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noperopesaredope · 1 year ago

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My Slightly Cringey Transformers OC

Well, well, well. Look who decided to finally give in to their inner "cringe" and make a canon-non-compliant Transformers Prime OC.

Me.

It's me.

I'm the one who decided to make a dumb OC.

Now, let me start off by saying that I have only watched Rescue Bots and about half of Transformers Prime (I'm partway through Season 2). I don't remember much about the lore, and in this instance, I don't exactly care. This OC likely breaks some lore in relation to Cybertronian history and society, and I'm not really gonna do anything about it. It's also one of those OCs that I just kinda inserted into the team and pretend that she's always been there this whole time.

I did this purely for self-indulgent reasons, because I wanted to make a big cool robot who is morally grey and will help people with their redemption arcs. Please be understanding of that fact. I'm working on just allowing myself to create "dumb" and "cringy" OCs and stories, because this is all just for fun, and why should I limit myself?

So, with that out of the way, please enjoy.

Tireslash is a relatively liked member of the Autobots, but she has a few dark secrets that she constantly worries will get her kicked out of the group. Long before the war, Tireslash was a member of the infamous criminal group known as the Ground Shakers. They were essentially like a bank robbing gang, but instead of stealing money, they stole energon and resold it on the streets. It was a very organized criminal enterprise, with carefully planned operations, separated teams of thieves, and a network of distributors. And Tireslash wasn’t just a random grunt, oh no. She was someone working on the field, actively participating in robberies and some of the more violent stuff. She led her own team and personally knew the head of the Ground Shakers (though they weren’t super close or anything).

However, eventually the organization fell apart, and most of its members were arrested, including Tireslash, whose teammates were killed during a raid, the same one in which she was eventually caught (though it is later revealed that her second in command, Firewall, actually survived and went into hiding). Tireslash was sent to prison, where she reflected on her life and began to regret her crimes.

She remained there for a long while, until one day, the war broke out. At a later point in the war, the war came to the area which her prison was in, and the prison wasn’t safe from the blasts as the battle raged on around it. The wall next to Tireslash’s cell ended up being destroyed by a stray blaster shot, and she and many other prisoners ended up escaping in the ensuing chaos. Somehow, Tireslash managed to find a small ship, and she stole it, escaping to another area across the planet. Due to this being later in the war, a lot of stuff had been destroyed, and many computers and systems with Tireslash’s criminal records in it were deleted.

Due to this (and being a more obscure criminal whose crimes occurred long ago), Tireslash was able to join the Autobots with few suspicions against her. She liked Optimus’ vibes and beliefs, and had heard about some of the more atrocious behavior of the Decepticons, something she no longer wished to be associated with.

I might make it so that Optimus has his suspicions about her past, and may have even found out about Tireslash’s crimes long ago, but after getting to know her, he was able to tell that she likely regretted her past, and had developed a good heart. He believes in second chances for many bots, and seeing how willingly Tireslash took that chance to do genuine good, Optimus decided to never mention his insight into her past. None of the other Autobots know Tireslash’s secret, and it is only at a slightly later point in the series that her past is revealed, about partway through.

This happens in an episode in which Bumblebee and Tireslash are patrolling an old ship that was a prisoner-transport-ship-turned-energon-transport-ship. Some of the old files were saved in the ship’s computer, and Bumblebee choses to go through a few of them while Tireslash continues to patrol the ship. Bumblebee accidentally ends up stumbling across Tireslash’s old prisoner files, which outline some of her past crimes and history. He is both shocked and unsure what to do with this information, and when Tireslash comes back into the room, he quickly clicks out of it and pretends he didn’t see it. This will lead to some drama later on, and at some point, while Tireslash is out, the truth will come out to the whole team, with the records appearing on the screen of the main computer and everyone staring at them. Tireslash then walks in, and freezes at the sight of her mugshot-type-picture.

She then proceeds to immediately flee the base, panicking. More drama ensues, and it is very fun (for me. Not for the characters).

But anyways, I should talk a bit about her personality.

When we first meet her, Tireslash has already had her reformation and redemption arc, so she is somewhat likable at this point (though she was already somewhat likable even back when she was a baddie). Very friendly and encouraging, Tireslash tries to see the best in almost everyone, and if any Decepticons happen throughout the series, she is likely to quickly welcome them in with open arms. She is very open minded and, despite having been a violent robber, very sympathetic when others talk about their feelings.

She also cares a lot about her friends and teammates, valuing them over everything else and protecting them with her life. This is why she was so well respected by her old team, and why she is well liked by her fellow Autobots. She puts a lot of effort into maintaining positive relationships with the people in her life, hanging out with them and lifting them up when they’re feeling down. She can also be a very good person to work with when trying to work with people who don’t work well with others and are often unfriendly. Tireslash is almost immune to feeling insulted, and even the most mean and sour of people will barely phase her.

I actually initially thought her up because I was thinking about potential Starscream Redemption AUs, and I wanted to, for funsies, make a character on the team who quickly empathizes with him for personal reasons. So if I do have any kind of Starscream Redemption in an AU where she exists, she will immediately be like “well, I guess you’re part of the family now.” He could constantly be trying to insult her and act contrary, and she’ll basically laugh it off.

Tireslash is just very easy to get along with for many people, and it can be very fun in regards to character dynamics. However, she is not without her flaws.

While she tries her best, Tireslash can admittedly have some issues regarding understanding others, and will occasionally say some pretty hurtful or insensitive things by mistake. She means well and wants to do good, but she can occasionally forget how things like death have an emotional effect on people.

In a Starscream Redemption AU, Tireslash and Arcee may have an argument over whether or not to forgive Starscream, and Tireslash unintentionally says something really insensitive things to Arcee in regards to Cliffjumper, resulting in a temporary rift in their relationship. Whilst she might be shown to have many very good points about redemption and forgiveness, Tireslash is explicitly presented as being in the wrong here. She later ends up apologizing to Arcee, and they make up, explaining their points more calmly.

Generally, Tireslash is good at working her way into people’s hearts through her friendliness and ability to shrug things off, forgiving and forgetting quite quickly. However, she is also somewhat socially awkward, and this can cause problems in a few of her relationships. She forgets about personal space a lot, which can get very uncomfortable very quickly. She is a bit too blunt, stating things that she really didn’t need to say aloud, and putting other people off.

When she was robbing and hurting people, she really didn’t seem to process the fact that her actions affect others, not thinking much about it or the morality of her actions. While she’s gotten better at that, she wasn’t always good at it. She just sometimes forgets that her actions have consequences, and that is a major flaw of her’s. Tireslash also has some impulse issues, and can be a bit triggerhappy. Again, she may be reformed and somewhat redeemed, but old habits die hard, and her slight violent tendencies is one of those habits. She can forget where to draw the line, and occasionally needs to be reminded to chill out a bit.

Tireslash is an experienced fighter, having been part of a crime syndicate after all, and while she’s developed a tamer fighting style that’s more fine tuned, her past still shows. Tireslash heavily relies on her weapons, but she actually doesn’t use her blasters all that often. That is because blasting at energon could be dangerous, and so she and her team were ordered to use their blasters as little as possible. This is why she’s best at using her blades and objects around her, tending to improvise in the middle of a fight.

She also does a lot of ambushing, trying to knock her opponents out before she even needs to fight them. But if she needs to fight, she will continue to focus on mainly knocking people out as quickly and efficiently as possible, aiming her punches more towards the head. Due to being quite clunky and large for a Femme, Tireslash often ends up being forced into the role of Tank, blocking attacks and even just hurling herself at the enemy. Her main form of attack is literally just body slamming people.

The main things that she brings to the team are fighting skills, but also her intense amounts of knowledge on Energon and gathering it, as well as conducting raids. Tireslash may be no scientist, but she was required to have a generally good understanding of it in order to do her job, so she knows a lot about how it’s stored, harvested, and how to transport it properly. She will also reveal random skills and knowledge (that make sense in the context of her backstory) which will serve as foreshadowing to her past.

Tireslash’s alt mode is probably gonna be one of those armored trucks that banks use for transporting money. This is quite useful at times, as Tireslash is able to carry various things with her, and this function is used quite frequently throughout the series when it comes to certain smaller items. She also has slightly thicker armor than most, which is very handy in battle and allows her to act as a bit of a shield for others.

Due to having been in many battles over the years, Tireslash does have a few scars, some of which cause her a bit of chronic pain. A particular example of this is one in which she got stabbed in the elbow, and really deep as well. At the time, she didn’t have much access to good medical services, so her old teammates tried to fix it themselves.

Eventually, by the time she could have been able to have it fixed, it had already mostly healed/become old. So she now has a slightly wonky left elbow that she dislikes moving. Tireslash will still insist on “powering through” the pain, but there have been times where she’s been fighting for multiple hours, and her arm gave out on her. This is why her fellow Autobots occasionally remind her to not fight with that arm for too long, and Ratchet will scold her if she does.

Tireslash’s past does come back to bite her multiple times after the others have found out the truth, like when she discovers that her old second in command and longtime friend, Firewall, has joined the Decepticons. There is a lot of angst there, especially in regards to Tireslash trying to convince her friend to come to the side of good. They actually have an argument in which we learn some of the more unsavory parts of Tireslash’s past, specifically the murder of innocent people. Tireslash was a legitimately bad person, and though she has grown a lot over the thousands of years of war, it doesn’t take away what she’s done.

It even leaves some of the other Autobots feeling conflicted, because sure, they knew that she likely did some pretty bad stuff, but hearing the specifics makes it feel a lot more real.

There’s also some stuff tied to what caused these bots to join this group and become violent criminals. We look a bit into what things like poverty and desperation did to certain bots, and how some got wrapped up in a life like that. While we don’t get to know too much about them, there is a flashback episode in which we get to see the day most of Tireslash’s team dies and she is arrested. In that episode, we get to know a bit about her old team and their legitimately sweet friendships, their hopes and dreams. We see both the kindness and ruthlessness within Tireslash, and how she views things like death and revenge.

Tireslash’s past isn’t her whole character, but it does greatly shape it. I’m hoping to show an extremely nuanced and ~messy~ character who is nonetheless somewhat likable. A character who has a very specific kinda past. A character who has a somewhat sympathetic backstory, but not completely, and has a more unsympathetic backstory than a sympathetic one. A character who has a unique perspective in regards to the Decepticons without ever having been one.

Also, I just generally wanted to create a herbo with a dark past because I’m like that.

Hope you like her decently enough, or find her vaguely interesting. Please tell me what you think. I’m trying to just let myself make fun and silly OCs without caring what others think, but I do hope that people find this character to be potentially compelling. I might make a few more, each more cringy than the last, since I just do that with Transformers. I like big cool robots and I will make big cool robots if it’s the last thing I do.

So, TFP fandom, your thoughts?

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thanksjro · 4 years ago

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More Than Meets the Eye #31 - Ammo and the Anti-Glowup

So, the Lost Light disappeared, stranding all the crew in space in their little escape pods. 200-some robots just lost their homes and worldly possessions. That’s absolutely horrible. What a devastating thing to happen.

Anyway, here’s Drift with a flashback sequence.

No hips, fingers all the exact same length, hockey pucks embedded in his forearms- Rojo, this is a crime you’ve committed. When will the long arm of the law stop your sinful, pancake-shaped hands?

About two years prior to current events, Drift, Riptide, and Pipes- yes, Pipes!- were wandering around trying to find a ship for the space yacht trip. The gang’s here to see who owns the big honkin’ ship outside. Problem is, Drift is unintentionally terrifying because he has a great deal of swords.

Now, you may say to yourself “isn’t it a bit odd that the species that has members who literally turn into guns would be nervous around a guy with swords?” This is a valid critique, until you remember that at least some of the folks who turn into guns were born that way, and Drift was very much NOT born bladed the fuck out. There’s an entire miniseries devoted to explaining this, it’s called Drift. The swords are a choice, one that he makes every day.

Drift is willing to pay an honestly absurd amount of money for the ship, if he can just find the dude with the paperwork- don’t ask where he got the money. Pipes isn’t being terribly helpful in finding them, so Riptide decides that now is the time to start practicing being proactive and pulls a Coyote Ugly.

No, no, he doesn’t.

He does climb up on a table and start yelling for the ship’s owners to reveal themselves, though. Which they do.

Now it’s time for the world-building portion of our comic issue. Let’s learn about chirolinguistics.

Drift, staying true to his Mary Sue nature, uses his near-perfect Hand skills to strike up a deal with the owners of the ship. This would be impressive, if it didn’t just look like the most convoluted hand-holding session in the friggin’ universe.

Still, Drift is rich enough to make Jeff Bezos weep with envy, so the arrangements are made and the lads go on their way, talking some mad shit about the original name of the ship as they do.

So it is revealed to us that the Lost Light is named after a festival for honoring the dead and disappeared, which makes the fact that Rewind and Chromedome were there all the more sad.

Back in the present, Megatron tells Riptide to shut up so they can figure out what the hell they’re going to do about this whole “our home and also ride has ceased to exist” situation. He’s putting an awful lot of distance between himself and the rest of the Autobots as he does it, something that isn’t lost on the more bitter people of the crowd.

But why were we even talking about the Lost Light in the first place? Not to reminisce, believe it or not. See, it’s time for Nautica to get a little panel time, and she’s going to use it to be a massive fucking nerd and explain how the quantum engines work. As she does, Ratchet notes that his hands feel funny. Must be the weight of his hand-stealing sins manifesting itself in his joints.

