Squawkbox

Squawkbox is a Decepticon Mini-Cassette combiner from the Generation 1 continuity family.

Many high schools will send you home if you show up wearing a skirt this short.

Squawkbox—the combined form of the Decepticons Beastbox and Squawktalk—is a passionate musician. He loves playing with sound, using the combined powers of his components. Listening to, creating, and manipulating sound is his life. The results of his compositions have been called "unnervingly cacophonous", but his Decepticon commanders came up with a way to put them to good use.

Squawkbox has been assigned the function of "Battlefield Dissonance" and set free to distract and disorient the Autobots with his latest works. Squawkbox is thrilled to have both a captive audience and access to all the terrible sounds of a battlefield for future use. Unfortunately for him, his work can prove just as detrimental to his teammates as his opponents if he's not careful, and at that point it's anyone's guess as to which side will be the first to try and shut him up via photon blaster.

Fiction

Hearts of Steel

Telegraphic Communication. Hh.

Squawkbox served as Starscream's communications officer while Megatron was in stasis lock. When Starscream learned the Autobots were active, he ordered Squawkbox to alert the other Decepticon forces by telegraph. All Squawkbox utters is "Yes, Starscream!" Hearts of Steel #3

"Strange Visitors" establishes that events identical to those of Hearts of Steel and Infestation 2 occur in the 2005 IDW continuity; however, they happened to Maximal explorers brainwashed by Shockwave into believing they were the Autobots and Decepticons of the Great War.

Madman The Transformers comic

That's Squawkbox to the upper left. And also to the lower right.

In the year 2001, Squawktalk and Beastbox accompanied Soundwave and several other Decepticon mini-cassettes to spy on the construction site of Autobot City on Earth. The team recorded a secret meeting between Optimus Prime and Ultra Magnus where the two Autobot leaders discussed hiding the Matrix of Leadership in a bunker on the building site. Once the majority of the Autobots had left for Cybertron, Soundwave deployed Squawktalk, Beastbox, Ratbat, Slugfest, and Overkill to begin excavation. Squawktalk combined with Beastbox into Squawkbox and successfully dug up the Matrix, but was then run over by the Autobot Hot Rod. The Transformers

2005 IDW continuity

First appearance: Spotlight: Sixshot

He's good.

At the beginning of the Autobot-Decepticon conflict, Squawkbox and a number of Soundwave's other minions watched Starscream massacre the Senate. Megatron Origin #4

Much later, and much to Squawkbox's discomfort, Sixshot asked him to locate the missing Terrorcons. Squawkbox fearfully complied and directed Sixshot to the planet Mumu-Obscura to find his comrades. Spotlight: Sixshot

Squawkbox eventually ended up on Earth, where he was captured by Bumblebee's Autobot squad and handed over to Skywatch. The Hanging Sword

Following the Chaos War, Squawkbox was one of the Decepticons who began repopulating Cybertron along with the Autobots and NAILs. When riots broke out after the return of Megatron, Squawkbox holed up in Blurr's bar instead of joining in. City on Fire They were soon forced to abandon their hideout after rioters began attacking it. The Verge During the subsequent battle over Iacon, Squawkbox and several of the NAILs and disillusioned Decepticons he had been hanging out with prevented Needlenose from killing Swindle. Heavy Is the Head When it was all over, all Autobots and Decepticons were banished from the city, and Squawkbox was among those who abandoned their factions in favor of staying with the NAILs. Second Exodus

Beast Wars: Uprising

Squawkbox participated in the Siege of T'Muk, where he piloted a sky-sled into battle. Centuries later, the sled found its way into the collections of the Museum of Decepticon Heritage. Cultural Appropriation

Toys

The Transformers

Botty Longtorso, Botty Longtorso, the bot who comes in pieces!

• Squawktalk / Beastbox (Mini-Cassette 2-pack, 1988)

• Accessories: Left & right "high decibel sonic boomers", 2 "compression cannons"

Sold in the fifth year of the original Transformers toyline, the Decepticon mini-cassettes Squawktalk and Beastbox were packaged together, and combined to form the humanoid robot Squawkbox. The two components' guns combine to form two large double-cannons clipped to the combined robot's arms; as both sets of guns have "fin" clips, either one can be the "base" gun attached directly to Squawkbox's arms.

They were the last Decepticon cassettes ever released in the original line, years after Soundwave himself stopped being available.

In Japan, Squawkbox was only available as a mail-away exclusive during the Super-God Masterforce series. He cost 980 yen and 2 Robot Points.

• More information on Squawkbox at TFU.info
• Instructions for Squawkbox at Botchthecrab.com

Notes

Overkill not included.

• The 1988 North American catalog shows Beastbox (and ergo Squawkbox) with a fairly significant engineering difference: Beastbox was originally going to have a panel that flipped over in gorilla mode to hide Squawkbox's face on his butt, which would have become a chestplate in the combined mode. (The coloration in the catalog also suggests Beastbox/half of Squawkbox may have originally been burgundy, though how much of that is lighting is hard to say.)
• Squawkbox got his first ever official profile/bio in the Dreamwave More than Meets the Eye guide, 15 years after the toy was released.
• A 'squawk box' is a name for a many-to-many always-open-circuit telecommunication system.

Foreign names

• Japanese: Squawkbox (スクォークボックス Sukwōkubokkusu)