Dave's TF Combiners Rant Storm Jet Superion Maximus This review will cover Storm Jet individually, plus the assembled Superion Maximus. Review revised on February 5, 2005, after I got the recolored limbs. CAPSULES Storm Jet: Pretty nice, if oddball, vehicle mode. Transformation is okay, but there's a serious lack of solid connections. Robot mode has great posability and lousy stability. Mildly recommended. $9.89 at Target. Superion Maximus: Looks good, but holds together poorly, due to problems with every piece. Not a compelling reason to get four limbs together, not worth the roughly $40 needed to get all the parts. RANTS AUTOBOT: STORM JET Combiner Code: A5 Altmode: Supersonic Jet (no real type, as far as I can tell). Name Previously Used For: Recolor of Beast Machines Jetstorm Combiner Component: Torso Quote: A weapon is wasted when used only for defense. STORM JET is a fast and powerful AUTOBOT warrior. He possesses a weapons arsenal that most AUTOBOTS would consider a generous upgrade. He is a precision marksman in both aerial and surface-to-air combat. STORM JET never misses his target and has earned a notorious reputation for unnecessary roughness during battle. He has even been known to start arguments with other AUTOBOTS simply to spark a good-old fashioned brawl. OPTIMUS PRIME and JETFIRE have warned this rambunctious fighter to cool it down during battle and to use his head before his fists. Although he respects his commanders' authority, STORM JET cannot help but want to pound enemy metal anytime or anyplace. STR 8 INT 6 SPD 9 END 9 RNK 5 COUR 10 FRB 8 SKL 6 Avg 7.625 Packaging: Standard Deluxe Powerlinx Battles carding, with "Combat Class" in the upper right corner. So I suppose that means that the "Energon Class" on the limbs makes them Omnicons. Mine came with volume two of the comic/catalog, and Lazer Tag poster that came with the limbs. The instructions cover the robot mode on the front and torso mode on the back. They are missing steps, you might be better off just using the photo on the package as a guide. Also, the folding panels that form the sides of the lower torso in robot and torso mode are left hidden in jet mode in the package and in the instructions, but it seems like they were intended to fold out and cover some of the robot kibble in jet mode. Three twist-ties hold the jet into the bubble tray. One big rubber band holds a plastic shield over the tail section. Vehicle Mode: 6.5" (17cm) long, 6" (15cm) wingspan. The front half (which can be detached for safety purposes, or to escape from Galvatron and land on Junk) is only about an inch (2.5cm) wide and tall with cnards, the rear half is more or less a right triangle of the 45-45-90 variety, with the hypoteneuse as the trailing edge. Red and white dominat the color scheme, with some black and gray in the rear section, and metallic blue accents. The landing gear is pale gold. There are some similarities in look to the original Storm Jet, such as the small wingtips (although they can't rotate to hypercritical) and the angled double tail. It also reminds me in some ways of the X-70 Valkyrie supersonic bomber. The wings are kinda wobbly due to lack of strong pegging or stiff joints. The spark crystal housing is near the back of the front half, while the front section has a molded Autobot symbol atop the cockpit. There's a dead hardpoint on either side of the tail, but it seems mostly intended for Energon weapons, since even with the fins folded towards the center there's not a lot of clearance on one side. There's some hinged flaps kept hidden inside in this mode that are there to cover the flanks in robot and combo mode, but they're clearly intended to do SOMETHING in this mode, due to the extra hinged bits. Pulling them out and laying them against the sides of the fuselage helps cover some of the gaps and smooth out the lines a bit. [Later note: later shipments of the toy have a "hollow" blue cog on the fuselage by the molded Autobot symbol. It does not have a tiny Autobot symbol inside the cog.] Transformation to Robot Mode: The instructions are missing a number of steps, but it's pretty easy to figure out from looking at the pictures. Getting the body to hold together is difficult, because it depends on a lot of loose-fitting tabs and slots. Going back to jet mode is a bit tougher, as it takes a lot of twisting to get the legs back into place. Robot Mode: 5" (12cm) tall at the head, 5.5" (13cm) at the backpack. The torso is mostly red and white with some blue (metallic blue paint, clear blue windows). The limbs, on the other hand, are black, pale gold and medium gray with some metallic blue paint. The head is black with silver face and gold "eyebrows", plus blue lightpiping. The proportions are okay, although the shoulders are a little low. The spark crystal ends up on the backpack, as do the hardpoints. [Later note: Two more stubby hardpoints are facing forward, above his