The Energon Pub

First review in a loooong time and first Transformers review, so please, be gentle.

Today, after a minor bungle at the post office, I managed to collect Takara’s new Infiltrator Starscream. In case you didn’t already know, this is a transparent redeco of the Fall of Cybertron Starscream mould, that’s supposed to represent his cloaking ability in the game. Or Ghost Starscream for G1 fans



The box is typical of Takara’s exclusives, black and white imagery. Didn’t shoot the other sides, but pics are available out there on the net.



A little bit concerned at how it was all packed - loose in plastic bags inside cardboard dividers.



Straight out of the packaging looks like Starscream’s had a bit of a crash, but I can’t see any physical damage, so I guess the packaging was adequate. (It did travel halfway across the world and back before I got it - China (I’m assuming) to the US to Australia.)

Robot Mode



A moment later restoring him to his robot mode glory, and you can see just how transparent he is, along with some nice silver paint work on his shins, wings and chest, and some “glowing” pink on his arms and shoulders. Physically there are no differences between the sculpts of Infiltrator Starscream and the other FOC Seekers.



Close up on his face shows more silver paint, and really nice light-piping - though seeing some of the yellow bleed through the transparent blue forehead makes me think of deep-sea jellyfish for some reason.

Alt-mode






As with robot mode, there’s no new sculpting compared to his opaque brethren, but again the paintwork really shines through.



Unfortunately there’s no Decepticon sigil on his tail fin like the other Takara FOC Seekers, however this matches the Hasbro versions. My copy here has a slight plastic defect that adds an ugly white mark that wouldn’t be quite so obvious if it weren’t transparent. Didn't shoot it, but there's a small defect on the side of his head also.

The build quality is surprisingly good for what is I think the 7th use of this mould. Joints are very stiff in most cases, even the “feet” which were quite loose on even the original Hasbro Starscream. One of his bicep swivels is so stiff it’d rather pop out than rotate, but easily pops back in.

Accessories



Unfortunately the same can’t be said for his main weapons. The barrel for the “Neutron Assault Rifle” is quite loose, and while not as bad as the Hasbro Skywarp version, it’s not far off. The other two weapons have no faults (no moving parts) and the shiny decos are quite nice.



Probably won’t display like this, as using his forearm 5mm sockets has already caused a stress mark, and doing this on my Hasbro Starscream actually cracked his forearm. On the Hasbro Thundercracker and Skywarp versions, their arms seem to be made of softer plastic, and don’t have this issue.

Final Thoughts

Overall an interesting deco of Starscreaam, for the most part very high quality but for the price, the loose weapons and (minor) plastic defects are a let down... Overall I'd say unless you've got a bit of cash to spare and are a big fan of the character and/or mould.

And finally, all the FOC Seekers together.



L-R Takara Skywarp, Takara Thundercracker, Takara Starscream, Takara Exclusive Infiltrator Starscream, Hasbro Starscream, Hasbro Thundercracker, Hasbro Skywarp



Hope you enjoyed the review, and you may see more from me soon.

/prjkt

I like it.
The overall effect is impressive.