#BlueIke

[blueikeproductions]

So an interesting detail was revealed about the TFONE Quintessons.

It would appear, according to staff on the movie, that the ships are actually living, organic creatures.

By extension, going by their design similarities, the TFONE Quintessons are likely fully organic themselves.

Prior to the Quintus Prime origin, it was never clear where the Quintessons came from but their designs are clearly mechanical.

Japanese media would offer an explanation of sorts, in the Controverse manga.

In this story Primacron, the ancient sea monkey alien that created Unicron and later Tornedron in the G1 cartoon, would stake the claim that he created ALL mechanical life. When the Quintesson Judge calls this out, Primacron calmly responds that he created mechanical bacterial life once and surmises those creatures became the Quintesson race.

Further manga would reveal this is true, and go the extra mile by revealing Primus and Primacron were ancient beings that existed in the universe prior to the Big Bang (mirroring a similar idea in the Marvel comics).

Primacron was originally Primus’ pet, but as his intellect grew, and so did his ambitions, and once the old universe died and ours was born, Primacron would enslave his former master in what would become The Matrix of Leadership, and it would grant life to his mechanical creations, the Beast Mode Primitives, the Quintessons and Unicron.

It would appear most modern media opts go instead cast the Quintessons as organic creatures, created by Quintus Prime’s Emberstone, that pilot mechanical suits.

Cyberverse’s take on the Judges also goes an extra mile, similar to Primacron, revealing that these Quintessons are born by fusing five distinct lifeforms together, all chosen to judge a universe accordingly. This is depicted by using Starscream as the dominant component….

But unlike the wholly mechanical Judge seen before, Starscream’s Judge form has organic components, with other organic races in the Greys and Velgrox.

While there’s an argument the G1 Quints might be biomechanical, it’s never been clearly defined with Cyberverse Quint Starscream more plainly leaning in that direction.

As for the organic technology present among the TFONE Quints, that potentially has two origins.

The more famous one are the Trans-Organics, the prototype race the Quintessons developed before making the Consumer Goods and Military Hardware robots that would become The Transformers.

A cyborg like race of primitive animals, they were unable to accomplish basic tasks, and gave into their beast like savagery, destroying several Quints before they were sealed away deep within Cybertron.

In the modern era, a group of Quintessons opted to free their ancient beasts of burden, tricking Galvatron into unleashing them so that the Trans-Organics may destroy the Transformers, allowing the Quints to reclaim Cybertron. Inevitability this fails, with the Quints done in by the Dweller beast, an energy vampire worm Trans-Organic.

The Dweller is the most famous one, and spawned other counterparts seen in Cyberverse and EarthSpark, with the EarthSpark versions being a race native to Quintessa, typing it back to its origins.

The second inspiration, if potentially coincidental, could be GI Joe’s Cobra-La.

The GI Joe movie would reveal Cobra had its origins in Cobra-La, an ancient race of snake people that were the original dominant species of Earth before us mammalian humans evolved.

Cobra Commander is native to Cobra-La, originally being a snake man scientist who became mutated in a lab accident before becoming leader of the snake themed terrorist organization that’d slither into America.

He’s further mutated as punishment for his failure in taking over the world in Cobra-La’s name, slow mutating into a cobra.

While the DiC sequel series would see him restored, albeit still as a mutant snake man.

Presumably CC’s still a snake dude when he briefly menaces in the G1 Movie era Autobots as Old Snake.

Anyhow, the relevance to the Cobra-Laians and Quintessons, is the former use organic based technology. Basically, this means they create specially developed animals to use in place of tools, bridges & vehicles.

@bogleech’s own post on Cobra-La discusses other examples of their technology: https://bogleech.com/cobrala

In the GI Joe film, the Cobra-La people are disgusted by humanity’s use of inorganic machinery, and opt to eradicate humans and reclaim the land that was theirs prior to the Ice Age.

In the Energon Universe, this prejudice exists still for humans, as Cobra Commander is instead a human that lives in their ranks, but they’re more offended by the existence of the Transformers after CC’s science team dug out a frozen Megatron to study him.

Aghast at a cold, mechanical planet populated by giant metallic robots, Cobra-La sends Pythona aboard a space fairing … whatever this fella is…

… to Cybertron to nip this so called invasion in the bud.

It would appear she takes a semi unintentional detour, dealing with matters in the Void Rivals series first, where she’s set to battle the Skuxxoid in particular. (I’d laugh if she became the wife he constantly talks about.)

The Quints and Cobra-La sharing the concept of organic technology is honestly very interesting, and while I do think it was created independently of GI Joe, should more TFONE content be made and the Transformers and Quintessons go to Earth, a further connection to Cobra-La would be really cool.

