Viewer Log: Beast Wars ep 33

 Another day, another doomsday weapon.

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Viewer Log: Beast Wars ep 32

 They're BACK!

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Viewer Log: Beast Wars ep 31

 Dinobot has a crisis of faith, yet again. 

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Viewer Log: Beast Wars ep 30

 As always, Tarantulas weaves a wicked web. 

Last time on Beast Wars, the showdown finally got underway. The Maximals did their best to keep the Predacons away from their base while Rhinox had his out-of-body experience. Unfortunately, Megatron got wise and sent Waspinator and Silverbolt ahead to force them to fall back. Cheetor got kicked into gear by Rattrap and flew to head them off. He took out Waspinator with a headbutt and then had the auto-guns shoot Silverbolt down. Rattrap and Dinobot joined them, and they elect to help the new bot and get him repaired. Rhinox made it back to his body and while they’re still not in a great position, he insists that miracles can happen. The Maximals hold off the Predacons for a bit longer but were eventually overwhelmed. Megatron had his troops walk up slowly to gloat, which bought enough time for a reconstituted, Transmetal Optimus Primal to make a big entrance. He singlehandedly defeated most of the Predacons, and Silverbolt drove Megatron himself off as an end to his affiliation with the Predacons and start being a Maximal. Meanwhile, Blackarachnia was forced to try to recover some of Megatron’s records of the Golden Disks after Dinobot stole the original by Tarantulas. She used his momentary distraction during the fighting to download the records and then pretend that the records were booby trapped. In the end, Megatron announced things moving forward will be… interesting. Enough recapping. Let’s get to it, shall we?

 

The episode begins with the Predacons meeting to discuss making repairs to their infrastructure that was lost during the Planet Buster attack. He calls Tarantulas to him specifically, despite the spider’s insistence that he’s working on very important research on their new transmetal bodies. Megatron orders him, and the two other Arachnids, Blackarachnia and Quickstrike to a new Energon deposit he’d detected to build a refueling station for them. Inferno and Waspinator wonder what they can do in the meantime, and they’re ordered to build a jamming station nearby to block Maximal communications. They’re excited to do it, Inferno saying as much to his ‘Queen.’ I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it before, but Inferno still sort of thinks he’s a giant ant and not a robot, and he mostly understands the world through that lens. So, if Megatron is his leader, that means that he is Inferno’s queen. He mostly sticks to calling Megatron the Royalty as a more gender-neutral term but slips up constantly. It’s the one thing Megatron hates about his new top kiss ass. Tarantulas ask why they’re doing this and Megatron cryptically says “Preparing for the future.” Whatever he’s doing, Tarantulas does seem to know what it is, saying that Megatron is “persist in his madness.”

 

The bugs all prepare to go about their various tasks. Tarantulas complains about wasting his time with this, but Blackarachnia tells him to shut up and get moving. She uses a bit of flattery to get Quickstrike to agree to take her share of the cargo, by saying that she’s sure a ‘big strong bot,’ like him can take more than 1/3^rd of the weight. Quickstrike agrees and gives her the nickname ‘Sugar-Bot,’ a nickname he will always use instead of her name going forward. I think even as a child in the 90s, I knew Quickstrike was simp. Waspinator brags that he and Inferno will finish their mission while the arachnids argue. Tarantulas is set on disrupting whatever plan Megatron has in place and plants a beacon in their supplies that will broadcast their position on Maximal frequencies. He transforms into his cycle form and drives off.

 

We cut to the Axalon where Rhinox is attempting to run tests on Optimus’ new Transmetal body. He says that despite his best efforts, they really don’t know the limits of these new forms and want to use a scanner he cobbled together to get more data. Unfortunately, the scanner shocks them both and knocks Rhinox out. Cheetor interrupts and lets them know he picked up Predacon signal on one of their frequencies. He tells Cheetor to get someone on it, and the closest pair are Rattrap and Silverbolt. So, fun fact, while Scott McNeil has provided the voice for Rattrap, Dinobot, and Waspinator this entire time, he also now voices Silverbolt. So basically, a third of the character interactions of the Maximals are just Scott McNeil talking to himself. Weird. Anyway, Cheetor tells them to check it out, Silverbolt is eager to be a service while Rattrap is a passive aggressive whiner. Silverbolt says he’ll “prove worthy of (Optimus’) trust,” and flies off as his noble trumpets flare. Despite knowing Silverbolt for only a little bit at this point, Rattrap says he already hates when he does that, implying to me that everyone hears the horns when Silverbolt is being noble.

