement on him, well worth getting
Ramjet is a Wave 3 Classics toy in the USA shipping with Cliffjumper and some other toys carried over from previous waves. In the UK these two new toys shipped in the sparsely distributed wave 2 case alongside Astrotrain, who was not distributed in the UK Wave 1 case, Grimlock and Mirage. I can't remember finding this case when it should have been released. Indeed the only time I saw it was discounted in Wilkinsons store late in 2007 after the Movie toys came out.
Classics Thundercracker
In 2007, after the conclusion of the Classics line while we waited for the Movie to hit, that year's Botcon convention was held. The exclusive that year was a boxset adding a number of characters to the Classics line using existing toy moulds. In this set were the three jets not done in the Classics toyline, Thundercracker, Dirge & Thrust. You can see why Botcon wanted these for the convention boxset, indeed it turned out to be one of the most popular convention exclusives they've had, though I feel Hasbro shot themselves in the foot by not holding those over for Classics 2.0/Universe. Even now, though Dirge & Thrust have since escaped into the mass market, it urks me that my collection of G1 Jets in classic form isn't complete !
Thundercracker is exactly what you'd expect - a blue jet with silver robot chest, black tail fins and gloves. He's pretty close to the original Thundercracker design and that may make releasing a "slightly different but still accurate" version later on a little difficult.
Botcon Dirge
Dirge and Ramjet are quite similar in their Generation 1 forms - Dirge's wings turn up at the end where Ramjet's go down, Dirge has extra small wings at the front of his larger ones and lacks the engines that Ramjet has. So it's not too huge a leap to recolour Ramjet as Dirge which is what happened in the Botcon 2007 set. Dirge's swaps Ramjet's white for a lovely bright blue and while Ramjet's grey becomes black with the wing tops painted over with pale orange.
It's a nice toy and it's a shame it didn't go to general release.
Of course this Dirge didn't have remoulded wings so if a toy was produced with new wings it wouldn't be the same and could be released.....
Botcon Thrust
Thrust takes the existing Ramjet base mould and modifies the wings to produce a design similar to the original Thrust - the larger wings with the fans mounted on them are fitted to where Starscream's front wings are while the smaller wings are attached to his back becoming ankle mounted. The red, for Ramjet's white, and black, for the grey, are a dead on match for the G1 toy. Of note here are the missile launchers which include the larger missiles found with Classics Ramjet where the G1 version had missiles identical to the original Diaclone derived jets indicating that Classics Thrust should have the same style weapons as Classics Starscream.
Again, a huge shame it didn't get a general release. I'm sure the money made from putting these out for Botcon would have been less than a general store release.
The new accurate tooling for the wings represents a problem in releasing this toy at retail. However the solution was quite ingenious as we shall see.
Henkei Starscream
This version takes the Classics Starscream mold and gives it a paint job much closer to the G1 original. Gone is the large amounts of red paint on the wings and the blue stripe down the back. Instead we now get small red and white stripes on the wings and the upright tailfin with the majority of the tailfin being blue. The blue round the cockpit and nosecone is gone too and the red on the fuselage is now a brighter red. The launchers are basically the same, except that the round housing between trigger and missile has fallen prey to Takara's obsession with chroming pieces. There's a backwards facing Decepticon symbol on top and under each wing. Why ???? The symbol should face forward and then it'd be the right way up in robot mode ! Gone is the rubsign.
TFing to robot mode and we see the bright red is continued onto the robot chest and that they've painted the sides of the vent boxes - hurrah ! There's white markings on the side of the waist piece now and white also replaces the red stripes on the shoulders. The blue too can now be seen to a bit brighter as it's visible now on his hands, forearms, feet & kneepads (replacing the gold - the previously blue bits are now yellow) There's a thin grey stripe round the end of the forearms. The wheels inside the vents can be seen to be painted a dark grey. Gone is the gold on the upper part of the bits sticking up from the shoulders, instead the vents lower down are painted in a more metallic gold.
Overall: Greatly improved over the classics version. Mine is spoiled by some not great paint applications, and it going into the plastic packaging still wet - the missile launchers came out stuck together in one block and had to be prised apart.
Starscream is Henkei toy D-02. A large picture gallery comparing the Henkei toys with their western releases can be found here.
Henkei Ramjet
Henkei Ramjet takes the existing mould and plays with the colouring - the white & the grey parts inherited from Starscream becomes bright white, the wings turn from black painted with red to moulded in bright red plastic with the missiles and engines being chromed. Somehow this manages to miss the mark slightly - the red is too red, and the original fists & wrists could do with being grey grey like the Classics version.
You take your choice between the two versions.
Ramjet is Henkei toy D-04.
Universe Acid Storm
Why would I be wanting to pay out money for a £13 repaint of the Classics Starscream toy made to resemble something that's in a 20 year old cartoon for 5 minutes ????? Instead I could be getting a jet repaint of an established TF character. But no, they had to give that to the convention. What were they thinking that day ? It was obvious Classics was coming back - they announced stuff at that con itself IIRC. It's obvious from the first wave of Classics 2 that repaints are at the forefront of Hasbro's thinking as there's 2 inline repaints of both the Autobot cars available - and then some convention milking with Diaclone specials. Whoever was in charge at Hasbro really dropped the ball that day as TF fans would keep coming back in their thousands for G1 jets redone. This should have been an exclusive along with Sunstorm and whoever else as the appeal is really for the most die hard of G1 fans. Just such an odd decision. As such I'd intended to boycott this toy completely but there was a decent deal on eBay for the pair so I snatched it and have sold it on quick.