It’s theorized in the Energon Universe that the Quintessons could’ve created or at least influenced the Cobra-La people, and such an idea isn’t unheard of, as the Zertonians and Agorrians of Void Rivals are revealed to be descendants of Transformers via a new character called Zerta Trion. It’s implied but not yet totally confirmed the Quintessons created the Transformers also via the G1 cartoon as well, and I just think it’d be hilarious if the proud, organic Cobra-La people would discover they’re related to the fully mechanical Transformers via the Quintessons and be utterly mortified. (I don’t think they’d like their Zertonian/Agorrian cousins much either since, despite being organic they have technology based Energon ports on their heads.)

Incidentally it feeds into a personal headcanon regarding EarthSpark, since MARS Industries exists here, that Quintus Prime used the Emberstone to seed life on Earth that would one day evolve into Cobra-La, making them relatives to the Terrans, Quintessons, and Lithonians (the later because Quintus reminds me of Kranix for some reason).

[blueikeproductions]

The Matrix of Leadership is pry one of the most important aspects of Transformers, that it was pivotal in TFONE…

Buuut as usual these things don’t have a straight path.

The Matrix didn’t appear in the cartoon until the original animated movie, with its purpose largely being to destroy Unicron. Naturally the movie never really explained why we never saw the Matrix before or what it truly is. The succeeding third season would establish it as a very ancient relic with surprisingly mystical qualities that conflicts somewhat with the mechanical characters we follow.

Most of what we know is all past Autobot leaders had carried it up until Rodimus Prime, and that it’s potent enough to kill Unicron. Why it affected Unicron is never explained, but the Primacron episode would show the Matrix escaping the dead body of Primacron’s ape-bot assistant.

Which is confusing as the story suggests this wasn’t supposed to BE the Matrix, but a separate entity that would later summon Grimlock and the other Beast Mode Transformers to fight Unicron’s successor, Tornedron.

The Matrix’s final feat in the original cartoon was to vanquish the Hate Plague as its eons long accumulated wisdom was more than enough to cancel out the rage affecting the galaxy.

The funny thing is the Matrix wasn’t even part of the original scripts for the 80’s movie, which instead had Optimus’ “Life Spark” be the object passed down, upgrading Magnus to Ultra Magnus and ultimately be unleashed inside Unicron to kill him.

Megatron’s Life Spark was also a plot point originally, in that it was supposed to be entombed in the Decepticon crypt on Cybertron, but Megatron’s Spark and the Sparks of other dead Decepticons would be released accidentally, where these ethereal beings would come across Unicron who would instead encase them in new bodies as Galvatron and company.

The Matrix originally was featured in Marvel G1, a “Primal Program” housed in the current leader of the Autobots that allows them to bestow life on new Transformers. This was to explain how the Transformers reproduce in the absence of doing it the human way as the race (originally) wasn’t intended to have female characters.

Eventually the comics would retcon it that the Creation Matrix had a physical form similar to the cartoon, with the Matrix described as being the life force of Primus itself passed down to his creations.

This version of the Matrix would be transferred into Buster Witwicky’s brain by Optimus in an attempt to keep it away from Shockwave, which would temporarily give Buster Lawnmower Man like mastery over other machines, to the point he was able to disassemble (a non living) Decepticon Jetfire with his mind.

Buster, after Shockwave was defeated, was able to return the Matrix back to Optimus, with this concept loosely adapted in RotF years later when Sam Witwicky would be given the power of the Allspark in his brain by accident. Later the Matrix would need to be found once more, as the Autobots sent Optimus’ dead body to space, not realizing the Matrix still physically existed in him evidently, kick starting the Matrix Quest. The Matrix would be tainted by Thunderwing, creating the Dark Matrix Creature that served as the final antagonist of Re: Generation One, but the Matrix otherwise would be purified by Optimus and used to destroy Unicron.

G2 would see the Matrix restored, and later abused by Starscream briefly, while ReGen One would ignore this, instead having the Matrix completely gone…. Until Hot Rod was able to get an intact copy from another universe and evolve to Rodimus Prime. Yea it’s convoluted but this is Transformers, it’s always kinda convoluted.

After this the Matrix stopped having a major influenced for awhile, though the Japanese Beast Wars era would introduce the Energon Matrix, a personalized Matrix unique to different Maximal leaders from Optimus Primal, Lio Convoy, Big Convoy and Fire Convoy.

Other series like the Unicron Trilogy would include the Matrix, but it was just kind of there, mostly included just because G1 included it. The Matrix would instead become more of a religious concept during Beast Wars, and later become Transformers heaven in Beast Machines, and while it didn’t exist in Animated, the Allspark would later be contained in a container resembling the G1 Matrix.

Because of the life giving Allspark introduced in the Bay films, the Matrix, along with Vector Sigma, became somewhat redundant, with this being a problem Hasbro and other creatives haven’t been able to properly adapt. The Allspark became a sort of catch all for wisdom and life baring abilities the other two relics were known for, though modern media, albeit not successfully, has tried to make each relic distinct. Vector Sigma in Prime would be a repository of wisdom, while the Matrix was merely the symbol of leadership passed down by Primus to various leaders. Confusingly the Matrix would still display some holy power filled with wisdom, as using it shut down Unicron, but reset Optimus back to Orion. Vector Sigma’s back up data was necessary to reboot Orion into Optimus again… Cyberverse would see Vector Sigma and the Allspark used in conjunction in creating life, while the Matrix was a repository of wisdom from the past Primes as before, but its power could also be used by Megatron and Megatron X, showing the writers’ favoritism towards the Decepticons when they shouldn’t be able to be use it otherwise.