 

Back with the arachnids, Quickstrike attempts to impress Blackarachnia by offering to take more of her load from her. Blackarachnia is clearly already annoyed by his advances but pretends to be flattered by his attention but doesn’t want to strain him. Tarantulas’ projects into her mind and laughs at Quickstrike not seeing how she’s manipulating him. He reminds her that he’ll allow her to play whatever games she wants with Quickstrike, but if she tries to play with him, he’s going to punish her. He then mentally blasts her so bad she causes some of the cargo to fall on her. Quickstrike rushes over and unintentionally belittles her again, and she snaps at him. He’s confused by this saying it’s impossible to understand females, and Tarantulas agrees that that is a fact of life. And I’m just sitting here thinking about how weird it is robots have any concept of gender at all. Blackarachnia swears to herself she’ll beak free of Tarantulas’ control and make him pay.

 

The Predacons start setting up the refueling station. Tarantulas is extremely impressed by the location. Aside from the cave entrance, it’s incredibly well hidden, the Energon is abundant, and fits his personal design aesthetic of “creepy underground lair.” He decides he won’t need the Maximals meddling anymore and destroys his beacon, announcing the cave is a perfect location for his new lair.

 

Rattrap and Silverbolt lose the signal. Silverbolt says they should do their best to follow their noses now they’ve lost the signal, which, ya, works when one’s a wolf and the other rat.

 

Back at the cave, Blackarachnia has the same idea as Tarantulas, saying that the cave would make a perfect fortress with some reinforcement. Tarantulas notes that the Energon deposit could supply a frugal Predacon for a very long time. He jumps on ‘Blackarachnia’s’ idea, suggesting that maybe they could turn this cave into a stronghold for them. An arachnid alliance, their own third faction. Blackarachnia scoffs at this, saying he's out of his mind. Tarantulas reminds her he’s inside hers, so she really doesn’t have a choice. He pitches the idea to Quickstrike, who is interested in the idea when Tarantulas suggest that he’ll get to fight even more in his faction. He’s hesitant at first, because Megatron is so powerful, but Tarantulas manipulates his fragile masculinity to get him to agree.

 

Silverbolt and Rattrap find the scent, and know the three Predacons they’re dealing with. They then find the combination of arachnid legs and tire treads that they left behind. The chase continues.

 

Thinking she’s alone, Blackarachnia mutters to herself that Tarantulas can laugh for now, but she’ll soon use Megatron’s datatracks against her. Tarantulas hears her muttering, but not what she’s actually saying, and demands to know what she’s thinking. She refuses so he tries to scan her mind. He discovers that she’s actually gotten a portion of her mind completely blocked from him. He tries harder to scan, but she fights him, throwing the equipment she’d been holding at him and knocking him over. She transforms and scurries away. Tarantulas gets up and quotes Bugs Bunny of all people, “Of course you realize, this means WAR!” I’m starting to think Tarantulas is a fan of The Looney Tunes…

Megatron relaxes in his CR chamber jacuzzi when Waspinator calls. He says they’re finished their project and will be heading back soon. Just before Inferno knocks a tripod leg over and the tower pitches forward onto Waspinator. So I guess they’ll be delayed a bit longer. Megatron is still pleased with their progress. He decides to check in on his Arachnid trio, but no one will answer their coms. So he knows that at least one of them is up to something.

