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The Stage of Battle is the 2nd War... Beast Wars, Maximize!!

Beast Wars II: Super Lifeform Transformers catalog story
You have NO idea how much strife this one little catalog story has caused.
"The Stage of Battle is the 2nd War... Beast Wars, Maximize!!" 闘いの舞台は2 (セカンド)戦争... ...ビーストウォーズ、変身!! (Tatakai no Butai wa Sekando Sensō...Bīsuto Wōzu, Henshin!!)
First published	Spring 1998
Continuity	Its own (see "Continuity" below)
Packaged with	Spring 1998 Japanese Beast Wars toy releases

New leaders are appointed as a new war begins.

Synopsis

While Optimus Primal and Megatron are off fighting their own life-or-death struggle, a new conflict, the "2nd War", is about to unfold on a planet within a star system located in a remote part of the galaxy. The participants of this conflict are members of the heroic Maximal Space Guard and the evil Predacon Armored Corps, respectively. Their battle is fought over a mysterious weapon hidden in ancient ruins of the planet, a weapon known as the "Great King of Angolmois". It is said that the victor of this conflict, be it Maximal or Predacon, will be decided in the seventh month of the Cosmic Year 1999.

The leaders of both sides of this new conflict are introduced by each of their immediate predecessors. Megatron introduces Galvatron as the New Emperor of Destruction, and recalls a time when, back on Cybertron, the two once disagreed over how to conquer the universe. This led to a fight between the two, in which Galvatron bested Megatron after catching him off guard. Though he now acknowledges Galvatron's ambition and his care for those under his command, Megatron also begrudgingly admits that Galvatron may hold enough dignity to succeed him as Emperor.

Meanwhile, Optimus Primal introduces the new Maximal leader, Lio Convoy, who was originally an ace in the Maximal Space Guard. Optimus notes that he is strong, valiant, and even kind, but also, admittedly, a bit too frank at times. Nevertheless, Optimus considers him to be an ideal leader, and remains hopeful that he can count on Lio Convoy to do all that he can to help maintain peace throughout the universe.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Maximals	Predacons
Optimus Primal (3) Lio Convoy (4)	Megatron (1) Galvatron (2)

Quotes

Galvatron: "Your time is over, Megatron!"

Lio Convoy: "Please leave it to me! Optimus, sir!!"

Continuity

This catalog story was originally written for the express purpose of explaining the premise of the then-upcoming Japanese-original series Beast Wars II, which had been created to fill the gap left by the delayed Japanese release of the second and third seasons of the American Beast Wars cartoon. Once the first season had finished airing, it would be succeeded by the Beast Wars II animated series, along with an accompanying manga series published by Comic BomBom. This little story was released about a month ahead the Beast Wars II cartoon's debut, and attempted to explain just how Beast Wars II was supposed to fit into the continuity of the American Beast Wars cartoon.

Timeframe

This didn't happen.

As described above in the Synopsis, it is stated that Beast Wars II is set concurrent to the Beast Wars fought between Optimus Primal and Megatron on what was, at the time, not yet revealed to be prehistoric Earth (in Japan, the planet was instead known as "Energoa" prior to its reveal as Earth). But, it was not initially made clear if this meant it took place during the same timeframe as the Beast Wars (since the time travel aspect had not yet been confirmed in the Japanese dub) or if took place in the far future timeframe that Optimus Primal and Megatron's crews had originally come from before traveling back in time to prehistoric Earth. Needless to say, the latter became the most widespread interpretation once it was made clear on both sides of the Pacific that the American Beast Wars cartoon was set on Earth in prehistoric times. Additional support for this interpretation came from the setting Beast Wars II itself, Gaia—a post-apocalyptic planet overrun by plant and wildlife—which bore a strong resemblance to Earth (with the manga making even more explicit hints to the planet's identity by featuring city ruins that heavily resembled Tokyo). The manga even featured guest appearances by Optimus Primal that depicted him as native to the timeframe of Beast Wars II. This notion even bled back over into some American media, with the Beast Wars toy bio for Transmetals 2 Cybershark alluding to the Beast Wars II Seacons as his contemporaries, while the Beast Machines bio for Dinobots Magmatron positioned the events of Beast Wars Neo as having occurred before Beast Machines.

