Rook, Andromeda, and the Editor's pages were the first pages to be set up in 2015, tying into that year's BotCon theme, "Cybertron's Most Wanted", which was set in the TransTech universe. Initially somewhat straight-faced, as time went on and Rook became more and more of a crackpot, I found these pages increasingly entertaining.
Axiom Nexus News originally appeared in the Collectors Club magazine comic strip Around Cybertron, written and drawn by Jesse Wittenrich. The TransTech version of the strip lasted for only two installments, moving on to Shattered Glass and eventually Wings Universe versions as the magazine's main comic changed continuity. Andromeda and Rook were introduced in those first two strips, while the Editor is introduced on these Facebook pages. We initially thought Rook was an offworlder, but it's cleared up here that he's a TransTech. Fun fact about the Editor: they turn into a fax machine, a bit of a self-criticizing poke at the Collector's Club continued use of the fax machine in the modern day. The abbreviation for Axiom Nexus News, ANN, is likely derived from CNN. Andromeda was created by Greg Sepelak, Trent Troop, and Nick Roche. The Editor was created by (I believe) Jesse Wittenrich.
Not everything for the ANN pages was Sorenson's effort; it tended to alternate back and forth between him and Jesse Wittenrich. For ease of convenience, I'll just do everything here.
The earliest set-up began back in March; I don't believe we noticed until the posts began, however. Andromeda's profile picture is from that years "Cybertron's Most Wanted" comic from BotCon, as is the page header showing the TransTech Cybertron, both of which were penciled and inked by Matt Frank, and colored by Thomas Deer with Wade Alexander. Rook's profile picture has art from "Cybertron's Most Wanted" in the background, with art of his face (I believe) by Jesse Wittenrich, and his header is an image of Axiom Nexus' skyline. The Editor has a profile picture for both when they're presenting as male and female, drawn by Wittenrich with the background sourced from "CMW"-this would eventually be replaced with an image of the TransTech Autobot symbol in a blue orb circled by a gold border, with "ANN" written in Maximal Cybertronix (a cipher language from Beast Wars) below, and an image of Axiom Nexus' roadways.
Now, we'll go by days:
April 29: We'll start off with Andromeda. The Restonian Cluster is all new; the Zed Nebula's name is inspired by both the evil Decepticon-aligned entity Devil Z and the G Nebula from Super-God Masterforce. Beta Cores are inspired by Apple/Android smart phones; Jesse gave the reasoning as Apple--Alpha Core--Beta Core. A quartex is a unit of time, mentioned in the original Sunbow The Transformers cartoon episode "More than Meets the Eye, Part 1".
Now, onto Rook's page: the Hydra Loop is named for fan-turned-pro Andrew "Hydra" Hall. Rook's second post is illustrated with a panel of Starscream and Rattrap from "Cybertron's Most Wanted"; their partnership is inspired by their IDW Publishing counterparts, where Rattrap works as Starscream's crony, as seen in The Transformers and Windblade. Rattrap is visually based on his Beast Machines incarnation. The Turbo-Span Bridge's name was inspired by the hydrospanner, a type of wrench from Star Wars. A rat rod is a style of hot rod/custom car.
Nothing too notable in the Editor's post for today, although the ReportNow program is somewhat creepy.
April 30: Rook starts off today. Sym-Phur, the company, is named for the city of Simfur, introduced in IDW's prequel mini-series to the 2007 live-action Transformers movie, and named for writer Simon Furman. Rapticon is a TransTech version of the Beast Machines Transmetal 2 Dinobot Velociraptor, who was himself a redeco of Beast Wars Dinobot II.
Andromeda's post features an interview with Garara, a TransTech version of the Go! Predacon Jaki, redecoed from Prime: Beast Hunters Predacon Twinstrike. Leatherhide was a cancelled Wal-Mart exclusive for the 2003 Universe toyline; a redeco of Beast Wars Mutant Soundwave, he was to be an Autobot Horrorcon, sold with Blackarachnia. Terraspin is named for a turtle-like alien from Ben 10: Ultimate Alien. The mysterious substance that Garara mentions, along with the caverns mentioned in Rook's post, would be revealed to have been the result of the Waruders being transported to the pasto of Axiom Nexus, as reveal in BotCon 2015's "Cybertron's Most Wanted" comic.
The Editor clarifies it wasn't Rapticon, the usual spokesbot, who gave the quote in Rook's post, but rather Dinotron-a TransTech version of the Beast Machines DinobotPachycephalosaurus, redecoed from Beast Wars Neo Predacon Hardhead, who was himself retooled from the original Beast Wars Dinobot toy. Dinotron is noted to be the manger for the Racing Fuel division of Sym-Phur, referencing Alternators Decepticharge, who was covered in fake sponsor logos, including one for "Dinotron Racing Fuel".
May 1st:
Andromeda and Rook both post today about Mecha-soccer. The sport was originally mentioned in the Marvel UK The Transformers comic letter's page. According to Wittenrich, Kickstart turns into a motorcycle, while Heavyfoot turns into a muscle car. Krok was a Decepticon Action Master from the final year of the original toyline; his tech specs portrayed him as a former mecha-soccer player before the war. Krok's team, the Granaught Gatoraiders, are named for his Action Master partner Gatoraider. Sonar is a TransTech version of the Maximal Transmetal 2 bat from the fourth year of the Beast Wars toyline.
May 4:
Andromeda: Punch/Counterpunch was release in the fourth year of the toyline, an Autobot with a Decepticon robot mode for his function as a spy. Recent fiction has established the idea that Punch and Counterpunch are two separate personalities. Star Upper is a Maximal kangaroo, created as part of a character design contest for Beast Wars II in the magazine Comic Bom Bom; he would appear in the Beast Wars II manga and the Beast Wars Neo anime. Ironclad, meanwhile, was derived from an early plan for Generations Combiner Wars Computron, described more in detail in the Of Masters and Mayhem story "Lively Pursuit" published the following year. The story described him as a redeco of Rook in mustard tan and grey, with a redeco of the Brawl head with a red faceplate. Apparently he was meant to be a new version of the 1993 European exclusive Lightformer Ironfist. His portrayal as a boxer here owes to the fact that Rook could insert his combiner fist into either of the two 5mm arm ports on his hands as a giant "Hulk hand." Equinicons are Transformers with horse alternate modes, derived from the term "equine".
Rook: Gladiatorial combat was originally introduced to the Transformers franchise in the Marvel UK prose story "State Games". The three races include "the Epoch-Stakes over at the Baron Rift, Fulcrum Derby at Crystal City and finally the Emersion Grid Stakes, which takes place on the Sword Coast.", which are references to the Belmont Stakes, the Kentucky Derby, and the Preakness Stakes. The Baron Rift is named for Sir Barton (minus the "T"), who was the horse that won the 1919 Triple Crown. The Fulcrum Derby is named for the Decepticon Fulcrum, from IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye. Crystal City was introduced in the Sunbow cartoon season two episode "The Secret of Omega Supreme". The Emersion Grid Stakes were derived from Grid (the Japanese name for Armada Mini-Con Swindle), and an ad for "Emerson Appliances" that was running when Jesse Wittenrich wrote this entry. Sword Coast is a location from Dungeons & Dragons. Mach Kick was a Maximal horse from Beast Wars Neo. His Mini-Con partner, Fastbreak, is named for the strategy of a "fast break" from the sport of basketball.
May 6: Andromeda's and the Editor's posts this day are just mainly to promote Rook's. A lot of the backstory here comes from the various TransTech profiles published in the fourth year of the Club magazine; the Liege Maximo (originally introduced in the Marvel Generation 2 comic), his servant Jhiaxus (a TransTech version of the character also introduced in the Marvel Generation 2 comic), and Optimus and Megatron working together to stop him all come from there. The Early Travelers bit, however, is new here. (And of course, Rook fails to mention how Shockwave's analysis of offworlders often requires, oh how should I say...morally dubious methods.)
May 8: "Dux non Intruitus" is a bit of garbled Latin (Intruitus should be spelled "Introitus") that essentially means "No entrance to leaders". The TransTech prose stories established that Primes and Megatrons were banned; specifically mentioned here as being barred access are versions of Optimus Prime, Rodimus, Ultra Magnus, Megatron, Shockwave, and Starscream. The Convoy were introduced in "Invasion Prologue", gathered by TransTech Optimus Prime. The events Rook mention here about the recruitment of a bounty hunter are referring to "Invasion: Epilogue". In that story, Generation 2 Hero Optimus Prime (specifically. the version from the Japanese Comic Bom Bom G-2 manga) and Cybertron Optimus Prime (in his Jungle Planet body, explained by his toy bio as the result of the mutative energies of that world's Cyber Planet Key, and redecoed from Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal) recruited Beast Wars: Uprising Depth Charge to locate the Origin Matrix in the prehistoric past of the Shattered Glass universe.
Yes, I know, that's a lot to take in.
Shattered Glass Ultra Magnus destroyed the Classics universe in BotCon 2012's "Invasion". The artifact hidden by the Thirteen is Rarefied Energon, the form of energon that composes a Transformer's spark. The Hytherion comes from the Alternity storyline; an extra-dimensional creature whose natural foodstuff was time and space, named for the Greek Titan Hyperion and the Greek root word "therion", meaning beast. The Hytherion was forcibly enslaved by the Megatron of the Alternity's home dimension to evolve him into a higher-dimensional being. Megatron was eventually defeated by the hyper-evolved Planicrons, who destroyed the group consciousness controlling the beast. Apparently, this left it inactive, allowing for dead and damaged universe to pool over into others, spreading their diseased state throughout the multiverse. The Alternity, meanwhile, were the hyper-evolved future forms of the Autobots of the Binaltech universe, who also served as guardians of the multiverse. Cloud World is the main setting for Cloud, which introduced another group of Autobots who served as multiversal guardians. The SARA mentioned in the Editor's accompanying post on his page is a gynoid robot, whose abilities to open dimension gates allow the Cloud World Autobots to fulfill their tasks. The Editor, in a comment on Rook's post, mentions blackouts; these blackouts would eventually be revealed to be the work of the Waruders in "Cybertron's Most Wanted".
May 9: Andromeda's post on this day, I believe, is the first post Jim wrote for this group of pages. The Cybertronian Day, Dillesol, and the Cybertronian month Boltaneon, along with all the other days and months, were introduced in The AllSpark Almanac II, written by Jim and Bill Forster; all the Cybertronian days take their names from the last names of various writers/staff members of various Transformers cartoons; in Dillesol's case, it takes its name from Flint Dille, writer on the original Sunbow cartoon. Boltaneon, meanwhile, takes its name from Boltax, the neutral Transformer librarian who served as the Temple of Knowledge in the original Marvel comic (yes, you read that right-he transferred his mind into the Temple). His servants, the Disciples of Boltax, would serve as the source of the name for Jim's blog. The D. Manus Industrial Average also comes from The AllSpark Almanac II-in full, it's called the Dirk Manus Industrial Average, named for the roguish conman from the Sunbow cartoon season three episode, "Money is Everything", and the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
Cybertron Galactic Systems was originally seen in the online "Datafile Decoder" game, a tie-in for the first live action Transformers movie from Lunchables, of all places. CEO Speed Dial is a TransTech version of Speed Dial 800, a Real Gear Robot Autobot cell phone from the first live-action movie toyline. The transdimensional radiowave scrambler was seen in issue #10 of the Marvel comic, while the voltronic galaxer was seen in Sunbow cartoon season two episode "Blaster Blues". Memo-streams were mentioned in the second chapter of the Japanese Unite for the Universe manga, which were meant to tie-in to a subline for the Revenge of the Fallen toyline that ultimately ended up cancelled. The Non Admiscearis Principum is another bit of Latin that essentially translates to "No involvement" (Principum is there to sound like "policy", it actually means "princes" in Latin).
Galactic Express was mentioned by Blurr in Sunbow season 3 opener "Five Faces of Darkness Part 1". Trans-spatial cylinders come from the live-action movie Classified series of tie-in YA novels, in which they were shown to be prone to catastrophic malfunctions. Guardian Speed was part of the Guardian Mini-Con Team, a redeco of the Cybertron Recon Mini-Con Team (with Guardian Speed being redecoed from Six-Speed). She and the others sold as promotional items at certain stores for anyone who bought 2,000 yen worth of Revenge of the Fallen toys on or after May 30, 2009, with Guardian Speed being sold at Bic Camera and Yodobashi Camera. She's established to be a girl here. We get our first universal streams here; the universal stream concept was introduced in the TransTech prose stories, with their naming conventions being fleshed out in "Withered Hope". The Uniend Cluster-or "Aligned" continuity-was introduced in the Ask Vector Prime bits published in The Complete AllSpark Almanac just a few months earlier, which hadn't been translated at the time. Uniend 610.23 Zeta is the world of the various "Aligned" novels-Exodus, Exiles, and Retribution. Aurex 503.21 Gamma is the world of the Panini Armada comic.
The Supreme Multi-Circuit Court is named for both the real-life concept of a Supreme Court, and the Autobot Multi-Circuit Court, seen in Marvel issue 36. The Vraz-Halogen Act is named for Vraz, member of the Council of Ancients from Dreamwave Productions The War Within, and Halogen, member of the High Council from Exodus. Hydradread/Highbrow Hybrid Technologies is named for the 1993 European exclusive Decepticon Stormtrooper; the Autobot Headmaster helicopter from 1987; and Hybrid Technologies from the Sunbow cartoon season two episode "The Girl Who Loved Powerglide". It also serves as a reference to 3H Productions, the holders of the BotCon and Collectors Club license before Fun Publications. Shanix is a form a currency from the Marvel UK The Transformers comic, Death's Head preferred form of payment. Beachcomber should be obvious, being a 1985 guy. The Iocus Cluster was also named dropped in The Complete AllSpark Almanac; Beachcomber is referring to the world of Hero Mashers here, a line of toys of non-transformable characters that can mix and match parts, where all of these characters were sold (and in Ultra Magnus' case, he was only sold as an arm).
Rook's post on this day was written by Transformers fan and Mini-Con enthusiast Greg Black, and suitably enough, it goes over the small bots. This "Mass Reemergence" is new here. Micronus Prime was a member of the Thirteen introduced in the "Aligned" continuity through The Covenant of Primus. The Micromasters were the original small Transformers from the original toyline. The events described here depict an alternate version of the Armada cartoon; the Mini-Cons combined into a green version of Unicron in Armada episodes "Union" and "Origin". TransTech Heinrad first appeared in "Timeless", and is based on the Beast Wars Neo Maximal takuni.
May 10: Andromeda's post might be another Jim one, going by the usage of the day Gerbesol. Gerbesol's name is taken from Steve Gerber, story editor of the third season of the Sunbow cartoon. Primax 798.0 Gamma is the world of the Beast Wars II, Beast Wars Neo, and Beast Wars Metals mangas. Kitte Shūshū is the mother of Beast Wars Neo Maximal Stampy, seen in fourth installment of the Beast Wars Neo manga, and given a name here for the first time. Her name is Japanese for "stamp collecting" and is named as such to homage to the sort of Japanese language jokes that don't really translate well into other languages (stamp collecting, thus, Stampy). Z Grill, Stampy's father, is mentioned for the first time here. The Z Grill is a one-cent postage cent, perhaps the rarest of all US postage stamps. He is a pika, another species of mammal classified with rabbits as lagomorphs. Andromeda asks her if she left out the "chu" syllable, referring to Pokemon character/species Pikachu, who derived his name from a combination of Japanese wordplay and the pika. The energy capsules Stampy is off looking for are Angolmois Energy, life force of Unicron.