Tarantulas hunts for Blackarachnia in the cavern. He begins to swear vengeance when she appears, transforming and pulling a knife on him. Having had enough of Tarantulas’ rummaging around her processor whenever he likes, she uses her dagger as a vice on an Energon chunk and tells him to severe the link or she’ll kill them by crushing the cube and causing a massive explosion. He says he’s not afraid and that he can stop her with a thought. Blackarachnia bets that the Energon radiation will interfere with the link. Tarantulas tests it, and she starts crushing the cube. The radiation causes them both intense pain, but Blackarachnia refuses to toss it aside unless he breaks the link. He initially is fine with her killing herself, but their link causes him to feel her pain as well. He finally agrees and breaks the link to free himself. Blackarachnia tosses the cube aside with just enough time to save herself from the explosion. Tarantulas is furious he lost his control over her and threatens to make her suffer for that, but Quickstrike interrupts, saying they’ve got trouble with a capital M.

 

The Predacons go outside and see Rattrap and Silverbolt closing in. Quickstrike is overjoyed he gets to fight something, finally and leads the charge against them. The battle commences, Silverbolt lobbing explosive feather javelins as Quickstrike fires his poison blasts. Silverbolt’s wing gets clipped and crashes. They trade blows, the Maximals holding their own despite the numbers difference. Until Silverbolt refuses to strike Blackarachnia because chivalry or sexism, depends on who you ask. But he has no trouble fighting Quickstrike, especially after he shoots Rattrap. They fuzors face off, something they often do as they’re ya know, kind of a pair. Silverbolt gets him pinned to the ground but is knocked off by Tarantulas. The spider runs from the cavern, warning the others they need to keep the Maximals away at all costs. Hearing that piques their interest, Silverbolt tries to fly to the cavern, but it explodes, knocking him back. Tarantulas says the Maximals have destroyed the cave and order them to fall back. Rattrap compliments Silverbolt on the explosion, but he insists he didn’t do it. Quickstrike tells Silverbolt, whom he dubs Tinhorn because he’s a southern cowboy stereotype, they’ll have it out for real one of these days and follows Blackarachnia, trying to get her attention again. Rattrap thinks Silverbolt will want to chase them, but Silverbolt has had enough excitement for today and thinks they can leave things as they are. And Rattrap thinks that’s the first thing he’s said that makes sense all day.

 

At the Darksyde, Megatron chews out his minions for failing to report and then for failing to protect the new refueling station. Tarantulas, so obviously faking contriteness that I’m shocked Megatron doesn’t pick up on it, claims that everything was destroyed even the stable cubes they could have harvested. Megatron orders them all out of his sight, as he’s furious. Later, we see Tarantulas setting up his lab, revealing that he’d destroyed the cave entrance with a single well-placed charge. He ends the episode with the old saying, “be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home,” and cackling madly.

 

This episode mostly serves as setting up Tarantulas’ position in the new status quo. As I said last time, with the death of Terrorsaur, he takes up the lion’s share of being the most traitorous Predacon. He was never dripping with loyalty, but he used to mostly work in concert with whatever Megatron is doing. But now, he’s much more active in his defiance of Megatron. I mean, he went so far as to propose forming a Predacon faction that was against the Maximals and Megatron. And if Blackarachnia hadn’t broken the link, I think he’d have kept up this plan. She has Quickstrike under her claw, so with her manipulating the other Arachnid, he’d have had two minions that would serve him. But Blackarachnia outfoxed him with that Energon gambit. I’m a little disappointed that the psychic connection didn’t last longer, as having Blackarachnia as an unwilling minion was an interesting dynamic. There was a point where it seemed like these two would work their own side hustle, but neither spider is particularly loyal so in a weird way they grew the most antagonistic to each other than any of the other Predacons. The other part of this episode was just to give us more of an idea of Silverbolt’s personality now that he’s a Maximal. And… ya, he’s a white knight. He does the tasks put to him with honor and vigor, he doesn’t complain, makes noble speeches, and refuses to strike a lady even when the lady will absolutely shoot him in the face if given the opportunity. There is good and bad to the white knight. He also gets along with just about everyone, as showcased by Rattrap being annoyed by but not openly antagonistic towards him in the episode. The only other thing to note is obviously that Megatron is planning something big, and it’s a plan crazy enough that Tarantulas has doubts about it. We won’t get many more details for a while, but since I know the plan, I can confirm its batshit nuts. But we’ll see more of that later. So, ya, Tarantulas is getting more unruly, Silverbolt has ingrained himself with his comrades, and Megatron is planning something bonkers. Next time, Dinobot makes a choice. See you then. 

