In 2000 I wrote: "Starscream and BB is a rather nice recolour of the existing G2 ATB which I suspect most of you have - nice toy, the yellow live edge works well.... "
Right, Never done a proper full ATB review and the arrival of the Korean BWII version gives me an excuse to.
The Advanced Tactical Bomber set is made up of 2 jets - a Big Stealth Bomber - Dreadwing - and a smaller Stealth Fighter - Smokescreen. Both are cast mainly in dark blue plastic. The Stealth Bomber has a light blue six barrelled missile launcher cannon swung underneath it - there's no obvious way to fire the missiles in this mode, as well as 3 missiles mounted under each arm which are dropped by pressing on red clear plastic ovals mounted in the top of the wings. The cannon is used to support the front of the bomber when it's on a flat surface, 2 landing gear being available to lower from the sides of the plane. There's a space in the back of the Bomber for Starscream to slot into. A silver strip runs down the front edge of the wing, under which is a red light piped strip which is the same material used for his cockpit.
Smokescreen has 3 landing gear - 2 at the sides to the back and one under the nose. There's 2 cannons that can be mounted in the sides of the jet which take identical missiles to those used on the bomber. Starscream can slide into the space on the BB's back with these still mounted. Smokescreen's aesthetic is very similar to it's original contemparies the Cyberjets, and this toy may even have been intended as some sort of Cyberjet leader.
Removing the Smokescreen from the Bomber triggers one of the 2 auto transformation features in the toy - the wings raise up. If you then fold the landing gear up, and look towards the back of the pieces they're attached to you'll find a button at the rear of each piece - pressing these causes the outside half of the pieces to spring forwards revealing some tank tread detail. The Cannon can then be folded up through the space the Smokescreen occupied and rotated to face forward. You can now use one of the best TF weapons ever - rotate the back of the cannon and out fire the missiles in turn. I don't think this works quite as well as it does on the later two versions - I have a memory that there were some changes made after this release to the mechanism which locked the missiles in place - they had a habit of dropping out when the launcher was turned upside down ! Even so it's a superb weapon, and a great bonus third mode.
The first stage in TFing Dreadwing is to unplug the air intake vents on top of the jet, and rotate them forwards, then fold in the wing tips. If Starscream is attached remove him now which will cause the wings to pop out the sides. Fold the cannon behind the bomber, and it's supporting strut up into the chest. Unplug the track/landing gear pieces - they want to be folded up, not open in tank mode - and straighten behind the Bomber. Fold the feet out, and then fold each leg inwards till they click so the feet are pointing what would be down from the Bomber. Fold the nosecone down - this will release the wings if they are still in flight position - while raising the robot head through the neck. Fold the air intake vents to the sides to form the arms, and then pull away the vents themselves to reveal the arms underneath. Turn his back towards you and open a flap running the length of his back on your left. The hinge for the cannon will fold into the revealed space. The strut will then fold into the space placing the cannon on BB's robot mode shoulder.
Dreadwing's robot has a neck joint, fore & aft and to the sides on the shoulders, a bicep, and forwards at the elbow, ball jointed hip and bending knee. In addition the cannon swivels on it's mount. The head is sculpted in black as a helmet with a visor line lightpipe in it using the clear red plastic seen earlier on the cockpit and the bomb buttons. The holes in the hand will take the guns with Smokescreen but look to be somewhere in between the 2 standard peg sizes - Flipchanger and Armada. I seem to recall they're scaled down on subsequent releases.
To TF Smokescreen to Robot mode...... I'm going to cheat - it's a copy & paste from my Energon Starscream review
"To TF fold the waist down from under the cockpit which brings the legs out in front of the jet with it. The panels attached to the fins rotate the other way up, the feet unfold at the bottom of the legs, and the lower legs twist 90 degrees at the knees to face forwards. The tail fins & their mounting then have to be pushed through the jet - I swear it feels like these are going to break, need some force on mine ! - and then origami out to form the arms. Twist the cockpit round 180 degrees and fold the mid section of the jet down and back while pulling the rear up and forwards and it all come together to form the torso of the robot. "
The 2 toys - Smokescreen & Energon Starscream are identical in shape, TF and articulation if not size !
Again for a rundown of Smokescreen's articulation "Lots of posability: Feet, 2 swivels at each knee, ball at the hip, 2 swivels at each shoulder, bicep, swivel at the elbow - part of the TF (all on each side) and his head turns" Again the hand holes will take the weapons provided but aren't of any other standard size and were rescaled along with the weapon pegs on subsequent releases. A word on Smokescreen's head - it's Optimus Prime's. It always amuses me when Prime's distinctive face shows up elsewhere - Hotspot has it - leading me to think it was intended as a Optimus toy - but so does Onslaught as well as the Stealth Jet. Smokescreen is similar to the extent of having the face plate cast in a different colour to the rest of the head, separate eyes (here lightpiped in red), "horns" to the sides and a crest above the eyes.
Overall: Fantastic toy. Hasbro at the absoloute top of their game for the time.
A word on the Black colour scheme - in jet mode I feel this is the most appropriate of the 4 colourschemes. You expect a stealth plane to be black ! The only improvement could possibly be an all black version eliminating the purple, silver and grey. As it is these are very Decepticon colours, especially invoking memories of G1 Skywarp.
Overall: For a toy that's 12 years old it's fantastic. Of the 4 this is my favourite colour scheme - both from the black suiting the toy's purpose and yelling Decepticon at you. Get one if you can - I got one for £20 delivered off eBay in a Korean Box - with a nifty Korean BWII catalogue and a pair of LeoConvoy & Galvatron trading cards.
So relatively straightforward if lengthy. The only slight complication is Energon Starscream who looks, transforms and poses just like BWII Starscream. Except he's about 30% bigger !
Repaint: What ? It's been done 4 times I hear you say. But I believe there's another repaint left in this toy: Jetfire and Optimus Prime. Play on the head looking like Prime's, colour parts appropriately and you've got the making of a good Prime as a jet toy.