Balance

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You must watch Book 4 of The Legend of Korra.
"Balance" よみがえった巨大神 () (Yomigaetta Kyodaishin) "The Revived Giant God"
Production company	TV Aichi, We've, Tōkyū Agency
Airdate	August 20, 2005 (Japanese) April 15, 2006 (English)
Writer	Hiro Masaki
Director	Mitsuru Kawasaki, Kenji Setō (asst. dir.)
Animation studio	GONZO
Continuity	Unicron Trilogy cartoon continuity

Primus speaks, and ancient history is revealed, as is the location of the fourth and final Cyber Planet Key.

Synopsis

Surprisingly enough, there was never a Takara-made Lucky Draw toy of this.

Cybertron has transformed into the body of Primus, the Autobots have returned to its (his?) surface to try and communicate with their creator directly. While Jolt, Coby, Wing Saber and Jetfire survey from above, the other Autobots set up the necessary machinery, hooking up Jolt to the system on the basis that he was the one who channelled Primus in the past. The equipment is turned on, and as Optimus invokes Primus, Jolt glows golden and begins to float, and Primus begins to speak through him. Primus explains the history of the black hole to his children, detailing how good and evil must always be in balance. The destruction of the ultimate evil, Unicron, has disrupted that balance, distorting space and time and creating the black hole. Bud has trouble grasping the concept of balancing forces, so Coby illustrates it to him with a coin.

Primus goes on to explain that only he can close the black hole, but that his spark must be fully restored first by placing all four Cyber Planet Keys and putting them in the Omega Lock. Alas, the Autobots only have three Keys so far, and as Hot Shot points out, even the Decepticons have not been able to locate the fourth, and they have the Planet Map. Primus answers their request for information indirectly, by first telling them of the space bridge project carried out by the ancients. Four great starships, including the Atlantis, were sent out in to the universe, each carrying a Cyber Planet Key, but the entire planetary system that the fourth colony ship departed for was caught in a wormhole and transported to another universe, which is why no-one has yet been able to locate the fourth Key. Primus's energy levels begin dropping (a consequence of Starscream's earlier absorption of much of his power), and before the god drifts back into slumber, he names the fourth planet: Gigantion, home world of Safeguard and the Recon Mini-Con Team!

Unbeknownst to any of the Autobots, this divine wisdom has all been eavesdropped on by Sideways. He warps away, departing Cybertron and rematerializing in a shadowy, unknown location, where lies the body of Starscream, who Sideways spirited away after his defeat at the hands of Optimus Prime. Starscream awakens, and is greeted by Sideways, who assures him that things have just gotten very interesting indeed.

Thunderblast likes to watch.

Back on Cybertron, the Autobots ask Jolt for the location of Gigantion, but the Mini-Con is, alas, unable to answer their question. He and Vector Prime explain that the Mini-Cons were accidentally launched into space aboard a shuttle when they were playing hide-and-seek in it, and were found and saved by Vector Prime. Red Alert thinks he can dig data on Gigantion's location out of Jolt's memory banks, though Jolt is not thrilled about the prospect of having his brain looked into.

In the field of debris surrounding Cybertron, Scourge looks at the transformed body of Primus, and offers up a brief eulogy for Megatron before turning to the other Decepticons and announcing that he is their leader now. Naturally, everyone starts fighting over who should take leadership, save for Thunderblast, who ducks behind an asteroid. As the one-sided battle rages, with Scourge thoroughly stomping the other Decepticons, Starscream and Sideways fly by overhead, and Thunderblast looks up at them, musing that maybe leaving Starscream was a mistake...

RAAAAAAIIIID?!

Back on Cybertron, Red Alert is scanning Jolt, and makes the surprising discovery that his brain is more like that of a human than a Transformer (that explains why Jolt and other Mini-Cons communicates with children that easily), which means it will take longer to analyze. The scan is halted by the sound of an alarm, alerting our heroes to the approach of Starscream and Sideways, who land on the planet with the intention of taking the Omega Lock. The Autobots mobilize quickly, and Optimus and Wing Saber combine into Sonic Wing Mode, and the other Decepticons soon arrive to join the fight. Using the Decepticons' arrival as a distraction, Starscream jets away with the deluded intention of finishing off Primus, and fires his cannons right at the deity's face. Much to the shock of the assembled combatants, Primus's hand moves, blocking the shots, then swatting Starscream away. Starscream keeps trying to attack Primus, causing everyone observing the fight to doubt his sanity, while Scourge avails of everyone's preoccupation to attack Optimus and begin another round of fighting. This is, again, short-lived, as everyone stops fighting to marvel as Primus unsheathes a pair of colossal cannons to knock Starscream well and truly out of the fight. Hit dead-on by the cannon blast, Starscream is hurled away, and drops the Planet Map straight into the hands of the waiting Vector Prime.

