Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)

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<tr style="font-size:14px;"> <td class="tti_buttonlink">« </td><td>Beast Wars ep <strong class="selflink">29 </strong>

</td><td class="tti_buttonlink">» </td></tr></table> </td></tr> <tr> <td colspan="2" style="font-size: 12px; background-color:#ffffff;" align="center"> <img alt="" src="/w2/images2/thumb/2/25/Coming_of_the_Fuzors_2_Predacons_sunset.jpg/300px-Coming_of_the_Fuzors_2_Predacons_sunset.jpg" width="300" height="227" border="0" /><br />Let the battle begin! </td></tr> <tr> <td colspan="2" style="font-size: 14px; background-color:#e7d492; color:black;font-weight:bold;" align="center"> "Coming of the Fuzors" (Part 2) </td></tr>

<tr> <td> Production company </td><td> Mainframe Entertainment </td></tr> <tr> <td> Airdate </td><td> November 9, 1997 </td></tr>

<tr> <td> Written by </td><td> Bob Forward </td></tr>

<tr> <td> Directed by </td><td> Cal Shumiatcher </td></tr>

<tr> <td> Animation studio </td><td> Mainframe Entertainment </td></tr> <tr> <td> Continuity </td><td> Beast Wars continuity </td></tr></table> The outnumbered Maximals must defend their base from a Predacon assault while Rhinox takes a dangerous journey.

Japanese title: よみがえれコンボイ (Yomigaere Convoy, "Convoy Reborn")

Synopsis

Powerlinxing gone horribly wrong

Dinobot, Rattrap, and Cheetor attempt to hold off six Predacons some distance from their base, to allow Rhinox to complete his mission to travel through the Allspark. When Megatron orders them to take no survivors, Silverbolt protests, saying they should let the Maximals surrender, only to be struck by the irate Predacon commander. When Silverbolt is perplexed by their resistance, Megatron realizes that they are keeping them from their base. He orders Waspinator and Silverbolt to head to the Axalon. Cheetor takes to the air, and Rattrap converts to vehicle mode, ordering Dinobot to hop on and provide cover fire (disgusting the former Predacon).

Tarantulas, however, is using the psychic link to force Blackarachnia to search for information on the Golden Disks. While she searches through the files, she discovers something of importance, but refuses to show Tarantulas. When Tarantulas is rendered unconscious by a boulder, Blackarachnia downloads the information, then destroys the computer, claiming that it was boobytrapped.

No organic lifeforms were harmed in the making of this episode. Several Cybertronian lifeforms were.

Reaching the Axalon, Silverbolt is shot down by the autoguns, and captured by the Maximals. Dinobot prepares to destroy him, but Rattrap and Cheetor prevent him, instead taking him in to repair him. Rhinox, who has finished, tells the Maximals they must hold the Predacons off for a little while longer. Inside the Axalon, a charge hits the device Rhinox was connected to, traveling to a stasis pod with a blank protoform. Outside, the shields fail under the fire, and the Maximals engage—to discover that they are out of ammo. The Predacons seriously injure the Maximals.

"Check out my new pec-implants. I only had to sell my old body to get 'em."

Having waited a long time for their victory, the Predacons approach, prepared to deliver the killing blow. Before they can finish the Maximals off, there is an explosion in the hull of the Axalon. When the smoke clears, the Maximals and Predacons alike are shocked to see the cause of the explosion—Optimus Primal. The Predacons attempt to destroy him, but Primal, now with his own Transmetal body, causes the Predacons to scatter. Primal takes to the air, dispatching the rest of the Predacons. Megatron attempts to kill Primal, but Silverbolt knocks Megatron off a cliff, defecting to the Maximals.

After the battle and some repairs, Primal inquires as to how the new bodies do with absorbing energon. Rhinox remarks that all the energon within the area either detonated or was converted to Energon cubes, so it isn't really a problem right now. They'll have to wait for Tigatron and Airazor's report on the rest of the planet. In the meantime, Primal remarks that he has to put his house in order, such as get to know the new additions, and remove Rattrap's personal effects from his quarters.

She's got a twinkle in her eye.

