#grimlock is indeed very hot

[twitchesandstitches]

Story commission for Clonecomando, who asked for Arcee from Transformers Prime turning into a super busty giantess alongside Airachnid!

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The moon, as far as they knew, had no name. Arcee knew well that so much had been lost in the war for Cybertron and its fall, the senseless destruction waged by the Decepticons wiping out eons of hard-won knowledge, history and cultural memory.

In the years since the end of the war, the rebirth of Cybertron and the reunion of all the scattered Autobots, figuring out what they actually had at hand was the important thing, and normally a moon would be fairly low on that list, save that over the past few months it had been sending out stronger power signatures, nearly blacking out some of the orbital scanners, and when Arcee had asked permission to investigate and bring Jack with her as part of his training, Optimus (nearly bedridden after the strain he suffered reactivating the Allspark) had agreed.

Arcee was mildly surprised to find that the moon had an atmosphere, its metal surface of the same biomechanical form as Cybertron, and as far as they could tell, uninhabited. At least, there were no visible dwelling signs, and no buildings or evidence of survivors holding up here, like in some of the cities that had been protected by Sub-Commander Grimlock during the exodus.

Nevertheless, as she and Jack approached a strangely artificial site, she felt watched, and remained on high alert.

(And, in the distance, they were watched.

The great hulking masses of Insecticon hive-soldiers waited beneath the metal soil. Templated descendants of the Bombshell, the Hardshell, and the Kickback - most of them, Hardshell kin, but Bombshells vlew and Kickbacks waited to spring into action - lurked in the shadows, shying away from the light.

Most of them, particularly those who had been most recently supped upon by the Mistress, were burned by the light. It seared hot, piercing through their frames and their altered Sparks screaming at its touch. Fear moved in their fuel lines now, need and desire subordinating all higher impulses save the voice of the Mistress.

She was the hive queen, and her will shaped them, gave them purpose, protected them from the terror.

Her thoughts moved through them, and she flew above them in the shape of a flying vehicle from a distant world; a long, bulky thing with a rotating saw crowning it. They felt her curiosity, and she saw through their eyes as her rival, and her rival’s prized subordinate, came upon a strange ruin. They spoke to each other for a time, about this evidence of habitation, and that it was old indeed. The Mistress had said as much in the past.

And the Mistress watched, and she waited. Here, her thoughts said to the hive, was her own way into its secrets, at last.

The blue Autobot placed her hand upon the wall, and it seemed to her surprise as much as anyone’s, a wall slid away and revealed a passageway.

Into it, the two went. The Insecticons waited obediently as the Mistress radiated curiosity and interest as she followed, crawling along the walls like the predator she was. The hive obeyed her commands, and retreated. And alone, she followed after her prey into the dark.)

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Arcee led the way down the ancient steps. More accurately, she grabbed the hand of the mech Jack operated to stay on her level and she dragged him behind her, the stumpy legs of his mech waddling fast to keep up with her. Eventually, she slowed her pace, mostly because he kept getting pulled up.

His mech was not significantly smaller than hers; modeled after the armor Starscream and then Miko had employed, though not quite as refined as the work of the legendary Solus Prime, it was a squat and bulky thing, though still slimmer even than Arcee. That said a lot; duowheel platforms like her didn’t have much body mass in relation to their size. But she was far stronger than she looked, and Jack’s mech paled compared to her brief bursts of armor-shredding power.

She paused, her struts clacking on the ground. Her head turned, blue optics peering through the canopy towards Jack, who was looking a little overwhelmed. Her face clicked into a softer look, and she lowered him to the ground. “Take the time you need,” she said, and waited.

When he was ready, they set off again, and Arcee had a hard time resisting the urge to just take hold of his hand and escort him. It had been years since he’d become a fully grown man, as the humans reckoned such things, and though he was certainly competent and capable, he was just so… small. And Arcee was well past the point of ‘just’ being attached.

Deeming an alien one’s conjunx endura, the most intimate and close of Iaconian romantic ideas, was certainly atypical, but not unheard of. It was just rare for Autobots to settle down anywhere to get close to an alien. And for Arcee, a partner was as close as it got.

They descended down, into the ruin, and Arcee had already suggested that it was much older than any potential resident might have been. Soon it became clear, as they descended down, that this was a temple of some sort. Arcee supposed it was, at least; the elaborate carvings, the deep hieroglyphs shimmering faintly in the walls, the strange angles in the walls spoke to old sacred geometries of Cybertronian worship. Or then again, perhaps this had been a storage facility. She recognized some of those hieroglyphs from Iaconian Energon reservoirs, and supposed this might have been such a place.

But it was old. Glyphs like the ones carved into the walls had not been actively used for many thousands of years since before any modern Cybertron city-realm even existed in a recognizable form. Their languages changed only slowly, but even so Arcee found these glyphs so hard to read, so distant from her own languages, that it was mildly disorienting.

Jack looked at them, pausing to study them. Arcee waited beside him, doing her best to look stoic and cool and not at all miffed that he was doing a better job of translating them than she did. “I think this bit kind of looks like the old Iaconian High Pentamatrix glyph for ‘god’,” he said, looking pained. It must have been a very rough translation, then; his studies into Cybertronian language were progressing well, better than her own had during her brief and terminal attempts to work with linguistics. “But it’s, I don’t know. Weird. Some bits of it look like they’re representing sounds, not a given idea. Or, um. Does Cybertron have things like, sign posts?”

“Sign posts?” Arcee repeated.

“Yeah. You know, images where you see it and you instantly know what it means without context? Like a sign post that says ‘danger!’ on earth. I know what that would mean, even if it had nothing on it.”

Arcee rolled her optics. “Course we have those, Jack. Memetic information and ideas aren’t exclusive to humans.”

“Right, I know. I thought I’d be sure, first. Didn’t want to just assume and us get hurt over it.” He frowned, his mouth moving as he extended his mech’s hand over the glyphs. “I can see hints of something that looks a bit like the Iaconian glyphs for ‘fast food’, but that can’t be right. And this bit here, it looks like old Simfurian Claw-Scratch. I don’t have the right words to explain what they sound like, but it sort of looks like its suggesting… danger? No, its more like… cautioun. Like a ‘careful where you step’ sign?” He shook his head. “You sure this is a temple?”

Arcee glanced up and pointed. Right above them were two small statues mounted into the wall: the more monstrous of the two was a grotesque thing, almost like a robotic centaur but with a strong dragonish air. The lower half was a low-slung beast, paws tipped with claws and a long tail curled around it calmly. From the waist up, the statue was more humanoid but barely so, too broad and armored to read as anything but a monster. Multiple arms were crossed over a body that some ancient sculptor had endeavored to suggest was both mech and femme-aligned, and the triangular head was that of a beast. And yet, for its monstrosity, it emanated wisdom and serenity; its many eyes were closed, its great jaws held primly shut in an expression of sage calmness.

Across it was a statue more recognizable; it was indisputably a fembot. Definitely a fembot; the sculptor had made that very clear. Energon tanks swelled out from the chestplates to unreal extremes, the hips were impossibly massive, and Jack seemed unable to look directly at its curves without getting embarrassed. The statue’s head had been carved to look as much flame as it was metal, and her expression was a wild, fierce joy. ‘Maniacal’ might have been a good word, too.

“Onyx Prime,” Arcee said of the bestial shape. “And Solus Prime,” she said, pointing to the curvy one. “Two of the original thirteen Primes. Optimus’ predecessors, you could say. They were worshiped as gods in ancient times, and you won’t find statues of them in just any facility.”

“Why build a temple on the moon?” Jack wondered.

“...Good question. That’s usually something you do to keep it secure.”

They began to go down the stairs again. Arcee noticed that they were strangely shaped, with multiple sizes and shapes for someone to ascend. There was a set just the right size for them to go down, bisected by an even smaller set perhaps for minicons. And besides them were increasingly bigger stairs, for ‘bots in Optimus’ size range, and then Grimlock’s… and then who knew? Perhaps the likes of Omega Supreme.

Arcee did not notice that the walls themselves, towering as they were, swelled up even bigger than that. Those were also stairs, for something as big as Metroplex. Or larger still.

Down they went, and behind them someone followed. Someone very much like a spider.

-----

Downwards they went, and the stairways looped in a loose spiral, in a fairly linear path without additional branches or chambers. This ruin led somewhere specific, and Arcee suspected its purpose was not purely spiritual.

The strange arrangement of steps they’d noticed continued, all the way down, and though there were no more ancient lighting arrangements, it was still brightly illuminated. Cracks webbed up and down the wall in a surprisingly harmonious arrangement.

As they went down, further, they came to an raised platform the glowing cracks encircled like a directional sign. When they stepped on it, it creaked faintly, with the sound of mechanisms around them that sounded like an old calculating engine going to work. Something clicked, and the platform slid away, and descended on down.

“Whoa!” Jack yelped. “Did we just hit a trap?!”

“No, no!” Arcee patted the dome-shaped seal over his seating. “It’s just an elevator.”

Down they went. Jack stared blankly. “...An elevator.”

“Yes. What’s weird about us having elevators?”

“...Arcee, I’m who-knows how many lightyears away from Earth, on a planet that had a thriving civization millions of years when the dinosaurs were still alive. You guys having something as mundane as fricking ELEVATORS is a little weird, okay!?”

“Fair enough, but guess how I felt when I saw that your planet had created vehicles that were an absolutely perfect match for our natural alternate forms. I’m just saying that the freaky feelings go both ways, you know.”

In this manner, they idly talked the nervousness away, aware of a dim glassy substance around them. A tube, perhaps, the means of conveying them downwards, and they could see outwards.

For whatever that was worth; the elevator moved surprisingly fast, nothing but dark groundmetal visible, and they were descending many miles every second, a trick of pressure keeping this from having any adverse effect on them. (Not that Transformers needed to worry about that kind of thing, but it was still a concern for Jack. Arcee kept glancing at him, concerned.) Jack kept close to her, extremely embarrassed by his mech acting on his true desires by clinging fearfully to Arcee’s leg. She put a hand on top of his pilot seat, comfortingly, as they came to a stop.

The illumination had grown brighter, and as they stepped out, more complex. Dimly, her optics took note of a vast expanse around them, a faintly lit horizon outlined into an outward curve. A great dome extending in every direction, as far as they could see. They stood on an island of sorts, and around them was a vast lake, shining a faint pink against an oilly surface, meeting the distant wall. The lights became more regular, shaped into hieroglyphs, and stretched across the entire chamber so that it illuminated the distant curving horizon. Jack squinted as they stepped onto a raised podium, perhaps an altar, and Arcee patted him briefly. “Ease up, Jack. Not gonna ask for a translation. You’d need binoculars or something first. Besides, I think I got a pretty good idea of where we are now.”

“You do? THat’s more than I got.” With every sign of reluctance, he parted from Arcee, and she found him missing his close proximity with a surprising intensity. He looked up, towards a distant ceiling, and a faintly visible tube they had apparently moved down through. The entrance above looked like a tiny hole, just barely lighted. “How far down are we!?”

“If I had to guess? Probably in the center of the moon.” She tilted her head. Judging from the religious iconography…” She pointed at the altar, which extended for a considerable distance, as if some very big things were expected to sit there. In the distance, she saw a large tower, and it looked old; ancient carved lines flowed with pink light, and set into the very top of it was a large crystal. “Yep. See the little statue things on ‘em? Kind of look a bit like the Predacons? Denizens of ancient Simfur. And, let’s see what else we have here.”