Nautica explains that the engines run off of improbability- it is highly unlikely, but not impossible, that the ship can reach light speed, and riding the fine line between what can happen and what can’t, results in the creation of power for the engines. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Brainstorm gave us a watered down version of this explanation back in issue #2. If it sounds familiar for a different reason, it’s because this is how the Heart of Gold runs in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Again, I’m not sure why it is that the British love this concept so much, but there you are.

Oh, it appears someone has a question. Let’s see what they want to know about, shall we?

…Rojo, what the fuck is this.

Our muppety friend here isn’t too keen on how much of a smarmy asshole Nightbeat is being right now, though I’d assume it actually has something to do with the fact that Nightbeat got smacked around with the pretty-boy stick while Getaway very much did not. While the two bicker- there’s a lot of bickering in Season Two- Nautica presents a theory on what happened to the ship; it went too far in the direction of “can’t” and made itself cease to be.

Megatron gives not a shit about quantum improbability, though. He only cares about how they’re going to get out of this mess. Which, y’know. Valid.

Blaster picks up a radio from Rodimus, who tells the gang that they’re to meet up on a nearby planet to regroup and figure out their next move. The call drops before he can get more than a couple Megatron-directed insults in, however. Megatron, in response, tries to be the bigger person, and almost immediately fails. We do get a headcount though, which is good, logistically speaking. This information is communicated to us by way of a splash page full of character head shots. We’ve got 20 ‘bots on board this ship.

Yep. 20. No more, no less.

As our friends approach the planet, we’re informed that it’s actually a Lectureworld- a planet devoted to the study of a single field. Except it’s actually a Smartplanet now, and it’s been privatized by the Galactic Council, so you’ve got to pay to go there. Cyclonus thinks that that’s bullshit, and I can’t help but agree. Crosscut tries to network with they guy about his play, probably because word got around that Cyclonus is rich as hell, when the lights cut out. When they come back on, Crosscut is nowhere to be found.

It’s time for a Whodunnit.

Tailgate immediately pegs Megatron as the culprit in this disappearance, and breaks out a gun over the matter. Megatron thinks that this is absolutely adorable, which only serves to further infuriate our marshmallow friend. I guess he’s still mad about the whole “I was a Decepticon for five minutes and got brainwashed over it” thing, and wants someone to pin the anger on who’s socially acceptable to hate.

Cyclonus and Ratchet both think that Tailgate’s not going about this the right way, but the guy is simply too het up to listen to them. Tailgate suggests that they lock Megatron in the engine room for the time being and-

OKAY WHO LET HIM HAVE THAT

Riptide breaks out his gun, and soon we’ve got a standoff going between the three of them. Cyclonus tries to deescalate, which makes Gears and Huffer break out their guns. Then Hound breaks out his gun, though he seems to be doing his own thing, by pointing it in Nautica’s direction.

Broski, I think that might be animal cruelty.

Megatron manages to shoot Ravage “unconscious” and catches him by the friggin’ throat, stating that he has zero idea how this guy got here. With the heat off the two of them for a moment, Megatron communicates to Ravage to play ‘possum for the time being. Ravage responds, and I wonder exactly how he’s doing that, considering I don’t think he has enough fingers to effectively utilize Hand as a language. Or fingers at all, really.

While this is going on, Cyclonus snatches the gun out of Tailgate’s hand, admonishing him for being reckless about picking his fights. Generally speaking, you don’t want to try to go toe-to-toe with a guy who’s responsible for the deaths of literal billions. Getaway swoops in to comfort Tailgate, calling him gutsy. I wonder if this will become a trend.

Swerve says a thing, as he is wont to do, and it’s made known that multiple folks have disappeared during this incredibly brief standoff.

Wow, Chromedome just fucked off, huh? He wasn’t even in that sequence, just left.

Everyone’s positively baffled by the current happenings. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to who’s being taken. I guess we’ve got a mystery on our hands.

And who better to solve a mystery than a detective?

Nightbeat wrangles all the leftover folks into a corner of the room, so they can figure out what the common denominator is with all the disappearees. He starts with the easy stuff.

And by “easy”, I mean the super-special racism Tyrest subscribed to.

If you’ve read Eugenesis, you know that Nightbeat was also part of the first wave of cold-constructed bodies there. However, the general populace wasn’t nearly as chill about it as they were in IDW. Also, Wheeljack was his dad. No word on if that particular tidbit made it into IDW lore.

It’s at this point that we learn about M.T.O.s- made to order soldiers. They were cold-constructed ‘bots created en masse during the war in order to keep up with the demands for troops. Pretty fucked up, if you think about it, being born to die like that.

Now where have we heard that name before…

Chromedome, can your love life not be part of the plot for five minutes, my guy?

Nautica makes the honestly horrific claim that a lot of folks owe their existence to Megatron being a warmongering fuck, and even Megatron himself seems rather uncomfortable with the idea. Some thoughts we keep to ourselves, Nautica, even if they might be technically true. And even if Ammo wants to tack on his two cents on the matter.

What did they DO to you, Ammo? You’re supposed to be hot! Where are my three-paragraphs of description as Hound stares slack jawed the entire time? I miss Polyhex Wars.

Anyway, it’s Megatron’s turn to get poked with the questioning stick, and he’s not having it. He claims that by revealing his mode of creation, he’s risking a repeat of Functionist ideology. This would be valid, if people weren’t literally disappearing without any sort of explanation as to why. As it is, he’s being a stubborn asshole, but I guess he didn’t get his reputation by being a decent person who knew when to back down, now did he?

It’s at this point that Ratchet remembers he knows all the info Nightbeat’s looking for, and the conversation on Megatron’s birth is shelved for another day. I’m sure it won’t be a major plot point later, not in the slightest.

As it turns out, Nightbeat’s theory doesn’t hold water, and folks are still popping out of existence. We get another splash page, this time with everyone’s mode of creation listed under their names, and we move on to other theories about what the fuck is going on. While Nightbeat has a minor crisis over what the answer could possibly be, the MTOs in the group reminisce on the Ten-Step Program, a series of tests they were put through to make sure they worked well enough to get handed a gun and shoved out the door. Riptide wasn’t a fan.

Riptide has more wood panelling than a 70’s-style ranch house, and I think that’s very brave of him.

It’s at this point that Ratchet remembers it’s been quite a bit since he last shat on religion, and takes the time to do so while informing the reader about Information Creep. This is a concept we’ve seen mentioned previously, during Chromedome’s runaround in Overlord’s brain, but it’s here where we get the juicy implications.

Because memories can become corrupted in the brain due to extreme age, what ought to be objective fact has to be reinterpreted due to missing pieces. This is why nobody knows what the Knights of Cybertron got up to, or if they’re even actually real at all.

The lights go out again, and when they cut back on, Cyclonus is missing, leaving only his sword behind. Tailgate is extremely distraught by this, but Nightbeat gives not a fuck about Tailgate’s impending breakdown. He only cares about the truth!

And then a giant eyeball shows up.

It’s Ultra Magnus, coming to us live from his shuttle, via holomatter avatar! He shrinks down to a far more reasonable size, in a panel reminiscent of the first time IDW readers saw Megatron.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a neat parallel, I’m just… not terribly sure why it’s happening. One could say it reflects a reversal in power dynamics, but that theory gets tossed out the window when you remember that this isn’t actually Verity. I suppose it’s just a cool little thing.

Because the comms aren’t working, Ultra Magnus has been forced to use this avatar to communicate with the folks in the Rod Pod. Megatron asks just what the hell is going on, but unfortunately Magnus isn’t sure either. Then his shuttle disappears, and it’s bye-bye grunge girl Magnus.

It’s at this point that Nightbeat decides it’s time to stop pussyfooting around and get serious. He tells Ratchet to throw HIPPA directly in the garbage and write down everything he knows about the Autobots who crewed the Lost Light. And he does mean everything, as we get the splash page again, this time with lots of neat info on our friends, including spark type.

Spark types will become plot-relevant in the storyline after this, but for now let’s focus on some weird gender essentialism that got slapped into the first print of this issue.

As we know very well by this point, Transformers as a franchise has a tumultuous relationship with the idea of women existing. You would think that the awkward introduction of other genders we got in “Dark Cybertron” would have been the end of things being weird in IDW. However, you would be wrong.

In an effort to explain why genders exist, Roberts had the idea to make it spark-based. Nautica, in the solo print of this issue, has an estriol-positive spark. Estriol is a type of estrogen, which is the hormone that develops and maintains feminine secondary sex characteristics, when present in certain levels, in conjunction with other hormones. Biology

This “spark = gender” idea is, generally speaking, not a great idea to be presenting us with, especially when the writer is a cishet male, because it implies biological essentialism- the idea that a personality trait/quality of a person is innate and predetermined by their biology, as opposed to social, cultural, or individual experiences. Because this story doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it’s irresponsible to reduce the experience of being a woman to a single, physical, unchangable asset, especially when all other assets of the same class have zero effect on one’s gender identity. You don’t exactly see many nonbinary robots running around, now do you? And there are definitely more than two spark types, despite the Transformers as a species being... very binary.

It also makes female Transformers into an “other”, which is a problem that has existed from the very start of the franchise, in some form or fashion, and really doesn’t need to be perpetrated anymore than it already is.

The estriol spark type was removed in the trade edition, and Roberts has expressed regrets over its inclusion, having realized that it was potentially offensive.

Getting back to the story, Swerve, Tailgate, and Ratchet have disappeared, though Ratchet seems to have left his hands behind. His stolen, Pharma-original hands.

That’s still fucked up to me. I don’t think it’ll ever not be fucked up.

Riptide reveals the reason that he wasn’t in Season One of MTMTE was because when he went back to grab a receipt for the ship two years prior, he’d discovered that the original owners were worshipers of Mortilus, Cybertronian god of death, and knew about the nasty little problem that was the sparkeater from the first storyline. When Riptide went to confront them about it, they beat him up so bad he was unconscious for two solid days.

Which is a long-ass time to be unconscious. That might have been a coma, Riptide. Jesus, I hope someone got him to a hospital after this beatdown happened, or at least scraped him off the floor.

With this last piece of the puzzle, we finally have the common denominator in this big ol’ mystery. Everyone who disappeared was on the Lost Light when it took off from Cybertron in issue #1, and everyone left behind- Skids, Getaway, Nightbeat, Nautica, Megatron, and Ravage- didn’t join until afterwords.

Of course, having the answer doesn’t do us much good when everyone is still missing, and Megatron seems to agree with me, because he’s about to throw hands, when Nautica lets them know that they’ve arrived at the rendezvous. Problem is, so has something else.

...

I’m sure it’s fiiiiiiiiiiiiine!

#transformers #jro #MTMTE #issue 31 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #incoming analysis #overthinking about robots #comic script writing

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silkyshulks · 4 years ago

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Steeljaw B O X

*3:00 at a abandoned storage room*

Bumblebee and Steeljaw’s are now fighting 1v1.

Bumblebee: “Its about time your deceptacon empire is going down Steeljaw.”

Steeljaw: “NEVER I WILL MAKE A WORLD FOR THE DECEPTACONS.”

Bumblebee tries to hit Steeljaw with his deceptacon hunter,Steeljaw dodges bumblebees attack and accidently triped on something and fell into a empty amazon box.

Steeljaw: “GET BACK HERE BUMBLEBEE SO I CAN RIP YOUR HEAD OFF.”

Bumblebee: “pfft... umm Steel-pfft,theres something on your chestplate.”

Steeljaw: “WHAT ARE TALKING ABOUT!?”

Sideswipe comes in to assist Bumblebee and he just see’s Steeljaw with a cardboard box,Sideswipe can’t help but burst out laughing.

Sideswipe: “BHA ha ha,he-hey Steeljaw did something happen to you or is it just your leadership.”

Thunderhoof hears something and goes to Steeljaw what all the ruckus is about.

Thunderhoof: “AY STEEL-....,what are yous wearing?”

Steeljaw doesn’t know what Thunderhoof is talking about until he notices that he’s stuck one of the boxes that he triped over.

Steeljaw: “WHAT THE,EHGAH.”

The rest of the team hears Steeljaw’s anger checks on him.

Fracture:”Steeljaw,whats going on......”

Clampdown: “What the primus happend to you,pfft... you seem umm a little different.”

Steeljaw tries to go in alt mode but that doesn’t work,Grimlock and Strongarm come in and just see Steeeljaw with the B O X.

Strongarm:”Lutenint,whats going on he-,umm whats wrong with Steeljaw.”

Bumblebee: “Umm how do I explain this,uhh he just trips over the boxes and he just got stuck there.”

Divebomb: “Steeljaw WTF do we do?!”

Steeljaw: “This my umm first time saying this,we have to retreat without alt mode.”

everyone agrees and they just speed walks out of the storage room and Steeljaw shuffles awkwardly.

*Back at Steeljaw’s Base*

Thunderhoof: “Ayo Steeljoo,umm how are we gonna try to get this off”

Steeljaw: “umm Clampdown try to grab this thing and pull it out.”

Clampdown: “Got it boss”

Steeljaw: “Thunderhoof grab on to Clampdown and pull at the same time.”

Steeljaw: “Ok on the count of 3 2 1”

While pulling on to the cardboard,Thunderhoof accidently slips his hand and just throws Clampdown at the wall and makes a dent.

Clampdown: “WHAT THE HELL THUNDERHOOF.”

Steeljaw: “Fracture,try to get your minicon to rip me out so I will be free.”

Fracture nods and takes out Divebomb and Airazor.

Fracture: “Ok umm,I know this situation is umm not the same but try to just free Steeljaw from... whatever he’s wearing.”