At the Predacon base, Blackarachnia tells Megatron that Dinobot stole the Disks and destroyed the computers. Megatron and Tarantulas ask if anything from the back ups can be recovered, and when Blackarachnia reveals that it was totally destroyed, Megatron smashes Tarantulas into the wall in rage. Megatron then declares that the Beast Wars has entered a new phase, while, unseen, binary code flashes across Blackarachnia's eyes.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

<table border="5" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="5" align="center" style="border:#800000"> <tr> <th style="background:#FFEEEE"> Maximals</th><th style="background:#EEEEFE"> Predacons </th></tr> <tr> <td style="background:#FFEEEE" valign="top">

• Cheetor (4)
• Dinobot (5)
• Rattrap (6)
• Silverbolt (8)
• Rhinox (10)
• Optimus Primal (12)

</td><td style="background:#EEEEFE" valign="top">

• Tarantulas (1)
• Megatron (2)
• Inferno (3)
• Quickstrike (7)
• Waspinator (9)
• Blackarachnia (11)

</td></tr></table>

Quotes

"Prepare for a full attack!"<br /> "What? We outnumber them more than two to one."<br /> "Yes..."<br /> "We have twice their firepower."<br /> "Yes..."<br /> "We should give them a chance to surrender!"<br /> "Mmm...no."

—Megatron and Silverbolt have a tactical disagreement.

"These Maximals are fools! We flank their position. They should retreat, but still they fight."<br /> "Ah, the Maximals are many things, but fools they are not."

—Silverbolt and Megatron

"To think, that a warrior must become a... a rat patrol."<br />

—Dinobot on having to ride Rattrap.

"Tarantulas? Yo, Legs! (pause) Free! For a second, anyway."

—Blackarachnia, discovering her mental link to Tarantulas has been briefly severed.

Silverbolt: "Lead on."<br /> Waspinator: "You no tell Wazzpinator what to do. Wazzpinator in command."<br /> Silverbolt: "Okay, fine! What is your command?"<br /> Waspinator: "Doggy-bot follow Wazzpinator. Wazzpinator will lead."<br />

—And that's why Waspinator can only dream of being in charge.

"Yeah, we would've been here sooner if Dinobutt wasn't such a porker."<br /> "The vilest ride of my life!"

—Rattrap and Dinobot

"It's not what Optimus would've done."<br /> "Bahhh! Maximal sentiment! Oh, I must've been defective to defect."

—Cheetor and Dinobot, on the possibility of destroying the captured Silverbolt

"Am I back?"<br /> "Oh, the machine said so. Oh, but you had me worried for a second. Where'd ya go, anyway?"<br /> "Where all are one."<br /> "Oh, where all– what?"

—Rhinox and Rattrap

"Oh, great. We're all gonna die."<br /> "It happens, but miracles happen, too. Let's go!"

—Rattrap and Rhinox, as the Predacons attack the base

"It's us and the Preds now."<br /> "You know my vote!" [begins firing]

—Rhinox and Cheetor, after the shields collapse

"Comes... the dawn."<br /> "And...[Dinobot's arm falls off]...our doom."

—Rhinox and Dinobot.

"At least we go with honor."

—Dinobot, certain the Predacons will destroy them

"Well, that's just prime!"<br />

—Optimus Primal, alive and kicking.

(Silverbolt knocks Megatron off a cliff)<br /> "Consider that my resignation from the Predacons, Megatron! (to Primal) I know now that my place was always with the Maximals. May I join you?"<br /> "Well...I like your résumé."

—Silverbolt and Optimus Primal

"Hey, come on! Gimme a break, will ya? The guy was dead."

—Rattrap, defending taking Optimus's quarters during his absence

"Yes. Well, we enter a new phase of the Beast Wars then. Future developments should prove very interesting."<br /> "Yesss. Very interesting indeed."

—Megatron and Blackarachnia

Notes

Trivia

• After Rattrap throws a rock in the air as an example of what would happen if they moved away from the cover of the boulder, it's blasted into a tiny pebble and hits the ground. All three Maximals' "eyes" then pop out of their heads towards the rock in the fashion of the eyeball gag in classic Tex Avery cartoons.
• Blackarachnia's theft of the Golden Disk data would have consequences carrying through the remainder of the series.
• Though neither admits it, it seems likely that both Tarantulas and Megatron see through Blackarachnia's sleight-of-hand with the backup data tracks. Blackarachnia tells Megatron that the computer was destroyed by Dinobot... after telling Tarantulas that it was destroyed because it was booby trapped. Tarantulas says nothing to contradict this lie to Megatron, and later interrogates her when the chance presents itself in "Bad Spark". Megatron likewise guesses the truth and attempts to strong-arm the data from her in "The Agenda (Part III)".
• This episode continues the Spaghetti Western film references, especially when Optimus fights Inferno.
• Speaking of Inferno, there were plans to have him be a reborn version of Megatron<sup id="cite_ref-0" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-0" title="">[1]</a></sup>, but those plans obviously never came to be. This abandoned plot was hinted when the two flyers crash into one another, and recover only to find their heads on the wrong bodies. Megatron was capable of using Inferno's body during this mix-up to punch Inferno's head.
• It seems somewhat unusual that Rattrap would have Silverbolt (then a Predacon) sent to the CR Chamber instead of a holding cell (especially when you consider what was done to the deactivated bodies of Inferno and Tarantulas during Aftermath), but, since it did result in Silverbolt defecting to the Maximals, it all worked out for the best.
• As of the end of this episode, four of the eight members of Primal's team have spent time as Predacons, one way or another.