Not keen on the colour scheme much either.
EDIT: I've changed my mind
1) Acid Storm is another Decepticon Jet and that's no bad thing.
2) Acid Storm is coloured similarly to Machine Wars Thundercracker so if you're too poor for the Botcon or Henkei versions then buy this and pretend it's Thundercracker.
3) When I reviewed the Cyberjets I noted there was something odd going on with the colours and how the Decepticons set looked more Autobotish... Well now I've looked again at Strafe and blow me the colours are dead on for Acid Storm. Whereas Spacecase is more like the Aerialbot Leader Slingshot.
EDIT 2:
This is the third time I've looked at this mould and I can now see that the upper legs on this toy are a pale blue, which is a different colour to the body and lower legs. Previously all three parts have been the same colour. We find the pale blue elsewhere on the toy on the missile triggers and internal hinges. This lets us say with some certainty that there's FIVE parts frames used for this toy mould:
Frame 1: Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels: Grey on Starscream, Green here.
Frame 2: Upper legs & launcher triggers: Grey on Starscream, Pale Blue here.
Frame 3: Feet, engines, lower arms, hands & launchers: Blue on Starscream, Black here.
Frame 4: Nose, wings, tail fins & missiles: Grey on Starscream, Green here.
Frame 5: Cockpit Canopy: Clear Orange on both toys.
On Ramjet Frame 4 is swapped for a new parts frame of different versions of all those parts.
Universe Starscream
Since I ordered Henkei Starscream I've seen the Classics 2.0/Universe version which is basically the Henkei version with no chrome, no white paint and blue launchers. I am liking that a lot. I've now got it in the plastic and can see that the grey is more white than grey and the red is very bright, almost to G2 levels !
Henkei Skywarp
Skywarp's been done before in Classics, but this version takes the more G1 accurate Henkei Starscream paint job and uses the paint patterns there with the G1 Skywarp colours. The result is a robot with a similar amount of purple to the one found in the Vs pack with Ultra Magnus, but this time it's a shade more lilac and closer the G1 version. The stripes on the wings are more accurate and in the same configuration as Henkei Starscream. As per Henkei SS the tips of the missile launchers are chromed.
Not a bad toy, but perhaps not an essential purchase if you already have the Magnus vs pack.
Henkei Thundercracker
Now Thundercracker was one of the toys lost to the majority of the buying public in the Botcon fiasco. He's back again in a metallic blue that more closely matches the G1 version. All comments about Henkei Skywarp apply here too.
There's a persistent assembly error on Thundercracker: The arms aren't screwed together tight enough and as a consequence the missile launchers won't hold in place in the arm sockets properly. This is easily fixed I'm told by tightening the screws or resorting to our old friend the blue tack or the clear nail varnish.
A more essential purchase due to the rarity of the Botcon version.
Henkei Dirge
Like Thundercracker & Skywarp, Dirge & Thrust made their way onto the Japanese market as store exclusives. Dirge gains new G1 accurate shaped wings with weapon mounts underneath. A Decepticon symbol on each wing manages to be the right way up in robot mode - oh that does annoy me! His launchers acquire a chromed ring round the end like the other G1 jets as does the interior of the cockpit making it much more visible - good touch. My only criticisms would be the blue & white stripes added diagonally across each wing make it look more like a Classics toy than a more accurately decorated Henkei one and that he comes with the missiles found with Starscream et al rather than the larger Ramjet missiles.
The missiles & head throw up a bit of a conundrum for us: I can be reasonably sure that the new parts frame introduced for Ramjet contains his head, nose & missiles and that the original Starscream mould has the missiles on the frame that's discarded for Ramjet: one of the multicoloured toys bellow seems to prove that. So I'd be expecting Dirge to have the same missiles as the Ramjet mould, albeit coloured blue like the nose parts. Yet he doesn't have the same missile mould and more confusingly they're moulded black.
But a mighty fine toy. Expensive, but cheaper than netting the Botcon version.
Henkei Thrust
The Botcon Thrust involved using the Ramjet version of the classics jet mould and moulding new parts for the wings solving the problem of how could a Henkei Thrust be released without using the same parts used for the Botcon version, which would presumably infringe on whatever agreement Hasbro & Botcon had.
Thrust gains new wing pieces with large tail fins. 5mm weapon holes are added to the underside of the rear wings and through the front wings. To further distance the wings from the Botcon version a white Urban Camo pattern is added to the front wings. The front wings in jet mode can be folded forward to present a straight edge in vehicle mode and he's the only one of the jets where the weapons can be mounted above the wings in vehicle mode. The Fans for the front wings become removable units rather than being moulded in the wing and can be pegged onto either hole - a nice little touch here is that the fans do spin. The same chrome on the missile launchers and cockpit is present here, and in addition Thrust's face is painted white to resemble his G1 animation model. Like Dirge he has the smaller Starscream missiles, appropriately so here, but unfortunately they're coloured black here unlike the originals which were red. Annoyingly his Decepticon symbols on his wings end up upside down when folded back in Robot mode.
The new parts for Thrust have added a little extra play value for the toy. The deco is great. Very recommended.
Generations 2009 v2: Starscream
Like the previous Generations 2009 mail away offer, Starscream is a transparent version - this time representing Ghost Starscream which has been done on a larger size. Using the Henkei version as a base the grey is cast as clear plastic and all the other colours are clear versions of their original colours with the exception of the chromed pieces which remain as they were.
