Shitposty just-woke-up thinks Spoiler: the Dominus reveal If the Ambus twins are older than the war, considering certain corners of the fandom calling such old characters (Kup, Ratchet, etc) "grandpa", and given their altmode(s? Do we ever find out what Minimus' is?)... ...does that make Dominus Ambus a foxy grandpa?
Spoiler: more shitposting, does Magnus's identity still need spoips? ...wait oh my god how does the Magnus Armor work with altmodes Are the Enforcers altered to also be trucks? Is the Armor modified to match each new wearer's alt? Does the wearer transform at the same time as the Armor or do they have to double-transform? Could we see tiny Minimus in Magnus's cab or bed? Is Magnus in altmode a tiny truck in two larger truck trenchcoats? Eta: oh my god altered I'm keeping this pun for the next time someone gets a new altmode, thanks past me for being unintentionally brilliant
Spoiler The Magnus Armor has a distinct altmode from the wearer's, so no altmode modification necessary. I think Brainstorm gushes over that at some point. Minimus-in-one-trenchcoat turns into some sort of truck-thing anyway.
sickblogging more TFP Spoiler: s1e13 ooh ooh ooh Soundwave's on the preview for this one! robot hips remain absolutely beautiful, thank you based animators thooooooooose don't look like survivors "don't touch anything," Ratchet says, after having touched a corpse A+ doctor dad welp there's contagion have fun OP "cybonic plague" at least "cybercrosis" is only vaguely related to its organic counterpart :T knooooooock ooooout 8D obligatory "I'm in" guys come on I realize voice is easier for the cartoon format but is yelling over radio really the best option when you're on a stealth mission? oh my god what is this shadowplay bullshit this is hilarious beeeeeeeeee scream♠ko is still A++ Kaon D8 well. that's a fast-acting plague, how did it stay in stasis for so long? you can hear the "what the fuck??" in Bee's boops Smart Megs Is Smart somehow I don't think soundy's gonna buy your bullshitting, guys, much as I love the pitch team-up oh my god can no one say "dead" in this universe "What makes you think I would save the life of my oldest enemy?" YOU TWO ARE PITCH AS FUCK BRO GET OVER YOURSELF ALREADY I am going to murder my brother he's yelled over this conversation with megs and bee six times now Well. That ties things up nicely for Scream, but... man, poor Megs :c That is probably not the reaction I was supposed to have but [SHRUG] ooooooOOOOOOOOOOOO PLOT HOOK PLOT HOOK PLOT HOOK Spoiler: s1e14 wow they really couldn't leave that plot hook to simmer, could they? on the other hand, Raf(f?) and Ratchet are adorable on the preview card nooooo please tell me we're not going to do the "previously on" thing now :C beeeeeeeeee dammit megs man I still love the title sequence please don't tell me there's never been a backfire of this whole mnemosurgery "psychic patch" thing, at the very least you'd think Ratchet would know to be on the lookout for false-flashbacks and/or signs that the "traveler's" consciousness isn't properly/fully realigned with their frame :| ...then again, it is Con tech. Still. For it to have been outlawed, there had to be some instances of use in the past... you don't make rules about the unthinkable. scream. scream, baby, do you just monologue at (near-)corpses in every continuity, is that your Thing? KO, proving very well that Starscream has no situational awareness, I mean come on last episode's plot on the Con side was Soundwave has recording equipment everywhere, Screamer, are you okay? ...did I dream up someone else theorizing that Dark Energon has mind-altering properties and that's why Megs got so bad at planning? Because, uh. Count me in, Starscream seems a lot... more idiot-ball-carrier when he's holding it. (KO♠SS forever, KO popping in to remind him not to be such a fucking idiot.) ...at least Ratchet knows better than to question that. ...why is there a tracking device on the lens of a telescope oh jesus this is the most contrived subplot why Did we ever hear Raph's full name before? OHANA MEANS FAMILY AND FAMILY MEANS NOBODY GETS LEFT BEHIND there's no subplot of Ratchet blaming Raph for this and I am So Happy, thank you grump doctor ...Raph. Raph, baby, the fact that Bee's in there is probably the reason you weren't immediately splatted, I think being up in a vent is a best-case-scenario here Oh now you realize Ratch, why didn't you look for complications earlier? Like, yknow, the