shoulders. They're mainly there for attaching his fists in combiner mode, but some Energon weapons fit on them.] Poseability is excellent. The shoulders and hips are universal joints. There's swivels in the upper arms AND lower arms, plus just above the knees. The elbows are double hinged, the knees are single hinges. The toes and heel spurs can bend up (transformation joints), and the head turns. The overall arm poseability is impressive. Unfortunately, the body just doesn't stay pegged together, the pegs are all very loose. Even my work dremeling at the pelvis to try to get the combiner mode nose peg into the hole that it otherwise can't reach because of the nosewheel. Extensive use of postertack helps a little. Transformation to Torso Mode: From robot mode, it's fairly straightforward, although getting the arms all moved around so they lock in place is tricky the first time (the instructions don't really help). The pelvis swings down so that instead of the jet nose not locking into a crappy slot, it doesn't lock into a crappy hole. The Superion Maximus head comes out of the nose section of the jet, and there's a molded Autobot symbol inside behind the head that's only visible during transformation. Torso Mode: LOOKS great. Despite the hollow interior and somewhat unstable pegging, the appearance is dynamic. The head has blue lightpiping, although the backpack (containing the regular robot head) blocks a lot of light from getting in. The connector pegs are blue clear plastic. Unfortunately, the looseness of the legs (more below) and the fact the chest pops open with no real provocation go a long way towards countering this positive appearance. SUPERION MAXIMUS There is no separate bio for this yet. I could give the background from the cartoon, but since those eps have only been seen online so far, it'd be more spoilery than I want to go right now. Appearance: To the top of his head, 9.25" (23.5cm), to the top of his horns it's 9.75" (25cm). With Sledge and Duststorm attached in the place od Terradive and Windrazor, he weighs about 14 ounces (400 grams). Decent color balance, with red, white, gray, blue and black or dark blue. The torso is a bit short, but wide enough that the only real proportion issue is that the legs look too long. Storm Jet's wingtips should form a nice chest flare, but they have to angle forward a bit to accomodate A1 or A2 as limbs. Putting Sledge or Bonecrusher on as an arm pretty much forces the wingtips straight forward. Both A1 and A2 make for wide legs, requiring a wide stance. This totally doesn't work with Treadshot's energon kibble feet. Neither is really that great looking as arms, though, either. Storm Jet looks cool as a torso, but his limbs let him down. Stability: Poor. Storm Jet's chest is held together with a single loose peg, popping open at the slightest provocation. The hips swing out sideways too easily, a definite problem in the wide stances required of Superion Maximus. And the A1/A4 kibble bits for feet and hands do NOT lock in place very well in actual practice. Poseability: Shoulders and knees are swivel and ratchet combination joints, and work fine. Hips are universal ratchets, seriously hampered by both looseness of the Storm Jet boots and how they also get in the way. The feet do not lend themselves to the greatest poses, although A1/A4's width can allow some one-legged stances. Overall: The real question at this point is, does the Superion Maximus mode make me want to buy a couple of recolors just to complete it? The answer is NO. I may get Terradive and Windrazor anyway, because they're good on their own as Basics, but I won't be displaying the team as Superion Maximus. Update 2/5/05: Well, I now have all the parts, Terradive and Windrazor looked good enough to be worth picking up. The overall effect of the canonical assembly (Treadshot and Terradive as arms, Sky Shadow and Windrazor as legs) looks decent, in part because the color scheme is relatively unified. Almost all the colors are shades of red, blue or the white-gray- black family., with bits of gold here and there. There is a bit of a clash generated by having the muted colors of A1 and A2 on the right and the brighter colors of A3 and A4 on the left, though. It's almost like one side is in shadow and the other in sunlight. Unfortunately, Storm Jet's instability is still a major problem. Although I just realized that if you have Treadshot or Windrazor as arms, the robot mode ankles give you wrist joints of a sort on Superion Maximus. While individually the Sky Shadow/Terradive figures make better legs, used together they're a bad idea, as their knee-area kibble forces an even wider stance than the canonical configuration! I mean, seriously, he's striking a Significant Marvel Pose, his feet about 6" (15cm) apart (center to center). Dave Van Domelen, now to disassemble it again to use the limbs to pad out Constructicon Maximus and Bruticus Maximus.