Divebomb and Airazor try to rip and ther box but that's not working at all.

Divebomb: “Nothing is working WTF do we do?!?”

Underbite: “I GOT THIS.”

Underbite tries to rip a chunk out the the box and Steeljaws go flying off along with the box still stuck on him.

Underbite: “Oh... I don’t feel so good.”

Underbite plops on the floor and just gets sick.

Quillfire: “FOR THE REVOLUTION.”

Thunderhoof: “QUILLFIRE NO-”

Quillfire shoots his quill at his chest plate and one of them hits his face.

Thunderhoof: “Oh no....”

Steeljaws optics widen up and just start running around the base.

Steeljaw just sees Airazor as a chew toy and just goes ham on him.

Airazor: “HEY WHAT TH-”

Airazor: “HOW DO YOU STOP THIS THING.”

Fracture instantly grabs onto Steeljaw and it just turns into riding him.

Fracture: “DOWN STEELJAW,DOWN”

Meanwhile Airazor get chomped on by Steeljaw

Steeljaw drops Airazor just bust out to the exit of the base and starts just runnning.

Fracture lets go of Steeljaw in relief that Airazor is no that hardly injured.

Fracture: “Scrap,Steeljaw escaped and we don’t even know where he’s heading,Divebomb check his signal.”

Divebomb: “Boss umm,we may a problem.”

Fracture: “What is it?!”

Divebomb: “His signal is near the Scrapyard.”

Thunderhoof: “Scrap he’s gonna get captured.”

Thunderhoof: “Wait I have an idea.”

Fracture: “?”

Thunderhoof: “Fracture can you get one of our energon blocks and carve it up like a stick.”

“Back at the Scrapyard“

Sideswipe: “pfft”

Slipstream: “Whats so funny Sideswipe?”

Sideswipe: “Oh you should've have been there,so while Bumble and Steeljaw were fighting 1v1,Steeljaw triped on something probably and fell on a pile on boxes and one o- pfft he got stuck on one of them.”

Slipstream: “PFFT”

Jetstorm: “What are you guys talking about?”

Slipstream: “Steeljaw got stuck in a box while we were on a mission.”

Jetstorm: “BHA HA ha,scrap I can’t stop laughing now”

Drift: “What in the primus are you talking about.”

Sideswipe: “I'm not gonna try to laugh very hard but while we were on our missions Steeljaw got stuck in a box.”

Drift: “What...”

Sideswipe: “PFFT... its true they kinda have to retreat and Steeljaw is just shuffling away.”

Meanwhile Steeljaw see the scrapyard and imeadietly starts jumps on the security door and manages to get over.

Sideswipe: “What the... I'm gonna go check something,I just heard something might be a deceptacon.”

Sideswipe gets ready and pull out his deceptacon hunter.Sideswipe goes to where the source of the noise is.

Sideswipe: “Hello anyone there?”

Sideswipe: “What the.... STEELJAW”

Steeljaw notices that voice and turns around and his optics get more wider and wider.

Steeljaw pounces on Sideswipe,dropping his deceptacon hunter.

Sideswipe: “WHA- what the hell is with you today!?”

Steeljaw slowly drags Sideswipes arm to the securities door.

Sideswipe: “SOMEONE HELP ME”

Fixit hears something and leaves the command center for a little bit.

Fixit: “?”

Fixit notices something dragging Sideswipes arm and imeadiety runs down to check it out and he just see’s Steeljaw just dragging on his arm.

Fixit: “STEELJAW and why do you have a cardboard box on your chestplate?”

Steeljaw drops Sideswipes arm and runs at Fixit full speed and bites on his arm.

Fixit: ”He-,LET ME GO”

Steeljaw yeets his body in the middle of the scrapyard and just starts running around in circles and barking around at the autobots.

Fixit: “SOMEBODY HELP MEE.”

Bumblebee: “STEELJAW STOP RIGHT THERE.”

Strongarm: “STOP RIGHT THERE IN THE NAME OF THE LAW,YOU ARE BREAKING PROPERTY.”

Thunderhoof and the rest of the pack drives into the scrapyard.

Thunderhoof: “STEELJOO,WE KNOW THAT HERE,I GOT A SCPECIAL TREAT FOR YOUS.”

Steeljaw recognized Thunderhoof’s voice and drops Fixit.

Thunderhoof takes out the energon stick that they planed out and tries to lure Steeljaw.

Thunderhoof: “Cmon Steeljoo,I know yous want this.”

Steeljaw runs up to Thunderhoof as the speed of light.

Thunderhoof turn to alt mode and there both on a cat and mouse chase.

Steeljaws getting faster and faster while on Thunderhoof’s tail.Thunderhoof has to call Fracture in com to get here for backup.

Thunderhoof: “Fracture get ready,Steeljaws getting onto my ta-,SCRAP Steeljaws now on me,yous know what get yous minicons and get over here.”

Fracture: “Sigh...,Divebomb,Airazor lets go”

Divebomb & Airazor: “Yes boss.”

Thunderhoof: “Steeljoo,why you gotta do this to me.”

Steeljaw: “B A R K”

*A few minutes later*

Fracture: “OK,WHAT DID STEELJAW DO NOW?!”

Fracture: “Oh...”

Thuderhoof: “How the fuck do I even got stuck here you ask...,I don’t know really.”

Fracture: “Pfft,ok well try to get you out of Steeljaw’s... position.”

Fracture just tries pulling off Steeljaw but Steeljaw doesn’t get off easily.

Thunderhoof: “Steeljoo yous are no- getting this.”

Thunderhoof: “Fracture I have a plan yous gonna have to run to the base with the energon stick.”

Fracture: “Ok on the count of 3.3,2,1.”

Fracture changes his alt mode and driving as fast as he can.

Fracture luckly makes in the the base and yeets the energon in there.

Steeljaw imeandietly runs into the base and busy chewing on his energon.

Thunderhoof: “Fracture,did you manage to get Steeljoo into the base.”

Fracture: “Yes,Steeljaw is in the base.”

Thunderhoof: “I’ll be back at the base soon,try to pin Steeljoo down on the right time if Steeljoo trys to escape.”

*Some time later*

The rest of kinda calms down Steeljaw.Everyone is able to rest for a little bit wile there guarding Steeljaw to not escape.

Thunderhoof: “Hey Quillfire,can yous go gets some scraps of metal,were gonna have to make a wall since gonna be in stasis and Steeljaw is probably gonna escape anyway.”

*Sometime later*

Quillfire comes back to the base with the scrap metal and starts building the wall except for Underbite that is guarding Steeljaw from not escaping.

Some time pasts by and everyone is off to stasis mode.

Thunderhoof hears some scraping from his berth.

Thunderhoof: “Sigh,Steeljoo what do you want now?”

Steeljaw: *insert dog whining sounds*

Thunderhoof: “Steeljoo we are NOT going outside,yous caused enough trouble for today.”

Steeljaw is just barking a lot.

Thunderhoof: “GO TO SLEEP.”

*1 hour until the maturity affects wear off*

They team wake up from stasis and they realize they have to bring Steeljaw so he doesn’t run off somewhere.

Thunderhoof: ”Wait Steeljaw...,how are we gonna restrain him from not escaping from a mission?”

Divebomb: “I’ve heard that are these leashes that humans for their pets,why don’t kind of just steal one.”

Thunderhoof: “Ok I’ll accept yous plan,Underbite were resuming this mission,stay here a guard Steeljoo.”

Some time later they break into the pet store and get the leash

Thunderhoof and the rest of the team come back and Underbite stugguling to hold him down for a little while.

Underbite: “Thank the Pimuses you came back,Steeljaw’s trying to escape and go outside for a little while.”

Fracture: “Scrap,I’ll hold Steeljaw while Thunderhoof prepares the leash.”

everything becomes disaster.

Thunderhoof: “Ok umm Divebomb yous know human stuff right,how do you use this?”

Divebomb: “There are 2 parts of the leash,theres one that hooks onto the leash so you can hook it or unhook it.”

Divebomb: “Just try not to... break it.”

Thunderhoof tries to rangle Steeljaw with the leash but Steeljaw just rips it apart.

Thunderhoof: “...”

Thunderhoof: “OH FOR PIRMUS SAKE STEELJOO.”

Steeljaw pulls on the leash refusing to get it on himself.

Thunderhoof: “Finne... will go outside unless you put the leash on.”

Steeljaw stops resisting and go’s up to Thunderhoof waiting for him to put on the leash.

Thunderhoof: “There we go,not that hard,right Steeljoo?”

Thunderhoof: “Cmon,we got a mission to compleate.”

Thunderhoof and the team go to the same storage room where they are gonna try to finish it.

*Back at the Scrapyard*

Fixit: “Bumblebee I'm detecting signals from Steeljaws pack that they are going to the same storage room as the last mission.”

Bumblebee: “team lets rev up and roll out.”

Thunderhoof and the team make it early to the storage room.

Thunderhoof: “Ok Steeljoo,be a good deceptacon and stay here,make some noise if you see and autobots coming.”

Bee and his team make it to the storage room and barge in what Steeljaw’s pack want.

Steeljaw: “B A R K B A R K”

Sideswipe: “oh ther-,WAIT IS HE STILL WEARING THE SAME CARDBOARD BOX.”

Strongarm: “FREEZE DECEPTACON.”

Steeljaw go’s running through Sideswipe.

Sideswipe: “OH NO NOT THIS AGAIN.”

Steeljaw trying to rip off Sideswipe arm as a toy for himself.

Sideswipe: “GAHHH”

Thunderhoof: “Oh... its Steeljoo”

Thunderhoof and the team run to get Steeljaw,knowing what he will do will make it more worse.

Thunderhoof: “STEELJOO,come here boy,I get energon for you after this mission.”

Steeljaw notices this and runs up to Thunderhoof.

Thunderhoof: “Now be good while your with me.”

Bumblebee: “Wait hold up,is... that a leash?”

Thunderhoof: “Ay,I get it Steeljoo on a leash you got a problem with that.”

Strongarm: “Umm is Steeljaw even ok with that??”

Thunderhoof: “He’s fine with it.”

*Insert fight scence*

Steeljaw: “Ugh.. what happened”

Thunderhoof: “Well... while we were trying to get off the box,someone had a GREAT idea to use there ability to go rouge and run off to the SCRAPYARD.”

Quillfire: ”Erm.. I may have used my quills to lose your maturity...”

Steeeljaw: “YOU DID WHAT TO ME?!”

Quillfire: “Heh heh.... (this is probably a big disapointment to my revolution).”

Steeljaw: “Sight lets never speak of this again.”

Steeljaw: “Lets all get some rest after of what just happened.”

END

#Steeljaw #Thunderhoof #Fracture #Divebomb #Airazor #Quillfire #Underbite #Clampdown #Bumblebee #Strongarm #Sideswipe #Grimlock #Fixit #RID15 #IT'S FINALLY DONE!!

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megalavenderemi · 6 years ago

Note

Can you explain the story for all of the Transformers movie after Transformers 2? I couldn't sit through the rest

FUCK If I KNOW. Those movies suck. But ill try my best to remember.

Full thing after the break because long post

TF3 Dark of the Moon

If I recall correctly after TF2, Humans talk about the Ark which is a Transformers ship since G1. The Ark was discovered on the dark side of the moon back whenever we landed on the moon. The ark was filled with dead autobots trying to escape cybertron but was shot down and crashed. 1 body is revived using the power of the Matrix that optimus has in TF2. the Revived TF is Sentinel Prime who is like on the same level of leadership as Optimus or something very close.

Optimus and Sentinel talk it out and everyones a big happy autobot family. Until it turns out that the decepticons actually were using the Autobot Ark as an exit point for a spacebridge that connects Cybertron to Earth. The spacebridge would then teleport a small portion of cybertron to Earth to be conquered by all the decepticons coming in from cybertron. Yep Sentinel Prime worked with the decepticons all those millions of years ago so that the whole cybertronian race could survive on a new planet even at the cost of all of humanity. City is taken over by decepticons. A lot of robots and humans die. This event will be refered to as the Chicago War in future films. Optimus comes in to save the day with the help of Megatron by killing Sentinel who has a magic wand that is keeping the spacebridge open. Megs helps because of the whole “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” shit and Megs wants Earth to be HIS planet and his alone. No room for sentinel. Optimus then murders Megatron in the most dissapointing Prime vs Megs fight because it legitimately last for NO JOKE 10 SECONDS. I HAVE THIS MOVIE ON MY PC AND I TIMED IT. TEN. Also Prime has 1 arm in that fight because Sentinel chopped it. How does Megatron lose to that?

TF4 Age of Extinction

All robots are in hiding. After the chicago war, humanity wants nothing to do with cybertronians. Every single cybertronian, good and evil, is being hunted down by the military with the help of a decepticon named Lockdown who is the only good thing about this movie. As the military hunts down transformers, their parts are given to a tech company who is extracting “transformium”, what a fucking stupid name, from them in order to create mass produced transformers for people to buy. Because ya know, humanity wants nothing to do with transformers so why not make our own transformers? Also, get this, their AI is based off of the inner workings of the severed head of Megatron. Oh yeah the new safe mass produced thousands of giant robot cars totally wont go apeshit and kill everything like megatron.

Anyways, Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch find optimus who is in hiding and reunites OP with Bumblebee and some other autobots. Optimus is then found by Lockdown who is on a mission to capture optimus in addition to killing other cybertronians. Optimus is captured but not before fighting Galvotron, Megatron in a new mass produced transformium, body who then proceeds to take control of all the mass produced transformers and starts fucking China.

