#but Unicron is salty about him

[csilis]

The third part of my detective Unicron series is here! Hope you enjoy this one too!

Previous part

Part three: Wonders of life

It took Sarah half an hour to convince Eric that no, her car and in extension no vehicles will turn into giant talking alien robots he just called "my brother's creations". His reluctance just fuelled her annoyance which led her finally just pushing him into the car and closing the door on him.

"Let me out you mortal!" he screamed on a high-pitched noise as he tried to not touch anything here out of pure disgust. "I'm a God! I'm..."

But Sarah just turned on the radio and put the volume on max. As the radio blared the opening chords of Highway to Hell, Sarah couldn’t help but smirk, the irony of the song choice almost too perfect.

"Sorry, what were you saying?" she yelled with a grin.

Unicron glared at her, his fingers pressed against his ears as he shouted over the music. "I hate you!" But to be honest, Unicron usually hated everyone.

"The feeling is mutual!" she yelled back, shrugging her shoulders as she pushed on the gas. All throughout the journey he was rambling again but at least this time Sarah couldn't hear him over the volume of the music. Thank the Gods!

Only when she parked down before the apartment complex where she lived was when she turned off the radio.

"Agh" he groaned, massaging his temples, wondering why humans inflict this pain on themselves and call it pleasure. This type of behaviour was a mystery even to him. How could humans be more evil than him, their own creator? "I will never do this ever again."

“Oh, don’t worry, big guy, you’ll be getting in that car plenty of times while you’re with me,” Sarah replied, flashing him an insufferable smile as she climbed out and slammed the door shut.

As they made their way towards her apartment, Unicron took in his surroundings with a look of pure disdain. Every step he took seemed to fuel his irritation, his nose wrinkling at the scent of gasoline and faintly burnt food from a nearby vendor. “How do you live like this?” he muttered, sidestepping a crumpled soda can on the sidewalk as if it were toxic.

"Well, ask that God of yours why he didn't increase my salary" she looked at him amused as she stretched.

"I do not meddle with the foolish struggles of mortals" he said, almost offended that Sarah thought he was ever going to care about such things as salary.

"Then don't be surprised if we live the way we do, Eric" she stated as they arrived in her apartment and Unicron took a good look at the small and worn flat.

“This,” he said, looking around with a sneer, “is hardly fit for a god.”

“Good thing you’re not one,” she shot back, grabbing a stack of blankets from the closet. “Now, here’s your bed.” She tossed the blankets on the couch, ignoring his look of horror.

And then, almost at the worst possible moment, Molly appeared. Probably curious about what was happening in the living room.

"Hi aunt Sarah" she said, books in her hands. "Nelly's parents took me home after school and I have been doing my homework since" she said as she went to the fridge. The guy in the living room was new but Molly knew from a young age that her aunt always had some weird things coming her way.

"Hey" Sarah greeted her while rubbing the back of her neck. "Ah... I think we have to talk. This is Eric" she pointed at Unicron. "And he will be staying for a... while."

"Hm..." Molly hummed as she started to drink her orange juice with a straw and walked closer to Unicron. "What are you?" she asked, almost seeing through him. Which somehow made Unicron uneasy. What were these little creatures?

"I'm Unicron, the god of..."

"No, you're not," she said, drinking casually. "I think you look like somebody who just fell from grace."

"I am not some tragic hero!" he glared at her, even the thought of good making this body's skin crawl.

"Then why do you have that righteous anger in your eyes?" she asked back, calm in her voice. "As if someone betrayed you?"

Primus

The name burned in his mind. He was his brother a traitor. A weak and pathetic being who thought creation and order is what the universe needed. Primus was his brother nothing.

"Okay Molly, I think you have been watching too much TV. Eric is only a bit full of himself" Sarah said, dismissing Molly who just made a pouting face, but retreated to her room, taking a bag of chips with her. "Look, I'm going to do some research in my room since you gave me nothing to work with in this case."

"He said something about butterflies" Unicron stated, trying to take his mind off his brother Primus. "I resurrected him for a moment and he said butterfly."

"Butterfly?" Sarah suddenly turned around. "The Butterfly night club is just a street away from where you and he lived" Sarah said, her voice full with excitement and thrill. There it was finally. A clue.

words: 858 characters: 4680

[lord-squiggletits]

For the Salty Asks (forgive us for the avalanche, if it's too many you can pick your top three): 2, 9, 10, 11, 13 (Optimus), 20, 25 (IDW1), 26

uhhh honestly I feel a bit like a hermit who's out of the loop on what's popular/unpopular so some of these might be completely off the mark but here we go

2. Are there any popular fandom OTPs you only BroTP?

Mmmm I think most of my brotp's aren't shipped as OTPs to start with, so I dunno if I have any that fit this question.

Guess the closest example for me would be OPli/ta. I don't actively platonically ship them but I think platonic is way more interesting than romantic. I don't like the fandom's interpretation of romantic O/Plita at all + I feel like as one of the original "token woman" Autobots, I'd like to see Elita unshackled from Optimus as a love interest, esp because any official interpretation of them is probably gonna be written extremely heteronormatively/token romance between an action hero and The Girl. And the fanon version of them that's Strong Independent Girlboss Elita with whipped simp husbnad Optimus is just as boring and gross.

I just don't like the vibes and would rather them have some sort of friendly or regular relationship together.

9. Most disliked character(s)? Why?

IDW1 Slide, who I've gone into detail about my hatred of in several posts, but the TLDR is that she comes off as some kind of mouthpiece character? Not a mouthpiece as in for the author's beliefs, but it literally feels like she only exists to shit on Optimus and call him a piece of shit. Her dialogue is so cheesily written ("literally fascism" is an actual thing she says) and her bitching/lack of cultural comprehension about Cybertronian history is so prevalent, that for a long time during my IDW1 reading I was genuinely confused as to whether she was supposed to be some sort of parody/strawman/mockery of someone IRL (her character comes off almost EXACTLY like an anti-SJW stereotype of a screeching harpy calling everyone she dislikes a fascist, and it's only Barber's very obviously left-leaning writing in other parts of the story that told me that definitely wasn't the intent). So then I was wondering "okay is she gonna like, randomly become evil and turn against the good guys because she's just that petty? I mean she spends all of her time bitching about how Optimus/the Autobots/Cybertronians in general are the worst ever and she also hates humans too so I mean maybe? Half of this story already doesn't make sense so I can see it happening."

Thankfully that didn't happen, but like. Slide is so goddamn annoying and ignorant and gets way too much page time dedicated to her angry monologuing (in Unicron aka the finale of IDW1 there's literally a whole half page panel of her bitching about how Optimus is an evil tyrant while Trypticon is dying behind her and it comes off as a poorly timed, bad taste joke). The narrative treats her like she's some important individual whose feelings are important and valid, but she's fucking annoying. Any sympathy she was meant to garner is canceled out by badly written dialogue and the fact that she's a Literal Nobody of a character who seemingly only exists to bash the decades old, beloved legacy characters. For the sake of, idk, talking about how fucked up Cybertronians are that they just shrug and move on when people die? Bc apparently it's some sort of sin to be numb after 4 million years of war (and war that's literally still ongoing while Slide is bitching) and just soldier on trying to get through it? God forbid that a military hierarchy fighting to keep neo-Decepticons and various other alien threats from colonizing Earth be run like a military in which orders have to be followed, people die, but you still have to keep fighting anyways? Idefk man I just hate Slide so much she's basically the embodiment of all of the bad aspects of Barber's writing personified.

10. Most disliked arc? Why?

Mutineers arc in MTMTE/LL. I feel like (whether due to early cancellation and/or JRO wasting time on too many side plots to give it its full depth), I dislike how the mutineers were basically boiled down to pure evil morons who are the most disgusting, despicable evil ever and the only reason the mutiny had Good Guys (TM) in it was because they were horribly misled and not because, you know, the mutiny was 100% a valid thing to have happened as retaliation against Rodimus and Megatron's captaincy.

Like, I'm not opposed to the idea of Getaway and his cronies being assholes (I personally thought Getaway was a GREAT slow-burn, puppet master villain/anti-hero), I just dislike how the quality of their writing degraded from MTMTE to LL. Felt like they (Getaway in particular) got passed the Idiot Ball and then the actual reasons behind the mutiny were never addressed, it was kind of just "oh Getaway died horribly so we're all friends now and we forgive each other and Rodimus/Megatron will just go back to being captains now."

11. Is there an unpopular character you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why?

You mean besides IDW Optimus because anyone who's been on my blog for like 5 seconds knows he's my biggest problematic fave skldfjskd

Uhhh I guess in the spirit of the previous question, Getaway. I feel like the fandom's hatred for him is overblown mainly bc it's a combination of Tailgate/Cyga/te fans going "HE GOT IN THE WAY OF C/YGA/TE AND ALMOST KILLED THAT PRECIOUS CINNAMON ROLL" and Rodimus or Megatron stans going "Getaway hates my fave?? But my fave is a good captain and deserves the world HE'S EVIL MY FAVORITE IS BEYOND CRITICISM OR REPROACH GETAWAY IS THE EMBODIMENT OF EVIL."

Like to me it seems as if the hate for Getaway isn't normal dislike or even people hating him because he's a well written villain. It feels weirdly like ppl really take Getaway's actions personally and hate him with the kind of passion you normally see reserved for actual real life horrible people. Or they like, see Getaway as an obstacle to [favorite character]'s happiness and not as an individual who, before the quality of his writing tanked, was actually an interesting character who maybe even had good points? It just feels like people mainly hate Getaway because he's the antagonist to more popular characters/ships and so they project their defense of their faves into virulently hating him.

13. Unpopular opinion about (Optimus)?

Honestly 90% or more of the fan content I see for Optimus is really boring/uncompelling to me, or really just comes off as out of character. It's either Optimus being reduced to an accessory to be shipped with someone (usually turned into some sort of moe cutesy uke type) or him being turned into.... idk some permutation of "feral irresponsible gremlin" or "One Of The Good Ones (TM)" or "anxiety-ridden damsel who needs to be rescued by his lover" or, in some circles, "character I project my issues with authority onto and try to frame as evil for things that aren't even evil."

Idk how to specifically describe it, it's just... a vibe? Most of the Optimus content I see doesn't actually feel like him at all. It feels like it's Optimus/Orion in name only, who got so separated from canon and distorted by fanon/flanderization/shipping/porn stereotypes that he now only vaguely resembles the character he's supposed to be.

20. What is the purest ship in the fandom?

Ahahaha I don't really go into the realm of pure ships honestly, plus this is the war criminal fandom where pretty much every character has killed people or committed crimes or is just generally scarred by war so uhhh

Idk I think Thundercracker/Melissa is a pretty hinged ship? They get along and cope surprisingly well with all the shit that happens. There's no angst or betrayals or misunderstandings or enemies, they're just very respectfully together. Sdfklsajfksd

25. How would you end (IDW1)/Would you change the ending of (IDW1)?

Honestly, I'm pretty satisfied with the ending of IDW1 on both sides of the story. On Barber's side I would've preferred if every single planet including Cybertron didn't get fucking eaten leaving them all stuck on Earth together, and I would've also kept Trypticon alive while... minimizing Slide's role, to say the least. I don't have a problem with Optimus' ending bc I actually think that Optimus' arc in Unicron is like, one of the few 1000% good things Barber wrote for him it's just. It's pure Optimus in his best form.

On JRO's side I would've cut out the last panel with the alternate Lost Light and left it ambiguous as to whether the quantum jump successfully copied the ship or not. I dislike the vibes of the canon ending that implied that everyone moving on with their lives (almost universally to new and exciting and happier places) was the "sad" ending and going on a permanent road trip is the "true, happy" ending. In the author's notes I think JRO said that he wanted to give the readers an ending that would allow them to imagine their faves continuing to go on adventures, but I think compromising a good ending to a story to appease fans is fucking stupid + fandom has never needed permission or approval from the author to write alternate, happy endings. So why ruin a poignant, melancholy ending about how endings come with new beginnings and sadness/nostalgia can be mixed with hope and happiness by going "sike lol they're all living happily ever after on their space cruise."

Also I wouldn't have randomly killed off Ratchet for no reason because like. What was that even supposed to accomplish. I'm no stranger to writing major character deaths but like. He just fucking died of disease off-screen and that was that??? Why, like what was the narrative/symbolic purpose of that besides just making the ending more sad? Maybe to emphasize how going back to Cybertron was the "bad ending" and the quantum Lost Light is the "good ending" since on the LL Ratchet is still alive? But see the paragraph above for why I don't like that.

26. Most shippable character?

The most shippable character to me is whichever character I think is the sexiest, because if I think they're sexy it makes me want to ship them with everyone. "Guards, fuck that man for me" etc etc. Lmao

[just-absolutely-super]

Final review of the Prime Wars Trilogy, here are my thoughts on Power of the Primes

you can find my reviews on Combine Wars and Titans Return in the links provided

So Combine Wars set the bar super low, and then Titans Return was a step in the right direction

Power of the Primes...while not as bad as CW (like I said, that one set the bar pretty low), I still wasn't really impressed with this. I went from hopeful with it, to extremely meh, and then at the end I kinda hate it a little

Maybe I'm just looking at it from a very biased perspective but this just...bothered me so much, and I'm not that hardcore of a TF fan enough to articulate why it bothered me so much

But I'm gonna try. Sorry if this is just turns into an all-over-the-place rant, but that's the only way I can convey my feelings on this:

Okay, let's start with something general about the series that I kinda noticed after watching TR. It seems like it just takes itself too seriously. From what I read, this trilogy was meant to be more mature but like...c'mon guys, this is Transformers we're talking about. It's a big elaborate marketing scheme. Why are we being edgy about it? I mean, even the Bay movies had their moments of silliness

It got to the point I started associating it to the '86 movie in regards to the character deaths. I'm not one to complain too much about death, I know there are times and places for it, but after the 4th one I was just like...okay really, was all that necessary?

It also pisses me off because they revived Optimus (who died at the very end of TR btw) at the very last second, but refused to revive all the other character deaths. Yes, Optimus is known to die and get revived, and we all love him for that, but he only gets revived because...somehow Solas Prime going back to being completely dead allowed the Matrix to revive him? I didn't...really get it. I'm trying not to be mad about it, but it was one of those things where I'm just like...bro you either shouldn't have died in the first place or you should have stayed dead

(ngl I'm just salty in general that Optimus was only here for 10 minutes, they only killed him off because it's just what you have to do)

Getting into the story, though, I don't think the plot was terrible, but it didn't hit right for me. Like I went into this thinking we were going to see all previous Primes coming together to stop Megatronus the Fallen, but no. Megatronus and Solas Primes were the only Primes we see (not counting Optimus, Rodimus, and Optimal Optimus). DID WE NOT LEARN FROM CW ABOUT FALSE ADVERTISING??? SMH

But even if it wasn't the worst plot in the world, some things just didn't make sense. Like how is mass genocide supposed to revive Solas Prime's spark? Is sacrificing every single spark of a transformer the requirement to bring back one Prime? And even then, when she shows up as a ghost thing everyone is still alive and kicking. Then they remove the artifacts completely from the machine keeping her spirit around AND IT'S STILL THERE

I MAY BE STUPID AND JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND, BUT IT BUGGED ME THE ENTIRE FINAL BATTLE

And Unicron is also involved because of fucking course we have to involve Unicron! And I hated it because he possessed Hot Rod the entire freaking time and made my boy kill people! To the point that in the end that trauma will stay with him and Optimus implies he'll never recover from the guilt!

FUCK YOU! LOOK WHAT YOU DID TO MY BOY!

AND ANOTHER THING ABOUT THAT ENDING THAT WAS STUPID

THEY ENDED IT ON A CLIFFHANGER SHOWING THAT STARSCREAM SURVIVED AND IS ALIVE

YOU ARE NOT FOLLOWING UP WITH THIS, WHAT THE ABSOLUTE FUCK IS THIS ENDING SUPPOSED TO IMPLY??????

sigh.......

Moving on (no, sadly, I'm not done)

Another thing that kinda bugged me here was the continuity. I went into this thinking it was just its own thing and it would have sprinkles of references here and there like any other TF media I've been consuming. As I kept watching, it seems this is like a mashup of G1 and the comics (IDW in particular maybe? though some aspects seem to be taken from other comics). I don't think this is a bad thing, but there were moments where I found myself just being like...am I supposed to know this stuff?