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Viewer Log: Beast Wars ep 29

 A showdown at High Noon. 

Last month of Beast Wars, I promise. Not sure what’ll be next, but we’ll take a break from this hyper fixation. Lol

 

Last time on Beast Wars, we learned of two new combatants. The fuzors, Silverbolt (wolf with Eagle wings and claws) and Quickstrike (scorpion with a cobra headed tail) came online and were discovered by Megatron. He convinces the two, one naïve and one violent, that they’re Predacons and that their job is to destroy the Maximals. Silverbolt is clearly not comfortable even with the activation code word of “Terrorize” so this’ll go well, I’m sure. Meanwhile, the Maximals recover one of their stasis pods, but the protoform inside is unfortunately a blank, a body without a Spark. After this, Rhinox decides to go offline. He says the Transwarp explosion that killed Optimus left a window into Transwarp space open. He needs to do something in Transwarp space but won’t say what. Cheetor uses his new jets to spy on Megatron dealing with the fuzors and a chase begins. Tarantulas also has Blackarachnia transfer his mind back into his body, giving him a new transmetal look. He also kept a psychic connection to Blackarachnia’s mind so he can now mentally punish her if she tries to disobey him. Dinobot breaks into the Predacon base and steals both the golden disks, hiding one but keeping the other on him. Rattrap and Dinobot get the warning from Cheetor, and they outfit themselves with weaponry to help. The Three active Maximals meet the six Predacons, (Megatron, Tarantulas, Inferno, Quickstrike, Silverbolt, and Waspinator) and face off at high noon because this is a western now for a little bit. Enough recapping. Let’s get to it, shall we?

 

We open on the shootout as it begins. For a six on three fight, the Maximals do really well. They last a whole 30 seconds before being blasted into a pile. Rattrap smacks Dinobot’s side, who throws him off. Rattrap shakes off the hit and moans that at times like this he really misses Optimus. Cheetor suggests flying around and attacking from above, which Dinobot thinks is a good flanking maneuver. But then Rattrap points out the Predacons are on a hair trigger by lobbing a rock into the air above them. It lands about the third it’s original size. Dinobot suggests trying anyway, but Cheetor just smacks him. They start firing from cover and praying to Primus. Well… maybe not, I’m not sure if Primus was established as Transformer god yet…

 

Anyway, we get a slight continuity error where Waspinator and Tarantulas are shown just arriving at the fight, despite being there since the walking lineup earlier. That’s not super important, but I felt like pointing it out. Megatron tells his troops to prepare to finish them off. Silverbolt asks them to wait. He points out the obvious, that they’ve got the Maximals outgunned, outflanked, and they’ve no hope of winning this fight. When Megatron confirms that’s the situation, Silverbolt hopefully suggests that they give them a chance to surrender! Megatron smacks him for this idea, and threatens to tear him limb from mismatched limb if he questions Megatron’s orders again. He says they’ll finish them off nice and quick and then asks if any of his minions have more to add. Quickstrike starts to talk, and Megatron grabs him in a chokehold with his tail-lance before asking, “yes?” Quickstrike asks if the finishing off could be slow instead of quick, as he likes to make his enemies squirm a bit. Megatron admits he likes the idea, but reminds Quickstrike this is a business before pleasure situation.

 

Back at the base, Rhinox is still astral projecting from the ship. He’s connected himself and whatever he’s doing to the blank Protoform in the cargo hold. Sentinel warns for the second time that Rhinox has been outside of his body for too long and that his chances of recovery are decreasing rapidly.