IDW would bring back the Matrix more prominently, but rapidly downplay its mystical nature to the point it was practically described as an advanced light up toy, and could easily be replaced with a fake or have multiple versions be created by Rung’s gizmo mode.

It still held religious significance and was thought to be part of Solomus, the god of Wisdom.

Tyrest would be revealed to be Solomus, so uh… take that as you will.

It’s not clear if Tyrest ever held the Matrix, but in his civilian life, he did work with it, being tasked with extracting life energy from it to make new Sparks after the life giving Hot Spots on Cybertron began to fade. This started the Constructed Cold Transformers, robots whose Sparks were housed in pre-built bodies rather than emerging from the metal of Cybertron naturally. Tyrest would later come to believe the Cold born Transformers were evil and try to kill them all, yeah wisdom my actuator.

After various trials and tribulations, the original IDW Matrix would be split in half, one half claimed by Rodimus the other Optimus, with each one being destroyed in order to fix a problem of the hour. Optimus’ half survived longer, being used as a means to sway the religious colony worlds into Optimus’ goals to have a Council of Worlds, Earth among them.

Despite downplaying the mystical nature, sometimes it would crop up to somewhat demean Optimus, implying he wasn’t worthy of it. Optimus would complain having the Matrix hurt him, while Rodimus instead felt like he just harmed the power of the Chaos Emeralds. The Matrix also temporarily was held by Thunderclash, and had to be surgically removed from his chest because apparently the Matrix didn’t want to leave Thunderclash.

SkyBound seems to meet in the middle, having some general rules with its Matrix, but not being embarrassed by its mystical nature like IDW was.

This Matrix seems to be more of an advanced machinery that has a finite power source, and while it can heal, it can’t reactivate the dead. It is tied to the barer’s life force, and exerting too much energy can kill the barer. Optimus’ selflessness saw him wanting to use what power was left to revive all the Autobots, but when talked out of it, he instead used the power to reactivate the Decepticon damaged hospital Spike was recovering in. Later when Sparkplug merged with the Matrix by unexplained means, the Matrix was re-energized, but also caused Optimus to be given flashes of Sparkplug’s memories and trauma, often seeing a memory of Spike as a baby, one that became increasingly distorted (a fan theory as of typing connected it as a side effect of wearing Megatron’s arm) when Optimus was pushed to his limit and killed Shockwave, and later, possibly due to Sparkplug’s PTSD from his own war, accidentally blew up a tank when the Autobots tried to respond to a Decepticon attack on another city.

Who originally bore the Matrix differs from series to series… Japanese media would try to expand on it in modern manga borrowing ideas from the 80’s cartoon and Beast Wars where appropriate.

The Matrix was originally owned by a survivor of the Big Bang, Primacron, who sealed his master Primus within to use his godly power to bestow life to his robots, eventually creating Unicron. The Matrix would escape and later bestow organic life to a barren planet, but early Quintessons would discover this planet and reformat it into Cybertron. The Quintesson leader of the era was the first leader to bare the Matrix, the being the 80’s cartoon would only describe as “It”.

Netflix War of Cybertron would state Alpha Trion was the first recorded barer of the Matrix, contradicting modern lore which states Prima, who originated from Marvel G1, was the first inheritor of the Matrix.

The modern lore with Prima was contradicted again in One, where Zeta Prime originally held the Matrix.

Who holds the Matrix before Optimus isn’t really nailed down as much as Hasbro wants it to be, as their intended idea is that the Matrix was originally part of the Star Saber, adorning its hilt, but the cartoons and comics tend to be a bit more resistant to this, preferring to to their own direction. Other leaders post Rodimus tend to not have the Matrix either, with Star Saber, Fortress Maximus, Ginrai, Dai Atlas, and RiD15 Bumblebee not using it.

Other Matrix variants are shown to exist here and there, most unusual is a Sharkticon Matrix briefly held by Megatron in Aligned media, and a Mini-Con Matrix held by Over-Run in the Dreamwave Armada comics. A Decepticon Matrix was said to exist in the G1 cartoon, but while it was a fib by the Quintessons to trick Galvatron into their servitude, an actual Decepticon Matrix probably DOES exist somewhere given all the variants I haven’t mentioned for simplicity.

Who can wield the Matrix varies, but for the most part it’s a heroic paragon of justice, hope, and goodness like Optimus who is considered worthy to use it. Hot Rod would also be shown to possess these qualities as would Optimus Primal, all being able to open up and use the Matrix. Ultra Magnus was unable to open it, with him even having to adjust the relic to better fit into his chest. Decepticons, according to the old cartoon, can’t use it. Galvatron tried to both open it and install it as a power source for his cannon and was unable to do so. Scourge and Starscream experienced mutations that did make them powerful when they installed the relic… but had side effects. Scourge was in inconstant pain (possibly, but never confirmed, to be the ancient Autobots retaliating when the Matrix wasn’t returned to Rodimus), while Starscream was instead slowly turning good by the Matrix’s divine power, something the jet was repulsed enough by to surrender the relic, as he loved being a dick.

