Botcon Scourge (Wings of Honor)

Prelude: Scourge is a repaint (with a different head) of Cybertron Sideways / Galaxy Force Noisemaze. Now normally I don't do complete reviews for repaints of figures I've reviewed already, but it's been quite some time since I reviewed Noisemaze, so Scourge gets the full treatment regardless.

Robot Mode: Let's start at the top here. Scourge got himself a new head, seeing as the Noisemaze head doesn't bear all that much resemblance to the G1 Sweep leader. The new head, though, is a pretty decent match. It does lack the giant red-eyed laster pointer that G1 Scourge sported, instead it only has a tiny red jewel imbedded in his forehead, but it does have the beard and everything. Clearly Scourge, so no complaints here at all.

The rest of the body doesn't bear all that much resemblance to the original Scourge except in colour. Scourge's characteristic bat wings are hinted at by the struts on the figure's back and the legs bear some similarity, but apart from that, not much. Still, a great-looking and very posable robot mode and the colours make sure you know who it is (even if you disregard the head). Scourge can use the wings on his legs as blades, either separately or connected into a big one, and he has that whatever-it-is on his right arm. Noisemaze's gimmick of a changign allegiance symbol is gone, of course, so the Cyberkey only causes the red blades to snap out, but still: Looking pretty good. So all in all a great-looking robot mode, the details of which are brought out even better here thanks to the blue colour as opposed to Noisemaze's black.

Alternate Mode: Naturally Scourge transforms into the same kind of alien-looking jet / spacecraft that Noisemaze did. The resemblance to the vehicle mode of G1 Scourge is pretty much non-existent. G1 Scourge was a wingless boat-thing, Botcon Scourge is a sleek and dangerous-looking flying craft. The great detailing of this mold is even more prominent here than in robot mode. One thing, though: The cockpit has these slits on the sides where the horns of Noisemaze's robot head would fit. Scourge doesn't have any horns on his head, so the slits remain empty here. Not a big thing, just something I noticed.

Not sure how much more I can write here. The jet looks great, everything fits together well, and you can even activate the Cyberkey gimmick here by elevating the middle of the jet so the red blades can flip out. Not sure what the point is as the blades aren't in a position to cut anyone here, but it sure looks cool. So the bottom line is: A top vehicle mode, which does much, much better than Scourge's original G1 vehicle mode did.

Remarks: Scourge is the only Decepticon in the boxed Wings of Honor set and his inclusion there is a bit of a strange choice. Scourge does not appear in the actual Wings of Honor story, which is about Kup's first mission as a young Autobot. He only makes an appearance in the framing sequence, which is based upon the 1986 Transformers Movie. He also dies pretty quickly. Banzaitron or Skyquake would have been more fitting choices for the boxed set, but whatever. The Noisemaze mold was a great choice for Scourge, who looks great in both modes. Despite quite a few differences to the original G1 Scourge, he's close enough that there is no doubt who he's supposed to be.

There were actually three more versions of this figure available at Botcon 2009, as three greenish-coloured Scourge clones were issues as "Sweeps". I don't own them, but I can already say that we'll soon have images and a review of them courtesy of TFU's number one guest reviewer Desastron. With or without Sweeps, though, Scourge is a great figure. If you have the money and the opportunity, you should get one for your collection and complete the Unicron trio (together with Galvatron and Cyclonus).

Rating: A

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