Repeat Performance!

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Jurassic Spark
"Repeat Performance!"
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First published	May 1985
Cover date	September 1985
Script	Bob Budiansky
Pencils	William Johnson
Inks	Kyle Baker
Colors	Nel Yomtov
Letters	Rick Parker
Editor	Jim Owsley
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity

Ratchet recovers the Dinobots, and together they fight Megatron.

Synopsis

We have made..... another commercial

Ratchet journeys by shuttle to the Savage Land to locate the Dinobots, who fought Shockwave there shortly after the Ark crash-landed on Earth four million years ago. He uses his M.A.R.B. to locate Cybertronian life deep in a tarpit. After a lot of digging, he locates Slag, and uses a memory probe to view the Dinobots' battle with Shockwave, and their subsequent entombment. Slag awakens and, after recognizing Ratchet as an Autobot, readily agrees to help finish the job they'd started: destroying Shockwave.

Shockwave checks in on Megatron, who has been left to guard the Ark alone. Megatron has prepared the head of Optimus Prime for transport to the aerospace plant recently captured by the Decepticons; Shockwave is pleased and comments that he may have to raise his odds-of-having-to-destroy-Megatron calculations.

Shockwave returns to the plant with Optimus Prime's head, effortlessly defeating an Army force that has surrounded the plant. Within, he prepares to begin the construction of a new generation of Decepticons, using the Matrix program within Prime.

Ratchet contacts Megatron, and shows him video footage of the Dinobots defeating Shockwave. With his end of the bargain fulfilled, he arranges for Megatron to meet him on a nearby mountain. When Ratchet arrives, Megatron promptly threatens to kill him. This breaks the bargain... and the hidden Dinobots burst forth from the snow. Turns out Ratchet knew Megatron wouldn't hold up his end of the Rite of Oneness, and the video was from the Dinobots' tussle with Shockwave four million years ago.

But despite the Dinobots' power, Megatron beats them all, leaving Ratchet to face him alone once more. Determined to fight like a warrior, even to the death, Ratchet tries to carry them both over a cliff edge. Though Megatron doesn't budge, the impact weakens the cliff beneath him, and Megatron is sent tumbling away. He transforms into his gun mode in a desperate effort to survive, but disappears into the snow and is not seen again. With Megatron thus defeated, the Ark and the Autobots are free.

Meanwhile, Josie Beller, a series of printed circuit strips laced onto her arm, fires an energy bolt that destroys her hospital room's television. She speculates that she's about ready to check out...

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans
Ratchet (1) Wheeljack (2) Cliffjumper (3) Gears (4) Optimus Prime (4) Sunstreaker (7) Jazz (8) Slag (9) Grimlock (10) Snarl (11) Swoop (12) Sludge (13)	Megatron (5) Shockwave (6) Soundwave (16) Laserbeak (17)	G.B. Blackrock (14) Hawthorne (15) Josie Beller (18) Eliot (19) Casey (20) Sue and friend (21)

Notes

• Although this is advertised as the introduction of the Dinobots, they had actually been introduced in issue #4. This issue features their recovery from the Savage Land in the present day.
• The cover features only Grimlock, Slag and Sludge—without Snarl and Swoop. These same three Dinobots were initially introduced in the animated series's "S.O.S. Dinobots" before their remaining two companions, and the same three only were seen in the commercial animation for the Dinobot toys. Coincidence?
• Optimus Prime transferred the Creation Matrix to Buster Witwicky in "The Worse of Two Evils!," why is Shockwave still able to use it to create new life? Letter columns confirmed that some residual energy remained in Prime's head. This energy was used on the Constructicons, but tapped out before Jetfire could be completed.

Errors

• Megatron still has his off-center insignia. This is so consistent it has to be intentional, but it's unclear why.
• Snarl's actions in the flashback are a very good match for Sludge's character bios. Sludge's toy bio has the lowest intelligence and often the victim of self-inflicted calamities. His Universe profile goes on to say that he often has to be dug out of the rubble he brought down on himself. In the issue, Snarl brings rubble down on the Dinobots and is repeatedly called dumb.
• Shockwave is colored as Megatron for 2 panels in his battle with the Dinobots.
• When Shockwave arrives at the plant, Soundwave is alone. In the next panel, an oddly colored Laserbeak is on his shoulder and appears to speak for Soundwave (whose mouthplate is miscolored also).
• Josie uses her right hand to operate her computer, but a moment later, that arm is paralyzed.

References

• Footnote on page 1 indicates this story takes place before Avengers #257 (in which the Savage Land is destroyed).

Covers (3)

• 
  US issue #8 - What IS Grimlock doing to Slag?
• UK issue #27 - ... that shaked when he laughed like a bowl full of purple jelly.
  UK issue #27 - ... that shaked when he laughed like a bowl full of purple jelly.
• 
  UK issue #28 - "We'll defeat Shockwave with the Dinobots. And a free poster. And an elephant."

• US cover: Sludge, Grimlock and Slag, by M.D. Bright.
• UK issue #27 cover: Shockwave transforming, by Robin Smith.
• UK issue #28 cover: reuse of art from US cover.

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Reprints

• 1987 — The Transformers Comics Magazine #4
• 2003 — Transformers: New Order
• 2008 — Classic Transformers Volume 1
• 2008 — The Transformers: Best of UK: Dinobots #6
• 2011 — The Transformers Classics, Vol. 1