Quintesson Judge (G1)

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

The Quintesson Judge is a type of Quintesson from the Generation 1 continuity family.

Leaders of the Quintesson race, the Quintesson Judges determine the sentences of their unfortunate victims in Quintessa's courtrooms and serve as the face of their many business and war excursions.

“	All shall be judged.	”
—Quintesson Judge's Earthrise motto

Faces

A Quintesson Judge's most distinctive physical characteristic is its set of five rotating faces. Each face represents a different aspect of the Quintesson, and not only does their physical sequence vary, so do their meanings. The only face identified during the run of the original Transformers cartoon was the "Face of Death", memorably called out directly by the narrator of the Secret Files of Teletraan II.

The script for The Transformers: The Movie—the first appearance of the Quintessons—called for the other four faces to be "angry", "smiling", "grimacing", and "suspicious", and artist Floro Dery designed the faces to represent these emotions. A spread in the January 1987 issue of Japan's Comic Bom Bom would also reflect this intent, using mostly direct translations of the English descriptors—Shi (死, "Death"), Ikari (怒り, "Anger"), Warai (笑い, "Laughter"), Jūmen (渋面, "Grimace"), and Utagai (疑い, "Suspicion"). This would remain unknown to Western audiences until circa 2002, when fan Andrew Hall provided a translation, identifying the faces as "Rage", "Laughter", "Bitterness", and "Doubt".

These newly translated designations were not prevalent in the fandom at the time, so when author Simon Furman penned the 2004 book, Transformers: The Ultimate Guide, he invented his own names for the other four faces. While he struck lucky dubbing the "angry" face "Wrath", the others—"War", "Wisdom", and "Judgement"—have no connection to the actual intent behind the Quintessons' design.

In 2020, the Quintessons made their big comeback as part of the War for Cybertron Trilogy franchise. The instruction manual for the Quintesson Pit of Judgement multi-pack (see below) gave the "smiling" face the new name of "Wit", while using a mix of established names for the others; these names were reinforced by their use in the Earthrise cartoon, which was released a few months later.

The Movie script	Death	Angry	Smiling	Grimacing	Suspicious
Fan translations		Rage	Laughter	Bitterness	Doubt
The Ultimate Guide		Wrath	War	Wisdom	Judgement
War for Cybertron			Wit		Doubt

Fiction

Generation 1 cartoon continuity

Macrocosmic Seekers

The Seeker was a Quintesson Judge before he abandoned his race to become a being of pure information. A Treasure's True Worth

Legends comic

A Judge and a Prosecutor were in contact with the Matrix, which was filled with the Quintessons' evil wisdom. Bonus Edition Vol. EX

A sole Judge from a time long before 2021 led a troop of Overcharges to attack the Legends World through a portal. He was attacked by the diminutive Blitzwing of 2021, but was thrown away by the Judge's attendant Overcharge. Blitzwing soon made his own transtector from a fallen Overcharge, and he was able to convince his past self, who was the Judge's Overcharge, to find his own identity. Fleeing Blitzwing back to his native time and place, the Judge declared the creators of the Legends World to be dangerous. Bonus Edition Vol. 59

The Story of Super Robot Lifeforms: The Transformers manga

A Judge loudly announced the emergence of Gilthor from Earth's oceans. The Story of Super Robot Lifeforms: The Transformers #4

Controverse

The Galactic Court assigned Adveraros, a Quintesson Judge, to Primacron's trial on Millaath. Controverse

Generations Selects Special Comic

The Quintessons would eventually break free of their dimensional prison thanks to the Angolmois Energy on Earth and the unique properties of Dinobot Island. With one Judge leading several other Judges, a Bailiff, and some Allicons, the Quintessons sought to subdue the Dinobots so they could sell the Autobots to the highest bidder. The Dinobots resisted, so the lead Judge released a Recreator that recreated Predaking to fight the Dinobots. However, the Dinobots were able to combine into Volcanicus, and the Quintessons fled while the Dinobot combiner defeated Predaking. Volcanicus comic 1

Marvel The Transformers comics

Lord Kledji and Sevax were Quintesson Judges. Space Pirates!

3H comics

Derodomontatus, Betrayal Heirodyus, and Brinn were Judges. Wreckers: Finale Part II

2005 IDW continuity

Pentius was a Judge-type Quintesson. Faces of Darkness

War for Cybertron Trilogy continuity

War for Cybertron Trilogy marketing material

The Quintessons were one of the few unforeseen dangers ahead of the Autobots and Decepticons in their race for the AllSpark. The Judge's function served as a Galactic Marauder. Their primary objective was to decide who is worthy and who shall suffer, and their primary weapons were the Allicon guards and drone army. Earthrise webpage

War for Cybertron Trilogy cartoon

Deseeus was a Quintesson Judge. Earthrise episode 2

Toys

War for Cybertron: Earthrise

"It is a day so long in coming that I am uncertain how to celebrate it."