She shone a light, and took a step back in shock as liquid power shifted welcomingly in front of her. Blackness gleamed, somehow bright, and pink glimmer shone like solar flares. The liquid flowed, frosted steam rising up, heavy crystals slowly rising up here and there in places where it was thickened into a solid mass. And far, she saw the pink and black mass gushing out of the walls, being made by some mysterious internal processes, and she saw the hints of ancient machinery about her and in the walls.

The crackle of electricity fell over her, the taste of power was bright, and she at last understood. “Oh,” she said softly.

Jack took a sharp intake of breath. “Is that… energon?!”

The blessed life blood of their people, the fuel that kept them alive, that kept them immortal over the ages, and the rarest substance in the known universe. And here was an entire lake of it, being made on the spot. “Yeah,” Arcee said, numbly. “But I’ve never seen this kind before. And, okay. I get it. This moon. I think, I think the ancients hollowed it out and built something in it. This was a, an energon production facility! And it came online not too long ago…”

She felt woozy, a bit distant, and she felt very hungry indeed.

Jack gave her a concerned look. She put a hand on him, steadying herself. She thought weakly of too many eons of going hungry, of rust growing in painful patches and bits of her aching. “Why’s it black? And pink?”

“Energon used to come in different varieties. Aspected to the different original Primes; the kind you’re used to is attuned to Prima, the first of the Thirteen. Pink probably means something to do with Solus Prime, and black…”

“That’d be Megatronus, right? The one that betrayed the rest.”

Arcee gave him an unamused look. “Don’t think your color expectations apply here, Jack. Black means Onyx Prime. Red used to be for Megatronus.”

“Sorry.”

Arcee bent down. “Well, this would explain the power readings; there’s a damn lake of Energon being made down here, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to stop any time soon. We absolutely… uh…” She put a hand to her forehead. Her vision flickered. Arcee wasn’t aware of it, but just for a moment, her optics glowed bright pink. And above them, something spidery was patiently crawling down.

Thoughts of what they absolutely should do went out of Arcee’s head. Her processor pounded; lightning moved in her, a feeling of lightness was making it hard to stand. She stumbled, her exoframe shifting. She felt… not itchy. She felt hot, cold. Both at the same time, and with an irrepressible feeling that was intolerable. It was like firing up a transformation cycle and then holding it, until it hurt…

Something was sinking into her, fusing, and gently reconfiguring her, and it was then she realized it.

Energon radiation. Like transwarp mutation. Just being near this stuff was changing her! And non-Primian Energon, like Dark Energon, could do things to you.

Just for a moment, she looked up, at the crystal alighting the tower, and she felt the power flowing from it. That was no Energon crystal. It was something… older. Something power, as ancient and mighty as the Star Saber had been, or the Forge of Solus.

Even as her fuel lines blazed with a sudden and ferocious pleasure, Arcee shouted, “Jack! Get back!”

He complied, scuttling back all the way to the elevator, unaware of the shadow crawling closer from above the both of them; he was too fixed on Arcee, his eyes wide and afraid. She stumbled forward, her optics wide, glowing pink… and then, so did the rest of her.

For a moment, Arcee’s slim frame turned a glossy black. Not for long, and Jack had to admit it didn’t look ominous like the purple of Dark Energon, and then her usual colors asserted themselves.

Then her frame began to shift, and grow bigger. As soon as her colors appeared, Arcee began to grow larger, slowly swelling up bigger than Bumblebee was. She kept growing, and swelled up even taller than that, soon reaching the height of the likes of Knockout or some of the bigger Vehicons.

And her body shape was changing. She was getting… not muscular, given how Autobots were built, but she was getting broader. Her torso was expanding notably outwards, her waist a bit moreso, and her hips sprouting outwards.

She kept getting bigger, her proportions growing so fiercely she looked as proportionately beefy as Optimus was. And her thighs expanded outwards, with such ferocity that a better word might be exploded. They plumped up and grew, and grew and just kept growing, her armor fusing into a malleable and less rigid form to absorb attacks; her servo musculature swelled into place beneath it, even as her thighs got bigger than her torso and her waist!

And then, the swell where her hip-joints met her waist plate grew, Energon collecting there and producing new mechanisms and growing them to immense size; two enormous swells, plated in more deflect metal and the jet black of her undercoating, grew into a gargantuan backside; Arcee hissed, an undercurrent of pleasure as it bloomed outwards, her body creaking as her plating adjusted to a butt projecting outwards like a shelf, or an ant-insecticon’s abdomen.

Pink and black flashed around her body as her butt kept growing bigger, pumping in more mass, flashes of light shining around her. She tottered forward, more extreme heel struts forcing her stance into something awkward as she struggled to compensate, and it was harder to walk; she was getting taller, growing upwards too, and the gradual changes to her size were shifting her balance almost as badly as her new assets. Her energon tanks began to grow, wobbling larger with each step, hanging off and providing heavy weights, dense Energon settling into them and making them grow faster.

But not as fast as Arcee herself was growing. Her shoulders were broader, her overall body significantly more amazonian, and her hips nearly as wide as she was tall. And she was growing upwards faster than all of that anyway; her legs lengthened, heel struts stabilized into ultra high heels, her thighs clamping together as she wavered in place, and she shot up twenty feet all at once. Arcee yelled, her head dizzy with a surge of power and a delighted thrill, and flailed her arms, trying not to fall over even as she grew taller than even Optimus was. She got bigger, she kept growing upwards. Another fifteen feet, with no signs of stopping.

And another twenty after that, and then another; she was more than twice the size of even the likes of Grimlock, the single biggest bruiser in all the Autobot ranks short of the likes of Omega Supreme, and she was still growing upwards, shooting towards the ceiling.

It felt so right; the Energon burned bright in her, her entire body felt filled with a sweet flame, and though she was aware of changes in her mind, certain inhibitions falling away, she didn’t mind. The straightforwad nature of Onyx Prime, and the wild mania of Solus Prime touched her, influencing her, and she liked it. She certainly didn’t mind as her energon tanks expanded, tripling in size with a single wobbling flux. Her torso plating was completely absorbed, energon tanks totally fluid and wubbling and pure black, now descending somewhere around her waist and projecting out nearly half her total length. And they were still growing, swelling outwards, filling with more energon. They fizzled, gleaming from within so that a pink light was visible within them, and she felt more mass being generated and pouring into her tanks, making them bigger.

And on the ground level, Jack gaped in shock as Arcee kept growing, a true giantess even among the Autobots. Her high heel-shaped feet clattered forward, her entire body jiggling in a way he wouldn’t have thought an alien robot could. She was still growing, her exoskeletal armor fused into a squishy and soft hull like metallic latex, and he couldn’t help but think that she looked kinda beefy. Her shoulders were wider, her waist was tiny, but her limbs were much thicker than before, her thighs dominating his view, and her butt was swelling out so much she was toppling forward. Her butt was almost bigger than she was by now, two hge hills swelling up and gradually forcing her downwards, and her breasts (possibly not the right word, he knew, but damn they were so big) slamming into the ground, now absolutely bigger than Arcee herself, so that Arcee was sinking into them with every sign of pleasure.

She kicked a leg up, groaning softly. Arcee turned her head around, her optics glowing pink. “Jaa-aack,” she sang softly, a whirring noise as she focused for him. “Where are you? Where are you!?” She reached for him, pinned by her breasts. “Come here…! Now!”

Jack timidly stepped forward. Something in her voice sounded… different. He wasn’t sure he trusted this raw, wild intensity. It felt like something had been scraped off her.

Before he could get too far, though, something swooped down, and perched on Arcee.

Arcee turned as Jack recoiled in horror at this familiar threat. Arcee’s stupified self-satisfaction faded as she recognized her old foe: “Airachnid!” She shouted.

On the left swell of Arcee’s backside, there stood Arcee’s oldest tormentor and nemesis, Airachnid herself. A tall and fearsome Decepticon, built on broadly the same lines as Arcee, she was nonetheless a spider-type Insecticon, a rare hive queen. Her body had the plated, spiky look common to the Inecticons, and her rear dominated by a heavy spider abdomen (not dissimilar from Arcee’s new backside, in fact). Where Arcee was blue and black with a hint of pink, Airachnid was purple, black and deathly grey.

And something else was… different about her. Besides her dancing up and doing trying to avoid sinking into Arcee’s super soft mega butt, that is. That rather spoiled the intimidating effect.

Arcee swatted at her, while Jack rushed over in a very bad attempt to fight her. Unfortunately, Arcee’s butt was simply too large for her to reach, and her arm smacked off her own endowment. Arcee maneuvered her leg into Jack’s way, and a wall of metal cut off his route. Airachnid laughed. “As I thought! You could open the way into this place, with all its treasures, and all its power! And at last, here you are… so helpless.”

Arcee squinted. “Say what you want, little bug,” she said, her voice smoother than normal, and with a sudden pleasurable awareness of how… puny Airachnid was. “You’re looking pathetic now. Come here, so I can crush you!”

Arcee’s arm transformed into weapon mode; instead of the slim pistol-grade shooter, it swelled up into a ridiculously massive cannon. She blinked, shrugged, and aimed.

Airachnid bounded away as a wall-annihilating flood of pink-black force almost obliterated her. “Perhaps I have bitten off more than I can chew. But then again…” She grinned, and her face split open. Long fangs extended, and a horrific feeding tendril extended. “What an interesting idea!”

“Arcee!” Jack shouted from below. “Get her off you, now! She’s a Terrorcon! She’s a decepticon vampire!”

“She what!?” Arcee felt a sudden pinch on her butt. “Ow!”

Airachnid bit deep… and as luck would have it, it was basically like a mosquito biting Arcee. She was too small, and Arcee too large, and even as she drank her fill, the lost fraction was too small for Arcee to even notice.

There was a brief pause as Airachnid bloated up, filled to maximum capacity by even this small sample, and rolled right off her backside. As she fell, towards the Energon, she was visibly growing curvier in the same way as Arcee, and doubling in size in even the brief moment between the fall-

And the splash, into the energon. She was heavy enough now to crack through the frozen layer.

Arcee paused. Rubbing the small bump on her backside, she frowned, her lips notably plumper than before. “This seems like a, a bad thing to me.”

“You think!?” Jack yelled.

Arcee paused, noticing him. “Ah. THERE you are~!” She reached towards him.

And at this point, interrupting her attempts to be cuddly again, something arose from the energon. Something… big.

Mostly they saw two very big somethings, wobbling and bouncing in place right in front of them, and rising up towards the ceiling. There was a lot of purple, and a brief sight of exoskeletal armor fusing and morphing into a new shiny form. A broad waist like the side of a mountain, broader than Arcee’s curves, hips dominating everything in front of them. The splash of a monstrously huge metal butt growing so fast it slammed into the energy and made tidal waves, and more splashes as gargantuan breasts swelled up as much as Arcee’s head, hitting the Energon…

Arcee looked up, and up, and up to see Airachnid towering over her, growing even faster than she had, as large as a Metrotitan and still growing bigger.

Airachnid laughed like a noblewoman, her horns glinting as she tilted her head back. “Oh, oh, this is just perfect! You do the hard work to come in here, and I am the one who reaps the most benefits!” As she spoke, she was visibly growing up towards the ceiling, and her horns rammed into them, her breasts and backside competing to fill up as much space as possible. Arcee squeaked as purple metal squashed into her.

