Ooooh, interesting! I'm not familiar with any michael bay movies past number two, if the ladies get any actual development (hahahAHAHA), so by comics personalities, let's see. I'm still inclined to say Arcee is the best fit for him. Because a lot of this comes down to fearboner. Do all these ladies deserve a fearboner? Absolutely. But the fearboner has to have the right level of engagement and excitement, and it can't be TOO much, or things are going to go sour. Elita is too much fearboner. She's an unstoppable force, and she needs an immovable object, or she's going to run roughshod all over that poor sucker. I think softer relationships with her COULD work, but it would take a whole lot of slow burn and the person in question being REALLY removed from any power plays or politics going on for it to have any chance of success. She is just SO self-assured and demanding, and it's super hot, but Kaput doesn't seem like the kind of person to have boundaries that would hold up against that sort of nudging. Chromia on the other hand..... hmmmmm. She's the next best bet, after Arcee. But in a lot of ways, I kind of think she wouldn't care? She's pretty self-contained, and the parts of her that aren't self-contained are almost 100% focused on Windblade. We do see her slowly opening up and starting to engage, but a lot of that seems to be with people who are like her, fighting-type pokemon. Gah, words are hard today. She's conserving herself and engaging with things that are familiar, and isn't making a point of seeking out new experiences. And she's a more controlled type of dangerous than Arcee, but less OVERWHELMINGLY fearboner than Elita. Shitty analogy time! You're a mouse, chilling. Doing your mouse thing. Unicycle mouse. Chromia is the cat lying across the room, asleep, who looks up at you once, decides to ignore you, and goes back to sleep. Elita, if you catch her eye, that is the big predatory wild cat looming over you and looking at you with WAY too much attention oh god this is how it ends. Arcee is the cat who gets up and follows you, and she's maybe poking at you a little with her paw, and she... could eat you. It could definitely happen. She hasn't done it yet, but the way she's looking at you is JUST enough to be uncomfortable. And plus! Arcee would get some really nice things out of the relationship too. She's lonely and wants approval and friendship and wants to do a social, even if she struggles with knowing how to do a social. Kaput is chill, incredibly nonconfrontational, he seems to absorb a ton of bizarre medical requests without being at all unsettled. If she's not threatening violence AT him, and if she's not directly threatening violence at anyone near him, he seems to be pretty chill. And she's not that kind of dangerous, it's not like... Whirl posturing or anything like that to shove people away. Arcee wants to be friends. She feels dangerous and acts weird, but she wants to be friends. As long as she isn't being dangerous at him, Kaput can absorb a lot of weird without acting ruffled. He doesn't have that much of an agenda of his own, and he has no interest in putting himself in harm's way. He'd be nice and stable and chill, he doesn't seem like the kind of person to demand that she change herself, and I think it would be really nice for her. Honestly, if I had any interest in writing him or any idea how to shove them together, I think it could be pretty cute. (as long as the unicycle man doesn't prove himself to be untrustworthy, of course. but even then, arcee's Person used to be prowl. she can field a lot of sketchy revelations without even batting an eye)
oh hey, so I'm off on a prowl quest, and I found an interesting thing Given what we learned in TAAO about cold constructed dysphoria and unsettled sense of self and all that jazz, this is interesting. See also: his dependence on rules and his gravitation to black and white extremes, giving himself external structure. And see also: the way OP was all condescending and junk about how he thought Prowl was an ~open wound~ thanks to his past. I'm not thinking or speaking well enough for conclusions, but here's a pile of interesting tidbits that make me love my poor awful boy even more
so i got to thinking abt getaway today and wrote a sort of character study? i already posted this in my art thread but i guess it can go here too, in case anyones interested?
Spoiler: OP10 Yeah, I'm having a lot of trouble reconciling that Arcee with the Arcee we know. Like that one panel of Arcee with a fembot hanging off each arm. I'm going to have to go back through exRID to see if it actually looked like Arcee and Galvatron indicated any shared history. Also, that adds Arcee to the list of "really, really old".
