Tarn (G1)

This article is about the leader of the Decepticon Justice Division. For the Cybertronian city-state, see Tarn (polity).

Tarn is a Decepticon from the IDW portion of the Generation 1 continuity family.

He kills you with culture... and also violence.

Tarn is an eloquent Decepticon. He enjoys nothing more than playing beautiful music as he waxes poetic quoting Towards Peace and other philosophical works by Megatron. He tends to indulge these pleasures at the same time he's using his specially modulated vocal processor to cause the Decepticon Justice Division's latest transgressor's spark to self-destruct. The current leader of the D.J.D., Tarn epitomises the mentality of the team. He is beyond zealous in his devotion to Megatron's cause, going so far as to emboss the Decepticon insignia onto his own faceplate. No traitor, no coward is capable of escaping his team.

Despite appearances, Tarn is a mess of contradictions. Viewing himself as the central pillar of the D.J.D., he can be as brutally violent as any other Decepticon, but views himself as a bureaucrat and his team as his administration. He believes his actions are entirely justified, yet sometimes his thoughts are a constant stream of self-denigration. He works hard to run a tight but fair ship, and is not above taking in an open-minded, needy stray. On the other hand, for all his thoughts of sophistication and control, Tarn can go from affable to life-threatening at the least provocation. His addictive tendencies have led to him burning out his original transformation cog years ago, and his reliance on the power-enhancing Nuke can lead to his losing himself to the lust for violence. And have no doubt that while he may try and convince himself otherwise, Tarn is a truly sociopathic murderer. Ultimately whether Tarn is a monster or not is irrelevant. His utter devotion to the Decepticon cause means he will ensure the fear of Megatron is put into any that would consider abandoning their noble goals.

If you want to break someone—mentally, physically, emotionally—wait until they're happy. Let them live and love and thrive. Once they recognize the value of a life well lived... THAT'S when you move in for the kill. Because you can't take anything from someone who has nothing to lose.Tarn, "The Sun in Flight" teaser

Fiction

IDW Generation 1 continuity

As with all members of the D.J.D., Tarn's true identity was unknown, hidden by his mask and assumed name. He was forged, born an exceptionally powerful Point One Percenter, and his "weaponized conversation" was a natural ability, suggesting he may be an Outlier. Exactly how and when Tarn joined the Decepticons is unknown, but Megatron would later claim it was done to hurt someone and prove a point. Your Fierce Tears Rebuilt under the supervision of Lobe, The Permanent Revolution Tarn's power and endurance was considered by Prowl to put him on the same level as a Phase Sixer. Remembrance Day

At some point before taking the position of Tarn, he was commandant of Grindcore prison, where he became associated with "The Empyrean Suite", playing it at maximum volume to drown out the screams of the prisoners he executed via smelting. When the prison's smelting chamber malfunctioned, "Tarn" bargained with the captured Autobot Skids to fix it, telling him it was a "teleport chamber". Tarn released fifty prisoners in exchange for Skids's skills, but then forced him to watch as the repaired chamber was used to execute a group of prisoners, including Skids's cellmate Quark, melting them down into raw materials for use in the creation of M.T.O.s. Speak, Memory: Part 1 Speak, Memory! (Part 2)

After Tarn became leader of the D.J.D., the group established a base on the world of Messatine in order to obtain the "Nuke" superfuel there, The Permanent Revolution Tarn coerced Pharma, head surgeon of the planet's Autobot medical facility Delphi, into helping feed his addiction by supplying him with an ever-increasing number of transformation cogs from deceased patients, in exchange for the hospital being unmolested by his team. Pharma would eventually cut off Tarn's supply by orchestrating the facility's shutdown. How Ratchet Got His Hands Back

He's got friends on the other side.