I'm a basic enough fan that I know most of these characters and the lore, but there are so many things that I had to rely on a database for to better understand characters and plot. For example, during my watch of CW, I had to look up the Camiens to get a better idea who they were because I haven't touched anything they're a part of yet. And now here with Overlord, who was introduced in the Japanese G1 continuity before the comics picked him up, we learn that he associates with Unicron and The Fallen in order to get revenge on Megatron and I'm just sitting here like...revenge for what?

I wouldn't call this a very glaring flaw, as I'm sure this trilogy was made with hardcore TF fans in mind and not newcomers, but for anyone who is very new to the franchise, they won't have a lot of understanding of some things. Anything you don't know or if there are things you haven't heard of, you need to do extra research

Also I'm not a Beast Wars expert (as has been brought to my attention numerous times throughout my dive into TF media lol) but from what little I have gathered, the Maximals are like...meant to be descendants of the Autobots, right? But Optimus Primal here in this age guarding the Requiem Blaster for who knows how long? I know he won some kind of poll they did as promotional matieral, so maybe that's why they put him here? Or maybe there was a retcon somewhere in 40 years where he and other Maximals are around during the age of the Autobots, and they put him in this particular position because he's cool, I'm so tired of digging through the wiki to understand this stuff...

(side note: while it's cool that they got Ron Perlman to voice Primal (and apparently he plays him in the movie ROTB so that's cool), part of me wishes they brought back Garry Chalk to reprise the role. No disrespect to Ron, I just think Garry's cool)

Characterization-wise...honestly the only people I can really comment on are Megatron, Perceptor, and Grimlock. Perceptor is...Perceptor. ngl he kinda annoyed me during all of this, but he kinda annoyed me in G1 too so that tracks. And Me, Grimlock is always nice to see. You can't really go wrong with Grimlock tbh. It was super cool seeing him and the other Dinobots turn into Volcanicus

But for Megatron, I guess this trilogy was presented as some kind of redemption arc for him because he grew from regular antagonist, to anti-hero, to an actual heroic figure. He still has that typical Megatron attitude, so him being thrown into this position didn't feel forced to me. It was actually fun watching him at times. I just kinda wish Optimus was alive to lead with him. It would have been nice to see them working together and mending a friendship that the trilogy implied they did have (Optimus referring to him as his brother like in other continuities)

You all know my feelings about how they treated Rod...

Megatronus was kinda cool I guess, and his plot to bring back his lost love was interesting. It's just weird to me that it took him now after millennia of his banishment (which was apparently self-inflicted???) to think of this plan to revive Solas. What, did Megatron taking on his name and doing evil during the Great War in honor of the first Decepticon intrigue him so much he decided to put the plan on the backburner? It kind of was a long-game sort of thing but I still kept wondering why he chose now of all times?

Solas Prime...eh I guess? I think she's an interesting character, and her basically solving the conflict by being like, "If I'm dying I'm taking you with me because you're literally fucking everything up," was definitely something. I am confused on how exactly she died in the first place. Like the Requiem Blaster wasn't even facing her when it went off. It looked like it blew up the entire area but Megatronus--who was literally inches away from her--wasn't effected at all? I watched that scene twice and I still didn't really understand what happened...

Ugh, overall it was very underwhelming as a finale for the trilogy. The action didn't hit like in TR, and the plot dragged a lot for me. Maybe if you're a hardcore Optimus Primal fan you'd be into it, but I don't know him that well yet so for now...I missed Robot Dad, and Robot Son deserved better

4/10 rating

[autobots-and-their-crazy-kids]

If you guys are salty about how the TFP Autobots let Megatron go, imagine how the TFP humans feel about it?

Jack: So, let me get this straight... Unicron had awakened and had somehow brought Megatron back to life... And you let him go...

Raf: Despite all the horrible things that he's done...

Miko: Including trying to destroy the whole world?!

Bumblebee: ...Yes?

(And that's the true reason why the TFP humans aren't around in RID 2015!)

[seeking-the-stars]

💜 Decepticon Redemptions Rankings:

G1 Skyfire: Even though Skyfire was never evil and he was tricked to believe that the Decepticons were heroes, the tragic former friendship he has with Starscream is beautiful! I loved how he risked his life to save the Autobots and the humans! I’m pretty salty they changed his name to Jetfire and him basically becoming the Autobot’s flying taxi and they never really did anything with his broken friendship with Starscream after Skyfire’s first episode... 9/10 

BW Dinobot (even though he’s a predacon): What makes Dinobot interesting is that he joins the heroes aka the Maximals at the start of the show (cause Optimus liked his sense of honor), but he mostly did it for selfish reasons (like wanting to destroy Megatron and become Maximal Leader) and was still kinda a jerky warrior... However, he slowly begins to care about his team, the Earth and it’s future. He was willing to die for them not once but twice. His death is a shame, but at least he died with dignity... 8/10 

BW Blackarachnia: Like her as a villian, but her wishing to be a Maximal as well as her romance with Silverbolt feels kinda forced to me... 2/10

BW Silverbolt: He’s pretty heroic, but his story leaving the predacons feels similar to Skyfire leaving the Decepticons... 5/10

TFP Knockout: I love Knockout, but him wishing to become an Autobot and how he joined them is probably the second most forced (and last minute) redemption I’ve ever seen in a Transformers cartoon and the fact that all he had to do to redeem himself in the Autobots’ eyes is to attack Starscream (who’s already been through hell) makes me depressed... 1/10

TFP Megatron: The most forced (and last minute) redemption I’ve ever seen in a Transformers cartoon! He’s also a bigger coward then Starscream cause he’d rather die in space then suffer the consequences for his actions! Frag this bot! 0/10 

RID 2015 Grimlock: I like him, but it’s weird how the moment he’s free from his stasis pod he’s so willing to attack his fellow Decepticons and join the Autobots. There was no build up. Maybe if they made him a secret Decepticon spy, who learns to care about the Autobots and humanity, his story would be much more interesting... 3/10

Armada Starscream: I honestly might be biased on this, however this Starscream’s story and redemption is my favorite because this Starscream cared about others (the minicons) before becoming an Autobot as well as learning to care about humans (especially Alexis)! He was willing to fight (and be killed) by the dark god Unicron to convince Megatron/Galvatron/The Decepticons to create an alliance with Optimus Prime/The Autobots to destroy Unicron together! He’s the reason the universe was saved! 10/10

[toaarcan]

Arright so 

I while back I made a post where I chronicled my disappointment with TFP Megatron upon learning that he was basically just the IDW version of Megatron without the nuance or depth.

Like take the IDW one, imagine that instead of gradually losing he way because of circumstance the corruption of power, he just got really salty that his boyfriend got bigger approval for saying “No murder” instead of “Yes murder”, add a space-coke addiction, and you’ve got TFP Megatron.

But then the other day I had a revelation that changed everything, and made me re-evaluate my stance on the Prime incarnation of Megatron from the ground up.

He’s not a poor man’s IDW Megatron.

He’s G1 Galvatron.

Seriously, this dumbass pops out of a portal, goes to Earth and within the span of, like, a year at most, completely fucks up the perfectly adequate operation that Starscream is running, runs through a bunch of hairbrained schemes where he keeps getting distracted by fights with his ex, and then dies.

Seems like a mediocre resume, especially considering for all the show treats Starscream’s bragging about killing Cliffjumper, that is a 100% increase on any of the other Decepticons in terms of killing Autobots.* Megatron gets zero Autobot kills.** So yes, Starscream should be in charge, because not only did Megatron’s return kick-start the chain of events that ended the war, but the only thing Megatron kills are Vehicons.

*Seaspray and Tailgate don’t count, they weren’t even characters.

**Bumblebee doesn’t count, he was dead for like three seconds and then got back up and put a sword bigger than he is through Megatron’s chest.

So yeah, that was disappointing, but then I worked it out. He comes back from wherever he fucked off to between the prequel books and Darkness Rising with his space-cocaine, and the space-cocaine is the Blood of Unicron. He’s a raving lunatic that keeps everyone in-line by fear instead of actually inspiring loyalty. He assaults and outright murders his own troops.

He’s Galvatron.

And, for a moment, I was happy. I’d cracked the code and I was now able to enjoy him as something unique.

But now I’m disappointed again because we don’t have an episode where Soundwave finally runs out of patience and teams up with Starscream and Knock-Out to send Megatron to the Therapy Planet. 

[starscream7799]

My Top 5 In order:

G1 Starscream- The sassiest, saltiest, most bratty, but intelligent of all Starscreams. A personal top fav forever. He was so legit. Had the BEST voice imo for any Starscream, Chris Latta was a boss, I love his unique voice for SS. This Starscream got shit done! After he was banished from the Decepticons, he washed up on a deserted island and fucking made his own combiner after stealing their chips from a prison on Cybertron, and then proceeded to beat up Megatron successfully with said combiner. And then later after the G1 Movie, after everyone else had died, Starscream fucking came back as a ghost and tricked Unicron!! !! ! - Even further, he appeared after the series ended and had an entire Beast Wars episode dedicated to this version of Starscream. He was like a lovable cockroach. 

TFA Starscream- This was a tie between IDW, and I’ll explain why in a sec. But this Starscream is great, he’s got that ambition that he had in G1, the guts to stand up, that hint of self preservation most Starscreams have, and he has a great voice to match. He was salty and sarcastic as well as incredibly sneaky. His relationship in Megatron wasn’t even as bad in this series as it usually was. He and Megatron argued with each other equally, and since this Megatron was actually competent, Starscream was made to be just as sly to match.

IDW Starscream- I really loved this Starscream back during the earlier IDW comics and the Windblade comics. That’s just about where it ends though. But let me start with the good things here. I really love his frame design in the Windblade comics, 117/10, god tier, good job Sarah Stone. After he becomes ruler of Cybertron, he actually is competent enough to pick up some of the pieces Megatron and Optimus left behind on their broken planet. Starscream, as deceitful as he can be, was actually trying to restore Cybertron back to something better than it was (Even if it was just to make himself look good, you can’t say he didn’t actually do anything good for Cybertron, he absolutely did). And then we follow this character through the whole Windblade comics and watch him and Windblade herself try to keep Cybertron together and reach out to other colonies. They work together, despite hating one another, and they even get so far as to be able to tolerate each other on occasion. Starscream grows and learns from mistakes and for once Cybertron actually isn’t so bad. Starscream literally was left to fix what ages of war had destroyed, and he did an okay job at it. I’m proud of him. - The bad things about this Starscream and why I prefer TFA over him? How they handled him in Till All Are One. I loved TAAO at first, I drew fanart for it, wrote fics, and roleplayed this Starscream. But after more time passed and the comic began to come to a close, I realized that things were going backwards? The writer, as great a job she did portraying Starscream in the Windblade comics, was regressing his character in TAAO, and that made me upset. The whole ending ruined this Starscream for me, and not just because his “True Form” was ugly as fuck lol. It was because the Starscream who was changing for the better, who was depressed, had been psychologically damaged, and was tormented with PTSD, was thrown back down into hell all over again. In the comic, they put Starscream in prison. I could argue so many other mechs who deserve to be in prison than Starscream, but it happened anyway. It was so disappointing to me to see this, as if everything Starscream actually went through in the comics was disregarded and thrown in the trash. Anyway that’s my little rant about IDW SS.

TFP Starscream- My first impressions of this Starscream were.... meh. But then I started watching more of the show and I loved him. I definitely had to get used to his voice change, from screechy to chain smoker. However, I am sad to see just how much physical abuse is used with this Starscream, as always. The fandom presents him as a huge coward, but like if you knew how abuse could affect someone, you’d realize just why Starscream acted “Cowardly” the way he did. He was also pretty small too, so I don’t blame him for not wanting to face literally anyone but small TFs like Arcee or KnockOut or whatever lol. I honestly do love this Starscream, he’s a little funky and different from the other incarnations of him, but I still like him for this show.

Armada Starscream- This Starscream was always interesting to me because he sorta began like the other Starscreams and had that ambitious nature to him, but then later on we see that he’s not very similar to the other Starscreams. He’s very noble in this show, but also plays the game to win. And this was the first time we really saw a Decepticon befriend a human or really did anything decently kind at all.  - This Starscream started off wanting Megatron’s praise and would do what his leader said, but then he realized just how shitty Megatron is! I like the wiki’s definition of this, “Starscream may have once been compassionate, he may once have known what true friendship is, but all that has been replaced, scab for scab, with the lessons of Megatron's abuse. Unwittingly, Megatron may have created a monster even he cannot ultimately control.” And I love that. He definitely can’t be controlled, but he’s also kinda lost throughout the series, switching sides. - Ultimately in the end, he sacrificed himself to save both sides. And wow, that definitely made me tear up when I first watched it. _______ Anyway, that’s the list of my top 5 favorite Starscreams and why. I know I wasn’t asked why, but I wrote it anyway. And I may be rusty on my information, because honestly I haven’t watched any of these shows or read the stuff in ages djhfgjhf

[evilsciencebros]

Agathrights: This local bug literally lives in a box and Megatron lets it crawl around inside of him to do repairs, News At 10.

evilsciencebros: You made him 10x awesome in ways I never would have expected! I love your fountain of imagination. LMAO *snuggles up inside the warrior poet*

agatharights: I kinda had the vague idea of making him either a true minicon or an uplift a while ago so it was fun to finally flesh that out!Who doesn't want to crawl around inside of megatron. it'd be cozy

evilsciencebros: *huggles the swiss army knife* He's perfect *squishes down into pancake mode*

agatharights: He just squish down.The only problem with being an uplift is that -actual- scraplets will probably follow him if given the chance, because this scraplet is bigger and smarter so clearly it has more food!And i'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that a nonsapient swarm of dumb, hungry metallovores makes for poor company, unless you're in an autobot base in which case HEY NEW FRIENDS EAT EVERYTHING

evilsciencebros: The perfect drone army. They're not allowed in the Decepticon base

agatharightsyeah: probably a good idea to not bring those homeThey can't tell the difference between autobots and Decepticons and while Oil Slick is pretty unpalateable to everything (both Junkions and Unicronians refuse to eat him, which is impressive) everybody else...

evilsciencebros: Bless. He probably has a little hidey hole for them, so they don't go wondering off. Either that, or just kills/eats them, like Movie Scalpel did with that creepy worm thing that crawled through Sam's head. LOL. Everything keeps trying to eat Oil Slick and fails miserably XD

agatharights: I'd imagine so. Scalpel can probably eat virtually anything, if given enough time for his teensy tiny mouth, since he's still got a scraplet digestive system.

evilsciencebrosI: eat with his butt

agatharights: They had to remove most of the scraplet mouth/jaws though to make room for an actual brain.

evilsciencebros: Tiny brain. An Archive worth of knowledge. That's an impressive memory chip he's got

agatharights: Excellent quantum linkage with his spark for memory storage. Whatever company made him probably priced him pretty high- he would've been top-tier medical equipment at the time

evilsciencebros: ^w^ He is one of a kind

agatharights: "He is one of a kind" "Because everything else in his production line was disposed of when they became obsolete or were deemed too high-risk." you can even ask Optimus but like "What was Cybertron like?" "It was beautiful, and terrible."

evilsciencebros: it was beautiful...but at the same time, on fire

agatharights: Well, to be fair, on fire was more after Megatron finally started calming down and realized he maaaay have literally killed Primus and was like "Mm. Okay. I'll admit, I got a little out of hand.""Lets...lets just go find a new planet."

evilsciencebros: *sweeps the old planet under the rug.* Don't worry, we can still fix this

agatharights: And then he left Cybertron, a post-apocalyptic wasteland, and somehow by the time he got back Shockwave had made it worse and he was like how did you do this? When I left this was a heap of scrap that was on fire and full of electrical storms? WHY IS IT FULL OF ZOMBIES AND PREDACONS NOW? And Shockwave was like "i thought you were never coming back ever so I panicked"

agatharights: Shockwave is the master of "picked up necromancy as a hobby, made some mistakes"

evilsciencebros: This is what happens when you don't return people's phone calls. they join cults

agatharights: And if there's no cults to join, they make their own, and when you finally show back up they're like heyyyyyy...the good news is, Cybertron's not dead, the bad news is, neither are the Insecticons and now there's so many of them.

