Phil's Transformers
Starscream, Thundercracker & Skywarp,
Thrust, Dirge & Ramjet
and
E-Hobby Sunstorm Review

Starscream

The origin of Starscream and his fellow Decepticon Strike Planes - I will not use the S word favoured by our American cousins to describe them - lies in Takara's Diaclone toy line like so many other 1984 & 1985 Transformers. Starscream is essentially the Diaclone High Speed Fighter Type which seem to surface in 1983 according to These Diaclone Catalogues.

Starscream is a grey F-15 Eagle fighter jet with blue tail fins, a blue rubber nose point and red metal air intakes & stripes on his wings. This initial version has a smoked grey clear cockpit canopy which can be opened to accommodate a Diaclone driver should you have one. I haven't. He's got a removable front landing gear made from black plastic and a metal wheel that plugs into the underside of the nose and some more metal wheels mounted on the rear of the undercarriage. Under each wing is a missile launcher which can fire either a short warhead like missile or a longer more gun like missile.

Transformation: Remove the front landing gear. Fold the smaller wings at right angles to the tail fins down 90 degrees. Look at the underside of the jet with the nose pointing up. Fold down the rear wheel mounts to form the feet. Push the centre of the jet through the jet splitting it in two and fold out to the sides to form the arms. Fold the main wings back. Fold the top half of the jet's nose forward and down, then rotate both parts of the nose through the chest cavity till the cockpit canopy fills the gap. Fold the jet's nose back so the base forms the side of the heads. Slide the fists onto the end of the arms. Unpeg the missile launchers from the wings and peg them into the sides of the arms.

The Starscream robot design has become quite iconic with the air intakes framing the head. The main colour in this mode is still grey but we now have a red metal chest and blue fists & feet to break up the grey. His articulation is sadly minimal: The arms turn at the shoulders which also fold back as part of the Transformation. And that's it. This limitation coupled with Starscream's prominent role in all Transformers media lead to him having a high place on many fans "must redo" lists for many years, which eventually led to Classics Starscream in 2003 which looks like this toy in both modes and has bucketloads of articulation. He's got no additional weapons to hold in his hands which don't have any sort of peg holes. Most of the other Diaclone toys with no peg holes at least have missile launching hands!

For the time the toy had limits, lots of the Diaclone originated toys have superior articulation. Releasing the same toy at once in 3 different colours is taking the **** a bit - I don't think any other Transformer toy has had *Three* versions released simultaneously! And, without the media to back it up, Starscream has the most boring colours of the first three iterations of this toy. Back then this was your only Starscream so if you were a character collector you had to own it. Now, however, there's other Starscreams you can go to for the character which work better as toys. So unless you want an F-15 for your Diaclone drivers to fly, or are on a real nostalgia hit, the original Starscream is essentially superfluous.

Starscream was available in the west from 1984-1986. He was Transformers release #22 in Japan, also appearing in 1986's Goodbye Megatron 2-pack. He was re-released in Japan in 2001 as part of Takara's series of Generation 1 box style releases. He was re-released by Hasbro in 2003 as Commemorative Series II Starscream where both missiles are elongated and strengthened. Takara then issued Transformers Collection #9 Starscream which comes in "anime" colours closer to the cartoon with the blue parts - both the plastic and the rubber nose - moulded in a brighter blue and a clear orange canopy. This release includes a small replica of Megatron's gun mode, modified Starscream fists allowing him to hold the Megatron gun, a modified Optimus Prime fist to allow him to hold the same weapon and a promotional DVD. Starscream's final reissue to date is as Takara's Encore release 4 which is essentially the original version but with an orange/yellow canopy.

Thundercracker

Thundercracker is another Diaclone colour scheme for the F-15 jet, in this case originally used on the Acrobat Type released at the same time as the High Speed Fighter Type. Thundercracker is a simple colour swap with grey becoming blue, blue becoming black and the clear canopy becoming clear orange.

