Mirage (Energon)

Mirage is a Decepticon from the Energon portion of the Unicron Trilogy continuity family.

I'm also better at being gay for Megatron, but don't tell me that, either.

Mirage claims to sport as much firepower as the mighty Tidal Wave. Truth be told, in a head-to-head match-up, Mirage would actually have a slight edge. But don't tell him that, it would only fuel his vanity. Megatron counts on Mirage as one of his best warriors. Mirage carries out his destruction of Autobots with the skill of an artist. He uses his high-speed gunboat to great advantage at sea, but is an equal threat on land.^[1]

Fiction

Toy pack-in comics

As part of Eclipse-Team, Mirage was assigned to patrol the exterior of an Autobot energon refinery plant while his team-mates Sharkticon and Slugslinger plundered the resources within. The plan quickly went awry and when Slugslinger called in Mirage for reinforcement, Mirage was swatted by Omega Supreme for his troubles. The mission was a complete failure. Energon Volume 3

Toys

Energon

• Mirage (Mega Class, 2004)

• Accessories: 4 missiles
• Known designers: Eric Siebenaler (Hasbro), Takio Ejima (Takara), Marcelo Matere (packaging artist)

Released in the second wave of Energon Mega Class toys (and the only new item in said wave), Mirage transforms into a sleek assault speedboat with multiple spring-loaded missile launchers: two on his deck, and one on each rear "wing". His "Hyper Power Mode" simply involves popping up his deck guns on their joined spring-loaded frame by pushing a button, and flipping down the rear "wings". Something of a shellformer, Mirage's transformation sequence is one of the most complex for the Energon toyline, and as a side effect, he ends up with some rather large vehicle mode shell kibble. Some poor design and excessively tight knee joints means his lower legs will often detach from the upper thighs whenever one tries to bend his knees.

Speaking of poor design, the instructions show that Mirage's feet are supposed to fold all the way up inside his boat mode, however, when doing this, his forearms don't sit flush on the top due to the raised edges of his feet occupying the same space that the elbow joints need to sit in, causing collisions. This doesn't affect the tabbing of any of the parts, it just causes his forearms to stick out, which can be annoying. Seemingly, the model designers of the Energon cartoon caught onto this, and opted to design his boat mode model with only his heels folded inside the boat mode, with his toes just folded up onto the back. This can be replicated on the toy and looks objectively cleaner overall.

The initial releases of Mirage were one-per-case, and part of a wave that saw limited distribution due to a glut of early product on the shelves. However, Mirage was later put into "Mega-Buy" multi-packs at a buy-one-get-one-free price at numerous chains, including Toys"R"Us and Walmart, relieving much of the demand for the item.

The Mirage toy was also released in the Takara Super Link toyline as Shockfleet, the upgraded form of Shockwave (Tidal Wave), which this figure was repurposed to represent in most Western Energon fiction. This mold was also redecoed into Energon Dreadwing and BotCon 2009 Banzai-Tron.

• More information on Mirage at TFU.info

Notes

• With mid- to late-run Energon toys like Roadblock, Landquake, Beachcomber, and Mirage, the apparent struggle between Hasbro's intentions and Takara's decisions came to a head. Numerous toys intended to be new characters had been turned into powered-up versions of existing characters when portrayed in the cartoon. And so it was with Mirage, who was shown to be a rebuilt Tidal Wave when he debuted in the cartoon. Hasbro had intended the toy to be a new character, however, and either did not have time to change his bio, or else decided to proceed as planned regardless. And so, Mirage represents both Tidal Wave and a new, separate character.
• Aaron Archer states that the Mirage/Dreadwing design's alternate mode was inspired by the G.I. Joe Cobra Moray hydrofoil.^[2] The general "form" of the robot mode, meanwhile, was inspired by a fan-painted Gundam Archer saw in Hobby Japan magazine, which also served as reference for Dreadwing's colour scheme.^[3]
• Mirage shares a color scheme with fellow seafaring Decepticon Sharkticon.
• Mirage's bio states that he has gained a high rank in the Decepticon army. However, his "rank" Tech Spec is only 7.

Foreign names

• Hungarian: Délibáb ("Mirage")
• Polish: Miraż ("Mirage")

References