Airachnid pressed forward, submerging her in squishy metal, and still laughing, let herself keep growing into the ceiling. She kept growing, soaring upwards, more metal fembot body filling up as much as space as possible, and her optics fixed on something; she bent down and plucked the ancient device Arcee had observed earlier, right off the grand podium at the very center of the chamber. It was a small thing; a crystal of the deepest and brightest light, like a piece of the sun made solid and safe. Black and pink laced around it, infused into it, and clearly it powered the whole facility, for as soon as Airachnid took it away, the room became dark. The hieroglyphs, speaking their mysterious wisdom and words of the ancients, became dim, and then all was dark.

All, but for the pink glow of the Energon. It grew fainter as Airachnid’s body continued to absorb it, fueling her growth. By now, she must have been over a mile tall, and she was still growing. Her butt was now so large as to be nearly a separate thing from the rest of her body, rising as high as her elbows and low as her mid thighs, her whole form monstrously curvy. Spidery limbs extended, growing larger, and all manner of kibble materialized on her body, suggesting far more than just one possible alternate form. This was evolution, ascension beyond the limits of modern Transformers.

She peered at the crystal. “Interesting,” she said, after a moment. “A relic of Solus’ own work, I would imagine. And some of the handiwork of Onyx too. And married to energon harvested from the very heart of Primus, to amplify the effects of their creation. Making Energon to uplift… no, transform and upgrade us. Supercharging, in fact. Oh, if only it had been active during the war… then I could have crushed that short-sighted maniac and taken over in a snap!” She snapped her claws for emphasis, and the shockwave tore vast chunks out of the walls, and knocked Arcee all the way to the other side of the chamber, in an instant; she made an ultra curvy impact crater, and slipped into the Energon.

“Arcee!” Jack turned to her, freezing and unable to decide; run and hide, like Arcee would want, or figure out something to do. Anything at all! And then, the sky went dark, and huge metal claws closed around him. “Ah. Arcee’s little beloved. What fun,” Airachnid said smugly. She pressed Jack into her cleavage, a small hatch appearing to receive him and then locking him away, vanishing him into her body. She then considered the artifact.

Will was usually the answer. She concentrated upon it, letting herself be a vessel for its power, and it wanted to flow. It’s boundless essence flowed into her, and it was important to know that the Energon it had made… that was not the limits of its power. That was what the grand mechanism around them had been built to do, transfer its power into a consumable form. Airachnid received, instead, the full and unbound force of it.

She gasped, almost indecently, and her curves surged, fluxing several sizes bigger, and then she grew upwards, soaring towards the ceiling. Arcee emerged from the Energon, to see Airachnid growing thousands of feet in seconds, almost instantly filling up the entire facility, her monstrous breasts slamming into the rooms, an oppressive weight above them, and she was still growing bigger-

There was light, and the ceiling cracked. It fought against the weight of Airachnid’s body, and soon lost as her strength was boosted as much as her size, and with a vague thrust of her shoulders, she smashed right through solid metal, and kept growing upwards. Almost instantly, Airachnid’s head disappeared into the gap, then her shoulders. Her breasts, low-slung and projecting out as much as they did, carved out even more, and then so did her backside as she grew so much her hips soared through the ceiling. Her thighs grew; she had to be over five miles tall by now, and her thighs alone filled the whole room, slamming Arcee into the walls.

And, at last, the pressure was gone, as Airachnid broke through the surface of the moon and hauled herself up, on pure reflex.

As silence fell, Arcee felt a brief surge of relief, the sheer terror of Airachnid being so big fading away. Then, a fresh terror came to her. Airachnid had been here the whole time, she was loose. She was larger than a Metrotitan, she was supercharged by a Primal relic. And then:

She had Jack.

Arcee, with a lot of effort, forced herself to crawl forwards. The Energon’s surface had been cracked, and she sank into the liquid depths. It swam and coursed around her, caressing her every expanded inch, and she barely felt the thrill of it being absorbed into her metal body, or that several tons of Energon were being sucked into her every second.

It had a purpose, and it wanted to fulfill that purpose. Here was Arcee, as suitable a host as any.

But all she could think of was Jack; her partner, her beloved. She was responsible for him, she wanted him, she needed him safe, it was her fault he was there. Her enemy had him, and he was totally in her power, and she couldn’t let him be hurt. She forced herself forward, with no clear idea of what she could possibly do; she yelled in frustration, and again, she raised her arm, and willed it into weapon form.

Out came the cannon. She aimed it upwards, towards a vast purple mass that looked suitably jiggly, and she fired. The resulting beam of power would have made Megatron’s fusion cannon look puny, and it could have one-shotted the Nemesis at the height of its power.

Airachnid didn’t really even notice the blast, but she did feel a sting. Dazed by euphoric pleasures, and the enticement of her own growing body, the shock of the sting was enough for her grip to loosen, and the artifact fell out of her hand.

Arcee saw it’s shining light fall, and drop into the waters. She grunted, her body reconfiguring into an alternate form; a long and low slung vehicle, with as much resemblance to a two-wheeler form as a tyrannosaur bore to a sparrow; it was TECHNICALLY the same thing, but the details were notable. Not even pausing to wonder why her alt mode had changed, she revved into the waters.

The Energon soon vanished, poured into the ideal vessel that was Arcee’s body. The entire chamber was totally dry.

And then she grabbed the artifact, and her drive to beat Airachnid was all the way in it needed.

Very, very quickly, Arcee found the ceiling getting rather closer.

--------

On top of the surface, the Insecticon hordes bowed to their queen, as she stood to her full size.

By now her size had stabilized, and there was a gaping hole in the moon where her body had torn its way through, big enough for a hyper curvy fembot now standing one hundred miles tall; she was so large, her body extended well into space off the moon, and she was plainly visible to the Autobots on Cybertron. Indifferent to what threats might come her way, she laughed softly, delighting in the feeling of power radiating in her.

She felt as though she were a goddess; every movement could break a continent, her exhalations raise a hurricane. The power coursing in her satisfied even the ravenous hunger of a Terrorcon; for the first time since her transformation, she felt satisfied.

“Come, my children,” she said sweetly, a sudden burst of generosity in her. That felt odd, and for a moment, she felt somewhat concerned. But then it was soon gone; the urge to not think at all, to simply do as occurred to her, felt much more satisfying. And it felt… good… to do things like this.

Perhaps later, she might worry about the influence it had on her, or if her mind was changing.

The Insecticons clustered around her, feeding reverently. One by one, they scuttled away and through her psychic link, she felt them at last satisfied. And something in them… changing. The dark hunger, the same as Unicron, was still present, but… dimmed. Or tamed?

Much like her own. Something, certainly, was changing her mind.

She considered the human currently sealed inside her, and she rather thought she enjoyed the feeling of him wriggling there, and not just because she’d denied Arcee a prize.

Hrm. Where was Arcee?

As the last Insecticon drank their fill from her, she felt the mad hunger fade from them, and plenty of them curled up to nap. “Missing your bike?” Airachnid murmured to Jack, of a mind to taunt the organic speck, and paused, not even noticing any reaction from him.

The Insecticons sensed something approaching. Something big. Airachnid leaned towards the rift her body had torn into the ground, peering into the black depths there, and she saw movement-

And then a fist as large as her own, large enough to tear islands from their roots, clocked her in the face.

The impact hit so hard, it rearranged the atmosphere, and the shockwave from it changed the geography of the moon. New mountains rose up from that punch, and the Insecticon horde was scattered to the wind.

And Airachnid was actually staggered by it.

Arcee stood up, strutting out of the pit, and she stood eye to eye with Airachnid, just as big as her, easily 100 miles tall.

She walked forward, her steps making islands on the moon. Each swing of her hips moved enough metal to make entire continents, and Airachnid was floored at how massive those hips were. Thighs packing more mass than cities slammed together, intricately interlocked squash plates mashing together, and her hips produced their own weather systems, flashing with pink and black energies. Her hips were easily wider than she was tall, and her backside so massive that the two globes rose higher than her elbows, jiggling and wobbling with each step, so broad they were visible from the front. Mostly black metal, interlocking into the transformed blue of her leg greaves, the light caught on her metal butt and she was jiggling so much the effect was like a disco ball. Behind her, her backside projected out like a tremendous shelf, an awe-inspiring sight.

Her breasts were not quite so large; if Airachnid had to guess, Arcee’s hips were larger than her own, but Airachnid had the bigger energon tanks.They still descended to, perhaps, her waist, dipping further, the black teardrop-shaped masses sticking outwards for a shocking distance, enormously wide, and so as Arcee advanced, her breasts slammed into Airachnid’s. They docked at first, and Airachnid was surprised at the pleasure of it, the shock of warmth in her. The full weight of it pushed her back, and Arcee rushed forwards, almost knocking her down; the massive weights dense enough to actually push her forwards.

Arcee actually leaped; her new form was significantly more bulky and powerfully built, and just as strong as Airachnid, and she flew into the sky, easily flipping and landing a kick square into Airachnid’s face. The Insecticons, at least the ones on different parts of the planet, had since recovered from her explosive arrival, and rose in a great mass to descend upon her. Arcee simply punche at the air, indifferently, and the shockwave again washed over the moon, knocking them away.

Airachnid commanded all her Insecticons to her; recognizing that they would be no use in this fight, she instead produced many openings in her body, as though she were a living ship. Her insecticons entered, hiding away inside her, and she allowed herself to draw power from them, and comfort from their simple adoration of her. And, annoyingly, she sensed that the human inside her knew Arcee had arrived, and was already rejoicing. Out loud, she said, “How did you reach my size!?”

Arcee smirked. There was something wilder about her now. She was moving differently. It was a sexual kind of ferocity, unhinged and even savage. What had the transformation done to her? “You left the artifact to me. And the rest of the Energon was mine. Easy enough to outdo you!” She smacked her massive butt, for emphasis, making a noise somewhere between rubber being slapped and a metallic clang.

Airachnid scowled. “...I’ll take it from you, once I finish beating you down.”

Arcee, having already swallowed it for safekeeping, doubted that. “You can try.”

“And I suppose now, Autobot, you’ll demand I surrender.”

“Mmm.” She made a mocking kissing sound. “Oh, you won’t have to surrender,” Arcee said, grinning in a truly terrifying way. Her plump lips slid back over rows and rows of long and cruel fangs. It was a feral smile, a bestial Dinobot kind of smile. “I’ll just beat my Jack out of you, and then I’ll keep on pummeling you until I get bored!”

For just a moment, Airachnid felt a flutter of uncertainty. “Wait-”

Arcee swung, a surprisingly graceful movement that put her massive bulk into the air, her heel strut landing square into Airachnid’s face. With that, the battle was properly joined, and Airachnid was plunged into a new valley carved out by the force of the kick. Another one, as Arcee spiraled down, struck Airachnid in the right boob, but the enormously dense metal absorbed it handily, and Arcee hopped in place, her foot stuck.

Airachnid’s spider limbs, much longer and bulkier than before, produced a number of nasty drills, hooks and other combat attachments. They dove forward, with such speed and force the air tore around them, and when they hit it produced a massive blast making more cracks in the moon. Unfortunately, most of them slammed into Arcee’s boobs, and the only one that didn’t hit a glancing blow on her butt, with all damage absorbed.