By the thirty-sixth episode of Beast Wars II, it was revealed that Gaia's ancient inhabitants hadn't lived on the planet for several tens of thousands of years, which placed Beast Wars II that far into the future. Conversely, the thirteenth episode of the American Beast Wars cartoon stated that the cast of that show originally hailed from only three centuries into the future. However, the specific "three centuries" line from the English version had actually been omitted from the Japanese dub of the episode, so there was no contradiction there. That said, a few discrepancies did eventually begin to crop up in the immediate sequel series to Beast Wars II, Beast Wars Neo. Namely, Beast Wars Neo opened with explicit confirmation that the Maximals and Predacons were at war with each other, and had been for some time, while in the first episode of the American cartoon, Optimus Primal stated that the Maximals and Predacons were instead at peace with each other, and had been for centuries (this line was kept faithfully in the Japanese dub). Likewise, the supercomputer Vector Sigma was shown to be a known public figure on Cybertron, residing in a tower as the highest authority on the planet. By contrast, the first episode of the American Beast Wars sequel series Beast Machines showed that Vector Sigma had long ago evolved into a new form called the Oracle, and presented it as a long lost legend hidden deep within the planet (though, to be fair, since Beast Wars Neo was made first, there was no way the Japanese production staff could have predicted the future developments of Beast Machines).

Optimus Primal and Megatron

This didn't happen either.

Besides the timeframe discrepancies, there were other factors that ended up contradicting this catalog story's depiction of Optimus Primal and Megatron. The two are presented here as Maximal and Predacon authority figures in positions of power that allow them to appoint other individuals with official titles of leadership; Optimus in particular is treated as Lio Convoy's senior officer. This is in stark contrast to how, in the English version of Beast Wars, Optimus was merely the captain of a science vessel, while Megatron was, indeed, originally perceived as the main leader of all Predacons in the cartoon's first season, but changes made during the show's second season revealed that he was instead a wannabe tyrant with delusions of grandeur, and was considered a criminal on Cybertron even by his own people (but, like the Vector Sigma contradiction, there was no way the Japanese could have predicted what the second season would change after the first season). Nonetheless, the first-season depiction of Megatron as a true leader likely influenced the depictions of Predacon leaders Galvatron and Magmatron in Beast Wars II and Neo, respectively. Both were the captains of their own spacefaring vessels, were known by all as fearsome emperors, and answered to no higher authorities within the Predacon ranks. This stood in contrast to how, later in Beast Wars, the Tripredacus Council was revealed to be the true head of government for the Predacons, with Megatron being labeled a dangerous renegade.

The early Japanese depiction of Optimus Primal and Megatron as high-ranking Maximal and Predacon leaders seems to have stemmed from an early perception of the two that originally pegged them as being the same characters as their Generation 1 namesakes, Optimus Prime and Megatron. When the original Beast Wars toyline started up in 1996, the earliest toy bios and pack-in comic presented the Maximals and Predacons on present-day Earth and as just Autobots and Decepticons having been upgraded by "Bio-Genetic Engineering". While this idea was dropped when the Beast Wars cartoon came along, it seems Takara hadn't quite gotten the memo over in Japan, as the earliest Japanese toy bios for Optimus and Megatron were based on their earliest American toy bios, with both giving them the lofty titles of "Supreme Commander" and "Emperor of Destruction" just like their namesakes. Optimus Primal was even given the same Japanese name as Optimus Prime, "Convoy", and his toy bio treated him as if he was the same Convoy of old. Special Japanese-only redeco toys even mentioned a "trailer truck" and a "Walther P-38" as having been Primal and Megatron's previous altmodes. Likewise, the Maximal and Predacon factions themselves were given the same Japanese names as those of the Autobot and Decepticon faction, being "Cybertron" and "Destron", respectively, in a seeming attempt to remove as much distinction between the two sets of factions as possible.

This perception even appeared to bleed over into other Japanese Beast Wars media: The third chapter of the Beast Wars II manga featured a short bio for Optimus Primal that described him as "A fierce fighter who has fought against the Destron army for thousands of years." And when he later guest-starred in the Beast Wars II movie, he was depicted as a "legendary Supreme Commander" that everyone knew and was in awe of, complete with his own Matrix. That same movie also had Galvatron refer to a "Megatron" as "the greatest and most vicious legendary Transformer in history." But, it was never clarified if this grandiose description was in reference to Generation 1 or Beast Wars Megatron... likely because, at the time, the movie treated the two as if they were the same person, just as it seemed to do for Optimus (Although, when Lio Convoy and Optimus Primal first interacted with each other in the movie, Lio Convoy at one point asks "Please forgive me. But, who are you?" when looking directly at Optimus, casting some doubt over whether they actually knew each other beforehand like this catalog story claimed).

BUT, within the Japanese dub of the Beast Wars cartoon's first season itself, this perception was not the case. While the dub did insert references to Optimus being a Supreme Commander and Megatron being Emperor of Destruction, the dub was more or less accurate on the matter to the original English version. The two were never described as being the same characters as their Generation 1 namesakes, and even when the Decepticon Starscream made his famous guest appearance, the episode's Japanese dub made it even more explicit than the English version that Megatron had no familiarity with him at all. Consequently, this show of restraint by the dub turned out to be fortuitous in the long run, as the later two seasons of the series made it abundantly clear that Optimus Primal and Megatron were completely separate individuals from Optimus Prime and the original Megatron.

