TRANSFORMERS: Revisiting The Characters Of Generation 1 - JAZZ

TRANSFORMERS:  Revisiting the Characters of Generation 1

    "Do it with style or don't bother doing it!" - Jazz, 1984.

AUTOBOT

Name - JAZZ

Function - Special Operations Agent

Series Debut - 1984 / Wave 1

Sub-Group - None (1984), Pretender (1989)

BACKGROUND...

    No Autobot embraced his new life on Earth quite like Jazz!  One of the handful of marooned Autobots that crash-landed on Earth long ago, Jazz seeks to learn all he can about this strange new world.  He finds it intriguing and fascinating, and has found a love for all Earth-culture - especially rock n' roll music!

    As Optimus Prime's right hand man, Optimus counts on Jazz for his Earth knowledge to help the Autobots understand their new surroundings.  Jazz has a good-natured, cool personality and is liked by all of his fellow Autobots.  Though he does tend to try their patience when he is blaring his rock music at full volume!

    The computers onboard the Autobot's spacecraft gave Jazz the alt-mode of a Porche 935 with racing stripes.  He is extremely fast in car mode.  To distract or disorient his enemies, Jazz is equipped with a powerful stereo/light sound system that can blast his favorite music up to 180db.  As a robot, he carries a photon rifle and flamethrower, and his hand module can convert to a grappling hook / winch.

    Jazz served as one of Optimus Prime's most valuable officers the entire time they were on Earth.  By 2005, after the Decepticons took over Cybertron, Jazz was put in charge of Security on Moon Base 1.  He assumed command of the moon when Optimus needed to return to Earth to fend off a Decepticon assault.

   When the moon came under attack from the giant planet-eater - Unicron.  Jazz and Cliffjumper attempted to take off in a small Autobot shuttle as the moon busted and crumbled into the maw of Unicron.  Unfortunately, they could not break free of Unicron's pull and they were sucked in with all the other debris, seemingly to their doom.

    A short time later, a team of Autobots smashed their way into the depths of Unicron.  Through a series of events, Jazz was found, rescued, and eventually escaped with the other Autobots by driving through Unicron's eye.  

    A few years later, Jazz, along with Grimlock and Bumblebee, were upgraded to "Pretenders".  This outfitted him with a synthetic outer shell in which his robot form would be concealed.  His shell resembled that of a large human space trooper.  It was armed with a semi-automatic ion pulse gun and also carried a deflector shield.  Jazz could exit the shell and fight as a robot, but could maintain radio-control the shell so they could fight as a team.

    The road has been long and rough, but Jazz continues to serve alongside Optimus Prime as one of his most valuable officers.

MY THOUGHTS...

    The original Jazz was always a great figure and such a fun character on the show.  My friends and I were always laughing when he cranked up the rock n' rock to the dismay of his comrades!  Unfortunately, I never picked him up in 1984, and soon he was hard to locate.  Luckily, the cereal Cookie Crisp, had a mail-away offer for him and I was able to get that!  I believe the figure was the same as the original.

    Let's add in that I was so bummed when Jazz and Cliffjumper "died" in the Movie.  After they got sucked up by Unicron I thought to myself "Darn it, there goes 2 more!"  I was relived when both of them AND Bumblebee and Spike were saved at the end.  But I am confused...  Why were they saved?  No one pulled their punches with Prowl...  Or Brawn...  And don't say it's because they were popular characters because we saw how that worked out for Ironhide and Starscream.

    I was well out of Transformers by the time the Pretenders hit the shelves.  I do recall seeing the Pretender Jazz as well as K-Mart's Legends line including the new Jazz figure without the shell.  I thought this was a strange direction and that the new Jazz didn't even come close to matching the awesomeness and charm of the original!

    Jazz here is represented by the Heroes Of Cybertron PVC figure and the Jada die-cast Jazz in car mode.  The PVC is a great representation of his G1 animated appearances.  This figure is straight for the cartoon.  I really like that line of figures and wish they made more!  The Jada car is flat-out amazing!  It really captures the G1 feel of the original cars from the 1984 line.  Really, I don't think the size is that much different then the original car mode that you could slip in your pocket as a kid and take to school.  Very awesome!

    (Information on the character's lore was taken from the Sunbow Transformers cartoon series, including the Movie and the figure's original Tech-Spec.)