The Cyberverse Matrix seemed more open minded to Megatron and Megatron X for some reason, despite their own atrocities, with the show implying Optimus wasn’t worthy. Remember kids, villain worship to this extent is unhealthy. Megatron being able to use the Matrix misses the point, something TFONE fixes. When the greedy Sentinel made a grab for the Matrix, it evaporated in front of him, only later reforming when Orion proved worthy of it. This version also attempts to be both a symbol of leadership and a life giving relic, as it controls the flow of Energon on Cybertron. What this means when Optimus goes to Earth has yet, if ever, to be explored…

The long and short of it is the Matrix typically is just an ancient ball that’s a symbol of leadership that occasionally can grant life depending on the demands of a particular story. The only object that’s similar in reverence is the Animated exclusive Magnus Hammer, with it able to generate intense storms and tremors by its user, but is carried around like Thor’s Hammer (never been shown if they need to swing throw it to fly with it tho’).

[silverzeo]

Watched Looney Tunes: The Day the Earth Blew up TWICE this week and we might finally get Coyote Vs ACME out in theaters with how things are going! Keep going! Enjoy Wilieious Prime art done by BlueIke on DA with the Dog King @nightcrestcomics as his additional armor power up! If we can get Wile his movie out, maybe we can do the same for Transformers ONE TOO! #ReleaseCoyoteVsACME

[askmissthunder]

Dear Miss Thunder, How do you get ready to fight crime? Do you have a special transformation sequence for getting into your costume, or does it just appear on with nanites like in the movies? I'm tired of the nanites, everyone's helmet disappears every 2 minutes so they can say a line of dialogue. I tell you, Batman never needed to take off his mask to tell The Penguin he wasn't the mayor!

Miss Thunder: Blimey, I wish I had nanites or my costume just appeared like magic! No, the reality is a bit more boring, really. I just wear my costume underneath my regular clothes.

There's a hidden compartment in the back of my wheelchair's seat that stores my boots and mask. That's honestly what eats up the most time when I have to change quickly: kicking off my shoes and having to slip on my boots with all this belly and bosom blocking my view, but I think I've done it enough times now that I'm getting better at it. Also, I just wear a domino mask, so no unmasking needed to talk. Honestly, do superheroes in your universe not need secret identities anymore?

(Artwork by BlueIke)

[blueikeproductions]

JD: I AM NOT FUCKING GAY.

Veronica: -elbows him playfully in the ribs- Says the guy with a meticulously collected “Gay artifact” collection~! I saw you drinking that mineral water and reading Stud Puppy.

JD: -flustered- I read it for the articles. This body is doomed to look like my “father”, and I gotta do as many ab crunches to starve that off, Ronnie!

Veronica: Uh huh. Say is that Braverman over there?

JD: -looking around blushing, clearly interested- Danny-boy? Where? …-realization dawns, and he cups his head in his hands embarrassed- FFFFUCK. -curses in German briefly- Dammit, Veronica.

Veronica: -looks smug-

JD: Aw go kiss Duke.

Veronica: -looks forlorn- I can’t, she’s on a family trip with Braverman.

(Not very) unpopular Heathers opinion: both JD and Veronica are 100% bisexual, like come on, just look at them

[blueikeproductions]

I’ve said before Transformers has struggled recently with its villains and recent material doesn’t change this.

Ever since this happened…

We’ve largely been stuck with poor man’s Vegeta Megatron.

And as such the series has lost its main villain, and become directionless.

The modern version of this trend started with Rescue Bots & RiD15, but it made sense in their respective series, and the replacement villains were treated like actual villains and are fondly remembered because of that.

It’s also not the first time Megatron was succeeded in leadership, as the Marvel Comics did this shockingly frequently.

With RatBat being the most unique case, in that he was the only one who largely succeeded in his efforts, and was a result of sincerely wanting to try something different.

I think that sincerity is long gone in favor of brand stagnation and “DEI” despite the later going out the door as of typing.

The usual replacement tends to be Galvatron, often depicted as an evolved Megatron through mystical means.

But Hasbro seems very reluctant to use Galvatron lately for whatever reason, instead usually having him as a (technically) separate character if he does show up.

Cyberverse kinda shows the current problem two fold. The bad writers convinced themselves they wrote a sympathetic Megatron when the writing shows him to still be certifiably insane and going through what is essentially an on the nose bad break up with Optimus. This extended to Megatron somehow being worthy of using the Matrix, and able to use it, despite Decepticons never typically being able to, and imply Optimus isn’t worthy of the Matrix, but never follow up on it.

