Sky Shadow

OK, quick history lesson.  Black/Sky Shadow is an obscure Generation 1 Transformers character that hails from the Japanese series Victory.  In the US, the Transformers G1 canon ended with the Headmasters three-part mini movie.  In Japan, Takara realized that the US Headmasters movie was awful, and Transformers was still seeing much stronger sales in Japan, so Takara continued the line with three more cartoons: Headmasters, Super God Masterforce, and Victory.  These lines featured mostly the same toys as the late and post-cartoon US line, including Headmasters, Targetmasters, Powermasters, and Pretenders.  They also featured some exclusive new characters and toys, such as the inimitable Star Saber and Victory Leo (and Dai Atlas!).  They ALSO featured a couple of new characters based on existing toys, such as Black Zarack, Blue Bacchus, and Black Shadow (now called Sky Shadow).  In Japan, Takara decided that the Mega Pretenders Thunderwing and Crossblades, which featured transformable robots that fit into human/monster shells that could ALSO transform, were just too weird.  Instead, the inner figures and Pretender shells were retooled to be completely robotic, giving us the Autobot Blue Bacchus and Decepticon Black Shadow, two extremely hard to find toys.  Because they had already made a new Thunderwing toy, Hasbro decided to give us a new figure of Black Shadow, now called Sky Shadow for whatever reason, in the Generations line.  I, for one, love them for it.

Sky Shadow is a retool of Generations Thunderwing, just as Black Shadow was a retool of G1 Thunderwing.  It all comes full circle.

Sky Shadow features a decent enough jet mode… depending on what angle you look at it.  From the top, it’s pretty sleek and cohesive.  From the sides it’s a bit chunky, but from underneath is where things fall apart…

Sky Shadow’s jet mode has a robot hanging off the bottom.  Oh well.  You win some, you lose some.

Transformation is simple, and the tradeoff for a janky jet mode is a nicely articulated robot figure with most of a jet hanging off its back.

Sky Shadow features two missle-launching guns.

For all the faults of the jet mode, this mold makes for a fun robot figure.

The two guns can combine into one giant, double barreled rifle that holds together pretty well.

Thanks to Sky Shadow’s nice shoulder, elbow, and wrist(!) articulation, he can actually get a hand on both handles of the rifle.

Intergalactic gangster mercenary jerks come to battle well prepared.