Nemesis Part 1

« Beast Wars: Transformers ep 51 »
"The most powerful warship ever built! ...and I just had it washed."
"Nemesis Part 1"
Production company	Mainframe Entertainment
Airdate	May 6, 1999
Written by	Bob Forward
Directed by	Ezekiel Norton
Animation studio	Mainframe Entertainment
Continuity	Beast Wars continuity

Down but not out, Megatron discovers Tarantulas's secret tunnel network that leads to the Decepticon warship, the Nemesis.

Synopsis

"And the Bay said 'Let there be light', and there was a sunset."

The Maximals, secure for the first time since they moved into Mount St. Hilary, begin searching for the Predacons, who have been vulnerable since Tigerhawk destroyed the Predacon base. Optimus Primal quotes a verse from the Covenant of Primus, believing Tigerhawk's arrival to be divine prophecy.

Dinobot II discovers why no one can get down Bugs Bunny's rabbit hole.

Meanwhile, the Predacons are growing disaffected with Megatron. (Even Waspinator is mouthing off.) Inferno, ever loyal to his "queen", declares that a new "colony" will resecure them. Megatron orders him to take Waspinator and Quickstrike, while he, Rampage, and Dinobot search the remains of Tarantulas's lair. Dinobot finds a hatch which leads to an underwater tunnel and a computer. Accessing the computer, Megatron becomes quite excited by what he discovers, and takes the rail car with Dinobot II, while Rampage follows in tank mode.

Silverbolt and Depth Charge spot Inferno, Waspinator, and Quickstrike leaving. Optimus orders them to fall back, but Depth Charge heads in. Optimus leaves with Blackarachnia, Cheetor, and Tigerhawk to support them. As Primal arrives, Depth Charge finds the hatch—and a bomb. The explosion fails to kill any of the Maximals, but Silverbolt is damaged, and Blackarachnia and Cheetor escort his parts back to base.

At the protohumans' cave dwellings, Inferno declares that the caves will be their new "colony". He orders Quickstrike and Waspinator to engage, but Waspinator angrily refuses. Something has finally snapped in Waspy's central processor, and he declares that he is out of the Beast Wars. After a tirade against Megatron, the Predacons, life in general, and always being blown up, Waspinator tells them that they can kiss his stinger. Inferno and Quickstrike blast him, and proceed to attack the protohumans (who have become much tougher, having learned from the example of Dinobot and the Maximals).

Where is all the furniture?

In the tunnels, Primal, Tigerhawk, and Depth Charge continue searching. After locating a data terminal, Primal accesses it and discovers what Tarantulas found and Megatron desires—the Nemesis, the flagship of the Decepticon fleet and the vessel which Megatron used to shoot down the Ark. Realizing the threat the Decepticon warship holds, Depth Charge heads out to locate it. Optimus sends out an emergency warning to the Maximals, and he and Tigerhawk head out to the Nemesis's location through the air.

Meanwhile, Megatron and Dinobot are able to board the ship, where they discover that Tarantulas had been a busy spider: not only did he repair the vessel, he added a transwarp cell and installed a Predacon control console. Best of all, in Megatron's optics, Tarantulas left behind a copy of the Covenant of Primus to boot: the tome from which he took his name! Megatron and Dinobot begin powering up the vessel for an attack.

Why so serious?

Reaching the sunken behemoth, Depth Charge informs Optimus of his discovery, and Optimus in turn authorizes Depth Charge to neutralize the Nemesis by any means necessary. Before Depth Charge can start, he is engaged by Rampage. The two enemies fight, and Depth Charge grabs an energon crystal. He drives it into Rampage's spark, and the explosion destroys both Transformers and also causes Dinobot to cry out in pain. Optimus, though mourning Depth Charge's loss, is relieved to know the threat of the Nemesis has been dealt with.

That is, until the Nemesis rises from the ocean, fully operational. To be continued...

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Maximals	Predacons	Protohumans
Tigerhawk (1) Rhinox (2) Blackarachnia (3) Cheetor (4) Optimus Primal (5) Rattrap (6) Silverbolt (7) Depth Charge (8)	Dinobot (9) Megatron (10) Quickstrike (11) Rampage (12) Inferno (13) Waspinator (14)	Una (15) Protohumans (16) Leader Neanderthal (17)

Quotes

[Silverbolt has been injured in an explosion]
Silverbolt: "Worry not, my love. It's just a...scratch."
[Silverbolt's arm falls off]
Optimus: "Maybe. But I think you're due some time in the CR chamber."
Silverbolt: "Sir, I'm fine. I —"
Blackarachnia: "Shut up and obey your commander, bone-brain."
[Silverbolt's head falls off]
Silverbolt: "Yes, dear."