To convince themselves and the audience that the regular CV Megatron was still a good person despite his atrocities, the writers pulled an Archie Sonic, and brought on their own Robo-Robotnik in Megatron X.

He too is apparently worthy of the Matrix and able to use it, despite completely destroying Cybertron and most, if not all, of its non Perfectcon inhabitants.

(To be fair, the idea of a Decepticon being able to use the Matrix goes back to Marvel G1 Thunderwing, but his actions helped corrupt the Matrix, creating the Dark Matrix Creature, but Cyberverse never states this is the case at all. This isn’t really a popular concept the series goes back to either, making Cyberverse the outlier.)

This ties back to Hasbro’s reluctance on Galvatron, as X was originally supposed to BE Galvatron in a Marvel G1 homage, but Hasbro said no.

So we’ve been left with a weird, but non committed, experimental phase of trying out different Villians to less than stellar results…

(Mandroid and Scourge are pretty good villains, but Mandroid quickly succumbed to bad writing, & Scourge was fairly quickly killed off, with no clear intent to go back to the Terrorcons and have a Movie Cyclonus based on the Armada version to take Scourge’s place.)

This feeds back into fan complaints about Hasbro’s unwillingness to try new things I’ve seen recently. In context the complaint was more wanting another Beast Wars like thing with new factions and new non G1 characters.

Like we HAVE been getting that with the Terrans and Terrorcons, but it’s clear kids aren’t that interested in them, and adult fans are as fickle as ever and not supporting it super well either. TFONE is pry the most damning, where it’s doing poorly across the planet theatrically, despite trying a new non-evergreen art style, and a much better version of Aligned/IDW caste system that simplifies it to Cogs & Cogless.

It’s not for lack of trying, but it’s also not grabbing kids well either.

This weird flip flopping recently came into play with Galactic Trials, the crappy looking racing game.

The game casts Nemesis Prime as the main villain, who tried to steal the relics of the Primes, but fail and cast the Chaos Emeralds, er, relics across the galaxy.

Here’s the weird part: this happens before the Great War began, with the Autobots and Decepticons now finding out in the present and scrambling to collect the relics for themselves. The story isn’t expanded and confuses things. Nemesis typically isn’t even a Prime, but a Decepticon clone of Optimus. Barring a few exceptions, the main deviation this MIGHT be referencing is IDW Nova Prime, who briefly became Nemesis Prime, powered by a Matrix like relic from the Dead Universe.

So does that mean in this universe the Matrix chose a guy literally named Nemesis to be Prime? Is this actually supposed to be Nova Prime via IDW? Is this Orion Pax’s black sheep of the product line? So many questions this game isn’t going to answer.

This is the frustrating part about all this. I like that they’re trying to branch out still, and I liked Nemesis Prime in IDW and back when he was Scourge in RiD01, but…

He’s kinda pointless here.

Why are we using a “new” character for a failing on launch, not-mobile game, when the plot would be much simpler in that Megatron or Starscream raided the vault of the Primes only for Optimus to intervene and launch the relics into space. Why is Nemesis the villain? For that matter, since it’s a racing game, shouldn’t the Stunticons be the villains?

This is where CyberWorld might be the make or break now.

I think slowly but surely, Hasbro is recognizing their past ideas on overusing antihero Megatron isn’t working, and that they need to properly commit to a successor if they don’t want Megatron to be a villain anymore.

Going by toy leaks, it appears they’ve decided to go BACK to Galvatron proper, but they also include Scorponok, who’s typically cast as a leader in some capacity (excluding Beast Wars).

(Until we learn more, I’m leaning towards their roles being similar to Superlink’s.)

So I think that’s a step in the right direction so far; going for Skybound’s aim of familiar but, they’re willing to pivot under better writing.

I think that’s where TFONE D-16 doesn’t work as a concept.

Like it if not, casual audiences and kids aren’t that invested in the idea of a wide eyed good boi Megatron who fell from grace or wants to redeem.

They want these kinds of power hungry megalomaniacal Megatrons, who are willing to go the extra mile just to upstage Optimus to stroke their own ego. Not high school bosom buddies with gay lover subtext that Stereotypical Tumblr-Twitter wants. And hopefully with what we’ve seen with Skybound, we’re going back to that Megatron soon. And if we don’t go back to Megatron strictly, then Galvatron might be the way to go cartoon wise.

[transformers-mosaic]

Transformers: Mosaic #380 - "Leader Of The Club"

Originally posted on May 13th, 2006

Story - Alain Desrochers Art, Letters - Dane Eichinger

deviantART | Seibertron | TFW2005 | BotTalk

wada sez: This strip is inspired by the Disney Label version of Optimus Prime, “Mickey Mouse Trailer”. The strip’s title is quoted from the theme song to The Mickey Mouse Club. On deviantART, Desrochers offered a list of the “magicians and sorcerers” Mickey is acquainted with: “There's Jafar from Aladdin, Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty, Fairy Godmother from Cinderella, Merlin from Sword in the Stone, Master Yensid from Fantasia, Genie from Aladdin although he's neither a magician or a sorcerer.” See below for Desrochers’ original script and commentary.