Stunning. Me want. But far too expensive for my pocket. Fortunately there's a much cheaper very high quality knock off in circulation and I've got one of those :-)
Generations Thrust
So the Henkei Exclusive Moulds then get recycled for the Western Market in the Generations toyline.
Thrust gets a makeover: The grey of the wings becomes a dark brown, the red becomes darker and the canopy goes from clear to orange. He retains the chrome in the cockpit but looses the chrome ring on the missile launchers which is now the same colour dark red/purple as the jet as are the missiles bringing it in line with the original. I think we can safely say that these missiles are a new parts tree moulded separately to everything else. The removable fan units - mounted under the tail in the package - come with a Decepticon symbol on the non tabbed side of the fans. The wings loose their white stripes and Decepticon symbols, but gain dark red and white stripes along the front of the wings again like the original Thrust. There's what looks like a slight remould to the wings gaining two small circles on the top side of the wing close to the body, but close examination reveals these were previously on the underside of Henkei Thrust's wings: The wings have swapped sides and are now upside down to how they were mounted before.
Robot mode sees the feet, hands and forearms change colour from the red to the dark brown again more in line with the original.
So given the choice between the three Thrusts I think the cheaper more G1 accurate colour scheme of Generations Thrust wins every time.
Thrust is a Wave 1 Generations toy shipping with Drift, War For Cybertron Bumblebee and War For Cybertron Optimus Prime. This wave shipped to the UK.
Generations Dirge
Like Thrust, Dirge's modified Henkei form is released in Generations with some tinkering to the colouring. Gone are the blue & white stripes on the wings replaced with some red & white stripes along the line of where the wing meets the body, much like on the original Dirge. The upper legs, arms, hands and chest are all now black like the original Dirge too. The weapons, still the Starscream type, are in black for both the launcher & missile with a blue ring round the end of the launcher. In a lovely little touch a small Decepticon symbol has been added to the chest just bellow the head.
All the Dirges from this mould have been good, but this all but nails the colours of the original.
Dirge is a Wave 4 Generations toy shipping with Blurr, a remould of Generations Drift. Blurr eventually arrived in the UK courtesy of a later revision case that was released here but Dirge has not, to date, been released here.
Generations Thundercracker
Generations Thundercracker is essentially a western retail release of the Henkei Thundercracker albeit without the chrome.
This complete western retail releases of classics version of all 6 Generation 1 Decepticon jets. However since Skywarp was previously a store exclusive and both he & Ramjet have paint scheme which are perhaps not up to the accuracy demanded on later toys I wouldn't be surprised to see more of this mould at retail at some point in the future.
Thundercracker was introduced in the second 2011 Generations Wave, alongside Wheeljack, and returned in the third wave which introduced Warpath. Neither of these waves were sent to the UK.
Botcon 2011 Tundercracker
Rewind to 1991. Phil walks into Beatties toyshop in Kingston and finds the new Action Masters Exo Suit toys Thundercracker & Circuit. These are both new toys containing repaints of earlier Action Master figures from older toys: Thundercracker is of course a repaint of Starscream while Circuit is a repaint of Axer. Interestingly their larger Motorised Exo Suit brothers also use repainted figures Slicer is a repainted Wheeljack and Rumbler is a repaint of Sprocket. Now even then I knew that Thundercracker shouldn't be the colours used on the Action Master toy. I knew he should be either blue or black but couldn't remember which because back then I had difficulty remembering which jet Decepticon was which!
Over the years Action Master Thundercracker has acquired rather a fan following. Do a Google Image Search for "Action Master Thundercracker" and marvel at the sheer number of toys repainted in this awful colour scheme. So over time a repaint of Classics Starscream became an inevitability. Thankfully it ended up as a Botcon toy so didn't pollute the rest of the world with it's evilness.
We need to confront what the colours used here actually are. Broadly they're based on the original Action Master Thundercracker:
Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels - red, which is slightly different to the pink used for the original Upper legs & launcher triggers - pale blue Feet, lower arms, hands & launchers - lime green Nose, jet wings, tail fins and missiles - purple
As you may be able to perceive, I'm not a fan of these colours. Action Master Thundercracker is the herald for all the really nasty bright colours used on some Transformers in the early part of the Nineties. I'd say he was the worst of the lot but I've seen the G2 Sparkabots and Firecons. Horrid colours, avoid!
But if there's one benefit to having such a varied psychedelic colour scheme you can see definitively which parts colours of plastic are on which parts frame when the toy was constructed! It reveals the toy designers were thinking about doing Starscream remoulds from the word go because that fourth frame, coloured purple here, contains all the parts that are changed between Starscream and Ramjet.
TFCC Generation 2 Ramjet
To explain why I like the Generation 2 Ramjet colours I'll quote my review of the 1994 toy:
Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels - purple
Upper legs & launcher triggers - purple
Feet, lower arms, hands & launchers - turquoise
Nose, jet wings, tail fins and missiles - black
All three colours are good Decepticon colours and I think they work very well with each other here. Detail is mainly painted on but there's silver stickers within his feet and air intakes. I note that he's missing the large name stickers that the Generation 2 toy had. That makes it easier to give him a new name: I think Scramjet might be appropriate.
He's the first fan club toy I've bought and I love him to bits. Grateful thanks to Mr Andy Kiernan for obtaining mine for me.