evilsciencebros: On the bright side there's a cool spider lady who keeps them in check...when she doesn't wanna eat you herself

agatharights: I dunno about that. Season Three of TF: Matrix is basically slotted to be "Blackarachnia is pissed Megatron ditched her on Cybertron, has been selectively breeding an army of insecticons and predacons to take it out on him" Megatron, and who can blame him, was like "Alright, we need to get everyone we can off the planet before the spacebridges go dark...but do i want to be stuck in a tube floating in space with a bunch of self-replicating cannibals? Do i really?"And then effectively gave the Insecticons/predacons the wrong time/place and took off without them and they've been salty about it for a few centuries

evilsciencebros: Megatron. Can't break up with someone to save his life. Instead changes his phone number and address, and pretends to be shocked when they finally run into each other years later.

agatharights: ...god I'm terrible because the first thing that pops into my head is "Clearly, he learned that from Orion"

agatharights: Since Orion basically ditched Megatron as soon as the Decepticons started getting too hot for him to handle and then Megatron didn't see him again until he was working with Sentinel Prime centuries later.And he was like  " :) This is fine" And promptly murdered them both.

evilsciencebros: Cybertron. Died because of poor communication

agatharights: Pretty much.Which, to be fair, this problem didn't start with Megatron and Orion, this problem probably started the moment Prima was like "Guys, I know the thirteen of us are pretty happy, but what if we made a few billion more people?"

agatharights sent a GIF

evilsciencebros: I don't see any downsides to this.

agatharights: Downsides: Quintessons were like hey, uhhhh looks like you have...a lot of people there. Can we...borrow some??????"no piss off Quintessons"

agatharights: And then Unicron was like HEYYYYY LOOKS LIKE YOU HAVE A LOT OF PEOPLE THERE...CAN I DEVOUR EVERYTHING??? "NO PISS OFF UNICRON" (and then Nova Prime was like "Hey, what if institutionalized racism?" and instead of going "no piss off Nova" people were like "yeah okay" and that's Cybertronian history) The ghost of Solus Prime shaking her head like come on you guys I did not make all this shit that can literally cause miracles just so you could immediately start conquering and murdering things but she was dead so nobody listened to her

evilsciencebros: immortals need hobbies too. The only ones allowed to traumatise their OCs are them.

agatharights: "these are my OCs the entire Cybertronain race. original idea, do not steal." (and then the Quintessons, who created Primus and Unicron, were like WHOA PLAGARISM) Also oh no I realized the saddest thing that could happen to Scalpel

evilsciencebros: !!!!!

agatharights: Scalpel would've been an actual Scraplet, if very briefly (probably plucked right from a natural forge) before he was modified into a, well, a person, rather than a parasite. Which is all well and good, uplifts weren't uncommon for a long time, though they're very rare post-war

agatharights: But if he attacked Buster and Buster panicked there'd be a chance Buster's matrix abilities- including the ability to "repair" virtually anything Cybertronian given enough energy, would kick in- and Scalpel could be reverted into a Scraplet. It briefly happens to Ravage, but Ravage shares a spark with Soundwave- so Soundwave is able to re-activate his uplift status by restoring his spark (and Buster is very sorry like yeah okay the Decepticons have regularly tried to kidnap him as a power source but he didn't mean to hurt anyone!)But Scalpel being turned back into a Scraplet, even if it were temporary, sounds like a nightmare for him. Turned into a literally brainless creature (scraplets have no processors- their actions are directly connected to their spark rather than utilizing a processor)

evilsciencebros: ;-; poor baby

agatharights: He keeps biting Oil Slick and then being surprised and angry when Oil Slick tastes bad but he has no memory at the time. So he keeps trying bc Oil Slick carries him off to try and fix him ;-;

evilsciencebros: <3

agatharights: awwgh that's so sad i'm putting that in the "horrible things to potentially do to characters" folder

evilsciencebros: My boys. Looking out for each other ;3;

evilsciencebrosYou should feel bad! Poor Scalpel, reduced to something less than an animals, and poor Oil Slick trying to care for his little buddy.

agatharights: Someone on the team suggests that they should put Scalpel out of his misery, that they don't want to risk him eating someone and producing more scraplets, and Oil Slick gets so angry about it he has to leave for a lil bit, just to clear his head before he does something stupid like drop a white phosphorous grenade on them)He'd have to get fixed, eventually, but until then Oil Slick can keep him in a box and feed him scraps

evilsciencebros: OMG I hope he gets better one day! Poor Oil Slick trying, and failing, to bring Scalpel back, but unwilling to snuff out his little spark.He will murder that human boy >:/

agatharights: jskdlfaj if he confronted Buster the poor kid would be like ???!!! Because he'd have no idea what he'd done, and once he knew he'd freak out and start bawling because he didn't mean to! He's so sorry! He can fix it- he can, he can try, at least? "I don't want to hurt anyone! Please, just lemme try to fix it..."

evilsciencebros: He is very fortunate that Oil Slick is desperate and revenge can wait.Now stop pouring lubricant out of your optics and do your work weird god magic shit.

agatharights: akfdljsaf poor babies. At least Buster can probably undo it. Might take a bit, though, and a lot of energy. he'd konk right out afterwards, and Scalpel just re-grew an entire brain so he's very tired too.

[verdigrisprowl]

Mar 6 Lost Light Stream - Transformers Prime: Predacons Rising

At last, it’s over. Prowl spent the evening on hand-holding duty. Magnus showed up; Prowl asked if he had any progress on Tyrest, and Magnus said no.

Missed the start.

