Home Soil

« Beast Machines: Transformers ep 19 »
"I'm just a mean green mother from outer space, and I'm bad!"
"Home Soil"
Season	2
No. in season	6
Production company	Mainframe Entertainment
Airdate	March 15, 2000 (Canada) September 16, 2000 (USA)
Written by	Meg McLaughlin
Directed by	Dennis Heaton
Animation studio	Mainframe Entertainment
Continuity	Beast Wars continuity

A spaceship crash-lands on Cybertron, and the Maximals encounter a mysterious alien.

Synopsis

My god, Bones. What have I done.

High above the planet of Cybertron, a mysterious spaceship and a cluster of asteroids prepare to make planetfall. But the automated space-cannons manage to destroy the asteroids and badly damage the ship, sending it plummeting towards the planet. Flying above the city streets, Silverbolt sends word of the crash to base.

Underground, a worried Optimus examines the wilting technorganic trees and ponders their survival and the future of Cybertron should they die. Cheetor tries to console him, but to no avail. Suddenly, Rattrap bursts in, telling the Maximals about the ship's crash. Megatron has also found out about the arrival of the ship and orders Thrust to destroy any survivors of the crash. Thrust obediently heads towards the site, turning the mission into a race against time.

Not running away from something for once.

As the Maximals head towards the crash site, Thrust and his troops whiz by them. Several of the drones peel from the squadron and about-face, turning to fight the Maximals. Transforming into robot mode, the Maximals make short work of the Vehicons, but they have lost time. Primal splits them into three teams: he and Cheetor will travel on the surface, Rattrap and Blackarachnia will go underground, and Silverbolt and Nightscream will take to the sky.

In the air, Nightscream and Silverbolt destroy a squadron of Aero-Drones, but Nightscream still treats newcomer Silverbolt rudely, even after the latter compliments their teamwork together.

In the sewers of Cybertron, Blackarachnia is upset that Silverbolt still hasn't forgiven himself for his days as Jetstorm, even after she freed him from his Jetstorm slave form and reformatted him into his present condor form. However, the conversation is cut short as two Mole Drones burst in from the sides. Blackarachnia destroys one and Rattrap commandeers another, and the duo head towards the site much quicker.

On the surface, Cheetor and Primal are surrounded by a group of drones. The two flying Maximals arrive to help them, and together they destroy the drones.

Eventually, the Maximals arrive at the ship. Stepping inside, they discover that the walls are covered with plant matter. They are suddenly attacked by a tentacled plant beast. The monster runs wildly through the ship, forcing the Maximals to split up to try and corner it. Ultimately, the creature turns tail and heads underground. The Maximals give chase; Optimus intuits that the beast is headed for the organic core, and fears that the fast-growing seeds the alien leaves in its wake will contaminate and destroy the orchard along the way.

Of course, if this Transformer is normally a ravenous psychotic, they'll now be more dangerous, but hey, who dares wins!

However, he has a plan: Tapping the power of the Oracle, he attempts to reformat the monster. Cheetor is skeptical, but Optimus goes ahead with his idea, blasting it with a white light. The organic components of the creature begin to merge with the technological, and a technorganic, plant emerges. The creature explains that she is also a Maximal. Several years ago, she and her crew left Cybertron on a mission of exploration. Reaching a planet covered with mobile plants (in other words, "talking trees"), she and her crew took the natives' forms to study them and avoid predation. The plant says that Megatron's attack had shorted out both her ship and her higher mental functions, so she was merely acting out of self-preservation.

The plant-bot is cut short as a phalanx of Tank Drones attack, beginning to ravage the orchard. The newest member of the Maximals takes action, transforming into her robot mode and disintegrates the entire platoon with an electrical attack. Thrust retreats, but not without warning the newcomer that she's just made a big mistake.

Do you still have that baggy I gave you?

Examining the poor state of the plants, the robot adjusts the lighting with a gizmo of her own. She observes that different plants need different lighting. As the technorganic plants flourish, the new Maximal introduces herself as Botanica.

Above, Megatron (encompassed within the Grand Mal) notes the newest arrival and transforms into a "spaceship mode", destroying the remains of Botanica's ship and the rampant plant growth around it. As Thrust gripes about the ever-increasing odds against him, Megatron declares that it is time to put an end to the Maximal "infestation" for good.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Maximals	Vehicons
Silverbolt (1) Optimus Primal (2) Cheetor (3) Rattrap (4) Nightscream (5) Blackarachnia (6) Botanica (13)	Thrust (7) Megatron (8) Cycle Drones (9) Aero Drones (10) Mole Drones (11) Tank Drones (12)

Quotes

"Don't worry, legs, I know the drill."