Parts Frames
We're now reasonably certain that there's five parts frames on the standard Starscream version. One is swapped for a sixth for all the coneheaded jets, with a seventh missile frame appearing later.
In addition extra frames for new wings are used for all Thursts and Henkei/Generations Dirge.
This, then, is how the parts frames are coloured for each version of the toy:
Future Repaints
I find it quite incredible that we still haven't seen the Classics Starscream mould recoloured as Sunstorm, but the Sunstorm craze has died down a bit now. Careful examination of the cartoon reveals several other colours that could be used, there's a purple one in the pilot for a start!
Starscream's recolours give us two similar black colour schemes that could be tried: the exclusive "Machine Wars" Starscream, itself a homage to the actual Machine Wars Starscream and the sort of similar Black Robotmasters Starscream. Generation 2 Starscream is broadly similar to the original but might just be different enough for people to buy.
I have seen a clear blue knock-off of this toy floating around. A real version of that would be nice :-)
So for your pleasure and enjoyment:
Phil's Classics, Henkei & Universe Starscream
Classics & Henkei Skywarp & Ramjet
Botcon, Henkei & Generations Dirge, Thrust & Thundercracker
and
Universe Acid Storm Review
Classics & Henkei Skywarp & Ramjet
Botcon, Henkei & Generations Dirge, Thrust & Thundercracker
and
Universe Acid Storm Review
Classics Starscream
I am not a big Starscream fan either as a character or as a toy - both of which were hideously overused. The original toy has robot parts that can't be stored in vehicle mode and vice versa, is horribly proportioned and is a brick below the waist in robot mode. Starscream has been back as a Classic pretender, Action Master, reissue, Beast Wars II toy, Robot Master, in all 3 of the modern TF series - Armada, Energon and Cybertron, in the Movies and in Animated all of which have been repainted to death. So I'm not approaching this toy with a whole lot of love for it's history. But on the other hand I am very pro Hasbro putting out affordable (deluxe or smaller) jets and believe that Starscream as a main character aught to be offered on a card every year - rather than a more expensive boxed toy - as a counterpart to the main Autobot hero "Hot Rod" character
Starscream is an F-15 Eagle jet almost entirely moulded in grey plastic. The classic version is the same shape as the original toy but with a different deco - the wings, tailfins and tail wings are mostly painted red and there's a blue stripe along the middle of the jet. A Decepticon symbol is on the right wing looking from the front. There are 2 large missile launchers under each wings. There's no front landing gear as such, but the sides of the front of the jet's undercarriage fold down as wheels, with wheel on the back of the plane, none of which move. The cockpit does not open. I think that's all I can say about the jet - it's good enough shape wise, your appreciation of it comes down to what you think of the deco changes and the lack of a proper front landing gear.
The TF is where it gets interesting as there's a lot that's different to G1 Starscream - pull back on the rear of the jet, rotate the tailfins and tail wings down and lower the feet. Remove the missile launchers. The wings - courtesy of a double hinge - fold so they are the other way round. Holding to he undercarriage pull up on the nosecone - the entire back of the plane will fold up just above the robot's upper legs. Fold the arms out to the sides of the body and fold the hands out of the forearms. Pull down on the rear of the cockpit - it's attached to the rest of the plane by a long plastic strut hinged at both ends. Rotate the cockpit round the end of the strut. Fold the jet end of the strut down into the body while folding the cockpit end ender the cockpit. Pull and fold back on the nosecone exposing the robot head. Put the front and the back halves of the toy back together and you have the robot. Mount weapons on shoulders or as hand weapons.
I've got to give it to Hasbro, the changes to the TF make all the difference to the finished robot producing a toy that's fully articulated, looks like the cartoon/comic version of the robot and still is the original jet. We've got a rotating joint below the knee, knee, ball jointed hip, shoulders that swing out to the sides as if he was puffing his chest up and ball joints in the actual shoulders, elbows and neck. An added paint application to the sides of the boxes on the chest would have helped here as the grey breaks up the red chest. The robot mode reveals some pieces moulded in a different colour of plastic: the feet, lower arms, hands & the bulk of the missile launchers are all dark blue plastic which indicates that they're probably moulded together.
I don't think Starscream could have been realised in plastic any better - although the deco changes weren't necessary I can see why the landing gear was omitted and the weapons are so large. Excellent stuff, this should be your one toy Starscream (Masterpiece ain't a toy !)
Repaints - duh. You could fund the rest of the line just by periodically repainting Starscream. Skywarp is already on the way (and looks very nifty too) in a box with a white Prime repaint as Ultra Magnus. I'm sure Thundercracker and Sunstorm will follow somehow. Ramjet has been shown reworking the toy and looks to be a great success which gives me high hopes for Dirge and Thrust too.
Starscream is a Wave 1 classics deluxe toy shipping in the USA with Astrotrain, Bumblebee and Rodimus where all four toys were packed at 2 per case. In the UK the same assortment was sold without Astrotrain creating an unevenly packed case.
Classics Skywarp
Skywarp appears in the Battle for Autobot City 2-pack with Ultra Magnus.
Both are much as you'd expect - Magnus is mainly white in both forms, while Skywarp is Black, for Starscream's grey with Purple highlights and swaps purple plastic for blue. For my money Skywarp is miles better than Starscream. It stays a lot closer to the original Skywarp colour arrangements than Starscream's slightly altered appearance.