scan directly after he returned? yall seriously need a flier on your team like damn Ratchet. Ratchet, friend. Get some combat training, grump doctor, please. Ratch. Ratch it doesn't matter how dead the corpse is, DE will still rez it. Get the shiny away from BeeMeg (Beeg?) first. ...the idea of Delaware resurrecting anything is hilarious, remind me never to use that shorthand for Dark energon again Raph. Raph bb. You're not an action hero. oh this is some lovely framing, they've actually made Megs intimidating, this is lovely KO's first reaction is to pet his face, bb my peacock son ...did yall seriously never consider blastmining before like. A+ robots fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff I know it's a different continuity but I will never ever be happy to see Megs beating the shit out of Starscream [squirms uncomfortably] ...I know they said "feels like summer" but I really fuckin hope someone's got an insulated compartment somewhere, because once they leave the blast zone it's gonna go back to arctic temperatures and Raph's gonna die It just spontaneously hit me that no one ever makes a problem out of Bee's alternate communication or at least they haven't so far, save for Jack once when they were alone in a combat situation and Jack was panicking just fuckign love this bot protect the writers who let him be different without that difference being bad or funny Spoiler: s1e15 Skyquake, Skyquake... is that whatsisface what got rezzed however many episodes back? AU shenanigans, ho! [uncomfortable screaming] can we not with the abuse and the torture and the megscream interactions, Get Starscream Away From Megatron 2k16 (on the other hand, it is a nice nod to that one textbit with... whatsisname, Rotorstorm? The Academy kid Whirl beat up and put into one of the fancy new regen-tubes Because Reasons) scream. bb. ripping out your... IVs? Life support machine? is not a good way to recover ohey ko worried spade hurting spade :C SCREAMER THAT'S A BAD IDEA LET YOUR DOCTOR SPADE FIX YOU UP MAN DON'T SHOVE SPACE JIZZ INTO YOUR CHEST THE FLAMES ARE PRETTY BUT THIS REMAINS A REALLY BAD IDEA also, "symbiosis"? With, uh... with what, Screamer, this is, uh, this is sounding worse and worse all the kids are idiots forever, why am I surprised can we have an AU that's just Raf and Bee plx at least miko's good at climbing? "you cannot harm me" is just asking for something to happen, bro ...huh. crack theory: breaking the shard made its powers weaker. Don't stand by the engines portals when they're about to flout the laws of physics! "shadow zone" NERD ALERT IS RIGHT I CAUGHT THAT YUGIOH REFERENCE RAF scream :c HELP I'M HAVING FEELINGS ABOUT KO♠STARSCREAM Spoiler: s1e16 The summary says they have to rescue Breakdown and if KO isn't helping I will be A Sad where is this magical volcanic post-apoc setting, I must know oh noooooo (out of nowhere, from the title sequence: Megs' design is really pretty) soundwave exists entirely as a visual prop, fucks off when scream starts monologuing A+ oh nooooooo KO's not gonna be allowed to go after his husband D8 Russia! Post-apoc volcanic town is in Russia! Looks liiike somewhere in central Kamchatka? Which is a very volcanic region, so A++ researchers! [Gets derailed looking for Which Volcano] Guesstimating given the two seconds of map we get from Ratchet and the locations of Kamchatka volcanoes, probably Kizimen? Which was indeed erupting in the late 2010s through 2013ish! man I love when the research team does their job :D ...well, that was twenty minutes of my life I'll never get back, I'm good at focus, let's get back to Space Robots ...oh my fucking god if I'd listened for another five seconds they fucking named the thing fucking kill me (On the other hand "its volcano" singular? Fowler, I am disappoint. Also "mostly abandoned" my ass, at last census the peninsula alone had ~322k people living on it (the Kamchatka peninsula being part of the larger Kamchatka Krai, which has some territory further into "mainland" Russia). There were some evacuations around Kizimen's Red status days, yes, but it wasn't abandoned by any means.) ...someone stop the Nerding thank you for being a decent Prime, OP. The Cons are Cybertronian too :c aaaaaAAAAAAA WHAT IS IT WITH TRANSFORMERS AND BODY HORROR arcee what the fuck is that pose you're gonna go ass over teakettle if you shoot like that BULKHEAD NO (also, bulkhead♠breakdown, help, I'm falling further into the