—Rattrap, about to take out a Mole Drone.

"Real fair. One of me, six of them."
"Seven! ... now. As we remain static, the organics grow yet stronger. Clearly this infestation must be exterminated, once and for all."

—Thrust groans about unfair odds, while Megatron makes with the foreshadowing.

Notes

Animation and technical errors

• At the very beginning of the episode, the sun (seen peering from behind Cybertron) has a shadow. And the white light glowing around the sun is much brighter than the sun's yellow surface.
• The Maximals are missing from the background when Thrust orders his drones to turn back and attack them.
• When Optimus chucks the tank drone away, the shot is mirrored – the drone's cannon and chest detailing are on the wrong side.
• When Nightscream jumps onto the tank drone, his fingers clip through its shoulder-cannon.
• Not a big goof, but when the Mole Drone bursts out of the ground in front of Thrust, one puff of dust on the right doesn't dissolve completely like the rest.
• As the Maximals are walking toward the bridge, some of them appear as lower resolution models. This happens again during their first clash with the plant being.
• After Optimus pries open the door, Rattrap's head makes a sudden jerk to the side.
• When Rattrap hides behind Nightscream after being spooked by the plant creature, he's clipping through Nightscream's leg-wing.
• Nightscream's hand passes through his leg-wing too when he berates Silverbolt for letting the plant thing go.
• When the Maximals arrive in the orchid, Cheetor somehow overlaps the glow of a light on top of a pole, despite him being behind and under it.
• When the seed lands between Rattrap's wheels, the lower pistons attaching to said wheels detach for a moment.
• As Cheetor slashes about with his swords during the fight with the tank drones, his right sword first clips into his right thigh, and before he jumps away, his entire left arm clips through his left leg.
• Silverbolt's upper torso gets all distorted for a moment when he twists Nightscream around.
• In the closeup of the Tank Drone driving over the plants, one leaf on the ground pops into existence between frames.
• Nightscream's left hand clips through his leg-wing when he waves at Silverbolt.

Continuity errors

• Primal doesn't suffer any weakness post-reformatting, as he did with Nightscream in "Forbidden Fruit". Then again, Cheetor mentioned that Optimus wasn't strong "enough" when he tried to reformat Nightscream, so maybe he's improved?
• Like Nightscream, Botanica is able to transform to robot mode immediately after being reformatted. Then again, like Nightscream, she was reformatted by Optimus Primal directly, instead of the Oracle, which might be a deciding factor in the new transformation process. Although that still doesn't explain it with Silverbolt.
• Rattrap usually transforms into robot mode in order to interface with computers. In this episode, he transforms out of robot mode to do it.
• It apparently doesn't occur to Optimus to use his jet boosters to reach the downed spacecraft first. Plus, even if they have to stay in beast mode, why do they stick together rather than sending Cheetor out on ahead? Or are they seriously suggesting that every Maximal has the same top speed? (This isn't the first time this has happened.)
• None of the Maximals apparently notice Thrust as they race through the tunnels, even though his engine is audibly roaring and he's approximately ten feet behind them.
• Why does a Maximal shuttle look exactly like a four million year old Autobot shuttle, instead of, say, the Axalon, one of its contemporaries? It also has a very inconsistent size. Botanica fills the exit door when she leaves the ship in the flashback, whereas Thrust and the Maximals were all tiny against it when trying to break in.
• Botanica was apparently experiencing symptoms of Megatron's virus, at least according to Optimus. The Maximals in "The Reformatting" were visibly sparking and alluded to severe internal damage, whereas Botanica appears physically unscathed.
• By this point in the series, the Maximals are based in the Oracle's chamber. In this episode, Thrust follows the Maximals into this chamber and even attacks them in there with Tank Drones. Yet, later episodes will raise the notion of the Vehicons discovering the Maximals' base as a point of concern for them, despite Thrust having already found it in this episode (and a few Cycle Drones having already found it all the way back in the first episode).
• How does Botanica know who Megatron is? Depending on when she left Cybertron, Megatron was either a petty crook or presumed dead.
• Botanica also refers to Optimus Primal by name without ever having been told his name.
• An overhead shot of the Oracle's chamber seen during the fight with the Tank Drones showed the drone to have run over the entire orchard of technorganic trees. Yet, at a point after the battle, Optimus and Botanica walk over to a bunch of still-upright (but withering) trees that weren't in that spot in the earlier overhead shot.
• So, er, what happened to Botanica's crew, then? There's a lot of dead plant matter inside the ship, which doesn't inspire a lot of confidence...

