Jetfire's vehicle mode is an SR-71 Blackbiard-- well, more or less. This is REALLY a "only look at him from above!" vehicle mode, as his robot parts hang out pretty blatantly from the bottom of the SR-71 "shell" on the top. The worst offenders are the hands under his nosecone, but it's his whole robot mode is pretty much all along the underside here. Still, alt mode kibble is the easiest to overlook in this mode, simply because the Blackbird mode is so. Freaking. HUGE. Granted, he really spreads out, but WOW this is a big vehicle mode. Makes the other Leader class molds look tiny by comparison. The panel detailing is quite good in this ode, and the little military-esque detailing, such as "JTFR", the scraped-off Decepticon symbol on the wings, and the varius military markers on his tailfins are all done quite well. He has three deployable landing gear in this mode-- which you'll pretty much need if you don't want him to just sit on his uneven kibble-- and a standard spring-loaded missile launcher underneath the front of this mode. It's also pretty darn accurate proportionally if you just go by the vehicle parts.
    It should be noted here that Jetfire is one of the most difficult Transformers to convert that I've ever owned, to the point where he's one the few I genuinely HATE to transform, especially from robot mode into vehicle mode. You have to get everything-- both the robot mode parts and the panels-- to line up JUST right in vehicle mode for everything to snap together, and the wing-turbine pieces come undone way too easily regardless, which can of course set the whole thing to start creaking apart as you try to fix the loose turbines. It's just... augh. AUGH. I don't think I've ever transformed him to vehicle mode in less than half an hour.
    Jetfire's robot mode is definitely the weaker of his two primary modes, mostly in proportions and the sheer amount of kibble hanging off of him. I mean, pretty much his entire vehicle mode is hanging off his back and his arms, albeit at places somewhat compressed. It just doesn't look good in the least, and really hinders his movement and balance. His proportions aren't very accurate to the movie model, either-- the arms are way too skinny, he doesn't have enough of a "hunch" formed from his armor and thus too much of a "normal" chest. His legs are a bit more accurate, though a bit overly spindly between the knees and the feet. Here he gets a bit more of a color scheme with dark blue and light gray/silver being the main colors in addition to just black, and although not bad, it's far from eye-catching, either. One of the good bits about this mode is the sheer amount of mold detailing that's gone into him, impressive even for a movie toy. His arm in particular are COVERED in gear and piston detailing, and I quite like it looks like his jet engines form his knees (though that's not really how his transformation works). His head is also quite well-done, pulling off the "old man" vibe pretty well for a robot what with the slivers of metal making up his "beard" and "ear hair"-- those bits are made of rubbery plastic, however, so they can get permanently bent if you're not careful. The fake cockpit for a forehead was also a nice touch. In addition to a standard handheld missile launcher, Jetfire also comes with a "cane" made from his primary landing gear in vehicle mode, which is incredibly creative and just plain hilarious. It could stand to be a bit longer, though. As for electronics, if you pull down on the lever on his chest, his eyes and chest will blink a few times while he says "Jetfire's mah name" in a... fair... imitation of his movie voice. I wish he had more sound effects than just that, though. As far as articulation, Jetfire can move side-to-side at the neck as well as the shoulders (at two points), elbows (at two points), at the base of his three fingers on each hand (which all move as one piece), and at the hips (at two points), knees (at three points), and ankles (at two points). It sounds like a lot, but as mentioned before all the kibble, along with his odd body and leg structure make him considerably more limited in movement than it would appear from a description.
    As weak as his robot mode is, Jetfire's combined form with Optimus Prime-- called "Jetpower Optimus Prime"-- is truly an awful mess. It's basically Jetfire's form spread out as thin as possibly to more or less encase most of Optimus' basic robot mode form. It's not solid at all, gives him awful balance, has kibble EVERYWHERE, and just... I really don't have anything positive to say about this mode except it gives Optimus more weapons, and the big Blackird engines don't look all that bad. Still-- the less said about this mode (which is also a royal pain to get the figures into), the better.
    Jetfire is the perfect example of a design that looks good on paper (or as a CGI robot in a movie) but whose design doesn't translate that well to reality. All of his modes suffer to one degree or another. His vehicle mode is easily the best, only having a bit of obvious robot mode kibble if looked at from a side or bottom view, but his robot mode is positively drowning in Blackbird parts and has terrible proportions, and his combined mode with Prime is an absolute failure. Combine all this with his incredibly difficult transformation, and I wouldn't recommend him to anyone but the most hardcore completists or ROTF Jetfire fans. Get the (I can't believe I'm saying this) Legends version instead if you want a good representation of the character.

Review by Beastbot

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