hole) aaaaaaadfgklnpuina again with the eye horror I Cannot this reads a lot like the mess with Sunny and... whoever the fuck was doing Headmasters 2.0 in the Earth series, honestly :c "Autobots wouldn't come to rescue me" Breakdown says this like Decepticons would, which makes me wonder who he was expecting :c (KO GO SAVE YOUR HUSBAND DAMMIT) yep. fuck. I'm in the dumpster, time to add another spade to the shipping wall. corpses are the best projectiles SCREAM SCREAMER BABY I WAS NOT EXPECTING THIS ..."commanding officer A orders subordinate B to kill B's kismesis" must be a component in so many troll romance movies Project Chimera, huh? This doesn't sound like it's heading for Headmasters at all :| [/sarcasm] Spoiler: s1e17 oooooooo airachnid's back! And making skeevy deals but [SHRUG] there she go, living up to the beastformer reputation :| like seriously, girl, I know your decoration options are limited, but did you have to go the cliche "web-festooned canyon" route? well at least there's one good parent in this show, the bots really shouldn't be raising kids jack buddy the easiest solution is to say the motorcycle got stolen, when you come home on the normal bike Arcee will obviously not be with you and honestly she's pretty enough it's believable aaaaaaaand now your mom thinks you're delusional, A+ jack THAT ESCALATED QUICKLY "man up already" well, at least we know one bit of human culture airachnid's learned :|| oooooooooh that was a lovely frame, beautiful composition weLP at least she's a good mom Spoiler: s1e18 okay I clicked the "next episode" button and then went to eat lunch so I've actually completely forgotten what the hap is supposed to fucken Adventure™ "Metal Attraction" I know they won't do an episode about robot romance. But this sounds like the title of an episode about robot romance. Jack's mom is like the only person who calls Ratchet "doctor" and now it's bothering me RESPECT GRUMP DOCTOR "I wore heels and everything" NEVERMIND THIS EPISODE IS 100% ABOUT INTERSPECIES ROMANCE I am so glad they didn't just gloss over the loss of Breakdown's eye between episodes like they did with Scream's arm mom vs stepmom, oh no AIRACHNID WAT D8 (why does bulkhead exist to get beaten now. why this. let this con rest.) "helicopter mom" could be so hilariously literal with transformers ...wait WHIRL AS HELICOPTER MOM 2K16 arcee :c airachnid is missing a SIGNIFICANT NUMBER OF LEGS wait I lie she's just in rootmode daaaaaamn son that's a fun toy Miko's tagline may as well be "but have you considered 'Miko YES'?" like seriously why do they ever try to stop her anymore oh my god this is such a stupid plot but it's beautiful Miko doesn't ship Arcee/Bulk :c Raf in the corner like "I like you" oh jesus aaaaand again: with all the helicopters Fowler plays with, none of the Autobots have scanned a flight-capable alt yet? :| Goddamn welp. Cons are nothing if not resourceful. Spoiler: s1e19 As far as I can tell from the snippet, this episode is literally "let's lock them in a closet until they kiss play nice and escape together via Power Of Friendship" this is gonna be great "Unbelievable." "Have you met her?" Thanks, Jack, for being the audience stand-in. on the one hand, scream and megs landing in unison to dramatic music is a badass entrance, v intimidating, 10/10 would coo over villains again on the other hand, scream and megs in the same space Scream looks and sounds so scared, like. bb bb no :C he's probably not here to try and murder you again with 0 witnesses (also, dude, maybe the ex-miner knows a little more than the bird about mining operations, let him take a look) scared scream :C every time megs and scream are in the same frame I am. so uncomfortable. protect this bird. (also, A+ animation, making a giant space robot somehow look frail, the size difference and composition between scream and megs is beautiful. painful, but beautiful.) The fact that megs would rather go after a retreating starscream than the enemy actively attacking him is. A little worrying. For many reasons. bulkhead playing meat metalshield :c Scream :C SCREAM ESCAPED :D scream. bb. stop monologuing to corpses, only soundwave can hear and he happens to have a Thing for Megs. The fact that Starscream thinks he has literally nowhere to escape to from Megatron is... well, he's probably not wrong, but. :c Someone help this bird "that could come in handy," jack says, about alien (enemy) equipment he's never seen before, can't read any