Rodimus: ((lol Rodimus: ((rodimus does love star wars FakeProwl: *surveys the room, then claims his usual spot next to Slendy's other side* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave nods to both allies and tries to make himself as comfortable as possible.* Rodimus: So---- what one you guys on? FakeProwl: ((roddy your music is very very quiet and your skype alerts are loud)) Bruin: (is the screen black ??) ItsyBitsySpyers: *And, yes, there is a small scorch mark by the left knee.* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[We are on the final documentary tape - the last assault.]] FakeProwl: ((thank)) Txen: *could repair that* Shockbox: *Notes to himself that he'll have to catch up on the others later.* Shockbox: *Surely he won't be missing that much context....?* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Could also, BUT wouldn't say no if the offer is made later.* Txen: *Darksteel is visibly excited, though his tails length makes wagging into more of a full-hindquarters affair* Whirl: ((dinner is acquired at last)) Whirl: *crosses his legs, spreads his arms over the back of his couch, and looks between his companions* Sup, you two? Rodimus: *passes a snack up to lazerbeak before pulling out his datapad to flip video files frown a slight frown on his face* Whirl: I'd offer you the use of my footstool but he won't be able to make it tonight, I don't think. Your feet are ontheir own. Txen: DS: *hops in place in a way that shakes the ground slightly* Tonight's the night! My BIG DEBYOO... Rodimus: I need one more song until im ready then. Airachnd: [a shrug] Nothing too exciting on my side of the multiverse. FakeProwl: *notices that tiny scorch* Sorida changed their nickname to Bee. Bee changed their nickname to Bee. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy bops Darksteel on one shoulder.* \\YO. IT'S GETTIN' REAL TALL IN HERE. MIND?\\ In other words, can he sit on Darksteel for a better view. Rodimus: *seriously doubts the deck would be bounced* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Laserbeak chitters happily and noms the HECK outta that snack* Txen: Darksteel: Huh? *looks left, then right, then down* Oh! Sure thing, guy. Sorida: [gonna just slide in] Txen: ((not bounced. still makes vibrations)) Sorida changed their nickname to Bumblebee. Rodimus: ((dont upset the science deck =) ItsyBitsySpyers: //Eh. Been worse.// That's all Rumble will say about that. Deflection time. //Where's Chill?// Whirl: Same. *shrugs, this is a huge lie, since Whirl has, since the last time he saw her, met some mechs to arrange a secret and very illegal operation, but shh nobody needs to know* Txen: DS: *dips one shoulder so it's easier to clamber on* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy scrambles up Darksteel with a FRAG YEAH and gets comfy. Soundwave nods to Bee.* Whirl: *he will very subtly nudge Rumble in unspoken acknowledgement; it's an imporvement, he supposes* He's ill. Something to do with those greyfaces, poor guy. Airachnd: [she has plans too,and how legal it is, well, it's quite questionable] Smokescreen: :O did I actually come on time this time?? Bruin: *Specter has decide its time to be tall as well and is going to kick Spotter off Bruin's helm with a squawk* Airachnd: Yes. Sorida: (( c'mon livestream do the thing )) Whirl: I offered to help the best way I know how--which is to say, I got him blackout drunk for a period of time. It's a tried and true cure for most ailments. Airachnd: rip)) Rodimus: It seem so Smokey Sorida changed their nickname to Bumblebee. Smokescreen: Whoa. That's pretty rare! Also Rodimus Rodimusrodimus- /He's going to go over to see if he can sit with Rodimus!/ Rodimus: get out and come back in fashionably late! *grins* Bumblebee changed their nickname to Bumblebee. Txen: DS: *is pretty spiky, but he's also broad. there's probably a comfy spot between his wings* Smokescreen: Haha- I'm a trendsetter! Coming in on time! Bumblebee: [nods back at Soundwave] Rodimus: *you can join him but rodimus has his feet on the seat and but on the back of the couch* Bumblebee: Proud of you, Smokey. ItsyBitsySpyers: //Frag greyfaces,// Rumble says while Laserbeak laughs at poor Spotter. ItsyBitsySpyers: *And Frenzy's pretty spiky himself, so he doesn't really mind. Good thing he's smallish.* Whirl: They're usually more trouble than they're worth. Being turned into a bird WAS fun, though. Smokescreen: Aww, thanks, Beepbee. Whirl: *swivels his helm around to look at DS and SL* So, this is when you two chuckleheads finally show up? Rodimus: ((who is da bee? Smokescreen: /Smokescreen's gonna try sitting like Rodimus here! It looks cool to him, at least./ ItsyBitsySpyers: ((radioactivibee, yeah?)) Bumblebee: (( radioactivibee ^-^ )) Txen: Skylynx: Unfortunatel-- Shockbox: *Ah, it is starting!* Txen: Darksteel: *interrupts* YOU KNOW IT. Smokescreen: :OO It's starting! Bumblebee: (( ALSO did not realize like, hasbro studios is in Pawtucket, RI )) Whirl: *snickers* Smokescreen: ((oh yep Rodimus: Were is their NAILs? ItsyBitsySpyers: *All right. He can do this. He doesn't have memories of this. Only recordings. Long, slow vent.* Starscream: *slides in quietly* Bumblebee: ...A NAIL? Txen: ((the budget ate them roddy)) Whirl: Probably where they belong--scattered all around the galaxy. Rodimus: Thats a patchic sized gather Optimus... Airachnd: Non affiliated indigionous lifeform. Rodimus: I meant to ask-- your Cybertron not call everyone back? Smokescreen: ... Yeah, Optimus never made that speech here. Bumblebee: We did after this. Starscream: Why do they have a statue of him? boomtank: . . . Whirl: Non affiliated pains in the aft, more like it. Bumblebee: We were kinda the first back and we were about to send out the signal when this scrap happened. Airachnd: Because he ordered it. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Looks at Shockwave. Questions will mostly be his to answer tonight.* Whirl: Oh, THIS nimrod again... Smokescreen: That's Kaon! That was like. Megatron's house basically ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave pings Starscream a polite greeting.* Bumblebee: Yeah. And surprisingly, really well maintained compared to the other city states. Airachnd: He SIEZED Kaon. Smokescreen: ..... wait ONCE flowed through his veins? so like. if you ever have dark energon you can't... Txen: *nods at Smokescreen's explanation* The statue was erected prior to our final exodus. Bumblebee: He seized a lot of things, ok? Starscream: But shouldn't they... get rid of it or something? FakeProwl: *oh. that's unicron. prowl is probably going to be on hand-holding duty tonight.* Airachnd: It was never really his, he took it. Bruin: (i forgot unicron was so damn Irish)) Bumblebee: Oh just wait. Airachnd: [she's trying to ignore what's on screen] Starscream: hahaha serves him right Smokescreen: ...... boomtank: Oh....uh...yeahno Bumblebee: ...So that's what happened. Whirl: So... the lesson here is. Don't just destroy Unicron's BODY. Whirl: You need something that'll kill his, er, "soul," as it were, too. Bumblebee: Pay up Smokey, I didn't fragging miss his spark.. Smokescreen: ... Yeah, this isn't my universe, at least. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Yes.]] Txen: ((squints at chat lag.... are my posts even showing up)) Whirl: Have we figured out how to do that yet? *swivels his helm to look between Soundwave and Shockwave* Smokescreen: Okay, okay, sorry, Bee! FakeProwl: ((that one did)) Bumblebee: [slightly salty that nobody acknowledges the rank change] ItsyBitsySpyers: ((one did earlier txen)) Bumblebee: (( nah i got lag too )) Smokescreen: oh primus I'm embarrassing in every universe Rodimus: I party----- Starscream: ((me too Airachnd: Yes, you are. FakeProwl: ((errybody laggin)) Whirl: Of COURSE he is gonna run off. Bumblebee: We can sit together in mutual embarrassment. Whirl: That's what Optimus does BEST. Bumblebee: Speeches? Bumblebee: Leadership? ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Only in some timelines, Whirl.]] There are still so many he doesn't know how to stop. Whirl: No, running away from his problems. Txen: *to Whirl* Primal energies are antithetical to his essence and provide a partial solution, under the right circumstances. Bumblebee: Literally everything and anything requiring an iota of responsibility? Whirl: And then swooping back in and swanning around like he never left. Airachnd: Droning on? Smokescreen: ... Oh. Oh yeah-- I learned about this pretty recently- wait, the matrix can lead to it...? Bumblebee: ... Starscream: ugh, OP speeches, annoying in every verse Bumblebee: Apparently? No idea how it works. Smokescreen: Sounds sounds do you think these universes are the same on something like that? Rodimus: I'll navigate YOUR deep space, Optimus. Bumblebee: ... Smokescreen: ...... Starscream: hahaha Rodimus: *yawns and stretches* Bumblebee: why Smokescreen: RODIMUS NO Airachnd: No. Txen: ((so does this mean that to robots, irish accents are like. the accent of the devil)) Smokescreen: I need to make sure Megatron never dies ItsyBitsySpyers: *Hold it together. Megatron is dead. Separated. Devoured. He cannot be reanimated.* Rodimus: No what? Starscream: torture him more! Bumblebee: (( IMAGINE IF THEY WATCHED JACKSEPTICEYE )) Starscream: Go back! FakeProwl: *hey this likes the kind of thing Soundwave really wouldn't like. knuckle nudges hand?* Whirl: So, in theory, the best weapon against unicron is life. Well. Praise Heqet, I guess. Txen: ((robots only get irish accents if you're born and raised on the devil hisself)) Airachnd: Or, you know, throw his body into the nearest star and make sure his body melts completely. FakeProwl: *BULKHEAD IS A TERRIBLE FOREMAN AND PROWL IS JUDGING HIM.* Bumblebee: I like that idea, Airachnid. At least, to mine. ItsyBitsySpyers: *He was going to try to last without it but now that it's there he will take the Pit out of that hand.* FakeProwl: *HE HAS 2+ MONTHS OF EXPERIENCE, HE CAN JUDGE.* Smokescreen: shockwave more like shockbabe Bumblebee: smokey no Airachnd: Smokescreen. Txen: *Shockwave is here, Smokescreen* Airachnd: Stop. Smokescreen: ... This is kinda... Smokescreen: I'm sorry, what was that, Spidey? Maybe Babewave would work? Shockbox: *visibly reacts to 'shockbabe', but does not press on it.* Txen: *youll get used to it, alternate. just ignore them* Airachnd: Stop Rodimus: Barawave Bumblebee: Smokescreen...why? Whirl: I know that face! Txen: DS: *POUNDS ON FLOOR* FakeProwl: ((i keep forgetting their accents)) Smokescreen: Bee it's bugging Spidey! How about... Cuddlewave? Or is that a Soundwave nickname Txen: DS: ITS US!! *shakes skylynx* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[He does not know if the Matrix hears the call of the AllSpark. Prowl was the one who first tracked it.]] Bumblebee: Looking back...this feels really unnecessary. Smokescreen: :OOO I WANNA WRESTLE LIKE THIS but preferably with less chance of dying Rodimus: Hm? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy whoops in delight. His chair pal is a badass.* Whirl: Pfft, you think? Bumblebee: Primus, Smokey... Airachnd: [she enjoys Smokescreen getting smacked around though] Smokescreen: ... Oh. Do you think someone could use the matrix to find it without having to- you know. Whirl: *is probably enjoying watching Ultra Magnus get his butt whooped than he shold* Smokescreen: HEE still pretty awesome here though! Bumblebee: Ok, now I'm really happy you have that thing. Rodimus: Shag the matrix permenetally? Bumblebee: Weird storage pockets and all. Smokescreen: wait do what with the matrix Txen: DS: *stops to think a second* ...Yeah, it might've been unnecessary, but it was -also- pretty fun? Bumblebee: whY ARE WE FRAGGING THE MATRIX?? Rodimus: What you need found? Smokescreen: I'M NOT FRAGGING THE MATRIX- the allspark! Txen: *RUDE BEE* Bumblebee: [looks at Darksteeel] I meant mostly on our side but... Smokescreen: shockwave's parenting Smokescreen: wait wait where FakeProwl: *sees no reason why cloning something doesn't result in the product of "new life."* Whirl: Pfft. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Agrees.* Txen: Shockwave: I am not a parent. Smokescreen: Momwave! Bumblebee: Look, science isn't my area of expertise, ok? Rodimus: *head tilt* Yeah i most likely could look for it--- why you guys lost yours? Airachnd: So, that's where it was. Whirl: The only parents in the room are the preds. *pauses* I think. Bumblebee: Now you are, Shockwave. You created life from bones, you now have offspring. Airachnd: Anyone with optics could have seen that Bug. Txen: *though its true the two predacons were very young and rowdy at the time. violence was basically their idea of playing* Smokescreen: wait that means shockwave's a grandpa! Smokescreen: Well- I think it's similar here too Txen: Shockwave: Clones are not the same thing as offspring. Bumblebee: Grandpawave Smokescreen: ... really bee Bumblebee: ...l o o k Airachnd: Is...? Really? Smokescreen: Grandpa science! Whirl: Your Highness. Pfft. Really. Bumblebee: I-It worked, didn't it? I mean, that had like, a 4% chance of working, but it did. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Listening to Rodimus' offer to find an AllSpark. Good distraction.* FakeProwl: Seventeen percent. Txen: Predaking: *it was the flattery as much as it was him not knowing much about tech yet* Bumblebee: PredaKING. I wasn't gonna risk him plowing me into the ground... Txen: Predaking: *has a ...dislike for stabby sticks* Shockbox: *Listening to this 'parenting' conversation with some very slight amusement.* Bumblebee: Wait, really? 17%? That's a lot better than I thought. Rodimus: *side eyes bee* You sure you need into that kinda thing? Bumblebee: Need what? Rodimus: ((need = not Airachnd: [is glad she didn't have to deal with this on her Cybertron] FakeProwl: Seventeen's not good. But, yes, technically speaking, it IS higher than four. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Rumble mumbles a "Heh" at that side eye and comment* Txen: Shockwave: *ugh. dont call him that, Starscream. especially not in that -voice- of yours* Starscream: When do we get to see more Megatron torture?  That was fun to watch. Smokescreen: .... starscream is kinda. awful ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Soon. Too soon.]] Smokescreen: guuhghhhhhhh why is starscream Whirl: Oh, please tell me someone kicks his sh it in. Txen: Skylynx: A g r e e d. Airachnd: He is. Bumblebee: I mean, I had a 5% chance of surviving Tyger Pax, so 17% is a blessing. FakeProwl: There's no relation between the two situations. 17% is low. Bumblebee: ...past me, why didn't we just start here? Bumblebee: Low, but not impossible! Whirl: Oh god, more of this. Whirl: Nothing gives  me more secondhand embarrassment than watching that clod try to fly. Buzzstrike: ...wish you'd had time to check the basements Rodimus: *chucklesto himself whirl will like Starscream's ending* Airachnd: Ugh. Smokescreen: ..... ive done this exactly Txen: Shockwave: Factually inaccurate. If you are 'too close to turn back' then you are too close to escape after retrieving the target. Bumblebee: [snorts] ItsyBitsySpyers: *Okay. Well. He got this far without seeking a hand himself, and without taking a second. He'll just. Search the other one out now.* Bumblebee: Still proud of you, Smokey. Smokescreen: Megatron's throne is pretty cozy! Ridiculous, but cozy. Whirl: *BURSTS OUT LAUGHING* Smokescreen: ... bee how Txen: Shockwave: *lets those lil fingers slip right in there between his* Bumblebee: Really? It reminds me of the Iron Throne and THAT looks like the most uncomfortable seat ever. Airachnd: [cringes] Whirl: He looks--R-RIDICULOUS! Bumblebee: I DIDN'T MISS OK?! boomtank: ........ Rodimus: I keep forgetting this universe is one of THOSE universes. Smokescreen: his eyebrows though Whirl: He looks like a walking RUST HEAP Smokescreen: It's more comfy than you'd expect! Like, the actual seat part isn't too bad! Starscream: I don't want to hear talking, I want to see him in pain Txen: Skylynx: A downgrade, -thats- for sure. Bumblebee: Smokey, I still vote we put tennis balls on Megatron's pointy bits. Txen: Skylynx: Even for a biped. Airachnd: A downgrade, in every since of the word. Bumblebee: You could, you know, say my fragging n a m e. Starscream: torture him! Airachnd: *sense Starscream: :( Shockbox: *He would look upon this hand holding with suspicion...were it not that the others so large, rendering him unable to wittness it.* Smokescreen: Definitely! We can soften him up some- boomtank: That's...a lot of firepower Whirl: So far it's just been fancier guns and bombs than the usual. It's not exactly CREATIVE... but I think I've been spoiled. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[All that he wills.]] Starscream: He failed Unicron, they got away.  Torture him! Txen: *theyve done more suspicious things than hold a hand* Smokescreen: optimus please be safe Smokescreen: I swear he better not get hurt in this! Bumblebee: ... Bumblebee: No but um... Bumblebee: You'll know when to look away. Smokescreen: what Whirl: What a surprise, here he goes running back. And let me guess--he's gonna assume his old role like he DIDN'T abandon everyone. Smokescreen: .... who hurts him I'll fight them I swear Bumblebee: Don't worry about it - hey look, Unicron! Whirl: That's the OP we all know and love. *dryly* FakeProwl: ((I got kicked offline and lost a chunck of text)) Airachnd: You heard the Bug. Shockbox: *He has been a preoccupied mech. He might have missed a few tells.* Txen: ((what even are those)) FakeProwl: ((from "Megatron's throne is pretty cozy! Ridiculous, but cozy" to "Starscream: torture him!")) Bumblebee: (( ...scyyyythes? )) FakeProwl: ((could someone send me the missing chunk please)) Whirl: ((i got u Puff)) Txen: ((purple praying mantis arms)) Smokescreen: ((I can send! FakeProwl: ((snif did it, thanks)) Bumblebee: Also, don't call me bug. Txen: ((unicrons weed logo tho)) Whirl: Everything he does looks incredibly goofy. Whirl: ((TEX)) Smokescreen: ((aaa okay Airachnd: Quite. Txen: ((age of chaos more like age of dank)) Rodimus: OH! Smokescreen: ..... yeah I'd do this Bumblebee: (( age of DANK MEMES )) Txen: ((get him some reefer thatll bliss him right out)) Smokescreen: Also Unitron seems like the best one! Rodimus: What the all spark is what makes new sparks right? Txen: ((space crack is whack)) Airachnd: age of the good kush)) ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Yes. It is.]] Shockbox: (( I am dying.)) Rodimus: *nods to Smokescreen* yeha i could find that. Smokescreen: ((its from earth how good can it be)) Txen: ((unicron IS earth)) Rodimus: I can find vector sigma-- i can find that. Magnus: *tries to slip in as discretely as a giant man can* Smokescreen: :OO So- the matrix can do all that...? Airachnd: [sage not at what Ratchet said] Rodimus: *makes grab hands at Magnus* Whirl: I don't think the allspark would help US any--unless you're getting it for them? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave looks up, slightly surprised. A greeting ping.* Txen: Skylynx: *oh hey! the guy he chewed up!* Magnus: *nods to Rodimus* Good evening. FakeProwl: *... magnus is one of the people prowl would least like to catch him sitting on a couch with a soundwave and a shockwave* Rodimus: Magnus <3 Whirl: *snickers* I like your strategy, big guy. FakeProwl: *but prowl is on hand-holding duty. he can't leave. he'll endure it.* Smokescreen: But there's gotta be a better way to find it- I did get a bunch of coordinates from this thing recently- one of them's gotta lead to it. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave's not oblivious. He will find a way to repay that.* ItsyBitsySpyers: *But first.* @Prowl: (txt): Warning: modified patch attack approaching. Shockbox: *Two shockwaves.* FakeProwl: *acknowledging ping* Smokescreen: oh no boomtank: -so confused- Shockbox: *He still has a place on the wave couch.* Whirl: *nice* Magnus: ((was whirl talking to magnus?)) ItsyBitsySpyers: *At least Shockbox isn't being asked to perform hand duty.* Airachnd: At least Megatron has some standards. boomtank: -apparently missed enough for this to not make sense- Starscream: yes! Bumblebee: ...I oddly don't care, Megatron. Smokescreen: .... Rodimus: *he will sit properly on the couch for magnus* OuO Whirl: I can't believe Megatron said the most sensible thing I've heard all damn night. Bumblebee: ...sorry, smokey. Txen: ((god that just reminds me of the *** terrible line thats at the end)) Smokescreen: I. I need to protect Megatron- frag that sounds weird to say but ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave's dorsal plating ripples. He hates the moments within Megatron's head most of all. They are the closest to reliving the memories he stole.* FakeProwl: *squeezes Soundwave's hand instead of covering neck* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Returns it as tightly as would not also be painful. A mutual thing.* Txen: Predaking: *shudders and hackles* Magnus: *perches on the edge of the couch, not quite settling in yet* How are things on the ship, Rodimus? Bumblebee: The retributive part of me is just...really, really satisfied knowing Unicron treated him like that. Airachnd: I cannot exactly protect my Megatron, considering he is molten slag. Bumblebee: But it's the worst feeling so... Whirl: I wouldn't protect Megatron, I'd jus give him the dignity of killing him. Rodimus: Busy--- you coming back to me, Magnus? :D Whirl: ...maybe a little slowly. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\Y'ALRIGHT OVER THERE, YOUR KINGLINESS?\\ Smokescreen: That's fair! But- he's kinda stuck as leader here, andI don't want Unileader. Whirl: But a... slightly slow and very painful death is pretty damn generous, under the circumstances, really. Bumblebee: ...You two are kind of adorable. Whirl: Hmm. These two remind me of some people I know. *sidelong look at Rumble* Txen: Darksteel: Us? Bumblebee: ...Wait are we really all that surprised someone ELSE came back from the dead? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Slow blink. Equally slow look over at Frenzy. Then back at Whirl.* Smokescreen: oh nooooo megatron's butt is awful now THANKS UNICRON Bumblebee: Yes, you two. ItsyBitsySpyers: //...Guess the birds are like that, yeah.// Bumblebee: ...Smokescreen, what the frag? Swoop: :V Magnus: Only with a certain someone in handcuffs. *glances up and around at the room, faceplates shifting into a frown at the scene* ... Yes, busy. I can see that. Swoop: :V Txen: ((shockwave non reaction lmao))\ boomtank: ohwow Smokescreen: ... What? Airachnd: shockwave, seeing god of chaos: eh)) Smokescreen: ... I need to learn to NOT externalize every thought, huh? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Crunch.* Shockbox: (( Isn't that at least 90% of his reactions, though.)) Whirl: *maintains his cheeky sidelong look for a moment longer before watching the action* I gotta say, I like Peadcons' style. I mean it went poorly but how can you not appreciate someone whose first-- Whirl: --reaction to encountering the avatar of a god is to try and kill him? Rodimus: *nudges Magnus* I was the first in weeks--- *shrugs* I doubt i even need to hold these. FakeProwl: *has been quietly listening in on Magnus's conversation* Txen: Shockwave: *crunched* Smokescreen: oh no Bumblebee: No Smokey, I just...Megatron's butt? Really? Txen: ((and yes... his reactions are all 'eh' and it is precious)) Rodimus: ((I = this Whirl: *snickers at Rumble* FakeProwl: @Magnus «Have you made any progress that you're at liberty to share?» Swoop: Him Shockwave dead Bumblebee: Shockwave, you were not built for speed. Smokescreen: those squeaks from those predaterrors are kinda adorable Bumblebee: ..........Dear Primus. Airachnd: [covers mouth with hand servo] FakeProwl: ((I get the feeling that Shockwave's "It defies all science" and Starscream's "We're doomed!" are the same statement in different languages.)) Whirl: Bless them, tanks are fantastic but not known for their maneuverability. Txen: That is true. I am not. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave pings Shockwave. He's so very, very grateful his ally survived. And was not turned.* Bruin: *get wreked* boomtank: Wh-what just happened there? Txen: *is clearly not dead, swoop* Magnus: *bats Rodimus's nudging hand away like someone might a child's* It is, of course, your decision, captain. You know more of crew morale than I do these days. Swoop: *no, ur dead* Txen: ((lol puff)) Swoop: *don't tell him is business, that dude dead* Txen: *glances at Soundwave and wiggles his fingers in agreement. he didnt particularly wish to die there either* Whirl: A moment of silence for our dear, departed Shockwave. I can't believe he's gone. *drapes a claw over his cockpit dramatically* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\I CAN STILL HEAR HIS VOICE...\\ Txen: Shockwave: *quiet scoff* Airachnd: [chuckling] Bumblebee: Sometimes, I can still hear his voice. Smokescreen: ... Airachnd: [LAUGHS] Smokescreen: RUDE Bumblebee: Smokey please Shockbox: (( I remember /cackling/ when I first saw that.)) Whirl: *laughs* Swoop: :V Bruin: *lol* Smokescreen: ... /Going to go ahead and phase himself into a wall just for extra effect/ Beeeeee help I'm a wall decoration Rodimus: *pouts just a little but still smiles widely* Bumblebee: [snickers] Swoop: :V :V :V Airachnd: How shallow of him. Txen: Skylynx: *rolls onto his back and covers his optics with his tail plume* Txen: Skylynx: This part is....... embarassing... Smokescreen: beeeee I'm a real wallflower here :( Bumblebee: And I can't believe THAT worked. Swoop: *patpatpatpatpats Skylynx* Bumblebee: pfffffft Magnus: @Prowl: *glances sidelong at the unexpected comm* ::I am loath to admit it, but I doubt the chase will end soon. There is little positive to report.:: Swoop: What embarassing boomtank: ...are you kdding me? Whirl: Happens to the best of us, mech. *sympathetic nod to Skylynx* Smokescreen: I can! You can't spell Starscream without "Gullible." Bumblebee: Smokey, I'm so doing that again. Smokescreen: Stargulliblescream FakeProwl: *mumbles* fifty-eight percent probability. Whirl: ...won't happen to ME, though. *cheeky, sidelong look Predaking's way* boomtank: He broke it that easily? Airachnd: Oh, he's alive. Swoop: Look, him dead Bumblebee: He's alive. boomtank: Shockwave looked alive there Smokescreen: Pff- please do, Beepbee. Txen: Predaking: *amused hmph at Whirl* I do not expect -your- fealty. Merely your defeat. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Ravage joins the couch to park himself on Soundwave's lap.* Bumblebee: Whirl, are you flirting with Predaking??? FakeProwl: @Magnus «I see. If you need any assistance...» Smokescreen: Hey Soundwave- are the predacons online where you are? Txen: Shockwave: *looks quite alive now in fact* FakeProwl: @Magnus «I'm certain you won't accept it from me. But, I offer it anyway.» Whirl: Pfft, as if anyone could earn my fealty, really. But still--we need to set up a time and place. ItsyBitsySpyers: =Yes. Many.= Airachnd: [laughs] Smokescreen: ME NO Whirl: *to Bumblebee* Hmm. No, not yet. Gotta see how he fights, first. Airachnd: The idea of smokescreen being a Prime. Rodimus: Firebreath is so awesome, its a good motif! Smokescreen: me you don't need to mention that every time it's really not necessary and- yeah. Not the right bot at all. Airachnd: It's laughable at best.