May 11: Much of Prime's backstory comes from Rook's summary on him is from his profile in issue #24 of the Club magazine. The "Alpha Trion incident" refers to the events involving Shattered Glass Alpha Trion in the "Transcendent" storyline. The "Flaternity" mentioned here is the Planicrons, the two-dimensional Transformers hyper-evolved into higher dimensional beings and replacements of the Alternity from the Alternity storyline.
May 12: Another Jim post. Leadfoot is a TransTech version of the Generation 2 Rotor Force Autobot race car. Electro-cells were seen in Sunbow cartoon season two episode, "Traitor". The Skriix are an aggressive alien race, from the Playstation/PC Beast Wars: Transformers video game. Their homeworld, Skriixos V, was name-checked on Swindle's planet map from The AllSpark Almanac II. The eventual failure of the sentry post here is probably what allowed them to spill out into the multiverse and, for instance, exit through the inter-dimensional porthole to the Earth of the Beast Wars video game. Class-K stars are a real-world concept, derived from the Morgan-Keenan classification system. The Recyclons are non-Cybertronian transforming robots seen in "Collect and Save", a prose story from the Transformers Legends anthology book. Filtrek force shields (of the A and H) variety were mentioned in the Dreamwave Armada comics. Megatron used as synch-pulse transmitter to spy on Blackarachnia, as noted in the script of Beast Wars episode "Bad Spark". Maleksol takes its name from Bryce Malek, story editor on the Sunbow cartoon for seasons one and two. The Editor's post this time doesn't have anything of note.
May 13th: Much of Megatron's history in Rook's post comes from his profile, also published in issue #24 of the Club magazine. He's noted here to have been a gladiatorial pit referee before his military career; various versions of him were directly involved in the gladiatorial games. Megatron's use of brutish force in the "Alpha Trion incident" refers to Megatron killing Immorticon and savagely injuring Alpha Trion. Megatron's theoretical "Megatronus Squad" takes its name from the real named of the Thirteen member the Fallen, as revealed in the "Aligned" continuity. The "Mega-Megatron" diagram is derived from concept art by Draxhall Jump for the original, cancelled Transtech toyline. The Editor's post introduces Ask Vector Prime; go to that section to follow along.
May 14th: Cybertron's Got Talent was mentioned in the pack-in material for the SDCC 2014 "Knights of Unicron" set, and is a pastiche of America's Got Talent, Britain's Got Talent, and the like. The Cybernet Space Cube was seen in the Generation 2 rebroadcast of the original Sunbow cartoon, an early computer-generated image (this was slightly before Toy Story) used for scene transitions. Tarn was the leader of the Decepticon Justice Division from IDW Publishing's comics continuity, introduced and seen mainly in More than Meets the Eye. Rosanna was an Autobot mini-casette from Kiss Players, redecoed from the Eject/Rewind mold. Escargon was a Maximal snail created by Shōji Imaki as an example design for a Comic Bom Bom Character Design Contest for Beast Wars II (the aforementioned Star Upper was the winning design). Greasepit was an unreleased Generation 2 Go-Bot, redecoed from the Gearhead mold. The TransTech character Ego was killed by Bulletbike in the 2008 TransTech prose story "I, Lowtech". Tarn takes up a bit of a Simon Cowell role; he was said to have an addiction to transformation and would regularly burn out his t-cog. Greasepit has "Spychanger showmanship"; the Spychangers were a group redecoed from the Generation 2 Go-Bots from the 2001 Robots in Disguise series. Escargon's ability to flip genders comes from his "Love-Love Lancer", and obviously comes from the fact that snails are hermaphrodites.
Stakeout and his Protectobots are from the Power Core Combiners toyline. Power Core Combiners place in continuity was somewhat confused, with characters like Huffer being practically identical in personality to his Generation 1 counterpart, and it was introduced during the big push of the "Aligned" continuity, causing the speculation for Stakeout to be from the Uniend Cluster. Hasbro didn't really consider them tied to any continuity. The only fiction aside from toy bios that explicitly Power Core Combiners characters was from two places: a little blurb in issue #32 of the Club magazine and Smolder's appearance in episode nine of the online Cyber Missions cartoon, which placed them in the live-action movie continuity. Along with some additional links in the Dark of the Moon toyline and the Classified novels, Power Core Combiners has been pretty firmly placed in movie continuity. The Editor's accompanying post plays up the confusion, noting that there is conflicting evidence that he could be from the Tyran Cluster of the Primax Cluster instead (and indeed, Stakeout's profile casts him as practically identical to his Generation 1 Micromaster counterpart).
Sideways is a Unicron-aligned Transformer of confusing origins, a dimensional hopper who alternates between being an enigmatic figure to a comedic goofball. He's indicated to be from the Aurex cluster here, the world of the Unicron Trilogy, and he'll show up again in Ask Vector Prime. His Combi-Micromaster double headmaster is Mirror, composed of Mini-Cons Rook and Crosswise. Combi-Micromasters were a concept mentioned by Dreadwind in the letters page for issue #269, where two or more Micromasters combine into one robot mode. Another blurring of Micromasters and Mini-Cons as a concept. His unique abilities mentioned here are his trans-phase abilities, which allows him to regenerate, warp away, and shapeshift.
Quickswitch was an Autobot six-changer from the fifth year of the original toyline. The original commercial for Quickswitch indicated he was the son of Sixshot, the Decepticon six-changer released the previous year. The fact that there's a plurality of Primax-cluster natives who serve as a built-in fanbase references the sheer amount of Generation 1 related fiction, and probably is a sly nod to the "GEEWUN" crowd.
Backfire, an Autobot motorcycle from the Tyran Cluster (the continuity surrounding the live-action movies), was introduced in the 2010 Transformers: Hunt for the Decepticons toyline, redecoed from Revenge of the Fallen Knock Out. This version here is the Dark of the Moon Human Alliance toy. Characters in the live-action movies have the built-in ability to trans-scan and radically alter their bodies and alt-modes at will. MechTech was the main gimmick of the Deluxe-class figures and up of the Dark of the Moon toyline, weapons that transformed with the push of a button.
Glutsol takes its name from Donald F. Glut, writer of several episodes of the Sunbow cartoon.
May 15: Absolute Shifter doesn't appear to be a reference to any specific show; shifters are a type of Transformer who have such advanced capabilities they can mimic other Cybertronians, introduced in the "Aligned" continuity. This post is a bit of a meta joke about how all of Rhinox's appearances post-"Withered Hope" have him just sitting in front of screens. Uniend 911.05 Alpha is the world of the "Aligned" continuity cartoons-the "new faces" Rhinox refers to is probably about all the new characters from the then current 2015 Robots in Disguise cartoon. Primax 1005.19 Gamma is the world of the original IDW Publishing comics continuity; Rhinox is talking about the More than Meets the Eye and The Transformers series here, and the "sadism" bit is mostly referring to the former. The Quill was the artifact of "Aligned" Alpha Trion, Used with the Covenant of Primus, it's able to alter the future. The idea of those who wield the Quill is a bit of a minor detail that will be brought up a few times again; a sort of meta-commentary once more.
May 16: The links the Editor gives are supposed to be the first two pages for for the three page comic, "Collections". The links are now long gone, but they're preserved here on Imgur: https://imgur.com/a/udnxXjq
May 18: Rook posts the final page for "Collections" here.
May 19: Wisesol takes its name from David Wise, the most prolific writer for the Sunbow cartoon. Needlenose was a Double Targetmaster Decepticon from the fifth year of the original toyline, sold with his Targetmaster parnters Sunbeam and Zigzag. Needlenose's Chic Chips were mentioned in his The Transformers Universe profile, published in issue #64 of the original Marvel comic. Apex Accessories is likely derived from the Apex Armor, a nigh-indestructible armor originally introduced in the Commemorative Series reissue of Powermaster Optimus Prime (well, technically, the reissue of Masterforce Ginrai as Powermaster Optimus Prime) and having made several appearances since, such as in IDW's Megatron Origin comic and in the Prime cartoon.. Electronic Paint was introduced in Animated episode "Where is Thy Sting?" Timberwolf is a shade of grey. The color scheme Needlenose suggests for Andromeda is that of her Shattered Glass counterpart, seen in that era of the Around Cybertron comic strip. Needlenose's Sunbeam is a Mini-Con from Armada, while Zigzag is a Cyberdroid from Planet Master. Cyberdroids were the forms of the titular characters from the Micromaster toyline before being upgraded, small and non-transforming, and is a term that would eventually be applied to the Japanese Headmasters and Targetmasters. Master is a planet from The Headmasters cartoon, a Cybertronian colony from which the titular characters originate. The Mirage Needlenose did up came in with his original white and blue colors, and came out with the green and purple color scheme with an alligator decal from his cancelled Generation 2 toy, revealed in the Transformers Vault book. Ghoulon was one of the Decepticons honored in the Hall of Heroes from The Transformers: The Movie, as revealed in Floro Dery's design notes. The Swarm was an entity created as a by-product of the Cybertronian reproductive process of Budding, a hollow cloud like mass bent on consuming mechanical life, seen in the Generation 2 comic. The term "X-Dimension" was introduced in the Japanese Micron Legend toyline, where most of the Mini-Con teams were sold in an alternate color scheme as [Team Name] X-Dimensions; The AllSpark Almanac II mentioned it in passing, and the non-canonical ALTernity Today website released to promote the described it much the same as it is here. The website also hinted that it was the home of the Elder Gods of H.P. Lovecraft lore. The Chaos Saber is the new name given here to Sky Terror Mini-Con Team's sword mode; the Sky Terror Team was released in the Cybertron toyline, redecoed from Energon's Energon Saber Mini-Con Team (themselves retooled from the Armada Air Defense Mini-Con Team). The Zephyr Blade Mini-Con Team are repurposed versions of the X-Dimension release of the Air Defense Mini-Con team, using the Japanese names of Runway, Jetstorm, and Sonar; Zephyr is another word for a gentle breeze.
May 21: We'll start off with Andromeda. RFID stands for radio-frequency identification, a real life type of identification used in a variety of different fields, such as with credit cards. The Nemesis Prime/Black Convoy here is the one from the 2003 Universe, and was originally an evil servant of Unicron. In the Alternity storyline, he would be cured of his insanity and become a hero, protecting the multiverse with others in the higher-dimensional Alternity. At the end of the storyline he became a normal Transformer once more, and has ended up here. His universe stream is somewhat different from the standard, because technically, he doesn't have a home universe; he was created by Unicron in a pocket dimension, cloned from the corpse of a dead Optimus Prime. The Aurex 405.0 Epsilon stream is the world of the Club Cybertron fiction, derived from the publishing date of the first chapter of "Balancing Act". Next is Lio Convoy, from the Beast Wars II/Beast Wars Neo universe, whose codename is derived from his Classics figure. Specifically, he is in the red and blue body of his 2009 Universe toy, retooled from Cybertron Leobreaker. Next up is the Sam's Club exclusive Universe toyline Robots in Disguise Optimus Prime, who would eventually be revealed the one who appeared in "Balancing Act" and "Revelations". His universal stream is derived from the release month and year of his toy. Next up is Hero Prime, based on the Generation 2 Hero Optimus Prime toy. There's a bit of a mix-up here; his universal stream given here is derived from the year his toy was released. However, his profile in issue #49 of the Club magazine indicated he was from the universe of the Comic Bom Bom G-2 manga, which Louis Sun (who would go on to write for AVP) in the comments points out, and the Editor concurs. Beast Prime is the Jungle Planet Optimus Prime toy from the Cybertron toyline, redecoed from Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal. His home universe is derived from the date of his release. Primal Prime is said to be from the Wings Universe here, as that Primal Prime was last seen going through a dimensional portal in the Facebook page Tornado - Decepticon Saboteur. However, because artist Matt Frank accidentally drew him the "Cybertron's Most Wanted" comic with his original Beast Machines toy body, this would be changed latter. And finally, Sentinel Maximus is the one from 3H Productions continuity, last seen working alongside "Ignition Prime" in "Revelations". Everyone but Primal Prime and Nemesis Prime appeared in "Invasion Prologue"; the symbol seen here was seen in that comic.
Now, for Rook's post: much of Starscream's backstory was told in his profile from issue #23 of the Club Magazine, which is where the art depicting him comes from (pencils by Will Mangin, inks by Jake Isenberg, and colors by Winston Bolen).
The Editors post for Andromeda notes that 13 is a common number with Primes, and obviously enough that's a reference to the Thirteen.
May 28: The art accompanying this post is by Jesse Wittenrich, featuring 2015 Robots in Disguise Mini-Con Fixit and Generation 1 Micromaster Fixit, member of the Rescue Patrol. Lobbing is a sport similar to catch introduced in Prime episode "Con Job". The "Sub-Metro" part from the Sub-Metro Amateur League Lobbing Championship name probably comes from Metroplex, and of course the full name is an acronym for SMALL. The Off-Road Patrol was another Micromaster group; Wittenrich intended the Mudslingers (the monster truck member of the Off-Road Patrol) to be a version from the toy tech specs reality, a version from the Marvel comics continuity, and a version from Japanese continuity. The guy who Fixit refers to here is Ambulon, a former Decepticon medic from the IDW continuity who defected to the Autobots after an attempt to make a combiner left him stuck with a leg for an alternate mode.
May 29: Rook refers to the Shattered Glass universe here; the good Unicron had only been seen in the prologue for "Another Light" at that point. The sports almanac bit is a reference to Back to the Furture Part II. Heinrad mixes up how to flip off Rook, it should be his middle finger. Sentinel Prime is the predecessor to Optimus in many continuities. Crow Convoy was a Maximal crow stuck in a half-transformed state from the Beast Wars Neo manga. Vector Prime already gave the "spokes" metaphor over in Ask Vector Prime. Thrustinator is Heinrad's partner, a merged form of Beast Wars Waspinator and Beast Machines Thrust sold as part of the 2014 Transformers Figure Subscription service.
June 1: We'll start off with the Editor. Aston and Miss-Q are TransTech Mini-Cons. Unpublished profile art for the pair meant for release next year would show that they were repurposed from the candy toy versions of 2008 Universe Mini-Cons Bodyblock (a red monster truck with yellow and orange highlights) and Brimstone (a green dragon). Aston takes his name from the British term for the graphics seen scrolling across the bottom of news broadcasts, which originates from the company Aston Broadcasting Systems. Miss-Q, meanwhile, takes her name from "miscue", obviously. We'll get to pneuma-lions with Rook's post. The Editor initially starts to use the old Transformers swear "slag", which has fallen out of use since it has a very rude connotation in the United Kingdom. Instead, they uses the swear "Slammoth", one of the names for the Combiner Wars fan poll that resulted in the creation of Victorion.
Andromeda: Deduce and Groundbreak are TransTech version of the Targetmasters from United EX, sold with Airmaster and Dozermaster. I believe this post was also written by Greg Black, who's online screenname (MrDuce) and initials (GB) served as the sources for Deduce and Groundbreak's name.