Spoiler: OP 10 That's not Arcee, that's Galvatron. Arcee is the twin with the lighter face and slightly smaller build. Arcee is the one who's disturbed by the change in power and in the Thirteen painting themselves as divinely chosen, Galvatron is the one who loves a firm social order with himself on top instead of on the bottom. I think it makes sense given their later characterization. And makes their fights later really sad, such as Galvatron calling Arcee a freak because she's a woman.
Okay so re: the reveal in OP 10, there's some summarized stuff on Galvatron's page on the tfwiki that make a TON more sense with this in mind. Spoiler So that whole arc asked the question: why do Galvatron and Arcee ever work together, despite being diametrically opposed? Why are they written as such counterparts? Why does Arcee accept a 'compliment' from Galvatron that would drive her to literally murder anyone else? Why is Arcee so horrified when Optimus murders Galvatron, despite being a lean mean killing machine herself who had vowed to kill Galvatron or die trying? This issue gives us the answers: because they're twins and there's some love there even if there's no trust, because they are, because they're twins, because they're twins. Arcee knew Galvatron had to die and could accept that, but she also wanted to kill him herself as a proper send-off.
We've finally found the one thing Ramondelli draws amazingly... Spoiler: OP 10 Onyx Prime. Seriously, Onyx Prime looks GREAT in this style, and much better than anyone else? wtf??
Spoiler Suddenly, my deeply desired AU where Chromia and Arcee go hunting Liege Maximo together has SUCH fascinating possibilities, if Arcee is so very old...
Spoiler I know, right? I don't know what it is but Onyx Prime looks amazing. What a great monsterdude. Also man I had NOT realized that Arcee and Galvatron were both that old.
Spoiler: OP 10 It's also interesting because we can see the groundwork of what later ruins their relationship with Galvatron buying into the idea of a social order, but just not wanting to be on the bottom himself (and at this point, I assume not wanting Arcee down there, either, they clearly love each other). Meanwhile Arcee is a good fightgirl but is not really into the sort of lies and obfuscations that the Thirteen are engaging in, much less the idea of someone being better than others inherently. I fucking love that even this far back she was doing the 'fade into the shadows, watch stuff, fade out to drop some uncomfortable truths onto the lap of a higher ranking person' thing. Shadow Arcee is watching you make bad decisions and judging you, Alpha Trion. I wonder if Arcee and Galvatron were still on speaking terms when the Ark left Cybertron. I wonder if Arcee blames the Dead Universe for how Galvatron turned out. EDIT: My impression is she doesn't, since the bones for him having a huge boner for facism and Arcee knowing it is laid so early.
Spoiler: OP 10 am I the only one looking for a Deathsaurus/Onyx Prime link, now? this seems similar to the whole Pious Maximus/Fortress Maximus connection
Wait, shit- Spoiler: OP 10/OP 9 This really recontextualizes Arcee's stated regret for letting her brother get killed in front of her. We thought she was talking about old old business, something that went down pre-war. She wasn't. She's grieving Galvatron.
Spoiler: OP 10 Meanwhile OP hears this story and is like. 'I think I left my stove on -goes into deep hiding-'.
Spoiler: OP 10 Also I just realized that Alpha Trion is telling Pyra Magna all about the sham that is the divinity of the Thirteen Primes. Starscream and Optimus were already skeptics, but Pyra Magna is a true believer. How's this going to impact her? Will she just dismiss it?
Spoiler also holy shit I love Arcee, like, way to take the pink obligatory fembot and turn her into an epic-style tragic hero who's one of the oldest badasses in the setting who was apparently there for incredibly major plot events with connections to the guys even more important to the setting than Megatron and Optimus.
Spoiler: OP 10 also, Sideswipe is still super dead but he's on the active characters list p: hm. (BRING MY FAVE BACK. BRING HIM BACK.)
Spoiler: OP 10 Boy this issue sure helps explain why Arcee bonded to Sideswipe's comatose body so shortly after the death of her own brother, huh??????? EDIT: Actually I'm not sure of the timeline of Sideswipe's injury to when Galvatron died, and there's plenty of reasons Arcee liked Sideswipe. I more thing that the fact that Both Arcee and Sideswipe were extranged from their brothers helped her identify with him.