—Silverbolt is pretty whipped.

"There! That will be our new colony!"
"Eww, I don't wanna move in there. It got all them hairy critters in it. Unless... unless you mean, we's gonna slag 'em! Oh, oh, please tell me that's what yer plannin'!"
"The royalty demands a new colony, and we shall take it, by force"
"YA-HOO! Now yer talkin', haha!"

—Inferno and Quickstrike discuss a possible new home.

"I said no! Dragon-Bot command you, Sub-Commander Kiss-Butt! Dragon-Bot not command Waspinator! Not any more! Waspinator sick of being evil. Sick of being Predacon! And, Waspinator especially sick of getting blown to scrap all the time! Sooo, Waspinator quit! As of now, which means Ant-Bot and Two-Head can just pucker their mandibles and plant big, wet, juicy one right here on Waspinator's big...fat...stripy...a..."
[BAM!!!]

—Waspinator finally stands up for himself...and gets blown to scrap by Inferno and Quickstrike.

Dinobot II: "Mmmm, impressive." Megatron: "Oh, it is far more than that, my malevolent minion. That is the most powerful Decepticon warship in Transformer history....the ship that shot down the Ark itself....THE NEMESIS.....the Nemesis."

—Megatron and Dinobot II

Optimus: "Prepare base defenses for a full assualt." Rattrap: "W...What!!! I thought we had this all sowed up!" Optimus: "Meg's just ripped it wide open, Optimus out." Rattrap: "Oh Man, is it just me, or did he just kinda say, we're all gonna die?"

— Optimus briefing the other Maximals on the situation.

"I've no time for you, X."
"Like you had no time for Starbase Rugby? You had friends there as I recall. Tasty ones too!"

—Depth Charge and Rampage.

"I was your assignment, and you failed!"

—Rampage

"Raw energon! Right through your twisted spark! Take it! Take it straight to the pit, you SICKENING PIECE OF SLAG!"

—Depth Charge's final words before killing Rampage.

Notes

• The death of Rampage is the only time in the series that a Maximal kills a Predacon (not for lack of trying).
• "Nemesis" was originally going to be a three-part episode, but was later compressed to two.
• Bob Forward and Simon Furman both worked together on the "Nemesis" outline, to the extent that it wasn't decided for a while who would be writing which part. Originally they'd had bigger, grander plans, but many of them got dropped when it was clear a fourth season wouldn't be coming. [1]
• Flying, flying, everywhere! Apparently Cheetor can now fly outright in his Transmetal 2 form's beast mode, rather than merely being restricted to his previous rocket-boosted running. Furthermore, Depth Charge has developed the ability to fly in both his regular stingray and robot modes, and Optimus (although shown hovering and such in robot mode beforehand) now demonstrates the capability to fly at high speeds in this form as well. This does rather raise the question of what point their respective flight modes actually serve anymore.
• At the beginning of the episode, when Rattrap holds up the Covenant of Primus, the Maximal variant of Cybertronix text can be seen. It reads "7 613 were cast out with him a cork one fork and a bowl of beans between them". This presumably follows the portion of the Covenant read by Primal, Datatrack 7.613: "And a mighty warrior came down from the sky, and a rainbow was upon his head, and his feet as pillars of fire. And the great dragon was cast out onto the earth, and his followers were cast out with him."
• The copy of the Covenent of Primus on the Nemesis has the Autobot symbol on the cover.
• This is clearly the only time Waspinator refers to himself as "I." This is also (regrettably) the last time Waspinator is slagged as a participant of the Beast Wars.
• Rattrap kisses Rhinox for the second time, much like he did in The Agenda (Part III). He still didn't enjoy it.
• Since Transmetal 2 Megatron has his beast-mode head as a robot-mode arm as his original T-Rex body did, Megatron's... odd relationship with his hand has returned. In this two-parter, he can not only be seen petting the dragon-head, but at one point, he turns from a monitor he's watching, and his head-hand turns toward it, and actually moves back and forth as it observes the on-screen events.
• This is the first time we hear that Megatron's name is not a reference to that other Megatron.

Animation and technical errors

• When Dinobot squeezes the piece of Rampage's spark he possesses to pacify his "half-brother", his shoulder pads are missing. Also, the spark seems to float freely when it is released, in contrast to previous episodes where it was held in place by Dinobot's spark chamber.
• At the very beginning when Optimus is reciting, Cheetor is visible in the background in his normal Transmetal body, walking with Blackarachnia.
• Megatron must have had a tight fit climbing down the hatch that Dinobot found.
• Una must be a very strong protohuman to smash a sizable lump into Waspinator's skull.

