Thundertron

Thundertron is a Star Seeker from the Aligned continuity family.

"Do you fear death? Do you fear that dark abyss? All your deeds laid bare, all your sins punished?"

Cybertron and its inhabitants will tremble, for they will hear the massive clang of steel amidst the sound of leonine growls, and fall before the might of Thundertron! The massive, peg-legged leader of the Star Seekers and Captain of the Tidal Wave, Thundertron claims to be "the mightiest freebooter on the spaceways". Aside from being a merciless pirate, the destruction of his home-world by Cybertronians has given him an unquenchable hatred and a desire for revenge. He vows to hunt down and slaughter any who come from Cybertron, and is equally brutal with anyone else who would get in his way.

Fiction

Aligned novels

Sensing the energy trail of a Cybertronian ship, Thundertron had his ship land on Velocitron. He quickly questioned the planet's leader if there were any Cybertronians there. She said there were none, but the leader's refusal to divulge where they were, her insolence in asking the fault of being Cybertronian, and her rival's insistence that she was Cybertronian quickly made Thundertron lose his temper and ordered his crew to attack.

Following the energy trail, they traveled through a space bridge to Junkion, where he found not only the Cybertronian ship, but another. While the Cybertronians were fighting each other, Thundertron met with the leader of the locals. He quickly forced the Junkions to repair his ship and attach a space bridge to it. He had two crew members show the Junkions they meant business by killing one of them. As soon as the space bridge was attached, Thundertron ordered the Star Seekers to attack the Cybertronians. Exiles

Some time after the battle on Junkion, Thundertron and the Star Seekers engineered a ruse to trap the Decepticons and to wipe out the Nemesis with the Requiem Blaster. Taking advantage of the Blaster's high energy consumption rate, Megatron and the pirate leader came to a stalemate in hand-to-hand combat while the Nemesis overwhelmed the Tidal Wave, forcing the pirates into a retreat. Retribution

Ask Vector Prime

Optimus Prime and the Earth Protection Taskforce unsuccessfully attempted to capture Starquest and Thundertron. Ask Vector Prime, 2015/08/17

Toys

Prime

Thunder! Thunder! Thunder! Thundertron, Ho!

• Thundertron (Voyager, 2012)
  • Series / number: 1 / 006
  • Accessories: Claw/Battle sword, claw/right foot

Part of the fourth wave of Prime: Robots in Disguise Voyager Class toys, Thundertron converts from a robotic lion to a peg-legged space pirate and back! He features an incredibly long beard and looks like he's wearing a long-coat, with the latter being due to the beast mode "wings" on his robot waist and the coattail-shaped panel on his back. He also features translucent plastic, such as his back and forearms/beast mode forelegs, to accommodate his weapon's light-up gimmick.

For accessories, he has a short-bladed claw which is pegged (via 5mm peg-hole) into his peg-leg, and serves as his right robot mode and rear-right beast mode foot. He also has a long-bladed claw that transforms into a "Battle sword", the LED in the weapon illuminating the sword blade as a sort of "Energon glow". Either accessory can peg into his hands, forearms, robot and beast back, and into either side of his "wings". Additionally, the light-up weapon features a peg-hole on either side of the lever.

In order for him to fit in the box, he is often mis-transformed in-package, with his chest panels not being opened, and his crest, "coattail", and pelvis being left in their beast mode positions. His package-back also features a call-out to his static snap-on claw/right foot accessory, but it incorrectly points to his claw/sword accessory instead. Additionally, his stock photography depicts additional paint operations not present in the final product, such as silver paint for most of his robot feet/beast hind-feet, and gold paint for the lower half of his peg-leg. Finally, his instructions forget to mention that the spurs on the sides of his rear feet have to be swung up and angled for lion mode, as shown in his package art and stock photos.

He was later redecoed into Leo Prime, Go! Go Prime, and BotCon 2014 Alpha Trizer.

• More information on Thundertron at TFU.info

Notes

• Thundertron was designed by Emiliano Santalucia.
• Thundertron's status as a captain of an independent ship, his apparent peg leg, and his unending quest for vengeance harken back to Captain Ahab from the classic novel, Moby-Dick. He isn't the first.
  • The former two traits, plus his tentacle-esque beard and the way his "hat" is oriented makes him look like Davy Jones, captain of the Flying Dutchman in Pirates of the Caribbean.
• The Star Seeker pirates were first previewed to fans at BotCon 2011, showing all new versions of familiar characters. This, combined with the way Exiles purposely hides their Captain's identity for an extended period, leads to something of a disconnect when, in what is clearly written to be a big dramatic reveal at the end of the book we find out the Captain IS... a new character we've never heard of? This assumed knowledge of the character's reputation is even more perplexing when you consider the fact that Alex Irvine, author of Exiles has stated that he did not create the character of Thundertron, but couldn't speculate on Hasbro's reasons for his existence. This, combined with his prominent toy release would point to Hasbro thinking that we should all know and love the character, even though he's never been used before.
  • In 2015, former Hasbro employee Rik Alvarez stated that Thundertron would have appeared in Season 3 of Prime, before external pressures forced the writing staff to focus instead on the Beast Hunters toyline. As a result, Thundertron was scrapped, rendering his buildup in the novels obsolete and somewhat bizarre when viewed out of context.

Foreign names

• Mandarin: Pò Tiān Léi (破天雷, "Heaven Breaking Thunder")