At the time of the discovery of the G2 Desert-Camo Ramjet mock-up, yet another spectacular unreleased Generation 2 mock-up surfaced. This yellow-to-turquoise G2 Sideswipe never saw release in any country and like the Ramjet, is completely hand-painted over an existing production toy. This specimen came with no accessories but is unbroken, undamaged and completely transformable. As I just mentioned, it is painted over a production toy, and that production toy appears to be a black G2 Sideswipe.

This concept of a yellow Lamborghini Countach (Sideswipe-mould) is of course extremely close to that of the Diaclone Yellow No.15 Super Countach LP500S pre-Transformers Sideswipe, but with some possibly highly significant differences.

The rear end of the vehicle mode rapidly progresses from a bright yellow to a light green and finally turquoise. This type of very eye-catching bright colour scheme is much more reminiscent of the Generation 2 theme for Transformers than say the G2 Desert-camo Ramjet mock-up. So this release could have been considered very seriously, however no artwork samples have surfaced to suggest how far development of this idea progressed. That does not mean however that artwork does not exist.

What this reminds me of greatly are those Hot-Wheels cars of the early 90s which would change colour when dipped in water. It is a slight possibility that Hasbro were considering a similar gimmick for Transformers, but considering the heavy stickersheet-related look of these toys that is not particularly likely. It could well have just been a twist added to what would otherwise have been a simple yellow G2 Sideswipe.

While many of the G2 colour schemes provided slightly clashing designs, the yellow and turquoise on this Sideswipe go together very well, even if it is a highly unrealistic colour scheme for a Lamborghini Countach. Realism, of course, was not high in the G2 agenda. It is more than likely that if this toy had seen release, the overall look would have been embellished by factory-applied stickers and of course a re-designed stickersheet. Unlike the Ramjet, we are not lucky enough to look at any available artwork concepts to see how it would have looked near completion.

We already knew from Diaclone that this mould would look superb in yellow, and even with the addition of the turquoise rear-end, this mould is still extremely attractive and striking in vehicle mode and I am certain it would have been a highly presentable and displayable toy if it had made it to production. At the moment, this prototypical stage shows sections of uneven hand-painting, marks, nicks and paint-chipping. This sample was probably presented to a group of important decision-makers at a meeting in order to decide whether to proceed with production, so there was no need to produce a perfect specimen, just something to give everyone a good idea of how a finished article would appear.

Here are some close-ups of various details of this Sideswipe:

G2 Autobot cars like Jazz and Sideswipe had holes moulded into their roofs so that the hand-weapon accessories could be attached in vehicle mode. This picture shows a very very early rough rendition of the aforementioned hole. This could imply that the roof was not from a G2 production Sidewsipe...yet it appears black underneath.

This picture shows the airbrush-effect of the rear-end gradiented paint job. It's obvious that the turqoise was airbrushed over the yellow from chips missing and leaving only yellow underneath.

Here, the various nicks and marks on most of the chassis are shown in greater detail. When holding the Sideswipe so close in the flesh, the hand-painted nature of the toy is very clear as the surface is not so smooth.

Here is a picture of the underside in vehicle mode:

So if this has been painted over a G2 Sideswipe, the black areas were painted yellow, the red innards painted turquoise, the chrome and white sections left untouched. The really concrete give-aways are the 1992 G2 copyright...

...and the black section on the forward waist area (usually hidden) which has the G2 Autobot symbol and says "Autobot" just like the G2 production Sideswipe toy:

Now having had a sneak peek, let's have a look at the full robot mode:

Once again, the choice of colours for this sample do not clash at all terribly in robot mode and just as in vehicle mode, they work quite well and make this appear as a very believable toy for release. The lack of stickers and accessories give an unfinished and plain feel to the figure, but that is exactly what any collector would want from a prototype or sample. The large red mark on the top right section of the chest appears as a deep battle scar and doesn't really spoil the displayability.

As mentioned previously, the close resemblance to the Diaclone Yellow pre-Sideswipe ensures that the new(ish) colours do not immediately stun and shock as the G2 Desert Ramjet does, this is not a million miles from what has gone before. And it is because of that resemblance to the Diaclone that it is no surprise that this G2 Sideswipe works so successfully in robot mode. The view from the back of the robot shows how nice the gradiented colour scheme works on him.

What you might have also noticed is that the extendable sections of the arms/shoulders where G1 Sideswipe's launcher would have attached are still black on this sample. They chose not to paint those parts yellow like the rest of him, again betraying the toy's true origin as a production black G2 Sideswipe. As those parts will experience a lot of friction during transformation, they were most likely deliberately left unpainted for a mock-up.

As you can see, the robot head is not fully painted, he would most likely have had a silver face for the final production version. As with the G2 Desert Ramjet, that gives this Sideswipe a very nice feel of not being a completely rushed and untidy hand-painted prototype, yet not quite resembling a completed product without the trimmings of mass production.

I've been talking a lot about the Diaclone yellow Countach that this G2 mock-up so closely resembles, so here they both are side-by-side:

The yellow is much lighter on the G2 mock-up and the lack of black provides much less of a striking contrast as it does on the Diaclone. Despite that difference, the chrome and white sections are the same and they still feel very closely related. I feel that the Diaclone edges it in appearance, but I am extremely fond of the gradiented rear section of the G2 sample. The mock-up feels more like a racetrack-styled sportscar as opposed to a road-going supercar, and as we know, that is rather G2.

Here they both are with another yellow Countach of some renown...

...which brings up the rather interesting question of whether or not this G2 sample is actually supposed to be some kind of G2 Sunstreaker? Unlikely as that may be, the Sunstreaker mould having then just recently been re-used for the European gold-boxed Classic release and this sample being extremely close to the G1 Sunstreaker colour scheme, nothing should ever be totally ruled out. We know the Sunstreaker mould has been recently classified as unusable by Hasbro and Takara, and that could well have been a result of its use for the Classic early 90s Sunstreaker releases.

Regardless of exactly what this sample was meant to represent, a repainted G2 Sideswipe, a G2 Sunstreaker or the first step towards colour-changing Transformers, this beautiful specimen remains a hugely significant and historic relic from a time when anything and everything were being considered for Transformers in order to keep the line interesting, innovative and more importantly, alive.

And the colour scheme selected for this wonderful G2 mock-up, coupled with a Lamborghini Countach, can certainly be described as 'alive'.

All the best
Maz