“Well, what do you know,” Arcee panted, a thrill in her optics. “These new features aren’t just fun. It's better than armor!” She headbutted Airachnid with a wild scream… and then promptly reeled back, dazed and woozy.

“Pity you don’t have the headgear for that kind of move!” Airachnid headbutted her, and with her horns, she was actually able to pull it off. Arcee stumbled back and Airachnid pressed forward, ramming her head into her again and again, chipping off bits of Arcee’s head plates and armor with nicks of her sharp horns.

Arcee recovered gradually, ducking back just enough to avoid another headbutt, and ducked low, leaning onto her breasts and affording herself enough leverage to kick out. Airachnid howled with pain as her shin joint locked up from the blow, sinking into a hole made by the impact. Arcee leaped up, and levered her massive weight into a brutal slam down onto her.

Airachnid escaped, and transformed. For a moment, she had some dreadful uncertainty; she felt not one potential alternate state, but many. It shocked her; she had not just one alternate form now. And the instincts of them all felt ready to direct her mind. The form of a spider, all predatory skill and violent speed. A two-wheeler form for pure speed, not so different from Arcee’s native form. Her original helicopter form, but scaled up…

She folded up, her curves compressing and providing far more cybermatter to make an even larger form, and she flew out as… well, as a spaceship. For a moment, it occurred to her she could simply leave, right here and now, with her prize. She rose up, engines firing…

“WE’RE NOT DONE HERE!” Arcee roared, her voice positively deranged, and her hands extending into wicked claws. Another arm became weaponized, turning into an absolutely massive cannon, and fired, the blast knocking Airachnid’s ship mode out of the sky.

Airachnid landed in the form of an enormous mechanical spider, raising forward multiple bladed limbs, and she charged. Her blades clattered ineffectually against Arcee’s armored breasts, but they were more effective against the rest of her, slicing at her forearms.

And so the two continued to fight.

Across the entire moon, their battle raged, assuming a multitude of forms as they did. Both of them fought far more aggressively than they might have before, though it had to be said: Airachnid was fighting for just enough space to retreat, perhaps recognizing that she needed more time to plan. Arcee fought for Jack, and to finally put down Airachnid, and she fought with a completely wild, ferocious savagery in keeping with the likes of Onyx Prime’s modern disciples; she clawed, she bit, she roared like a monster.

“SHOW ME SOME BLOOD!” She snarled, assuming the form of a gigantic creature not dissimilar to Earth’s wolverines, with a hint of velociraptor in there.

“We’re robots! We have no blood!” Airachnid retorted, in her ship form again, evidently an evolution of her original alt mode.

“SEMANTICS ARE STUPID! HOLD STILL AND DIE!” Arcee assumed a two-wheeler form, though now resembling a battle barge with treads, and rocketed into her. As she bounced off, she transformed back into biped form, producing a set of blades on her forearms and enthusiastically swinging at Airachnid, and began parrying Airachnid’s bladed spider-limbs.

Below, on Cybertron, the Autobot host assembled, waiting on instructions. Optimus Prime watched solemnly, doing a good job of hiding his complete bafflement on Arcee’s transformation, but he gave the order; make no move, unless Arcee was hurt. The battle was too large to risk collateral damage.

After all, the two fembots were still growing. Somehow, the radiation continued to affect them, and though they were too deep into battle to realize it, they had nearly doubled in size, to two hundred miles tall.

They continued to assume a dizzying variety of new forms, each one feeling as natural as two-wheeler and helicopter had before. Arcee barreled into her as a speedy tank, Airachnid resisted the attack as a combiner swarm. One became a living city and brandished turrets in a massive firearms attack, the other dug under the ground as a digging insect. One ran circles around in multiple speedy forms, the other simply assumed increasingly tougher and resilient ones. Even as Airachnid became a ship once more and rammed her, intending to piledrive her all the way into Cybertron, and Arcee became a space station, extending many weapons and firing point blank, dazing Airachnid so that they both floated in space, now orbiting Cybertron.

And, for that matter, both of them now larger than the moon they had been battling upon; their breasts and backside remained the roughly same proportions, but their enormous roundness looked like stellar masses from ground level. Their energon tanks slammed together, jiggling enticingly, as they clung to one another.

“Just… give me the artifact!” Airachnid hissed. “I’ll give you back your precious human! Let me achieve… perfection!” Her voice took on a slightly desperate air. “It is the key! To become as grand as Solus herself! I know it is!”

Arcee grinned in a truly frightening way. “It’s worth keeping it from you, just for that. You’ll have to live with that, forever! I took something you wanted! That you decided was yours! Try and live with THAT, Decepticon scum! See what it’s like!”

Airachnid hissed. “Mine… mine! Give it back!” She lunged.

And, unfortunately for her, it was very poorly timed. Arcee was a more experienced fighter overall, and while Airachnid was a deadly schemer, a vicious ambusher, and a cruel torturer, she battled best when she could surprise her foe. And Arcee was a scrapper by nature, and this was exactly her element. She rammed her tanks into her, using leverage and mass to her advantage; with her bigger hips, and larger backside. She had much more force to offer.

Airachnid leaned back, both stunned by the impact and strangely aroused. Arcee lifted herself up, wrapping her monstrously big thighs around Airachnid’s waist, and was pleased by how her old foe grunted in dismay. And she squeaked, putting all her planet-cracking leg strength into it. Airachnid gasped, with a satisfying cracking noise. As her monstrously huge breasts floated up in the vacuum of space, Arcee took her opportunity, and struck!

Her claws sank into the base of Airachnid’s torso, right to the join of cleavage and torsoplates. She missed the Spark chamber, though whether through mercy or sheer accident… hard to say. But she found what she aimed for, at a spot she had been focusing on the whole fight, and her claws popped it right open.

Her hands closed around Jack, still safe in his protective mech. And, for him, the entire world was the goddess-like grandness of Arcee. Her cleavage could have sheltered continents, her eyes burning stars, and her mouth swallow his home whole. She grinned with a wild and possessive air, and with no preamble, she scooped him up. Right above her Spark casing, she produced a suite suitable for the care and housing of an organic sweetheart, not unlike a luxury spaceship might have, and she plopped him in there. Multiple armatures stripped him out of the mech, to enjoy the comforts of Arcee more directly, and by some strange tweak of her internal shifting, it wound up in her mouth. She spat out the empty mech, indifferent to its cost.

She noticed, in a vague sort of way, his clothes were also there as well. Perhaps she got a bit overzealous, and then grinned as she thought of him naked there.

Still dazed, Airachnid moved. The motion drew Arcee’s attention, like a cat seeing a mouse move, and she grinned even wider. “I can think of one thing to make this day even better,” she said sweetly, drawing her arm back. It grew a massive blade, and she pointed it right at Airachnid’s chest. Airachnid’s eyes widened, because Arcee wanted her to know what was coming. Arcee swung, straight at her Spark-

Airachnid headbutted her again and Arcee detached. She was so stunned by the blow that one of her compartments opened, and out flew the artifact. “No!” She yelled, but Airachnid was faster, and she caught it. “No, no!” Airachnid ignored her, transforming into her ship form once again, and this time, just revved her engines up. The heat of them grew intense, sub-light systems manifested and engaged. Arcee roared in fury, and transformed as well, but her form blurred. She was so angry, so awash in pure bloodthirsty intent and thwarted revenge for so many lost friends, that she couldn’t settle on the right alt mode.

Normally, it would only have been several seconds of hesitation. And it was enough time for Airachnid to accelerate free of Cybertron’s orbit, breaking away from Arcee and out of her reach.

Arcee fired at her, but by now, it was a performative gesture. Airachnid, in ship mode, accelerated, and shifted into other realms of existence; she jumped, and then-

She was gone.

Arcee stared where she had been, for a long, long time.

And then her screams of rage made all of Cybertron shrink back in terror.

“Arcee…?” Jack said meekly within her, completely nude and quite self-conscious about it, but a lot more concerned by her thrashing. “Arcee! Please! Talk to me!”

It was a little frightening how fast Arcee’s attitude instantly calmed down. “Oh. Jack. You’re okay…” And mine, mine, MINE, some jealous and vindictive part of herself roared, and she purred in personal agreement.

“Arcee? Are we… are we okay?”

Arcee looked where her foe had gone. At least for the moment, Airachnid was gone, the last Decepticon holdout of any notable throat no longer an immediate concern. Jack was safe. And Acree herself…

She felt a thrill of power, such that she could tear worlds apart with barely any effort, and she gloried in the unfettered might of it. “Yes, we’re okay.”

She turned, regarding Cybertron, and she focused her attention, her optics zeroing in on the otherwise minute specks of the ordinary Autobots.

Her expression was...strange, for a moment, and briefly, unsettlingly like Airachnid when she regarded the brief and irrelevant humans she so looked down upon.

Then Arcee smiled sweetly, though fiercely, and wiggled her claws in greeting. “Hello down there,” she said coyly. “How do you all like the new me?”

------

It was several months later.

The moon had, by and large, been repaired, and now colonized. The facility within it could no longer produce the empowering Energon without the artifact it had hidden to do so, but it could still produce ordinary Energon, and was now presently feeding Cybertron and even its allies. Grimlock wasn’t too happy about his moon getting wrecked, but it amused Arcee to argue about it with him.

Arcee herself had kept growing for some time even after the fight, stabilizing until she was a little smaller than Cybertron. Given that the planet was largely hollow, her overall mass was probably equal to it. However, it was a bit boring hanging about in space with herself, Jack and any nearby space-capable ‘bots, so she worked out a way to displace her mass and become smaller, though she disliked getting too small; presently, she liked hitting Metrotitan size, and spent some time as her own city in what had once been the Sea of Rust.

Jack and her were now even more inseperable than before; she was becoming very jealous and possessive of him, and he was so enamored and won over by her that he meekly obliged her every whim, and simply lived in her full time. Some speculated what, exactly, they got up to in the complexity of her body, but the general opinion was that it was their own business.

Anyway, upsetting Arcee by being too nosy about it seemed… dangerous.

Not that she came off malicious to the other Autobots. She had changed, yes, but she was still an Autobot; compassionate, honorable, and vaguely insane at the best of times. (They had… unique recruiting practices. But you didn’t stick with the Autobots if you were a normal robot.) Optimus seemed to trust her, at least, so that was probably a good sign.

But she was a lot more wild than before. Enamored with her own power, preening and even vain.

“You’re… sure you don’t feel very different?” Ratchet said dubiously.

He sat atop her finger, which was big enough for him to stand upon with ease. Arcee sat upon her territory, one massive thigh posed dramatically, her energon tanks sloughing onto the ground around her, a number of Autobots happily curled up in there. Sometimes she cooed over them in a surprisingly maternal way. “Not really.” She smirked. “People think I do, huh?”

“You’ve been more… discreet, in the past.”

“You mean restrained.”

“Hmph. Yes. Suppose I do.”

Arcee leaned back. Her butt arched up into the sky, even with her laying back on it like her own personal mattress. “Doesn’t feel right anymore. I just like going with the flow. Anyway, planning’s hard. I guess. Easier to just… do whatever pops into my head.”

Ratchet looked worried. “But you don’t feel… less intelligent!?”

