King of the Dinosaurs
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 Goodbye, my reptile friend | ||||||
| "King of the Dinosaurs" | ||||||
| Production company | Allspark Animation | |||||
| Airdate | December 7, 2018 (CN app/website) December 8, 2018 (USA) | |||||
| Writer | Randolph Heard | |||||
| Director | Ehud Landsberg | |||||
| Animation studio | Boulder Media Studio | |||||
 Watch this episode on YouTube
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Windblade and Bee uncover a buried Autobot who turns out to be an old friend.
Synopsis
In a construction site overlooking a human city, Windblade and Bumblebee watch doubtfully as Teletraan-X, now "reprogrammed" to "accept" Windblade's instructions as well, commandeers an excavator to dig up the mysterious Autobot Windblade learned about during their prior encounter with Slipstream. All seems to be going well until Teletraan-X hits metal, revealing the frozen body of a robotic dinosaur!
After filling in the two incredulous Autobots on what a dinosaur actually is, Teletraan-X explains that this Autobot has taken the form of a Tyrannosaurus rex, a species known as the "king of the dinosaurs"... cluing in Windblade to their memories of Maccadam, and his cryptic instructions to find the "king of the dinosaurs". The mystery is seemingly solved when Bumblebee retrieves a fallen crown, seemingly cementing the mystery 'bot as their long-sought quarry. When Windblade asks for the identity of the Autobot, Teletraan-X identifies him as Grimlock, one of the many MIA 'bots aboard the Ark before its disappearance.
Furthermore, Teletraan-X is able to identify how Grimlock wound up separated from the rest of the ship; during the Ark's crash-landing, the Autobot warrior was inadvertently roused by Teletraan-1 moments before a hull breach punctured the ship. As Bumblebee's stasis pod fell from the ship, Grimlock tried to catch and retrieve it. As the ship hit Earth's atmosphere, however, Grimlock lost his grip, sending both Autobots plummeting to Earth; amidst the chaos, Teletraan-1 activated its auxiliary backup and ejected it from the ship to ensure that the ship's memory banks would survive the crash intact.
The history lesson over, the two Autobots regard Grimlock's frozen form, unsure if their friend is still alive. Teletraan-X explains that his power source is inactive, but points out that the Autobot has one percent of his energon left; to bring him back online, they'll need a lot of power... but it's a good thing that they've made camp right next to an electrical transformer.
Tapping into the city's power grid to jump-start Grimlock's systems, the jolt does successfully bring Grimlock back online. However, Grimlock reboots as a brutish, inarticulate beast, rather than their famously eloquent friend, and before anyone can do anything the robot dinosaur escapes the construction site and flees into the city to run amok. Bumblebee and Windblade give chase, but their vehicle forms are no match for Grimlock's size and power, and it's ultimately Teletraan-X who saves the day by mesmerizing Grimlock with flashing lights and a lullaby, safely leading him back to the construction site.
Back at the excavation site, Teletraan explains that to survive amongst the dinosaurs, Grimlock rerouted his cognitive processes to enhance his raw physical strength... but this means that the drone isn't sure if Grimlock will even remember his old friends from Cybertron. Indeed, Grimlock speaks up, demanding to see his "friends", but not Windblade or Bumblebee: Grimlock wants to see his dinosaur friends. Nobody is sure how to broach the subject, but the decision is made for them when Grimlock demands his crown. Teletraan-X plays along and "crowns" Grimlock, causing the crown itself—revealed as a homing device—to begin flashing as Grimlock runs off into the wilderness.
As the sun rises, the three pursue Grimlock as he approaches a nearby mountainside. As the confused Autobots watch, Grimlock, still searching for his friends, bashes his way through the rock to reveal an ancient stone bunker built directly into the mountainside. When the rubble has been shifted, Grimlock enters, revealing his old home during his exile on Earth: an exact replica of the Ark's bridge, carved into the cavern. A frustrated Grimlock paces back and forth, searching for any sign of his "friends", before Teletraan-X breaks the news to Grimlock that the dinosaurs have gone extinct. A despairing Grimlock presses his head against a nearby console, and, by doing so, inadvertently activates one of his ancient video logs, the last one recorded before the final extinction of the dinosaurs, where Grimlock urges his dinosaur friends to keep up their spirits in the face of impending doom.
His memories evidently jogged by this video, Grimlock finds the strength to transform back into his robot mode. Apologizing for his rambunctious behavior, Grimlock takes the opportunity to properly introduce the team to his new headquarters.
Featured characters
Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Others |
|---|---|
|
Quotes
"Good morning everybot!" [Notices a hull breach] "Oh, I see how it is. Raised from sweet golden slumbers into the thick of dire emergency! Teletraan-1, status report — but please don't tell me the Ark is going down."
"The Ark is going down."
"Such a simple request. But you just had to-"
- —Grimlock and Teletraan-1
"Teletraan-1, how can I save the crew?"
"Go to my main console and-"
(Grimlock loses his grip and falls.)
"WAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!"
"...never mind."
- —Grimlock and Teletraan-1
"Review. What are your prime directives?"
