Scavenger (BW)

Scavenger is a Predacon from the Beast Wars portion of the Generation 1 continuity family.

He was binned alone, unmourned, and unloved.

Scavenger is an evil, evil Transmetal Predacon. Despite previous reports of him being their infantry commander,^[1] he's actually more interested in psychological warfare. He prefers to use fear to give him a tactical advantage, and nothing makes him feel better about himself than bullying others into being afraid of him. As well as a master blackmailer and a strategist, he's also created viruses to induce hallucinations in his foes.^[2]

Regardless of what his primary function truly is, he likes to use his drilling third mode to ambush Maximals from underground.

Fiction

2006 IDW Beast Wars continuity

Scavenger was one of the protoforms left behind by the crew of the Axalon on prehistoric Earth. He was activated and put in chronal phase by Razorbeast at Magmatron's request. He was sent to dispose of Razorbeast and his small band, but the attack was interrupted by a much larger force of Maximals. The Gathering #2

During the battle, Scavenger got his teeth re-organized, courtesy of Bonecrusher's fist. After the battle, he presumably regrouped with Ravage and the rest of the Predacons. The Gathering #4

He was next seen as part of a large Predacon assault on the Maximals' base-camp. When the Pack arrived, Scavenger was knocked over by Stampy. The Maximals and Predacons were then forced to team-up to battle the Blendtrons. It's unknown if Scavenger stayed on Earth or returned to Cybertron aboard the Pack's transwarp cruiser. The Ascending #2

Beast Wars: Uprising

Scavenger^[3] was on the Predacon team in the fateful final match of the Games, which was interrupted by Lio Convoy's assassination of Supersonic and call for an uprising against the Builders. Broken Windshields

Toys

Beast Wars

He's Inferno, but hornier. You know, for his queen.

• Scavenger (Mega Transmetal, 1998)

• Known designers: Daniel Sanfilippo (deco artist), Masakatsu Saito (concept artist)

Originally designed as a new form for Inferno, Beast Wars Transmetal Scavenger transforms into a robotic ant with a third "transport mode", a double-drill tank. The drills end up as his robot-mode hands, and spin using gear-wheels.

There is a variant of the toy regarding the "SCAVENGER" name tampograph. On some versions, the name is printed on his right robot-mode thigh (still visible in ant mode). The other version has the name printed on the chromed abdomen shell. It is unknown if one is more rare than the other.

Early promotional pictures show the figure with an "Inferno" name tampograph on the abdomen. Why the change was made is unknown; while Hasbro might have wanted to secure the trademark on "Scavenger", it is possible that since Inferno had a tendency to be a shelfwarmer, Hasbro felt a name change might help avoid that. As it happens, Scavenger was an even worse shelfwarmer.

Following the original intent, this toy was used as the "Metals" version of Inferno for the Japanese Beast Wars Metals line, with the only change being the removal of the name tampograph. The version included with Depth Charge in Takara's VS two-packs lacks both his Predacon rubsign and name tampograph.

• More information on Scavenger at TFU.info

Generations Selects

Pictured: Scavenger's goth phase.

• Antagony (Voyager Class, 2023)

• Accessories: Missile gun
• Known designers: Mark Maher (Hasbro), Shuhei Umezu (TakaraTomy)^[4]

A Generations Selects add on for Legacy: Evolution, Antagony is a black and lavender redeco of Legacy Inferno, and includes an alternate robot head designed to make her or Inferno resemble Scavenger. The purple paint on the Scavenger face matches that on Inferno's shoulders and biceps, while the gunmetal paint on the sides of the head and horns matches that on Antagony's shoulders and pelvis.^[5] Furthermore, sculpted details inside the ant head are made to resemble Scavenger's chest, which can be displayed in robot mode by leaving the ant head panels fully open and the mandibles folded down.

Notes

Foreign names

• Japanese: Scavenger (スカベンジャー Sukabenjā)

References