“No, no!” She waved a hand calmingly. “Not at all. I just don’t like… planning stuff out. Making things too complicated. It gets frustrating and, I don’t know, unnecessary.”

“Hrm.” Ratchet considered that. “Well… I do have some interesting news on that front. You know I was originally from Simfur, yes?”

“Thought you were Iaconian, doc.”

“Ethnically, yes. But I was raised in Simfur. When I was with Wheeljack, we raised Grimlock and his other, hah, reprobates.” He said this with greater affection than he used with anyone. It was a little weird, actually. “I learned much of the legends and stories of the area, particularly since Grimlock became a true believer in the religions surrounding Onyx Prime. You should know that this sort of… impulsiveness, is closely associated with the way Onyx Prime was described in the older legends.”

“I thought they was all wise, enlightened and that other slag.”

“Well, yes. But Onyx was also the first beastformer and progenitor of the Predacons. Their default solution to a threat was to bite it’s head off.”

“Hah!”

Ratchet eyed Arcee’s pronounced teeth and claws. “The… physical traits are more subtle than expected. Historically, anyone exposed to Onyxian Energon becomes a mutant beastformer. I suppose the presence of Solus’ influence affected it… though based on her legends, you ought to be even more unhinged.”

“Oh yeah, she was a bit wild, eh?”

“I think a more honest term might be ‘mad scientist’, Arcee.” Ratchet sniffed. “...Do you like being this large?”

“I’m gonna level with you, doc.” Arcee leaned in. “I have no idea how I could stomach being… puny. I’m never being smaller than this, I promise!”

“And the…” Ratchet gestured vaguely in a way that indicated outsized chest ornaments. “Those?”

“They’re Solusdamned sweet, is what!”

“...To each their own. I don’t judge, you know. Out loud.” They went through a variety of other topics, briefly covering Jack (who was quite happy, if increasingly agoraphobic and disinterested in non-Arcee vistas), Optimus’ mild approval of Arcee’s state on the basis of ‘if an Autobot wants to be something, it is that Autobot’s right to do so’, and Grimlock’s continuing attempts to arm wrestle her fingers for fun.

As Ratchet’s check up came to a close, with a report on his findings on Arcee’s changes, which were frankly alien (among other things, she was apparently multidimensional now, and her T-cog was now distributed throughout her whole body), he brought up one other matter. “There’s been no signs of Airachnid.”

“I didn’t think so.” At Ratchet’s glance, Arcee continued. “A giant fembot Terrorcon as big as a moon with an artifact like that would make some news.”

“If she’s even just the size of a moon now,” Ratchet said grimly. “The two of you had access to that… whatever it was, for less than a megacycle, and you’re bigger than Unicron when you want to be. Now…? We may need to look for solar systems disappearing when she’s feeling peckish.”

Arcee actually shuddered. “Don’t even say that, Ratchet. Don’t like to think about those cute little aliens getting… hit, by her.”

Ratchet glanced at her. ‘Cute’ was a new sentiment from her. But regardless. “I don’t know if even your increase in power will be able to cope with whatever she might have become. But, at the moment, barring some unusual breakthroughs in universal combining technology, you’re our best option. Megatron turned himself in, Starscream is in hiding, and most other Decepticons have either been captured or have submitted to trial. Airachnid is the last remnant of that sorry chapter of our lives.”

“More’s the pity I couldn’t kill her when I had the chance!”

“Well, you may just get your chance. You AND Jack.” Arcee gave him a surprised look. “Tell me, have you heard of something new the biological experts are looking into?”

Arcee tilted her head, with the clouds shifting in response. “Nope. I’m interested, though.”

“I’m not clear on the specifics. Xenobiology has never been an interest of mine. But we’re working on a way to resonate Sparks with the physiology of certain bonded aliens to amplify our power. It’s similar to combination, but without a physical transformation. But you need a close bond to make it work…” He gave her a look, or perhaps Jack’s permanent residence. “A VERY intimate bond.”

“...Oh~?” she said sweetly.

“A symbiotic link, amplifying an Autobot’s power, and potentially size. They’re calling it the Headmaster technology, I believe… or Powermaster, not sure which. What do you think? Would you and Jack take a look into it?”

Arcee almost drooled at the thought of being even stronger, and allowing Jack to help bring down Airachnid once and for all. “I wouldn’t mind~!”

[afterspark-podcast]

G1 Episode 10: Transcript

Episode Show Notes

[This can also be found on AO3!]

[Stinger]

S: And his uncle Benjamin who gets eaten by a cannibal! And he's just so angry.

O: [Laughter] Can you blame him?

[Intro Music Plays]

O: Hello, and welcome to the Afterspark Podcast, an episode by episode recap of the generation 1 Transformers cartoon. I'm Owls!

S: And I’m Specs.  

O: And today we're gonna be talking about episode number 10: War of the Dinobots. Let's talk about giant robots today, shall we?

S: Mm-hmm

O: So, we open with Chip viewing a ‘dangerous’ meteor through a telescope.

S: We got our boy, Chip, back!

O: I’m glad, he's- Chip’s a good boy.

S: He's the best! He's the best human so far.

O: Yeah.

S: I think he will continue to be the best human-

O: I have a hard time picking between him and Raoul, to be honest.

S: Yeah.

O: I really like Raoul but I also really like Chip so I have a hard time picking. And like, I feel like Raoul might win just ever so slightly because I like him and Tracks together more but Chip still- he's up there. He's like my second favorite, if nothing else.

S: We need both of them and Carly to show up in an episode in some new series

O: I know!  And they never do in G1 which is really disappointing because, like, I like all these characters but we never actually- like, I think we get to see Chip and Carly interact and we get to see like Chi- oh, not Chip-

S: Spike and Raoul?

O: Spike and Carly, and Chip and Spike but I don't think we really get to see a lot of the other ones interact.

S: Yeah.

O: Which is a pity. Anyway, Chip calls the Autobots because they’re ones who can save the Earth from this meteor, apparently?

S: Nevermind that it apparently lands more or less safely but who the hell cares? Spike is chilling in Optimus’s cab on a ride to the obs- observatory, you know, like a- like teenage boys do.

O: No worries, dad, I'm not going out drinking and driving! I'm just gonna ride in my giant alien robot friend! Optimus’ burning conviction to save the earth once he, ah, you know, figures out what's going on shines through as he clenches his fist and it's covered with red electricity!

S: How very anime of you, Optimus.

O: Indeed. Uh, Optimus decides they need to get to the meteor before the Decepticons do because it might be a power source. Apparently. And opts to take the Dinobots as back up.

S: I don't think they thought this through. At all?

O: [Laughter] I don’t think they did either!

S: Meanwhile, Megatron totally rages against the machine.

O: Or at least the fact of the Dinobots kicked their ass.

S: [Laughter] Yeah. So it's Tuesday night- time for Starscream and Megatron's weekly tiff.

O: Of course! Megatron insults Starscreams’ strategies and orders Soundwave to find the Dinobots weak points.

S: You know, as one does.

O: Of course.

S: Soundwave flies off to spy on the Dinobots.

O: Slash Autobots.

S: Yes, the Autobots, sorry.

O: Which, of course, means he lands near them. And then Soundwave, a giant 30-foot tall robot, does this by sneaking against the side of a building. It is great.

S: Oh, I feel we should probably mention that the meteor, like, lands in, like, the middle of this sort of bombed out looking town which is across the river from a perfectly ordinary looking town, or whatever.

O: Did I miss that part where it was across the river?

S: There's a bridge or something I think? Well, it's separated, somehow, I don't remember.

O: Regardless, yeah, it basically landed in this like very bombed out looking place perfectly fine? So I don't know why there was this whole “They've got a save the earth.”

S: Yeah but so, yeah, Soundwave is basically sneaking through ruins.

O: Yes but of course he's still a 30 foot robot so, you know, he sends out a good old listening tentacle.

S: It makes snake sound effects. It's kind of weird.

O: I love it.

S: The Autobots are trying to get a twofer for putting their allies in danger today as they brought along both Chip and Spike.

O: Because that was a good idea. And okay, Soundwave has been beat out for worse naming schemes to fucking Spike. Spike suggests they named the meteorite after Chip as the meteorroni chipperoni?

S:  Meteorini Chiporoni or whatever.

O: Oh god, it's terrible. Anyway, shut up Spike!

S: It's a pretty fucking big meteor, I guess? About the size of Optimus Prime though whether it was bigger when it was- before, you know, burning through the atmosphere is another thing entirely and I mean honestly it probably should have, like, had a crater.

O: Yeah, it really didn’t. Like it might have but it wasn't very deep. Uh, they extract a sample from the meteorite--via shooting at it.

S: Extraction via gun. It's the fastest but definitely not the safest way to do this when you're afraid that goddamn thing is gonna blow up.

O: We don’t know that yet.

S: Well, they keep talking about how it's possibly dangerous soooo.

O: You know, I sometimes question Wheeljack’s science credentials.

S: Except isn’t Optimus shooting the thing? I don’t remember.

O: Maybe it was, but Wheeljack’s the one who asked for a sample.

S: True. And the Dinobots are left behind to guard the meteor, as one does.

O: Of course.

S: Chip describes seeing the Autobots transform as ‘outrageous’!

O: What show does he think he's in? Jem and the Holograms?

S: Well, it could be argued that they’re all in the same universe.

O: [Laughter] We’re not getting into that, but yes!

S: So they just decide to leave their young, impressionable, and not so smart babies behind without supervision to guard the meteor.

O: What could go wrong, am I right?

S: I mean they stick them- they leave them in a closet most of the time so, ok, no one get- no one ever gave them the stranger-danger talk.

O: [Laughter] So true.

S: Seriously, they couldn't leave Wheeljack and/or Ratchet with them? Ratchet? Someone?

O: You would think? I mean, like, clearly they shouldn’t be left here by themselves.  Hence, Optimus despite trying to offline them a few episodes back says he's pleased with the Dinobots and is going to order two more.

S: [Sighs] Their family planning is not good.

O: No, no it’s not. Once back at the base, Chip suggests a Stegosaurus and a Pteranodon for the two new dinos. Ratchet and Wheeljack seem to agree with this.

S: They think it's a hot idea.

O: [Laughter] They just wanna make more babies.

S: Yeah, and Sparkplug asks if there's anything Chip doesn't know about. Spike and Chip just, like, share a look that seems to say, “Good question.”

O: Chip: Resident super genius. Back at the Dinobots, Soundwave continues spying by initiating a brain scan with a scanner that pops out of his head.

S: [Sighs]

O: [Laughter]

S: Because, of course, we've got a- we've got the weird. We've got this listening tentacle and now we’ve got brain scan time. I mean, yeah, okay you're psychic but whatever.

O: I mean, at least we've seen the listening tentacle pop up a few times at this point.

S: This breaks down to Slag wants to fight, Grimlock who wants to be the boss man and Sludge just wants to follow whoever’s strongest cuz apparently, well, he's not good at critical thinking.

O: He’s not.

S: But I don't think any of them are especially good at that. Though we did look at the tech specs and Grimlock is indeed the smartest of them.

O: Or at least in the toys- in the comics that, uh, begs to be seen if that's relevant. If that's the exact same stats here.

S: Yeah.

O: Megatron seems to translate this information slightly differently, with Slag is hostile, Grimlock is arrogant and Sludge is stupid. Poor, poor Sludge.

S: Yeah.