Elsewhere on the surface, Ransack and Crumplezone are sneaking around, trying to get a good position to shoot somebody in the back. Just then, a cluster of Scrapmetal suddenly attack, and Crumplezone is swarmed by the insect-bots. Much to Ransack and Thundercracker's horror, Crumplezone is buried beneath the Scrapmetal and destroyed when they cause his body to explode. The odds against them, the other Decepticons start beating a retreat, but are stopped cold when, floating in the sky above them, the ghostly shadow-image of the deceased Megatron appears!

And in the Autobot base, the kids react to Megatron's reappearance, with Coby responding very badly to Bud's suggestion that Megatron is a ghost. Then, they realize that the Mini-Cons are missing...because Sideways has warped into the building, and has nabbed them! The enigmatic 'bot warps away, but the kids leap into his warp-field before it dissipates, and reappear, floating in zero-gravity, in an unknown location...

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans	Others
Jolt (1) Wing Saber (3) Jetfire (4) Vector Prime (6) Scattorshot (7) Red Alert (8) Optimus Prime (9) Hot Shot (12) Leobreaker (13) Landmine (14) Evac (15) Snarl (16) Crosswise (17) Override (18) Reverb (19) Six-Speed (20) Safeguard (21)	Starscream (23) Scourge (24) Thundercracker (25) Ransack (26) Crumplezone (27) Thunderblast (28) Megatron (30)	Coby Hansen (2) Lori (10) Bud Hansen (11)	Primus (5) Sideways (22) Scrapmetal (29)

Quotes

"He's the creator! We're standing on him with our dirty feet!"
"I sure hope we don't get smited for this!"

—Leobreaker and Landmine

"Optimus Prime, you and the Autobots defeated the evil Unicron."
"We kicked his planet-eatin' butt is what we did!"

—Primus and Leobreaker

"Now hold steady. You may feel a slight sting but don't worry."
"Gu-huh?"
"I'm fairly certain I can put you back together again..."
"GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

—Red Alert and Jolt

[after being knocked away by Primus's hand]
"That wasn't...so...bad...*recovers and transforms* Ha! Very interesting. This might actually be half a challenge! And I HATE a challenge!"

—Starscream is disturbingly confident in attacking the creator of Transformerkind.

"Hey! Put the Mini-Cons down!"
"Ooh, I'm so scared of you I think I'll run away! See ya!"

—Coby fails to intimidate the Mini-Con-swiping Sideways

Notes

Differences with Galaxy Force

• As originally conceived, the storyline of this series was always supposed to involve the black hole forming as a result of Unicron's destruction at the end of Transformers: Energon. But when the Japanese production of the cartoon wound up splitting Galaxy Force off into its own universe, unconnected to Energon, Unicron's hand in its events was downplayed to the point of almost total excision. This episode is the closest Galaxy Force comes to mentioning him, when it explains that the black hole's formation is the result of an unnamed "evil god" (邪神 jashin) haing been sealed away by a previous bearer of the Matrix. As part of its efforts to retcon the series back into continuity with Energon, Cybertron explicitly identifies Unicron by name. Notably, the booklet included with the Japanese DVD release of this episode also explained that the "evil god" was Unicron, and provided a detailed recounting of the legend of his and Primus's long war.
• Galaxy Force sees Sideways offer up a more thorough explanation for Megatron's demise in the previous episode. See, he was hit with a blast from the Cyber Planet Keys, which are designed to bring life to planets, which is to say, to create something from nothing, so, like, that means they can... also... make nothing... from... something... and... that's why Megatron's dead? Yeeeah, Cybertron sticks to its guns of him just being blown up because he got blasted.