Continuity notes

• Cybertron apparently has an asteroid ring.
• Megatron's orbital defense system was alluded to in "Descent", where it shot the Autobot shuttle out of the sky.
• Nightscream wonders aloud if the new arrivals might "spread some sort of virus" while glaring at Silverbolt, a reference to the events of last episode.
• Optimus insists that rather than overrun the technological with the organic (as Botanica threatens to do), their mission is to achieve balance, showing that he's learned from his mistakes in "Fallout".
• In this episode, we learn that Optimus and his crew weren't the only Transformers on an exploration mission. Later ancillary fiction would refer the "Maximal Imperium" as Cybertron's dominant governing state, suggesting that these missions were the precursors to a colonization program that never came to fruition.
• Cheetor mentions that Megatron was responsible for nixing their original scientific mission, referring to the events of "Beast Wars (Part 1)"
• Apparently Botanica (or at least one of her crew) can change her alt mode just from receiving information from a DNA scanner, without the need for a CR Chamber. This does tie into Nightscream's statement in "Survivor" that stasis pods, and presumably other external scanning devices, were rendered obsolete.
• Gadgets and powers:
  • Silverbolt's throwing knives are curved in this episode, compared to their straight-bladed appearance in "In Darkest Knight".
  • Botanica uses an absurdly powerful electric attack at the end of this episode, that literally disintegrates an entire legion of Tank Drones. One wonders why the other Maximals don't just send her to blow up the Grand Mal.
  • Botanica deploys a little portable lamp to help the sick technorganic plants.

Transformers references

• Botanica exclaims "Thank the Matrix", a phrase occasionally used in Beast Wars.

Real-world references

• Nightscream and Silverbolt declare "Do not pass 'Go!' Do not collect $200!", a clear reference to the popular board game Monopoly.
• Nightscream at one point refers to Silverbolt as "Typhoid Mary", a reference to both the previous episode and the infamous real-life carrier of the Typhoid virus.

Trivia

• The planet that Botanica and her crew were sent to explore is apparently Planet Jungle from Mainframe Entertainment's other toyline-based cartoon Shadow Raiders/War Planets. Whether this is an intentional crossover or simply due to the recycling of backgrounds and animation models for budget reasons is unclear.
• This is the only episode where Grand Mal Megatron transforms.
• The destruction of Botanica's ship in the last scene is reminiscent of Rampage's destruction of Depth Charge's starhopper in the last scene of "Deep Metal". In both cases, the writers were cleaning up a loose end, since giving the heroes access to a working spaceship would've derailed the story.
• Botanica's pre-plant form, seen only in shadow, is another reuse of the Giant Robot model from ReBoot, which was previously used for Megatron's pre-beast form and in a number of other places during Beast Wars. As used here, it has what looks like Depth Charge's head.
• For some reason, Blackarachnia checks herself out after Botanica gets reformatted. Jealous at no longer being the only girl, Legs? (She also has the most over-the-top look of shock on her face imaginable.)
• When Thrust's drones surround the Maximals, Thrust extends one of his fingers and holds his hand up, as if he's flipping Optimus the bird. This marks the second time Thrust has displayed obscene hand gestures to his enemies. Optimus is not amused.

Foreign localization

French

• Title: "Terre Natale" ("Native Land")

German

• Title: "Botanica"
• Original airdate: December 20, 2000

Italian

• Title: "Suolo natio" ("Native soil")

• Instead of saying: «we're trapped like rats», Rattrap says: «we're in trap like mice», partially losing the pun on his name.

Japanese

• Title: "Shokubutsu no Hanran" (植物の反乱, "The Rebellion of the Plant")
• Original airdate: January 8, 2005

Mandarin

• Title: "Chóng Fǎn Gùtǔ " (重返故土, "Back to the Homeland")

Brazilian Portuguese

• Title: "Solo Nativo" ("Native Soil")

Spanish

• Title: "Su Tierra Natal" ("Her Native Soil")

Home video releases

All releases listed are in English audio unless otherwise noted.

DVD

2005 — Super Lifeform Transformers: Beast Wars Returns — Volume 5 (Geneon Entertainment) — Japanese audio only.
2006 — Beast Machines: Transformers — The Complete Series (Rhinomation)
2014 — Transformers: Beast Machines — The Complete Series (Shout! Factory)
2007 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Season Two: Volume One (Sony)
2007 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Complete Season Two (Sony)
2009 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Intégrale Saison 2 (Sony) — French audio only.