Blast from the Past

"When they opened Disneyland in 1956, nothing worked". "Yes, but John , when Pirates Of The Caribbean breaks down, the pirates don't eat the tourists".

Professor Sumdac upgrades a trio of animatronic dinosaurs from a local theme park, but the creatures develop minds of their own and become rampaging Dinobots, bent on destroying the Autobots.

Synopsis

Sari takes the Autobots to "Dino Drive", a dinosaur exibit, inorder to teach the Autobots some of Earth's history. On the way, Bulkhead accidently destroys every car in the parking lot. Once inside, the see the dinosaurs and become amazed dinosaurs' power. Bilkhead becomes so facinated he tries to get the Pterodon to fly and do other things to amuse him. This only succeeds in having the robot Pterodon fall and cause a Triceratops and Tyrannosaurus robot collide and break each other. With this, the Autobot take the broken anamatronics to Professor Sumdac for repair.

At the lab, Megatron views the power of dinosaurs through the tutorbot and becomes amazed at their supposed strength. Sumdac then walks in and reliazes the tutorbot is on and becomes preplexed about how simple the information on it is saying how everyone already knows it. Megatron then speaks to him saying he did not know. Sumdac becomes shocked at Megatron's awakening and tells him where he is. Megatron the reassures him that since he's not going anywhere, he can sit through a long story. Megatron then convinces Sumdac that he is a friend of the Autobots and that they'll be happy to see him repaired so they keep his existance a secert. After this he tells Sumdac he will help him repair the dinosaurs; not telling Sumdac of course that he plans on using them for prototype attack drones.

Meanwhile, at the Autobot base, Prowl tries to teach Bulkhead how to control his strength and size. This off course ends with Bulkhead falling on Prowl. He then takes him to an abandoned island to train, but this results in Bulkhead dropping trees on Prowl.

At the Dino Drive, Sumdac reveals his and Megatron's creations: The Dinobots!

After displaying what Sumdac programmed to do, Megatron makes them display what he programmed them to do: Destroy the Autobots! As the Dinodrones attack them Bulkhead tries to recreate Prowl's teaching to no effect as the others get beat up by the drones. Ratchet and Bumblebee then combine their powers to create an EMP blast to shut them down, but Sari's key activates to blow the dino skin off them and reveal their robot bodies. Sumdac then takes them back to his lab to see what he can fix.

At his lab, Megatron becomes preplexed as to why the key activated, thinking something was Cybertronian about the drones. He then dissmisses this ldea and curses the drones for being useless. Then something happens that surprises Megatron, the Tyrannosaurus starts to talk, and the other dinosaurs to to move! And on top of that, he finds he can't control them!

Megatron then surmizes that the Autobots did something to them declaring somehow they have sparks of their own. The Tyrannosaurus then dubbs himself "Grimlock" and without fail Megatron declares that he is the Dinobots' leader. Grimlock of course dosen't approve and announce he is the leader. Suddenly the tutorbot activates, much to Megatron annoyance, and explains how dinosaur fossils make fossil fuel which makes cars and trucks work. Grimlock takes this as that cars and trucks "eat" dinosaurs and announce that cars and trucks are bad. Megatron takes advantage of their low intelligence and tells them that "fossil feeders" are bad and the only thing worse then cars or trucks are car robots aka Autobots. He then cuases them to activate their fire breath powers and they use them to destroy the tutorbot. Grimlock is pleased with this, but does not know how he did it. Megatron then tells them that the fossil feeders want them dead, so the Dinobots go to defend themselves.

As they go to wage war on the fossil feeders, Capt Fanzone's arrives to attempt to stop them. Suddenly, Slag (who has not yet named himself, neither has Swoop) tailwhips a car and Capt Fanzone's car becomes the first casulity of the Dinobots' war on the fossil feeders as it lands on his car. Fanzone then takes a bazooka and shoots Slag; but Slag just eats the missile.

The Autobots then arrive and lure them to a park to battle them. As Grimlock sees them transform, he says he forgets something but then remembers that he was told car robots were worse than cars and trucks. As the battle goes the on, the Autobots are seriously out matched. But as Bumblebee and Ratchet heat up a parking lot, tar is made and Bulkhead throws the Dinobots in. The Dinobot use their flames in an attempt to free themselves from the "Black-Sticky-Stuff" but to no aval.

Trapped, the Dinobots are like in frozen tar with only their heads sticking out and Sumdac declars to melt them down due to their danger to society. Optimus approves of this but Prowl does not feeling that they have sparks within them. As Sumdac returns the next morning, he finds the Dinobots have escaped from their tar prison.

On the deserted island Prowl and Bulkhead trained on (which has been dubbed "Dinobot Island" but fans) Prowl and freed the Dinobots in a huge crater, which houses a beautiful natural inviroment, there with Bulkhead's help. Prowl and Bulkhead then see how happy they are and surmize to keep it their secert. With that, Prowl sets a hologram up to keep them hidden and safe from the world.

Stats

• Written by: Kevin Hopps
• Directed by: Irineo Maramba, Ben Jones, & Kentaro Mizuno
• Original airdate: January 12, 2008

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans
Bulkhead (6) Bumblebee (3) Grimlock (9) Optimus Prime (2) Prowl (5) Ratchet (4) Slag (10) Swoop (11)	Megatron (7)	Captain Fanzone (12) Isaac Sumdac (8) Sari Sumdac (1)

Other notes

Transformers references

• The island Prowl takes the Dinobots to may be a reference to Dinobot Island.
• Grimlock's robot mode looks very much like G1 Grimlock's with a few changes.

Real-world references

• The entrance of Dino Drive is remarkably similar to the entrance of Jurassic Park in the movie of the same name, and music reminiscent of the Jurassic Park theme can be heard during some of the Dino Drive scenes.

Miscellaneous trivia

• This marks the first time the Dinobots have been used in a Transformers TV series since Generation 1. There is much joy.
• The Dinobots' color schemes are lifted directly from the Generation 1 cartoon, with some minor variations. This is most obvious in Swoop's torso being blue, rather then the red featured in Generation 1 Swoop's comic and toy incarnations. The Diaclone version of Generation 1 Swoop's toy likewise had a blue chest, so this is possibly an homage, but is more likely coincidence.
• Unlike Generation 1, the Dinobot's alt modes match up more closely with how dinosaurs are depicted in the fossil record (less sluggish, more mammal/bird-like, Grimlock bent over horizontally, no bow-leggedness, etc.). There was still a lack of feathers before they were de-skinned, though. (However, since it's doubtful T. Rexes had a feather covering like smaller therapods, and pterosaurs only had down, it's not really an issue)
• In this episode, Tutorbot actually teaches Sari and the Autobots about dinosaurs and fossil fuels. He's back on form however when the pre-transformer Grimlock squashes him.
  
  
  From Teletraan I: The Transformers Wiki, a Wikia wiki.