The damn stream rebooted. Lost a huge chunk of the chat.

Welcome to the 'lostlightstream' room. Smokescreen: No no no no no- I'm NOT crying on more Optimi. Bumblebee: You want to talk? I...it's...I get it. Smokescreen: ((it's completely hoeless now :( Whirl: If you say so. Airachnd: Oh well, it started when I told him to talk to my Optimus, to truly see if he was over Optimus' death. Whirl: *SMOKESCREEN, HE IS BEING SINCERE* Whirl: *Exhibit A that Whirl is Not Good At Comforting People* boomtank: No, you didn't but you're blaming yoursself for something that you were not capable of stopping ItsyBitsySpyers: *Tiny helm shake. All right. He's focused on the room again, and not distant thoughts. Where is everyone's conversation? He'll buzz Ravage for the data.* Whirl: ((hoeless, eh)) Rodimus: YOu remember to refuel Magnus? You forget when you are working too hard. Airachnid: ((wait dangit it did somethign weird with the chat)) Shockwave: ((wow i just DCd and it lost recent stuff and is showing me older stuff ;;) Airachnid: ((what the heck)) FakeProwl: ((... skype just randomly refreshed and deleted the whole window, can somebody send me the log-- dammit did it happen to everyone)) boomtank: ((the frick? Airachnid: WHY IS YOUR NAME  AIRACHNID ON MY SCREEN)) Smokescreen: ((Yeahhh it happened to everyone)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((it happened to me too D:)) Smokescreen: ((I DONT KNOW IT JUST DID THAT??)) Whirl: ((SMOKESCREEN AAHAHA)) Whirl: ((THEYF UUUSED)) Sorida: (( omg what just happened)) FakeProwl: ((well, fvck. i lost a huge chunk of tonight's chat. :,) Rodimus: ((cause not its not lagging Smokescreen: ((smokescreen is actually airachnid)) Sorida: (( I KNEW IT )) boomtank: ((smokey no! Rodimus: ((they reset servers Airachnid: fusion is just a tactic to make weak Cybertronians stronger)) Airachnid: *grunts, pulling his attentuion away from the shouting* Sir? I'm fueled to sufficient levels. I have no intention of working tonight. *oddly enough, he's not getting up to stop the shouting* Smokescreen: But yeah- Optimus' life is way more important than- you know. Whirl: ((OH NO IT HAPPENED TO BIG M TOO)) Smokescreen: ((ULTRA MAGNUS is also airachnid livestream made everyone spider Airachnid: EVERYONE'S NAME IS AIRACHNID ON MY SCREEN WHY)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((who am i appearing as)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((awwww, i'm still myself)) Whirl: ((and in that moment... I swear we were all airachnid)) Airachnid: we are all spider)) Sorida: (( PFFFFFFFFFFF )) FakeProwl: ((are we at least multicolor airachnids)) Shockwave: ((omg magnus is airachnid too)) Bruin: ((go home livestream ur drunk)) Shockbox: ((Hm.)) Airachnid: Airachnid has taken over)) Whirl: ((our queen)) Smokescreen: ((queen!!)) Shockwave: ((i vote we end on this note. nothing can top Airachnid Rainbow)) Airachnid: -finger guns-)) boomtank: ((oh god Shockbox: (( Pffffff.)) Airachnid: true)) FakeProwl: ((everyone's name is normal to me but im delighted to know that yall have rainbow spider)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((i have two airachnids and everyone else is fine)) Whirl: ((most everyone's name is normal here, with the exception of BB's and Magnus's, but BB's has changed)) Shockbox: (( Txen is showing up as 'Shockwave' for me.)) Shockbox: (( But that is not problematic at all, really.)) Shockwave: ((it booted me back to a previous nickname i guess)) Airachnid: ((Lord, I do show up as airachnid)) Airachnid: ((weird Shockbox: ((/shrug emoji)) boomtank: You didn't know what was going to happen, and blaming yourself is doing you no favors FakeProwl: ((oh wait, magnus is airachnid! i DO have a false spider.)) Airachnid: ((identity crisis)) Airachnid changed their nickname to Magnus. FakeProwl: ((well, we already knew you were everybody)) Smokescreen: I guess so... It makes me feel like I've got some control over what happened, but- it's not like I can go back and change it now. Rodimus: You remember to refuel Magnus? *he starts to stand up* You forget when you are working too hard. Sorida changed their nickname to Bumblebee. Bumblebee: [hugs Smokey] Bumblebee: You weren't expecting it, doesn't sound like anyone was. Smokescreen: /Clinging to Bee/ boomtank: You didn't. That's the point. You did what you could in a situation you had no control over Whirl: I still maintain that the Drifters did this song better. Rodimus: I like her voice. Whirl: It's not bad/ Airachnid: It is indeed nice, tolerable for human music. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[It is pleasing. As are the lyrics.]] Whirl: But not everyone can be Ben E King. Whirl: It's a good song. *nods* Smokescreen: But I didn't do enough- I wish I could've done more. I at least could be not here helping Megatron of all bots, but- I don't think I could lead something against him now. Whirl: *tilts his head* Hey, Rodders, got time for a request? FakeProwl: *not enough rock. isn't enjoying it.* Rodimus: I bet Magnus could sing it better * he grins teasingly at the ex-enforcer* FakeProwl: *but, it managed to rouse soundwave back into speech. ...well. "speech."* Rodimus: What's up Whirl? Whirl: Anything by AC/DC. Not enough classic rock in tonight's playlist. boomtank: You did what you could. And...sometimes that isn't enough. It's life. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Trust good music to draw something out of him even when he's tired.* Whirl: *and he happens to know a certain depressed mech sharing the couch with him might appreciate some AC/DC* Airachnid: /By the Allspark/. boomtank: But you continue to live. And looking back like you are only holds you back. Shockwave: *taps Soundwave's palm with a claw. he has... Potentially Humorous Commentary* Smokescreen: I guess so- but doesn't make it better- I wish I could've done better. Magnus: I'm quite alright, si- *pauses a little* I'm not singing anything. *frowns, not right now* Rodimus: AC/DC --- ok i play alot of that let go with something i never played before. Bumblebee: Smokes... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave glances over at Shockwave. Hmm? What?* boomtank: You can't do anything now, but you can move forwards Whirl: *listens; it's not immediately apparent what this is* ... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Rumble hears good jams and starts to lift his helm.* Bumblebee: But think about what's happened now Whirl: --WAIT. WAIT NOT THIS ONE. Whirl: DIFFERENT SONG. ......*ahem* ItsyBitsySpyers: *...Wait a second* Whirl: *attempts to regroup  his cool* Whirl: How about Shoot to Thrill. Rodimus: What---? Whirl: How about that one. ItsyBitsySpyers: *IS HE PLAYING--* Bumblebee: Whirl, what? Rodimus: Not alot about rosie? Whirl: NO. Smokescreen: Move forward? I don't even know what I CAN go with now Whirl: I mean, no. Whirl: Shoot to Thrill. Whirl: *HE BEEFED IT* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Rumble's visor dims to near black. He suddenly gets very interested in looking at Airachnid instead.* Whirl: *SUPER BEEF* Airachnid: ... what? FakeProwl: *there's shouting. what's whirl doing.* Whirl: *he's doing his best to keep his cool* Magnus: *stiffens a little, promised himself he wouldn't get in the middle of it but it's getting harder the louder it gets* boomtank: Live rather than survive. Looking back like you are now? That's not living. You cannot change the past, so stop putting all your focus on it Airachnid: He cannot apparently. Airachnid: Pity. boomtank: Stay out of this spider ItsyBitsySpyers: //Nothin'. Jus' was--// He can't even lie well right now. //--Thinkin' bout the moon. 'S all.// Bumblebee: Airachnid, take your sass. Put it in your pocket. Airachnid: Make me. boomtank: I just might Smokescreen: I thought I was doing a pretty good job of living, though... Bumblebee: You are! Airachnid: :3c Bumblebee: I mean, look at how many friends you have, how many bots care about you. Whirl: *should he pretend it never happened? What do? WHAT DO* ...@Rumble: Sorry, mech. Shockwave: *passes over the thought of a rather silly mitten-looking 'Hand Reinforcement' for protection against future crushing. if, you know. they werent already done with the content that's to blame.* Shockwave: *its clear he doesn't really resent having to repair his hand twice and its just a ... very, very dry attempt at joke* Bumblebee: Don't you make that face, Airachnid. Rodimus: *looks to magnus and gives a small shrug* Airachnid: >:3cccccccc Smokescreen: buddy you're a wise man something something gonna be a big man someday Smokescreen: ... oh Bumblebee: [bobbing his head a little, he actually knows this song] Rodimus: @Magnus ::If we are in a hurry I can kick them all out so we can have our meeting.:: Whirl: ((imagining airachnid make that face tho)) Shockwave: ((shockwaves hand to soundwaves hand: we've got to stop meeting like this)) Airachnid: she does)) Bumblebee: Close, Smokey. Big difference between Queen and AC/DC Shockwave: ((soundwaves hand to shockwaves hand: ive got a crush on u)) Airachnid: when she smiles, her mouth is like :3)) ItsyBitsySpyers: @Whirl: //What for?// How the FRAG did he know? WHO TOLD HIM? Whirl: ((PFFT)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((txen you're killing me lmfao)) Bumblebee: (( i'm convinced that's the only expression she knows )) boomtank: -better, lets Bee take over now- Airachnid: it's the only emoji she uses)) Smokescreen: I know Queen? That's one difference ItsyBitsySpyers: @Shockwave: [[...In red.]] Whirl: *well, even if he hadn't said anything, his reaction to the song gave him away anything* @Rumble: I think you know. But, uh. ...sorry. *excellent. he has mastered wordsmithing, just look at him* Whirl: ...*anyway Whirl: *anything?? wtf me)) Bumblebee: Smokescreen, you ever hear Bohemian Rhapsody? That one's a trip. Smokescreen: Of course! Magnus: @Rodimus: ::Do not rush things on my account, but if you think it will stop the shouting... Well, it is not my place to say anymore. I relinquished my place here.:: Shockwave: @Soundwave: *considers whether the polyfibers could be dyed, then nods. the little mental image turns red* Rodimus: @Magnus ::Just go head up to my of-- no wait--- the ready room we can have our meeting there and not be interupted.:: boomtank: -back to the work on his datapad- Rodimus: *shrugs and tilts his helm to the room* Rodimus: @Magnus ::No other officers come to this anymore i can just leave it to them.:: Bumblebee: What other Earth music do you know? [oh good, a distraction until next time Optimus comes up in conversation...] Whirl: ((the closest thing to an officer in this room is Whirl. What a scary thought)) Bumblebee: (( ........that is terrifying )) ItsyBitsySpyers: @Whirl: //Yeah. All right.// A long pause. //Listen, don't - I don't wanna... y'know.// He's not ready to talk about that yet. //Jus'. Don't say nothin'.// boomtank: ((wait, what? Rodimus: ((just rodimus alone THATS FINE HE IS GETTING USED OT IT)) Smokescreen: A bunch of it! I'd play a bunch of their pop music whenever I was driving- It was one of those stations that did pop music from the '80's to today? Bumblebee: wait you did what on patrols?? Bumblebee: please tell me those weren't patrols. Smokescreen: Not on patrols! Smokescreen: Just drives for fun. Whirl: *makes a soft "pfft" sound aloud* @R: Of course I won't, mech. I haven't so far. I'm not gonna throw you under the bus. Bumblebee: Ok, because I did that my first few months and...yea. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave huffs softly. He appreciates the mitten joke. He also pictured them on the revived Megatron's hands instead, to make him less intimidating a thought. It helped.* Bumblebee: What stuff did you hear? Magnus: @Rodimus: *glances around with a grunt* ::I think that sounds like a good idea. I'll be waiting for you, sir.:: Smokescreen: I'd play other songs while on patrol to get my head in the game. Magnus: *slowly brushes off his frame and starts to get up* Shockwave: ((gosh my LS chat is doing a thing where it wont scroll unless i catch it up manually ;;)) ItsyBitsySpyers: *Rumble stares at Whirl for a couple of seconds before nodding. His visor goes a tad brighter, but his night's kinda done now.* //Goin' home. Seeya.// Whirl: ((I HATE IT when it does that X|)) Whirl: *bobs his helm* G'night. Smokescreen: A lot of stuff! You ever hear about Michael Jackson? He's the King of pop! Really talented! Actually actually can we listen to him Whirl: I'm Bad's a good song. Rodimus: I like this cover Bumblebee: Yeah, I have! Smokescreen: all his songs are good songs Whirl: It... huh. Sounds like. Cyclonus, a little. *blinks* Bumblebee: ...This is a nice cover. Bumblebee: Sad, but nice. Whirl: ((his voice is lovely but the original is so much more haunting <3)) Rodimus: ((you shut it you only like orginals Whirl: *just gonna stare at the blank screen with a wide opic and a perked antenna, like a cat watching a computer cursor* Rodimus: ((I tihnk its cause i heard this one live and his voice tears your chest Rodimus: ((I am glad he made a offical cover Whirl: ((I like plenty of covers... Iron Savior's cover of The Hellion/Electric Eye is much better than Judas Priests;'s, for instance)) Shockwave: DS: *looks from screen to whirl a few times* You look like Shockwave when a test tube's around. Magnus: *nods to Rodimus as he stands* I'll be seeing you shortly, sir. *begins to slip out towards their meeting spot* Whirl: ((His voice is wonderful, but I just love Simon and Garfunkel's haunting harmony!)) FakeProwl: ((this isn't the best version I've heard him do)) Rodimus: *smiles brightly at Magnus* FakeProwl: ((p good though)) ItsyBitsySpyers: *Laserbeak CACKLES at Darksteel's remark* Bumblebee: [snickers] Whirl: *blinks and snaps out of it, snorting* What? Really? ...do his antenna do the thing. Airachnid: [it was somewhat cute] Rodimus: ((yeah it was killer live Whirl: ((I'll bet!)) Rodimus: Cyclonus really...? Whirl: Hmm? What about him? Shockwave: DS: They do all sorts of stuff if you pay attention long enough. *leans in conspiratorially* Shockwave: DS: You really wanna see em wiggle? Whirl: *snickers* I'll be sure to keep an eye out. Whirl: ((now HERE is a cover I love, this one is amazin)) Whirl: *doesn't even try to hide this statement from Shockwave* FakeProwl: *ugh. so apparently it's all sad melodic songs now.* Shockwave: Shockwave: *not dignifying this conversation with a response* Rodimus: Maybe that gravel part of the voice--- you know right when you -hit- his shpot /just/ right be is hella hard to get the deep---- OH HELLO MULTIVESE MECHS! :D Smokescreen: /Drooping a little with the song- sad songs are rough tonight!/ Rodimus: *lets just go stack up cubes and like talk details on how to get crewmates off* FakeProwl: *turns down his audials. if anybody wants his attention, they can shout to him. the only person here he plans on speaking with doesn't talk anyway.* Bumblebee: [pets Smokey's wings] Shockwave: DS: *IS actually talking in a hushed voice, just isnt very GOOD at it* Just put that... weirdo human movie alien he likes up on the screen. Whirl: *if that was sexua, it went right over Whirl's head* Yeah, when he sings, it's always got that edge to it. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((DARKSTEEL)) Whirl: Also, Rodders, if you'll deign to take a second request from me, can we listen to I'm Bad? Smokescreen: /Nuzzling Bee some here/ Smokescreen: YEAH YEAH BAD!!! Rodimus: *snrots and looks up at the warrior to see if he is getting tyed with* Whirl: *he';s gonna cheer SOMEONE up, dammit* Rodimus: What no more sappy songs eh? Whirl: You're gonna hafta be more specific than that, Darksteel. Whirl: Oh, no, I'm enjoying this. The harmony's lovely. But 'Bee talked about Michael Jackson, so... *shrugs* Bumblebee: ...This song is a lot sadder than I remember. Smokescreen: .... Shockbox: *He is paying attention to the conversation, but doing his best to pretend he isn't.* Smokescreen: /Going to rest his helm in Bee's lap- he's already feeling drained enoughhhh/ Bumblebee: [pets Smokey's helm] Shockbox: *This....talk of aliens and antennae wiggles.* Bumblebee: Same, buddy. Whirl: ((everyone wants to know the Secret of Shockwave's Antenna)) Rodimus: Half way? *he grins cheekily* Shockwave: Darksteel: *grimaces and tries to remember. wiggles a claw in the air* You know, the... it's all black and shiny, and it lays its eggs in people? Bumblebee: Darksteel, what?! Whirl: *momentary distant look* Whirl: Can't... say that's familiar, mech. Smokescreen: ... Wait, Darksteel, what? Where? Bumblebee: Should we be...worried about that?? Shockwave: Darksteel: *shushes Bee and Smokey urgently and looks back at Shockwave* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy leans on Darksteel's side and motions for Whirl's attention. He then points at Soundwave and mouths the word "Halloween"* Whirl: Send me a pic. Shockwave: Shockwave: *dun give a fuk* Rodimus: Aleins? Bumblebee: Insecticons? Whirl: *looks to Frenzy* ... *he's trying to tell him something, he can feel it* Shockwave: Darksteel: No-- I mean, I think he likes them too-- and -yeah- no slag its an alien... Rodimus: That? ItsyBitsySpyers: *PRIMUS WARN A MECH* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave sits back a lil* Whirl: Well, if it's in a movie, I'VE never seen the movie. *looks to the screen* Shockwave: Darksteel: *pulls a blue crayon out of his subspace and starts doodling drawing of a xenomorph on it* Here--- heyyy. Whirl: Yep. Never seen that film. Whirl: *NOW IMEMDIATELY LOOKS TO SHOCKWAVE* Rodimus: We showed it FakeProwl: *??