Lockdown is about to leave Earth with Optimus in his ship but not before getting his reward for helping humans kill cybertronians. Lockdown gets “The Seed”, an item that can turn an entire landmass, like all of china, into cybertronian metal. IDK what lockdown wants with the Seed. Optimus’ friends sneak on the ship and break out OP as well as some other of Lockdowns prisoners, the Dinobots. Oh yeah they steal the Seed too.

Galvotron wants to activate the seed so he can create a massive army of mass produced transformers from the giant landmass of cybertronian metal the seed would make. Thats a big no-no so Optimus and new dino friends kill every last one of those mass produced TFs, but not Galvatron conveniently. Lockdown is pissed OP escaped so he tries to capture OP again but fails and Lockdown dies. Turns out Lockdown was going to bring back OP to Quintessa, creator of the transformers. Optimus grows rocket shoes and flies into space himself.

TF5 Last Knight

This movie sucks and makes no sense at fucking all and thats saying something so i wont even try to give a legit synopsis. Uhhh fuckin hey Transformers have been on earth since medeival times. Dragons in our fairytales? Actually inspired by Transformers. How did we beat WW2? Transformers. Did you know Hitler was killed by a transformer watch? Yes they actually say that in the film.

Transformers not illegal anymore because why not. Marky Mark finds a cybertronian knight badge which “indicates the end of days”. British man tells Mark that the badge is the key for something. Mark and crew go to an underwater spaceship and activate a thing. Now giant horns are growing out of Earth because Earth is Unicron. Yeah, Earth is literally the transformer god of death. Optimus comes back Evil because he is under the influence of Quintessa and tries to activate Unicron. Shit dont work. Bumblebee speaks out of nowhere which then makes OP good again.

Optimus stops Unicron from activating and everythings good. Oh yeah Megatron is here as Megatron and not Galvatron... who has no story relevancy at all. Megs and his team of decepticon losers get fucked, but megs doesnt explicitly die. whether he died or not is debatable. He got thrown out into the sky but he has a jet mode so he coulda flown. So yeah the earth has Unicron Horns now. idk what was even planned to happen next.

I probably forgot a lot of stuff but FUCK THESE MOVIES WHAT A CLUSTER AND WASTE OF TIME. FUCK TF5 ESPECIALLY. The only good thing about TF5 was the “Did you forget who I am” scene which was a pretty cool shot.

#SUPER LONG POST #long post

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saintgale · 7 years ago

Text

Forgive me. I’m having feelings and I think have talked about this a lot on a side blog before, but wanted to try to condense some of my thoughts on this here because I’m still bitter and upset after all this time, whoops.

This is about Starscream’s treatment in TFP.

There’s a lot of text below the cut and also tw for abuse mention. Also spoilers for TFP, some Aligned stuff, and TAAO.

Also warning that I’m going to get sort of heated here and I’m not making the best case for him (bc I’m emotional right now), and these points are not, as they are now, grounds for a really sound argument because there are holes and patches and references missing. Also let me say up front I don’t condone Starscream’s behavior, I am not trying to make excuses for anything that he’s done--but that’s not what this is about. This is more about his treatment in the series by other characters, through the fourth wall in the writing, etc. This is more about how victimized he is and how he’s painted so often as the end-all-be-all villain of the century when there’s so much more to it than that. I feel like so many times his suffering was meant for comic relief or to make a moment for another character. Also how everyone was bent on him being Evil when he was trying to be something else.

This isn’t about painting Starscream as a “good guy” or trying to make him look good. This isn’t about trying to pardon him from all the wrong he’s done. It is about what I see as pretty gross injustice and how damn relate-able he was as an abuse survivor.

-- Recall, he wanted to swap sides. We don’t know for certain how this would turn out bc the Autobots wouldn’t give him the chance but you know what, they have the same target, being Megatron. Starscream could have been invaluable: he could have helped them tremendously even if it was in the end just for his own gain. But damn would I like to think what could have happened if for once in the goddamn show someone treated him with an ounce of kindness.

You know what he does when confronted with Cluffjumper’s murder--he admits his mistake. He admits he made many. He repeatedly voices that he wants to CHANGE and he DOESN’T WANT TO FIGHT HER. (Fair, we don’t know if this was genuine or just excuses made to try to cover his ass, but seeing as he explicitly asked to join the Autobots at the beginning of the episode and made no attempts to resist, gave them the info they wanted, and didn’t once threaten them even when they treated him poorly--ex: battering and dragging him around, I’d say he was well on the path to trying to be honest with them).

It’s only when it’s clear that Arcee is going to murder him (ie: force him into combat when he’s being held prisoner and is very much going to fight to the death) that he turns on her. And then gets really nasty, because tbfh if she’s going to just treat him like a criminal and force him into a battle while he’s the Autobots’ prisoner, and no one’s going to give him a chance, etc., why should he hold back?

-- Here’s the thing about Starscream: he literally cannot afford to trust anyone and it’s painful to watch. He has been conditioned to look out only for himself, because he’s HAD TO to survive. Megatron has quite literally beaten it into him that he can’t rely on anyone else, he’s alone, no one wants him, and that if he doesn’t continuously prove his worth, he could be killed at any minute. Pair this with constantly being ostracized, threatened, yelled at, punched, blamed, etc., and here you have Starscream’s already existing paranoia all bundled up in the most on-edge ball of nerves you ever did see.

-- He has to trade information for medical care. (Ie: He can’t “prove his worth?” Then he’s labeled as useless and left to die or punished for it--but Star’s damn used to that by this point, right?) Given I understand the Autobots had limited resources themselves and then again this is Starscream but he was defenseless and asking them for help in a time of need. As if saving Arcee’s life from Arachnid or helping them locate the Harbinger and begging to join their side beforehand wasn’t enough proof that the potential for him to change was there--he wanted to change--but no one would give him a chance.

-- He was gravely injured and literally begging for his life on his the goddamn floor and Ratchet and Bulkhead were content to let him die. Alone, vulnerable, out in the middle of nowhere with no affiliation, when no one else knew where the hell he was, when he had renounced his allegiance to the Decepticons. He was a neutral at that point. He was literally disabled (ie: forcibly had one of his internal organs removed from his body so he couldn’t transform into his alt mode or even transform his arm into his gun to defend himself) and starving and left to fend for himself with whatever little resources his brilliant mind could scrounge up from the NOTHING he had to work with.

Sure, Star is notorious for being a trickster/backstabber, but for fuck’s sake at points he was lying there BLEEDING OUT on the ground, and he had already shown before that a) he was MORE THAN WILLING to join the Autobots and help them out instead and BEGGED THEM TO LET HIM JOIN and that b) he had ABSOLUTELY NO INTENTION to do any harm to them. As if he were even in the state to hurt them if he wanted to. Damn.

Again. It would be well within the Autobots’ rights to be cautious/take precautions around him. But the level of disregard for even his life was concerning. Yeah, there was a war going on, yeah he was their enemy, but he had no affiliation at that point--he was literally all alone and begging for medical attention, would it be that much to show some empathy?

Like I keep thinking of that line Optimus has at one point (I think there are several iterations of it throughout the series) something like “every sentient being deserves the chance for redemption,” how 1) not only was Optimus content to let Megatron into the Autobot base when they were fighting Unicron, but 2) lets him fuck off into space in Predacons Rising because apparently Megatron now understands “the true meaning of oppression.”

No shit, man? Isn’t that what sparked the Decepticon uprising in the first place? I’m pretty sure Megatron put Starscream through a hell of a lot more than what Unicron did to him in that brief period of time, but Starscream just doesn’t seem to be able to catch a break. When he does show some signs of potential change, it gets brushed off or denied.

-- I’m pretty sure the Autobots KNOW how awfully Starscream is treated by Megatron (and this is a joke, it’s supposed to be something funny and it’s sickening--G1 even had a Heroes laugh about Starscream’s mistreatment as they ride off into the sunset moment, if I recall). Starscream has literally been beaten within inches of death, to the point of hospitalization, and for SHOW in front of the Decepticon troops, and left with his entire body, head to fucking toe, littered with scars, scrapes, dents, etc. We’ve seen him scream and beg and get down on his hands and knees and pray to Megatron not to hurt him. And yet he seizes up and is completely powerless to stop it--watching it physically hurts me. He’s so fucking terrified of Megatron that he flinches and shrinks back and winces wen approached by him, when Megatron raises his voice, or fuck forbid his fist.

-- I love Bulkhead and all for but his gentle-giant act his literal response to Starscream not wanting to tell him where the exit of the Nemesis ship was was to beat the life out of him. (Turns out this was a clone, but Bulkhead killed it. He would have killed Starscream over Star not wanting to give him information because low and behold! Bulkhead didn’t have anything to offer him back. Which is really fucking funny considering when it was the other way around, with Starscream being desperate for help, Bulkhead and Ratchet wouldn’t even consider giving him the medical attention he needed unless Star coughed up intel they could use.) He’s not only Megatron’s punching bag, it’s like he’s everyone’s punching bag. Just because he’s fucking there. And hearing him scream and cry is funny apparently.

-- Get this, Starscream was SO DESPERATE that he went BACK HIS ABUSER instead of trying again to ask the Autobots to join them. He pulled off the impossible because he’s fucking brilliant--something that Megatron was never able to do: infiltrate the Autobot base (let us also recall that Starscream had been collecting intel since early season 1 on the base’s location, but he literally sets up a trap to get in through their ground bridge despite the world spitting into his face) and steal the Omega Keys. Which he uses, of all things, as bargaining chips to try to negotiate his way back into the Decepticon ranks--he even is willing to forsake his position as Second In Command, he just wants some goddamn patch of dirt to stand on at this point.

-- I stand by my statement that Starscream absolutely proved more than once through the series that he not only had the potential to change, but he really wanted to change. But no one else seemed to want to accept that change, and no one was willing to give him the room to grow on it or prove that he really was trying to better himself. He spends every second of his life in Megatron’s presence cowering in absolute fear (bar when Megatron was in a goddamn coma on life support and thus could not hurt him), and trying to find ways to make sure that no one can hurt him. I’m convinced that his actions and his goddamn levels of treachery/me-against-everyone-else is because it’s been proven to him over and over and over again that no one will help him, no one cares about him, and no one is willing to give him a chance to be anything but evil scheming Starscream. So at the end of it all what goddamn choice does he even have?

-- He doesn’t even know how to accept compliments. I don’t mean flattery/you scratch my back I scratch yours types of things, I mean like. Out of the blue really sincere stuff. Like when they think they’re gonna die and Knockout says something nice to him, and he just like. Shuts the fuck up and looks away and gets all flustered? I seriously have a hard time recalling any points where another character is legitimately nice to Starscream (let’s be fair, is he particularly nice to anyone else?, it doesn’t seem so, but then again who the hell has given him a reason to be anything else but hyper-aware and suspicious?) and that kind of just hurts.

-- THANK FUCK in TAAO he got the redemption arc he so rightfully deserved and it was handled pretty well imo, and at the end of it all, he was described, by the author, as exactly what he is: an abuse-victim. I’m still salty as fuck that Megatron got ANOTHER get out of jail free card in MTMTE/LL and gets to fuck off and around the galaxy on a space journey (again) while Starscream winds up punished via life in prison but that’s out of my hands.

I don’t know if it’s a coincidence that Ms. Scott worked as an assistant writer on TFP (and was probably well-aware of what TFP Star went through and the details of his character) and that TAAO Star gets such a goddamn well-written redemption arc and blatant address to the horrors that he’s had to suffer through in his life, particularly the physical and emotional abuse he had to endure at Megatron’s hands, but there’s some similarities here.

-- I’m not saying what Starscream (in any verse) does was right or anything like that, but what I am saying is that particularly in the case of TFP (and TAAO) his actions are understandable. We know why he’s doing what he’s doing and we know the extreme level of trauma that he still suffers and the lengths he will go to to ensure that it never happens again.

Also shoutout to the Aligned novels where we see him before the abuse really starts (though Megatron and Shockwave basically traumatize and power play him on purpose) where he is an absolute fucking badass and takes Megatron on head-on at a disadvantage and puts up a DAMN good fight. And looks him straight in the eye when threatened, like he does not give a Fuck.

We see how goddamn obvious the before and after is. We see how utterly afraid and miserable Star is and how he will do anything to kill Megatron, will do anything to try to make himself feel safe. (Or safer.) We see not only the sheer difference in size between Starscream and Megatron, but the difference in the power versus the powerlessness. Here’s the thing about Starscream, his whole personality and physical appearance in TFP is crafted around him not being very strong (physically)--it’s all about his mind being his sharpest weapon. (I have to note that this doesn’t mean he’s not a good fighter--he most certainly is, he’s proved that, and that for a bot his size he’s actually pretty strong. Also we gonna talk about the melee capability he has and how agile he is because this guy’s got spikey-pointy bits all over his body including what look like pile-bunkers on his elbows and claws like knives). Starscream can kill Megatron, and he’s come really close to it more than once. But he often feels like he doesn’t have the power to do it. He doesn’t fight back when Megatron beats the hell of out him, he either tries to get away and/or begs him to stop. It’s so damn relate-able and it makes me hurt inside.

Also for the record I don’t see the problem here as Starscream very clearly being a queer-coded character. (Though we can talk about in general queer-coding villains in media.) I DO see a problem with Starscream being a queer-coded character who used as a punching bad and constantly beat up by a hyper-masculine character (Megatron), and Starscream as being constantly kicked around, made fun of, and having to suffer because of his femininity, lack of strength, lack of control, etc.