O: The evil plan for today is to use this information to make them fight against Optimus Prime and steal the meteor.

S: So we're just gonna make babies do shit today.

O: I'm gonna go with yes?

S: Yeah, yeah.

O: I remain convinced Megatron has a bling obsession as he is way too damn excited about big shiny rocks.

S: I mean there were those rubies. There was that giant thing in South America. There's these- I feel like there have been more rocks. There's going to be more rocks in the future.

O: Yeah ju- he has a thing for bling. Optimus just needs to get him bling and then propose to Megatron and the war would be over. Just give the man his bling.

S: Yeah.

O: The Seekers attack the Dinobots, who defend themselves.

S: They gave the babies guns, probably with little to no proper training on said weapons because the Autobots are morons.

O: [Laughter] Well, the Autobots just aren't good with Sparklings, me thinks.

S: Yeah.

O: Megatron lands and several things happen all at once. Namely, that Megatron takes three dyno beams/fire to the face with absolutely no issue what-so-fucking-ever. He literally tosses his fusion cannon off to the side, he basically is like, “Why can't we just be friends? I just want to talk to you guys.”

S: The Dinobots fall for Megatron's flattery as he tells them they are stronger than him and stronger than all the other Autobots.

O: Leading Grim to reach the conclusion that, “He, Grimlock should be leader.” Oh you idiots, my poor, poor dumb Dino idiots.

S: Poor Dino babies.

O: They deserve better.

S: And meanwhile the Seekers take off with the meteorite that the Dinobots were guarding. Like, they literally toss out these, like, grappling hook things from their bellies and they latch onto the meteor and it just looks really goofy.

O: Ah, back at base- are ya ready for a montage?

S: We’re ready for a montage!

O: We- we see that plans are underway to build the new Dinobots.

S: God, Sparkplug--is holding a document that says, “outline plan desge.”

O: [Laughter] Someone couldn’t spell design.

S: Or they couldn't fit it and they didn't care. Or they just didn't speak English or something.

O: Or they were, like, nobody will see this. And then DVDs came along and whoops! Making babies though, it's totally something the whole family can enjoy together.

S: [Laughter] Yeah, and Wheeljack calls Optimus to his lab to tell them that the meteorite is unstable as fuck and could literally explode at any second!

O: This is important because we need to show off Trailbreaker’s super-secret awesome ability to create force fields which he promptly uses to contain the conveniently timed explosion that happens immediately after.

S: I mean we saw the force shield stuff when they were off on Cybertron with the acid rain that time, so this isn't exactly a surprise but it's a new use of it.

O: I guess.

S: Because, yeah, he just surrounds the thing and then it blows itself up and that's fine.

O: Everything's fine. The base is fine. Wheeljack is fine. Optimus is fine.

S: There isn't even, like, a smear or whatever. I don’t know. And so, hey! They learned something from the first Dinobot disaster, so no showing off the Dinobots indoors by the Ark [I meant, Teletraan 1. ~Specs] They're gonna show Swoop and Snarl off outside instead of next to freaking Teletraan 1!

O: [Laughter] You know, the thing that controls their entire base.

S: They learned a thing!

O: They did learn a thing! Swoop and Snarl seem to be slightly smarter than their compatriots, with Swoop using a more grammatically correct sentence than we normally hear from a Dinobot.

S: And the new Dinobots are solar powered, at least Snarl is. They probably both are and I guess go back to the intelligence thing apparently Swoop and Snarl have “7” according to their toy tech specs. Well, “7” in intelligence.

O: Which is still more than the other Dinobots, aside from Grimlock, right?

S: Yeah, Grimlock was an “8.” I think Sludge was a “3,” which just makes me sad.

O: Poor Sludge, poor baby.

S: Yeah, not sure about-

O: I just want to give Sludge a hug.

S: Yeah. Not sure about, uh, Slag or Slug. I feel like he was a “5.”

O: Maybe he was.

S: But I don't remember. And- oh god- and then Ratchet and Wheeljack just tell basically everybody to try and take out the Dinobots cause-

O: I'm not! I’m not sure who I think this is being mean to: the Dinobots or to everyone else.

S: Cuz the Dinobots do a number on everyone. Yeah. Sideswipe is super goddamn excited to fight and gets a pretty good punch on Swoop in.

O: Swoop and Snarl pretty much wipe out everybody else, though.

S: Yeah, I think someone gets picked up and dropped and... Yeah, none of the Autobots are having a grand old time. And then Optimus shows up where they left the other three Dinobots, who are now missing along with the meteorite because we saw what happened earlier.

O: Exactly! And we get to see his tiny antenna pop out of his helm as he calls the base. It’s great!

S: The Dinobots then pop out of nowhere and triple-team Optimus. Optimus makes a plea for the Dinobots to stop this but naturally this fails. Um. [clears throat] Optimus is also making strange moaning noises again through this. I wish he would stop. [Laughter]

S: Oh god, I'm not sure how either of us could, like, do the keyboard smashing noise.

O: [Laughter] I- that was. I knew I was gonna have to be the one to say that anyway, so I was just like [incoherent noise]!

S: And so Optimus is knocked on his ass. Like, he's literally knocked into some sort of fissure or something?

O: Yeah.

S: Yeah, um. Well, he’s knocked on his aft or his ass or whatever. Grimlock shows a smidgen of discomfort at the idea of murdering a helpless opponent, because, apparently, he has some sort of honour even though he is a small child- basically, a very young person who has not had a whole lot of, um, moral education.

O: As Optimus puts it when he gets back up, he blathers something about “traces of Autobot training.” [Laughter]

S: What training? You stuffed them in a closet!

O: In the next shot, Grimlock has clearly stolen Optimus’ gun as he reports in to Megatron about Prime’s defeat.

S: Because he literally just has it under his arm?

O: Yeah, he has it. Yeah, yeah, I feel a little weirded out that I can actually tell Prime's gun apart from everybody else’s now, but I can.

S: That's what happens.

O: That’s what happens when you play the freakin PS4 game so much and you end up playing as everybody including Optimus Prime despite only wanting to play as Wheeljack! I actually feel bad because I'm like, Grimlock’s in that one. I love Grimlock. I think I don't like playing as him because he's hard. He's basically constantly swapping between robot mode and Dino mode the entire time. It's kind of a pain in the ass.

S: Hmm.

O:  Elsewhere, we see Megatron overseeing the filling of Energon cubes from the meteor or where they’ve taken the meteor anyway.

S: Yeah, Soundwave is making more Tupperware cubes again and then seems to defy all laws of physics as he shoots the meteorite and, somehow, this causes a flow of energy to fill up the Energon cubes.

O: Despite them being, like, not near each other, it's very strange.

S: Yeah, it’s kind of- kind of kooky.

O: And, for once, Starscream makes an accurate observation that the meteorite energy seems unstable.

S: And Megatron's a dick about it.

O: Of course! Nevermind that Starscream is, in fact, a scientist, but whatever!

S: Then the Dinobots show up dragging Optimus with them, you know, like the dead weight he is right now.

O: [Laughter] Ouch! Uh, Megatron is rather pissed that Optimus isn’t fucking dead.

S: And Starscream says that Grimlock will never destroy Optimus, begging Megatron not to listen to Grim.

O: Give the bot credit, where credit is due- he is on a roll today. Starscream is on a roll today.

S: He is, and Optimus also attempts to tell Megatron that the meteorite’s unstable, so that's two people telling him it's unstable.

O: Yes, Megatron ignores this, too.

S: At the Ark, Wheeljack has tracked down where the Decepticons have taken the meteor and the Autobots send out Snarl and Swoop to help.

O: Megatron’s unstable Energon stash finally explodes sending Reflector and poor Soundwave flying.

S: There were some really funny photos from that.

O: There were, it was pretty great.

S: Mmhmm. And Starscream gives Megatron his best, “I told you so!”

O: [Laughter] Swoop and Snarl show up via flying and Megatron orders the other three Dinobots to transform and attack.

S: The Dinobots fight, Swoop getting the short end of the stick fight-wise because one of his wings gets chomped on.

O: Yeah,

S: At least a few times.

O: It looks painful, poor baby.

S: Poor kid. Like, he's just woken up, he's like-

O: And now his older brothers are chomping on him!

S: He's now an hour old or something.

O: [Laughter] Starscream and Megs flee as the meteorite threatens to explode and Optimus tackles Grimlock out of the way of the explosion.

S: This looks an awful lot like that bit in Fantasia with all the dinosaurs.

O: [Chuckles] Grimlock, understandably, is now pissed at Megatron.

S: And Megatron does the smart thing and orders a retreat to escape the angry t-rex.

O: Angry, big t-rex.

S: Yeah.

O: I'm glad a camera, a cassette and a cassette deck can fly. [Laughter]

S: Yeah, and then the cavalry arrives in the form of the rest of the Autobots. Of course.

O: Of course! And Grimlock apologizes for, you know, trying to kill Optimus.

S: Optimus Prime kind of ignores this apology. It's like, “I'm not forgiving or forgetting,” as sort of an undertone here.

O: Seems like, he’s like, “I'm going to give you some long-winded speech that's not going to address your apology in any way.”

S: Yeah,

O: And that's the end of episode so we're now up to five Dinobots because more is always better when it comes to dinosaurs.

S: Yeah.

O: Join us next time for the beginning of another three parter, The Ultimate Doom, Part 1. Or the episode that third Bay movie was basically based on.

S: Yeah, or the trio of episodes or whatever.

O: Yeah [Laughter].

S: Ok, so we've got the fanfiction recommendations.

O: Yup!

S: Gotta do it, there's only the two of them and they're both by the same person. One of which is a sequel to something that I recommended earlier. Alright, so for a first recommendation we have “Art in Me” by Nightwind. Continuity's G1 cartoon, rated K. It’s Gen, there's no pairings. Our characters are the Dinobots, Prowl, Red Alert, Wheeljack, and Ratchet.

S: Okay, so “Art in Me” is a sequel to a story that Nightwind had written earlier called “Vigil” and so the summary is, “The Autobots might have a budding Picasso on their hands. Who might it be?”

O: [Chuckles]

S: And so our theme for actually both of these recs or recommendations were “Dinobot shenanigans”-

O: Yes!

S: Because we now have all five Dinobots and as, um, I’ve been keeping track of things were in a series or one-shots or whatever, this is a sequel to Vigil, also by Nightwind.

S: And our second recommendation- there's only the two of them today- is Crosses to Bear, as I have said before, also by Nightwind. G1 cartoon continuity, it's rated T. It's Gen, there's no pairings. Our characters are the Dinobots and various Autobots. And in summary, “It’s Swoop and a few other crazy Autobots versus a really big chunk of rock with Track's life hanging in the balance. Rating upped a bit to due to Trailbreaker’s gratuitous use of a certain expletive.”

S: Expletive. God.

O: Expleti- Expletive.

S: [Laughter] A certain curse word!

O: There you go!

S: Okay, and yeah. Dinobot shenanigans and that's the two fanfiction recommendation. Do we have fan art recommendations?

O: No, it’s an even numbered episode.

S: Ah.

O: Well, we’ll have fan art next week, though!

S: Yep.

O: Well, next episode, not next--we post every two weeks but you know what I mean.