Continuity errors

• The Beast Wars retelling of the Ark's crash and the Nemesis differs from any previous version. In the original cartoon, the Decepticons used the Nemesis's tractor beam to lock onto the Ark, and it was the Autobot/Decepticon fight inside the Ark that caused it to crash. (As elaborated in "More than Meets the Eye, Part 1" and "Microbots".) In the Marvel comics, the Decepticons boarded the ship, and Optimus deliberately crashed the Ark onto Earth, in "The Transformers", with the Nemesis being left abandoned. (The UK comics had Galvatron destroy it in "Target: 2006".)
  
  As Beast Wars is intentionally not a direct continuation of any specific continuity, instead seeking to treat all previous Generation 1 stories as if they were Arthurian legend, this would imply that those accounts are not canonical in this series. Alternatively, Optimus could just have the details wrong.
• The flashbacks to the battle between the Ark and the Nemesis recounted by Optimus Primal and Megatron neglect to mention that the Decepticons boarded the Ark before the crash. This was probably done either to simplify the retelling, increase the significance of the Nemesis's involvement, or both.
• The bomb Megatron left behind as a trap for the Maximals has some very curious properties. It has enough power to severely damage Silverbolt and creates a powerful energy wave that is felt by the approaching Cheetor and Tigerhawk, who are miles away (even disintegrating a butterfly in the process). However, despite all of the above, Optimus and Depth Charge suffer absolutely no ill effects from the bomb, despite being at extremely close range and having very little time (or even room, given the terrain) to run for cover. Depth Charge opened the hatch, but Silverbolt is the one who got damaged. Assuming that there was very little time to get away, Silverbolt could have jumped in front of Depth Charge to protect him (but why would he?), but it is still misleading going into the commercial break.
• How exactly did Megatron construct a bomb from scratch to begin with? With his base destroyed in the previous episode, it seems very unlikely that he would have the materials to create one on hand.

Transformers references

• Megatron refers to Tarantulas as Unicron's spawn. While from the context this appears to have been a generic insult (equivalent to "bastard" or "son of a bitch"), convention-exclusive fiction like Primeval Dawn have depicted Tarantulas as a literal creation of Unicron.
• This is the first source to give the Decepticon vessel that attacked the Ark a name.
• Optimus Primal tells Depth Charge to stop Megatron "at any cost", which echoes Optimus Prime ("no matter the cost") in the Transformers movie during the Decepticon siege of Autobot City on Earth.
• When Dinobot II cries out in pain after the death of Rampage, brief flashes of the original Dinobot's animation model can be seen as he looks upward. This possibly alludes to the plot of the unproduced episode "Dark Glass", where Rattrap uploads the original Dinobot's datatrax into the clone. For more information on that controversy, please refer to these articles.

Real-world references

• Inferno calls Rampage a drone at least once in this episode. It is unknown whether the writers knew that a drone is a male ant whose main purpose is to mate with the queen, who in this case would be Megatron.
• When contacting the Maximals, Optimus encodes transmission "M Sipher", a reference to Greg Sepelak.
• Silverbolt's remark "It's just a scratch" followed by the dismemberment of his arm could be a reference to the immortal line of the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Coincidentally, the Black Knight is able to survive fatal mutilation.
• Inferno utilizes the classic cartoon method of hiding, appearing from behind an impossibly skinny tree.
• When Megatron powers up the Nemesis, external ship lights illuminate Cybertronix text in the Predacon variant, which spells out "Red Dwarf", a reference to the British sci-fi comedy show.

Foreign localization

French

• Title: "Némésis 1" (Canada)

Italian

• Title: "Destini - Parte 1" ("Fates - Part 1")

Japanese

• Title: "Dokkān" (ドッカーン, "Ka-Boom")

Portuguese

• Title: "Nemesis Parte 1" ("Nemesis Part 1")

Spanish

• Title: "Nemesis Primera Parte" ("Nemesis First Part")

Home video releases

All releases listed are in English audio unless otherwise noted.

VHS

2000 — Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers: Metals — We Have Returned (Pioneer LDC) — Japanese audio only.
2000 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Volume 4 (Universal)

DVD

2000 — Beast Wars: Transformers: Metals — DVD Box 2 (Pioneer LDC) — English and Japanese audio.
2004 — Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Third Season (Rhinomation)
2006 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Season 3 (Madman Entertainment)
2009 — The Transformers: Beast Wars — Complete Collection (Madman Entertainment)