Nahhh... 124.00 for a very extremely limited exclusive of 2 giant main characters from Armada, with a complete x-Dimension Minicon set... it's not a huge amount of money, atleast not for something like that..
Back to some of the more choice Figures from Armada, We have the rest of the seeker crew...Lets start with my Name sake shall we:
Armada Skywarp Hasbro (2003):
Skywarp was a Hasbro exclusive in the Armada line who received no biography from them, but was later expanded upon by Dreamwave Productions.
Box Art:
His Jet mode was nice, an had the same gimmicks as Starscream..
The gimmick being the Minicon releases a set of Powerful launchers on the shoulders of the jet.. and Robot mode..
The Robot Mode was superb, and I believe that the remold incorporated a little more articulation in some areas..as well as a completely brand new Head sculpt..
He did have a certain appeal for not being in the Armada Cartoon, which was a shame though because of his loyalty to Megatron, it would have been nice to see the Competitiveness over Megatron's attention..
Like starscream his Left wing could become a sword..
Skywarp's color scheme and remolded Head and articulation gave him a decided edge over the Previous Starscream release.. and his aesthetics looked wonderful next to Galvatron..
The Armada version of Skywarp is an homage to the G1 character in his color scheme. Unlike the original Skywarp, the toy is a remold of Starscream rather than being a mere repaint.
Armada Skywarp was redecoed into Universe Ramjet, who came with a redeco of Thunderclash and three additional Mini-Cons.
Armada Thundercracker (2003):
Armada Thundercracker was used in the television show as Starscream's Super Mode, instead of as a separate character as originally intended.
Same gimmicks with the shoulder launchers..
When Starscream gets the upgrade he quotes: "I look like Thundercracker." This began a trend which was prominent during Transformers: Energon where Hasbro released toys that were repainted from another as a separate character with a different name even though the show depicted the repaint as an upgrade to the original character.
This was because the show's creators did not like to use repainted toys as separate characters. To cement the character of Starscream as being separate from the toy character he now looked like.
The American version of the show added a line of dialogue where Starscream remarked that "he looked like Thundercracker", implying an off-screen character that Starscream somehow knew.
Money Shot!!
Thundercracker's Mini-Con is called Zapmaster who is a grey repaint of Starscream's Mini-Con.
Thundercracker's color scheme gave him a decided edge over the Previous Starscream release as well, because of the darker Blues.. and his aesthetics looked wonderful next to Megatron..
Either way you can always portray Thundercracker as either the Upgraded Starscream, or as Thundercracker..as his box indicates..
Overall the repaints and Starscream are some of the best seekers from Transformers, and they really had great homages in the Dreamwave comics as well..
Wikipedia says that according to Dreamwave:
Dreamwave Productions
Thundercracker's only fictional appearance was in a flashback scene in the Transformers: Energon comic #30 and #31, as one of the Decepticons being led into battle by Scorponok.
While not much was known about Thundercracker, the Dreamwave Productions More Than Meets the Eye biography series filled in some of the gaps. It reveals that Thundercracker was one of Megatron's elite aerial troops, and was responsibe for training Starscream and Skywarp. Eventually he grew disenchanted with Megatron and disappeared. Resurfacing shortly before the battles on Earth, and now with a Mini-Con partner, he seemed to become a mercenary.
Like Starscream he can use one of his wings as an Energon blade and is a lethal martial fighter. However, in seeming reference to his original Marvel bio, his only weakness is his self-doubt.
Dreamwave Productions
While not much was known about
Skywarp, Dreamwave's "More Than Meets the Eye" series established one extremely important fact - in the comics continuity he is related to Starscream. He is a grim and dangerous combatant with a near-perfect aim and an array of martial techniques. Unlike his treacherous relative he is loyal to Megatron; in fact the snide remarks of the other Decepticons about him getting his rank this way are the only thing that genuinely angers Skywarp. He is friends with Scavenger - a friendship complicated by the fact that, unbeknownst to Skywarp, Scavenger is actually a spy for the Autobots...
Skywarp would be briefly seen in issue 12 of the Armada comic, guarding Megatron's latest secret weapon alongside Wheeljack and Sideways. He would later be seen at the end of the Armada comic celebrating Unicron's defeat.
Armada Skywarp made his only Energon appearance in a flashback in Transformers: Energon #30 we would see Scorponok leading Wheeljack, Predacon, Terrorsaur and Skywarp against the Autobots in an unidentified battle on Cybertron. In Megatron’s battle barge, Starscream warned Megatron to watch out for Scorponok as Thrust, Cyclonus and Demolishor piloted the barge.
Armada Skywarp also was set to appear in the unreleased issue 31 of the Transformers: Energon comic series.
So after thinking about the way in which these characters were recolored and released, and comic stories elaborated on them, it's almost as if they were mass produced Botcon Exclusives.. but they were Hasbro Exclusives.. pretty cool huh..
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