Seeing as the original versions of these two toys would have set you back £30 - £20 for Optimus Prime and £10 for Starscream, the £20 Woolworths were asking for the set is a good deal.
Ramjet
Ramjet is a remould of the Classics Starscream toy, which give him an advantage over his case brother Cliffjumper who's merely a recolour of Bumblebee. Remoulds are rare - the Beasts and Skywarp in Armada, Roadblock in Energon, the Armada toys, Dark Skorponok and Dark Crumplezone in Energon. Remoulding makes me feel I get more for my money when I buy a toy a second time!
Gone are Starscream's wings, tail fins, missiles, nose and head - later multicoloured repaints of Starscream indicate that these are moulded together all on the same parts tree. In its place we have Generation 1 Ramjet style wings attached to the holes at the back previously used for the tail fins. The very front of each wing is a separate piece attached to where Starscream's wings are. The nose cone is considerably shorter in jet mode on Ramjet. The missiles are larger than Starscream's and look more like missiles than the gun like ones included with the earlier toy. All of these parts appear to be the same colour plastic so probably are found on the same frame.
The TF is the almost the same as on Starscream - I'd advise flipping the little wing stubs round like the larger Starscream wings so the arms have more space to move, but the main wing pieces are left sticking out to the sides even though they can be folded down. There's no fold down nose to the plane here.
Ramjet is a coneheaded jet with a new face that looks great. The robot mode paint scheme is really very nice with the dark grey, both on the new parts and those which were blue on Starscream, and the white, for the remaining grey parts from Starscream, a nice contrast against each other. Once again the side of the folding panel on his chest box is unpainted, yet the fan/wheel within has been painted. The gold highlights work well too. Starscream was good, but Ramjet is a big improvement on him, well worth getting
Ramjet is a Wave 3 Classics toy in the USA shipping with Cliffjumper and some other toys carried over from previous waves. In the UK these two new toys shipped in the sparsely distributed wave 2 case alongside Astrotrain, who was not distributed in the UK Wave 1 case, Grimlock and Mirage. I can't remember finding this case when it should have been released. Indeed the only time I saw it was discounted in Wilkinsons store late in 2007 after the Movie toys came out.
Classics Thundercracker
In 2007, after the conclusion of the Classics line while we waited for the Movie to hit, that year's Botcon convention was held. The exclusive that year was a boxset adding a number of characters to the Classics line using existing toy moulds. In this set were the three jets not done in the Classics toyline, Thundercracker, Dirge & Thrust. You can see why Botcon wanted these for the convention boxset, indeed it turned out to be one of the most popular convention exclusives they've had, though I feel Hasbro shot themselves in the foot by not holding those over for Classics 2.0/Universe. Even now, though Dirge & Thrust have since escaped into the mass market, it urks me that my collection of G1 Jets in classic form isn't complete !
Thundercracker is exactly what you'd expect - a blue jet with silver robot chest, black tail fins and gloves. He's pretty close to the original Thundercracker design and that may make releasing a "slightly different but still accurate" version later on a little difficult.
Botcon Dirge
Dirge and Ramjet are quite similar in their Generation 1 forms - Dirge's wings turn up at the end where Ramjet's go down, Dirge has extra small wings at the front of his larger ones and lacks the engines that Ramjet has. So it's not too huge a leap to recolour Ramjet as Dirge which is what happened in the Botcon 2007 set. Dirge's swaps Ramjet's white for a lovely bright blue and while Ramjet's grey becomes black with the wing tops painted over with pale orange.
It's a nice toy and it's a shame it didn't go to general release.
Of course this Dirge didn't have remoulded wings so if a toy was produced with new wings it wouldn't be the same and could be released.....
Botcon Thrust
Thrust takes the existing Ramjet base mould and modifies the wings to produce a design similar to the original Thrust - the larger wings with the fans mounted on them are fitted to where Starscream's front wings are while the smaller wings are attached to his back becoming ankle mounted. The red, for Ramjet's white, and black, for the grey, are a dead on match for the G1 toy. Of note here are the missile launchers which include the larger missiles found with Classics Ramjet where the G1 version had missiles identical to the original Diaclone derived jets indicating that Classics Thrust should have the same style weapons as Classics Starscream.
Again, a huge shame it didn't get a general release. I'm sure the money made from putting these out for Botcon would have been less than a general store release.
The new accurate tooling for the wings represents a problem in releasing this toy at retail. However the solution was quite ingenious as we shall see.
Henkei Starscream
This version takes the Classics Starscream mold and gives it a paint job much closer to the G1 original. Gone is the large amounts of red paint on the wings and the blue stripe down the back. Instead we now get small red and white stripes on the wings and the upright tailfin with the majority of the tailfin being blue. The blue round the cockpit and nosecone is gone too and the red on the fuselage is now a brighter red. The launchers are basically the same, except that the round housing between trigger and missile has fallen prey to Takara's obsession with chroming pieces. There's a backwards facing Decepticon symbol on top and under each wing. Why ???? The symbol should face forward and then it'd be the right way up in robot mode ! Gone is the rubsign.
TFing to robot mode and we see the bright red is continued onto the robot chest and that they've painted the sides of the vent boxes - hurrah ! There's white markings on the side of the waist piece now and white also replaces the red stripes on the shoulders. The blue too can now be seen to a bit brighter as it's visible now on his hands, forearms, feet & kneepads (replacing the gold - the previously blue bits are now yellow) There's a thin grey stripe round the end of the forearms. The wheels inside the vents can be seen to be painted a dark grey. Gone is the gold on the upper part of the bits sticking up from the shoulders, instead the vents lower down are painted in a more metallic gold.