Informed by Decepticon spy Brainstorm that high-priority target Overlord was aboard the starship Lost Light, Tarn and the D.J.D. continued to work through their list of offenders as they waited for Brainstorm to drop the ship's shielding so they could pick up Overlord's signal. The Permanent Revolution One such unfortunate was Black Shadow, whom Tarn explosively finished off with his deadly voice, after which the team set course of the planet Clemency to hunt down Decepticon deserter Fulcrum. Rules of Disengagement Arriving on Clemency, the team discovered a mysterious stasis tube awaiting them; when Tarn investigated, he found it contained a deranged, circuit speeder-enhanced Grimlock, unleashed by Fulcrum and his new allies, the Scavengers. Tarn was soon able to subdue the brain-damaged Dinobot, but was then crushed beneath the foot of a Cybernought battle-mech that Crankcase had activated. Tarn recovered in time to hear Fulcrum deliver a speech to all assembled about Decepticon ideals before apparently committing suicide. At that point, Kaon detected Overlord's long-awaited signal, and Tarn ordered the D.J.D. to head out—but not before warning the surviving Scavengers that their names had now made it onto The List. Who's Afraid of the DJD?

Tracking Overlord's signal, the D.J.D. found the Lost Light—which was, unbeknownst to Tarn and his team, actually one of two versions of the ship created by a malfunction of its quantum generators—near the planet Ofsted XVII. Despite having promised Brainstorm they would not harm any of the crew, the discovery that the traitor Deadlock was aboard the ship them set the D.J.D. off, and after dealing with him, they set about murdering the rest of the ship. The Permanent Revolution Tarn personally destroyed Ultra Magnus, Swerve, and Cyclonus, and forced a large portion of the crew to transform before executing them, leaving their transformation cogs warm for location and harvesting. Eventually, Tarn removed a still-restrained and suicidal Overlord's head with a chainsaw, and the D.J.D. left the ship. slaughterhouse The Road Not Taken

Sometime during the months that followed, Kaon spontaneously began writhing in agony right in front of Tarn, who tried to get his teammate to tell him what he could do to help, before the mysterious effect subsided. Arm the Lonely Also during this time, the D.J.D. welcomed a new member—Nickel, last survivor of a Cybertronian colony wiped out by the Black Block Consortia. At Nickel's insistence, they returned to Ofsted XVII to salvage the quantum engines from the derelict Lost Light. They wound up arriving in the middle of a battle between the Consortia and the Galactic Council, who teamed up against the Cybertronians. Under attack by both sides and faced with additional enemy reinforcements, Tarn was forced to retreat, leaving Vos and Kaon behind. The Permanent Revolution

The diminished D.J.D. returned to their duties, though Tarn began to weary of the work. After apprehending the Sparkeater-worshipping Blip, Tarn was about to end his life using his voice, until Blip used his last words to demand that Tarn remove his mask. Affronted, Tarn allowed Helex and Tesarus to finish Blip instead, averting his gaze beneath his mask. Tarn subsequently ordered performance reviews for the team, and nearly came to blows with Tesarus when he implied that abandoning Vos and Kaon was not the Decepticon thing to do. Calming himself, Tarn explained that they were returning to Ofsted XVII again in order to recover their bodies, but was interrupted by Helex's announcement that Vos and Kaon had returned to the ship safe, sound, and with something unbelievable: a postwar edition of Towards Peace that revealed Megatron himself had defected from the Decepticons.

His world shattered by this discovery, Tarn had the D.J.D. return to Messatine, where he attempted to fatally overdose on Nuke. Finding even the sensation of dying disappointing, Tarn opened his eyes to see a distraught Nickel pressed against the glass of his fueling capsule. The sight of her triggered a revelation for Tarn: she was a 'bot who had experienced first-hand the threat the predominantly-organic universe posed to Cybertronians, and who had fully embraced the Decepticon cause despite living her life outside of the war. The cause, Tarn now realized, was bigger than any one 'bot—bigger than Megatron. Galvanized, Tarn set up a meeting with the rogue Decepticon warlord Deathsaurus aboard his stolen Warworld. Knowing full well he was on the D.J.D.'s list, Deathsaurus pre-emptively attacked Tarn upon his arrival, even deactivating his audio receptors to protect himself from Tarn's voice, but Tarn was able to communicate with him and his troops through inter-Decepticon radio and explained the reason for his presence: he wished them to ally with him, in return for their being taken off The List. Deathsaurus agreed on the condition that Tarn kill the rest of the D.J.D., which Tarn refused to do—which was the response Deathsaurus had been hoping for. With their alliance cemented, Tarn declared their new objective: kill the traitorous Megatron and all of his allies! The Permanent Revolution