S: And that just about wraps it up for us today. Remember to check us out on Tumblr or Pillowfort at Afterspark-Podcast for any additional information, show notes, or links we may have mentioned. You can also find us on Facebook and Twitter @AftersparkPod (all one word) and various other locations by searching for Afterspark Podcast, such as AO3, Stitcher and YouTube, just to name a few. Till next time!

S: I'm Specs!

O: And I’m Owls!

S: Toodles!

[Outro Music Plays]

[transformersaesthetics]

Transformers: Classics

TUMBLR! I’m back! I’m real stoked on today’s essay. We’re gonna talk about the line that started it all, the line that puts the C in CHUG, the reason I’m a broke toy person, Transformers: Classics. This marks the beginning of a change of pace for us; from now on our analysis of Transformers will split into 3. The movies, the cartoon show, and the CHUG lines (read on for what CHUG means). I’ll switch which one we do every week, and we’ll work our way up that way. This is also the first essay I wrote, and I love it, it;’s so small.

Here you go!

Transformers:Classics was released in 2006, to compensate for the delay of the 2007 Transformers film.(Nevermore) It was a hodgepodge of different concepts, demonstrating  Hasbro’s reticence to rely entirely on collectors or nostalgia to sell toys, and their desire to include more broadly marketable elements to a line as well. Part of the line, most notably the legends class figures, is reminiscent of the 2003 Universe line, which consisted entirely of redecos of previously released toys.(Fiction Alchemist) Other parts of the line continue successful practices of the Unicron Trilogy lines; Classics released six new mold minicon teams.(Nevermore) However, the most significant part of Classics was the fact that it gave new toys with modern engineering to G1 characters. 

The deluxe and Voyager classes were entirely new molds of G1 characters.(Nevermore) Many of these characters, such as Astrotrain and Bumblebee, had not received figures since the end of G1.(ItsWalky;S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47, Astrotrain) More notable still, this is the first time that any G1 characters received toys that were designed to be updated versions of the characters, faithful and evocative of their original appearances while relying on modern toy engineering. This is the main contribution of Classics; it launches the practice of having modern toys of G1 characters on the shelves without any supporting fiction, in contrast to toylines associated with the movies or the current television show. Indeed, the 2008 Universe line was occasionally referred to as Classics 2.0, emphasizing the direct thematic ties between the lines.(Jackpot) Many figures in the Universe line were branded as part of the “Classics Series” subline.(Jackpot) This practice of releasing updated G1 figures has continued, at first haltingly, then more or less continuously since 2012.(DDog)

    While it was not uncommon to include nods and references to previous Transformers fiction in figures, such as including a crown for Starscream, a reference to his appearance in the ‘86 movie, Classics introduced references of a novel opacity. Grimlock’s entire figure is a reference to his Pretenders figure. They both break from Grimlock’s traditional transformation scheme and end with him wielding his tail as a sword, and share a blaster with a bayonet.(Abates) Hot Rod features a flip out buzz saw, referencing a scene in the ‘86 movie (the place from which all Transformers references stem).(Rotty) Jetfire includes weapons and accessories to better replicate his original toy, a practice which has become standard on subsequent Jetfire figures.(S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47, Jetfire) Astrotrain is decoed not to reflect his appearance in the cartoon, but his original toy.(S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47, Astrotrain)

 What is remarkable about these references is that, while they have significant play value independent of understanding them, they are extremely arcane to the uninitiated. What child in 2006 is going to have ready access to Grimlock’s pretender figure, Jetfire’s original toy, or care enough about the ‘86 movie to scrutinize every frame? These references are clearly intended for adult collectors who remember these things from their own childhoods. Indeed, the very gimmicks of the line reference G1; The line also featured the return of rubsigns instead of regular faction insignias, which the 2010 Reveal the Shield line would also notably do.(S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47, Transformers)   

Many characters have updated alternate modes. Grimlock turns into a more scientifically accurate T-Rex (archaeology having come some way since the 80’s), Astrotrain turns into a bullet train rather than a steam locomotive, Optimus Prime has a more aerodynamic cab, and Bumblebee turns into a little hatchback rather than a VW bug. This is evidence of Hasbro’s desire to fuse  nostalgia with other elements with broader appeal. Optimus Prime in particular is an excellent example; his new wind vane transforms into a new weapon for him to use, which fuses his new appearance and added play features.(FFN, Optimus) 

With the notable exceptions of Grimlock and Starscream, most of the figures feature sleek, rounded alternate modes, with paint applications that are mostly broad stripes of color. This is particularly visible on Astrotrain’s train mode and Optimus and Bumblebee’s alt modes. The palette is generally light and bright. Something else particular to the Classics line is the way the figures are jointed. While the use of ball joints is still reasonably widespread, Classics features an unusual prevalence of strange hinge joints. Of particular note is a kind of joint that appears on Astrotrain and Jetfire. There is one hinge for forward motion of the thigh in the middle of the thigh, rather than at the hip.This is quickly followed by a parallel knee hinge. At the hips, there is another hinge joint that provides the legs with their side to side motion.(S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47, Astrotrain) The same designer is responsible for both toys.(FFN, Takashi)  

The Classics Seeker mold is historically significant enough to merit its own discussion. The Classics Seeker mold is widely regarded as the definitive Seeker mold. It takes inspiration from the Masterpiece Seeker mold and translates it to the deluxe size class, giving fans a cartoon accurate Starscream in rough scale with their Megatron and Optimus.(MistaTee) Over the course of its long history, the Seeker mold has been released as no fewer than 13 separate characters, and received a general retail release as recently as 2012, with an exclusive timelines figure as recently as 2015.(MistaTee;Poweredconvoy) Indeed, it is the single most redecoed and retooled mold in the history of the brand, beating out the next closest mold by almost double, 31 uses to 16 (For those of you curious, the next closest is Combiner Wars Dead End).(ZacWilliam) The mold is so popular that, during Transformers: Earthrise, a line famous for creating almost masterpiece level retail figures, the Starscream figure was simply an upscaled version of the Classics seeker mold with more joints. (MistaTee)Even almost 15 years after its initial release, the mold continues to influence subsequent lines.   

While the sheer number of uses of the Seeker mold in and of itself constitutes a tremendous impact on the brand, it also gives a taste of things to come in more contemporary Generations lines. This is, in some ways, foreshadowing of Hasbro’s developing and understandable taste for squeezing every drop of money from a mold with retools and redecos. Indeed, this is somewhat evident even Classics itself; the final wave consists of a retool, Ramjet, and a redeco, Cliffjumper.(Nevermore) The primary strategies are using heavy retooling to release another character with the same mold (Starscream into Ramjet) , or using extensive redecos to release new characters or premium versions of existing characters (Starscream into Sunstorm, or G2 Starscream). This tendency was carried to perhaps peak extent in Combiner Wars (CW) and Titans Return (TR), and will be discussed more fully while examining those lines. 

Classics established important norms carried on by subsequent CHUG lines. G1 characters were given new, well articulated toys created using modern engineering. Obscure references were also included in these figures, to appeal to adult collectors.  The figures all have a unifying but loose visual aesthetic. Neither Classics nor its successor lines, with some exceptions, have featured supporting fiction. The vast majority of Classics figures do not feature action gimmicks.  However, while Hasbro was willing to provide a nostalgia element to the line, they were not willing to count on it entirely. While the figures were designed with recreating the G1 cartoon in mind, most of the figures featured updated alternate modes, and also include play features that appeal to children as well as adult collectors. Many figures were included in the line which had nothing to do with the G1 cartoon, being redecos of toys from the then current Cybertron cartoon or direct extensions of popular elements of other lines, namely Minicons. This practice would continue for a few subsequent nostalgia lines, but somewhat fades by the contemporary era. 

This is an excellent example of an element of Classics that does not continue to influence other lines; while foundational, Classics was also unique in many respects. Classics figures feature comparatively large amounts of unbroken, solid plastic, a design element that became uncommon in later lines. Classics figures also have unusual jointing, perhaps demonstrating that designers had not yet gotten the hang of crafting these types of figures. Indeed, several examples of this sort of trial and error process are visible in other parts of the line. Astrotrain, his fellow triple-changers, and Grimlock would almost universally recieve Voyager class figures from here on out.(Nevermore) Grimlock is traditionally portrayed as large, and, as Universe Octane demonstrates, it’s quite difficult to make a deluxe triple changer.  Grimlock, even in other incarnations, such as the RID 2015 character, would feature transformation schemes much more heavily based on the original toy. Megatron (or anyone else for that matter, see TR Sixshot and Siege Shockwave for examples) would never again receive an above Legends class general retail toy with a gun alternate mode, likely due to laws about toy guns. 

Although Classics was a small line, in many respects it has had an outsized impact on the brand at large.Classics is a remarkable moment in the history of the brand. It represents a confluence of ideas, elements and engineering from many previous toylines and franchises. Classics was also the last line before the Transformers movies changed toy engineering forever. Yet at the same time, it laid the groundwork for one of the most important changes that has occurred in Transformers.  Before Classics, almost every toyline was of new characters, and supported by a cartoon. After Classics, the release of new mold figures of G1 characters became increasingly commonplace, eventually becoming one of the three pillars of the contemporary Transformers environment. It is no overstatement to say this little line helped to usher in the current form of Transformers. 

Works Cited

Abates et al. “Grimlock (G1)/Toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Grimlock_(G1)/toys#Classics Accessed 5/11/2020

DDog et al. “Transformers: Generations (toyline)” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:_Generations_(toyline) Accessed 5/11/2020

Nevermore et al. “Transformers: Classics” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:_Classics Accessed 

5/11/2020

FFN et al. “Optimus Prime (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Optimus_Prime_(G1)/toys#Classics Accessed 5/11/2020

FFN et al. “Takashi Kunihiro” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Takashi_Kunihiro Accessed 5/11/2020

Fiction Alchemist et al. “Transformers: Universe (2003 toyline)”TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:_Universe_(2003_toyline) Accessed 5/11/20204

ItsWalky et al. “Bumblebee (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Bumblebee_(G1)/toys Accessed 5/11/2020

Jackpot et al. “Universe (2008)/Toyline"TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:_Universe_(2008_toyline) 

Accessed 5/7/2020

MistaTee et al.  “Starscream (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Starscream_(G1)/toys#Classics Accessed 5/11/2020

Poweredconvoy et al. “Nacelle (G1)” TFwiki.  https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Nacelle_(G1)#Timelines Accessed 5/11/2020

Rotty et al. “Hot Rod (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Hot_Rod_(G1)/toys#Classics Accessed 5/11/2020

S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47 et al. “Astrotrain (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Astrotrain_(G1)/toys Accessed 5/11/2020

S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47 et al. “Jetfire (G1)/toys” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Jetfire_(G1)/toys#Classics Accessed 5/11/2020

S.H.I.E.L.D Agent 47 et al. “Transformers (2010 toyline)” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Reveal_the_Shield#Hasbro_Reveal_the_Shield_subline Accessed 5/11/2020

ZacWilliam et al. “Dead End (G1)” TFwiki. https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Dead_End_(G1)#Combiner_Wars Accessed 5/11/2020

[asherv20-blog]

Transformers are about to get weird

It’s the morning of New York Toy Fair 2018 and this is a feeling I’ve had all week, the brand is about to take a turn and pivot away from the direction its been heading down since the release of the first live-action movie a little over a decade ago. Earlier today at Hasbro’s Investor Preview, they announced that there would be no follow-up to 2016’s Transformers: The Last Knight and after the Bumblebee movie slated for release later this year, the live-action movie series is going to be rebooted. Although, I wonder if some hooks won’t be sprinkled into the Bumblebee movie to make it a spring-board for whatever comes next.