 

Back at the fight, Tarantulas telepathically calls to Blackarachnia and demands she hurries with a task he’s given her. He’s using Megatron’s obsession with finishing off the Maximals as a distraction, so she’ll have time to steal something. No, not Megatron’s rubber ducky floaty he uses when he uses the restoration pits, but Megatron’s Golden Disk backups. While Dinobot took the actual physical disks, he undoubtedly made copies and recorded them to his private data tracks. She accesses his personal files only to discover the system was destroyed in the scuffle with Dinobot. Tarantulas orders her to try to recover something! Megatron notices Tarantulas talking to himself but can’t figure out why. He is monitoring Tarantulas’ communications and he’s not using their radio frequencies. Silverbolt distracts him by pointing out that the Maximals are extremely foolish. They’re outgunned, out flanked, and are running out of time, so why are they still fighting and not retreating. Megatron realizes that even without Optimus Primal, the Maximals wouldn’t be fighting a losing battle without a reason. He does a scan and sees Rhinox’ ion trail from their base. Megatron orders Waspinator and Silverbolt to circle wide and attack the Axalon. The Maximals realize they’ve been fought out, and Rattrap spells it out for us that they need to beat the Predacons to the base or Rhinox is dead.

 

Back at the Axalon Sentinel warns Rhinox’s core consciousness is fading. Rhinox’s mind is still searching for something, though, and we hear him think/say that what it is, it exists on the other side of the Matrix.

 

Rattrap orders Cheetor after the fliers. When he mentions that he needs a running start to take off, Rattrap literally kicks him into the sky to help him into the air. He then transforms into his new wheeled configuration and tells Dinobot to get on. Neither is happy with this, but he can drive faster than Dinobot can run in either form.

 

As they fly towards the Axalon, Waspinator announces to Silverbolt that he’s in command. Silverbolt is very gracious about following Waspinator, even when the dumb bug takes offense to Silverbolt agreeing he should lead, because he worded it like an order. They’re interrupted by Cheetor rocketing toward them and headbutting Waspinator out of the sky. Man, he’s having a rough day. Cheetor then leads Silverbolt away, with the implication that ‘well, dogs chase cats (shrug).’ Rattrap and Dinobot head out and the Predacons are ordered to chase them. Back at the Darksyde, Blackarachnia recovers some of Megatron’s earlier records on the Golden Disks. But she’s a clever ol spider and refuses to look at the computer screen, even when Tarantulas orders her to look. He’s distracted by the fighting and gets squished when Dinobot breaks a boulder from a cliff wall and it crushes him. Blackarachnia uses her few minutes separated from Tarantulas to have the computer download and triple encrypt the Golden Disk files for her.

 

Dinobot and Rattrap lead Megs and Inferno on a merry chase. Dinobot bies them a little time by shooting Inferno’s turbine and he crashes into Megatron, causing the two to briefly switch heads in the crash. Tarantulas recovers and demands to know what Blackarachnia saw. She claims the records were booby trapped and exploded before she could get anything, showing her hiding her harpoon launcher behind her back, in case you weren’t paying attention. Lucky for her that Tarantulas can’t scan her memories, it seems.

 

Cheetor reaches the base and orders the auto-guns online. They shoot down Silverbolt when he attempts to transform. Cheetor then gets his tail-sword to Silverbolt’s throat when Rattrap and Dinobot join them. Silverbolt doesn’t want them to delay the inevitable and tells them to get on with destroying him. Dinobot attempts to do the honors but the other two stop him, Cheetor saying that’s not how Optimus would want them acting. Dinobot is annoyed by the sentiment but goes along with it. Rattrap orders him to take Silverbolt to the CR chamber for repairs while he checks on Rhinox. They come in as Rhinox returns to his body. Rattrap pops him out of the pod he was using and asks where he went. Rhinox cryptically says he went to “where all are one.” Oh damn. He says he hopes his ion trail will last long enough. Cheetor reports that the Predacons are launching an all-out assault. Rattrap announces they’re all going to die. Rhinox shrugs and says it happens, but ‘miracles happen too.’ And they head out for more fighting.  

 

The Predacons unleash a barrage on the Axalon, overloading the shields. As they get battered, we see something follow the wires from Rhinox station to the pod, its lid opening. We get a weird scene of something crawling through the base, opening the CR chamber and letting Silverbolt out. The shields collapse, and the Maximals starts shooting. They’re weapons quickly run dry, though, as they’ve been fighting all day. Dinobot waves his sword at them but gets shot in the stomach. The Maximals get overwhelmed. They’re badly damaged, out of ammo, and can barely move. The sun raises and we’re once again briefly in a Western as the Villainous Five Predacons prepare to finish them off. They march in and reload their weapons so they can enjoy it. Dinobot says at least they go with honor, and Megatron says to “Finish it.”