* Smokescreen: :O Bumblebee: O.o; FakeProwl: *u ok soundwave* Whirl: I missed it, then. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Yes. Yes, er, he's fi--STOP THAT* Shockwave: Shockwave: .................. *antennae quiver* Whirl: *ZOOP* Whirl: *HE SAW IT* Shockbox: *Well....now /he/ is intrigued by this creature.* Shockwave: Darksteel: *a little miffed his doodle got beat to the punch* FakeProwl: *since he's already looking in soundwave's direction, catches that quiver from past him* Smokescreen: is that soundwave boomtank: -looks up- ....? Rodimus: He dressed up as one. FakeProwl: *glances back at screen. ... hmm. so /both/ of them.* Whirl: It's pretty neat. Whirl: I dig the tail. Shockbox: *He tilts his helm curiously, as his antennae, tragically, do not wiggle.* boomtank: What is that? Bumblebee: That is terrifying. Whirl: Nah, it's adorable. Bumblebee: Would not want to run into one of those. boomtank: Looks interesting Whirl: The inner mouth kinda reminds me of Killer, a little. Smokescreen: I mean, it could be kinda cute... Rodimus: It was a pretty cool movie if not---- a tad VERY 80's Shockwave: Shockwave: 8would very much like to run into one of those* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[It is - an efficient organic.]] Bumblebee: ...Do I want to know who or what Killer is? Whirl: ...waaait. Wait! No, I HAVE seen one of these! She shows up at Teach's movie night sometimes, yeah? *looks to Soundwave* Shockwave: ((RODDY YOU ARE THE LORD OF 80s)) Rodimus: ((its not an insult ot rodimus lol Whirl: Killer's my pet space barnacle. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Yes.]] Very, very carefully keeping his mental tone flat. [[She has.]] Whirl: It dismembered someone once. *drapes his claw over his cockpit* Such a little stinker. Bruin: *Specter is practically bouncing on Bruins head because thats a neat organic, could use a few more eyes tho* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Merciful Micronus, that one's a mech.* Whirl: Nice. Shockwave: Shockwave: *ah* Shockbox: *Reserving judgement for when (if ever) he gets to see one of these creatures in action.* Rodimus: *going to keep scrolling threw pictures yes.* Whirl: That would be a killer alt-mode. Shockbox: *But still, /very/ curious.* boomtank: !!! Whirl: *luckily for Soundwave, Whirl isn't judging him, he's most interested in the creatures, and sought from him merely confirmation* Shockbox: *Well. That is a little bit of action.* boomtank: okaynotinterestinganymore Whirl: Little drooly, though. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Distraction. Distraction. Shockwave's distracted. Can't ping him.* FakeProwl: *prowl is. just. sideways glancing at his couchmates. feels like he learned something tonight.* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Thoughts about documentary? ItsyBitsySpyers: *There. Yes. Good.* Whirl: *LAUGHS* Whirl: The little mouth! Shockwave: Shockwave: *going to put darksteel on -such- Throne Room Construction Duty* Whirl: Aww, look at it! It tore someone in two! Airachnid: [is going to sneak out while everyone is looking at the pictures] Shockbox: *Mesmerized* Whirl: *will swivel his helm and bob his head at Airachnid* FakeProwl: *ah? hm.* @Soundwave «The knowledge that Unicron can compact himself into the size of a regular mech is... alarming. I wouldn't have thought it possible for such a small frame to support him.» Shockwave: Darksteel: *Regret.......* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «I take it you invited Starscream to warn him against the dangers of making a bargain with Unicron for power.» ItsyBitsySpyers: *Thank goodness, the images are gone. Going from the tape to that was SUCH whiplash.* Shockbox: *Aw. It is over.* Whirl: ((darksteel, you did us all a great service today. Your sacrifice will not be forgotten)) Rodimus: *grins to himself and centently projecting his mirth* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Correct. Record indicated boxverse alternate attempted. This, not wanted. Rodimus: *trolllolololol* Shockwave: Shockwave: *relaxes very slightly now that he doesnt have to be so Attentive to the Perfect Organic* ItsyBitsySpyers: *RODIMUS HE TAKES BACK EVERY GIFT YOU GOT TODAY* Rodimus: *mind is off unicorn isnt it?* ItsyBitsySpyers: *...You can keep the gifts* Cardinal: Hello Soundwave and company! Whirl: *streetches* Well, I feel like I learned a lot tonight. I should see that movie sometime. Cardinal: ((Aww did I miss the stream)) Bumblebee: I never want to see that movie. Whirl: *stands and points to Predaking* Comm me when you're free. We'll has out a date and time. Smokescreen: Oh! Soundwave- did you ever get a chance to listen to that playlist? Bumblebee: [thumbs-up at Whirl] FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Boxverse. The one where Starscream is crowned and immediately assassinated by Megatron-turned-Galvatron?» FakeProwl: *he's guessing based on, y'know, the box shapes.* Shockbox: *He will have to ask his alternate what makes that Organic so 'Perfect', but he'll admit to it being appealing.* Shockwave: Shockwave: *hesitates* .... I possess the films on file and have shared them previously. boomtank: -and up he goes. Time to go home now- ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Greetings, Knock Out.]] And yes, he missed it. [[Farewell, Blaster.]] Bumblebee: Knock Out! boomtank: Thanks for the recording, g'night Whirl: There's more than ONE? Well, deamn. Yeah, shoot em to me, mech. *nods* Shockwave: Predaking: *nods to Whirl. now that the documentary has ended, it seems an opportune time for such... 'hashing'* Rodimus: *pings whirl a link to DL the triolgy later* Cardinal: Hello Bee! boomtank: -waves to Soundwave before leaving- ItsyBitsySpyers: @Smokescreen [[Part of it. He is enjoying it.]] Shockwave: Shockwave: Very well. boomtank: ((mun is gonna wander off now, thanks for the stream Shockbox: *And speaking of asking things later.....* @Shockwave: I have a proposition. Smokescreen: Really? I'm glad you're liking it! Guess I was right about the music you like. Whirl: All right, I'm out. See you losers later. *salutes the room and trots for the door* Bumblebee: Bye, Whirl! FakeProwl: *ah. the pretty doctor is here.* Shockwave: Shockwave: *looks at alternate expectantly* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Affirmative. That Starscream, also ghost. *Small pause.* Unknown if related to one encountered. FakeProwl: *he missed the show.* Cardinal: *awww* Bumblebee: Hey Predaking, um...never mind. Cardinal: *is going to look around for Buzzsaw* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Ghost. Is that a frequent occurrence with Starscreams?» Smokescreen: :O Knocktopus! Whirl: *spins on his heel to nod to Bee, spins back, and leaves* Shockwave: Predaking: *blinks* Cardinal: Trogdor! Smokescreen: /Going to wave at Knocktopus- he's not moving his helm from Bee's lapthough/ ItsyBitsySpyers: *Buzzsaw floats over to Knock Out and perches. Saw buds.* Smokescreen: You should lie down here with me- it's pretty comfy here! Cardinal: *saw buds 4 life* Cardinal: *waves back to Smokescreen* Cardinal: In a bit, definitely! ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Unclear. Three known. More examples needed. Bumblebee: ...Well, Predaking, sir. Would you, um, we're trying to organize treaties and...you know, Predacon territory. Protecting it. Yeah. So. Cardinal: Hello Buzzsaw.  How goes life in the art world? FakeProwl: @Soundwave «That's three too many for my tastes. I don't suppose you know how to... banish them? exorcize? ghostbust?» ItsyBitsySpyers: {{Successful, of course! Steve Vale awaits the completion of my newest piece with stalled ventilations.}} Cardinal: Steve Vale?  *thinks*  Is that the Eradicon settlement? FakeProwl: ((... is he making a statue of starscream for steve vale)) Cardinal: A sculpture I assume? Bumblebee: ...Steve Vale? Shockwave: Predaking: Ah, so you seek my advice regarding my bretheren from your 'universe'. Rodimus: *oh great they are all chatting now...* ItsyBitsySpyers: {{Ah! You've heard of it! Yes, they look forward to having their struggles immortalized.}} Bumblebee: Yes. Please. Council's tricky and this is the one thing they're going to let me do so... Cardinal: *nods thoughtfully* Cardinal: What kind of materials do you typically used? Rodimus: *flops backwards on the now cleared off table and broods* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Bumblebee: {{A large Vehicon settlement of approximately 80. All have assigned themselves variations on the human designation "Steve".}} Bruin: *Everyone has reached the end of their collective socialization tolerance fr the night, so time to leave* Shockbox: @Shockwave: In exchange for my own CNA sample, I would like to request a small preview of your current working area. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Negative. Knowledge never needed. One reframed, one helpful. Other seen, never met. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Laserbeak helpfully pats Rodimus' helm and offers him a treat with one feeler* ItsyBitsySpyers: *...She then takes it back, splits it in half, and offers him half. She'll eat the other piece.* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Hm. Too bad.» *it might be useful if he ever needs to assassinate Starscream someday.* Shockwave: Predaking: *frowns thoughtfully* What is the current status of your relations? Has their territory been respected thus far? FakeProwl: *admittedly, the dead usually can't hold public office, but he wouldn't put it past Starscream to try anyway.* ItsyBitsySpyers: {{Found materials, dead parts, energon... the usual, dear doctor.}} Cardinal: *chuckles*  I thought so. Shockwave: @Shockbox: *helm tilt* ...Acceptable. *his samples from the boxyverses are limited, and all evidence indicates that this alternate is not particularly destructive or disrespectful* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Will inform if discovered. Cardinal: My mate uses the same for his puzzles. I was thinking I might trade you some of his cast-offs for some of yours? Give you both more variety for your respective work. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Buzzsaw sticks out a feeler. Deal.* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «I'd appreciate it.» Bumblebee: As well as it can be, bots are afraid and mostly don't want trouble. But I know there's going to be THAT idiot that goes out and tries to hunt them. So I guess...how much space is enough space... Bumblebee: And how much contact do you want from us? Cardinal: *shakes it formally* Shockbox: *His posture might have straightened a smidgen. He nods at the other's confirmation.* ItsyBitsySpyers: {{I shall transfer you one of my rare failed pieces tomorrow.}} Shockwave: Predaking: *hmms* Such an individual would soon become the hunted. Bumblebee: Yeah, and then it would just be a giant mess for everyone. Shockbox: *Going to be the first time he willingly travels to someone else's universe for something other than a large gathering.* Bumblebee: But I'll keep in mind to write that into the treaty. Shockwave: *daw........ alternate playdate* Shockbox: *Shhshhhh yes.* Cardinal: Hey Trogdor, still room over there? Shockbox: *Might need....coodinates.....and to set up a time.* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «... How are you?» Smokescreen: Plenty of room! Come on over! FakeProwl: *he needs to leave to get ready for work soon, but he's gotta make sure Soundwave has adequately recovered first.* Shockbox: *Do not recall if Shockbox was ever given a frequency to attempt communication with, either.* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Relieved documentaries: complete. Tired. Journey home, recharge imminent. Rodimus: *bored Rdoimus. this is bad* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Which is why the minis are starting to gather toward him* Rodimus: *he sits up and peers aroudn the room servaying...* FakeProwl: *acknowledging ping. that's good enough.* @Soundwave «I should go get ready for work.» ItsyBitsySpyers: *Oh no. Soundwave knows what that means. He's scramming.* Smokescreen: /He's going to glance at Rodimus and wink at- come make a car pile!/ Bumblebee: Smokey, this is your song. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Acknowledged. Work well. ... Assistance appreciated. Shockwave: Predaking: If my 'alternate' is anything like myself, then the principle factors for consideration are power and respect. Peaceable relations -are- possible, but recall that your Autobots may still-- Cardinal: Excellent! Smokescreen: ((wait dangit the sound isnt playing what song Bumblebee: (( CARRY ON MY WAYWARD SOOOOOOON Cardinal: *He's going to head right on over to Smokescreen and Bee* Smokescreen: ((:OOO Shockwave: Predaking: --have much to atone for. As for the size of their territory, I myself claimed a large space centered upon our burial grounds and the Manganese Mountains. I am told it is roughly-- FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Rest well.» Cardinal: Hello Bumblebug! Smokescreen: wait I'm not a wayward son Smokescreen: Once I rose above Bumblebee: Hey Knock Out! ItsyBitsySpyers: *Nod and carefully de-laces both hands.* Smokescreen: /He'll sing along thoguh- he knows this! Kinda!/ Cardinal: How's it going? Smokescreen: CARRY ON MY WAYWARD SUUUUUUN Bumblebee: [nods as he listens, definitely taking some mental notes] Shockwave: Predaking: --equivalent to the size of one of your pre-war city-states. FakeProwl: *a farewell ping; disappears.* Bumblebee: Ok, thank you. I...I understand. I don't know how much the Council is willing to atone, but I'll do it myself if I have to. You helped us protect Cybertron and are incredible allies to have. Shockwave: Shockwave: Good night, Soundwave. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Looks to Shockwave and pings him. He's going to go home, (and be sick and scrub up a bit and maybe play hax until he can) get some recharge.* Bumblebee: Not just for power, but as another perspective for how our planet should operate to accomodate everyone. Bumblebee: And Knock Out...honestly, it's not bad. Bumblebee: Been happier lately, how about you? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Gets everyone docked, sends Shockwave a similarly appreciative message for the handhold, and trudges out* Shockwave: Predaking: *looks faintly surprised, but pleasantly so.* If you approach the matter with a similar candidness and dignity, then I am certain you can one day achieve this goal. Smokescreen: I'm gonna head off- I gotta go somewhere important, buuut- /He's going to hug Bee and Knock Out really quick./ Bumblebee: Glad you approve, easier than the Council. I have their approval, but it came with a price I'm not willing to pay again. And they know that. Bumblebee: Seeya Smokes. [hugs back] Smokescreen: Thank you for all your help, Bee Bumblebee: Anytime. Bumblebee: I'm heading out too, thanks for hosting again. Bumblebee: And thanks for your help, Predaking. Cardinal: Bye Trogdor!  *hugs* Shockwave: Predaking: *brows furrow-- more puzzled than anything* Your species' politics seem unduly troublesome. Cardinal: I've been fine, Bee.  Enjoying some down time. Bumblebee: Oh yeah, they are. That's why I quit, this is really the last thing I'm ever going to do for them. Bumblebee: Awesome Knock Out, I'll um...I'll comm. you sometime? Shockwave: Predaking: *nods in acceptance of thanks* Anything to assist in the well-being of my brothers abroad. Cardinal: Please do! Shockbox: *It is time for a sleep. Or in Shockbox's case, it is time to work his aft off in order to open up a large enough timeslot for his field trip.* Shockwave: *knows that feel, alternate* Shockbox: *All of you are being bid adieu.* Shockbox: *G'night.* ItsyBitsySpyers: ((night!)) Shockwave: *He, too, must attend to his work. Files quietly out as soon as he's certain that DS and SL aren't going to consume the entire snack table on their way out* Rodimus: *there is nothing but a prime on the snack table* Shockwave: *all the more reason to make sure they dont eat you* Shockwave: (( ;) night folks, thanks for streaming, i'll get out of roddymuns hair lol)) Rodimus: ((I wanta go playoverwatch l3

[toaarcan]

Sonic X, Sonic Heroes, and IDW, or: How a bad anime from 2004 spoiled a comic from 2019.

