Phil's
Energon Sky Shadow & Terradive,
TFCC Skyfall,
and
Universe Fireflight & Skydive
Review


Sky Shadow

Sky Shadow was numbered A2 in the Aerialbot team.

Sky Shadow is an A-10 Thunderbolt - the same plane type as the ancient Cobra Rattler jet that used to be available. He's a mixture of red, black and silver in this mode which to me would be steering me towards the Aerialbot Skydive but his Japanese name insinuates that he's meant to be Slingshot. As a nice touch there's a sort of gunner station under the jet..... A gun up the front can be used as an attachment for the big cannon weapon with the toy which can also be mounted on or under each wing. Fold down landing gear can be found under the nose and at the base of each wing.

Transformation: Unpeg the rear turbines and fold out to the side. Fold the gunner station down under the jet. Fold the wings back 180 degrees so they're under the rear of the jet and fold the gunner station up into the the exposed combination socket to form the head. Split the front of the jet to form the legs while the top & bottom of the cockpit become the feet. Easy.

Like the other Energon combiner limbs we have fantastic little robots here - the aforementioned gunner station becomes the head with lightpiped eyes complete with fold down goggles - such a nice touch. Ball joints at elbow, shoulder, knee, & hip plus a turning head and waist make for a decent set of articulation.

His Limb mode is basically the jet mode with the wings folded in. Plug in the folded up cannon into the gun for an arm. Separate the cockpit to form the robot's feet and peg the folded out cannon into the robot's feet to form a foot. It's the better of the two Aerialbot limbs, you almost wish there were 4 of them. Well until you see the other 4 combiner limb types !

Sky Shadow was released in Japan as part of the SC-26 Superion giftset where he was called Sling.


Terradive

Terradive was numbered A3 in the Aerialbot team.

This time round the plane gets a blue body and white wings, which is unlike any of the original Aerialbots but the Japanese are sure he's meant to be Skydive. The nicer of the two original sets of colours I think.

Terradive was released in Japan as part of the SC-26 Superion giftset where he was called Skydive.


Skyfall

Skyfall is the first of the TFCC toys released in 2005. The mainly clear blue jet looks really nice, but is spoilt by the solid red used for the robot's head, upper arms, waist, upper legs and gun/foot. The Energon is now a clear red.

A little more thought used to swap the reds for (say) sahdes of blue/black and this would have looked OK.


Skydive

Sky Shadow becomes Skydive in the first of his two appearances in the Universe/Revenge of the Fallen Superion boxset. A lilac/grey is used for the main body of the jet and the engines, with a darker grey used for the rest of the plane and a clear mint green/blue used for the Energon. Not colours that bring the original owner of the name to mind !

Fireflight

Fireflight, from the same Superion set as Skydive, obtains a brown and grey colour scheme for this release with clear dark blue Energon. Somehow the colours make me think more of the Beast Wars toy Airazor, whose name is used in this set instead of Slingshot. Surely Hasbro wouldn't have put the wrong name on the wrong toy would they ???


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