 

A hole gets blown in the Axalon as the Predacons all gasp in shock. A large Maximal with a very familiar helmet design announces, “Well, that’s just PRIME!” as his combat music plays. Optimus is back and he’s a transmetal too! The Maximals are excited to see their leader back, and Megatron orders the Predacons to destroy him. Optimus then single handedly drives them off with his new cannons and then leaps into the air in Beast Mode astride a skateboard, leading the Predacons away. Megatron announces flight is no longer his advantage and flies after him. tricks Inferno into blasting Tarantulas and Waspinator before they have a quickdraw contest. Optimus shoots and takes Inferno out. Megatron arms his T-Rex arm guns and announces, “Hello and goodbye, Transmetal Optimus Primal!” right before Silverbolt tackles him and knocks him off a cliff. He says to consider his resignation and asks to join the Maximals. He knows in his Spark that they’re who he’s meant to fight with. Optimus says “I like your resume” and welcomes him in.

 

Later, the others get repaired, and they fill Optimus in on what happened since he’d been gone. He asks how the new bodies handle Energon build up. They tell him that it’s not an issue anymore. Their sector got hit with the full blast of the death moon and it either ignited the Energon deposits or converted them into stable Energon cubes. Optimus says he’s got catching up to do, the first on the list is getting Rattrap to clear his junk out of his quarters. Dinobot smacks him for being opportunistic vermin.

 

Back at the Darksyde, Megatron sums up what Blackarachnia has told him of what happened since he’d left to get the fuzors. Namely that Dinobot stole the disks and destroyed his backups. He asks if she’s sure his disks were destroyed, and Tarantulas dangles down on an Energon thread to ask as well. She insists nothing was recoverable and Megatron slams Tarantulas up against a wall in frustration. He then switches his feet to skate mode and glides around his base, saying that they’ve entered a new phase of the Beast Wars. He transforms into T-Rex mode, saying future developments should be interesting. Blackarachnia agrees they’ll be interesting indeed, as binary code flashes across her eyes, reminding us she does in fact have Megatron’s Golden Disk data.

 

I watched this episode back in 1997, and several times since over the years with rewatches. I knew how and when Optimus would return. But still, that entrance is hype as hell even just shy of 25 years later. His new form takes a bit of getting used to, the pointed teeth I’ve never been a fan of, but this was definitely the entrance he deserved. I liked the build up to his return, with the Maximals having to fight tooth and nail to buy Rhinox the time to work. This is one of the rare times where we see the transformers build up battle damage as the fighting went on. Most of the time they’re blown to pieces or maybe damaged to a degree, but then they’re taken out of the scene. We don’t usually see cracked optics or burned and broken bits of armor for as long as we do. It really sells how tough a battle this all was. The show doesn’t officially explain what Rhinox was doing, but it seems like the idea was that he basically used transwarp space to reach back to the point where Optimus’ body was destroyed, leaving a trail for his spark to follow through space/time to take the blank body as his new one. So ya, Rhinox time traveled Optimus Mind/Soul to a new body. Neat. I liked Silverbolt’s arc across this two-part story. He is incredibly naïve and trusting, but smart enough to realize when things aren’t adding up. Megatron’s abusive and cruel attitude as compared to the Maximals being willing to not execute him on the spot and even repair him makes it clear which side the white knight here belongs on. Get used to the horns blaring, by the way, they get used a lot when he’s being all… Silverbolty. Megatron’s promise at the end of the episode that things will be interesting is very much going to be paid off in episodes to come. We’ve got new forms, new characters, minor politics shifting, things are heating up. I should note that with Terrorsaur’s death, we will be seeing Tarantulas picking up the treachery slack, as he’s now the primary rogue element in the Predacon ranks. Just a heads up. But more on that later. Have a good night. 

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