I think this was likely another "legit" error being the box was taped (I assume the tape looked clean with no signs of multiple tape layers/retape) and the packing rubberbands were still intact. Very cool error. I'd buy that if I found one that was not a repack to be honest.

Obviously it could be a very well executed repack after someone swapped the heads to give their Skywarp a more normal face too, but people who do repacks like that in my experience generally dont take the time to do them well enough that they actually look like they came from factory. Plus I hear it is tricky to remove that head and likely would be hard to do if you have the figure still strapped to the cardboard with his factory packing bands.

 

I took a closer look and upon closer inspection it appears the tape was cut and taped over with some jacked up serated edge tape. So you are all probably right that this was a head swap.

it just didn’t even seem feasible but now that I think about it, some sweaty fuck probably didn’t like his o-face skywarp and decided to replace it with a starscream head and return to the store. What a world.

 

I finally got the set and can confirm that my screaming Starscream is in fact painted the same color as the other Starscream I have, and is slightly darker than the one on Skywarp. So that is a tell on this factory error.

 

Very cool factory error to have IMO.

 

How hard is it to swap Earthrise seeker heads? I don’t want to pull too hard on this ball peg.

 

I just got my second Target set, so I'm going to swap their heads soon so I'll have a full set with normal heads, and a set with screaming heads. People who've done it say to just pry it off from under the chin.