Rook: I believe this is the same Beachcomber from Andromeda's earlier post, and I'm pretty sure Jim wrote both of those posts. Gutcruncher was a Decepticon Action Master from the final year of the original toyline. Punch/Counterpunch is obviously a play on the "Point/Counterpoint" segments from the news program 60 Minutes, using the aforementioned Autobot Double-Spy. Rokuneon is another Cybertronian month, derived from the Japanese word "roku", meaning six. Servitus Vetitum is another bit of Latin that essentinally means "slavery is prohibited". Sheepitrons were mentioned in the 23rd installment of the Recordicons strip, while sheepacrons were mentioned in Sunbow cartoon season two episode "The Master Builders". Pneuma-lions were mentioned in Wings Universe prose story "Flames of Yesterday"; a group of real-life lions is called a pride. Bahneon is another Cybertronian month; not entirely sure what it's derived from. Cold cast refers to constructed cold, one of the two main forms of Transformers reproduction in the works by James Roberts for IDW's comics; where sparks are created by the Matrix and placed into a pre-built body. This is in opposition to forging, in which a spark is generated by Vector Sigma and the living metal of Cybertron forms a body around it. Crosswise is a Mini-Con from Armada, and one of Sideways' partners; his other partner, Rook, is also mentioned. These are the Combi-Micromaster pair mentioned by Andromeda in her Cybertron's Got Talent post. The very last bit of Crosswise's "dialogue," so to speak, reads "Bebepating doosquee kipoppy EZANG-eezoo-ting!" which seems to be taken from Darths & Droids, an online webcomic using screencaps from Star Wars to tell a tabletop role-playing game story.
June 4: Andromeda had previously had a post about the Convoy on her page, which is brought up in Rook's post here. Bots "Sleekest Autobot Alive" award is probably a reference to the People "Sexiest Man Alive" award. Cheetor uses the word turbo here, much like his Beast Wars counterpart, as a prefix. As I said previously, the Primal Prime in the Convoy was originally meant to be the Wings Universe incartnation, but because Matt Frank accidentally drew the original Primal Prime in "Cybertron's Most Wanted", it's been changed to the Primal Prime of the universe of his original toy tech specs. The "Most Wanted" list mentioned here is similar to the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list. Images attached to this post include art of Cheetor from his profile in issue #22 of the Club magazine, with pencils by Will Mangin, inks by Jake Isenberg, and colors by Winston Bolen; and the Offworlder Zone Security Administration badge, featuring the TransTech Autobot symbol.
June 5: Rook crossed over with Ask Vector Prime today; go to that page for annotations. The Editor also makes note of the incident.
June 7: A clarification on an Ask Vector Prime post from the Editor. Read more about it on that page.
June 8: The ANN pages begin promoting BotCon 2015 in earnest, with a series of posts that go over each of the toys in the boxset. Today, we start with Shattered Glass Stepper and Nebulon. A bit of backstory for the pair: Stepper and Nebulon are based on The Headmasters Targetmaster pair Stepper and Nebulon (known in the US as Ricochet and Nightstick). A previous Shattered Glass version of the character, Ricochet, was sold at BotCon 2008; unsatisfied with the deco on that toy, this one is a bit of a do-over. The rift that Stepper was forced through will eventually be seen in "Spatiotemporal Challengers", published a little over a year later. Torca is a TransTech version of the Maximal elephant/orca Fuzor from the third year of the Beast Wars toyline; the Beast Wars: Uprising version of him was seen as a prison guard in "Alone Together: Prologue", inspiring his occupation here.
June 10: Andromeda goes over Oilmaster. Based on one of the unreleased "Double Pretenders", Pretenders that hold two robots inside the shell, Oilmaster first recieved his name in the e-HOBBY comic "Badlands", published with the Generations Magnificus toy, named after Japanese Transformers fans and gorilla lover Abura Chojin's screename. Andromeda's bit about "musicians" refers to the English-American rock band, The Pretenders. Bumblebee was one of four Classic Pretenders released in 1989, smaller versions of classic Transformers characters with Pretender shells. Starlogged takes its name from the Starlog science fiction magazine; it's supposed to bring to mind "star-crossed", indicating it's a show like The Bachelor. Cryotek was seen in the TransTech prose stories, and much like his Universe counterpart, he's a crime boss. Astral Nubus is a reference to the NuBus computer bus devloped by MIT in 1987- "Oh Astral Nubus" roughly translates to "Oh heavens!"
June 12: Rook goes over Packrat. Packrat was a blue and gold redeco of Beast Wars Rattrap, availible at BotCon 1997. We saw how Heinrad had him transported to Axiom Nexus in "Collections". Packrat was sold with Fractyl, a green and gold redeco of Beast Wars Terrorsaur. Sector Vurnest 23 comes from the a combination of the two titular characters in Hey Vern, It's Ernest! Kenner, the main company behind Transformers during the Beast Wars years, made the Talking Ernest doll.
June 15: Rook goes over Battletrap. One of the two Duocons released in 1987, the BotCon 2015 release was a triple changer-attributed to the fact that his brain components in his two body halves were rejecting each other, requiring him to be rebuilt. Dedeuce's "Third Rung of the Psyberchology 5-Tier Class" probably is a reference to Autobot psychiatrist Rung, from the IDW Publishing comics. Overlord was a Decepticon from Super-God Masterforce; he was classified as a Duocon in an Ask Vector Prime segment from The Complete AllSpark Almanac. The idea of "parallel killers" comes from the Jet Li film The One, where one version of Jet Li's character is going around the multiverse killing other version of him to gain their power, and serial killer. Jim and Bill pitched a Futurama art book where Humorbot 5.0 would tell the following joke in binary: "What is worse than a serial killer? A parallel killer."
June 16: The final member of the boxset is Movie Megatron, based on his appearance in Dark of the Moon. Obviously, he's hiding his identity because Megatrons are banned in Axiom Nexus.
June 27: And we're back, after a brief break. Andromeda's post is setting up the events for Ask Sideways, the temporary takeover of Ask Vector Prime by the villanous herald of Unicron. Flash Runner and Hurricane Hunter are both characters from the shortlived Chinese Transformers Online MMO. Their names are literal translations of their Chinese names, Shǎnyì Kuángbēn Zhě and Jùfēng Lièrén; the other characters from the MMO would recieve English names in later Ask Vector Prime posts. Flash Runner recognizes Sideways from the "show...with the fancy transforming"; this is Cybertron's Got Talent, which Andromeda covered in a post earlier on. Sideways was one of the finalist contestants in that post, and it looks like he was the runner-up. Sideways specifically was noted to be from the Aurex Cluster-the Unicron Trilogy. However, his description here, along with his profile picture, show him as Revenge of the Fallen Sideways. The movieverse character had previously been linked to the dimensional traveler Sideways before in The AllSpark Almanac II. Subspace storage pockets were a fan explanation for certain scenes in the Sunbow cartoon, where a character's gun would materialize seemingly out of nowhere; eventually canonized by various Fun Publications prose stories, the idea is that a character's gun is stored in subspace/transwarp, and can be summoned when necessary. Hurricane Hunter was noted to be fanatically loyal to Megatron in her profile. Crosswise has disappeared; he is one of the two Mini-Con partners of Sideways. The Waruder invasion happened in "Cybertron's Most Wanted".
June 29: Rook's back, to go over the events of "Cybertron's Most Wanted". Miss-Q was introduced earlier on the Editor's page. The Cymond Cluster is the world of various Pre-Transformers toylines and related toylines from Takara and Tomy. The Waruders, specifically, come from Diaclone. The idea of the Megaverse comes from the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe-the Megaverse covers series published by Marvel that don't really fit into the main Multiversal model, such as the New Universe or the Ultraverse. The fringe realities all mentioned here are the ones which are not fully Transformers related; Xobitor is the world of Robotix, Gargent is the world of GoBots, Lukas is the world of Star Wars Transformers, and Rovio is the world of Angry Birds Transformers. Lambda streams, introduced in the Ask Vector Prime sections of The Complete AllSpark Almanac, are covers, lithographs, and other illustrations that don't really fit into any of the other categories; they are more prone to have crossovers with other franchises. Primax, the world of Generation 1 continuities, has had extensive fiction to it's name. The Forest Leer is a concept from Ask Vector Prime, named after Forest Lee, who did much to define the multiverse of the Transformers franchise. The worlds that run ahead by a few hundred stellar cycles are the worlds of the Beast Era, seen in Beast Wars and Beast Machines, alongside related media. Cybertronix is the Cybertronian written language seen in Beast Wars and Beast Machines. It comes in two types: Maximal Cybertronix and Predacon Cybertronix.
July 8: Tying in with Ask Sideways, Rook reports on the scene as the OZSA tries to rescue Vector Prime from the evil herald of Unicron. The Quadwal cluster is our world. Octus and Megadeath are from Animated...but they're only reverse Pretender shells for the mirror universe Jim Sorenson and Bill Forster for the purpose of interviewing Decepticons, based on some Marvel UK Decepticons introduced in issue #213 and the prose story "The Magnificent Six!" respectively. Sideways kept tripping the auto-censors by swearing and making inneuendos. The Heap was introduced in the TransTech prose stories. An Absolute Terror Field is a type of force field from Neon Genesis Evangelion; the "quantum alignment" referred to here is the Transformers x Evangelion crossover. The Vortex Grinder was the main weapon of Revenge of the Fallen Devastator, which uses an artificial black hole to suck up material into him for processing and breaking down for raw materials. Rook is Sideways' other Mini-Con. Crosswise is the one who leaked it.
Post 2: Solus Prime is the (chronologically in fiction) first female Transformer, introduced in the Transformers: Exiles novel. Starfire fuel was mentioned in Spotlight: Nightbeat; the Andromeda Galaxy is a real place. The Dimensional Interfacer was a piece of technology from Challenge of the GoBots two-parter episode, "Invasion from the 21st Level".
July 29th: A bit more followup to "Cybertron's Most Wanted". Stungun was a TransTech police officer introduced i the TransTech prose stories; he, along with Cheetor, were two of the only TransTech online during the Waruder invasion in "Cybertron's Most Wanted". Oilmaster and Stepper, along with the rest of the CMWs, discovered the Waruders and helped fight them off. Waruders are techno-organic in nature, without sparks. Cybertron's Most Wanted #1 was, in fact, Megatron; specifically, a version of Dark of the Moon Megatron. "Peace through tyranny" was the original Megatron's motto on his tech specs. There's a few names here of guys who share molds with Megatron-let's go through them one by one. Cryotek was a Predacon from the 2001 Robots in Disguise toyline, redecoed from Beast Wars Transmetal 2 Megatron. Wind Sheer was a Decepticon from the 2001 Robots in Disguise toyline, redecoed from Machine Wars Megatron. Air Hunter was a Decepticon from the Robotmasters toyline, redecoed from Machine Wars Megatron. Predacon was a Decepticon from the Armada toyline, remolded from Beast Wars Transmetal Megatron. Thrust was a Predacon from Beast Wars II, redecoed from Machine Wars Megatron. T-Wrecks was a Maximal-aligned Dinobot from the Beast Machines toyline, redecoed from the Beast Wars Ultra-Class Tyrannosaurs rex Megatron toy. Cindersaur was a Firecon from the fifth year of the original toyline; he recieved a Generation 2 toy at BotCon 2010, redecoed from Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Megatron. Albitron was a planned Maximal exclusive toy for Transcon2 1997, who would have been made from the Beast Wars Basic-Class alligator Megatron toy. Arrested Development voice: They didn't, as the scanners thought Megatron was just a rusty old truck. Rook is wrong about him being brought into Axiom Nexus intentionally, though.
July 30th: Tying up a loose end, Spy-Eye, the drone companion of Burn-Out and Lift-Ticket/Dia and Cline was last seen with General Optimus Prime after the two had returned home at the end of "Cybertron's Most Wanted". Sandokan was an abandoned planet from the Cybertron prose story, "The Dark Heart of Sandokan"; a good Sandokan is a Transformer-style substitute for the phrase "a good Samaritan". Action Master partners tended to be small, transforming drones with weapon modes for the non-transforming Action Masters of the final year of the original toyline. Overcast was a redeco of Jetfire from Energon; his tech specs characterized him as a Jetfire's brother. Thunderhead Tower is presumably named for Thunderhead, an Autobot from the Human Alliance portion of the Dark of the Moon toyline. Several Transformers series have had the Autobots and Decepticons initially assume humans to be the pets of the "dominant" mechanical species, such as Animated. TransTech Sonar was previously established to be ANN's weatherbot in an earlier post.
August 16: The blue rodent mentioned here is Packrat. The dimensional gate mentioned here was created by Movieverse Megatron in the BotCon 2015 comic "Cybertron's Most Wanted"; Packrat teamed up with his gang in that story, and they used their portal to help send the Waruders to another dimension. Lots of this multiversal talk was given by Rhinox back in "Withered Hope", the TransTech prose story in which he first appeared. I.D. bolts were introduced in those prose stories, being how the TransTechs identified offworlders. Aside from the ones listed here, the Elder Gods of Lovecraft's mythos exist in transwarp. I've talked about the Hytherion before. The House was an entity from Doctor Who. The Langoilers are monstrous entities from the novella The Langoilers, by Stephen King. Most of the rest were created to sound like things from Doctor Who, but some specific references include the Antevishnum, roughly meaning "before Vishnu", one of the principle deities in the Hindu religion the Supreme Being in the Vaishnavism denomination; the Abaddontus Hunger, named for the pit of the dead in the Hebrew Bible and an Angel of Destruction in the Book of Revelations, and -dont, meaning "tooth"; and the Ravagers of Time, named after the Hong Kong manhua The Ravages of Time. Cataclysm's consciousness was spread across time and space after falling out of transwarp in the "Reaching the Omega Point" prose story, "Schism". Bumble-puppies were genetically engineered brainwashing devices from the Aldous Huxley novel, Brave New World; bumble-puppies from the planet of Antilla (originally from the Sunbow season 2 episode "Cosmic Rust") were mentioned in Cybertron Thunderblast's tech specs. The One is the entity who created Primus and Unicron, mentioned in "Primeval Dawn" and The Ultimate Guide.
September:
September 8: On Rook's page, following on from the end of "Cybertron's Most Wanted", this post begins a trend of hinting more and more about upcoming events from the current Club magazine storyline, "Another Light". Most of the universal clusters here I've already gone over. Following on from an earlier interview with Rhinox, the Higher Dimensional Science Ministry has begun sending out probes...probes that are disappearing. Oh dear. The probes are similar to the Cybernet Space Cube, a computer seen in the Geneartion 2 rebroadcasts of the original Sunbow cartoon; it was a CGI-animated addition to the rebroadcast, serving as a new form of scene transition. "Underspace" is another term for transwarp, mentioned in Dreamwave Productions mini-series The Dark Ages. The post is accompanied by a screenshot of the Cybernet Space Cube from the Generation 2 cartoon.
September 22: Following on from that, Rook posts again about the missing probes, with hints that the multiverse is beginning to be cut off. Holomatter avatars were hard-light holograms used by the Autobots in the early years of IDW Publishing's comics. Uniend 1012.30 Kappa is the world of Transformers: Prime - The Game. The Triple H industrial base dedicated to creating "Mashers" was mentioned in an earlier Andromeda post.
September 28: Following on from the last few posts by Rook, and a guest post by Andromeda on Ask Vector Prime, Andromeda's page follows more of the "Shroud", as it'll come to be known. The Tyran Cluster is the movieverse; we're moving on to the main clusters now. Tyran 509.28 Kappa is the world of the online Autobot Stronghold game, published by LG Electronics to die in with Revenge of the Fallen. Breems are a unit of time originally mentioned in issue #17 of the Marvel comic.