The allied forces of Tarn and Deathsaurus proceeded to attack the Necrobot's world, killing it's sole inhabitant and using his machinery to broadcast a message that lured Megatron and all those aboard the Lost Light sympathetic to him down to the planet. When they arrived, the villains shot them down and cornered them in the Necrobot's fortress. How Bright Their Frail Deeds As an act of indirect torture, Tarn had their forces pull back, warning Megatron and his comrades that they would return at sunset, leaving them to stew in their own fear. Returning to the Peaceful Tyranny, Tarn spent the time showing off his collection of Megatron's writings to Deathsaurus, and discussing tactics with his men; he did not take Tesarus's concerns about the Necrobot's fortress's storm shield seriously, but the discussion was interrupted by a call on Tarn's personal communicator from Megatron himself. The Sun in Flight Tarn agreed to a meeting with Megatron alone, whereupon his former leader agreed to surrender in exchange for the rest of the Autobots being allowed to go free. Saddened and disgusted to truly see with his own eyes how far his idol had fallen, Tarn beat him to within an inch of his life, and was just about to deliver the killing shot when Overlord suddenly appeared, insisting that it was his right to end Megatron's life. Neither refused to stand down, resulting in a bickering battle between the two that gave Megatron the chance to escape. Realizing their folly, Tarn and Overlord agreed to a truce, though Overlord continued to needle Tarn all the way back to the Peaceful Tyranny. The final straw came when a distraught Kaon arrived with the news that the Autobots had kidnapped the D.J.D.'s pet sparkeater; determined to cut out of both the hearts of himself and his men the compassion that he saw as Megatron's downfall, Tarn slew Kaon on the spot, tearing his head from his shoulders. Your Fierce Tears

At sundown, Tarn led the Decepticons in their attack. At Close of Day

Confronting Megatron, he found that his former leader had raised a strong force-field around himself - as Ravage revealed, Megatron had salvaged the system from Trailcutter's corpse. Although Overlord and Deathsaurus abandoned the attack for their own reasons, Tarn and the other remaining members of the DJD finally made their way in. Then, Megatron's true intentions were revealed: after years of study, he had finally managed to interlink his systems with a black hole to harvest antimatter. Sealing the forcefield, he destroyed his former enforcers, revealing their true names at the moment of their death - ending with Tarn, whose mask he ripped off first, adorning his own chest with it. In his dying moments, Tarn was revealed to once have been Damus, a member of Shockwave's group of Outliers with the mutant ability to destroy electronic systems without touching them. Megatron's last words to him were that "Everything you did was for nothing".

Kre-O online comic

Tarn was part of Bludgeon's forces when they uncovered the Red Bucket. Treasure Competition! Defeat with Block Power!

TransTech

At Axiom Nexus, Tarn was a judge of Cybertron's Got Talent in the wake of Ego's death. Tarn enjoyed calling out sub-par transformations as part of his judging. Andromeda - Axiom Nexus News Reporter

Games

Transformers Legends

Tarn and the rest of the DJD pursued Black Shadow for taking bribes from the Autobots. The DJD found their target hiding on planet Clemency, and dispatched them with extreme prejudice as Tarn set course for their next assignment. Rules of Disengagement

Notes

"What are you gonna do, talk me to death?"
"Yup"

• Alex Milne said in a Facebook interview that his ideal voice for Tarn is Keith David. That is AWESOME.
• Prowl lists Tarn as being on par with the Phase Sixers Sixshot and Overlord in "Remembrance Day". So far there's no official confirmation that Tarn is himself a Sixer, with "The Permanent Revolution" and the season 2 finale revolution strongly suggesting that his power levels were due to a combination of personal augmentation and the nuke. The same issue confirms Tarn's status as a Point One Percenter, calling out his possessing a "mottled green spark".
• Like all non-toy robot Kreons in the Kre-O comics, Tarn is made from existing Kre-O parts, but extensively "painted". He uses the Ratchet helmet, the Megatron arm-cannon, and some kind of setup to wear the Bludgeon treads on his back.