Now, I haven’t been following IDW Sonic all that closely. I get regular updates from Nemesis via Discord, and additional info from some of the Tumblrs I follow that are invested in it, but I don’t really have a desire to touch it myself. Here’s why.

There’s a multitude of reasons for this. Starting with the background of Sonic Forces wasn’t really a good place to begin from, and being based on present-day game lore in general was always going to hurt it, mainly because SEGASonic canon is currently a confusing mess of retcons brought on by Iizuka taking the J.K. Rowling approach.

Wait, no, he’s just saying stupid shit that contradicts previous canon, not trying to score woke points and hoping nobody notices the frankly terrible stereotypes and TERF tweets. Iizuka is taking the Greg Farshtey approach.

Added, as anyone that’s had experience with my opinions will tell you, I started falling out of love with Ian Flynn’s writing somewhere around Issue 200, and moved to outright dislike during Mecha Sally, and to make matters worse I started noticing that some of the flaws in the 200-247 era were also present in the 160-199 era, retroactively making those harder to go back to.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: I kept up with Archie for the SatAM cast. SatAM reruns back in 2004 were my Sonic, moreso than anything else, and even now I still have way more attachment to those two seasons of animation than I do to most other aspects of the franchise, warts and all. So Archie providing me with additional content for said characters was a major draw for me. I’d generally put up with a lot just to get myself more SatAM content.

That in itself is a large part of why I fell off the Archie train during Mecha Sally. The entirety of the SatAM cast were removed from the regular lineup, just leaving three SEGA characters with their personalities stunted, even if that didn’t make sense in-universe. But that’s a discussion for another day.

So being written by someone whom I no longer enjoyed the writing of, set in a mess of a canon with a thoroughly shite game as the main basis, without the cast I read the previous comics for gave me little reason to invest in IDW Sonic. It wasn’t for me, I’d just keep reading Transformers and move on.

Then MTMTE/LL ended with a heart-twister and Ex-RID ended with a giant Unicron-shaped fart, and the new comic is dull as fucking dishwater and started by killing off one of my favourites, who was also one of the franchise’s confirmed LGBT characters. So now IDW is getting none of my money. Which is good because I’m broke.

Tangents aside, my lack of interest wasn’t something set in stone. If it turned out that the comic was actually really good, then sure, I’d try it. I was up for being proven wrong. But so far, I haven’t felt compelled by the responses from the internet. If anything I’ve been more turned off.

I could talk about how zombies are really fucking boring. I could talk about how SEGA’s recent confusion over what to do with Amy has combined with Ian’s need to include a Sally-esque character to make IDW Amy into Sally Lite. I could talk about how Ian seemingly fundamentally misunderstood everything that was cool about Neo Metal Sonic and somehow managed to reduce him to a boring Eggman minion in an arc where Eggman was out of action due to amnesia… But I won’t.

Instead I’m going to talk about how the comic has done something that would legitimately make me think twice about picking it up even if the FF were to debut tomorrow.

Yeah, I would pass up a SatAM fix because of this, that’s how much this ticks me off.

Now, I presume that if you’re reading this, you have a favourite Sonic character. And you probably feel pretty strongly about how your favourite character is portrayed. If they get a bad run in a game or two then you probably get a little salty about that. Tails and Knuckles fans in particular, as of late, seem to be the ones getting the short end.

Well, my favourite character in the entire franchise is Emerl the Gizoid. I will take Gemerl as a worthy substitute, they’re basically the same character. And the comics have been doing them dirty since the Archie reboot.

(Sidenote: I will be referring to Emerl with male pronouns from this point on. The Maria-soul thing isn’t as widely known as I’d like it to be, so I’m going to compromise for the sake of keeping the focus on the actual point)

However, not everything about this can be laid at the feet of Ian Flynn. Arguably his portrayal of said character is merely a symptom of a long-running issue that has plagued Sonic storytelling for roughly 15-16 years now.

But before we get into that, let’s get into something important: Why Emerl is my favourite Sonic character.

Part 1: Emerl in Sonic Battle, or “How I learned to stop worrying and love the Gizoid”.

This game doesn’t get enough love.

Now, I totally understand why it doesn’t get enough love. There are game design choices, like the grinding and the repetitiveness of the story mode that really drag it down, and because of that, Battle can become a slow-going and tedious experience, and that’s a real shame, because the story that’s hidden in this game is a thing of beauty.

Like most Sonic games from the 2000s, this game introduces a new character to join Sonic’s list of friends. Unlike the games that aren’t SA2 and Sonic Rush, this new character is actually good (This is hyperbole, Omega, Silver, and Shade were fine too).

Emerl enters the story as a mute, barely-functional robot that doesn’t do much of anything for a while, and only seems to come to life when Sonic locates it and attacks it. However, as the robot absorbs more Chaos Emeralds, slowly a personality starts to form, largely pieced together from other characters’ traits.

Emerl, as he is dubbed, is initially childlike and naive, but as he grows he develops a sassy streak, and his speech becomes a lot more developed. Maturity sets in, as Emerl grapples with his own nature, particularly the legacy he carries from the ARK, and Shadow’s ongoing turmoil with regards to the whole “Living Weapon” deal. Ultimately he becomes a hero, following in the footsteps of his mentor, parental figure, and closest friend, Sonic.

That’s right, Sonic, not Cream, is Emerl’s closest friend. We’ll get to that.

But this heart-warming story of Sonic becoming a dad for a robot doesn’t have a happy ending. Despite Shadow and Rouge finding a way to neutralise Emerl’s destructive Gizoid programming, Eggman has a way to reactivate it anyway, driving Emerl into a berserk rampage. This is kind of the one sticking point I have with the game’s plot, Eggman shouldn’t have been able to do this after Shadow and Rouge neutralised Emerl.

Additionally, while Emerl was on the ARK getting Maria’s soul crammed into him, Gerald also added a self-destruct mechanism that would trigger if he ever went Ultimate again.

So with Emerl quite literally exploding with all the power of the Chaos Emeralds, but his destructive programming forcing him to turn Eggman’s latest Death Star knockoff on Mobius/Earth/Sonic’s World, Sonic races up to confront his mecha-child, and things take a turn for the Old Robot Yeller.

In a moment that really deserves more attention, Sonic confronts his own child on the bridge of a space station, while Emerl is running on the power of the Chaos Emeralds and outputting more energy than he can physically take, and they fight. In the space of thirty seconds, they have a ten-round knock-down, drag-out brawl, and at the end, Sonic stands triumphant. Without using a single transformation. Yeah, that’s how powerful this guy is, that’s not travel speed, that’s combat speed. Looking at you, Death Battle.

It’s not really clear whether Sonic outright defeats Ultimate Emerl, or just survives long enough for his opponent to reach his limit and self-destruct, but the end result is the same. Sonic cradles a robot that became his own child over the course of the past few weeks, someone he raised from a baby-like state into a mature and heroic individual, and Emerl looks up at him and asks “Sonic… am I going to die?” And despite Sonic desperately trying to get him to keep it together, Not only does Emerl die, but he’s aware that the end is coming, and bids farewell to all of his friends as Sonic pleads with him to hold on. Shadow is equally distraught, his only friend with a connection to the ARK, someone he can call a brother, someone who carries the soul of his deceased sister within him, is dead.

Emerl: “Sonic I don’t feel so good.”

Like it’s canon that Eggman basically murdered Sonic’s kid.

And goddamnit this ending hits me hard. It frustrates me that Eggman was able to pull a means to drive Emerl into his Ultimate freakout mode out of his arse, but other than that, it’s so gutwrenching, I love it.

Gamma’s story from SA1 gets a lot of praise on the Internet, but for me, this is even better. It’s like Gamma’s story, but if Gamma was actually central to the plot of the game and the characters other than Amy gave a shit about him, and gave a shit about him for longer than a single cutscene, after which they are never mentioned again. Hell, due to Chaos Gamma being a thing, Gamma gets more love from the other characters in Battle than he does in SA1.

But, unfortunately, it doesn’t end there.

Part 2: (Sonic) Anime was a Mistake, or: “Sonic X ruins everything.”

I’ve made my dislike of this anime quite clear in the past. The characters are flanderized, Sonic is a B-lister in his own damn show, the villains are weaksauce or boring or both, the plot is only remotely close to good when its cribbing from two videogames which told the stories in question better, and for the first two seasons the entire show actually revolves around not Sonic, but the least relatable audience surrogate ever made. The third season would continue to include him, but shove him (And everyone else) to the side in favour of a Pokemon whose only move was “Flashback”, making audiences the world over question why he was even there in the first place.

Oh, and it also near-singlehandedly destroyed the thin shreds of character development that Tails, Knuckles, Amy, and Eggman had received in Sonic Adventure 2.

All four of these characters had been significantly enriched by the then most recent console game. Eggman had been revealed to be motivated by an admiration for his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik, but in the same game learned that Gerald had lost his marbles and programmed the ARK to smash into the planet and kill everyone on it, probably including his surviving family, i.e. little baby Ivo Robotnik. Gerald betrayed Eggman posthumously, and it’s clear from Eggman’s interactions with Tails during the credits of the game that this is giving him a lot to think about.

Knuckles is a weird case because most of his characterisation in SA2 is conveyed via… the lyrics to his rap music. Yes, really. He gets minor growth through the cutscenes, most notably in his decision to shatter the Master Emerald early on. Having already reassembled it once after it was broken in SA1, he’s now confident that he can do it again, so is willing to break it to prevent Eggman or Rouge stealing it. Via the rap lyrics, however (Yes I just wrote that), we also learn that Knuckles is slowly warming up to Sonic, gaining a greater respect for him, that he is more in-touch with his history and ancestors after SA1 (Though fortunately not in a Ken Penders way), and that he’s also struggling with feelings for Rouge, a plot element that went completely out of the window after this game.

Tails and Amy, however, get it the worst, as both went through arcs in SA1 that are followed up on and expanded in SA2. Amy had come to the conclusion that she didn’t need to rely on Sonic for everything, and that she would make him respect her as a hero in her own right. And while Amy is clearly in way over her head throughout the events of SA2, she still makes a significant difference, not only freeing Sonic from his cell on Prison Island, allowing Tails’ invasion to be a distraction and stealing a keycard to facilitate it, but of course, she later saves the world by motivating Shadow to join the fight to stop the ARK drop.

Tails had a similar plot, about learning to believe in himself as a hero, without having to rely on Sonic, and in SA2 he gets to prove it, not only partaking in the same rescue operation as Amy and fighting Eggman on even footing, but effectively taking command of the heroes and becoming their new leader, and for the first time, Sonic defers to him.

And then Sonic X came along and fucked it all up.

Eggman became a clownish antagonist with no semblance of nuance, and he actually got off the easiest.

Knuckles became a loud, dimwitted loner who got tricked by Eggman constantly, which would go on to be his personality for the rest of the franchise, ultimately culminating in the travesty against all sense that was Boom Knuckles.

Tails was reduced to a wimpy taxi driver, incapable of doing anything without his giant mecha plane to sit in. This was largely exacerbated by the presence of Donut Steele, who usurped his role as Sonic’s best friend and sidekick for two seasons, a problem which only got worse in the third season when Donut Steele suddenly became a genius inventor too, encroaching even more into Tails’ territory. Tails did get himself some more focus in S3, but only to make googly eyes at the Pokemon, a role which frankly could’ve gone to literally anyone else and would have made no difference on the plot. I would say that Tails being involved in a romance story at all is weird, but given the comics and Boom the weirdest thing about this latest tragic love story for the kid is that the Pokemon was actually close to his own age, because outside of this it really does seem like Tails goes for older ladies. Though she did turn into an adult at the end so I guess that counts?

But Amy arguably got the worst of it. Not only was her crowning moment in SA2 taken away from her and given to Donut Steele, but the poor girl had her promising character arc cut short and replaced with an obsessive, unhealthy fixation on Sonic, combined with a violent temper and an eagerness to smash anything that displeased her, Sonic included, with a giant hammer. Her admiration and crush on Sonic were warped into her being a possessive, mean-spirited stalker, whom only got away with it because she was an anime girl and therefore it was cute rather than creepy.

I want to take the time at this point to stress that stalking is not okay, under any circumstances. A girl obsessively following an older guy and threatening him and everyone around him with violent assault if they ever so much as imply that he isn’t interested in her is not cute, it means it’s time for a restraining order. Sonamy is not cute.

Now that I’ve swatted that particular hornet’s nest with a cricket bat, let’s move on!

I’ve always found it ironic that, despite being the adaptation with the most oversight from SEGA and Sonic Team, and the most endorsement from them too, Sonic X had easily the worst characterisation of any of the shows at the time. But, for all its faults, I can’t blame everything that went down in the aftermath on it. It had a comrade-in-arms. Mediocrely-written arms.

Part 3: Partner in Crime, or “Sonic Heroes also ruins everything.”

Sonic Heroes has a lot to answer for. And I mean a lot. It was the beginning of the franchise’s obsession with references to the classic games, it codified the really awkward ages for certain characters, and it seemed to be dedicated to completely unpicking everything established in the Adventure duology.

Shadow’s sudden resurrection is one thing, at least they had the graces to include a means to preserve his sacrifice via having him be an android, the blame for that not taking should be laid at the feet of his own game.

But the rest of the cast? Ohhh boy. Sonic’s still fine, he didn’t change much in the Adventure games, but then there’s Tails. Despite all the development he went through in SA1, in this game he needs to turn to Sonic when Eggman returns, and honestly this whole setup could’ve been fixed if Tails sought Sonic out not for the sake of having him lead the charge, but rather simply to recruit him into the counterattack he was already planning. Nevertheless, throughout the rest of the game Tails is almost as wimpy as his X counterpart, not helped by the voicework he’s given. No offense to William Corkery, who was probably like six when he recorded his lines, but this what you get when you choose actors via nepotism, rather than talent. But at least he does something.

How about Knuckles? As the other side of his derailment, Knuckles just turns up in this game, buddy-buddy with the characters he was only just starting to warm up to before, and blatantly not caring about the Master Emerald until Rouge mentions she’s going to steal it at the end. This will combine with his becoming a dumbass in Sonic X and become basically his entire character for… ever. Even in Forces, where he’s supposed to be doing slightly better as the leader of the resistance… but he’s a dumbass, and even Ian Flynn, who kept Knuckles as competent and intelligent in the Archie comics (Making the best version of Knuckles we’ve had in forever), kept this ongoing in the IDW comic. The Forces prequel portrays him as deciding to become leader of the Resistance (To an empire that hasn’t actually formed yet) purely to be a glory hound, and then goes on to establish that he was basically a figurehead while the real work was done by Amy, of all people.

And speaking of Amy…

Yeah, poor Amy is basically her Sonic X counterpart. But worse. I didn’t think that was possible, but at least X’s Amy seems to care about her friends. In Heroes, we’re treated to an equally violent and stalkerish Amy, who ostensibly starts searching out Sonic because he’s implicated in the abduction of Cream and Big’s pets, but when they actually catch up to him, Amy clean forgets why she is looking for him in the first place and tries to force him to marry her. Despite being twelve.

Y’know when Amy said she wanted to marry Sonic in SA2, she was joking, right?

This is why I find the idea of Amy being the real leader of the Resistance frankly absurd: Because the only time she led anything, it was a team that consisted of herself, a small child, and a man less intelligent and aware of reality than said small child, and she completely forgot their actual objective the moment she set her eyes on Sonic. Add in an unfortunate stint of very poor eyesight that got less and less understandable with every instance, and we got Amy’s rough personality for the next decade.