This toy, and his repaint Skywarp probably taught me what a repaint was. My friend Giles had both: I looked on them and though "This is the same toy!"

Thundercracker was released in the west and sold from 1984 to 1985. He was sold in Japan as Transformers release 24. Thundercracker was first re-issued as part of set C of Takara's 2001 Original Boxed reissues. This set, also containing his repaint Skywarp, was an exclusive to Super Festival 21. Hasbro reissued this toy as Commemorative Series III Thundercracker with the same modified missile design as Commemorative Series II Starscream. The toy with the original missile design was reissued in 2008 as half of Encore 11 with Skywarp.

Skywarp

Unlike Starscream & Thundercracker, Skywarp isn't based on a paint design used in Diaclone. Like Thundercracker, Skywarp is a simple colour swap with grey becoming black, blue plastic becoming purple while the blue rubber nose becomes black rubber and the clear canopy becoming clear orange.

Skywarp was released in the west and sold from 1984 to 1985. He was sold in Japan as Transformers release 23. Skywarp was first re-issued as part of set C of Takara's 2001 Original Boxed reissues. This set, also containing his repaint Thundercracker, was an exclusive to Super Festival 21. Hasbro reissued this toy as Commemorative Series IV Skywarp with the same modified missile design as Commemorative Series II Starscream. The toy with the original missile design was reissued in 2008 as half of Encore 11 with Thundercracker.

Thrust

Thrust uses the same body and weapons as Starscream. Starscream's grey becomes red and blue becomes black. What's missing from the Starscream version are the wings, tail wings and tail fins replace with new black wings with vertical take off & landing fans mounted in them covered by a red housing and new tail wings. Instructions and box art show Thrust with his nose cone tilted back behind his head but traditionally he's been shown with the face as part of the nose cone pointing upwards.

Thrust was sold in the west in 1985 & 1986. He was released in Japan where he was numbered D-57. He was re-released in Japan in 2001 as part of Takara's series of similarly moulded releases. He was sold in Set D with Ramjet at Jaf-Con 10.

Dirge

Dirge uses the same body as Starscream swapping the grey for blue and the red & blue plastic for black while the rubber nose becomes black. He looses the wings, tail wings, tail fins, missile launchers and missiles. He gains new beige wings which stretch right the way back along the body. These new pieces have short stub wings at the front and large wings reaching their maximum distance from the body at the rear where the wing tips are turned up. Dirge also has new moulded weapons for the wings and arms. Like Thrust, his instructions and box art show Dirge with his nose cone tilted back behind his head but traditionally he's been shown with the face as part of the nose cone pointing upwards.

Dirge was sold in the west in 1985 & 1986. In Japan he was a mail away toy in 1986 costing 1980 yen and 4 Robot Points. He was retroactively numbered 97 in the Japanese toyline.

Dirge was re-issued in Japan in 2001 as set E of Takara's original boxed releases where he was a mail order toy from the 20th Century Toy Museum. He was re-released by Hasbro as part of Commemorative Series VII.

Ramjet

The final original Transformers jet again uses the Starscream body this time swapping the grey for white, the red & blue - both the plastic and rubber nose - for black while loosing the wings, tail wings, tail fins, missile launchers and missiles. Ramjet has new longer red wings which stretch right to the back of the jet's body with the tips of the wings curving down. There's new black engines mounted on the wings and new black tail fins that mount into the engines. During transformation these new tail fins must be removed and pegged into the holes on the sides of the ankles. He also has new moulded weapons of a different design to Dirge's.

Ramjet was sold in the west in 1985 & 1986. He was numbered D-56 in Japan. His only re-release in his original colours was as part of Set D of Takara's 2001 similar boxed reissues where he was packed with Thrust and sold at Jaf-Con 10.

Generation 2 Starscream

Starscream's original toy returns in Transformers Generation 2. In the intervening years he'd been a Pretender Classics toy and an Action Master. The real cavalcade of Starscream toys wouldn't start really until Armada in 2002.