October:
October 1: In October 2015, Vector Prime left Axiom Nexus to join Nexus Prime as part of the Club's "Another Light" storyline. Because of that, the entire month of October has Ask Vector Prime taken over by guest hosts. To set this up, the other ANN pages provide some posts, starting with the Editor:
Rook notes that Viron, the 2001 Robots in Disguise continuity, has gone dark to Axiom Nexus' sensors. Rook cost the channel its ratings after accusing Rhinox and the goverment of putting more resources into research instead of protection. Andromeda had his password for a post about the Rock Bots, on September 28.
Onto Rook's first post: Cragun is the Japanese name of Erector, an Autobot Micromaster Transport from 1989. Cragun's List, in turn, is a reference to the classified ads website Craiglist.
And the second post: the Grimlock here is the Sunbow version. Grimlock and Daniel Witwicky got sent to another dimension in the season 3 episode, "Madman's Paradise", where after finding a Quintesson banishment chamber, the two were sent to the swords and sorcery world Menonia. Byron's a real last name, of course; you're probably most familiar with the English poet Lord Byron. Skullcruncher was one of the Decepticon Headmasters from 1987; he was seen as a comedian in issue #45 of IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye.
October 3: Not much to talk about with the Editor and Rook's posts on this day. Grimlock gets fired for his stupidity, and Rook replaces him with Swindle. Breems are mentioned again. "The truth is out there" is the tagline for The X-Files.
October 6: Swindle has gotten fired for promoting himself. His tech specs did indeed give him an intelligence of 9. Someone earnest indeed, since he hires Animated Sentinel Minor.
October 9: After Sentinel quits due to learning about the organic audience, we have another set-up for a new host, which will be revealed to be the live-action movie incarnation of Bumblebee. Nano-kliks, decacycles, all units of time going back to Beast Wars. Both the 2001 Robots in Disguise and Animated clusters have gone dark to Axiom Nexus' instrumentation. Primax 1015.06 Kappa is the world of the Transformers: Devastation video game; when this post was published, the game had been released only 3 days ago, hence its recent discovery. Of course Bumblebee is popular with the youth.
Meanwhile, on Rook's page, we go to the discovery party. The Crystal Towers might be a part of Crystal City, which was introduced way back when in the Sunbow cartoon season 2 episode "The Secret of Omega Supreme". Hors d'oeuvre is a small dish served before a meal in European culture. This Rosanna is presumably the same version of the Kiss Players character who hosts Cybertron's Got Talent. The Pit is the Cybertronian version of Hell, first mentioned in Beast Wars. Video game-based universal streams were noted by Vector Prime to be constantly shifting, with only a few end states ever being consistent, due to the different way everyone plays through them. The "Unicron Trilogy" cluster has gone dark; it stopped having major streams when it ending about 9 years ago (relative to this post). Now only the original Generation 1 and "Aligned" clusters are left visible to the TransTech.
October 13: Bumblebee's time as a guest host ended when he was interrupted by a battle filled with explosions. Andromeda, unfortunately, doesn't pick the best replacement; her "articulate" and "defintie point of view" pick is Cy-Kill, leader of the Renegades from Challenge of the GoBots.
October 18: The explosion was the result of Cy-Kill's machinations over on Renegade Rhetoric, having planned to steal some sparks from Shockwave's laboratory. Tesarus was first mentioned in issue #4 of IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye. Helex, meanwhile, first appeared in issue #213 of the Marvel UK comic.
October 20: Following on the success of Bee's Backtalk, Kellen Goff (who worked on the videos) helped produce a few more with Jim Sorenson and Jesse Wittenrich; unfortuantely, only a few saw release due to time constraints. This is the first one, which Jesse wrote and Jim edited. The video uses Rook's profile picture for illustration. From Bee's Backtalk, Daniel Ross and Kellen Goff once more play Rook and Aston (with Ross having originally supposed to voice the Universe version of a character for a script reading, before 3H Productions lost the convention license). The Shroud is named here for the first time, the wall placed between universes thanks to Nexus Prime's actions in "Another Light". Interferometers are a real concept, look them up on Wikipedia since I have no idea how to describe them. I'm not sure if any of the background noise-the static, the buzzing electronic noises, the news fanfare-are anything beyond stock audio sounds. Hammerstrike (voiced by Marrisa Meizel) is a version of the Beast Machines technorganic Maximal shark. He's implied here to be one of the followers of Shattered Glass Alpha Trion. As we saw back in the "Transcendent" storyline and "I, Lowtech", Trion had his follower Topspin use his special spark manipulating powers to swap his followers' bodies (like Beast Wars: Uprising Blackarachnia, Nightscream, Scavenger, and Immorticon, and Generation 2 Bulletbike) with that of their TransTech counterparts. Hammerstrike is revealed to have done this as well, with his female counterpart; it's a bit muddy, but she seems to identify as female now? Not the best stuff, but it's minor as far as things go. Both unwilling to carry out his plot and unable to perform her counterpart's job as a courier, Alpha Trion left her to pretend to be herself, while he and most of the rest of his followers sprung their plans and return to Trion's home universe. I'm not sure if the I.D. Bolt number or any of the other numbers are meant to be references to anything specifc. Another mention of the Convoy. Uniend-the "Aligned" cluster-has gone down; it's been noted in Ask Vector Prime that it was a recent discovery by the TransTech. The "WTS" in the message probably stands for something like "What the slag?" We never find out what happens to Hammerstrike. "Don't trust anyone over three million" is a paraphrase of the slogan, "don't trust anyone over 30," from activist Jack Weinberg. The end credits song is "Heavy", by Huma-Huma, a band that publishes copyright-free music. The font looks to be based on the font used in the 2007 live-action Transformers movie.
October 21: The first installment of Renegade Rhetoric ended when Cy-Kill avoided arrest with his Renegades and returned to his home dimension, after he was found to be a faction leader and responsible for Shockwave's lab being bombed. TF-NBC, the Cybertronian equivalent to NBC, was mentioned by Swindle on Swindle's Spiel. Rush's status as a demagogue popular with Decepticons is a reference to conservative talk radio host and generally unplesant man Rush Limbaugh, while his canine alternate mode is a reference to the robotic dog Rush from the Mega Man series of video games. Rook's choice for next host is Robots in Disguise Sky-Byte, who by the end of the series had given up his evil ways and lived on Earth.
October 26: Sky-Byte quits, leaving us to get another host. The Lanarqians were seen in the season 3 Sunbow The Transformers cartoon episode "The Quintesson Journal". ANPR is the Cybertronian version of NPR, AKA National Public Radio. Aleph waves seem to be the Cybertronian version of human neural oscillations known as alpha waves, asscoiated with being awake. While that uses the first Greek latter of the alphabet, aleph waves derive their name from the first letter of the Semitic abjads. And so, we get our final host: female Decepticon adventurer Spacewarp.
October 29: Another video, this time written by Jim and edited by Jesse, in which we learn more about the "Shroud". Lots of actors this video: in edition to Daniel Ross as Rook and Abby Collins as Andromeda (whom she voiced in BotCon 2012 script reading "Bee in the City 2: Electric Boogaloo"), we have Jon Bailey as Optimus Prime (the announcer for the Honest Trailers Youtube channel, who had voiced Optimus in various fan productions, and would get another chance in Machinima's Combiner Wars cartoon), David Sobolov as Shockwave (he voiced the Prime version of the character as well), and Richard Newman reprising his role as Vector Prime. Various actors provide background noise (including Kellen Goff, Corina Boettger, Kelly Boyer, Sean Chiplock, Trent Martin, Marissa Meizel, Shane Morrison, and Penelope-Sophia Smith). Art used for the videos (to indicate which character is talking) includes Rook and Andromeda's profile pictures, the art of Optimus Prime from his "MTMTE" profile in issue #24 of the Hasbro Transformers Collectors' Club magazine (pencils and inks by Alex Milne, colors by Josh Perez), the art of Shockwave from issue #22 of the Hasbro Transformers Collectors' Club magazine (pencils by Will Mangin, inks by Jake Isenberg, colors by Winston Bolen), and the packaging art of the Universe toy for Vector Prime (probably by Marcelo Matere). The song "Heavy" is used again in the credits.
Prime's speech patterns in this are slightly inspired by then-incumbent President of the United States, Barack Obama, who was the original inspiration for TransTech Optimus Prime's backstory. We learn that the Primax cluster is now invisible too, the "Generation 1" and Beast Era universe no longer able to be viewed. Generation 1-based stories are still being made to this day, hence it making up such a big percentage of the multiverse. Gargent 1084.29 Alpha takes a bit of explaning: it's the world of the Challenge of the GoBots cartoon, using the airdate for "Battle for GoBotron" given by Wikipedia. However, we have already been given a designation for the cartoon in The AllSpark Almanac II: Gargent 984.08 Alpha, which correpsonded to the world seen in "Withered Hope". Thus, Gargent 1084.29 Alpha is the home universe of the Cy-Kill seen in Renegade Rhetoric, the hypothetical "seacond season" of the cartoon that was never affected by the Cataclysm. It was originally believed that the blackouts were remnants of the Diaclone Waruder invasion from "Cybertron's Most Wanted". Most of the factions and species listed in Prime's speech should be known to you. The Protectons and the Terrakors were the good and evil factions of Robotix. The Guardians were the heroic faction in GoBots, while the Malignus were an evil faction in Brazil's version of The Transformers toyline. The AllSpark Almanac II depicted the two groups as the earliest forms of the factions that would eventually become the Autobots and Decepticons. Vector Prime returns from the events of "Another Light", now no longer a multiversal singularity as we'll see.
November 5: Just a quick post by Jim here about the voting results for the most popular guest hosts on Ask Vector Prime.
November 10: On November 8, Vector was asked if he had ever visited any other Nexus cluster streams, which he had previously established were generally inhabited by more primitve Cybertronians. The term lowtech was a disparging one used by TransTechs for offworlders, though Vector was referring to the technology levels of those Cybertrons. Vector left for his secret mission to Nebulos on November 9.
December 2: A video today on Rook's page, written by Jesse Wittenrich, edited by Jim Sorenson, directed by Kellen Goff, and produced by Goff and Sorenson. The news fanfare used at the start and end of the video is the same as the video where Vector returns; I'm still not sure where it's frome. Our cast includes: Daniel Ross again as Rook, Kellen Goff as Aston, Laura B. Knapton as Blackarachnia, and Shane Morrison as Starscream. Each character is illustrated with a new piece of art by Jesse Wittenrich, for Rook (depicting for the first time his TransTech body; back when he appeared in Around Cybertron, he just looked like his Universe counterpart), Blackarachnia (based on a slightly different concept for TransTech Blackarachnia than the one used by her (well, by her Beast Wars: Uprising counterpart in her body, more on that in a second) in "Transcendent"), and Starscream.
We'll talk about Blackarachnia's ordeal in a bit. TransTech Starscream was established to be the Directorate of Cybertronian Intelligence way back in his profile in issue #23 of the Collectors' Club magazine. Ask Vector Prime and other such posts on the Editor's page indicated that Megatron was looking for a way to get around the Shroud by blasting a hole through it. The Ejoornus system takes a bit of explanation: the Ejoornians were the name given to the aliens who shot down the human ship in the one issue Marvel comic adaptation of the Robotix cartoon. Years later, in The AllSpark Almanac II, the aliens seen in IDW Publishing's prequel mini-series to Revenge of the Fallen, Defiance, were retconned to be the Ejoornians. Their homeworld was Ejoornus, from which they were forced off by the Quintessons, and they turned it into New Quintessa, the Quintesson's second homeworld seen in 3H Productions' The Wreckers comics. We've been seeing the TransTech using Offworlders with size-shifting space-based alternate modes with Galaxy Shuttle over in Ask Vector Prime. Megatron is, as has been established previously on these pages and in past profiles and stories, head of Cybertron's military. Hadeen was established to be the sun Cybertron orbitied in the psuedo-canonical novella, Alignment, which was canonized by The AllSpark Almanac II. And, as I've said before, Cheetor is the head of the Offworlder Zone Security Administration. TransTech Straxus was established to be Megatron's second-in-command of military forces a few days ago on Ask Vector Prime. Prowl was established to be second-in-command of Cybertronian intelligence in both his profile and Starscream's in issue #23 of the Club magazine.
Now, for Blackarachnia's ordeal: she, along with many other TransTechs, were kidnapped by Shattered Glass Alpha Trion and his acolytes, as seen in "Transcendent". Topspin, Alpha Trion's most loyal servant, and secretly part of Nexus Prime, used his spark-manipulation abilities to remove the TransTechs' sparks, replacing them with that of their offworlder counterparts. Blackarachnia was one of them, replaced by her counterpart from Beast Wars: Uprising, who has since returned to her home universe. Conjunx Endura is the Cybertronian term for "married couple", introduced in IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye; Rook appears to be married. A batch proto-initiator is the equivalent of a parent, first mentioned in issue #3 of IDW Publishing's Infiltration mini-series. In "Reunification: Part 5", Shattered Glass Optimus had Omega Doom, the Autobot's latest super weapon, blast Alpha Trion, seemingly destroying him, although the Decepticons noted at the end of the storyline that they had indications he had survived. We saw these containment capsules Topspin made in "Transcendent". General Optimus Prime is the member of the Convoy who got a toy at BotCon 2015, redecoed from Generations Thrilling 30 Roadbuster and based off the unrelased Auto Roller General Optimus Prime toy from Generation 2, itself meant to be redecoed from Decepticon Auto Roller Dirtbag. The "terrorist cell" is the Renegades gathered by Challenge of the GoBots Cy-Kill, as seen in Renegade Rhetoric; Rook was busy at the time, though mostly because he was chasing down his crackpot conspiracy theories. It was established over there that he was interested in the properties of sparks, and we'll soon see why in the new version of Renegade Rhetoric. TransTech Nightscream and Immorticon were also replaced by their Beast Wars: Uprising counterparts; that Immorticon was killed by Megatron in "Transcendent: Part 6", while Nightscream was killed by Shattered Glass Optimus Prime, as seen in flashback in "The Coming Storm: Part 1". Other known abductees of Alpha Trion include: Scavenger, replaced by his Beast Wars: Uprising counterpart (last seen back in Alpha Trion's home universe, presumably having been killed at some point); Bulletbike, replaced by his Generation 2 counterpart (last seen having been arrested after TransTech Bulletbike, having gone insane, died in an attempt to get his body back, with the data recovered from his brain module getting Generation 2 Bulletbike arrested); and Hammerstrike, replaced by her Beast Machines counterpart (as seen in an earlier post of Rook's). Blackarachnia's use of "shining beacon" in her thinly-veiled xenophobic rant calls to mind the "City upon a hill" phrase, derived from one of Jesus' parables in his Sermon on the Mount from the Gospel of Matthew, and which has been used in modern American politics by various parties like John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, describing America as a "beacon of hope". Of course, that often isn't the case. Megatron's speech patterns in his message definitely sound like David Kaye's performance for the Beast Wars/Beast Machines and the "Unicron Trilogy" incarnations of Megatron, with Rook adding on the former's habit of using the word "yes".