Animation or technical errors

• At Autobase, Wing Saber asks the Mini-Cons about their being adrift in space with Evac's voice.
• As Scourge decides to "throw" the other Decepticons into action, he speaks in his robot mode voice, despite being in dragon mode.
• Conversely, when Thundercracker calls Scourge to tell him they should run away (having witnessed Crumplezone's death at the claws of a Scrapmetal swarm), Scourge replies using his deeper dragon mode voice, even though he's in robot mode.
• When Thunderblast starts running, though Evac is in the scene, he seems to be talking with Wing Saber's voice, a reversal from before. Of course, we don't see his face, so maybe Wing Saber's off-camera.

Continuity or plotting errors

• Sideways has never left a visible residual warp field behind him when he has teleported before, only doing so now because the plot demands it.
• Primus references the Autobots' defeat of Unicron. "We kicked his evil butt is what we did!" says Leobreaker... despite not actually being there when it happened.

Continuity notes

• Jolt previously acted as a conduit for Primus in "Trap".
• Jolt casually mentioned that he and the Mini-Cons weren't originally from Cybertron in "Revelation".
• As Starscream and Sideways approach Primus, the latter quips that someone seems to have stolen much of the god's spark already. Starscream himself is behind this, having absorbed a portion of Primus's power during his time on Earth. He'll steal even more in a later episode.
• Megatron was destroyed in the previous episode.
• Coby's fear of ghosts and other creepy things was established back in "Speed".
• The Autobots and kids retreat under a protective dome forcefield, first seen in the previous episode, probably to protect the kids from Cybertron's foreign atmosphere, although this hasn't been explicitly stated.
• As seen in the previous episode, the Omega Lock, now blown up to gargantuan proportions and apparently fused to Primus's back, is still missing the three Cyber Planet Keys that had previously been found and installed.

Transformers references

Splunge for me, sir!

• In glowing gold and floating as he acts as a conduit for Primus, Jolt recalls Emirate Xaaron doing the same thing from the original Marvel Comics series.
• So the red force represents good, and the purple force represents evil, hm? A nod to the colors of the Autobot and Decepticon faction sigils, perhaps? Naaaaaaaaaaaah, coincidence, surely.
• The "wise elders" shown use the animation models of Generation 1's Optimus Prime, Rodimus Prime, Ultra Magnus and Jazz (although Jazz would appear to have shoulder-doors, which he didn't in the original 'toon. His original toy, however, does have them).
• Starscream never knows when to quit.

Trivia

"Normaltion" doesn't have that same "oomph".

• Gigantion, as it appears in this flashback, is way smaller than in later "present day" episodes. This would indicate (though it's never stated explicitly) that Gigantion's super-sizing occurred after it was pulled into the alternate universe.
• The "Mini-Con brains are more like humans" bit — intentionally or not — recalls the Armada cartoon, where humans and Mini-Cons are linked together, which is elaborated on a bit more in the "Linkage" mini-comics. In the Armada cartoon, Mini-Cons acquired souls and free wills thanks to an encounter with three time-displaced human children. The reason for the Mini-Con's human-like brains in Cybertron will be expanded on (very vaguely) in later episodes.
• This episode was the last to premiere on Cartoon Network's Toonami block, and the last episode broadcast for several months. When the series returned after a five-month hiatus, it was relegated to the 6am slot on the channel, where it would premiere new episodes daily until the series ended.
• This episode would later be combined with "United", "Cybertron", and "Darkness" to create the TV "movie" special, "Primus Unleashed".
• While many animated series avoided the third rail of writing religion into the fabric of their backstory, both Galaxy Force and, more amazingly, Cybertron retained this aspect, each with characters referring to Primus as "Creator" and worrying about receiving divine retribution for disturbing him.
• Crumplezone has been blasted, pounded, beaten senseless, run over, and flattened like a pancake. Twice. To have him give up the ghost after a few seconds of being swarmed by Scrapmetals is remarkable to say the least.

Home video releases

All releases listed are in English audio unless otherwise noted.

DVD

2006 — Transformers: Galaxy Force — Vol. 09 (Victor Entertainment) — Japanese audio only.
2008 — Transformers: Cybertron — The Ultimate Collection (Paramount)
2014 — Transformers: Cybertron — The Complete Series (Shout! Factory)