Overall: Greatly improved over the classics version. Mine is spoiled by some not great paint applications, and it going into the plastic packaging still wet - the missile launchers came out stuck together in one block and had to be prised apart.
Starscream is Henkei toy D-02. A large picture gallery comparing the Henkei toys with their western releases can be found here.
Henkei Ramjet
Henkei Ramjet takes the existing mould and plays with the colouring - the white & the grey parts inherited from Starscream becomes bright white, the wings turn from black painted with red to moulded in bright red plastic with the missiles and engines being chromed. Somehow this manages to miss the mark slightly - the red is too red, and the original fists & wrists could do with being grey grey like the Classics version.
You take your choice between the two versions.
Ramjet is Henkei toy D-04.
Universe Acid Storm
Why would I be wanting to pay out money for a £13 repaint of the Classics Starscream toy made to resemble something that's in a 20 year old cartoon for 5 minutes ????? Instead I could be getting a jet repaint of an established TF character. But no, they had to give that to the convention. What were they thinking that day ? It was obvious Classics was coming back - they announced stuff at that con itself IIRC. It's obvious from the first wave of Classics 2 that repaints are at the forefront of Hasbro's thinking as there's 2 inline repaints of both the Autobot cars available - and then some convention milking with Diaclone specials. Whoever was in charge at Hasbro really dropped the ball that day as TF fans would keep coming back in their thousands for G1 jets redone. This should have been an exclusive along with Sunstorm and whoever else as the appeal is really for the most die hard of G1 fans. Just such an odd decision. As such I'd intended to boycott this toy completely but there was a decent deal on eBay for the pair so I snatched it and have sold it on quick.
Not keen on the colour scheme much either.
EDIT: I've changed my mind
1) Acid Storm is another Decepticon Jet and that's no bad thing.
2) Acid Storm is coloured similarly to Machine Wars Thundercracker so if you're too poor for the Botcon or Henkei versions then buy this and pretend it's Thundercracker.
3) When I reviewed the Cyberjets I noted there was something odd going on with the colours and how the Decepticons set looked more Autobotish... Well now I've looked again at Strafe and blow me the colours are dead on for Acid Storm. Whereas Spacecase is more like the Aerialbot Leader Slingshot.
EDIT 2:
This is the third time I've looked at this mould and I can now see that the upper legs on this toy are a pale blue, which is a different colour to the body and lower legs. Previously all three parts have been the same colour. We find the pale blue elsewhere on the toy on the missile triggers and internal hinges. This lets us say with some certainty that there's FIVE parts frames used for this toy mould:
Frame 1: Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels: Grey on Starscream, Green here.
Frame 2: Upper legs & launcher triggers: Grey on Starscream, Pale Blue here.
Frame 3: Feet, engines, lower arms, hands & launchers: Blue on Starscream, Black here.
Frame 4: Nose, wings, tail fins & missiles: Grey on Starscream, Green here.
Frame 5: Cockpit Canopy: Clear Orange on both toys.
On Ramjet Frame 4 is swapped for a new parts frame of different versions of all those parts.
Universe Starscream
Since I ordered Henkei Starscream I've seen the Classics 2.0/Universe version which is basically the Henkei version with no chrome, no white paint and blue launchers. I am liking that a lot. I've now got it in the plastic and can see that the grey is more white than grey and the red is very bright, almost to G2 levels !
Henkei Skywarp
Skywarp's been done before in Classics, but this version takes the more G1 accurate Henkei Starscream paint job and uses the paint patterns there with the G1 Skywarp colours. The result is a robot with a similar amount of purple to the one found in the Vs pack with Ultra Magnus, but this time it's a shade more lilac and closer the G1 version. The stripes on the wings are more accurate and in the same configuration as Henkei Starscream. As per Henkei SS the tips of the missile launchers are chromed.
Not a bad toy, but perhaps not an essential purchase if you already have the Magnus vs pack.
Henkei Thundercracker
Now Thundercracker was one of the toys lost to the majority of the buying public in the Botcon fiasco. He's back again in a metallic blue that more closely matches the G1 version. All comments about Henkei Skywarp apply here too.
There's a persistent assembly error on Thundercracker: The arms aren't screwed together tight enough and as a consequence the missile launchers won't hold in place in the arm sockets properly. This is easily fixed I'm told by tightening the screws or resorting to our old friend the blue tack or the clear nail varnish.
A more essential purchase due to the rarity of the Botcon version.
Henkei Dirge
Like Thundercracker & Skywarp, Dirge & Thrust made their way onto the Japanese market as store exclusives. Dirge gains new G1 accurate shaped wings with weapon mounts underneath. A Decepticon symbol on each wing manages to be the right way up in robot mode - oh that does annoy me! His launchers acquire a chromed ring round the end like the other G1 jets as does the interior of the cockpit making it much more visible - good touch. My only criticisms would be the blue & white stripes added diagonally across each wing make it look more like a Classics toy than a more accurately decorated Henkei one and that he comes with the missiles found with Starscream et al rather than the larger Ramjet missiles.
The missiles & head throw up a bit of a conundrum for us: I can be reasonably sure that the new parts frame introduced for Ramjet contains his head, nose & missiles and that the original Starscream mould has the missiles on the frame that's discarded for Ramjet: one of the multicoloured toys bellow seems to prove that. So I'd be expecting Dirge to have the same missiles as the Ramjet mould, albeit coloured blue like the nose parts. Yet he doesn't have the same missile mould and more confusingly they're moulded black.
