Dreadwing
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- "Darkwing" redirects here. For the Disney character and television series, see Darkwing Duck.
Dreadwing is the name of several fictional characters from the various Transformers universes.
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[edit] Generation 1
“Dreadwing” is the name of the combined form of the two Decepticon Powermasters, Dreadwind and Darkwing, released separately in 1988.
The mournful Dreadwind is always looking on the bleak side of life, and is frequently avoided by other Decepticons, because they know that however cheery they are, Dreadwing can easily bring them right down to his miserable level. Dreadwind’s presence on the battlefield can even prompt feelings of despair in his enemies, but it’s not an advantage, as it only depresses him more. Dreadwing transforms into an F-16 Fighting Falcon jet, a flying armory equipped with missiles, thermal melters, machine guns and lasers, and is partnered with the Nebulan Hi-Test, a thrill-seeking over-achiever who does his best to bully Dreadwind into enjoying himself.
If Dreadwing is a pessimist, then Darkwing completes the equation by being a manic-depressive who believes that life is just one long road of suffering and pain. However, where Dreadwing simply accepts his fact and resigns himself to misery, Darkwing’s purpose in life to make others feel worse than he does. Darkwing transforms into a Tornado jet and is armed with two electro-kinetic blasters, which he prefers using to torture, rather than finish off, foes – as far as he’s concerned, death would be getting off lightly. Darkwing is partnered with the Nebulan Throttle, who is, by his own admission, a low-life thief who enjoys mixing with society’s dregs. If nothing else, Throttle’s honesty is admirable, and he expects the same courtesy from others – that’s why he gets along with Darkwing, because he doesn’t pretend to be something he’s not.
Dreadwind and Darkwing are the perfect partners in crime, almost attempting to outdo each other in the bleakness stakes, but they profess to hate each other, and utterly detest merging into their combined mode, the giant jet, Dreadwing. In this mode, in addition to their constant bickering, they are capable of space flight and beyond-light speeds.
[edit] Marvel Comics
The peaceful planet of Nebulos had earlier been visited by the Autobots and Decepticons in Marvel Comics’ Transformers series, and when they departed, only ruin was left in their wake. To prevent such horrors from occurring again, Nebulan scientist Hi-Q detonated a bomb in the planet’s atmosphere which “poisoned” the planet’s various fuel supplies and resources – although harmless to Nebulans, the “poison” was toxic to Transformers. This was the fate which befell Dreadwind and Darkwing when they came to the planet looking for the departed Scorponok, and refuelled from Nebulan resources, causing their bodies to cease functioning. Their rotting, immobile hulks soon became tourist attractions.
Meanwhile, Hi-Q’s jealous partner, Hi-Test, had vowed to outdo his contemporary, and hired criminal Throttle to steal Hi-Q’s latest fuel conversion theories, which he had dubbed the “Powermaster Process.” Using this data, Hi-Test bio-engineered his and Throttle’s bodies, and offered partnership to Dreadwind and Darkwing, who accepted; the two Nebulans transformed into engines and connected to them, supplying them with untainted energy direct from their own bodies. The Powermasters ran roughshod over the planet, but were eventually defeated by a new team of Powermasters, including Hi-Q himself, bonded with Optimus Prime, and exiled from Nebulos.
Dreadwind and Darkwing soon entered into a partnership with the robot-eating Mecannibals, hiding their own robot nature by dealing through Hi-Test and Throttle, whose job it was to find other robots for the Mecannibals to feast upon. Setting their sights upon Autobot Pretenders Landmine and Cloudburst, the Decepticons lured them into the Mecannibals clutches, but in a strange twist of fate, the Pretenders were sent to gather spices to improve their flavour. Dreadwind and Darkwing pursued them to make things difficult, but when the fact that they were robots was revealed to the Mecannibals, Landmine and Cloudburst departed while Dreadwing and Darkwind fled.
The Mecannibals pursued the two Powermasters to Cybertron, where they took an assignment from Megatron to acquire the body of the deceased Decepticon, Starscream, hoping it would allow them to shake off their pursuers. Heading to Earth, they discovered that the energies of the Underbase that had destroyed Starscream continued to animate his corpse, but when Throttle and Hi-Test drained them away, they took the body back to Megatron for revival as a Pretender. Megatron’s subsequent apparent death put the duo out of work, however, and they drowned their sorrows at Maccadam’s Old Oil House, where they remained drunkenly unaware of some Mecannibals that had picked up their trail being dispatched by the Autobot Quickswitch. Dreadwind and Darkwing participated in the attack on Unicron when the chaos-bringer assaulted Cybertron, and survived to serve under Bludgeon’s leadership, aiding in the raid on planet Klo, where they killed the Autobot Getaway.
Of the two, Dreadwind was a particular favorite character of series writer Simon Furman, and served a long stint as the character who answered reader’s queries on the letters page of the UK’s exclusive Transformers title.