First Panel: Blackness, nothing.

Prime: Where am I, what happened?

Second Panel: Haze is lifting, ill defined shapes are barely identifiable as the clouds, a tree and what might be the side of a building.

Unseen Commentator: Gosh, you had a bad fall, but don’t worry you’re safe now.

Third Panel: Shapes are fuzzy, but clearer. The sky is a vibrant blue, the clouds seem to glow, the tree sways gently as if in a breeze and the side of the building turns out to be a barn door.

Prime: I feel strange, something’s different.

Unseen Person: Gee I’m sorry, when I touched that crystal thing something happened to change you. I don’t know why.

Fourth Panel: POV Prime as he sits up, before him is a creature never before encountered, an anthropomorphic mouse with perfect round ears, white gloves, yellow shoes and a pair of red shorts.

Prime: Who are you?

Mouse: I’m Mickey Mouse.

Fifth Panel: Prime climbs to his feet and shakes his head.

Prime: I’ve never heard of a Mickey Mouse. The Matrix changed me because you touched me you say, but why? *Mickey shrugs at the question*

Sixth Panel: POV Prime looking at his reflection in a pool of water, he should appear cartoony similar to Animated Prime, but more in keeping with traditional Disney animation looks.

Prime: By the Matrix.

Seventh Panel: Full body shot of Mousemus Prime looking both shocked and comically petrified.

Prime: Megatron could never take me seriously like this.

Eighth Panel: Close-Up of Mickey looking suitably ashamed and disappointed at having caused Prime trouble.

Mickey: Oh I’m sorry if I caused you any trouble. Maybe I can get some help to change you back to the way you used to be, I know a lot of magicians and sorcerers. Even a Genie.

Last Panel: Mousemus Prime’s upper torso with a Disney bluebird flitting past his left ear, he shakes his head at Mickey’s concern.

Prime: *Sigh* It is not your fault Mickey Mouse, the Matrix does strange things. I shall have to learn to live with it I suppose. Or perhaps, sorcerers you say?

This might need a little work, let me know if I should rework the last couple of scenes. It might not jive well enough.

End ?

Here is the original script for my Transformers Mosaic piece, I have left it completely intact and chose not to edit it to reflect the changes made in the final draft.

As you can see there was some more dialogue between Mickey and Prime and no really dynamic ending for the piece. Blueike the artist really fixed it up for the second draft by limiting the dialogue and adding that final dynamic scene it helps the story a lot more than what I originally had as an ending.

Most of my other unclaimed scripts have good endings I think, but this one I will admit to having a difficult time limiting myself to actually end the piece on one page. Not only is it a blending of my two favorite hobbies, but it also wasn't easy letting go, my muse wanted to keep writing I think. But I had to limit myself.

Fortunately my collaborative comrade helped get a much better message across for an actual ending. Thanks Blueike :D

[shinybastiodon]

Reaction to YouTubers talking about recent Baby Yoda marketing pushes. They're not wrong! I want my Baby Yoda Flamethrower!

[blueikeproductions]

A personal headcanon was less reincarnation and that Sideswipe used to be Fastlane but renamed himself Sideswipe because he idolized the original. The extended joke being that he was Fastlane then he has a twin brother called Cloudraker to reference the G1 Autobot Clones.

While Sideswipe became a delinquent, Cloudraker became a junior member of the Elite Guard and is a squeaky clean goody two shoes but slightly naive.

So I haven’t really touched on exodus cause I’ve been busy (I got my GED! 🎉) but I vacuumed half the book up last night and—

Sideswipe in aligned continuity shows up in RID (2015) as a hot-headed teenager and part of a new generation born in the three years worth of rebuilt Cybertron.

But in Exodus Sideswipe already exists, with the same personality and everything, as one of the original Autobots to have fought in the Civil War. For that matter, he’s noted to have fought Devastator and bragged about it in a way that was very in-character for the RID15 one.

Man idfk anymore, maybe he was reincarnated. But that must be so weird cause Bumblebee was around to meet the first one and then around to meet the second?

AUGH make it make SENSE

[askmissthunder]

New Year, New Art!

Miss Thunder: Hello, hello, everybody! A belated Happy New Year to all of you out there!

Red Rabbit: and a Happy Belated Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, and Christmas too!

Talon: Happy whatever the hell you celebrate.

MT: To help ring in the new year, I'd like to share some of the recent fanart I've gotten of little ol' me!

T: Whoo hoo.

RR: Oh, be nice! It's always sweet to get some props every once in a while.

MT: Indeed, and to start off, here's an action-packed piece by Kreat-Like-Crete!

MT: Next, we have one with a very cheeky grin by Fapo!

MT: Up next we have a cute one by...aatvdngrz1! I hope I said that correctly...

MT: Now, we have another cutie by Grindagoat!

MT: And last, but certainly not least, we have not one, but TWO pieces of art by BlueIke!