But a mighty fine toy. Expensive, but cheaper than netting the Botcon version.
Henkei Thrust
The Botcon Thrust involved using the Ramjet version of the classics jet mould and moulding new parts for the wings solving the problem of how could a Henkei Thrust be released without using the same parts used for the Botcon version, which would presumably infringe on whatever agreement Hasbro & Botcon had.
Thrust gains new wing pieces with large tail fins. 5mm weapon holes are added to the underside of the rear wings and through the front wings. To further distance the wings from the Botcon version a white Urban Camo pattern is added to the front wings. The front wings in jet mode can be folded forward to present a straight edge in vehicle mode and he's the only one of the jets where the weapons can be mounted above the wings in vehicle mode. The Fans for the front wings become removable units rather than being moulded in the wing and can be pegged onto either hole - a nice little touch here is that the fans do spin. The same chrome on the missile launchers and cockpit is present here, and in addition Thrust's face is painted white to resemble his G1 animation model. Like Dirge he has the smaller Starscream missiles, appropriately so here, but unfortunately they're coloured black here unlike the originals which were red. Annoyingly his Decepticon symbols on his wings end up upside down when folded back in Robot mode.
The new parts for Thrust have added a little extra play value for the toy. The deco is great. Very recommended.
Generations 2009 v2: Starscream
Like the previous Generations 2009 mail away offer, Starscream is a transparent version - this time representing Ghost Starscream which has been done on a larger size. Using the Henkei version as a base the grey is cast as clear plastic and all the other colours are clear versions of their original colours with the exception of the chromed pieces which remain as they were.
Stunning. Me want. But far too expensive for my pocket. Fortunately there's a much cheaper very high quality knock off in circulation and I've got one of those :-)
Generations Thrust
So the Henkei Exclusive Moulds then get recycled for the Western Market in the Generations toyline.
Thrust gets a makeover: The grey of the wings becomes a dark brown, the red becomes darker and the canopy goes from clear to orange. He retains the chrome in the cockpit but looses the chrome ring on the missile launchers which is now the same colour dark red/purple as the jet as are the missiles bringing it in line with the original. I think we can safely say that these missiles are a new parts tree moulded separately to everything else. The removable fan units - mounted under the tail in the package - come with a Decepticon symbol on the non tabbed side of the fans. The wings loose their white stripes and Decepticon symbols, but gain dark red and white stripes along the front of the wings again like the original Thrust. There's what looks like a slight remould to the wings gaining two small circles on the top side of the wing close to the body, but close examination reveals these were previously on the underside of Henkei Thrust's wings: The wings have swapped sides and are now upside down to how they were mounted before.
Robot mode sees the feet, hands and forearms change colour from the red to the dark brown again more in line with the original.
So given the choice between the three Thrusts I think the cheaper more G1 accurate colour scheme of Generations Thrust wins every time.
Thrust is a Wave 1 Generations toy shipping with Drift, War For Cybertron Bumblebee and War For Cybertron Optimus Prime. This wave shipped to the UK.
Generations Dirge
Like Thrust, Dirge's modified Henkei form is released in Generations with some tinkering to the colouring. Gone are the blue & white stripes on the wings replaced with some red & white stripes along the line of where the wing meets the body, much like on the original Dirge. The upper legs, arms, hands and chest are all now black like the original Dirge too. The weapons, still the Starscream type, are in black for both the launcher & missile with a blue ring round the end of the launcher. In a lovely little touch a small Decepticon symbol has been added to the chest just bellow the head.
All the Dirges from this mould have been good, but this all but nails the colours of the original.
Dirge is a Wave 4 Generations toy shipping with Blurr, a remould of Generations Drift. Blurr eventually arrived in the UK courtesy of a later revision case that was released here but Dirge has not, to date, been released here.
Generations Thundercracker
Generations Thundercracker is essentially a western retail release of the Henkei Thundercracker albeit without the chrome.
This complete western retail releases of classics version of all 6 Generation 1 Decepticon jets. However since Skywarp was previously a store exclusive and both he & Ramjet have paint scheme which are perhaps not up to the accuracy demanded on later toys I wouldn't be surprised to see more of this mould at retail at some point in the future.
Thundercracker was introduced in the second 2011 Generations Wave, alongside Wheeljack, and returned in the third wave which introduced Warpath. Neither of these waves were sent to the UK.
Botcon 2011 Tundercracker
Rewind to 1991. Phil walks into Beatties toyshop in Kingston and finds the new Action Masters Exo Suit toys Thundercracker & Circuit. These are both new toys containing repaints of earlier Action Master figures from older toys: Thundercracker is of course a repaint of Starscream while Circuit is a repaint of Axer. Interestingly their larger Motorised Exo Suit brothers also use repainted figures Slicer is a repainted Wheeljack and Rumbler is a repaint of Sprocket. Now even then I knew that Thundercracker shouldn't be the colours used on the Action Master toy. I knew he should be either blue or black but couldn't remember which because back then I had difficulty remembering which jet Decepticon was which!
Over the years Action Master Thundercracker has acquired rather a fan following. Do a Google Image Search for "Action Master Thundercracker" and marvel at the sheer number of toys repainted in this awful colour scheme. So over time a repaint of Classics Starscream became an inevitability. Thankfully it ended up as a Botcon toy so didn't pollute the rest of the world with it's evilness.
