Dave's Transformers Siege Rant: Voyager Wave 4 Thundercracker (retool of Starscream) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/VThundercracker At first, I thought this was part of wave 3 with Springer, and a few early sightings popped up over the summer. But it soon became apparently that every other Springer sighting was paired with a reship (and sometimes minor retool and Decepticon symbol tweak) of Starscream. Thundercracker finally came out months later, shipping with Megatron. https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/VStarscreamS - Starscream mold CAPSULE $30 price point. Thundercracker: Original mold was recommended despite a significant flaw in the chestplate. They fixed that flaw and gave Thundercracker a new face (which I'll probably swap with Starscream). Recommended. RANT Packaging: Same as previous Siege Voyagers. DECEPTICON: THUNDERCRACKER Assortment: WFC-S39 Altmode: Tetrajet Transformation Difficulty: 22 steps Previous Name Use: Yes Previous Mold Use: Gen:WfC Fireblast: None Weapon: HPI Null-Ray Laser Launcher (x2) Function: Seeker Division: Air Command Unit: Infantry Rank: Sergeant HPI: DAM 20, PRE 15, RNG 16 Yes, he has exactly the same weapon as Starscream, with exactly the same stats. Poor form, Hasbro. Packaging: Three ties (waist, each ankle), plus blister shape holding the wings in. One rubber band going through the back of the blister connects the two gun barrels, while a second band holds the guns onto the forearms and passes behind the back to keep the arms from moving around in package. Unlike Starscream, no arm mistransformation. However, the thruster chunk is in its vehicle position rather than swung around to the back (the instructions acknowledge this and have a short bit on properly finishing off robot mode). The collar bit that folds up to lock the head in position for vehicle mode is folded completely inside the torso, which is consistent with the instructions, but inconsistent with what seems to be an intended design to have it between the shoulder pylons with its little tabs stuck into slots in the pylons. Cosells are Caliburst and Smashdown. Same sigil as Starscream but with a rank of Sergeant (two chevrons) rather than Starscream's Captain. Both are in Air Infantry, based on the Pulse article's use of Starscream's sigil as an example. Color Swaps: Clear red stays clear red, clear amber stays clear amber. Bright red becomes light gray (slightly darker than Starscream's gray), light gray becomes bright blue, bright blue becomes black (the blue is slightly teal-tinged, and standing next to Ion Storm makes it clear they're not the same shade). Black stays black, gunmetal becomes black. However, there's at least two black plastics. The stuff that was gunmetal on Screamer looks black under normal light, but under UV it's a sort of khaki green ick color. Oddly, though, the gunmetal of the torso top harness is regular black, not green under UV. Paint Apps: Sweet Primus, he has a lot of silver splatter. It looks like he flew through a flock of Petro-Pigeons. It seems to be a mask or tampograph pattern, since he has the same splatter as Starscream...the splat on the wings is just a lot more obvious on the bright blue plastic than it was on Starscream's light gray. There's minor variations on the shins, but that may be a case of the tampo hitting harder or a mask starting to fray. Same red paint apps as on Starscream. The center of the chest bits that go over the cockpit windows are painted bright blue in a very good match to the plastic. Silver face and toe tops, gunmetal chest turbines and rear thrusters. The fronts of the shins, tips of the shoulder pillars, the ventlike details on the wing leading edges, and the vent behind the true cockpit in vehicle mode are painted black (mostly under the splatter). There's no Decepticon symbols on the undersides of the wings, and barely-visible purple ones (the G1 style rather than the movie style that Starscream originally got) on the wing roots in vehicle mode. Mold Changes: The most obvious is that he has a new head, with a smirking expression. Several people I know have chosen to swap heads with Starscream, as the smirk suits him a lot better and the heads are the same colors. Less obvious from looking is that the connection of the chestplate has been improved. It's still not pinned, but the snap-on bump on the harness bit has been lengthened, and a reasonable amount of twisting and pulling did not make the chestplate pop off of mine. This retooling may be why it came out in regular black and not the "used to be gunmetal" black. Other Notes: The 5mm sockets in the shoulders are a bit loose on mine. Otherwise, no issues with either moder or with transformation. Overall: Okay, now that we know there's an F-15-type Starscream mold coming in Earthrise, you might want to hold off on seeker troopbuilding. But now that they've fixed the chest issue it's a good mold, and one of the few that looks genuinely both Cybertronian and like anything in particular (unlike the "pile of parts we'll call a spaceship" designs). Dave Van Domelen, picked up the Rainmaker set for someone else but they ended up not needing it, probably gonna open 'em up for a quick review and a quick beefing up of the pathetic Decepticon side of his current main display.