Wasp

This article is about the ill-destined wasp robot from Transformers Animated. For the ill-destined wasp robot from the Beast Era, see Waspinator.

Wasp is an Autobot from the Transformers Animated continuity family. After a freak mutation, he took the name Waspinator.

Wasp and Bee. Obvious, with hindsight.

Wasp is a lot like Bumblebee... physically, at least. Built from the same chassis and sharing many of the same specifications and subroutines, the two Autobots attended boot camp together. Wasp's pompous, smarmy personality leaves something to be desired, but he had a lot going for him as a soldier, being highly skilled in the use of his stingers and knowing just how to toe the line with the drill sergeant. In a better life, he might have been Cybertron Elite Guard commander material.

Might have.

These days, though, Wasp is a broken bot, mentally unstable and on the run from the Autobots who have branded him a traitor. What little remains of his mind is focused on just one goal... destroying Bumblebee, the bot who ruined his life!

“	Looks like the hybrid found himself a new friend... a total mudflap!	”
——Wasp lets the world know his high opinion of Bumblebee and Bulkhead, "Autoboot Camp"

Fiction

Animated cartoon

This section covers fiction that is ongoing. It will be added to as the story progresses. If it isn't current, you can help by updating it.

Voice actor: Tom Kenny (English), Jaron Löwenberg (German)

Wasp was a cadet in the same group as Bumblebee, Bulkhead, Ironhide and Longarm. Right away, Wasp took an instant disliking to Bumblebee, insulting him out of the blue as the yellow bot mused to himself about his future in the Elite Guard. He also dubbed Bulkhead a "mudflap", much to the amusement of his fellow cadets. The loud-mouthed drill sergeant Sentinel Minor took an immediate liking to "Wasp", as he dubbed him. Wasp and Ironhide quickly became close friends, often competing in little tests of strength, usually involving Wasp hitting or stinging Ironhide while the latter was in armor mode.

After Bumblebee "bumbled" several times, leading to many transform-ups for the whole group, Wasp and Ironhide decided to take matters into their own hands, unscrewing Bumblebee's lower legs and leaving them out of reach even before they dumped the rest of him in a locker.

Unbeknownst to Wasp, however, the reason for Bumblebee's foul-ups was that he was trying to out a traitor in the group—and had pegged Wasp as the likely culprit after seeing him walk out of a hangar in which someone had contacted Megatron. (Plus, let's face it, he was a complete jerk. And Decepticons are jerks, right?) At Longarm's prompting, Bumblebee eventually found evidence incriminating Wasp as a spy. Wasp was stripped of his Autobot insignia and wheeled away, protesting his innocence and swearing revenge on Bumblebee.

Wasp was once a 'Bot...

Many years later, Wasp escaped from Autobot custody and apparently eluded the now-Sentinel Prime by jumping through a space bridge. What was left of Wasp hid beneath the bridge as Sentinel left, buzzing and twittering to himself, still swearing revenge on "Bumblebot". In reality, however, the innocent bot—broken mentally by his years of imprisonment—had been set up with evidence planted by "Longarm", who had also arranged Wasp's "escape" to divert suspicion from himself. Autoboot Camp

Needless to say, when the truth was revealed to Bumblebee by his old "friend" Longarm Prime (aka the Decepticon Shockwave), he took it pretty hard. A Bridge Too Close, Part II

Toys

Transformers Animated

Finally Blackarachnia has a pal... and by "pal" we mean "guinea pig".

• Waspinator (Deluxe class, 2009)

Despite his cartoon origins, Waspinator is not a redeco or retooling of Bumblebee. Part of the sixth wave of Animated Deluxe-class toys, Waspinator transforms from a techno-organic wasp into a techno-organic, four-armed, winged robot that resembles his Beast Wars namesake, only far freakier-looking. In both modes, a lever on the thorax flaps his wings back and forth.

Notes

• A wasp and a bee, sharing the same mold? How preposterous!

• Wasp's time in prison seems to have shattered his mind and transformed him into a character akin to Waspinator of Beast Wars fame. Both of these bots have misfortune sprung upon them, but this character's misfortune is in a more serious vein than slapstick violence. The role of whipping boy is another's.

• Wasp's design also features some similarities to the original Waspinator, namely the stripes on his thighs, the head crest, the eye shape and his chin evokes Waspinator's 'mouth flaps'.

• The small vestigial arms present on the Deluxe Waspinator toy's robot mode torso have their origin in an early design concept for Lockdown; the bounty hunter robot's character model was subsequently altered to make his appearance less monstrous, but Derrick Wyatt loved the concept of the vestigial arms enough to incorporate them instead into Waspinator's design. [1] [2]

• The Deluxe Waspinator toy's packaging states that he is able to survive being blown to pieces, which harks back to the original's propensity of continually getting blasted to bits and yet surviving and coming back seemingly unscathed each time.