Endgame, Part I

This article is about the Animated episode. For the Beast Machines episode, see Endgame Pt. I: The Downward Spiral.

« Transformers Animated ep 41 »
You're telling us this entire series was just to get Prime a hammer and a jetpack? Again?
"Endgame, Part I"
Airdate	May 16, 2009
Written by	Rich Fogel
Directed by	Kalvin Lee Kentaro Mizuno
Animation studio	Mook

The Autobots race to find an advantage over Megatron's control of Omega Supreme.

Synopsis

At the plant, Jazz and Prowl are working on Prowl's processor-over-matter by having Prowl lift some oil cans. Jazz is impressed with Prowl's skills, and wonders why he never completed his training. Suddenly, Bumblebee and Bulkhead coming tearing in, causing Prowl to lose his concentration and drop the oil can, which Bumblebee and Bulkhead skid across the floor, crashing into the wall. As the two bots collect themselves, Prowl says that they're two reasons he never completed his training. Bulkhead and Bumblebee then explain why they came in so quickly: they've found Omega Supreme's energy signature, and it's on Earth's moon.

On the moon, Shockwave continues his efforts to probe Arcee's memory banks for the activation codes to Omega Supreme. However, all he's found so far are some prewar datatracks of her school teaching days. Megatron is convinced that his "most loyal servant" can find it in time. Starscream takes a moment to goad Lugnut that Megatron has another favorite, and Lugnut bashes Shockwave aside in protest, citing his great loyalty and never ending search for Megatron. Shockwave counters that while Lugnut was fawning at Megatron's stabilizing servos, he risked his spark by going spying on the Autobots for stellar cycles. The two get into a fight, much to Megatron's annoyance, while Starscream gloats and rolls his head out of the room...

At the plant, the Autobots debate their options. Ratchet says that they need to act now, and that they need to use the Magnus Hammer. Optimus is hesitant, and thinks back to his past...

At the High Council chambers, Ultra Magnus reviews Cadet Optimus and Cadet Sentinel's recent unauthorized visit to an organic world which resulted in the loss of Cadet Elita-1. Sentinel makes a final statement that he wanted to go back for Elita, but Optimus prevented him. Ultra Magnus again asks whose idea it was to go to the planet, and Optimus takes full responsibility as the senior Cadet. Ultra Magnus had high hopes for Optimus, even believing he could one day be Magnus, but now that will never be. Ultra Magnus pronounces his judgement: Optimus is to be expelled from the Autobot Academy and ineligible for service in the Cybertron Elite Guard...'

Snapped back to the present, Optimus reaffirms that they don't need to use the Magnus Hammer. What he was thinking was more a flight mechanism to keep up with Megatron. Ratchet is resistant, but the other Autobots point out various examples of Autobot flight, such as Jetfire and Jetstorm, Prowl's rocket booters, and Sari's own jetpack. Ratchet finally relents. Optimus says that they need more information, so Prowl volunteers to go and spy on the Decepticons. Jazz vetoes this, saying that Prowl is on the verge of a major training breakthrough, so someone else must go. Bumblebee asks who would be crazy enough to go spy on the Decepticons, and realizes that everyone is staring at him.

In the ruins of the Decepticon warship, Starscream is overseeing the process of creating a new body for himself from the shell of a clone and a protoform. Once he attaches his head to it, Megatron reveals his presence and destroys the already complete clones. Starscream begs for mercy, saying he planned to make an army for the Decepticon cause, but Megatron has bigger plans in mind for the protoforms needed to make the clones. Starscream assumes that Megatron intends to clone himself, but Megatron had something much bigger in mind. Even bigger than Lugnut. Three somethings, in fact, about the size of Omega Supreme...

Great, so now we know what the children would look like.

In the woods, Jazz guides Prowl in meditation, directing him to commune with the AllSpark. His efforts succeed, causing an AllSpark fragment to appear in Prowl's hands. Meanwhile, Bumblebee is transwarped to the moon. He manages to avoid being seen, but the transmitter he brought is destroyed avoid some construction work that Shockwave and Lugnut are doing. Making his way into Omega Supreme, he finds Arcee, and realizes that she isn't quite functioning right. Since he doesn't know how to disconnect her without deactivating her, Bumblebee decides to activate her communicator to allow them to listen in on the Decepticons, and quickly transwarps out. On Earth, the Autobots are unable to get the specifics of what's going on, but it quickly becomes obvious that Megatron is building something.