The dealings of the movie-verse aside, there’re other factors at work causing me to feel the brand is setting up for a significant shift. I wanna talk about the collector-focused toy-line Transformers Generations and its two latest refreshes, Titans Return and Power of the Primes. Titans Return re-introduced Headmasters writ large to the brand and quickly brought that play pattern’s most relevant characters along with it. But once the likes of Chromedome, Weirdwolf, Brainstorm and Fortress Maximus were rolled out; it seemed to me the back-half of the line turned its attention to filling in the gaps in our respective collections. We were offered a buffet line-up of characters that had little to do with the head-swapping gimmick of Titans Return, but were long-overdue for new toy treatment, including: Brawn, Seaspray, Kickback, Gnaw the Sharkticon, the Autobot and Decepticon clones, Top Spin and Twin Twist, Twinferno and the Decepticon Targetmasters to name a few.

Outside of characters introduced in 1984/1985, most of these dudes don’t have a lot of cache with the fan base at large. So its kind of surprising that so many of them would indeed get new, and in many cases very excellent toys – unless you look at it through the lens of Hasbro aiming to ‘clear out’ the roster of original G1 characters who’d yet to receive new toys.

Then we get to Power of the Primes, the ‘end’ of the Prime Wars Trilogy that began with Combiner Wars. Through the first two waves, this toy line has proven quite curious. Headmasters/Titan Masters have been side-graded into Prime Masters and though they share the same form factor as Titan Masters, the Prime Masters turn into a ‘spark’ rather than the head of another Transformers character and while they can be plugged into the head socket of any Titans Return compatible toy, they’re intended to socket into the accompanying slot of ‘armor pieces’ included with deluxe and larger figures and imbue that larger character with the ‘power’ of the corresponding Prime. In effect, you’re socketing a headmaster into a chunk of plastic and sticking that onto another Transformers figure.

Speaking of the larger figures, Power of the Primes is shuffling combiners back into the toyline using the technology first seen in Combiner Wars – to the point that some POTP figures feature tooling directly linked back to older Combiner Wars toys. I suppose it could be observed that Power of the Primes is celebrating the toys that came before by retaining the Titan Master play pattern and bringing back combiners.

I’ll take the opportunity here to tangent briefly and talk about the Power of the Primes leader-class toys which bring their own ‘evolution’ gimmick of a smaller figure integrating with an included larger set-piece to evolve into a different iteration of the character: Orion Pax merges with his truck trailer to become a very Masterpiece-inspired Optimus Prime, Hot Rod likewise links up with his camper trailer and upgrades into Rodimus Prime. The forth-coming fan-voted Optimus Primal will also incorporate his Optimal Optimus form in some fashion – this toy hasn’t seen full release yet, so I can’t speak to the specifics on how he’ll work exactly.

Let’s take a look at the characters we’re getting in Power of the Primes: Dreadwind, Darkwing (now Blackwing), Beachcomber, Windcharger, Tailgate, the Duocon Battletrap (made through combining two brand new Legends-sized characters!), the Terrorcons, Predacons, an honest-to-goodness full team of Dinobots! (Not just Grimlock for the first time in ages!) Even some of the female Autobot Resistance Fighters first seen in the G1 cartoon are getting toys at long last. Again, you look at that line-up and it seems to me that Hasbro is aggressively trying to fill out as much of the G1 cast as they feasibly can.

The last two years has given us a metric ton of toys based on characters from 1987/88 of the G1 lineup, often surpassing my wildest expectations: a new Krok, or Grotusque, or Overlord? Even five years ago, there’s no way I could see these guys getting new toys that weren’t convention exclusive repaints or expensive unlicensed toys – never mind in the main toy line and being (almost) readily available. So, what comes next?

Power of the Primes is still in its infancy, what with Wave 2 only just starting to see retail presence …and as I mentioned at the top, it’s the day of New York Toy Fair. We’re all eager to see what’s in store for the rest of the line. A lot of folks are hoping for the return of the Seacons and for the Dinobots to be retooled into either the Dinoforce or the Pretender Monsters. Some are hoping for more 84/85 characters to get revisited as combiner limbs. Personally, I’m hoping for more female characters to accompany Elita-1 and Moonracer, more Throttlebots, or maybe a Leader-class Deathsaurus. But what about beyond Power of the Primes?

The first natural assumption is that Hasbro just continues apace with updating G1 characters. But we’re talking 1989 and beyond which contains A LOT of Pretenders, Micromasters, and Action Masters; in short, a whole lot of characters that, beyond those of us in the fandom with extremely long gazes, most of the buying audience will surely struggle to muster any passion for. Of course, one could argue that you pepper in more releases of legacy characters like Optimus, Bumblebee, Starscream, Megatron, and Soundwave and anything released alongside them will continue to sell; but I have a hard time seeing that happening.

I keep coming back to the way Hasbro has used the phrase “The Prime Wars Trilogy,” Power of the Primes is the ‘final chapter’ of “The Prime Wars Trilogy.” Seems to me, you don’t bandy about branding like that if you’re intention is to continue doing the exact same thing; not after the ‘final chapter’ of your ‘trilogy.’ Which leads me to believe that the Generations toy-line as we’ve known it since 2010 is going to sunset with Power of the Primes. I don’t think it’ll stop entirely, I feel there’s way too much money in the collector-oriented market now for Hasbro to give up on, but Generations, or whatever branding it takes after Power of the Primes will definitely shift focus.

Whether that’s something as simple as turning back the dial and we’re back updating the G1 cast starting with 1984 all over again, or something completely different, I couldn’t say. Personally, there’s been quite a few new characters introduced over the last decade through movies and tv series that I’m super invested in, but they got really bunk toys and deserve another pass. I’m talking movie Blackout, Prime Knockout and Airachnid, Robots in Disguise Steeljaw. Like. Almost. Every. Robots in Disguise Decepticon… I’d love to see a toy-line focused on giving these newer characters better toys.

More than that, there’s an unspoken truth amidst the fandom and that’s that we’re aging up. There are way, way more folks in here with us that were kids during the Unicron Trilogy, or for the start of the live action movies and that’s their onboarding point – not G1. Their nostalgia is every bit as legitimate as the older segments of the community and its beyond time that ‘their G1’ got some love. Some of those early-to-mid 2000s toys are in desperate need of an update, the Armada toy line especially. But even the original 2001 Robots in Disguise could use some love and I’m not talking car brothers, I’m talking updated Spy Changers!

…and of course, let’s not forget the IDW comics. Now, there was a lot of belly-aching in the community the last time the comics got any kind of acknowledgement in the toy line (circa 2012) – unfounded belly-aching, I’ll add. Of all those toys, only like, half-a-dozen were *actually* based on or influenced by comic designs. Everything else was back-doored into the comics. I’m looking at you Armada Starscream, Scoop, Waspinator, and Sky-byte.

Anyway! IDW! Since the Phase 2 re-launch that started with Robots in Disguise and More Than Meets the Eye, we’ve been treated to a smorgasbord of delightful new characters that now, to many, are every bit as significant as any legacy character and every last one of them is aching for a toy. More Than Meets the Eye and Lost Light author James Roberts has utterly stuffed his cupboard with brand new characters that’ve resonated with his audience like Nautica (the Titans Return toy …really doesn’t count), Rung, Velocity, Pharma, and Roller just to name a very few …and of course I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention fandom darlings, the Decepticon Justice Division. Although, the likelihood of a toy being made of a dude who transforms into an electric chair and sold at retail are a little dubious. But the demand is there.

Just off the top of my head, that’s three new directions the future of the Generations toy line could head down once it moves on from updates of G1 characters, which I feel is all but a certainty as we move forward.

I also wanted to take a moment to shine a light on Japan, where it seems the Transformers brand is in a tremendously strange spot at the moment. Takara’s counterpart to Hasbro’s Generations line, Transformers Legends is coming to an end and has recently come to light that for their follow-up, they’re straight importing the Power of the Primes toys with seemingly no changes. This news has been distressing to fans of the Legends line which had become known for heavily modifying Combiner Wars and Titans Return toys for release in Japan – usually to the tune of alternate/additional applications of paint, to changing the visual look of a toy whole cloth, to the addition of completely brand new Targetmaster partners for their releases of Hot Rod, Kup, Blurr (although only included with Doublecross, who’d released after Blurr), Triggerhappy, Misfire, and Slugslinger; even including Targetmasters with their upcoming releases of Windblade, Top Spin, and Twin Twist – seemingly to future proof for any as-of-yet unmade Sureshot, Crosshairs, and Pointblank.

So it has been a bitter pill to swallow for those that were anticipating Dinobots and Optimus/Rodimus with more paint, or the release of Buster and Hydra in place of Dreadwind and Darkwing. Add to that, Takara seems to be doubling down on both Takaratomy Mall exclusives and Masterpiece repaints, and the quiet abandonment of the Transformers Adventure line, I can only wonder if they’re trying to reduce their costs as much as possible while trying to figure out what to do with Transformers in Japan. I have only the barest grasp on the nuances of that market; mostly just a lot of hearsay that Transformers has always struggled in Japan, or the Legends toys simply weren’t selling, or even that the Japanese collector’s market on the whole is shrinking.

Both at home and abroad, I can’t help but feel Transformers is in a weird place and on the cusp of a major shift. After five Michael Bay helmed movies, we’re due for a reboot; which we’ve learned we’re now getting. The current comics feel like they’re all heading towards their own eventual resolution, what with the long-withheld introduction of Unicron to IDW continuity finally taking place later this year; after which, I’m sure there’ll be a reboot of some stripe. Then there’s the Power of the Primes toy-line which as I oft mentioned already is the final chapter in the Prime Wars trilogy. I could wrong, of course, but stands to reason that something different is going to follow on the heels of the Prime Wars period of the Generations toy line.

Through all that though, I’m not preaching doom and gloom. I’m not saying brace for certain disappointment. Just get ready for Transformers to change a little. Wouldn’t be the first time. Heck, we’re not that far removed from a period in the franchise’s life where it was re-inventing itself every 18 months. We’ve just been treated to an exceptionally long period of the films, tv series, comics, and toys all remaining fairly consistent. But all of these facets of the brand need to be shaken up in order to remain viable in the market and it just so happens that shake up might hit each limb of the brand all at once.

I talked earlier about the aging up of the fandom, I’m in my mid-thirties and finally hit a point in my life where I can no longer indiscriminately purchase every single toy I want as soon as it goes up for pre-order and even as a dedicated reader of the comics since the first IDW mini-series, I’m starting to have some difficulty following all the myriad plot threads. Like, I didn’t even catch the part where the introduction of The Visionaries into IDW continuity shut off the Cybertronians from Vector Sigma and now they’re having to import their Energon from Earth? That’s a thing that happened. I didn’t catch it, but it did.

So maybe its time I finally took a break, and if you’ve read all that and you’re finding yourself worried about what’s coming down the pipe for our favorite Robots in Disguise, maybe we take a break together? The Transformers will endure, they’ll be there for us when we come back and there’ll be something awesome that happened for us to get caught up on!

Also. Hey. Its Toy Fair. At the very least, there’s gonna be some cool new toys to look at today!