For the trash-mess that was the RID sequel (there are still loveable bits though) one thing they DID get right was the expression of absolute hatred, fear, and bitterness that Starscream feels regarding his suffering at Megatron’s hands, and his entire reason for reappearing is to kill Megatron. Good on Starscream for calling out all the awful and horrible shit that Megatron did to him. AND calling out Bumblebee for the exact same ridiculing/belittling bullshit he tried to pull on him (which, as we saw, completely worked as a distraction because of how much it upset Star).

(Also can we talk about how the Dark Star Sabre “rejected” him and how Bee’s making fun of him because hahaa!! Look at you Starscream!! You’re such a failure that an EVIL SWORD rejected you!! But in actuality let’s think about the implications of this and wouldn’t this be a neat piece to reference for an Aligned redemption arc?? But I know that’s never gonna happen.)

And don’t get me started on the whole design change (the RID design itself was badass as fuck, the 180 from the TFP design and the reason for it was absolute utter fucking rotten dogshit) because I’m still pissed as fuck about that too.

-- You know. I think there’s a lot of differences between Starscream and Megatron but I think the one that sticks out to me the most is that Starscream never became his abuser the way Megatron did. Sure, we don’t know for sure, and maybe never will, but let’s also take note that for the short time that he was in charge of the Deceptions when Megatron fucked off to go get the Dark Energon and then was on life support or whatever, Starscream was aiming for big things (yes, devilishly evil in many cases but for fuck’s sake he’s at least competent, and he knows what he’s doing). Also yeah, we’ve seen him lash out at/smack people, but this really isn’t anywhere near on the same dimension plane as what Megatron does to him on a regular basis.

-- To me, Starscream’s the goddamn strongest character in the whole show (I don’t mean in brute strength, I mean strength of will and perseverance). He’s a survivor and he’s trying his damn hardest to keep surviving. We know damn well no one else is going to lift a finger to help or look out for him so he’s done that for himself. He’s absolutely ruthless and a menace but he’s been through some Shit and I just hope to hell and back he gets a happy ending somehow.

#dratz vents #dratz rants #shut up dratz #abuse and abuse mention tw #text post //#long post //#filler tag one //#filler tag two //#i think that's good //#starscream #tfp

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stuntiteachers · 7 years ago

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Masterpost of all the Post-series conclusions to Stuntiteacher AU stories

Mun: Here you go everyone! All the conclusions to stories I’ve had in my head these past few months, I hope you enjoy them for as long as it took me to write them all. I think I’ll probably draw some of these for my own enjoyment, as well as in general stuff regarding my favorite designs and what not. Like previously stated, I’m not done with this blog yet, this is more a precaution and just an in general “open endings to the stories”. I know some of these things are things people wanted to know about!

Post-Stuntiteachers AU

Please note that Cybertron and Earth are treated as two continents on the same planet in this AU.

Bee Team and Steeljaw travelled back to Cybertron to confront the corrupted high council. Very similar to in canon events, Cyberwarp managed to be a reckoning force that took Cyclonus down. The five were sentenced to prison, with Cyberwarp being in a separate jail and with a lessened punishment for her actions.

The new council is set up, with Windblade having to leave her teaching position in Earth until Cybertron elects their new council properly. Steeljaw, having the most authority regarding Decepticon affairs at that point, becomes an ambassador for Decepticons both in jail and out (until Soundwave and/or Starscream come out of their comas). He chooses to return to Earth to be with his own allies but keeps communications open and active with the Autobots to keep his post (he wants to make a change happen, and this is his best opportunity). Bee and his team return to their true home in Earth and resume their teaching/police jobs.

But you’re all here for the shipping side of things, so here we go on post-series fates.

Bee and Steeljaw awkwardly become friends through the Autobot/Decepticon alliance. At first it was still just strictly work related meetings but over time Steeljaw would just pull stuff to get his attention. Nothing past platonic, but an interesting development to both of their characters. Bee becomes more aware of what life is like for the Decepticons and becomes more sympathetic, while Steeljaw learns from Bee how to be a better person and strengthen his own existing relationships with his teammates and partner. After a while, they decide to make life easier for them work wise and do video chats every now and then (in private locations cause you don’t need cops finding out where your hideouts are).

Sideswipe and Strongarm both come out and confess their affections to Windblade when she returns back to Earth, and awkwardly ask which one of them she would consider dating if interested. Windblade takes a day to think, and decides if it was alright with them, she’d like to date them both. The three of them are very happy together, even if Strongarm and Sideswipe still squabble like children every now and then.

Grimlock and Drift remain good friends after Drift confides in Grim how he’s not particularly interested in romantic affairs (Grim is totally understanding about it and started asking before giving Drift big hugs). Drift even assists Grimlock in attempting to try asking Bumblebee out. Bee, although extremely flustered and nervous at the advance, accepts.

Slipstream and Jetstorm grow up with their ambitions of wanting to be police rookies and maybe one day becoming private investigators. They both suspect they’ll end up chasing down Airazor and Divebomb one day, as the two are trying to become bounty hunters like their dad. But until then, in their teen years, the four of them became close friends, and try double dating for a while, much to their fathers’ hesitation (“I’m not becoming an in-law to HIM no matter what”).

Fixit becomes an official un-official addition to the Clay family, moving in with Denny and Russell. He’s extremely happy every time he’s referred to as family although he lacks a proper connection to them in terms of title (“This is Fixit! He’s family!” “So what, your uncle or?” “He’s family!”). Fixit is also on great terms with Russell’s mother, funny enough, they bonded quickly. When they got to college, Russell and Hank, who recently transitioned, became roommates.

They’ve never been mentioned in this AU, but Optimus and Ratchet got married and went on a month long honeymoon vacation when everything was over that marked the start of their retirement until they were ever needed again. I don’t make the rules…except I do, and these grandpas need a break.

A number of the captured Decepticons were given revised trials and changed sentences after Steeljaw became a temporary part of the council. The more violent and likely to cause harm cons stayed, but ones with less malicious motivations were granted pardons under the guise of “being a part of the mind control plot from the previous council”, thanks to Steeljaw’s manipulation. This allowed him to free his previous pack team of Thunderhoof, Quillfire, Underbite and Clampdown as well as some cons like Fracture, reuniting them with their families and loved ones. In addition to this, Decepticons were given more rights in their government, granting them more job opportunities, resources to shelters for the homeless cons, and marriage and adoption rights (proper official ones instead of the shady ones they got away with for years).

After they awoke from their respective comas (a few days apart ironically), Starscream and Soundwave were told of what the High Council was trying to do in terms of trying to summon Megatron. After a very one sided conversation between the two former commanders, they both understood exactly what it meant when Megatron left them both behind, Soundwave facing the grim acceptance at last and Starscream slowly but surely taking a step forward to his own mental recovery by not pursuing his abuser for a satisfaction he might not even get. Once hearing about how there was elections for a new high council, Starscream went to run for an official position promoting rights for the Decepticons while also bringing Cybertron to equal footing in terms of alliances (essentially taking over Steeljaw’s temporary position), while Soundwave, true to his nature, worked by his side if only to make sure he wasn’t getting into trouble and was actually following through with what he was saying. The two do well to mark a significant change in the Cybertronian government system, and although neither knows this, Megatron is extremely proud of the two of them.

Steeljaw and Thunderhoof finally got a proper sit down talk about their relationship, thanks to Bee’s side assistance with helping Steeljaw understand Thunderhoof’s side of things. They decided to separate for a while, just to give each other a healthy amount of distance and time to figure out where to go from there. Six months or so later, they started meeting up again as friends and within a year start dating again, far happier than they were before.

Quillfire and Springload started doing the odd travel expedition together once Back and Forth became teenagers and could be left alone with the house for a few days without too much chaos. During one of which, they found an undiscovered ancient civilization, which to Springload’s mind was his long lost Doradus, much to both of their pure joy and happiness. The archaeological find gave the family enough financial stability that Quillfire didn’t have to always steal for Springload’s medication, and Springload was given enough credibility that he was hired to work with other history seekers professionally. Springload thanked Quillfire for all his support when they brought their kids back to see “Doradus”, and proposed to him (Much to Back’s excitement and Forth’s bemoaning about going to a wedding).

Underbite and Scowl do pretty awesome together. After being together for five years, they end up adopting a baby from Shadow Raker and raise him together (they choose to never get married out of personal preference). They raise a little one named Stomper, affectionately called Stompy, who’s as destructive and excited as his dads are. They love their little one, with Scowl acting as a stay-at home dad for the first few years before switching with Underbite. Scowl genuinely loves giving his son a chance to be whoever he wants to be in life, a choice he didn’t get to have growing up. Thunderhoof and Clampdown also have a tenancy to visit specifically to see the kid, both having a weakness for little Stomper, melting their hearts every time. It’s legitimately the only time where no death threats are made by Thunderhoof.

Clampdown is still as sneaky and information filled as ever. Never really locked down to one place, he’s just doing his own thing, gaining few friends and more people wanting his head. He’s honestly fine with it though. He’s looking out for himself in the best way he can, and he knows when life gets too hard he can always crash at one of his few friends’ places for some kindness and positivity.

Crazybolt and Slicedice, after being together for twenty five years, immediately got married when the law was passed. Slicedice bawled he was so happy, which made Crazybolt tear up, which made their employees wanna gag over how sickeningly love dovey it all was. They invited practically every con they knew, it was a fun time all around.

Vertebreak and Nightstrike pretty much never changed their ways. Kept being the murdering duo they were, only now they changed workshops every now and again. In addition, Wingcode started joining them upon finding out about her brother’s way of avoiding capture (“My boyfriend destroys the bodies for me”), much to both of their displeasure because, oh man, is she prideful. Not to mention acutely aware of everything they do, so they got interrupted a lot any time they wanted to be romantic.

Glowstrike, Scorponok and Saberhorn’s business got officially recognized and they started allowing Autobots and non-Cybertronian raised humans into the neighborhoods they owned. Media broadcasted this as a kind gesture ushering in a new era of peace and unity between factions, but really they stopped caring, money is money. Their relationship was good and functional until Glowstrike ended up collapsing one day, much to her partners’ immense fear and concern. After taking her to a hospital (a good proper one, thank you new laws) they found out she was pregnant with twins and that it will take a lot of her if she keeps them. This lead to a conversation the three weren’t expecting to have, with Scorponok worried for Glowstrike’s well being, Saberhorn worried about parenthood and Glowstrike worried about how this’ll change things for them. All of course, boiling down to the question of “do they keep the kids or not”. It took them a week after finding out about it to decide to keep the kids, under Glowstrike’s request to have a quick group marriage before they’re born and before she starts showing (because she refused to get in a wedding dress for that and she’d be damned if she couldn’t have a nice dress for her day). They had two healthy little girls named Lightbreak (taking after Saberhorn) and Firestrike (taking after Scorponok), and Glowstrike (although grateful her daughters were born) had her husbands’ take care of the babies the most in the first week, wanting to isolate herself for a while after the whole ordeal before going into her full motherly duties.

Nightra and Scatterspike are happily in love. Neither rushing things too much, but just enjoying each other’s company to the fullest. It was very hard for her to say goodbye, but eventually Scatterspike did move out of the Scavenger residence in an effort to live with her girlfriend and pursue work in construction. She still tags along for the big scavenging trips in the winter though. Nightra keeps her work as being a thief, although she admittedly enjoys the pay she gets from the cops for tipping them off to some really nasty criminals she works with.

Paralon eventually gets gently rejected by Dragstrip after trying a proper confession (Dragstrip mostly was just wincing cause he’s pretty bad at reading these things in general), but wasn’t too worse for wear. He’s still got his ambitions to make a name for himself, so he started experimenting with his talents by trying a lot of different jobs. He hasn’t found anything in particular to pursue yet, but he’s hopeful.

Thermidor and Clawtrap are still as bickery as ever, and after Scatterspike and Paralon moved out, it got worse for a while. Being alone with each other for so long made them remember how much the other irked them, at least with the whole group they could avoid each other. It took a while, but eventually some of the other cons got fed up and forced them into a couples therapy-like session with Kickback (who considers himself pretty neutral with all relationship-like shenanigans he seems to get wrapped into). After answering in stubborn and snarky attitudes for majority of the questions, Kickback managed to sneak some truth serum (courtesy of Scatterspike and her experimental syringes) into their drinks, and they started spilling what they actually loved about each other. It was messy and embarrassing as heck, but it worked out in the end, and they could actually admit out loud that were dating.

The Corvicons are doing pretty alright for themselves. Filch has been doing really well gathering her shiny things to sell, but she’s also made formidable improvement with her customer service, becoming a favorite of frequent customers. Boostwing one day comes home with the proud statement of having successfully asked out his shiny friend from the scrapyard he visits (it was Kickback), and that motivated Jacknab to properly pursue Razorhorn (“He’s shiny to me! He’s really stupid shiny!”). Pilfer is perfectly content staying single for a while longer, amused by his brothers’ antics in courting.

Through a lot of emotional comfort and confiding between themselves, Shadelock and Roughedge started dating, Roughedge gladly being Shadelock’s shoulder to lean on on the hard days and Shadelock giving Roughedge all the love he deserves. Wildbreak cried when Roughedge told him, while Dragstrip just sighed heavily over his stupid partner being stupid.

