Dave's Studio Series TF Rant: TRU Thundercracker

[Dave Van Domelen]

Dave's Transformers Studio Series Rant

TRU Exclusive Thundercracker (retool of TLK Nitro)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Studio/VThundercracker

Possibly the last TRU exclusive ever, it's a bit of a weird choice, and
I'd think it was a "predeco" for Starscream...except that a Starscream was
released as one of the regular Studio Series Voyagers in the first wave.

https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/TFLK/VNitro - Nitro review


CAPSULE

$30 price, I got it when the discount level had hit 15%. Leftover stock
already spoken for by an online retailer, so you still have a chance if your
local TRU never got any (or you read this review after TRU shuts down).

Thundercracker: Original mold was mildly recommended. All of its
virtues and flaws persist. The color scheme generally looks good, save for a
weird bit of gray in the wings. Mildly recommended.


RANT

General Line Info: So, the Studio Series is basically "Generations for
movie characters." The packaging identifies which movie and what scene the
character comes from, so the trade dress is slightly different depending on
which movie is involved. Most of the toys seem to be redecos or moderate
retools, as Thundercracker is, but there are a few entirely new molds.
Whether these were commissioned for Studio Series, or stuff that was designed
years ago but never made it to shelves is not something I know at this
point. For instance, the Deluxe Stinger may well have been designed for
2014's Age of Extinction, but it never made it to production back then.
All of the toys are boxed, and follow the same basic pattern as the
packaging I describe below. The first wave of Deluxes (which I'll review not
too long after this toy) are numbers 01 through 04, the non-exclusive
Voyagers (Optimus Prime and Starscream, which I don't plan to buy) are 05 and
06, and the two Leaders (new spiky Grimlock, new Blackout, might get and
review Blackout) are 07 and 08. Thundercracker is 09. The prominent
numbering does suggest this line is aimed more at collectors, in the same way
Generations is. They do seem to be trying to imply that these are all
improvements in some fashion, a more upscale assortment of toys, but that's
not really any more true than it was for "Premier" toys from the Last Knight
lines.

Packaging: Similar to the box design for Power of the Primes, including
the dominant black background, but the accent color on borders is bright blue
rather than purple or red. All of the first wave toys, regardless of
faction, use bright blue. In addition to the standard Transformers logo up
the right side of the box front, there's also a specific movie logo in the
lower right of the front, on the front edge of the box top, and on the upper
right of the box back. In this case, it's Dark of the Moon, which is as good
a place to hide a character as any, since it was full of hard to follow horde
scenes both in the flashback stuff and the climax.
Painted style art of the robot mode is in the lower left of the box
front (with the number, 09 in this case, in the lower right corner of the
art), zoomed in on when seen on the right side and left side. The bottom
edge of the front has the faction and name in the now-usual font, white on
black. The upper right has both the Takara-Tomy logo and the Generations
"lurking Autobot symbol" logo. So, I guess it technically really IS
Generations, but I've already split the Generations stuff, might as well keep
Studio Series as its own thing. :) Thundercracker has a foil "TRU
Exclusive" sticker on the upper left corner of the window.
The left-as-you-face-the-box-front side has the Studio Series logo along
the rear edge and the toy number quite large at the top. The right side, in
addition to a more complete look at the character art, has a cutout window
that reveals an Autobot symbol. This is weird, but I checked the Deluxes I
bought and the Decepticons in that line also have Autobot symbols in that
location. At the bottom of this side is the "Transformers Authentic" logo.
On the back, the background is mostly a red monochrome version of the
backdrop image from inside, with photos of the toy in both modes. There's
also an inset of the included backdrop and stage. In the upper left is "BIG
SCREEN INSPIRED Scale, Detail, Backdrop" in four languages. The upper right
has the movie logo, the character name, and then the relevant scene in four
languages. The lower right has a bio note in four languages...brief, but
more than the epithets the Last Knight toys had to make do with. The
non-exclusive ones also have cosells of the rest of their wave under the
backdrop inset (i.e. Deluxe 02 has 01, 03, 04 shown). Below that is the
usual legalese, and the bottom panel is also just legalese.
Inside the box, the robot is attached to a plastic tray via "sock ties"
and occasional rubber bands. Instead of cardstock, the backing tray is thin
corrugated cardboard. This wasn't enough to prevent rough handling from
punching a dent through the outer box and the backdrop on the one I got, but
it's hard to fault TRU employees for no longer really giving a slag about
careful shelf-stocking. The backdrop image uses the back and sides, it's
folded over on the sides but the extra space is just package trade dress
stuff rather than extending the scenery. The platform is only four-sided (no
back or bottom), and is a couple of centimeters tall (proportional to the box
size). I dunno if I'll bother keeping the backdrops, my usual display style
is too densely packed for the backdrops to fit. The instructions are folded
up behind the backdrop, no bag. Also no trading cards, unlike "real"
Generations. :)