Now, onto 2016:
February 7: On January 16, a post by Ask Vector Prime was hacked by the Renegades Crasher and Cop-Tur from the world of season 2 of Challenge of the GoBots, as related by Renegade Rhetoric, in which they disseminated the identities of the remaining classified members of the Convoy to sow distrust amongst the TransTech and Offworlders. It's worked on the Rook, at the very least.
So, in order:
Post 1: Akiba Prime was part of the Japanese Cybertron Satellite promotion as part of the Japanese release of Transformers: Prime; select cities and towns across Japan received their own "mascot" in the form of a Town Commander. Akiba Prime was the Town Commander of Akihabara, based on the Prime incarnation of Arcee (specifically, her Cyberverse Legion-class toy), with elements of a "magical girl" in her design (due to the city's otaku culture). Her stage name, Electric Town, is the real-life nickname for Akihabara, which came from the city being a major shopping center for electronic goods post-World War II. Her profile in The Town Commander Collection Book indicated she was an idol back on Cybertron, and gave her electrokinetic powers, used in tandem with her Electric Swords (also derived from the "Electric Town" nickname). Attached to this post is her main image used by TFWiki, composited from The Town Commander Collection Book and her sticker, created by an unknown artist. Her universal stream, unnamed here, is Uniend 1212.01 Beta, the universe corresponding to the Japanese Prime Dark Guard Optimus Prime toy, sold as part of a Cybertron Satellite promotion.
Post 2: Scourge is obviously a version of the Generation 1 Decepticon; he briefly bore the Matrix of Leadership in the Sunbow The Transformers episode "The Burden Hardest to Bear". The Alternity, I've already gone over. CS World, or Primax 1086.01 Alpha, is a splinter timeline coming off the main "OG World", the Japanese term for the world their version of the The Transformers cartoon and its various prequels, sequels, and so on. "CS" is derived from "Convoy's Shadow", the Japanese name for the Sunbow The Transformers episode, "Dark Awakening". In that episode, the deceased Optimus Prime was brought back to life as part of the a plot by the Quintessons. Already heavily damaged, when Optimus regained his own will, he sacrificed himself to allow the Autobots escape, and was seemingly vaporized. However, when his body was seen again in "The Return of Optimus Prime, Part 1", it was in pristine condition, explained here as a being the result of timeline drift. The splintering point, then, is Optimus Prime actually being destroyed. The timeline went normally up until Rodimus lost the Matrix and Scourge absorbed its power; since Optimus was fully deceased, Scourge was able to properly handle its power and retain it. Unspace was seen in issue #69 of the Marvel The Transformers comic. Attached to the post is a screencap of Scourge corrupted by the Matrix of Leadership, from "The Burden Hardest to Bear".
Post 3: Zeemon Magnus (who, according to Crasher and Cop-Tur, hails from Malgus 1008.19 Gamma, the world of the short-lived Titan Magazine UK Animated comic), is a version of the Guardian civilian leader Zeemon, from GoBots. His counterpart in the main Animated timeline was mentioned in The AllSpark Almanac II, where he was the leader of one of the initial Cybertronian factions, the Guardians. His private guard, the Protectons (named after the heroic faction from Robotix), executed a military coup, and eventually evolved into a new faction that replaced the Guardians; the Protectobots. Terragar Magnus, his former bodyguard, is named for Terragar, an evil Terrakor who Nemesis had Compu-Core place in Argus' body in an attempt to trick the Protectons, as seen in the episode "Captured". Attached to the post is an image of Zeemon Magnus, penciled, inked, and colored by Christopher Colgin; the image on Zeemon's chest is the bird symbol on his GoBots counterpart's "hood" chest, reinterpreted as a sort of faction symbol.
Post 4: General Hawk, of course, comes from the G.I. Joe. He hails from Primax 806.30 Gamma, an offshoot of Primax 703.02 Gamma; the latter is the world of the four Devil's Due Press G.I. Joe vs the Transformers crossover mini-series, while the former is the future Hawk glimpsed in a Matrix induced vision in G.I. Joe vs the Transformers: The Art of War issue #5. It was in that issue that Hawk bore the power of the Matrix; Optimus threw him into the Cobra Commander-controlled Serpentor Prime's open chest in an attempt to stop the mad villain. Unicron attacked Earth in the sequel mini-series, G.I. Joe vs the Transformers: Black Horizon. Rook is an asshole racist. Attached is an image from Black Horizon #1, as Hawk is picked up by Cosmos' tractor beam while reporter Ms. Allen watches (penciled by Andrew Wildman, with colors either by Wes Dzioba or Art Lyon).
Post 5: Bendy-Bus Prime was a lifesized(!) Transformer created as part of a competition held by infamous United Kingdom tabloid rag The Sun, produced by Paramount Home Entertainment and Propshop for a giveaway with the release of Revenge of the Fallen on DVD. He was made out of parts from London's articulated Mercedes-Benz buses. He hails from Tyran 110.21 Alpha, the world of Hasbro's online Cyber Missions cartoon, tying in with the Revenge of the Fallen toyline. Optimus Prime sent out his call to other Autobots in space at the end of the 2007 live-action Transformers film. The Void is the nothingness left behind by Unicron after he consumes a universe, as seen in Marvel's The Transformers issue #74. Bendy-Bus Prime's backstory as a promotional item is incorporated here. The "six" mentioned here as part of #savethesix are the six sparks stolen by Cy-Kill from Shattered Glass Alpha Trion's old hideout during Renegade Rhetoric, TransTechs who had their sparks removed by Topspin, Trion's assistant. As we've seen with the second run of Renegade Rhetoric, Cy-Kill's used the sparks to power the components of the Renegade combiner, Puzzler, in the same style as Megatron did with his Vehicon generals in Beast Machines. Attached to the post is a promotional image of Bendy-Bus Prime.
March 3: For March, we have a series of posts about characters from Beast Wars and its spin offs, to promote BotCon 2016 and its theme of "Dawn of the Predacus" (which, as we would eventually find out, was...how do you say, had a comic with extremely poor reception for it's attempts at a prequel that linked Generation 1 and Beast Wars). Our first post for this is on Rook's page, on Maximal commander Optimus Primal. ANN presumably got taken off the air due to the aforementioned hacks by Cy-Kill and his Renegades. The nine agents sent to monitor pillar realities were seen both on the Editor's page, and on Ask Vector Prime, as the old bot was one of them. The Ministry of Higher Dimensional Sciences is Rhinox's cabinet. Pinea Omicron was a planet that served as the battleground on which Optimus Prime and Galvatron II faced off, from the pseudo-canonical Alignment novella, written by Simon Furman to tie up loose ends from Marvel's Generation 2 comic. I think this post is connecting it to Colony Omicron, a Maximal colony destroyed by Rampage, mentioned in the Beast Wars episode "Deep Metal". Primax 496.22 Alpha is the universal stream designation for the world of the Beast Wars and Beast Machines cartoons. Rook and Andromeda start by going over the basic background of the Beast Wars cartoon, with the battleground on prehistoric Earth over raw energon and the alien artifacts of the Vok; for the most part, it's just a general overview of the cartoon, so I won't go into too much detail, aside from things that are for specific episodes. Obvious, Primal and Megatron's crews landed on prehistoric Earth and scanned beast forms in "Beast Wars (Part 1)", from which the screencap of Optimus in his first body on Earth comes from.
Primal was killed when he impacted with the artificial moon orbiting Earth (known as the Planet Buster) in "Other Voices, Part 2". Beast Wars Rhinox journeyed into the Matrix to resurrect Optimus Primal over the course of the two-parter, "Coming of the Fuzors"; the episode from which Primal's Transmetal body is screencapped is "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)".
Is that a sense of sarcasm I detect from Rook's comments on TransTech Megatron? Beast Wars Megatron attempted to assassinate the sleeping Optimus Prime onboard the Ark in "The Agenda (Part III)", causing a massive timestorm that nearly erased the Maximals from existence. To save Prime, Primal briefly carried his ancestor's spark while Rhinox repaired the Autobot leader, causing Primal to mutate into Optimal Optimus, as seen in "Optimal Situation" (the episode from which the screencap for Primal's Optimal form is from). The Maximals returned home with the defeated Megatron in "Nemesis Part 2".
Before the events of Beast Machines, Megatron managed to escape his chains, falling out of transwarp and arriving on Cybertron before the Maximals did, as seen in flashbacks in "Revelations Part II: Descent". In that same episode, the Transmetals among Primal's Maximals were shown to be unusually affected by Megatron's transformation virus, reverting to their original, "organic" forms they had instead of being immobilized, and causing them to become amnesic. Eventually, Primal and the ones able to escape the Vehicons met back up in the first episode of the series, "The Reformatting", where they found the Oracle, the evolved form of the supercomputer Vector Sigma, which reformatted them into technorganic forms (the screencap of Primal's Beast Machines body is from that episode), and tasked them with bring a technorganic balance to Cybertron. Primal battled Megatron (wearing his body) and sacrificed himself to reformat Cybertron in "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future". Cloudburst was an Autobot Pretender, released in 1988 as part of the original The Transformers toyline; he pretended to be a chef as part of an attempt to get him and Landmine out of the clutches of the ravenous Mecannibals in issue #53 of the Marvel The Transformers comic. Hence, Cooking with Cloudburst.
Now, in the comments, there's a bit of an explanation required. Keep in mind that this was back in the early months of 2016, when the idea of Donald Trump becoming president was seemingly laughable, unlike the hellworld in which we live. #savethesix was mentioned in Rook's previous post. That universal stream number is off thanks to some confusion, it should be Gargent 1084.29 Alpha. Anyway, TransTech Starscream is compared to American buisnessman and then-presidential nominee Donald Trump, with his promises to build a "Warp Avoidance Laser Layer" (a W.A.L.L.) and make the Renegades pay for it, parodying Trump's promise to build a wall between the United States and Mexico, and have the Mexican government pay for it. Yeah, kinda weaksauce, but again, this was back when everyone was convinced Trump wouldn't win. Anyway, a couple of fans took that the wrong way, reading it as saying something about the wiki not wanting to document Renegade Rhetoric (which wasn't the case; Sorenson didn't write the "W.A.L.L." bit) as a shot at them and trying to compare them to Trump, and so those first two posts were deleted. Heterochthonous means non-indigenous. The cha-cha is a Cuban dance.
March 6: Over to a post on Andromeda's page now. Historic Highway 8.12403840463596 is a reference to Route 66, one of the original highways in the United States; 8.12403840463596 is the square root of 66, see? You'd probably remember Route 66 best from the 2006 film Cars. Praxus was introduced in Dreamwave Productions' comic mini-series The War Within. Villages E19 - F37 are probably in reference to the villages in the Mini-Con Sector of Cybertron, as seen in Dreamwave's Armada comic. Tigatron came online in "Fallen Comrades" (from which the screencap of his robot mode originates); his identity circuits were said to be damaged in that episode. Snowstalker was killed in "Law of the Jungle".
Airazor came online in "The Spark". She and Tigatron left the main group of Maximals in "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 1)" to search for the stasis pods knocked out of orbit after the events of "Other Voices, Part 2". The Metal Hunter sent Tigatron and Airazor to Nexus Zero in "Other Visits (Part 1)" (from where the screencap of Tigatron and Airazor together comes from). Megatron took over the alien device briefly before it was destroyed by the Maximals in "Other Visits (Part 2)". The Vok created Tigerhawk from the fused bodies of Tigatron and Airazor in "Other Victories", sending him as an emissary to hunt down Megatron; infused with the essence of the two Vok, Tigerhawk was captured by Tarantulas and had the energies extracted from him, allowing for Tigatron and Airazor to take control of their combined form. We never did get a post on Tarantulas.
Tigerhawk faced down the Nemesis in "Nemesis Part 2", in which he was vaporized by the ship's weaponry. I thiiink that Matchstick Bot is a reference to the 2003 film Matchstick Men? Six Shot was the brother of Shockblast from Energon. The screencap of Tigerhawk comes from "Other Victories".
Kind of a gross question from a known dickhead in the comments, but Rook and Andromeda turn it around.
March 10: Another post from Andromeda today. Hydrophenia was an ocean world seen in issue #23 of IDW Publishing's Robots in Disguise. Hydrophenian bumble-puppies are a variant of Antillan bumble-puppies, mentioned in the Cyber Key Code bio of Cybertron Thunderblast; in-turn, they homage both Antilla, the doom ancient Autobot colony from Sunbow The Transformers episode "Cosmic Rust", and the bumble-puppies from Aldous Huxley's 1932 novel Brave New World. Demus was a Decepticon merchant introduced in issue #45 of IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye. TransTech Sonar, the weather reporter, is filling in for Rook as he's probably being interrogated by the government, to report on Beast Wars Terrorsaur. The screencap of Terrorsaur in beast mode comes from "Beast Wars (Part 1)".
Dinobot challenged Megatron and defected to the Maximals in the opening two-parter of the series, "Beast Wars". Terrorsaur was supercharged by a flying mountain of energon in "Power Surge" (as screencapped here). Megatron, of course, conquered Cybertron in Beast Machines. Rattrap pretended to defect over the Predacons and briefly supported Terrorsaur's coup in "Double Jeopardy". Sonar's jetwing vehicle mode is probably in reference to the Batwing, the jet used by Batman, as it was named in the 1989 Batman film. Terrorsaur was killed during the quantum surge when he fell into lava with Scorponok in "Aftermath". The Beast Wars toyline did have a Transmetal Terrorsaur figure. The live-action movie version of Swoop (named Strafe for unknown reasons) was introduced as a member of the Dinobots in Transformers: Age of Extinction, where the group were portrayed as ancient knights. "The Dark Knight" is one of the nicknames of DC Comics superhero Batman. Electronic Makeover is likely inspired by Extreme Makeover. Electronic paint was introduced in the Animated episode "Where Is Thy Sting?", in which it was used by fugitive Autobot to swap identities between himself and Bumblebee. Roadstorm is the Japanese Galaxy Force name of Cybertron Lugnutz. Biodyne was a company owned by the TransTech Corvo, mentioned in "I, Lowtech"; it's named for Cyberdyne, the company that created the Skynet super-computer from the Terminator films.
March 13: Back on over to Rook's page now. Serenity Spa isn't named after anything in particular. "Thoughtcrime" is a term introduced in George Orwell's 1949 dystopia novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four. Rook's been reprogrammed, obviously. Starscream was briefly involved in the Beast Wars in the episode "Possession", where Waspinator was possessed by Starscream's indestructible spark. Chartreuse is a shade of yellow. The screencap of Cheetor's first body on Earth comes from "The Web".
Tarantulas captured Cheetor only for Rattrap to rescue him, as seen in the aforementioned episode, "The Web". Cheetor's friendship with Rattrap and Tigatron was seen in many episodes. Cheetor was upgraded to Transmetal form in "Aftermath" (from which the screencap of him in his Transmetal beast mode comes from).
The "last stand" of the Maximals that Rook refers to occurred in "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)". Cheetor was upgraded into his Transmetal 2 form after he and Depth Charge attempted to stop Megatron's experiments with the Vok transmetal driver in the two-parter, "Feral Scream"; Cheetor's Transmetal 2 robot mode is a screencap from "Feral Scream Part 2". The Transmetal Driver was called a "datasphere" by the Vok in 3H Productions "Primeval Dawn" back-up strips from The Wreckers comics.
