Mutant (BW)

The name or term "Mutant" refers to more than one character or idea. For a list of other meanings, see Mutant (disambiguation).

The Mutants are an unaligned subgroup from the Mutant Beast Wars portion of the Beast Era.

SCIENCE!

The Mutants (also commonly referred to as Mutant Beasts) are a powerful group of beast warriors who've lost their robot modes, but are able to transform between two beast modes. Led by Icebird, the Mutants seek to create a purely organic existence. The Mutants don't belong to either faction, and will attack Predacons on sight, but they largely tolerate the Maximals as a necessary component of their goals.

Members are:

• Icebird, Commander
• Poison Bite, special ops
• Razor Claw, warrior
• Soundwave, warrior

Fiction

Packaging blurb

Megatron developed an anti-conversion virus, intended to prevent the infected host converting into robot mode, resulting in eventual shutdown. The Mutants were previously Fuzors, and the virus reacted in an unanticipated way with their physiognomy; it caused their conversion abilities to change, trapping their robot modes between two different beast modes. The virus also bestowed 'potent extrasensory powers' upon the former Fuzors, with each member having several unique abilities, such as invisibility, teleportation, or telekinesis. Unsurprisingly, the foursome managed to escape Megatron's clutches and then went renegade, starting the Mutant Beast Wars!

3H comics

Love a Mutant? Can anybody love a Mutant? Oh well.

The Mutants, on Megatron-dominated Cybertron, reported along with the Dinobots and the Wreckers to the Oracle and were given a mission to fulfill: to save the planet's future. Departure It was all a set-up, however, by Cryotek and the Quintessons. The Mutants' instructions led instead to their apparent deaths by Sharkticons, although Poison Bite was later seen concealed in Cryotek's headquarters—evidence that the reports of their deaths may have been greatly exaggerated. Betrayal

Poison Bite and Icebird later appeared on New Quintessa, attacking the Quintessons while their main forces were invading Cybertron. During their attack, Icebird temporarily became a vessel for Primus, "thanking" Judge Heirodyus for the Quintesson's unwitting role in the Great Reformatting while converting New Quintessa into a new colony world for the Transformers. Wreckers: Finale Part II

IDW Beast Wars comics

The remaining stasis pods from the Axalon were activated by Razorbeast. The majority of the newly-born Transformers were either Maximal or Predacon. The Gathering #1 But a few were born Mutants. They fiercely defended their swamp against intruding Predacons, making it clear that no Transformer was welcome in their peaceful home. The Gathering #3

Generation 1 cartoon continuity

Wings Universe

On their way to find the immortal spark of the infamous Decepticon Starscream, the Star Seekers passed near the territory of the Mutants, who now controlled former Quintesson space. The pirates were terrified of the Mutants, having heard that they were savage, and Captain Cannonball made a point to steer as clear of Mutant space as possible. Tornado's Personal Journal

Toys

• Mutants (2000)
  • Icebird
  • Poison Bite
  • Razor Claw
  • Soundwave

The four toys in this sub-group were originally designed for the ill-fated Animorphs toyline, and upon its failure were slightly retooled and brought over to the mainline Transformers continuity family. They have a couple of common features. Each toy had a robot head hidden somewhere within its body, to indicate that their personae were still essentially sentient rather than bestial. Also, three of the four toys had flip-up panels underneath their Mutant insignia, which were lifted to reveal robotic components (to convey they were still essentially robots, although they lacked a 'robot' mode); for some reason Razor Claw lacked this feature.

Notes

• The exact placement of these characters within the fiction can be argued. Though their packages labeled them as part of a unique Mutant Beast Wars toyline, they came out at a point when the Beast Wars toyline and cartoon were well ended and Beast Machines was well underway. Further, their packaging blurb and bios make reference to Megatron's mode-lock viruses, conflict between organic and mechanical Transformer life, and most tellingly the Oracle, all of which were specifically central points of the Beast Machines storyline. Hence, the 3H BotCon materials placed them on Beast Machines Cybertron as part of that conflict, while the IDW comics defaulted to their packaging label, ignored any conflicting backstory, and made them a part of the Beast Wars on Earth instead.
• Whether by design or coincidence, the beast-to-beast Beast Changer toy was released in the main Beast Machines toyline at nearly the same time as the Mutants.