Technical/animation glitches

• When Megatron opens fire on the Maximals the second time in this episode, his middle, ring, and pinky "fingers" are shown clipping through his cannon.
• While in pursuit of Rattrap and Dinobot, Megatron transforms from his beast mode in mid-flight and continues to attack from the air, yet his VTOL engines are inactive on his back rather than deployed.
• Before the Maximals begin getting hammered by the Preds, Rhinox is on top of Rattrap, with him either clipping through Rattrap's rear wheel, or the wheel has no interior.

Continuity errors

• Tarantulas and Waspinator arrive again mid-battle, despite having already arrived at the end of the previous episode.
• Waspinator and Silverbolt take off for the Maximal base twice, clearly going over the Maximals' heads a second time as they reassert the danger of the situation in different phrasing than before.
• Dinobot says his weapon is depleted, despite clearly having ammunition bandoliers criscrossed over his torso. The weapon gets fired more times before the episode ends, anyway.
• There's no real in-story reason for the Maximals to run out of ammunition before the Predacons, who have been unloading ordnance at them all night. Rhinox in particular should have fully loaded weapons when he enters the fight.

<div style="width: 90%; margin: 0 auto .2em auto; background-color:#efefef; border: 2px solid #eeeeee; padding: 2px; text-align: left;">Note: The above "errors" may in fact be intentional directorial choices, to fit the episode's thematic homage to spaghetti western serials.</div>

• The Transmetalization of Optimus Primal's new body doesn't quite fit the established Transmetal pattern, which is that bodies active before coming to Earth were Transmetalized (unless in a CR chamber at the time), while those "born" on Earth were not. As a raw protoform, Primal's new body seemingly should not be mutated.
• An earlier script revision<sup id="cite_ref-1" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-1" title="">[2]</a></sup> called for the elevator into the Maximal base to be destroyed during the fight, giving Primal a more practical reason to blow a hole in the side of his own base. Oh well, maybe the big guy was in a hurry.

Transformers references

How many Starscreams are there on this planet, anyway?

• While Blackarachnia is searching through Megatron's stuff, a gray model of Starscream's head is in the pile. (It's too small to be the real thing, given that Beast Warriors are shown later in the series to be much smaller than G1 characters. Part of a bust maybe? Ah, yeeesssssss.)
• Other items in the pile include a WW2-era model airplane, a model helicopter, a number of books, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Grail" class="extiw" title="wikipedia:Holy_Grail">Holy Grail</a>, two identical spiky planets, a pocket-watch, and a rubber ducky.
• During one of Rhinox's trips through the Matrix, near the end of the episode, the Autobot Matrix of Leadership is seen floating.
• When Rattrap asks where Rhinox went, he describes the Matrix as "where all are one".

Real-world references

• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rat_Patrol" class="extiw" title="wikipedia:The_Rat_Patrol">The Rat Patrol</a> was a 1960s TV show about a group of Allied soldiers fighting Rommel's Afrika Corps on the North African front during World War II. A remake starring Dinobot and Rattrap would be awesome.

References

<div class="references-small"> <ol class="references"><li id="cite_note-0">[#cite_ref-0" title="">↑</a> <a href="http://groups.google.com/group/alt.toys.transformers/msg/bc8e54e9165e0823?hl=en&q=inferno+megatron 1997 Bob Forward interview on ATT] <li id="cite_note-1">[#cite_ref-1" title="">↑</a> <a href="http://bwtf.com/bw/tvshow/episodes/seasontwo/cotftwo/cotftwoscript.pdf "Coming of the Fuzors" (Part 2) script at Benson Yee's site] (Currently down)</ol></div>