Cheetor's struggle in Beast Machines with the zealous Optimus Primal were seen over the course of the first season. Megatron downloaded the Oracle access codes in "Sparkwar Pt. II: The Search". Cheetor became spiritual leader of Cybertron after Primal died reformatting Cybertron in "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future". Rook manages to break through his reprogramming thanks to sheer obstinance. Bottom's Up just sounds like a generic sitcom. The screencap of Cheetor in his technorganic form is from "The Key".
March 17: Still on Rook. Real Gear Robots were a subline in the toyline for the 2007 live-action Transformers movie, with toys of small, everyday objects brought to life by the power of the AllSpark. Today's post is on Waspinator. Grid Deltron was a location on Earth seen in "Transmutate". Ener-barbital takes its name from barbital, the first commercially availible barbituate. Suture is a TransTech version of the Autobot who had previously held the role of Ultra Magnus in IDW's Transformers continuity, first mentioned in issue #19 of More than Meets the Eye. The screencap of Waspinator in beast mode comes from "Beast Wars (Part 1)".
Crysmagnetal was a substance seen in the two-part finale of The Headmasters, "The Final Showdown on Earth". Boomers the bar is ran by a version of Boomer, one of the partners of the Autobot Targetmaster Quickmix from the 1988 range of The Transformers. Waspinator avoided becoming a Transmetal in "Aftermath". In the toyline, a Transmetal Waspinator was released, with an interstitial third "jet" mode. The Great Cosmic Tree is presumably in reference to the World tree present in several religions. A screencap of Waspinator emerging from the stasis tank in "Aftermath" is included here.
Waspinator abandoned the Predacons and became leader of a protohuman tribe in "Nemesis Part 2", from which the screencap is taken.
As seen in flashbacks in "The Catalyst" (from which the screencap of Thrust and Blackarachnia comes from), Waspinator was eventually chased off Earth by the fed-up protohumans, returning to Cybertron and having his spark extracted by Megatron to power the Vehicon Thrust. Thrust saved Blackarachnia, causing her to believe that he was Silverbolt, in "Revelations Part I: Discovery". Looks like Andromeda's bisexual. Rook mangles lyrics from the "War", originally by The Temptations but more famous for a cover by Edwin Starr.
Jetstorm was reformatted back into Silverbolt in "In Darkest Night". Obsidian and Strika briefly considered defecting to the Maximals in "Spark of Darkness". Thrust had his spark extracted by Cheetor in "Endgame Pt. II: When Legends Fall", and was reformatted into a small technorganic Waspinator/Thrust hybrid in "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future" (which is screencapped here). Thrustinator is an alternate version of the Waspinator/Thrust hybrid who I've previously gone over. Endurer: Eukaris is based on the reality TV show, Survivor. Eukaris is Cybertronian colony inhabited by beast mode Transformers, introduced in issue #3 of volume 2 of IDW Publishing's The Transformers: Windblade. Shanix is a currency introduced in issue #113 of the Marvel UK The Transformers comic.
March 20: Back to Andromeda's page. Energon farms were first mentioned in Transformers Animated. A combine is a vehicle that harvests grain. I've already gone over the term "Conjunx Endura". Silverbolt came online, joined the Predacons, and defected to the Maximals over the course of the two-part "Coming of the Fuzors". The screencap of him, Quickstrike, and Megatron comes from "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 1)".
Silverbolt first showed affection for Blackarachnia in "Tangled Web". Protoform X came online and menaced Silverbolt and Blackarachnia in "Bad Spark". Silverbolt and Blackarachnia secretly opened a line of commuincation, as revealed in the three-part "The Agenda", with Blackarachnia defecting to the Maximals in "Optimal Situation". The screencap of Blackarachnia riding Silverbolt comes from "Proving Grounds".
Blackarachnia was freed from her shell program in "Crossing the Rubicon". Silverbolt and Blackarachnia defended the Ark from the Nemesis in "Nemesis Part 2". Silverbolt's spark was used to power Jetstorm, as first seen in "Fires of the Past". The screencap of Jetstorm, along with both Silverbolt's technorganic robot and beast modes, come from "In Darkest Knight".
Silverbolt was freed from the Jetstorm shell personality and reformatted in "In Darkest Knight". Silverbolt began behaving like his old self in "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future". The Good Knife is a parody of the legal drama The Good Wife. Wuji is the Arms Micron partner of Wheeljack in the Japanese Transformers: Prime toyline; the "Aligned" incarnation of Wheeljack was a Wrecker.
March 24: Still on Andromeda's page. Looks like the Shroud has allowed some civil rights reforms. Jerrica Benton is also known as Jem, the musician and band leader from Jem and the Holograms. Prysmos is the homeplanet of the titular characters of the Visionaries cartoon and toyline; Galadria was a fiction only Spectral Knight. Miss-Q was one of the Mini-Cons interns introduced earlier. The Italian name for Beast Wars was Biocombat. Razorbeast was a Maximal from the first year of Beast Wars toys in 1996, with a wild boar alternate mode; he was the main character of IDW Publishing's Beast Wars comics, The Gathering and The Ascending. The "mystery wrapped in an enigma" bit sounds like a line from the comic, but I think it's just in homage to the dialogue in the comic. TransTech Heinrad and his partner, Thrustinator, have disappeared. Razorbeast was mentioned to have had his atomic structure altered to infiltrate the Predacons in issue #2 of The Gathering, with him going with Magmatron and his Predacons to Earth to bring online the rest of the Axalon's protoforms in issue #1. Magmatron was the Predacon leader from Beast Wars Neo, who split into a Giganotosaurus, a Quetzalcoatlus, and an Elasmosaurus, hence "triple-threat". The Planet Buster knocked the protoforms out of orbit in "Aftermath". Razorbeast managed to prevent about half of the protoforms from becoming Predacons in issue #1. Magmatron was exiled outside of space and time in issue #4 of The Gathering, leaving the others stranded on Prehistoric Earth. Lio Convoy was the Maximal leader from Beast Wars II, who turned into a lion; the version from the IDW comics led the Pack, a top-secret group of Maximals. The Pack and the Blendtrons came to prehistoric Earth in issue #2 of The Ascending. Rartorata was one of Unicron's Blendtrons from Beast Wars Neo, slightly redecoed from Beast Wars Predacon lionfish/hornet Fuzor. A panel from issue #2 of The Gathering illustrates the post, showing B'Boom's hud scanning Razorbeast, with pencils and inks by Don Figueroa and colors by Josh Burcham.
We'll get to where this Razorbeast is from in a second. Andromeda obstentially got him on to talk about streams with Maximals and Predacons, only for her to get him to say quotes from the IDW Beast Wars comics. Razorbeast said "count yourself lucky" while escaping the Predacons after thwarting their attempt to turn all leftover Protoforms on Earth into Predacons in issue #1 of The Gathering. The "masterstroke" bit comes from Razorbeast explaining to the gathered Maximals about Magmatron's plans in issue #2, while the line about the Beast Wars "running their course" comes from the ending of issue #4. The idea of multiple timelines pouring into the Beast Wars cartoon timeline is an in-universe way of saying how multiple, conflicting pieces of fictions use the Beast Wars cartoons' events. Primax 206.15 Gamma is the world of the IDW Publishing Beast Wars comic. Primax 296.0 Beta is the universe of the second wave of the Beast Wars toyline; the bios for this were updated so that Primal and Megatron were unconnected to the originals, unlike the first wave, but still set on modern day 90's Earth. "Sorry Magmatron" comes from issue #4, when Razorbeast defeats Magmatron. Primax 209.0 Gamma is the original universal stream of the Beast Wars: Uprising bios and stuff; hints of "A Change to the Agenda" here with mentioning how it's connected to the cartoon timeline. Hrmph. "Over, finished" is one of the phrases used by Transformers writer Simon Furman throughout his work, called Furmanisms. Mend A Fractured Spark is based on the type of shows devoted to "mending" a relationship. Fracture was a Walmart exclusive toy from the 2007 live-action Transformers movie, redecoed from Classics Mirage as a homage to GoBots Crasher. The panel of Razorbeast in robot mode comes from issue #1 of The Gathering, pencilled and inked by Don Figueroa and colored by Josh Burcham.
March 27: Back over on Rook's page. To tie in with Easter, Rook and Andromeda go over Maximal rabbit Stampy, from Beast Wars Neo. Ishtar was a Babylonian/Assyrian goddess who has often been connected to the holiday of Easter, although whether or not she was the original reason for its celebration until it became to venerate the death of Christ is unknown. Mechanimal is a term for Cybertronian animals, introduced in the Wings Universe stories. The story Andromeda refers to was about Stampy's mother from the Beast Wars Neo manga, whom she interviewed for Mother's Day. The version this post talks about is the version from the IDW Publishing comics; Rook was unable to get clearance to talk about the original Beast Wars Neo cartoon Stampy. At the time of the post, Beast Wars Neo had not been dubbed or subtitled for a western audiance. Stampy showed up as part of the Pack in The Ascending. Big Convoy was the Maximal leader from Beast Wars Neo, who turned into a wooly mammoth. The cannon bit is both a dick joke and a meta-commentary on Transformers fans "obsession win canon". Stampy had a third "gun" mode of sorts. The Rolling Dead is a pastiche of zombie television show, The Walking Dead. Grimy is a new character, a Junkion named after show protagonist Rick Grimes. Kalis was introduced in issue #164 of the Marvel UK The Transformers comics, a city where dead Transformers were revived by the experiments of rogue Autobot scientist Flame. From Jim:
"The Rolling Dead... I don't need to tell you what we're referencing here. Grimy is NOT a nickname for Grimlock, it's a new (fictional) Transformer. I pictured him as a Junkion. The Rolling Dead takes place in some other Universe, though it's filmed in Axiom Nexus. They may, occasionally, do an on-location shoot in some other universe, but probably only for a big episode like a season opener or ender. The actors are mostly TT guys portraying offworlders, though there are some authentic offworlders in there. Acting is one of those professions where one can be a bit scandalous. The Rolling Dead is insanely popular on Axiom Nexus, though it has its fair share of detractors. The universe it takes place in is undefined, and includes elements of Primax, Aurex, and Viron. Of course, the multiverse being the multiverse, anything that one can imagine exists SOMEWHERE, so there's probably an actual universe out there with events very similar to what's portrayed in the show. But if so, the TT never cataloged it, and now they never will. "
The image attached to the post is the cover to sixth volume of Beast Wars Neo VHSes released by Pioneer, featuring Stampy thinking about himself all heroic-like and beating up chibified forms of Predacons Magmatron, Sling, Dead End, and Guiledart.
March 31: Back over to Andromeda. Facsimile avatars were seen in IDW Publishing's comics, synthetic humans created by the Decepticons to infiltrate and allow the Decepticons a foothold in politics, militaries, and more. The facsimile mentioned here is classic detective Sherlock Holmes, made obvious by the deerstalker and "elementary" bit. The Tripredacus Council sent Ravage to Earth to deal with Megatron, his Predacons, and the Maximals in "The Agenda (Part 1)", from which all the screencaps on these posts come from. Jim worked with John-Paul Bove, the writer for the then-upcoming BotCon 2016 comic "Dawn of the Predacus" to incorporate some of Bove's....well, less well thought-out ideas in here. Cicadacon was hinted to be Shockwave in his final convention toy bio. Transmatter is what the comic called the material protoforms were made out of, linking it to Unicron (for some reason). The Pit is the Cybertronian version of Hell, first mentioned in Beast Wars. The Auto-Censors are probably hiding the plot of "Dawn of the Predacus". Better Call Saur is a pastiche of crime drama Better Call Saul, with Saul Goodman replaced by Saur, one of the W Casettebots from The Headmasters, who transforms from cassette into an Apatosaurus. He combines with Dile, an Iguanodon, to form Legout. The other two W Cassettebots are Noise the Allosaurus and Graphy the Pteranodon, who combine to form Decibel. Legible is obviously a portmanteau of Legout and Decibel.
April 3: And back to Rook, for the final post on Beast Wars characters. Rip Skyler is Sky Grinder from the Xevoz toyline, an extreme athlete and a Neo Sapien. Xevoz was a Hasbro toyline from the early 2000s, action figures with interchangable parts, who hailed from the world of Zeotopia, a battle raging between mutliple species and factions. The Biomecha faction were cyborgs from the continent of Zyberia. The Neo Sapiens were the human population of the planet who served as peace keepers. The Arcasters were a mystical faction, while the Unnaturals were a faction of undead creatures. Atlantia was the city where the Neo Sapiens resided. The Golden Disk, of course, was stolen in the first episode of Beast Wars, though Megatron's true plans with it were not seen until the three-parter, "The Agenda". Dinobot defected from the Predacons after believing Megatron had led them astray in the two-part opener, "Beast Wars". The screencap of the Predacons attacking comes from "Beast Wars (Part 1)".
The Vok attempted to sterilize Earth in "Other Voices, Part 2" with the Planet Buster, the destruction of which caused a quantum surge that mutated Megatron and several others into Transmetal forms in "Aftermath", from which the screencap of Megatron's Transmetal beast mode comes from. Megatron attempted to kill humanity before it could evolve, only to be thwarted by Dinobot in "Code of Hero". Ravage came to Earth, while Megatron attempted to assasinate Optimus Prime in the three-part "The Agenda". Ravage's toy in the Beast Wars toyline was called "Tripredacus Agent" due to trademark issues with Ravage's name. Optimus Primal was upgraded to Optimal Optimus by Optimus Prime's spark in "Optimal Situation". Megatron was upgraded into his Transmetal 2 form by the spark of the original Megatron in "Master Blaster". Andromeda believes that Megatron's form should be called a Transmetal 3; Rook tells her that form came earlier, hinting at "Dawn of the Predacus" use of the BotCon 2016 Megatron toy; Andromeda (like any reasonable person) doesn't think that makes much sense. Tri-Malteranium comes from the BotCon 2016 Megatron toy bio. Tigerhawk destroyed the Predacons' base in "Other Victories". Tigerhawk's Japanese name is Tigerfalcon. Megatron used the Decepticon starship the Nemesis to attack the Ark in the two-part finale, "Nemesis". The image of Megatron in his Transmetal 2 dragon form comes from a promotional image released by Mainframe, the animation studio behind Beast Wars and Beast Machines.
