Another bug joins the bunch.
Last time on Beast Wars, the
Maximals and Predacons wrestled for control of a flying island. The island had
a powerful Obelisk at its center with a laser that could obliterate almost
anything. Optimus and Rattrap flew up to it to give back up to the stranded
Tigertron and Airazor. They were briefly slowed down by Terrorsaur and
Waspinator, but Optimus took out the latter and the former was forced at
gunpoint to fly Rattrap the rest of the way. Unfortunately, they arrived too
late and Blackarachnia was able to get inside. She took control of the Obelisk
and prepared to destroy the Maximal base. Tigertron, feeling horrible the whole
time, got in after her and destroyed the Obelisk’s power source. The Island
just barely missed the base and crashed into a nearby desert. As the Obelisk
fell, it fired a signal to another Obelisk on the closer of the two moons, and
it fired another signal into Transwarp space. As Tigertron laments the paradise
they had to destroy, Rattrap asks the important question of Who is going to get
that signal and what are they going to do about it. Enough recap. Let’s get to
it.
The episode begins in space with a
line of stasis pods circling the planet. These are way more than the number of
characters introduced, by the way. There’s about eight characters introduced
via stasis pod, so I have no idea what’s going on with the like ten we see in
space here. Anyway, one of the pods drops to the planet. The pod is detected by
Tarantulas, and he activates a device that causes a power overload at both bases.
Both sides assume the other is preparing for an attack, leaving them unaware of
the pod falling. Tarantulas has his computer calculate where the pod will land.
His planning is interrupted by Blackarachnia, who had found his secret layer.
She’s figured out his plan to find the pod and reprogram the Maximal proto-form
into a Predacon, loyal to him, and to his surprise she offers to help him.
In the wild, Tigertron is
patrolling on his own when he hears a noise and goes to investigate. He sees
the pod drop and tries to call it in. The comlinks are down, though, so he has
to go investigate on his own. The pod lands, and begins scanning for lifeforms
to model a beast mode after. The spiders arrive a moment later, and Tarantulas
quickly opens the computer and swaps out the chips necessary to make it a
Predacon. He pulls out a spider in a cage to use as a sample, but the computer
already found something else. Blackarachnia asks if he can’t just stop the
process, but he can’t.
Tigertron races to the pod but is
spotted by Waspinator who was hiding in a tree. He decides to attack Tigertron,
firing on the cat and tripping him up. Tigertron slams his head into a boulder
and passes out. Waspinator gloats about destroying Tigertron, giving Airazor
enough time to arrive and knock him aside. He tries to fight her, but she
knocks aside his missile and then shoots his wings off. Waspinator slams head
down into the ground, his head entering a rat’s burrow. The rat tugs at his
antenna as he states how much he hates Bird-bot. Tigertron recovers, and he
tells her about the pod and to get there quick. She flies off, Tigertron saying
he’ll follow.
At the pod, it opens and out comes…
a fire ant. Blackarachnia grumbles at how depressing it is that it’s another
insect. She asks if Tarantulas is sure it’s a Predacon, and Tarantulas tells
the ant to identify itself. The ant, weirdly, announces that Spiders are daring
to invade the colony and he transforms to fight them off. He’s dubbed Inferno.
He fires a rocket at them, launching them back. He says that destruction will
come to anyone that threatens the colony and that the Royalty demands it. He
then starts marching in front of the pod.
Behind a tree, the spiders revert
to beast mode and Blackarachnia demands to know what is going on. Tarantulas
believes that the ant beast mode is somehow interfering with Inferno’s mind. He
thinks he’s really a giant ant defending his colony. Blackarachnia says that
her venom will make him more friendly, but Tarantulas stops her, worried that
she’ll damage the pod. She wants to know why he wants the pod so bad, but he
refuses to answer. Airazor flies in, and tries to introduce herself to Inferno,
not realizing he’s both a Predacon and insane. He fires on her and she dodges,
but Blackarachnia transforms and shoots her down. She plants a foot on
Airazor’s limp form and announces death to the Maximals, the enemy of the
colony. She had the bright idea to try to frame the situation in a manner
Inferno’s ant brain could understand. She shot down the invader, thus she’s a
friend to the colony sort of thing. As she talks to Inferno, Tarantulas steals
the pod, dragging it off with his webbing, saying that he “finally has a means
off this dust bowl.”