At the plant, Ratchet, Sari, and Professor Sumdac work on the jetpack they're building for Prime. Ratchet is having trouble, so Sari scans the device and discovers the problem. Once it's ready, they have Optimus take it for a test run. After loosing control, flying around the city, and crashing in front of the plant all on five percent power, Ratchet and Sari decide to add some stabilizers.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans	Others
Jazz (1) Prowl (2) Bumblebee (3) Bulkhead (4) Omega Supreme (5) Arcee (6) Optimus Prime (11) Ratchet (12) Ultra Magnus (14, flashback) Cadet Sentinel (15, flashback)	Shockwave/Longarm Prime (7) Megatron (8) Starscream (9) Lugnut (10) Female Starscream (17) Three Lugnut Supremes (18~20)	Isaac Sumdac (16)	Sari Sumdac (13)

Quotes

Lugnut: I am the most faithful!
Shockwave: Have you blown a diode?! I'm trying to work here!
[A scuffle insues]
Megatron: Oh, for spark's sake...

—You get what you pay for, Megatron. And these guys are free.

Prowl: I'll transwarp to the moon and spy on them.
Jazz: And take five on your Cyber-Ninja training? No dice. You're close to a real breakthrough. And I got a vibe that says we're gonna need every advantage we can get our servos on.
Optimus: Agreed. We'll send someone else.
Bumblebee: Who'd be crazy enough to go on that mission? [Everyone looks at Bumblebee] Why is everyone looking at me? Why is everyone always looking at me?!

—Bumblebee gets tired of all the suicide missions he keeps going on.

"Instilled with my own powerful personality, the clones might try to overthrow me. But not so my most loyal lieutenant..."
[to Megatron] "Ah. I am honoured, my Lord." [to Shockwave] "Hah. Megatron trusts me the most!"

—Megatron makes all Lugnut's dreams come true. He responds by showing what a child he is.

Notes

Transformers references

Now, that's some upgrades...

• Optimus's new flight attachments (specifically the colors and details of his wings and gauntlets) are based on God Ginrai's flight-endowing Godbomber components. The flight pack itself, to which the wings attach, doesn't seem to owe as much to the Masterforce character, appearing instead to resemble booster pack from the original Jetfire (and thus, the FAST Packs from Super Dimension Fortress Macross). His shoulder cannons also appear to be based on his Voyager-class toy's water blaster.

• The wingless rocket pack could also be seen as a reference to the final scenes of More than Meets the Eye, Part 3 from the original series, when Optimus Prime borrowed Sideswipe's rocket pack to chase Megatron's space cruiser.

• As he jets into the sky, Optimus shouts out "Yessssss!" and "Excellent".

• The creation of the Lugnuts Supreme, evil clones of Omega Supreme, hearkens back to Omega Sentinel and the Dark Guardians.

• This episode finally confirms the real reason why Optimus is no longer a member of the Autobot Academy- he was expelled by Ultra Magnus for what happened to Elita-One. Also of note is that Sentinel said absolutely nothing in his friend's defense while the latter willingly took the blame, but really, should that come as a surprise by now?

• The episode also confirms why Prowl never finished his Ninja Bot training- his not-going-so-well "optics quest" was interrupted by Optimus' crew (who accidentally caused the destruction of his ship), and he did time on the vessel in exchange for a ride home. However, with the ability to materialize All Spark fragments out of thin air with this episode, it seems that he is becoming ever so closer to mastering his training.

• Ratchet once again harps on the fact that "Autobots don't fly", a common if frequently broken rule throughout most of the Transformers fiction, before being confronted with the harsh reality.

• This is not the first time that an Optimus has taken up a huge, Matrix-related melee weapon for the final battle against a Megatron.

Real-world references

• When testing the jetpack for the first time, Optimus started by using only 5% of the power and still went ballistic in flight, a reference to the comical scene from the movie Iron Man.

Trivia

• Prowl has been on his optics quest for at least "a million stellar cycles" before he joined up with Optimus... and had accomplished jack squat in all that time.

• It is shown and told that Prowl's sidecar contains shoulder additions that allow him to fly. His samurai toy version counterpart, on the other hand, doesn't.

• Megatron purposely started the Shockwave/Lugnut feud, knowing Starscream would try to seize Omega Supreme's access codes, just to be sure Lugnut would be in his most loyal state at the moment of the transfer? Now, that's some sleeky fore-thinkings...

• Shockwave has enough of a sense of humor that he can laugh. Who knew?

• Interestingly, Megatron destroys all of the remaining (albeit inert) Starscream clone shells, instead of reprogramming them to serve him and boost the number of troops under his command. Starscream even suggests this, but apparently Megatron prefers sheer brute force over numbers.

• After spending all of Season 3 as a disembodied head, Starscream finally regains his body....only to have Megatron blow it to smithereens at the end of the episode. Tough break, Screamer.