DECEPTICON: THUNDERCRACKER
Assortment: 09
Altmode: Fighter Jet
Transformation Difficulty: 35 steps
Previous Name Use: Yes
Previous Mold Use: TFLK
Movie: Dark of the Moon
Scene: Chicago Aerial Offensive

THUNDERCRACKER tears through the skies above Chicago, relishing the
destruction he rains down on the AUTOBOTS.

Packaging: 7 ties on the robot, plus a rubber band to keep the head on.
One tie each on the missile racks.
The backdrop is of an aerial combat, lots of missiles and explosions and
a few intact jets in the mix. The ground is not visible at all, so it could
be pretty much any airspace on a cloudy day. It's a tight fit thanks to the
backpack, but Thundercracker can stand on the base.
The box photos show a significantly lighter blue than the toy actually
has.

Color Swaps: This is tricky, because Nitro had several sprues of light
gray, and they didn't all get turned into the same color...plus one of the
colors is a dark blue that's hard to tell from black without shining a
flashlight on it. As near as I can tell, though, all the parts that are
black plastic on Nitro are black plastic on Thundercracker, the smoky clear
plastic becomes faintly yellowish smoky clear plastic (the photo on the
package has them very vibrantly yellow), and about half of the light gray
parts are replaced by dark blue. The chestplate is definitely black, but
pretty sure the shins are blue plastic rather than black painted blue. The
fake thruster backpack tips are black plastic...and continue to be almost
impossible to NOT pop off during transformation. Those little panels that
fold out to form the leading edges of the wings closest to the fuselage are
actually blue plastic, but painted medium gray so well that I had to do some
covert scraping to be sure they weren't gray plastic. The shoulderpads and
forearm/fist parts also appear to be black plastic, as is the gun housing,
but the shield parts are dark blue plastic.

Paint Apps: In robot mode, the chest is mostly painted medium gray, as
are the intakes of the backpack boosters. There's some yellow details down
the center of the chest. There's red "INTAKE" on each of the top scoops on
the thighs, with red V's around the words. The gun housing is painted dark
blue, the nosecone tip halves are painted black.
In vehicle mode, the wings have red and silver lines in the classic G1
wing pattern, and black Decepticon symbols that are hard to see under normal
lighting. The tail surfaces have red and silver lightning bolts. The gray
bits make no real sense, leaving them blue and adding stripes would have
worked a lot better. It's almost as if they accidentally put a Starscream
deco on those pieces.

Mold Changes and Other Notes: There's a new head, which is a movie-style
Starscream head with too many eyes and a generally insectile look to it. As
with Nitro, it's just a removable head, it doesn't transform. (I've ordered
a G1 Thundercracker faceplate from Prize Inside on Shapeways, and will use an
extra Fangry to create a proper Titan Master head for this toy later. The
cockpit can still hold regular Titan Masters as pilots, so all the more
reason to make this) The head is all black plastic with medium gray on the
face, red eyes, and silver fangs.
Still at least has much of a hassle to transform to jet mode as Nitro,
if not moreso. I was kinda hoping that some of the tolerance issues would have
been fixed for a store exclusive update, but nope. Transforming a toy
smaller than a Titan should not be tiring, but my hands and arms hurt from
the excessive force I kept having to apply.

Overall: It's a nice LOOKING mold in both modes, I just wish it weren't
such a literal pain to transform.