[edit] Generation 2
A few years later, when the Transformers comic was rejuvenated as Transformers: Generation 2, Darkwing underwent a startling transformation. When Megatron, recreated in a new, vastly powerful body, returned to reclaim leadership of the Decepticons from Bludgeon, Darkwing attempted an aerial attack on him from behind, only to be blasted out of the sky by Megatron’s rail gun. His body utterly destroyed, he was entirely reconstructed by Frenzy, using the cannibalised advanced technology of the Warworld and brought back to life with the stolen Creation Matrix. In his new body, able to transform into a heavily-armed stealth bomber, Darkwing aided in the attack on the planet Tykos to allow the Decepticons to steal the protective Rheanimum gas.
The toy of this character was originally conceived as a new Generation 2 version of Megatron and Starscream, but when this idea was abandoned, it was released in a new color scheme, with a new name - despite the comic’s portrayal of the character as Darkwing, the Generation 2 toyline released the figure under the name of Dreadwing, the first use of the name for a singular character. The toy includes a secondary Transformer named Smokescreen (the proposed Starscream) who transforms into a jet and locks into the rear of Dreadwing. With Smokescreen disengaged, Dreadwing can also transform into a tank. His stealth abilities cloak him from all detection, enabling him to bomb Autobot strongholds without ever being seen. Smokescreen is armed with wing-mounted missile launchers, while Dreadwing’s most destructive, distinguishing feature in all modes is his massive six-barrelled rapid-fire gatling gun.
Dreadwing was released in Europe as Ace Evader.
[edit] IDW Comics
Darkwing and Dreadwind appeared under Furman again, making their IDW debut in the Stormbringer miniseries. Darkwing commands the Decepticon cell operating on Nebulos and when Thunderwing attacked the planet, Darkwing made the call to help the Nebulans try & stop Thunderwing before he destroyed them along with the rest of the planet. While he shows some degree of leadership skills in this continuity, he also shows some cowardice when he and Dreadwind abandoned the battle at the earliest opportunity when Thunderwing's power was made apparent.
[edit] Transformers: Super God Masterforce
The American Transformers series ended in 1987, one year before Dreadwind and Darkwing were released. As the Transformers were originally manufactured in Japan by Takara, Takara produced their own spin-offs to the original series. Transformers: Super God Masterforce was the second of these and featured characters produced for 1988. As part of a different storyline, Dreadwing and Darkwing were recolored slightly (dark blue pieces of both Transformers were molded in red) and reinvented as the mighty Godmaster brothers, Buster and Hydra. They were also referred to as the Darkwings (perhaps as a nod to their American counterparts).
The lifeless mechanoid bodies known as "Transtectors" which would come to be owned by Buster and Hydra were stolen from a region of space called the G Nebula by the evil energy entity and self-styled "Decepticon God," Devil Z. Some years after the Decepticons were banished from Earth by the Autobots in 2011, Devil Z recruited two human beings, Lord Giga and Lady Mega, to find human partners for the Transtectors. A pair of brothers from Germany were soon found and bonded to two jet Transtectors, given the power to summon the Masterforce and transform into engines that allowed the jets to assume robot mode; Hydra, a master disguise artist and actor who plied his trade in the deadliest way as an assassin for the American criminal underworld; and the younger Buster, as cool as his elder brother, but more suave and amiable, and with a love of birds. Able to wield the power of lightning and wind, respectively, and to heal from any damage almost instantaneously, the two brothers can merge their Transtectors into the giant jet, Darkwings.
A string of defeats from the Autobot Godmaster Ginrai throughout their time serving as Decepticons eventually prompted Buster and Hydra to seek new ways to increase their power. Whereas Giga and Mega embraced the human aspect of their nature as Godmasters, Buster and Hydra rejected it, feeling that it was this which made them weak, and requested that Devil Z transform them permanently into entirely robotic beings. The villain did so, and Buster and Hydra were fused with their Transtectors as true robots, but even with this power, they proved unable to best Ginrai, and when Devil Z was destroyed, they fled into space with the other Transtectors that he had brought to life.
[edit] Transformers: Robots in Disguise
The Generation 2 Dreadwing and Smokescreen set was re-released in 2003 as a latecomer into the Transformers: Robots in Disguise toyline, redecod in a grey and green color scheme. Presented as new characters, the Dreadwing figure reverted to the Dreadwind name, while Smokescreen became Smokejumper. They were subsequently profiled in the first issue of the Transformers Collectors’ Club Magazine, which placed the characters in the storyline of Transformers: Universe.
[edit] Transformers: Energon
The first Dreadwing toy bearing no relation to any of the past holders of the name or its components, the Transformers: Energon incarnation of Dreadwing is a clone of Mirage, lacking in all emotion and considered pure evil. Like his forebear, he transforms into a high-speed gunboat. Even his fellow Decepticons admit that he brings a chill to the air, as he swoops upon the Autobots like a plague. He pledges allegiance to no cause or goal beyond the termination of anything and everything that stands in his way.
[edit] Transformers: Classics (2007)
Dreadwing is a part of the Predator Attack Mini-Con team and transforms into an eagle. He is unlikely to be related to any previous Transformer of the same name.