After being worn down, Motormaster eventually accepted trying to fix things with Shadow Raker. At least that’s what it seemed, but Motormaster actually had a plan of faking it until he could reach a point where he could destroy Shadow Raker’s heart like he did to him all those years ago. Slashmark and Heatseeker avidly mention how stupid that plan was, holy shit, what a STUPID PLAN, but Motormaster is honestly king of stupid ideas so he goes to that dinner date an hour later than he should’ve been, watching Shadow Raker wait in the cold the whole time. Thing is, as the date goes on (and on, because Shadow Raker refuses to let the night end yet) both of them start picking up on facts from the other regarding that “betrayal” that separated them. After going to the warehouse in question, both tried to recount the whole event in detail and after a while, they figure out what actually happened was one of their mutual enemies set it up so while Motormaster got arrested, Shadow Raker would come out of hiding to save him and would lead to setting them both up for an assassination attempt, but there was miscommunication and Shadow Raker didn’t find out about the arrest until much, MUCH later, when the damage had been done. Motormaster lost it when he figured it out, and after smashing some things in the warehouse to vent his rage, started hardcore crying cause all these years he’s been hurting over hating someone he loved for something that wasn’t even either of their faults. Shadow Raker laughed through his own tears, cause he almost forgot how emotional his partner could get. They embraced and Motormaster really couldn’t understand how Shadow Raker could wait for so long for him, and he replied saying Motormaster was worth it, he was always worth it. They got back together, and in a little less than a year got engaged like they wanted to be since the war days ended.

As a result of the reunion, Motormaster told his team he was aware of their relationships (“Very, VERY aware”) and that they have his permission to be open about it and that he’ll stop wearing his own copies of their rings out of possession (Shadow Raker side commented it was to wear his own ring to which he was promptly cut off by an embarrassed Motormaster). The other Stunticons were ecstatic about not having to hide or lie or be apart anymore and they all went out to celebrate and as a result came out to their fellow cons. There was a lot of cheers/groans from the cons that had bets going on about them.

Heatseeker and Slashmark didn’t change too much in terms of their relationship, although parties and gatherings were a lot healthier for Slashmark, not having to bite his tongue or drown his sorrows in alcohol. And Heatseeker was more than happy to have his favorite person next to him. The group still continued to be pretend teachers to new generations of cons, however Heatseeker and Slashmark actually found that they really enjoyed being teachers and started going an extra mile with their jobs with some extracurriculars for the students that wanted them. In addition, with the new laws in place Heatseeker found himself motivated to making sure his students wouldn’t suffer in their youth like he once had, and any time he noticed one of them not having a consistent lunch or new bruises, he’d pull them aside and ask them what was up, and if it was bad, let them know about soup kitchens and shelters for the nights it gets too hard. In addition, if he knows their parent personally he’ll make sure to make their life hell cause “c’mon, is this how you want to go down in their life? As the asshole they want dead?”. Slashmark and Heatseeker also decide to show sympathy to their teammates and gave them their extra mattress in return for a week off of their after hour crime jobs. They used that week to have a trip to Cybertron, just the two of them and their homeland’s sights. They got married a few months after Dragstrip and Wildbreak did.

Wildbreak and Dragstrip actually managed to end up having some good luck for once. Their jobs ended up getting them more money; their quick work and (in Wildbreak’s case) good attitude got the attention of some of their employers and they got raises. They managed to get enough to move out of their shitty apartment building and into a better one without roaches or awful landlords, with a similarly small apartment, but now with a decent bed. They still aren’t overly fond with their teaching jobs, but they aren’t quitting those. They do, however, get into some new weekend jobs through their hobbies. Dragstrip got to test out new race cars thanks to Kickback, Crazybolt and Slicedice’s jobs, while Wildbreak would volunteer at Shadow Raker’s foster care to take care of the younger kids. It was weird at first, having separate jobs, but both enjoyed it enough to make it work out, still happy to come home to each other. After many years of consideration and consulting others on it, Dragstrip did eventually go to Vertebreak for top surgery, Wildbreak by his side as long as he could. His dysphoria was still present, but Dragstrip did find it worked out well for him, occasionally patting his chest every now and then in pride (Motormaster continued to provide his own advice out of mutual experience). He also stopped smoking since he had to two weeks prior to the surgery anyway (and Wildbreak never was fond of it, he noted). Wildbreak was actually the one to properly propose; nothing fancy or public, just the two of them having a simple candlelit dinner in their little apartment, with Wildbreak proceeding to list off all the things they’ve done in the years they’ve been together and how he hopes they’ll still have plenty of new adventures to come together. It was beautifully cheesy, cause Dragstrip actually wanted to propose to him the same gosh darn night and they both just kind of collapsed on each other laughing and crying over how stupid they were but if that wasn’t them, who knows what is. Their wedding was sweet and simple, and after of few months of being newlyweds, they started talking about potentially adopting a kid.

Thanks for reading everything up to now! I hope you’ve enjoyed :D

#mun speaks #IT'S THE BIG POST

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spockandawe · 7 years ago

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So… things sure do keep happening in LL, don’t they.

I mean, on the one hand, I’m distraught, because everything is a disaster. But I am also super stoked, because everything is a disaster.

Going back to the older seasons, I mean, season one started with the ship engines exploding, them losing contact with Cybertron, miscellaneous crewmembers dying, and a sparkeater getting loose. Season two started with Optimus wedging Megatron onto the crew, they find Rodimus’s quantum duplicate corpse, the ship and crew start evaporating, and the remaining crewmembers wind up on a ship full of their friends’ corpses.

It makes good sense to start things off with a shitshow, that’s how you lay the groundwork for exciting future developments, and pack as much as you can into a script. And given that, so… for the run of MTMTE, despite all the disasters they were dealing with, there was a lot of positive character growth happening, and a lot of developing bonds between characters. That is good! But not a good dynamic for the shape of this story, in the direction the plot has gone. If the Dying of the Light crew was all together, all getting on well, then all the tension comes from the outside. It’s… a balance that can work, but it would be really unbalanced in comparison to the previous arcs in this series.

One of the things I’ve tried to do and stalled out on is circular plotting (usually just almost circular, with a twist to make it deliberately distinct). Like, Tailgate being trapped underground, but being trapped awake and with full knowledge of what’s happening to him. Cyclonus is free-floating and dangerously unattached and mourning a massive loss, but this time it’s all about personal connections, and Whirl has flipped from being a casually homicidal enemy into a supportive friend. But with a possible extra angle on the parallel of feeling betrayed and angry over how Galvatron used him, and how he’ll feel when he finds out Whirl was the one initiated Tailgate’s breakup. There are… haha, wow, so many characters and so many angles that I think I stall out from just the sheer scale of it all.

Anyways, maybe if I just write about deteriorating bonds, that’s manageable in terms of parameters. Most of the series was about building bonds, and messing with those is that almost-circular plotting thing that steals their progress away and hurts the characters and makes me upset because I’m emotionally invested and want everyone to be happy. And I can write it as a list. I sure like lists.

This isn’t meant to be making a grand point or anything. Sorting information just brings me great pleasure, and sorting comic analysis data points means I have to hunt my information prey down in the wild before I can pin it to a board.

(behind a cut)

General

Everybody from the marooned crew and everybody on the Lost Light. Plus presumably the mutineers and the group arriving with First Aid. That’s going to be… interesting :P

Special shout out to Thunderclash. I have Thoughts about the image of perfection and being cornered into maintaining that image at all costs, and further thoughts about the strain of maintaining that kind of performance for so long. Even if many/most of the aspects of it come naturally, that’s a hard standard to live up to. But he was THE model autobot, he made friendly noises at Ratchet, Drift, and Ultra Magnus… and he was a prominent member of the mutineers. I’m curious as to how this affects people’s image of him.

Tailgate

Well, the breakup is the biggest, most obvious thing, both in terms of the character, and in terms of overall broken bonds. The development of the relationship between him and Cyclonus has been building for so long, and now… this.

Cyclonus

Same thing, but with more!

Cyclonus and Whirl started from attempted murder, wandered over to the land of ‘I trust you to be brutally honest with me’, and accidentally drifted into bff waters, which was amazing and I loved it. And right now, Whirl is Cyclonus’s main support structure and oh wow that is an amazing sentence that I never properly thought through before. I am SO EXCITED for the cyclonus and whirl show. But… Whirl told Tailgate some information Cyclonus especially, especially told him not to, and it initiated Tailgate dumping him hard. I believe 0% that this information is going to stay secret forever, and it’s going to be rough.

Additionally, while the actual commanders were on their alternate universe teleportation field trip, Cyclonus was in charge on Necroworld. And he did SO GOOD with people! He was good with Brainstorm, with Ten, with Swerve, all while juggling more overt friendship things with Whirl and while being sweet with Tailgate. He shuts down when he’s struggling. And he sure has started struggling. Those were more casual connections, but I’m feeling like he’s lost his ability to feed them, and I don’t know how many will stand on their own. Whirl, yes, but everyone else is in question.

Whirl

Mostly the cyclonus thing

Swerve

Is struggling. Swerve is really struggling. Skids noticed before, when he almost died… and Skids is dead.

Cyclonus has tried to help out here and there, including after the Killmaster incident… And Cyclonus is having a rough, rough time and is probably not in any position to help anyone.

Tailgate was one of his closer friends. Tailgate is gone.

That’s three of his biggest support structures gone in a very, very short time span. How much does he even have left? He’s not in a great place, and almost everyone around him is preoccupied with their own problems. I am worried.

Nautica

Aww, honey :( This one hurts me extra, because she spent her time on the Lost Light building bonds to the extent that she amica-married five people at once, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised she’s having an extra rough time.

The Skids thing, that’s the biggest one. And especially with the way she fought to find a miracle solution, and the way that worked out… yeah, that’s rough.

But then the Velocity business, with blaming her over Skids, and being willing to sacrifice her friendship over it. Even if she didn’t follow through, she agreed to it in the first place. Even with Velocity saying she didn’t want to become friends again with someone who would do that to their relationship. And she took a cheap shot at how hard Velocity had to work to pass the medical exam. Yeah, the issue “worked out”, but even if it got resolved in the moment, that is some heavy stuff to lay on what had been an incredibly sweet, supportive relationship.

Now, Rung is also struggling bad over the Skids thing. He’s grieving pretty hard, and was doing it all alone, until Nightbeat came swooping in. And he’s also aware that he wanted to fight on Necroworld, and it was being Nightbeat who wound up preventing him from doing that, so he wasn’t even around or helping when Skids died. Now… how is he going to feel about Nautica selling off her grief like that? From a professional or personal perspective?

Velocity

Mostly just the Nautica business

Rung

There’s Skids, for one, and the way Nautica plays into that.

But also recall MTMTE 40, where Ratchet sent Skids to go make conversation with Rung, because Ratchet didn’t think Rung was really getting to talk to anyone outside of his work. And then the Froid mess happened, and Rung stepped down from his position. So he’s not getting to talk to Skids anymore. He’s not even getting to talk to people for work anymore. Nightbeat has stepped up to the plate, but if he gets pulled away, Rung is very alone, and not doing that great.

Megatron

Oh boy, this gets messy and complicated. For a start, Megatron, and… everyone. Not intentionally. But nobody from the original crew knows about Terminus being a lying, manipulative jackass. As far as everyone else knows, he bailed. To a whoooole new wide world for him to do his Megatron thing. And a group of mainly autobots who lived through the war, that probably isn’t going to set people at ease. And in Megatron’s words, he thinks the others abandoned him.

There’s also something to be said about him wanting to start over with Optimus, and ignoring all the disparities in experience and history that mean that if he wants the fairytale bff relationship to happen, he’s going to have to be hella dishonest or hella manipulative.

But a special mention to Ultra Magnus and Rodimus, who will get more detail in their respective sections

And a special shout-out to reviving an old bond……… just an incredibly toxic, unhealthy one. Terminus spends virtually all his screen time trying to steer Megatron, and oh my god, I am Upset that Terminus has gotten him alone like this when he was already in a bad spot.

Ultra Magnus

The conversation with Rodimus about how Megatron read all of his reports and thanked him for writing them, it breaks my heart. Because when Ultra Magnus disappeared in season one, Rodimus’s inbox was full of unread messages from him, including one just titled ‘struggling’. Rodimus tries, but he’s not naturally suited to the same kind of meticulous minutia as Ultra Magnus is, and Ultra Magnus has already struggled hard with feeling isolated and lost. Megatron openly appreciated and respected him. I’m worried.

But the bond between Rodimus and Ultra Magnus was strengthened, you say? When they had that conversation about Megatron? Oh, the conversation where Rodimus said things he didn’t believe so he could manipulate Ultra Magnus into finding his motivation again. Yeahhhh… That was a good idea from Rodimus, and probably a good thing to do in the short term, but I don’t think it adds up to a healthy direction for them to go.

Rodimus

Rodimus has Issue with regards to being a leader, some relating back to spotlight: hot rod, some relating back to Optimus (in general). The Magnificence just came back into play, and as recently as season two, Optimus was not only failing to give Rodimus positive attention, but he was running roughshod over his autonomy. So…. This Megatron thing.

Megatron started out very antagonistic with Rodimus, but their command styles are very complementary when they work as a team, and he came to openly respect Rodimus, and defer to his judgment when he thought it appropriate. Good! All good, especially in contrast to neglectful dad Optimus Prime! And then… Rodimus was suspicious Megatron was going to bail on them. Megatron gave Rodimus his word. And as far as Rodimus knows, Megatron turned right around and broke that promise.