labels of, and almost certainly doesn't know how to drive bulk dadding miko :c ...yknow, between bulkhead and whirl, maybe I just have a thing for ex-Wreckers doing the parent thing Jack conveniently knows how Decepticon mining equipment works, even though he's never seen anything like it before :| [drills into megs' face] WRONG ROOM WRONG ROOM Maaaan, it's been a while since Scream was able to be a fun villain instead of a chewtoy :3c you menace the tiny, scream, you do that JACK YA JINXED IT ...I'm sorry but I want that whine on a soundboard for entirely different reasons SCREAM DDD8 I AM INCREASINGLY UNCOMFORTABLE WITH SCREAM AND MEGS BEING ANYWHERE NEAR EACH OTHER (also, I feel like that last scene was supposed to be intimidating-- and it kind of was, bc of scream's reactions-- but Megs' eyes were going in different directions the whole time and it kind of ruined the mood) Spoiler: s1e20 "Starscream decides he would rather team up with the Autobots" YES PLEASE ESCAPE MY BIRDSON GO GO GO ...I love Soundy but this looks uncomfortably like "reeducation" :c oh nooooo is this cliffy's grave :c "Your chosen mode lacks... thrust." [inappropriate snickering] STARSCREAM WEARS PUPPY EYES SO WELL I'M SAD NOW I know I've said it before but I'm so glad this version of OP has some grasp of things like "mercy" and "redemption" Starscream for Obligatory Villain-Turned-Ally-via-Power-of-Friendship 2k16 even that's better than watching him get kicked around by Megatron Prime. Buddy. I love Arcee but she has a temper, leave Bee and take her if you want to keep party composition to two tanks and a scout. hot damn scream oh my god children is this really the time BEE BEE U SNEAKY LIL SHIT ILU ALL THE FUCKIGN PUPPY EYES IN THIS EPISODE HOT DAMN BEE BB ...well. At least Scream's officially off the radar, if both sides think he went to the other FLY MY BIRDSON FLYYYYYY
OK so I have been reading more of the comics and just got to issue 16 and am VERY SAD ABOUT EVERYTHING. And then @Petra made me MORE sad. >:{ but i am informed i also need to find a version of the text story for that issue talking about HOW Drift told Rodimus he was responsible? Anyone have caps?
hold off on that one until issue 21!! i posted the caps a couple months ago, i will link them in the morning (⋈=.=)°* z z z edit: okay, here is the prose story!! wait until after 21 though!!
Robots in Disguise is the main serial (and has a lot of good Starscream stuff prior to Dark Cybertron) but it's pretty slow. I like it, but it's more politically motivated than anything. Windblade v1 is a good standalone, but after the Sarah Stone issues, it weaves in with exRID again, so for best understanding you'll have to read both. TAAO picks up at the off end of Winblade v2 and exRID issue... 47 I wanna say? My reading order was MTMTE 1-22 => exRID 1-22 => Dark Cybertron => MTMTE through current => Windblade v1 => exRID through Combiner Wars => Combiner Wars => Windblade v2 => exRID through current => Til All Are One. That's the most chronological way to go through it, but not necessarily the most... sensible?
Also I jumped right into dark cybertron without reading RiD and it was fine. Then I later read RiD after finishing MTMTE and read it again. You get more from it if you've read both, BUT you don't need to break flow from MTMTE if you don't wanna.
Well I untangled almost the entire continuity here in Puni's thread, with the most comprehensive reading order I could manage (though it's a little outdated now). But my personal recommendation your first time through is to skip Dark Cybertron and consume ALL THE MTMTE. The writing in DC is not great, and the plot is really hard to follow unless you know what Shockwave has been fucking around with since back in phase one. As far as plot elements that tie back to mtmte continuity... You'll miss a tiny bit of backstory for a grumpy old man joining the crew (which is mostly explained in mtmte proper), the triumphant return of a dead character you would only know was dead if you read phase one, and Nautica, who barely got to do anything in DC anyways. I skipped DC and barreled through mtmte, and I really enjoyed the ride and never had to dump my momentum.
Yeah DC introduces Nautica and Windblade and Chromia but so many things are going on it only really intros them. Just know that while everything was going to hell because 'emotionless' doesn't mean 'won't kill you', they kinda bumbled into contact with the lost colony of Caminus.