We need to confront what the colours used here actually are. Broadly they're based on the original Action Master Thundercracker:
Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels - red, which is slightly different to the pink used for the original Upper legs & launcher triggers - pale blue Feet, lower arms, hands & launchers - lime green Nose, jet wings, tail fins and missiles - purple
As you may be able to perceive, I'm not a fan of these colours. Action Master Thundercracker is the herald for all the really nasty bright colours used on some Transformers in the early part of the Nineties. I'd say he was the worst of the lot but I've seen the G2 Sparkabots and Firecons. Horrid colours, avoid!
But if there's one benefit to having such a varied psychedelic colour scheme you can see definitively which parts colours of plastic are on which parts frame when the toy was constructed! It reveals the toy designers were thinking about doing Starscream remoulds from the word go because that fourth frame, coloured purple here, contains all the parts that are changed between Starscream and Ramjet.
TFCC Generation 2 Ramjet
To explain why I like the Generation 2 Ramjet colours I'll quote my review of the 1994 toy:
While G2 Starscream is at best a variation on the Starscream colours, the Ramjets are so different that it should be considered an essential purchase as a different Decepticon warrior even if you have the original Ramjet. Now where's a version of the Classics Ramjet in these colours?Well he's here now. To be honest I'm a little surprised to see the G2 Ramjet repaint go to the Transformers Fanclub as an exclusive as I was sure it would have sold well at retail because it's so different. This would tend to be born out by the speed at which he sold out at the Transformers Fan Club online shop. And yet, unlike certain other Nineties toys yes Action Master Thundercracker I am looking at you, the colours here make sense:
Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels - purple
Upper legs & launcher triggers - purple
Feet, lower arms, hands & launchers - turquoise
Nose, jet wings, tail fins and missiles - black
All three colours are good Decepticon colours and I think they work very well with each other here. Detail is mainly painted on but there's silver stickers within his feet and air intakes. I note that he's missing the large name stickers that the Generation 2 toy had. That makes it easier to give him a new name: I think Scramjet might be appropriate.
He's the first fan club toy I've bought and I love him to bits. Grateful thanks to Mr Andy Kiernan for obtaining mine for me.
Parts Frames
We're now reasonably certain that there's five parts frames on the standard Starscream version. One is swapped for a sixth for all the coneheaded jets, with a seventh missile frame appearing later.
| Frame | Parts |
| 1 | Body, upper arms, lower legs & launcher barrels |
| 2 | Upper legs & launcher triggers |
| 3 | Feet lower arms, hands & launchers |
| 4 | Nose,head, wings, tail fins & missiles |
| 5 | Canopy |
| 6 | Shorter nose,pointed head, new wings, tail fins & missiles |
| 7 | Missiles |
In addition extra frames for new wings are used for all Thursts and Henkei/Generations Dirge.
This, then, is how the parts frames are coloured for each version of the toy:
| Series | Toy | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
| Classics | Starscream | Grey | Grey | Blue | Grey | Clear Yellow | ||
| Classics | Skywarp | Black | Black | Purple | Black | Clear Orange | ||
| Classics | Ramjet | White | White | Grey | - | Clear Orange | Grey | |
| Botcon 2007 | Thundercacker | Blue | Blue | Blue | Black | Clear Orange | ||
| Botcon 2007 | Dirge | Blue | Bue | Black | - | Clear Orange | Black | |
| Botcon 2007 | Thrust | Red | Red | Black | - | Clear Orange | Black | |
| Henkei | Starscream | Grey | Grey | Blue | Grey | Clear Yellow | ||
| Henkei | Ramjet | White | White | Grey | - | Clear Orange | Red | |
| Universe 2.0 | Acid | Green | Pale Blue | Black | Green | Clear Orange | ||
| Universe 2.0 | Starscream | Pale Grey | Pale Grey | Blue | Pale Grey | Clear Orange | ||
| Henkei | Skywarp | Black | Black | Purple | Black | Clear Orange | ||
| Henkei | Thundercracker | Blue | Blue | Black | Blue | Clear Orange | ||
| Henkei | Dirge | Blue | Blue | Black | - | Clear | Blue | Black |
| Henkei | Thrust | Red | Red | Black | - | Clear | Red | Black |
| Generations | Thrust | Red | Red | Brown | Brown | Clear Orange | Red | Red |
| Generations | Dirge | Blue | Black | Black | Orange | Clear Orange | Blue | Black |
| Generations | Thundercracker | Blue | Blue | Black | Blue | Clear Orange | ||
| Botcon 2011 | AM Thundercracker | Red | Blue | Lime Green | Purple | Clear Green | ||
| TFCC | Ramjet | Purple | Purple | Turquoise | - | Clear Smoked | Black |
Future Repaints
I find it quite incredible that we still haven't seen the Classics Starscream mould recoloured as Sunstorm, but the Sunstorm craze has died down a bit now. Careful examination of the cartoon reveals several other colours that could be used, there's a purple one in the pilot for a start!
Starscream's recolours give us two similar black colour schemes that could be tried: the exclusive "Machine Wars" Starscream, itself a homage to the actual Machine Wars Starscream and the sort of similar Black Robotmasters Starscream. Generation 2 Starscream is broadly similar to the original but might just be different enough for people to buy.
I have seen a clear blue knock-off of this toy floating around. A real version of that would be nice :-)
