Starscream
Starscream is a character in the Transformers media franchise produced by the American toy company Hasbro and the Japanese toy company Takara Tomy. He is the second-in-command of the Decepticons, a villainous faction of alien robots that seeks to conquer their home planet of Cybertron and the rest of the known universe. As with all Cybertronians, Starscream can disguise himself by transforming into vehicles, in his case a fighter jet, and he is usually portrayed as a treacherous and cowardly air commander who seeks to overthrow the Decepticon leader, Megatron, and assume control of the Decepticons.
Character biography
The original suggestion for the character's name was Ulchtar. Bob Budiansky convinced Hasbro to name the character Starscream instead.Starscream has the ambition to overthrow Megatron as the Decepticons' leader. He has gained the control he craves on several occasions, but he eventually suffers defeat. Starscream is ruthless, cruel, bloodthirsty, and more intelligent than the average Decepticon, but is also unlikely to act directly on these aspirations without first securing conditions favorable to his ascension. He considers himself vastly superior to other Decepticons and finds Megatron contemptible for his antiquated military strategies and tactics.
Starscream believes the Decepticons should employ guile and speed more readily than brute force to defeat the Autobots. However, given the chance to lead, he is often less successful in this than Megatron. While Megatron frequently overlooks him as a threat, authors suggest such reasons for Megatron's tolerance of Starscream's presence as a grudging respect for his scheming nature and precautionary observation. Others suggest that Starscream's treacherous nature is welcomed; that without a threat to his command, Megatron believes he would become soft and overconfident, or that he even found his transgressions amusing. Even so, Starscream often quickly exhausts Megatron's patience; violent-yet-brief verbal and/or physical conflicts between the two are not uncommon. As such, there have been times when Megatron has been close to killing Starscream.
Starscream’s first appearance is in the 1983 Diaclone toy catalog, in which he is introduced as one of two colorations for a toy called “JetRobo” that transforms into a McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle. Later when Hasbro purchased this toy mold, along with several others in 1984, he was introduced and given the name Starscream in the Generation 1 animated series and the adjacent Marvel Comics series. As Decepticon Air Commander, he leads the other Decepticon Seeker jets, many of whom share his physical design. His technical specifications indicate top speed as Mach 2.8 and altitude ceiling as. Launchers mounted on his arm can deliver cluster bombs capable of leveling a area and fire his signature null ray, which for brief periods disrupts the flow of electricity in any circuitry it contacts. This action temporarily renders inoperable any electronic device or machine, including Transformers.
Animated series
Generation 1
Starscream was formerly a scientist and explorer, working with the future Autobot Skyfire, during the Golden Age of Cybertron, shortly before the Autobot/Decepticon war re-erupted. Following the disappearance of Skyfire when the two were exploring a prehistoric Earth, Starscream returned to Cybertron and soon abandoned his scientific pursuits, becoming a warrior in Megatron's Decepticon army as the civil war exploded. Starscream attended the Cybertron War Academy, mentioned in the episode "A Prime Problem".Starscream makes use of his old scientific profession in a few episodes. For example, in "A Decepticon Raider in King Arthur's Court", when he and several other Decepticons were temporarily displaced in time to medieval England, the weapons of the Transformers ceased functioning; Starscream knew how to use available materials to create gunpowder as a substitute for himself and the other Decepticons.
In "Starscream's Brigade", he attempts—in what was then only his latest in a series of attempts—to overthrow Megatron as the leader of the Decepticons. After being defeated and exiled in Guadalcanal, Starscream finds the remains of some World War II military vehicles, which inspire him to create an army of his own. He travels to Cybertron using the Space Bridge, forcing the guards and eluding Shockwave to do so. He breaks into the Decepticon Detention Center and steals the five personality components of Renegade Decepticons, then installs them into five wrecked military vehicles and they become the Combaticons. The Combaticons and Starscream then capture four Transformers. When Megatron rallies his troops against Starscream and the Combaticons, he deploys Devastator to fight Bruticus, but Devastator is defeated. Megatron attempts to retreat, however Starscream orders Bruticus to capture Megatron and hold him while he gloats and humiliates him. While this is going on, the Stunticons arrive, combine into Menasor and defeat Bruticus. Megatron then orders Astrotrain to exile Starscream and the Combaticons to a distant asteroid. In the next episode, "The Revenge of Bruticus", the Combaticons blame Starscream for their punishment. They imprison him on Cybertron after he abandons them, and plan a devastating revenge on Megatron by pulling the Earth towards the Sun using Cybertron's controls. After proving his worth in helping Megatron and Optimus Prime stop the deranged Bruticus, Starscream gets restored to Decepticon ranks.
In The Transformers: The Movie, Starscream and many other Decepticons participate in the battle of Autobot City, leaving several Autobots killed. After the Decepticons' defeat, they retreat to Astrotrain. In order to reduce Astrotrain's mass, the Decepticons were left with no choice but to jettison the heavily damaged Skywarp, Thundercracker, and Insecticons into space, and Starscream tosses a mortally wounded Megatron out of Astrotrain. After that, he nominates himself as the new leader of the Decepticons. However, during a grandiose coronation ceremony, Megatron, who has been reborn as Galvatron alongside Cyclonus, Scourge and the Sweeps, arrives and declares the coronation a "bad comedy". Starscream realizes that Galvatron was once Megatron, and Galvatron transforms into his laser cannon mode, obliterating Starscream with a single shot.
However, while Starscream's body has disintegrated, his "spark" remains as a ghost and returns later. In "Starscream's Ghost", he encounters his old friend Octane in the Decepticon Crypt and conspires with him to hand Galvatron over to Rodimus Prime, the new leader of the Autobots. Starscream possesses Cyclonus's body and tricks Galvatron into being captured by the Autobots. Galvatron escapes and later shoots Cyclonus when he realizes that Starscream's ghost is possessing his second-in-command. The vengeful ghost easily escapes and re-appears in an additional episode, "Ghost in the Machine". In the episode, he first appears to possess Scourge and reactivates the head of Unicron. Starscream then makes a deal with Unicron to restore the latter's sight and body by stealing the eyes of Metroplex and transformation cog of Trypticon, and wiring Unicron's head to Cybertron. Starscream successfully accomplishes most of this, however, when he can no longer possess Scourge, he demands that Unicron restore his own, original body so that he can complete the connections. Unicron complies and again demands that Starscream complete the connections, only to have Starscream double-cross him and tell him to "do it himself". At this point, the Autobots set off an explosion that blows Unicron's head and Starscream out into space. As Starscream tumbles out of control, he encounters the Decepticons who unleash all of their firepowers on him, damaging him and pushing him farther into space. Starscream is not encountered again in G1.