RR: *GASP* It's me! This is the best one! A+! 10 out of 10!

T: They certainly captured how tiny you are compared to Penny and somebody FINALLY drew you in your wheelchair.

MT: Oh, I love all my fanart! I couldn't possibly pick a favorite of the bunch, they all go up on my fridge! Again, thank you to all of the artists! It genuinely does mean a lot to me to see all these!

[blueikeproductions]

The Quintessons also got cards.

While we don’t know for sure if there’s other members of their race yet, these are a pretty big departure from the original designs, which have remained somewhat consistent.

Most notably the absence of the most recognizable Quintesson Judge is curious. There’s nothing that says they’re not there, but usually the Judge types are front and center for things, so removing them for a new High Command version is interesting.

The High Command and Soldier designs seem closer to some one off Quintessons from the 80’s cartoon.

The Quintessons have a somewhat complex conceptual history.

Their earliest concept looked like this.

A psychic biomechanical humanoid whose psychic abilities were so great they could make a horde of Sharkticons from scrap metal in an instant and probe the galaxy with a simple mind scan. Their head was apparently their true form, as it would eject and fly to another body when Hot Rod tried threatening it. The biomechanical look would persist for their final designs, but more modern media via Aligned and Cyberverse would instead state they’re actually organic creatures that look something like this:

Revealing their robotic bodies as merely being suits they pilot. It’s not clear yet if this is also the case in EarthSpark or ONE, though ONE feels like this is what they’re supposed to actually look like, but more organic this time than robotic as they typically are.

Some further revisions to the 80’s movie scripts and marketing of the time originally cast the Quintessons as working directly for Unicron, their mock trials were to punish and destroy any lingering survivors of Unicron’s wrath that passed by Quintessa. While this idea never made it into the original film, it was used in the Marvel comics and later revisited in early BotCon comics, but never became hard canon. The UK comics would make them into aliens clinging for survival as their home planet was destroyed by a time anomaly caused by the time traveling Galvatron. Running out of options, the Quints attacked Autobot City on Earth to try and colonize it, but were driven off by Rodimus Prime and Metroplex, their fate unknown but nevertheless swearing revenge on the Transformers.

The final version of the Quintessons in the cartoon cast them as the ancient creators of the Transformers, with some media explaining they also created Cybertron by terraforming a planet into a factory world (at least it wasn’t a parking structure planet). The cartoon would also establish them as slimy business men, having their tentacles in the affairs of other species for financial gain. Along with the Transformers starting out as in universe products to sell, it seems the writers might’ve been having a laugh at Hasbro.

The Quints’ primary goal in the cartoon was to push the Autobots aside so they could regain control of Cybertron, often conning the Decepticons into doing their dirty work for them. Where the Quints came from is never clear, as the show implies Cybertron was more their home planet originally due to their sentimental attachment to it. Their supposed home planet, Quintessa, is implied to merely be another planet they terraformed after getting booted off Cybertron.

Due to the more popular Primus origin from the Marvel comics, the Quintessons and their hand in the creation of Cybertron and its people was largely ignored in most mainstream media. While they saw a homage in Alpha Q in Energon (the connection to the Quintessons made stronger in the Energon Dreamwave comics), they didn’t really start resurfacing as major characters again until recently. The BotCon comics attempted to reconcile the two origins, stating the Primus origin was also the case in the cartoon, with the Quints interfering in the process, and this early idea served as the basis for the Aligned canon, where the Quints did the same in Cybertron’s early years, conning the young race into becoming their allies (servants), by bestowing both the futuristic space fairing technology Cybertronians enjoy today, their modern hierarchy (that became the corrupt caste system Megatron fought against) and the ability to Transform. Apparently the robots technically could already Transform as they all had Cogs, they just hadn’t LEARNED to Transform yet. Like the 80’s cartoon, these Quints intended to sell off the Transformers as products to the galaxy, with Sentinel (Zeta) Prime installed as their figurehead leader like in TFONE. Eventually they were chased off like in the old cartoon, but Prime nor RiD15 would ever revisit the Quintessons, though the prequel novels nobody read did claim the Autobots and Decepticons briefly became antagonized by them once more during the hunt for the Allspark in space.

Aligned’s main difference that’s fueled most modern interpretations is the Quintessons are the creations of Quintus Prime one of the newly established 13 original Transformers.

Aligned implies they killed Quintus and stole what they needed from him to become space fairing and eventually go to Cybertron, conquering other planets along the way.

The Quints were intended to be allies to Cybertron, as were other Quintus borne races, but this was not meant to be, due to the Quints’ hubris. EarthSpark’s version says the Quints were the first sons of the Prime, and in trying to discover their purpose, they became bitter and developed daddy issues, going around and killing off their cousins on other planets, attempting to acquire the Emberstone for their own use. The Quints and Transformers are strongly aware of each other, and clearly fought before, but their exact relationship has not been established yet, if at all.

