Phil's
Cybetron Overcast
and
TFCC Astro Line
Review


Overcast

Overcast has some history as a name - it was Energon Jetfire's repainted name, and was going to be used for the Decepticon version of Cybertron Jetfire. Overcast showed up as a prototype some months before release so we'd seen what he looked like for a while beforehand - it's basically a downsized version of Cybertron Jetfire in plane mode, with a Cyberjet style ball missile under each wing that can be folded down to act as landing skis turning him into a form of sea plane. The bulk of the place is in dark blue - shared with Longarm, while the purple for the missiles & grey for the robot's head are shared with both the other two members of the Giant Planet team.

He has one Minicon socket under the nose. He is going to look like a plane when attached to larger toys, but it's going to be one that adds two missile launchers to a larger toy and that's a good thing.

To TF: The very rear of the plane folds down to become the feet and the rest of the rear becomes the legs. which fold under the plane. The nose then folds down on a hinge - allowing you to flip the head up. The other end of the hinge folds up so the nose is in front of the face. Fold the nose cone down at the first hinge again to form the chest. Missile launchers fold down to become oversized arms - which look a lot more normal after the missiles are fired using the restraining mechanism on the launchers as claws.

It had been bugging me what the transformation reminded me of. But I think it's very similar to Beast Machines Obsidian. As indeed is the robot mode - very thin legs, big upper body with wings. He's got ball jointed shoulders - leading to the arms formed from the missile launchers - and hips, a waist and bending knee joints. The arms are fixed in an L shape and look a little small but like Wreckage from the Land Military team the ends look like claws once the missiles are removed (fired !)

Overcast was sold in the Giant Planet Minicon team pack with Deepdive & Longarm.


Astro Line

In 2007 all three Giant Planet Minicons return with Astrotrain (an Armada Jetfire repaint) and Starcatcher (Comettor repaint) as an exclusive for the Transformers Collectors Club. The team reuses the names of three servants of Unicron in the original Transformers comic: Hook (Longarm), Line (Overcast) and Sinker (Deepdive)

Line has drawn the short straw in the name department since Hook & sinker perfectly match he other two, whereas his doesn't bear much resemblance to his form.

Dark blue becomes purple, grey becomes black and purple becomes grey. Yellow highlights are added to the jet.

Decent if unremarkable repaint.


"Boss Coffee" Overcast

In 2008 Boss Coffee in Japan offered two of the Giant Planet Minicons as give aways in a promotion - Deepdive becomes Seawave and Longarm becomes Craydon.

Overcast doesn't get a repaint in this set but due to the gang moulding employed on the team we can tell you what it looks like. The dark blue - as on Craydon's legs - becomes a bright blue. The other two colours are used on the other two members of the team: grey on the head becomes green and the purple for the arms and missiles also becomes bright blue.

Somewhere out there there maybe an Overcast repaint looking for a home !


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