"Always maintain data backup. And... uh... oh, uh... what's the other one?"
"Assist all crew members."
"Right! Got it. This is pretty exciting!"
- —Teletraan-1 and X
Notes
Continuity notes
- Maccadam told Windblade and Bumblebee they needed to find the "King of the Dinosaurs" back in "Maccadam's"; Windblade learned his location in the previous episode, though it takes until this episode for the pair to learn what a dinosaur actually is.
- Since the events of "Siloed," Bumblebee has reprogrammed Teletraan-X to accept Windblade's instructions, though he still refers to her as "not crew".
- The Autobots were shown to have entered hibernation in "The Journey", and "Whiteout" established that Bumblebee's stasis pod landed in the Himalayas at some point after falling to Earth. That said, the Himalayas didn't exist during the age of the dinosaurs, so it's not clear if his stasis pod was moved at some point after crashing, or if it landed where the Himalayas would one day arise, and was subsequently pushed upwards by tectonic movement.
- Four other stasis pods are shown falling from the Ark. A possible future storyline in the making...?
- This episode gives us the first definite glimpse of the timeline between the Great War and the present day, establishing that the Ark left Cybertron at least 66 million years ago; possibly longer depending on how much time elapsed between the events of "The Journey" and Grimlock's flashback, as seen here.
Transformers references
- In many continuities, Grimlock boasts about being "King" of the Dinobots.
- When Grimlock is first exposed, a mechanical pterosaur wing is exposed, referencing Grimlock's fellow dinobot Swoop.
- Grimlock's adventures on Earth are remniscient of his Marvel comics counterpart; as seen in issue #8, the Dinobots were also reactivated millions of years before the other Autobots aboard the Ark by the ship's computer and subsequently adopted dinosaur forms based on the prehistoric creatures of the Savage Land before being buried until the present day. Similarly the idea of Grimlock wearing a crown is lifted directly from the Marvel comics, though in that universe his signature crown was a purely egotistical affectation rather than anything useful.
- Grimlock's dinosaur friends include a Triceratops, a Velociraptor (but see Errors), a pterosaur, a sauropod dinosaur, and a strangely undersized Spinosaurus.
- A Stegosaurus is absent, but they did only live during the Jurassic era.
- The concept of Grimlock's dual nature—articulate in robot mode, savage in dinosaur mode—is a concept that's seen use before in his Fall of Cybertron and Shattered Glass counterparts, though Teletraan-X's diagnosis that this behavior stems from his rerouting of his cerebral circuitry to enhance his physical power hews closer to the former than the latter.
Real-world references
- "Say hello to your little friend", says Bumblebee, paraphrasing Scarface.
- Whether through coincidence or design, the interlocking footprint-like decorations that adorn the entrance to Grimlock's headquarters (blink and you'll miss it!) bear a resemblance to the "Footprint alphabet" from the Dinotopia book series.
- The episode's title is a real life nickname of the T. rex, Grimlock's dino mode.
Trivia
- It goes largely untouched upon here but Grimlock's backstory means that the events on Cybertron and the Ark must have happened at least 66 million years ago. It's probably best not to think about how that works with an ongoing war.
Animation and technical errors
- When Grimlock is awoken and says, "Good morning every bot!", his chest clips into itself, covering a portion of his Autobot symbol.
- Grimlock specifically refers, in the following episode, to having a Velociraptor amongst his group of not-Dinobots, but in appearance, it looks more like a Utahraptor. Perhaps he had more friends offscreen.
- Grimlock previously stated he gets groggy and slow when he wakes up from stasis. When he is woken by Teletraan I, however, he displays no ill effects.
Paleontological errors
- Teletraan-X wonders if Grimlock's head-bashing is a Jurassic mating ritual; Tyrannosaurus, however, lived in the Cretaceous era.
- As is typical, there are location-misplaced dinosaurs, with African Spinosaurus among North American dinosaurs.
- Speaking of which, it's an error only as of recently, but the Spinosaurus uses the outdated, stereotypical theropod design that the species has been famously depicted in, rather than the updated, squat-limbed and more crocodile-like form it is currently understood to have had...although to give the episode some credit, Spinosaurus has undergone numerous revisions in the last decade with a still developing consensus on its anatomy.
- Said spinosaur is also criminally undersized: regardless of its skeletal construction, Spinosaurus has been the largest carnivorous theropod dinosaur discovered thus far, and it should dwarf most of the other dinos in Grimlock's group .
Foreign localization
French
- Title: "Le roi des dinosaures" ("The king of the dinosaurs")
- Original airdate: December 2, 2018
German
- Title: "Der König der Dinosaurier" ("The King of Dinosaurs")
- Original airdate: January 19, 2019
Hungarian
- Title: "A dinók királya" ("The King of the Dinos")
- Original airdate: February 24, 2019
Italian
- Title: "Il Re dei Dinosauri" ("The King of the Dinosaurs")
- Original airdate: December 8, 2018
Japanese
Home video releases
- DVD
2019 — Transformers Cyberverse — King of the Dinosaurs (Beyond Home Entertainment)