The Great King of Angolmois

One last contradiction in this catalog story is the fact that it refers to a "weapon" called the "Great King of Angolmois" (アンゴルモアの大王 Angorumoa no Daiō) that lies within ancient ruins of the planet. In both the cartoon and manga, it was instead a lava-like substance called "Angolmois Energy". Evidently, this was an early concept for the main plot device that was to be fought over by the forces of Lio Convoy and Galvatron, and even made it into the bio for Megastorm's toy; bios for later toys would instead reflect the cartoon and manga by referring to "Angolmois Energy".

Interestingly, the concept of a powerful weapon hidden deep within ancient ruins on Earth would later be recycled wholesale and fully utilized just two years later in the Car Robots cartoon, with Brave Maximus being said weapon.

Conclusion

In the mid-2000s, Takara began to make some serious efforts to organize the ever-growing Japanese Generation 1 cartoon timeline that included all of the cartoons from the Beast Era. Due to all of the contradictions laid out above, Takara made the decision to ignore this catalog story entirely, throwing out every claim and character-depiction it made in order to clean up all of the issues between the American and Japanese cartoons. Opting to lean into "several tens of thousands of years" statement given by Beast Wars II, it was decided to relocate the two American cartoons away from the two Japanese ones, by acknowledging the "three centuries" statement given by the English version of Beast Wars that the Japanese dub had originally omitted. When fans in the west first learned of this timeline, the placement of Beast Wars II and Neo being set so long after the Beast Machines cartoon came as quite a startling shock, having long since taken both this catalog story and the Beast Machines Magmatron toy bio as gospel, since all the continuity issues described above were virtually unknown to anyone outside of Japan due to Beast Wars II and Neo having not yet been fully translated into English at the time.

There was, however, one more discrepancy created by this attempt to fix all of the others: With the relocation of Beast Machines set before Beast Wars II and Neo, this now placed the technorganic reformatting Cybertron underwent at the end of Beast Machines as happening before its appearances in Beast Wars Neo as a metallic planet. This last hole would be filled in 2019 by a Transformers Legends pack-in comic, which explained how and why Cybertron was turned back into a metallic world several eons after the end of Beast Machines.

Thus, with the discarding of this catalog story from the Japanese Generation 1 cartoon continuity, its events have since been relegated to a little micro-continuity all unto itself. If anything, it still somewhat fits with the Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo manga, which stuck to the catalog story's placing all the characters in the same timeframe. Though, the subsequent Beast Wars Metals manga still treats Optimus Primal and Megatron as separate individuals from Optimus Prime and G1 Megatron, meaning they'd just be high-ranking Maximals and Predacons all on their own without any inherent ties to their namesakes.

Notes

Transformers references

• The "Maximize" in the title of this story is actually "Henshin" (変身), a Japanese word for "transformation" that was used in the Japanese dub of the Beast Wars cartoon as the Japanese equivalent/replacement for both "Maximize" and "Terrorize" in the original English version. "Maximize", rather than "Transform", is used here to reflect that dubbing decision, and also because Beast Wars II would distinguish "Henshin" from "Transform" by specifically using the former for those with beast modes, while the latter would be used by those with mechanical vehicle modes.
• Also included in this catalog is a brief recap of the final events of "Other Voices, Part 2", which had, at the time, recently aired in Japan on March 25, 1998. Said recap is given the title of ~Convoy's Great Explosion~ (〜コンボイ大爆発編〜 ~Konboi Dai Bakuhatsu-hen~). At the bottom of this recap is also an ad for the then-new Beast Wars II animated series and manga series.

Real-world references

• The "seventh month of the Cosmic Year 1999" and "Great King of Angolmois" are both derived from The Prophecies of French seer Nostradamus, whose prophecies were popular in Japan at the time. What these two bits actually mean, however, is a lot to unpack, but most interpretations basically boil down to either a prophecy of doom brought about by either a tyrannical warlord like Genghis Khan or by terrorism, or a prophecy of prosperity brought about by either a rich philanthropist or a king like Francis I of France, occurring at some point in July–September of the year 1999. In reality, it is still not entirely certain what, if anything, this prophecy referred to.
• Lio Convoy addresses Optimus Primal with the honorific of "senpai", which is used to refer to a person of senior experience, hierarchy, level, and/or age, who offers guidance, friendship, and general assistance to a newer, younger, and/or inexperienced person (known as the "kōhai") belonging to the same group, like a personal mentor. It is commonly used in the Japanese education system to refer to older students of higher grades by younger students of lower grades. In this case, it is used to indicate that Optimus Primal is Lio Convoy's personal mentor/superior (and is translated in the Quotes section above as "sir").

Other trivia

• Galvatron is depicted here mostly in shadow because, at the time, the color scheme for his toy had not yet been finalized. Indeed, his toy pictured elsewhere in the catalog is represented by an unpainted gray hardcopy.

References

[[Category:Beast Wars II media]] [[Category:Pack-in material]]