While Knuckles mostly stagnated at the same level of stupidity during that time, Tails got worse and worse, losing all of his badass traits with every game, a factor only increased by the “Sonic only” mentality costing him playable status, until he reached his nadir in Forces, cowering in terror from Chaos 0, and crying out to Sonic to save him, despite knowing full-well that Sonic was captured already.  Amy, meanwhile, limped along at the same level until about 2014, where it seemed someone at SEGA finally realised that A) Having the only female character you regularly use be a pink-coloured gender-bent version of your male hero whose only function is lusting after said hero doesn’t and shouldn’t fly in this day and age, and B) violent stalkers aren’t cute, and dropped this trait. Unfortunately, this has been more of a lateral move than a fix, as, much like Antoine in the comics, they forgot to give her anything substantial or fitting after she lost her negative traits, leaving her a bland and dull character, and when you’ve had a character be consistent for ten years, even if they were consistently bad, then changing it without cause or warning is still going to be jarring and awkward.

Part 4: Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right, or “Why the fuck did this happen?”

As I said in Part 2, Sonic X was made under heavy oversight from Sonic Team, and was heavily endorsed by them at the same time. There were promos for the show inserted into Sonic Adventure DX, a few episodes were released on GBA cartridges, and it received a long-running comic from Archie that ran alongside the main book, even after the show had ended. Additionally, characters that debuted in games from 2002-2004 were restricted from appearing in Archie’s main book for years afterwards (Which will become relevant later). The third season was commissioned solely off of the response to the first two, and primarily overseas response, hence why the original sub was never aired in Japan.

Sonic X was huge. And with that in mind, it’s plain to see that the portrayals of the characters in Sonic X were intended by SEGA. Yeah, all that horrible characterisation was intended as the vision for the franchise going forwards, and subsequent games were adjusted to match it.

And unfortunately, not only did this have a serious impact on the main cast of the games, but it had an even worse effect on Emerl.

Part 5: Emerl in Sonic X, or “Emerl vs. ‘Emel’”

Sonic X’s original mission statement was to adapt Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, and Sonic Battle. Why they skipped Sonic Heroes, despite Shadow being a major player in Battle’s story, I don’t know.

For whatever reason, the show took a full season to actually get to the first game adaptation, SA1, and instead spent the first 26 episodes on bland episodic “adventures”, in some kind of strange reverse-Isekai series. However, once it got there, the adaptation work was fairly faithful to the source material, which the exception of Donut Steele’s being crammed in to the plot. However, he mostly followed Big around, and since Big was the least involved in the game’s plot, he didn’t disrupt too much.

Sidenote, after 26 episodes of filler, the actual SA1 adaptation only lasted six episodes.

SA2 was likewise only six episodes, but with the exception of Amy’s big scene, it likewise wasn’t too bad. Tails suffered this time around too, which is somewhat surprising since he was mech-dependent in the anime anyway.  

After some more filler, which introduced the Chaotix and then did nothing with them, Emerl finally made an appearance, albeit they got his name wrong.

‘Emel’ looks like Emerl, and somewhat works like Emerl, but might as well be completely  different. ‘Emel’ stays completely mute for the entire time he’s around, never advancing much beyond Emerl’s initial silent, pre-first Emerald persona. He does get better at fighting, but he’s limited to only absorbing a single skill at once (Except for when he isn’t).

Dispensing with Battle’s interesting, rich, and heart-twisting plot, Sonic X instead has ‘Emel’ linger in ensemble for three episodes, before condensing the entire game’s premise into a two episodes of really bland tournament arc, where Sonic himself doesn’t actually fight and we get two rounds of Donut Steele being a dick to his friend and his father.

‘Emel’ wins the tournament, and is given a Chaos Emerald, and just when you think it might kickstart him becoming an actual character, instead it just drives him insane and he immediately becomes a pathetically weak version of Ultimate Emerl. After kicking the crap out of the entire cast, he is defeated by Cream and Cheese, because even though he can take on Sonic, Knuckles, and Rouge at the same time and win, along with Tails, Amy, Donut Steele and everyone else, he… can’t handle two opponents at once.

This is stupid.

You’ll notice that I haven’t talked about Sonic’s relationship with ‘Emel’, and that’s because he doesn’t have one. The wonderfully-written parental bond that these two characters share in the games is completely excised, and instead the focus is put on Cream. Bare in mind, Cream is so inconsequential to the actual game that she doesn’t even get mentioned individually in Emerl’s dying speech like Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Shadow do. Instead she’s just grouped in with Amy.

This is also stupid.

And as a result of this, it means that what is arguable base form Sonic’s most impressive feat just doesn’t happen in the anime, instead Emerl dies because he is lightly kicked a bit by Cream. Yeah, unlike the Advance games, Sonic X’s Cream is not an unstoppable engine of destruction, she’s basically just a small child who can sometimes fly.

Instead of Emerl’s tragic speech and Sonic’s desperate attempts to keep his son alive, we get treated to a prolonged scene of Cream crying over the death of her “friend”, something that is probably meant to tug at heartstrings but doesn’t because Cream’s voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard.

And Shadow isn’t even there! He doesn’t come back until a third of the way through Season 3, and never meets ‘Emel.’

This is really stupid. And, for those keeping track, that means of Sonic X’s originally commissioned 52 episodes, and the full series run of 78 episodes, a stunning total of seventeen of them were actually adaptations of the games that the series was supposed to focus on, leaving us with 61 episodes of what might as well be filler.

And, unfortunately, that franchise-wide initiative had damning consequences for Emerl.

Part 6: Gemerl and Sonic Advance 3, or: “An incomplete resurrection.”

So, Gemerl. I know his name is apparently G-Merl now but fuck that I’m calling him Gemerl. If the comics can do it then so will I.

Gemerl is the worst thing Eggman has ever done to Sonic. Like, there is no contest. Some of his other schemes might be more destructive and generally evil, but in terms of personal pain inflicted, nothing has topped this.

Eggman salvaged Emerl’s corpse, and brought him back to life as a mindless murderbot under his control. So not only did he kill Sonic’s robo-son, but he also brought him back as a weapon.

Come the conclusion of the game, Gemerl predictably betrays Eggman, steals the Chaos Emeralds from Sonic, and goes on another rampage. I have… headcanons about this fight, but that’s something to worry about later. What’s important is that, once again, Sonic is victorious, and Gemerl’s defeated body plunges into the atmosphere.

Fortunately, Tails is able to bring Emerl back properly this time, presumably using the Chaos shard that was left over at the end of Battle’s finale. So, it’s all a happy ending, right? Sonic has his child back, Shadow has his connection to his history restored, and Emerl is alive and well, right?

Wrong.

See, the vile spectre of Sonic X rears its ugly head once more, and sabotages this conclusion. Gemerl doesn’t return to Sonic, in fact we never see him reunite with his father. Instead, Sonic X’s version has enough clout now to take precedence, so Gemerl is now Cream’s playmate.

Bear in mind that Emerl’s idea of a fun game is all-out combat against his friends, and Cream doesn’t like fighting (Even if she’s really good at it in Advance 2 and 3).

And then he never shows up again. Even when Cream is part of the game’s plot, like in Rush or Generations, he’s not there, and most egregiously, in Sonic Chronicles, where Cream is not only an active player in the plot, but so are Gizoids, the creators of said Gizoids are the main antagonists, and Emerl himself is mentioned… Gemerl is not there.

But he did make it into the comics, for better or worse. Mostly worse.

Part 7: Embargos, knock-offs, and misused tropes, or: “Ian Flynn dun goofed.”

For a long while, Emerl/Gemerl was barred from the Archie comics, due to the Sonic X embargo, and when it was lifted, he didn’t appear until the reboot. We did, however, get a suspiciously similar substitute in the form of Shard.

Shard was the original Metal Sonic, but when he was brought back and rebuilt for the Secret Freedom arc, he was given a colour scheme ostensibly derived from Metal Sonic 3.0, but one shared with Gemerl, and a personality that was a lot like a watered-down version of Emerl’s own.

On some level I can understand Ian’s decision to bring back Metal Sonic v2.5, rather than use the character that seems to have been an inspiration for this new incarnation in some way. He’d need a fully-formed Emerl, necessitating a skip over the whole story, since there wasn’t room for an adaptation during the Mecha Sally arc that the Secret Freedom story was framed within. Heck, for all we know, the similarities between them may simply be a pretty sizeable coincidence.

But then the reboot happened and Gemerl finally joined the comic cast. And to say it was underwhelming would be an understatement.

You’ll notice that I said “Gemerl” rather than “Emerl”, because his entire story was indeed skipped. The events of Sonic Battle and Sonic Advance 3 had both happened already. This wasn’t Ian’s decision, as far as we know, his intention was for the comic to start over from the beginning. However, due to the interference of Paul Kaminski, who wanted a softer reboot, Ian was forced to fill the characters’ active histories with a large chunk of the games’ stories. Battle and Advance 3 were among those that had already happened, so Emerl made cameos in both incarnations via flashback… which unfortunately led to a plot hole.

See, Advance 3 and Sonic Unleashed are rather difficult to keep in the same continuity, because both share a common plot element: The world breaking into seven pieces.

For a long while, it was generally assumed that the handheld games and console titles were only semi-canon to each other. This avoided the awkward question of “If the Gaias were already there, why didn’t they emerge when Eggman broke the planet in Advance 3?”

Ian shoved them blatantly into the same continuity, and gave no attempt to explain what was different about the Advance 3 world-break compared to the Gaia incident, which served as the backbone to the reboot’s three year long Shattered World Arc. Why didn't the Gaias wake up during Advance 3? Because that's now a question we have to ask of the comics' world.

When Gemerl finally showed up doing something other than yard work for Vanilla (Despite allegedly being Cream’s friend, Cream spends all her time with the rest of the cast, and Gemerl is basically Vanilla’s maid), it was to get effortlessly dispatched by a brainwashed Mega Man with a terrible name in the extremely lacklustre Worlds Unite event.

This one was more than a little bit of a slap in the face, considering that Emerl and Mega Man are very similar in concept- robots that can copy the abilities of other characters- but Emerl is demonstrably more powerful. Now, if Ian had established that Gemerl had been nerfed when he was rebuilt, either by Eggman or by Tails, that would be fine. But he didn’t. In fact, Gemerl is given the title bubble “Super Gizoid”, implying that he’s stronger than a regular Gizoid.

Worlds Unite is generally pretty bad for having its corrupted heroes easily curbstomp every other character around, to the point that the only thing that can stop them is each other, but in Gemerl’s case it really serves no purpose.

This is the only thing that he actually does in Worlds Unite. He shows up to get beaten up and make Mega Man look stronger. That’s it.

This is something that TV Tropes refers to as “The Worf Effect”, a trope wherein an established powerful character is defeated easily by a new character, in order to demonstrate the latter’s power. Now, there’s nothing wrong with using this trope, but please note that I said establishedpowerful character, which Gemerl wasn’t.

At the point that this comic released, Gemerl’s last appearance in any Sonic media was over ten years prior. None of the comic’s intended target audience would remember him, and they wouldn’t know why defeating him was impressive. And this was, in addition, a terrible way to introduce him to new fans. Though the worst part is easily that this was unnecessary. Mega Man had already defeated everyone else, and had established his power pretty well just on them, and he was about to get removed from play permanently in the next issue. There was really no reason to throw Gemerl under the bus for this.

He made one more appearance in the event, getting controlled by the Zeti along with every other robot, and after that he got bopped on the head and just flew away.

Later, he’d make another appearance in the Panic in the Sky arc, and while his portrayal was far from the worst thing about Panic in the Sky, it only adds to the issues caused by the previous showing.

Gemerl makes one appearance, and promptly gets pinned down by the Witchcarters and Team Hooligan. Bear in that one of those groups are the joke villains who nobody takes seriously, and the other are a gang that was defeated by Tails before he met Sonic.

Archie Gemerl was a character who only existed to lose to villains in a vain attempt to make them look better, and that’s legitimately all Ian ever did with him, which makes me wonder whether he disliked the character. And it didn’t even make the villains look good, when you think about it. For anybody that was actually the intended audience for this book, Gemerl had no significance. He was just a robot that got beat up all the time. But for anyone like me, who does remember the games he appeared in, it stands out, not as good writing, but as a blatant narrative device and misused trope.

In this situation, I would simply rather Gemerl never appeared in Archie. At all. If Ian wasn’t going to give him time to shine, or at the very least be an adequate member of the supporting cast, he shouldn’t have used him at all.

Part 8: A Fresh False Start, or: “Wait, how did this get worse?!”

And now we arrive at IDW.

The one nice thing I can say about Archie Gemerl is that at least his personality was mostly on point. He read like a generally accurate take on the character that Emerl was at the end of Battle, which is what he’s supposed to be.

The same cannot be said for IDW.

In the pages of IDW, Gemerl acts like the most generic robot. He speaks in emotionless, stilted sentences with little in the way of actual grammar, leaving him to read like a poor man’s Soundwave, or Soundwave in one of those comics where the writer can’t decide whether they want him to speak normally or adopt his speech pattern from the G1 cartoon, so they just sort of do both.

Emerl pretty much never talked like this, as far as I can recall. His speech development is much more reminiscent of a child learning words, and the only time when he did adopt a more robotic speech pattern, it was a clue that he was slipping back into his destructive programming. He only spoke like a generic robot when he was in mindless destroyer mode.

He gets thrown for a loop by a simple logic flaw, unable to reconcile “Protect Cream and Vanilla” with “Don’t kill the zombots”, and has to be talked out of killing everything around him, when the entire point of Gerald’s modifications to the Gizoid was to make him a bringer of hope rather than destruction, and give him a compassionate heart.

The part of Battle’s story where Cream imparts a pacifistic mindset doesn’t frame her as being right. In that part of the game, they are cornered and under attack by hostile but ultimately mindless drones, and when she convinces Emerl to stop fighting, he almost dies. It’s Cream that learns the lesson there, that sometimes fighting is okay.

This character is already compassionate, he shouldn’t need to be talked into not killing the zombots by a small child, nor should he need her to point out that they’re innocent people who have been made this way by Eggman, because he was made into a killing machine by Eggman twice, and the first time he did die because of it. The character that lay dying in Sonic’s arms, scared and bidding his last goodbyes to his loved ones shouldn’t be the one experiencing this struggle when Omega is also in this arc.

That’s it, really. He’s not Gemerl. He’s a second, less goofy Omega. And it boggles my mind that, despite getting Gemerl’s character, if not his combat abilities, down almost perfectly in Archie, Ian is now subjecting us to this travesty.  

Like with the Archie example above, therein lies the crux of why the steady decline of Emerl/Gemerl that began with Sonic X is pushing me away from IDW: I don’t want to read Ian’s take on this character, because, to me, No Gemerl is better than Badly-Written Gemerl,

This isn’t the first time I’ve said this, either.  Way back in 2016, when I complained about Ian’s portrayal of Gemerl in Panic in the Sky, I said that the way he handled characters that I liked tended to make them the least likeable parts of the stories he wrote. As well as stating my dislike for his handling of Gemerl, I also stated that I used to really like Fiona Fox, moreso in concept than in execution, but under Ian’s pen she was largely an insufferable antagonist, little more than a trophy to make his pet recolour look better, and almost every story she was in only added to the “List of reasons she needs to stop lying to herself and just start the redemption arc already”. Additionally, I said that I didn’t want to see him bring back Neo Metal Sonic or Mephiles in any context, and we got the former, and it was exactly as bad as I thought it would be.

So, that’s basically why I don’t want to read IDW. That’s why, even if the aspect that was a big sticking point for me back when the comic launched was to be undone soon, I still probably wouldn’t pick it up. Because I don’t want to see my favourite Sonic character continue to be written badly by a guy that should know better, and has done better in the past.

If he were simply screwing up Gemerl’s personality the first time he wrote him, I would file it away under the same category as “Emel”, but the fact that he’s done better before, in a book where he had greater restrictions on what he could do with the characters, really settles this as an interest-killer for me.

Well done, Mr. Flynn. I legitimately didn’t think you could make me actually miss SEGA’s tighter control, but you somehow managed it. I would be impressed if it weren’t so sad.