Megatron was shown to escape his chains en route back to Cybertron in "Revelations Pt, II: Descent", and from there, conquered Cybertron with his Vehicon armies. The screencap of Megatron in his control harness comes from the episode "Survivor". Megatron was seemingly destroyed by the energies of the Plasma Energy Chamber (introduced in the three-part finale for Sunbow's The Transformers cartoon, "The Rebirth") and the Key to Vector Sigma (from The Transformers two-parter "The Key to Vector Sigma") in "Fallout". Megatron's essence was split into organic and mechanical halves; the massive mechanical head known as the Grand Mal (first seen at the end of "Fallout", the source of the screencap of the massive structure), and the organic Transformer Noble, who turned from his lupine form into the reptillian Savage (screencapped from his introductory episode, "Savage Noble"). Megatron transferred his spark into the Grand Mal in "Prometheus Unbound". Megatron attempted to absorb the sparks of Cybertron over the course of the three-part "Sparkwar", stealing the knowledge of the Oracle in "Sparkwar Pt. II: The Search", before being defeated in "Sparkwar Pt. III: The Siege". Megatron's spark survived with its polarity reversed, possessing dead bodies before being trapped in a Diagnostic Drone in "Spark of Darkness". The screencaps of his anti-spark, the sparkless Transformer he first possessed (recycled from the models for Transmetal Tarantulas and Dinobot), and the Diagnostic drone all come from "Spark of Darkness". Technically, the war in Beast Machines was known as the "Battle for the Spark." Megatron upgraded himself into Optimal Megatron in "Endgame Pt. II: When Legends Fall" (from where the screencap of this form is taken) and battled Optimus Primal before dying to reformat Cybertron in "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future". The Last Autobot was introduced as the "soul of Cybertron" in the final issues of the Marvel The Transformers comic; he was given the name Autonomous Maximus by Ask Vector Prime. The Atechnogenesis Theory is a parody of long-running sitcom The Big Bang Theory, with its name taken from atechnogenesis, the name Dreamwave Productions gave to the origin of the Transformers as an evolved form of "naturally-occuring pulleys, levers, and gears" in the first issue of the Marvel The Transformers comic. Shellformer is named for the show's character Sheldon, and the term given to Transformers whose altmodes mostly consist of massive shells that fold around the robot. Mainframe is a TransTech version of the 1990 Autobot Action Master from the original The Transformers toyline. His appearances on the show are in reference to scientists like Stephen Hawking showing up as themselves on The Big Bang Theory.
May 1: Today, on Andromeda's page, we have an interview with General Hawk of the Convoy, in what I believe was meant to be part oa series of interviews. Powerlinxing is the process by which Mini-Cons combine with larger robots to give them a power boost and new abilities. Humans can become Headmasters (heads), Targetmasters (guns), and Powermasters (engines) via reconstructive surgery and binary bonding, as seen in the western versio of The Transformers. Metalhawk was the leader of the Autobot Pretenders in Super-God Masterforce, know by his human alias Hawk. Clayton Abernathy is indeed Hawk's real name. Cyberdroids were the forms of the titular characters from the Micromaster toyline before being upgraded, small and non-transforming, and is a term that would eventually be applied to the Japanese Headmasters and Targetmasters. Lube is the Powermaster partner of the Autobot Slapdash from the 1988 range of The Transformers toyline. Rook being racist again. The G.I. Joes (specifically Flint) and Cosmos killed Unicron with metal-eating spores in G.I. Joe vs. the Transformers: Black Horizon issue #2. I already talked about how Hawk got the power of the Matrix. Hawk's vision of Sgt. Savage vs Iron Klaw and Fortress Maximus vs Trypticon was seen in issue #5 of G.I. Joe vs the Transformers: The Art of War. Sergeant Savage (AKA) was the main hero of the two G.I. Joe series, G.I. Joe: Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles and G.I. Joe Extreme. Much of the backstory of Sgt. Savage is taken from the one-episode pilot for G.I. Joe: Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles, released exclusively on VHS, such as Sgt. Savage having been frozen in ice for decades before being found in the modern day. General Blitz (Garrison Krieger) and the I.R.O.N. Army were the main antagonists of G.I. Joe: Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles. Kalistan was introduced in G.I. Joe Extreme. Savage's survival in ice is attributed to experiments by Blitz in both the cartoon and this post; wheras in the cartoon it was genetic, it would seem that Savage in this version underwent binary bonding. The Screaming Eagles were obviously the main protagonists of Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles. S.K.A.R. were the antagonists of G.I. Joe Extreme led by Iron Klaw, who masqueraded as the seemingly benevolent Count von Rani. Iron Klaw and General Blitz were previously connected in the fiction of the Japanese Binaltech toyline, where they were leaders of the Concurrence, an organization of human villains aligned with the Decepticons to rid Earth and the solar system of the Autobots. This post serves as the "fifth" Devil's Due Press crossover series that The Art of War teased.
All the heroes come from Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles, while all the villains come from G.I. Joe Extreme, unless stated otherwise. Most of the Autobots are the 1987 Autobot Headmasters, while most of the Decepticons are either Targetmasters from 1987 or 1988. Magno-clamps were mentioned in Alignment. Evelyn Beatrice Hall was an English writer; the quote Hawk states is from The Friends of Voltaire. Brave is the Japanese of Car Robots/Robots in Disguise Emissary, the partner of that universe's version of Fortress Maximus/Brave Maximus, replacing Generation 1 Fortress Maximus's usual partner, Cerebros. Sgt Savage thus replaces Spike Witwicky. Demolitions expert and chemist Dynamite (Hector J. Garrido) replaces Brainstorm's usual partner Arcana. Mechanical engineer Grill (Darren K. Filbert) replaces Highbrow's usual partner Gort. The IDW Publishing The Transformers version of Sunstreaker was a Headmaster briefly after being captured by the Machination and experimented on, partnered with Hunter O'Nion. Hunter is replaced by artillery expert D-Day (David X. Brewi). Computer specialist Mouse (Morris L. Sanderson) replaces Chromedome's usual partner Stylor. Playback was a Autobot, later said to have a cassette alternate mode, killed by Thunderwing briefly used by Autobot 1988 Headmaster Nightbeat's partner Muzzle to animate him and scare the Decepticon, as seen in issue #230 to 231 of the Marvel UK The Transformers film. Playback is partnered with communications expert Head Banger (Kevin M. Kaye). Vehicle operator Tank (Dwight M. Prudence) replaces Hardhead's orginal parter Duros.
Iron Klaw is Count van Rani, as I've mentioned. Double Dealer (or Doubledealer) was a 1988 Powermaster mercenary who worked for both the Autobots and Decepticons. Klaw replaces Skar and Knok, Doubedealer's usual partner. Cyclonus was re-released as a Targetmaster in 1987. Steel Raven was the second-in-command of S.K.A.R.; she replaces Nightstick, Cyclonus' usual partner. Misfire was a 1987 Decepticon Targetmaster. Pyromaniac Inferno (Kidwell Pyre) replaces Misfire's usual partner, Aimless. Slugslinger was a 1987 Decepticon Targetmaster. Cyborg super-soldier Wreckage (Eric Alexander) replaces Slugslinger's usual partner Caliburst. Triggerhappy was the final original 1987 Decepticon Targetmaster. Arms dealer Rampage (J. Remington III) replaces Triggerhappy's usual partner Blowpipe. Needlenose was a 1988 Decepticon Targetmaster. His partners Sunbeam and Zigzag are replaced by the mercenary employed by S.K.A.R., the Silencer. Scourge was re-released as a Targetmaster in 1987. Scourge's partner, Fracas, was replaced by Red Scream, an anti-globalist only seen in the Dark Horse G.I. Joe comic tying in to the G.I. Joe Extreme toyline.
I've gone over Sideways plenty of times at this point. His headmaster partners Crosswise and Rook are replaced by Quick Stryke (Rando Bama), a S.K.A.R. operative who defected to the Joes after his brother Johnathan was killed.
"Soldiers of Khaos, Anarchy, and Ruin" and "Invasion, Reconnaissance, Occupation, and Neutralization Army" both come from the classic media in which they were introduced. Optimus came to Earth in Black Horizon. Autobot Cosmos and the former Joe Firewall (Michelle LaChance, accidentally referred to by another Joe computer hacker's codename, Mainframe/Blaine L. Parker. She was introduced in the Devil Due's Press G.I. Joe comics), along with a few other Autobots, worked together to keep Cybertronian technology out of the wrong hands in Black Horizon. Carolee was Hawk's fiance in Devil's Due's G.I. Joe continuity, also seen in Black Horizon. The Robotmasters version of Sideways turned into a yellow and purple Harley-Davidson Electra Glide touring motorcycle, having been redecoed from Generation 2 Road Pig. The Road Bullet was a heavily-armed motorcylce from the G.I. Joe extreme toyline. I've talked about General Optimus Prime before. The V.A.M.P. was jeep used by the Joes in the old toyline, cartoon, and comics.
May 4: Andromeda ties in to "May the Fourth," a holiday celebrating Star Wars (coming from Obi-Wan Kenobi's line in the original film, "May the Force be with you"). Armada Nightbeat was the Mini-Con partner of Autobot Side Swipe, who turned into a motorcycle. Andromeda clears up he's not the more famous version of Nightbeat, an Autobot Headmaster from the 1988 range of figures. Nightbeat can impersonate R2-D2, or "Artoo"; most of the Mini-Cons in the "Unicron Trilogy" cartoons spoke in binary-like warbles, bleeps, and bloops. Aston gets what Nightbeat is saying because he's a Mini-Con as well. Nightbeat hails from Aurex 906.29 Alpha, the universe to which Soundwave and Sideways were sent to in the Cybertron episode, "Beginning". Uniend 610.23 Zeta, the world of the "Aligned" continuity novels Transformers: Exodus, Transformers: Exiles, and Transformers: Retribution.
The file photo Rook posts is C-3P0 and RD-D2 passing by Jan Minakaze, Holi, and Braver in the Schaeffer Energy plant from the Transformers: Victory episode "Battle Up of Wrath!!" Rook, being the idiot he is, thinks that Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, which was considered to be the worst Star Wars movie at the time, is the best. Star Wars Episode LXXIV is the 74th Star Wars film. Dr. Natasha Pyraniac was a time-travelling woman from the future, seen in the Transformers Animated: Be the Hero book, Time-Quake, based on the Doctor from Doctor Who. Emperor Sheev Palpatine first appeared as a floating holographic head in Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back. X-Wings and TIE Fighters are vehicles from Star Wars. Road Police was the leader of the Turbo Team from Operation Combination, a Micromaster combiner who became the chest of Sixturbo, and who turned into a police car. His toy was sculpted to have a tie, in emulation of the way some police officers dress. Wing was the Autobot jet leader of the Multiforce from Victory, who combined with his teammates to form Landcross. X-Brawn was one of the Autobot Brothers from the 2001 Robots in Disguise series.
May 21: There were supposed to be some more audio and text posts from the ANN pages, but as the Club was winding up operations, they were cut short. Thus, cryptic messages about ANN going offline appeared on Rook, Andromeda, and the Editor's page, making it look like a massive disaster had happened. It would be the final post on the Editor's page, at the very least, but at the tail end of the year...
January 31: We got a New Year's countdown, alternating back and forth from Rook and Andromeda's pages. Because of this, I'll be adding indications of which post is on which /src page on TFWiki, and at what times. Additionally, the Transformers Collectors' Club's Twitter account was briefly changed to a Twitter page for Rook to tie-in with this, but there's nothing of not beyond the banner, an illustration by Evan Gauntt from the TransTech prose story "Gone Too Far".
Post 1, Rook, 12:09 PM: Broadcast is the Japanese name of Blaster. According to Jesse Wittenrich, the one mentioned here is Broadblast from Binaltech Asterisk. Rookin' New Years Eve is named for ABC's Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve; Rook claims someone else owns the trademark when Andromeda questions why it's named after him. Rook claims in the comments that the Waruders were responsible for the May blackout, leftover from their invasion in "Cybertron's Most Wanted". "War Riders" and "Warblers" is just Rook trying to remember the Waruders' name.
Post 2, Andromeda, 12:41 PM: Andromeda's changed the name of the show to Rompin' New Years Eve. Rom the Space Knight is a toy created by Parker Brothers that Hasbro owns, who had a popular Marvel Comic back in the late 70's/early 80's. and who, at this time, was appearing as a part of IDW Publishing's "Hasbroverse" comics. Sparky (Pyra Ignatia Spark) is a female version of 1993 European exclusive The Transformers Obliterator, Pyro. Firecracker was a Go-Bot from Generation 2. Playback was an Autobot killed by Thunderwing who appeared in issue #230-231 of the Marvel UK The Transformers comic. He was said to turn into a tape like Rewind and Eject in the letters' page of issue #244. Sparky was a female Guardian from GoBots. "Pyra Ignatia Spark" is the female version of "Pyro Ignatius Spark", the full name of the Wings Universe version of Pyro. "Spark" is both the name Pyro was released under in Generation 2, a Micromaster member of the Liner Team that formed Sixline from Return of Convoy, and, as the variant of "Sparks", was the name of Hot Rod's Targetmaster parnter Firebolt in the Marvel The Transformers comic. Pyra is Pyra Magna, leader of the Rust Renegades/Torchbearers from Combiner Wars, who serves as the chest of the combiner Victorion. A batch proto-initiator is the equivalent of a parent, first mentioned in issue #3 of IDW Publishing's Infiltration mini-series. I've already talked about the term "Conjunx Endura" plenty. Vez was a human doctor mentioned in a post on the Tornado - Decepticon Saboteur page; he's Sparky's conjunx. The four Mixmasters are, according to Wittenrich: Micromaster Mixmaster, the evil half of Build Team member Mixing; Revenge of the Fallen Mixmaster; Generation 1 Mixmaster; and the Mixmaster who was one of the components of the female Devastator briefly seen in "Coalescence". Wittenrich notes he chose them because of the Sunbow The Transformers version of Mixmaster's love of mixing chemicals with explosions. Fisitron was the pen-name of the IDW version of 1993 European-exclusive The Transformers Lightformer, Ironfist. The Wings Universe version of Ironfist was a demolitions expert for the Elite Guard. According to Wittenrich, the ones mentioned here are some version of the original, and the "Aligned" version of the character sold as part of the second Transformers Figure Subscription Service. Rosanna is the same version of the Kiss Players character that's been mentioned several time on the Facebook pages.
Post 3, Rook, 1:46 PM: Countdown is a TransTech version of the 1989 Autobot Micromaster Countdown. Thunderclash (or rather Thunder Clash as he was originally known) was a 1992 European-exclusive Turbomaster. This version, hailing from Primax 913.12 Epsilon (the home of Chromedome, Rewind, and Treadshot in the IDW Publishing-inspired world seen in "Timeless"), is based on the character as he appears in IDW's More than Meets the Eye, a larger-than-life hero who was briefly leader of the Autobots. The "ball drop" happens on our world in New York every year, with the Times Square Ball. Not sure what ACubedN is a reference to.
Post 4, Andromeda, 2:01 PM: Andromeda takes to the streets. M'Gillda is a Sub-Atlantican, an underwater race of humanoids from Sub-Atlantica, seen in the Sunbow The Transformers episode "Atlantis, Arise!" They communicated telepathically, due to living underwater.
Post 5, Rook, 2:04 PM: Rook yells at Andromeda about what M'Gillda is saying.
Post 6, Andromeda, 2:30 PM: Spacewarp, Just in case you haven't been following along up to this point, for the 2003 Universe toyline, a redeco of Armada Jetfire, along with his Mini-Con Comettor and the Space Mini-Con Team (Astroscope, Payload, and Sky Blast), as a Toys"R"Us exclusive Decepticon named Spacewarp, who homaged Generation 1 Astrotrain. However, this toy ultimately had no interest from any retailers, and ended up cancelled. In 2007, Fun Publications revisited this idea with the Timelines Astrotrain toy, with a new head based on the original. The Cybertron version of Astrotrain came with a Commetor redeco named Starcatcher, but because the Space Mini-Con Team's molds had degraded, he instead came with a redeco of the Cybertron Giant Planet Mini-Con Team (Longarm, Overcast, and Deepdive) as Astro-Hook, Astro-Line, and Astro-Sinker. Eight years later, Ask Vector Prime would revisit Spacewarp, giving her a gender and a personality as a Decepticon adventurer. Her Mini-Con partners were all given new identities: Comettor became Foldspace, while the Space Mini-Con Team became the Interstellar Marauders Mini-Con Team (Boom Tube, Starburst, and Jump Drive). This Spacewarp is a different version that the one that hosted Spacewarp's Log. Sweeps is a new Mini-Con intern, from "ratings sweep". Sweeps gives some dire news to Andromeda.