Generation 2 Starscream evokes rather than replicates the original Starscream paint job. The jet body's grey moves closer to white while the grey of the wings and all the blue plastic becomes a slightly darker grey with the wings getting a camouflage pattern. The red of the robot body becomes a more orangey red with the canopy, which was previously clear grey, becoming a newly moulded piece in clear orange while the rubber nose becomes black. The missiles and missile launchers are replaced with newer launchers, moulded in black, that peg into the wings and arm the sae as before. He comes with two missiles for these launchers, here moulded in purple. The same launchers & missiles appear on 2 other Generation 2 jets, Ramjet (see bellow) and as blue launchers and red missiles on Generation 2's Blue Silverbolt.

This version of Starscream also comes with a battery operated peach coloured lights & sound pack that clips onto the back of the jet in jet mode via a pair of pegs added to the rear of Starscream's jet.

Generation 2 Ramjet

Ramjet's Generation 2 form is much more changes than Starscream's. White becomes purple, black becomes a very bright blue and red becomes black. He comes with the same missile launchers (now purple) and missiles (now black) as Starscream as well as the same lights & sound pack, also in purple.

While G2 Starscream is at best a variation on the Starscream colours, the Ramjet's 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?

E-Hobby Black Starscream

A number of E-Hobby repaints were released in 2001 to tie in with Starscream's re-release in Takara's original boxed reissue line. The "black" Starscream is inspired somewhat by the Machine Wars Starscream. The red metal on the body becomes gold, while the blue and the grey on the body become black. The grey of the wings becomes a darker grey similar in colour to the grey used on the jet mode's nose.

Lovely repaint this. We can always use more Decepticon warriors so hopefully this one will show up as on Classics Starscream toy mould.

E-Hobby Ghost Starscream

E-Hobby's Ghost Starscream is inspired by Starscream's spectral post mortem appearances in Season 3 of the Transformers cartoon and the Beast Wars cartoon. Black plastic - used for several joints and the landing gear - stays the same as does the red metal of the chest but all the other plastic becomes a clear plastic of a similar colour: grey becomes transparent and blue becomes clear blue. The blue nose becomes a much brighter blue.

Lovely repaint again. I hate the Starscream mould but wouldn't mind one of these.

Clear Starscream

Clear Starscream is a lucky draw prize given away through the Transformers Generations book. Limited to 5 pieces it's one of the rarest Transformers in the world. Due to the limited number of this toy and the bankruptcy of the publisher who offered the give away nobody's actually sure if it was released or what colour it is! For pictures of what most people suspect is the jet see Transformers@The Moon's Secret Starscream page and read up on the mystery behind this toy at TF Wiki's G1 Starscream toy page Based on the TF@TM pictures, the only pieces of this toy to have any colour are the red metal body of the jet and the black plastic head, joints and landing gear. All the rest of the plastic is moulded in colourless clear plastic. Or so it's thought. They could all be clear red according to the TFWiki page.

Either way, you're never going to won one!

E-Hobby Sunstorm

Sunstorm is yellow Decepticon jet warrior seen in the background of the cartoon. When Transformers Collection #9 Starscream was issued in 2003, E-Hobby produced this repaint to accompany it. For this toy Starscream's grey & red become orange while the blue - both plastic and the rubber nose - becomes white. The toy itself is rather bright, but most people's hatred towards it spring from the cult of Sunstorm which developed leading to a major role in the Dreamwave comics and multiple versions of the character including Heroes of Cybertron, Universe/Armada, Titanium, a Cybertron Minicon, Legends of Cybertron and Transformers Animated. It seems the only recent Starscream to escape Sunstorm is the Classics Starscream toy mould, which I would buy!

The original Sunstorm toy was re-released in 2008 to accompany Encore 11 Thundercracker & Skywarp

Email Philip

Phil's TF Review Page