And Drift. Complicated, because most of that happened pre-LL, and they’ve been pretty chill in LL. But Rodimus let Drift take the fall when Overlord happened… and didn’t come to get him even after Drift didn’t have to stay away any longer. Rodimus already apologized, but kind of like the business with Nautica and Velocity, that’s one hell of a strain to have weighing on a relationship.

Drift

Is mostly that Rodimus thing

But it’s also interesting that he’s got one of the few clearly shown BUILT relationships that doesn’t fall the heck apart. He and Ratchet started off very ill at ease, where sometimes they were in tune, but sometimes they clashed in ugly ways. But they’re very much trusting each other right now, and there have been zero (0) fresh wedges driven between them since the new series started. Them and chromedome and rewind, those are the only people allowed to have positive relationships in peace :P

Ratchet

But, go back to that Drift thing. Ratchet already said some harsh things over Rodimus’s treatment of Drift, back in MTMTE 40. And he was also the person who went out and found Drift later, and saw the state he was in with refusing to maintain himself and all. I’m not surprised Drift forgave Rodimus, because he is a total sweetheart. But I’m very curious to see how Ratchet feels about the situation

And this isn’t anything definite, but… it’s really weird how there were like many big medical Things going on before people left Necroworld, and nobody went to Ratchet. What does that mean?? I’ve got no idea. None. But there were three doctors. The ex-LL crew mostly knew Ratchet personally, and mostly knew Velocity personally. And… Everyone went to Kaput. The best doctor, the best best doctor was right there, and they all took their issues to the new stranger. Why? I have no idea what it could even mean, but… WHY?

Anode (and Lug)

Yeah, that lying to your wife for a very long time about why you quit your old job, and her thinking that it’s her fault you gave up on this illustrious career, that’s…… uncomfortable. Cool, but uncomfortable. And then your wife is actually a ghost, but you revived her, but she doesn’t have all her post-death memories, which I think was implied to cover a good amount of history. They might have made up, and I’m positive they still adore each other, but that is some heavy shit, and I don’t have any confidence that everything is all worked out.

Ten

Starting from a nearly nonverbal position, has been treated as an unperson before, got the shaft three times in a row when it came to DOTL, and now one of the only people who was treating him as a PERSON is in a post-being-dumped shutdown.

Tailgate got left behind.

And Ultra Magnus is not doing so hot either.

I think Swerve might be the next closest friend he’s got, and Swerve kind of led the charge on the whole unperson thing. Swerve might be sorry, but the fact that each of them is may be the best emotionally available friend the other one has left, that is CONCERNING

Chromedome (and Rewind)

You guys are good. Much love. Maybe some conversation about the Dominus Ambus thing would be good, but you’re adorable and treating each other well. (edit: ooh, but I have been reminded about prowl's blackmail attempt that provoked chromedome to mneme on him. and prowl is inching closer back to the plot. popcorn dot gif, oh my goodness)

Brainstorm and Nightbeat

????? There’s the grief suppressants for Skids, which raise some Nautica-esque questions about coping with the grief and sacrificing the bond in favor of a release from grief (also very chromedome of them), but it’s not clear how permanent this is or how much they’re taking.

Is that everyone? I don’t even know anymore. I was wrong. All the scope is too much scope. I cut this short and my brain is still fizzing with trying to juggle all the pieces. The tl;dr version of this is that the majority of characters have been reduced to a state of alone (or nearly-alone) that’s pretty severe and pretty worrying. I mean, everybody is fucked in the head in some way in this series, whether it’s from the war or from other things. But it seemed like there had consistently been positive growth, especially in an interpersonal direction, until DOTL ended, and the stress and changes came crashing down on everyone.

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youreallystarscreamedthatup-blog · 8 years ago

Text

Monday 10th April 2017

I hereby dedicate this post to @letsdiscussrobots because she liked my other OC post. Mind how you go, botfriend, cause here’s some more!

Say hello to Bolt Spark!

She’s part of (or rather, the focal point of) my TFA ‘Holy Spark’ AU, which also crosses over slightly (okay, a lot) with MTMTE. I have an awful lot about this saved onto a Word document, so just let me copy and paste, aaaaand . . . there.

Holy Spark AU

Plot: Bolt Spark is asked by the Cybertronian Council to go to Earth to help search for the Allspark fragments, since Spark Priests (that's what I'm gonna call their race) can sense the presence of the Allspark. The Elite Guard are told to escort her and Kilo Hide, who obviously has to come too because she's Bolt's Spark Guard (her type guards the Allspark and the Priests) and while they're on Earth, they can look into Decepticon activity as well.

Bolt Spark is part of an ancient type of Cybertronian who were priests/priestesses of the Allspark, and she is one of the sole survivors of a Con attack at the beginning of the war because she was a sparkling at the time and her carrier sent her off in a stasis pod. Kilo Hide is also part of that ancient race, although she was part of another sort of 'sub-race', who were created specially as guards for the priests. Since the priests stayed around the Allspark for however many millennium and lived near it, they sort of absorbed the Allspark energy into their bodies and it becomes hereditary, so if one of your creators was a priest/priestess, you wouldn't necessarily need to live near the Allspark to have the energy. This in turn means that your spark signature (energy signature) is the same as the Allspark. Oh, and priestess' sparkling chambers modified over time to hold the Allspark if the need arose, like if someone tried to steal it. They can still have sparklings, it's just that they can also act as a container to the Allspark. All Guards had wheeled pedes so that their speed gave them the upper hand in battle. Also, Kilo Hide was the same age as Bolt Spark (a young sparkling, not even a youngling) when they were shoved in the escape pod by Bolt's carrier to keep them alive.

The reason all the Guards and Priests died in the Holy Spark Extinction Incident is because Megatron himself came to the battle. The Guards, as wonderful fighters they were, weren't good enough to face the warlord and live. The Priests were just slaughtered, they didn't know how to fight very well if at all, because they were always protected by the Spark Guards.

Now, onto another OC, also part of this AU.

Again copy and paste . . . there we are.

Autocorrect works on the Lost Light. He is one of Alcatraz's closest friends, as he's a librarian, Alcatraz never went to any sort of academy as he's a Dinobot, so relies on Auty for a lot of knowledge. Alcatraz probably owes him like 3451895558932 data pads overdue and is so busy that he has to get Whirl to deliver them, which Auty hates, because Whirl always messes with the order. He has CDO (in alphabetical order, AS IT SHOULD BE) so a librarian job is perfect for him.

AND ANY TIME SOMEONE SAYS "CORRECT!" WHEN SOMEBODY ANSWERS A QUESTION RIGHT, HE POPS UP OUT OF NO WHERE AND SAYS "YES?"

AND SCARES THE LIVING SCRAP OUTTA THEM

He doesn’t wear glasses, so the first time Rodimus sees him, he'll be like "Helloooo, pretty femme . . . you have real nice optics."

"I'm a mech."

"WHAT?!"

(I couldn’t find a mech base on the internet so I improvised and used the femme base I had. Hence, Autocorrect is always mistaken for a femme.)

The reason Bolt and Hide know Autocorrect is because he found their pod after it crashed near his house, which is on the other side of Cybertron to the Allspark Temple. He takes them in and raises them. Since he's a librarian, he can get all sorts of data from libraries because no-one notices him whatsoever. He's like the TFP Soundwave, always silent and always watching, so he know where and how to access even the most guarded information. He’s an expert hacker. Upon them telling him where they were from and what they are, Auto did a lot of digging and found pretty much all of the files and data packets containing writings and knowledge of their culture and taught it to them- Bolt, mostly Priest/Priestess duties and caring for the Allspark, Hide, the fighting techniques and how to make her own special weapons and how to protect Bolt. He taught them everything about their culture, everything, since it had been completely destroyed by the Decepticons in Megatron’s attempt at retrieving the Allspark.

It became apparent during the first few solar cycles he knew them that Bolt Spark had PTSD (mostly in the form of nightmares, also little words or objects could invoke a flashback), so he introduced the sparklings to his good friend Rung, a psychiatrist. Rung becomes more of a grandfather/uncle figure, which makes it easier for Bolt to talk to him.

Now, as to the plot of this AU . . .

The first time Bolt and Hide meet the guys (Elite Guard) it's all very formal and it's before they start the journey. Since they're the only survivors of the Priests and Guards (Hide was put into the same pod as Bolt) they're extremely famous and well-respected members of the Cybertronian race. Meeting them is like meeting royalty, especially since Bolt's carrier was Head Priestess.

Kilo Hide would restrain herself from doing anything brash, but she'd definitely be less up-tight with the crew than Bolt, seeing as she's only a Guard, whereas Bolt is quite literally a princess and has to maintain that image.

The crew would be in absolute awe meeting them because, well, PRINCESS AND BAD-AFT GUARD. The Twins are more respectful than they've ever been with anyone, Sentinel keeps his opinions to himself, Blurr is trying his damnedest to speak slower and Jazz refrains from asking about Hide's fighting techniques, because Cyber Ninja techniques practically pale in comparison with Spark Guards. Ultra Magnus is the same as usual.

Leading on from the first time Bolt and Hide met the guys, when the journey starts it's still very formal and stiff and all, so no one's really comfortable. The ice finally breaks when one day Kilo Hide throws her arms up in the air shouting "Uughhh! I just can't take this anymore!" and marches straight up to Blurr( who's been trying to hide from her because she keeps giving him these side-long looks that make him squirm) and demands a race. "You're Blurr, Right? The 'fastest Autobot this side of the galaxy'?"

"Uh, yes?"

"I challenge you to a race! I'm the fastest bot on two pedes, I bet I can beat you any day!"

So of course his pride as a racer won't let him back down from a challenge. He doesn't CARE if she's a Spark Guard or whatever, she wants to race him and get her aft whooped? She can try as much as she wants, you’re goin' DOWN, glitch.

Imagine his surprise and horror when she beats him and leaves him in the dust to fail spectacularly.

From then on they're racing buddies and are constantly trying to out-do each other. And because of the race and Hide's outburst, everyone's getting along just fine and completely casual with each other.

The thing that gets the bots properly chummy with Bolt and realise she's just as normal as them is when Jazz is lured into the kitchen by the smell of Energon Goodies, only to be flattened on the way be Kilo Hide screaming about "Oh my Primus she's BAKING it's about fragging time I can't live without her Energon Cake!" And Blurr rushing after her because "DidsomeonesayEnergonCake?"

The Twins follow soon after because that stuff smells HEAVANLY

And when they arrive, they make such pitiful 'we-haven't-been-fed-in-days' faces that Bolt shoves the ninja and the two speedsters to the side and says "Have as many as you like, boys, I'm going to be baking all day today and I shan't let younglings go hungry when there's plenty to eat."

Blurr and Kilo Hide fighting over the last piece of Cake, Jazz swiping handfuls of Energon Cookies not-so-sneakily and Bolt Spark spoiling the Twins absolutely rotten. (She totally becomes their adoptive mother. One of Bolt Spark’s duties as priestess is taking care of blessed sparklings and that's why she is the ultimate Mum friend).

WAGING WAR FOR MAMA BOLT’S BAKING

EVEN SENTINEL AND MAGNUS STEAL SOME GOODIES

Right. I think that’s enough for one night. It’s really hard to put this down in a post and join it all together when I’ve just copy and pasted it from my chats with farore into a Word doc, but there we go.

So, how did anybody find that? Good? Bad? Let me know!

@letsdiscussrobots, let me know if you enjoyed!

#Drawing TF #Bolt Spark(oc)#Kilo Hide(oc)#Autocorrect(oc)#TFA #The Elite Guard #Holy Spark AU #Dedicated to letsdiscussrobots #this took a long time to do . . .#enjoy!#maccadam

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thanksjro · 5 years ago

Text

Before We Begin

Full disclosure: I’m not working off of a physical copy of this story, but rather a PDF download. I live in the United States, and don’t think I’d be able to find a copy of this book if my life depended on it.

When I was looking at the download packets, I chose the one with as many extra materials as I could, so I’d have the best chance at understanding the story without having to rely on the internet too much.

As you can see, there’s a good amount to work with here. I’m especially happy to have the notes- also known as the Story So Far. Thank god for this, because this would be an absolute slog to get through otherwise.

Eugenesis takes place within the Marvel comics continuity, which includes both the American and UK comics published at the time, and The Transformers The Movie. The guide summarizes the millions-year long war between the Autobots and the Decepticons over control of the planet Cybertron. Pretty basic stuff, things anyone who’s ever heard of the Transformers ought to know. The notes assume that the reader knows absolutely nothing about the franchise, which is good, because it means nothing gets left out.

This is already an interesting contrast between Eugenesis and MTMTE/LL, which didn’t need very much extra reading to be understood, if any at all. A rarity in the comic industry. Sure, there were things you could read to get a deeper understanding of certain character motivations- Last Stand of the Wreckers, for example, giving one a better grasp of why Fort Max is so messed up and angry.

But this is about the notes right now, not the comics. So, let’s dive right into:

That’s right, baby, this novel takes place in the far-flung future of 2012, and you better believe the date 12/21/12 comes up at least once.

There’s a lot of stuff that’s covered in the notes, and I’ll bring it up as needed as I progress through the novel. It’s helpful to have, but let’s move on to the juicier stuff.

…Is what I would say, if the notes weren’t completely batshit insane.

It starts out innocently enough, describing the beginnings of the war, establishing that the Transformers didn’t always, well, transform. Transformation technology was developed by Megatron in order to make the Decepticons more combat-effective, and the Autobots followed suit. They fought so hard that Cybertron was knocked out of orbit and got lost for a little while, eventually coming under the rule of a warlord named Trannis while Optimus and Megatron are busy being unconscious for four million years on Earth.