Post 7, Rook, 2:31 PM: Serif is another new Mini-Con intern, with his name coming from the typography concept. He's inspired by the character of Sans from Undertale, as a pun on sans serif.
Post 8: Andromeda, 2:32 PM: Andromeda checks in with Rook.
Post 9, Rook, 2:32 PM: Rook calls Andromeda back the studio.
Post 10, Andromeda, 2:33 PM: Andromeda heads back to the studio.
Post 11, Rook, 2:34 PM: Rook tells views to stand by.
Post 12, Andromeda, 3:00 PM: It looks like, during the time between May and this post, Megatron succeeded opening a hole in the Shroud, albeit tiny. "Infosphere" is a neologism that was first documented in a Time Magazines article by R.Z. Sheppard, and later popularized by Alvin Toffler in his 1980 book, The Third Wave. The word was used in Dan Simmons' series of Hyperion novels to describe the evolved form of the Internet, and more jokingly in Futurama as the name of a massive sphere in space where floating brains tried to record all information in the universe.
Post 13, Rook, 3:01 PM: "Lead-oxidize" is the Transformer version of the saying "sugar-coat". Primax 308.0 Zeta is the world of the Henkei! Henkei! Visualize prose stories published in Japanese magazine Figure Ō.
Post 14, Andromeda, 3:14 PM: Aurex 503.21 Gamma is the world of the Panini Armada comic published in the United Kingdom. Gargent 1084.29 is the "second season" of Challenge of the GoBots as seen in Renegade Rhetoric. Iocus 214.24 Kappa is the world of the Battle Masters mobile game. Primax 1003.30 Kappa is the world of the Japanese Playstation 2 The Transformers video game.
Post 15, Rook, 3:23 PM: Aurex 503.01 Gamma is the world of the Linkage manga included with the Micron Legend DVDs. Iocus 606.0 Beta is the world of the Attacktix toyline. Primax 1087.09 Alpha is the world of The Headmasters cartoon's title sequence after the fourteenth episode, "Explosion on Mars!! Maximus Is In Danger", when the Video Challenger toy was incorporated into it. Primax 905.0 Beta is the world of the Binaltech Asterisk toyline. Primax 798.0 Gamma is the world of the Beast Wars II, Beast Wars Neo, and Beast Wars Metals mangas. Primax 785.13 Zeta is the world of the letters' page from the Marvel UK The Transformers comic. Tyran 609.22 Kappa is the world of the Burger King Transform Your Way website tying into Revenge of the Fallen. Viron 901.8 Alpha is the world of the 2001 Robots in Disguise cartoon.
Post 16, Rook, 3:24 PM: Viron 903.0 Beta is the homeworld of the yellow Sam's Club-exclusive Universe version of Robots in Disguise Optimus Prime, who serves on the Convoy as Ignition Prime.
Post 17, Andromeda, 3:32 PM: Primax 509.28 Epsilon is the world of the Wings Universe stories. Fornax 813.0 Gamma is the world of the online Kre-O manga. Malgus 1008.19 Gamma is the world of the Titan Magazine Animated comic publishined in the United Kingdom. Primax 1298.19 Alpha is the world of the theatrical Beast Wars II movie, Lio Convoy in Imminent Danger! Primax 109.0 Beta is the homeworld of the "Vibrant Red" version of the Alternity Optimus Prime toy. Primax 504.0 Gamma is the world of The Beast Within mini-comic and it's sequel, The Beast Within Part 2, Consequences, included with the Metrodome DVDs for "Season 2, Part 2" and "Seasons 3 and 4" of the Sunbow The Transformers cartoon; Ask Vector Prime said it had previously been destroyed, and this post will be corrected later. Primax 406.3 Eta is the world of the infamous Kiss Players radio drama.
Post 18, Rook, 3:37 PM: The entire Aurex Cluster has disappeared, containing the "Unicron Trilogy" realities.
Post 19, Andromeda, 3:57 PM: The Brainstorm seen here is the version native to Primax 716.21 Beta; this means he's the Brainstorm sold as part of the Titans Return "Titan Force" set sold at San Diego Comic-Con 2016, with his Titan Master partner Teslor, Sentinel Prime and his partner Infinitius, and Windblade. Brainstorm is based here on the IDW version of Brainstorm as he appears in More than Meets the Eye; Brainstorm inadvertantly helped created an alternate timeline in issue #38. Nemesis Prime is the Alternity character, who used to be the servant of Unicron from Universe; Aurex 304.0 Epsilon is the world of the MegaWing Galvatron instructions, published in the first and only issue of 3H Productions' Collectors' Club magazine. I've talked about the Hytherion from Alternity before. The description of an "omniversal entity" pruning down the multiverse to only realities it considers important feels like a bit of meta-commentary about Hasbro, ala Grant Morrison's commentary on the decisions behind Crisis on Infinite Earths in Animal Man.
Post 20, Rook, 4:08 PM: Afterburn was an original creator created for Titan Magazines' Animated comic, supposedly a super-cool member of the Elite Guard that was really a drone created by Megatron. Not sure what "flying mulligan" means; it might be some kind of terminology from golf? Afterburn was originally supposed to be an Animated incarnation of Sideswipe, but fan backlash saw his name changed.
Post 21, Rook, 4:33 PM: Malgus 1207.26 Alpha is the world of the Animated cartoon. Primax 905.22 Epsilon is the world of the BotCon 2005 storyline, "Descent into Evil". Primax 094.0 Beta is the world of the toys from the Generation 2 toyline released in 1994. Yayayarst 086.0 Beta is the world of the First Transformers toyline. Fornax 613.03 Alpha is the world of the online mini-series Kre-O: Think Like a Kreon. Primax 698.20 Theta is the world of the BotCon 1998 script reading, "Visitations"-I feel like it's meant to be the world of Shokaract's empire. The Cymond cluster is the group of realities that are made up of Takara and Tomy toylines that either are the predecessors to or related to Transformers.
Post 22, Rook, 4:36 PM: Rook issues a correction about The Beast Within universe. Primax 704.08 Gamma was the one destroyed. It's the world of Dreamwave's shortlived Beast Wars comic, which had only one story see publication, "Ain't No Rat", in the 20th Anniversary Transformers Summer Special.
Post 23, Andromeda, 4:41 PM: Breems are unit of time first mentioned in issue #17 of the Marvel The Transformers comic. The remaining universes are all ones that were either currently still seeing material published, or were important to then ongoing storylines. Primax 616.02 Kappa is the world of the Earth Wars mobile game. Primax 113.12 Gamma is meant to be Primax 113.23 Gamma, the world of the one-shot Mars Attacks: The Transformers comic published by IDW, which was given the wrong designation on TFWiki at the time. Primax 785.06 Alpha and the splinter streams refers to the Japanese Generation 1 cartoon timeline, which had been ongoing for over 30 years at that point. Primax 1005.19 Gamma is the world of IDW Publishing's comics, which were still ongoing at that point. Tyran 707.04 Delta is the world of the live-action Transformers movies; Transformers: The Last Knight was still upcoming at this point. Primax 514.3 Gamma is the world of IDW Publishing's Transformers vs. G.I. Joe maxi-series. Primax 706.05 Gamma is the world of the Hearts of Steel comic, which had been hinted to be returning in Revolutionaries at this point, though not in a way we'd expect. Uniend 911.05 Alpha is the world of the Prime, Rescue Bots, and 2015 Robots in Disguise cartoons; the latter two were still ongoing at this point. Rovio 914.25 Kappa is the world of the Angry Birds: Transformers mobile game, which is still ongoing, bafflingly. Primax 1114.26 Gamma is the world of the Functionist Universe seen in the pages of IDW Publishing's More than Meets the Eye. Primax 206.15 Gamma is the world of IDW Publishing's Beast Wars comic. Iocus 514.31 Gamma is the "Legends World" from the Legends manga. Primax -408.24 Epsilon is the world of Shattered Glass. The Quadwal cluster is our "real" reality.
Post 24, Rook, 5:02 PM: Rook's proposed "Cybertron-1 to Cybertron-14" classification scheme reference the way the multiverse of DC Comics is classified, with Earth-1, Earth-2, and so on.
Post 25, Rook, 5:16 PM: Now only the movies, the IDW comics, the "Aligned" cartoons, Shattered Glass, and the TransTech universe.
Post 26, Rook, 5:27 PM: Only movies and cartoons.
Post 27, Rook, 5:42 PM: "Are All Dead" refers to the iconic cover of Marvel's The Transformers issue #5, where the logo of the comic was combined with "Are All Dead", written by Shockwave on the wall, thus making the sentence "The Transformers Are All Dead". A sliver of hope...
Post 28, Andromeda, 5:47 PM: ...annnndd it turns out that ANN are dumbasses who caused a planet-wide panic because of some dumbass. Waspinator is a TransTech version of the Beast Wars character, who works as a janitor at Rhinox's institute. "Rhino-bot" is TransTech Rhinox. Rhinox was seen shutting off his screens in "Epilogue" in issue #72 of the Collectors' Club comic, and in "Epilogue Two", published in the Diamond edition of G.I. Joe vs Cobra #9, which hadn't yet seen publication yet when this was posted. The "All-Knowledge" was some kind of concept of multiversal knowledge mentioned in the Shattered Glass prose story, "Coalescence".
Post 29, Rook, 5:48 PM: Rook links to Andromeda's interview with Waspinator.
Post 30, Andromeda, 11:28 PM: Sigma Oracle is based on the Vector Sigma toy that would have been redecoed from the Micro Change MC-14 Metal Man/Beast Wars Eggbot toy included with Alpha Trion, one of ten proposed exclusives that were voted on as part of a contest in volume 1 of Transformers Generations 2014; Siren was the toy that ended up winning. Sigma Oracle is a new identity, obviously derived from Vector Sigma and the Oracle.
Posts 31-42, Rook, 11:57-11:59 PM: We prepare for the ball drop now. Trans-Cybertronia Celestial Tower appears to be a reference to the Celestial Spires from the Marvel UK The Transformers comics, taking the place of the One Times Square tower. Rook posts a series of posts with Cliffjumper counting down the seconds till the new year; this is in homage to both Sunbow The Transformers Cliffjumper's voice actor, Casey Kasem, having served as the disk jockey on America's Top 10, and Cliffjumper counting down the Autobot shuttle launch in The Transformers: The Movie. 10 is a screencap of Cliffjumper from the Fall of Cybertron video game. 9 is a screencap Animated Cliffjumper from the episode "Five Servos of Doom". 8 is a scan of the card included with the Tiny Titans Cliffjumper toy. 7 is a panel of Cliffjumper from issue #4 of All Hail Megatron, pencilled and inked by Guido Guidi and colored by Josh Burcham. 6 is a screencap of Prime Cliffjumper from "Darkness Rising, Part 1". 5 is a panel of Cliffjumper from issue #1 of Marvel's The Transformers, pencilled by Frank Springer, inked by Kim DeMulder, and colored by Nel Yomtov. 4 is a screencap of Cliffjumper from Sunbow The Transformers episode "The Ultimate Doom, Part 3". 3 is an image of Clffjumper from the Big Looker Storybook, The Great Car Rally, painted by Earl Norem. 2 is a panel of Cliffjumper from Spotlight: Cliffjumper, pencilled and inked by Robby Musso and colored by Joana Lafuente. 1 is a panel of Classics Cliffjumper from the BotCon 2008 "Shattered Glass" comic, pencilled and inked by Don Figueroa and colored by Espen Grundetjern.
January 1, Rook, 2017, 12:01 AM: A final goodbye with the robots who started it all. The image here is the five covers for the five paperback releases of the original 30 issues of the Club Magazine, starring all five Nexus Prime components (Skyfall, Landquake, Breakaway, Topspin, and Heatwave), along with other characters important to the storylines: Cybertron Vector Prime, OTFCC 2004 Sentinel Maximus, Universe Ramjet, Cybertron Dark Scorponok, Robots in Disguise Omega Prime, Cybertron Unicron, Cybertron Soundwave, Cybertron Perceptor, Classics Megatron, Classics Laserbeak, Classics Starscream, Classics Cliffjumper, Shattered Glass Alpha Trion, TransTech/Beast Wars Uprising Blackarachnia, TransTech Cheetor, TransTech Shockwave, Shattered Glass Aquarius, Shattered Glass Omega Doom, Shattered Glass Optimus Prime, and Shattered Glass Cyclonus and Krunix. Also sold as a lithograph at BotCon 2015, the piece was penciled and inked by Robby Musso, and colored by Jesse Wittenrich.
There was also a planned final post for the Editor's page, but it nver saw publication, for reasons I'll go into below.
Post 0: In the wake of this, and other similar incidents, I feel that I have no choice but to tender my resignation. I’ve been meaning to spend more time in my alt mode, a Magnafax Telecopier. There’s something just so satisfying about transmitting graphical information digitally…
Do not fear, viewers, the ANN Board of Directors has already selected a replacement. I’m sure that the Fever Dream of Primax 209.0 Gamma shall bring a powerful new focus and, er, UNIQUE vision to the hallowed halls of ANN.
Goodbye, faithful viewers. Though you shall not be hearing from me in the future, know that life goes on, here among the stars. It is a time of endings and renewals, and I for one look forward to it. Adieu.
So I presume the reason why this post never got published is because, putting it nicely, it's something of a diss to Fun Publications (the comapny which ran the Collector's Club from 2005 to 2016 and thus, the Facebook pages) along with some of its employees by Jim and some othrs. The Editor's alternate mode, a Magnafax Telecopier, is a Xerox brand of fax machines; Fun Publications faced considerate criticism/ridicule for continuing to use fax machines for sending in information in the 2010s. Fever Dream, meanwhile, was introduced just a few weeks earlier in the Beast Wars: Uprising story "Derailment", created by Jim Sorenson, David Bishop, and Christopher Colgin. A repurposing of the brown and red version of the original Blitzwing toy sold with Astrotrain in the Generations Platinum Edition toyline, he was characterized as the executive of Iacon Communications Services in that story, a deluded Decepticon who believed that "his version" of the truth was the most important, and who would have his employees report stories that were either inaccuate or flat-out made up. The main source of Fever Dream's personality was Pete Sinclair, the infamous editor at Fun Publications, who among other things was constantly interfering with Jim and other's stories with bizarre requests and stuff that contradicted their own work; most infamously, he claimed at one point in a note that there "are no Micromasters" in Beast Wars: Uprising...despite them having shown up in every prose story published to that point. Notably, Fever Dream was forcibly converted into a Vehicon in "Derailment"; this one is noted to hail from Primax 209.0 Gamma, which for years was the standard universal stream designation for Beast Wars: Uprising. The cipher text in the final story in the series, "The Inexorable March", retconned this, having the prose story series be a seperate universal stream called Primax 215.19 Epsilon (this time taking its designation from the publication of "Broken Windshields", and also using the proper "Epsilon" designation for club stories, rather than "Gamma," which is meant for comic stories). This seperated Jim and David Bishop's work from the earlier stories and profiles that didn't quite fit in with their works (though the majority of events were still similar, and "Alone Together" still happened the same way); evidently, this Fever Dream didn't fall to the same fate as his main counterpart.