TFONE greatly simplifies it to the Quints being an alien race that attacked Cybertron during the time of the Primes, though the hows and whys aren’t clear. What is clear is the jealous Sentinel made a bargain, helping them destroy the Primes and letting him be in control in exchange for paying them off in Energon to leave Cybertron alone. It’s not clear if Quintus Prime created the Quints in this universe, but there is a resemblance.

Quintus at some point: Sorry guys, you know how kids are!

Despite the Quintus origin, some modern media has gone back to the 80’s cartoon origin. Notably Age of Extinction and The Last Knight returning to the aliens created the Transformers idea, but the movies not directly using the Quintessons. However concept art does suggest the original intent WAS supposed to be the Quintessons…

Instead all we have is an alien hand and later Quintessa to go by.

It’s never clarified if the two are related, with Quintessa possibly being a Transformer and a Prime as well, but she is also called a liar by those formally in her employ so… She IS able to reprogram Optimus into doing her bidding however, so there’s that. She’s clearly inspired by Quintus, but isn’t connected beyond that. Her goal was to restore Cybertron by draining Earth of its life force and destroy Unicron in one fell swoop (as Earth is inexplicably Unicron again like in Prime). The organic Creators meanwhile were responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs, deploying bombs that converted organics into cyber matter that made the metal of the Transformers. Lockdown was working for the Creators, but with the abrupt inclusion of Quintessa, it’s not clarified if he was working for her instead/also.

Cyberverse cast the Quintessons as major villains, but instead of the creation origin, they depicted them as trans dimensional entities that travel to other Transformers universes to judge them guilty and destroy them for no other reason other than they can. Truly the best kind of villain: petty. Still this Dr. Who meets The Matrix direction with them doesn’t appear to be at all popular despite the arc being regarded positively. I still think Cyberverse is awful top to bottom, but the general idea they went for is decent. The Primes exist here, as noted previously with Alchemist Prime, but it’s never stated if these Quintessons are related to Quintus Prime.

Netflix War For Cybertron and Skybound Energon Universe also return to the Quintesson origin for the Transformers, though in the former’s case, their connection, if any, to the Allspark is never clarified. Skybound’s Void Rivals is currently the main component using the Quints, and dialog heavily implies the cartoon origin, though some minor Aligned concepts creep up as well. Nevertheless the Quintus origin doesn’t appear to be as… nailed down as Hasbro probably would like.

Indeed despite the resurgence in relevance, Hasbro seems somewhat reluctant to use the Quintessons still. The Quintus origin in the modern era had only been used in EarthSpark, and even then it’s not used… super well. The Steven Universe Diamonds that need a family intervention, never mind the genocide they caused, persists here to much chagrin. With the inconsistency on how the Quints came to be in modern media, it also makes Quintus Prime unnecessary, if some media is treating the Quints as separate beings. Even IDW didn’t do anything with this, despite using a lot of the Aligned concepts, and for now Skybound seems content to ignore it also.

I think the reluctance is due to toys of them not doing well, with the Cyberverse ones doing especially poorly. The High Command guy being able to Transform toy wise seems to be an attempt to make it clear they fit in with Transformers, but their peg warming doesn’t seem to be fixing that.

Along with Hasbro and Paramount not handing the transition from Bee to ROTB properly (like how do we jump from what Bee did to suddenly Unicron attacks?), I don’t have high expectations that the Quintessons will be handled well for a possible TFTWO, if they’re even used at all.

Which is a shame because the ONE designs are pretty cool, they made the Quints more appropriately scary and intimidating vs the slightly goofy looking egg shaped Judges. And I like the Judges but still.

[alcharliebs]

Commish: Aruto and Goblimon by BlueIke

[myavenueninja-blog-blog]

Alice: Beach Bods pg1 by BlueIke

[shinybastiodon]

Art trade for @mametyramon

[blueikeproductions]

Whst came to mind from the above posts on Earth expecting compensation from the Autobots. Transformers do have a currency on Cybertron, but it’s not used very often. It originates in the Marvel G1 series, and I think RiD15 has been its only physical appearance in a cartoon so far. It’s never really been explored as to how it would function on Earth as actual money when I think humans would just prefer the Energon and technology lol.

There's a thing I think we forget: How will Cybertron compensate Earth for the damages of the war after the Autobots win? That would be cool in Earthspark (as a minor thing).

The only way I see this actually happening is in an ES fanfic. S1 probably would've done some bullshit along the lines of the 'TFs being really sorry, can we all just move on now?' while it's most likely not even a thought in Robby's fanfic the show post S1.

In all seriousness though, ES hasn't really shown the state of Earth much since it's too focused on the Malto bubble. Yeah, we see that there are toys and comics about the TFs, but that's so small compared to something like showing Cybertronian tech being widely used by humanity. I can see the Autobots sharing knowledge about how to build space/ground bridges, other energy sources, things like that.

[kaijuguy19]

So how's it going lately? I don't think I've spoken to you in a while. I'm BlueIke from dA, btw.

Pretty good thanks. :) I love your TF5 pics since they’re very creative takes on some of the characters for TLK and ones from the past movies.