Trannis is a massive technoist, who believes that mechanical beings are the bee’s knees, so he starts cyberforming other planets, until he gets offed by the resistance. He’s quickly replaced with Jhiaxus, who’s basically more of the same, and the Decepticons of Cybertron split up, one team heading into space to do evil robot things, the other guarding Cybertron from the resistance. The Beast Wars are mentioned. The cartoon continuity is mentioned. Shockwave shows up for a bit, gets thrown in a swamp a couple times.

Things go on like this until 1985, when the Earth-based Autobots reestablish contact with their homeworld.

Galvatron shows up- y’know, Galvatron. The revamped Megatron from the movie, which takes place in 2005. He time-hopped from the future to build a weapon to kill Unicron. The Autobots try to stop him. Why they don’t just let him kill Unicron, who is blatantly evil and a threat to anyone around him, isn’t stated, but they eventually trick Galvatron into going back to the future, with a little help from Kup, Blurr, and Hot Rod, who are also from the future.

Galvatron comes back a year later. He causes a bunch of time-travel nonsense to happen, and is basically the worst until the Time Wars happen.

Meanwhile, Megatron heads back to Cybertron to see what’s happened while he was taking a dirt nap. Straxis- who was left in charge by Jhiaxus- isn’t doing so hot, and decides he’s going to steal Megatron’s body for his own. He gets killed for his troubles. Megatron decides he’s just going to head back to Earth, feeling pretty paranoid at this point- which, fair enough. I don’t think I’d feel very safe after someone tried to steal my body either.

Later on, Optimus Prime dies in a video game. Optimus Prime is killed by a human child in a video game. In fact, let me just show you the whole paragraph that covers this, because I don’t know that I’m able to do it justice.

It just blows my mind, and I knew that this happened before I even attempted to read the notes. These notes are eight pages long, and this is on page three.

Now Fortress Maximus is leading a group of Autobots, but he’s really not feeling the fight so much, so he, Kup, and Hot Rod just kinda… leave. They end up on Nebulos and become Target/Headmasters, just in time for the Decepticons to track them down and fight some more. Back on Earth, the Autobots launch Optimus’ corpse into space and elect a dinosaur as their new leader. This goes about as well as one would expect.

Over in London, G.I. Joe finds out that Megatron’s been living in the sewers. Actually, it isn’t Megatron, but a clone, housing the personalities of both Megatron and Straxis. They kill him and throw him in the river. Shockwave catches wind of this and has the body brought to him so he can use it to kill Galvatron. He brings the body back online using a ‘psycho-probe’, and uses the power of suggestion to have Megatron do his dirty work.

Megatron decides to kill Cyclonus and Scourge first, since they work for Galvatron, and through a time-travel mishap, ends up killing one of them before they were created. This displeases the space-time continuum, which promptly rips, and will continue to do so over the next few months.

Are you starting to see why I needed to break this down?

Optimus Prime is brought back from the dead. Hooray.

Starscream finds the Underbase- an ancient storehouse of Cybertronian knowledge so vast it will literally melt your brain- and wrecks shop until the moment it kills him.

Meanwhile, clone-Megatron has decided he’s not going to kill Galvatron, but rather join forces with him. Everyone agrees that this is a terrible idea, and so the Autobots and Decepticons living in the year 2009 join forces to get Galvatron back to the future. The space-time rift swallows him, Scourge, and Cyclonus’ corpse, solving the problem pretty cleanly. Clone-Megatron finds the original-flavor Megatron, and promptly kills himself.

With the original Megatron back in play, he kidnaps Ratchet and forces him to resurrect Starscream as a Pretender- a robot in a protective shell. Ratchet decides that he’s going to fuck the warlord over as thoroughly as possible, instead bringing back a few of his friends and then exploding the Decepticon base. Both Ratchet and Megatron are presumed dead, but when has that ever stopped anyone in this franchise?

The newly resurrected Autobot Pretenders wind up in the center of the planet, Decepticons hot on their trail, and find themselves face-to-face with Primus, their creator god. Someone shoots the poor guy in the face, and he screams loud enough for Unicron, Bringer of Chaos, Vorer of Worlds, to hear him. So, that’s a thing they’re going to have to deal with in a few months.

Unicron finds a Galvatron from a parallel universe and takes him along for the ride, as the Autobots spend the start of the 90’s looking for the original Optimus’ dead body, which they never bothered to get the Matrix out of for some reason. They better hurry, because space is pretty big, and that Matrix is the only thing that can stop the Chaos Bringer.

Ratchet and Megatron are found- alive- in a pocket dimension, though they probably wish that they weren’t, seeing as they’ve been fused together so hard their brains have to take turns piloting their horrific, melty, shared body.

Unicron shows up in ’91 and kills, just, so many people. Optimus Prime sacrifices himself to save the rest of the population, flinging his body and the newly-recovered Matrix into the World-Vorer’s mouth. This kills God.

Optimus names Grimlock as the new leader of the Autobots- because that worked out so well the last time- and then dies. Prowl does all the heavy lifting to actually get the planet back in shape, seeing as the fight with Unicron wrecked Cybertron so hard its trying to tear itself apart via earthquakes.

Cyberquakes?

Anyway, Prowl works out a deal with the new leader of the Decepticons, Bludgeon, only to get sabotaged for his efforts, the Autobots being left to die as the 'Cons fly off to find new worlds to conquer.

Shockwave and Starscream- that’s right baby, he’s back- steal the Ark, unaware that there were multiple other people aboard. It’s like they didn’t even check. Galvatron is stowed away, and both Megatron and Ratchet- freshly separated- are stored in stasis pods. Ratchet wakes up and immediately crashes the ship into Canada, hoping to kill the Decepticons aboard. Galvatron lives, only to be trapped under the ice by a nasty fight with Fortress Maximus, the last Autobot left on Earth.

Back on Cybertron, Gridlock has a show of competence and reveals that he had extra ships hidden away, just in case the Decepticons tried anything funny. They get off the planet and go to fight some ‘Cons.

Optimus Prime is brought back from the dead. Hooray.

The Matrix is recreated. Wahoo.

The Autobots fight the Decepticons, defeating them once and for all. Or do they?

No, they don’t.

See, even the notes know what’s up.

Not even a year later, Optimus catches wind of Decepticon forces gathering along the edge of the galaxy. He decides to make Grimlock leader of the Earthforce- because Optimus never friggin’ learns- and they face off against Megatron and friends a few times before the Decepticons abandon Earth altogether. At some point, Fortress Maximus gets killed off. Grimlock disbands the Earthforce to chase the ‘Cons across the galaxy, and finds a Cybertronian empire, which holds at its center Liege Maximo, who claims to have created Megatron.

Well, that’s not exactly right; he claims to be Megatron’s progenitor.

It’s at this point I broke out the TFWiki, because that could mean a lot of things.

Still vague. Hmm. I’m onto you, Marvel comics. Don’t be jumping on the mechpreg just yet, we still have three more pages of notes to get through.

…What did I just say, Marvel comics?

Did I say three pages? I meant two paragraphs. Holy hell, that hits like a punch to the face, it does.

Okay, so this isn’t exactly what you think, believe it or not. This is describing the form of reproduction that was established in the Marvel comics known as budding- some unlucky robot’s body runs away with itself and basically vomits out another fully-formed ‘bot. It’s like their chest was chewing a huge wad of gum, tried to blow a bubble, but did it just a little too hard.

Getting back on track, Optimus Prime finds out about budding from Vector Sigma, but pulls out of their little pow-wow before he can be told about the byproduct of this birthing process- the Swarm, an ink-black cloud of evil energy that left Cybertron ages ago to find something to feed off of.

The Swarm finds its way home, interrupting yet another standoff between the Autobots/Decepticons and the Cybertronian Empire. A lot of folks die, and Optimus surrenders to the Swarm in an attempt to save his compatriots. The Swarm gets introduced to, and I quote: “concepts of nobility, compassion, and sacrifice”, then goes back into deep space to seek enlightenment.

Can you imagine if human afterbirth did that? You just had a baby, and now you have to beat your placenta off with a broom? Then the god-king of the world introduces it to meditation and kindness, and it goes off to find inner peace instead of killing everyone? Comic books are wild.

Other than that funky little aside, it’s business as usual for the Transformers- war! From 1995 to 2003, they’re fighting nonstop. Then the UN decides that Optimus Prime’s allowed to build a giant robot city on Earth. It sure is a good thing Optimus is such a nice guy, because I don’t think they would have been able to stop him otherwise. Imagine telling the thirty-foot tall robot-Jesus from space he needs a permit to build a city in the middle of the desert.

They build the city- Autobot City, in fact- with Metroplex the Titan sealed inside, just in case the Decepticons decide to try anything funny.

They do- it’s called The Transformers The Movie. There’s a slight difference in plot, in that the notes remind us of the fact that Galvatron is a time-traveling ponce, but other than that the movie’s the movie.

To summarize that- though I’d be surprised if I needed to- movie goes like this: It’s the distant future of 2005, ‘Cons attack Autobot City, Optimus gets shot and dies AGAIN, traumatizing thousands of children in the mid-80s, Megatron gets shunted into deep space, meets Orson Welles who makes him a thigh-tastic new body, Megatron-now-Galvatron turns Starscream into a small pile of ash, a bunch of robots get vored, Hot Rod fulfills his destiny and becomes the new space-Jesus, Unicron explodes, YOU GOT THE TOUCH YOU GOT THE POWER-

So after all that happens, the Autobots take back Cybertron and tell the remaining Decepticons to kindly screw off. Hot Rod- now Rodimus Prime- decides he’s not taking any chances and hires a bounty hunter to find and kill Galvatron, who’s off galavanting somewhere in space. Both Rodimus and the bounty hunter follow Galvatron through time- of course- and land in 1987, but return to the future/present empty-handed. While they were gone, Shockwave and a group of Decepticons showed up on Cybertron, resulting in a stalemate between the two factions.

In 2008, the bounty hunter shoots down Cyclonus and Scourge- Rodimus put a hit out on them, too- over the planet of Junk, home of the Junkions. Who else is there? Oh, just Unicron. He’s got the Junkions brainwashed and building him a new body. He uses the bounty hunter to kill Shockwave, instates Cyclonus and Scourge as the new Decepticon leaders, then gets blown up by Rodimus and Wreck-Gar. Cyclonus, Scourge, and the bounty hunter all go through a time portal as this is happening, and the two Transformers end up in 15th century Cybertron, where they’ll become Targetmasters. Their resumes must be very impressive at this point. Nobody’s sure where the bounty hunter’s gotten to- we’ll get back to him later.

Although his physical form has been destroyed, Unicron’s essence lives on inside the Matrix. This can only end well, surely.

Back on Cybertron, Soundwave takes control of the Decepticon forces.

The Quintessons break free from Unicron’s control, just in time to discover that their planet’s about to be torn apart by the space-time rift Cyclonus’ dead body made.

Are you beginning to see why I felt the need to summarize these notes?

The leader of the Quintessons decides that now is the perfect time to attack Autobot City on Earth, as well as Cybertron. This doesn’t go very well for the Quintessons, or their planet.

The time-rift is still causing issues, so Rodimus Prime grabs some Autobots and heads to the past, to go grab everyone’s favorite time-traveling ‘Cons. What happened there we already covered, so I’ll leave it at that.

Rodimus and friends return to the present, only to wind up in a parallel universe, and the fact that this is only the second time I’ve had to write “parallel universe” for this section of the breakdown honestly astounds me. Rodimus gets possessed by the spirit of Unicron, who was hiding in the Matrix as we covered earlier, but he handles it pretty well and they head back home.

Back in their original universe, they find Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge, repaired by the space-time rift. Rodimus destroys any and all time machines he can get his hands on at this point- the notes say it’s to keep a promise he made to Optimus, but between you and me, I think he’s just gotten sick of Galvatron’s shit.

A couple years after that, Unicron’s got himself a hot new bod, and now he’s gonna tear up the town. By "tear up”, I of course mean devour with the sole intent of destruction, and by “town", I mean the entirety of Cybertron. Rodimus Prime manages to stop him, by containing him within his body, perhaps his mind? The notes are vague here, but the Wiki seems to imply that he’s trapped within the Matrix again, which Rodimus holds.

Now it’s December 2012, and things aren’t going so great for the Autobots. The Decepticons have control of Cybertron, the remaining Autobots being forced into hiding underground. On Earth, Autobot city is manned by a hundred ‘bots, Ultra Magnus acting as leader. They’re there to make sure Earth’s safe from the ‘Cons, but there hasn’t been an attack in quite a bit.

That’s where the notes end. That’s everything you need to know before reading Eugenesis. So, what did we learn?

We learned that Galvatron and his goons time traveled so frequently they broke the laws of physics. Optimus is just as incapable of staying dead here as he is everywhere else- multiversal constant, that one. Rodimus is smarter than Optimus about confronting the enemy, in that he intends for them to die, either by his hand or one that’s been hired. Good for him, I say. Get the job done, Rodders.

We also learned that the mechpreg really isn’t Roberts’ fault. I mean, yeah, he probably leans on the concept a bit heavily, but he’s just working with what he was given by the franchise. We’ll see how deep that rabbit hole goes later on.

But I think the most important thing to glean from this is that comic timelines are a nightmare. That’s the real lesson here.

Okay! Notes are done! That means we can start on the novel, right?

No.

No, it doesn’t.

We still have the prequel to get through.

#transformers #jro #maccadam #eugenesis #Hannzreads #text post #long post

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