Back with Blackarachnia, Inferno
starts having an Energon surge and she tells him to return to beast mode. His
damaged logic circuits make this command difficult for him to understand.
Blackarachnia tells him that they’re both Predacons and Predacons are destined
to rule. Inferno disagrees, saying the Royalty are the rulers. It’s only then
that he realizes his pod was stolen. He reverts to beast mode and chases after
Tarantulas, Blackarachnia follows a moment later, after wondering why
Tarantulas wants the pod. Airazor is left on her own. Tigertron joins her and
she explains the situation. He tells her to go warn Optimus and he’ll follow
the Predacons. She wants to go with him but he claims to hunt better on his
own.
Near the Darksyde, Scorponok spies
on Tarantulas moving toward his layer with the stolen pod. In the base,
Megatron is trying to get the ship’s computers running again. After another
short he shouts for Tarantulas, as computer upkeep is his job. Scorponok radios
in and lets him know about Tarantulas. Megatron is intrigued by the stasis pod
and has figured out this is all Tarantulas doing. Inferno chases after
Tarantulas and the spider decides to take care of that bug. Inferno finds his
pod, Tarantulas leaps out and shoots him with his draining web. Scorponok
arrives, telling Tarantulas that Megatron wants the pod and the Predacon
brought to him at once. The pod suddenly explodes, knocking Tarantulas back and
knocking Scorponok out. It was shot by Tigertron, who announces the Predacons
won’t be getting any Maximals secrets from the pod. He’s attacked by
Blackarachnia and then shot up by Tarantulas, severely damaging him. Megatron
arrives and the spiders fall back. Inferno, infuriated, breaks out of the web
and swears vengeance on who destroyed his pod. Megatron says that he likes this
bug and tells him Tigertron did it. Inferno tackles Tigertron, swearing
vengeance on all Maximals. Before being blown to bits by Optimus. He and
Airazor fly in just in time to save Tigertron. The trio fall back, Megatron
shooting at them in impotent fury. Scorponok says they’re out of range.
Megatron throws Inferno’s head at Scorponok, saying to gather the pieces and to
find the Spiders, he wants a word with them.
At the Axalon, Tigertron is
repaired. Once he’s back to normal, he says he’ll be heading back to his
patrol. Optimus says there’s no rush, as Cheetor, Rattrap and Dinobot are
covering for him right now. He says that he wants to get back out there, as he feels
more at home in the wild. Airazor suggests that he could visit more often, and
he agrees to try.
Back at his layer, Blackarachnia
moans that she was insane for siding with Tarantulas and that Megatron will
have their heads for this. Tarantulas calls both Megatron and her short
sighted. She says she didn’t ‘mean’ anything by her comment, that they need to
stick together. Tarantulas admits that that also isn’t a good idea as the
planet they’re on is doomed. She realizes that he wanted the pod to build an
escape ship and wants to know how he knows. He orders her out of his layer. She
says to keep her in mind for a future team up, before muttering he’s a lunatic
and he calls her a witch. No love lost there. And the credits roll.
And that’s the last recruit of the
season. We’ll get other Transformers later, but Inferno is the last addition to
season 1. He’s a dangerously unstable Transformer, often shrieking about
wanting to burn everything for the glory of the Royalty. I should note that
after this episode, Megatron is able to rework Inferno’s programing to
recognize him as the Royalty. Though occasionally he’ll get confused and refer
to Megatron as his Queen, much to Megs’ annoyance. The bit about his beast mode
dominating his logic circuits is interesting. The moment where he was
essentially against everyone else was uniquely tense as you didn’t know whom
he’d start shooting at. The plot with the spiders is also rather interesting.
One of the dynamics I enjoy about them is that, while Blackarachnia clearly
tries to use her… it’s weird to call them feminine wilds when she’s a robot,
but yeah, those, to get Tarantulas to work with her, he’s completely aware of
it and won’t give her an inch. He’ll react to her caresses, obviously, he’s not
made of stone, but he never lets her get closer to his plans than he needs to.
Can’t be too shocked by this, I must imagine there’s nothing that makes a male
spider more wary than a female spider. His obsession with getting the pod is a
fun little mystery, and while we get the answer, the planet will be destroyed
somehow, we still don’t know how he knows. This’ll become clear later. Next
time, a hunt is called. See you then.
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Twitter: @BasicSuperhero
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