File:TF-WFC-E-Voyager-Quintesson-Judge.jpg

Promo render with incorrect beam color

• Quintesson Judge (Voyager Class, 2020)
  • Hasbro ID number: WFC-E22
  • TakaraTomy ID number: ER EX-08
  • TakaraTomy release date: August 29, 2020
  • Accessories: Blaster, cage, throne, levitation beam

The Earthrise Quintesson Judge is the first release of a "Generation 1" Quintesson toy. A trigger on his "back" activates a face-spinning gimmick. The faces of Death, Wisdom, and Wrath have opening jaws; the faces of Wrath and Doubt come detached in the package, requiring owners to clip them into their respective sides, with Wrath reported by many owners to be quite a challenge to attach correctly. The order of the faces matches the arrangement from The Transformers: The Movie, with Wisdom and Wit surrounding Death, which is slightly different from that used in the cartoon, which flanked Death with Wrath and Doubt. Unscrewing and detaching every face except Wrath can be used to replicate Deseeus cutting off his faces in the Netflix cartoon, although the bare plastic under the faces can be considered unsightly.

The lower body's five soft-plastic tentacles are on swivel joints to raise and lower, and each has three 3mm effects pegs designed to accommodate War for Cybertron blast effects parts. Using these pegs, the Quintesson can hold its blaster accessory, and the tentacles can also be pegged into specifically-positioned holes on the Judge's body to better "aim" the weapon forward. The Judge also includes a transparent "levitation beam", which pegs onto the included throne via a 5mm post-hole, then attaches to the Judge's underside via a clip; it does not function as an effects part. Promotional renders color the beam in translucent yellow, but the finalized figure leaves it uncolored.

Because it has to transform into something, the Judge converts via partforming into a tower with a prison cage in 16 steps. The top of the tower and the cage do not actually attach to the base; they only balance on it. The cage is large enough to fit a Battle Master (or other similarly-sized figures), and has a post-hole on top to fit the blaster. The throne/platform and the panel under the Death face have A.I.R. Lock System ramp connections, allowing it to connect to ramps from other compatible toys, notably the Quintesson-allied Slitherfang.

Like all Earthrise toys, the inside of the back of the Judge's package includes an exclusive clip-and-save piece of a larger star map. Also in the box is a thin red piece of transparent plastic with which to read the star map. The Judge's piece of the map contains the labeled location of the planet "QUINTESSA". Like most Earthrise figures from wave 2 onward, however, it is misprinted, and overlays the "decodable" red graphics from the map piece included with Earthrise Starscream on top of the details unique to the Judge's piece.

The Judge was originally supposed to be released in the second wave, but was pushed back to the third for unknown reasons, with Starscream taking his place in wave 2 cases. In Japan, the Quintesson Judge was released as a TakaraTomy Mall exclusive.

War for Cybertron Trilogy

They've got this case all wrapped up.

• Quintesson Pit of Judgement (giftset, 2020)
  • Accessories: Blaster, cage, throne, levitation beam

A redeco of the Earthrise Quintesson Judge is the centerpiece of this box set of toys, presenting the "trial" of Kranix during The Transformers: The Movie. The overall coloration is generally brighter, with some faces getting fairly extensive color changes. The tentacles are now bright green, the levitation beam clear-blue, and the throne base gray (as opposed to the stock photography's bright blue, the same photographs showed the Quintesson body to have a pink tint,which is not the case in the final version either). Thankfully, all five faces come pre-attached, saving a lot of hassle and hurt digits.

This set also includes the Quintesson Bailiff, a new-deco Sharkticon, and mini-figures of the Quintesson Prosecutor and Kranix. The packaging interior forms a diorama of the "courtroom", with poor Kranix on a gangplank over the Sharkticon pit with the Judge hovering above.

This set was announced to the public before the "standard" version of the Judge was released, and was first made available for people who attended the Hasbro Fans Expo in Hong Kong and preordered the set. It was later made a Hasbro PulseCon 2020 exclusive in the United States and Canada (except for Quebec), available to Premium members on September 23 2020, then opened up to all members on the 24th, where it sold out, went to pre-orders for more, then sold out of pre-orders within a few short hours despite a (stated) 1-per-customer limit.

Notes

• In their first appearance in The Transformers: The Movie, the two speaking Quintessons are voiced by Regis Cordic (who plays the judge) and Roger C. Carmel (the prosecutor). These two actors then became the primary recurring voices of the Quintessons in the third season of the cartoon, usually playing judges, with Jack Angel normally serving as a third in episodes where more than two speaking roles were required. In AKOM-animated episodes, Cordic's Quintesson (usually designated "Quintesson #1" in scripts) would commonly speak from the Face of Doubt, while Carmel's ("Quintesson #2") used the Face of Laughter; Angel's intermittently-appearing third Quintesson would most often use the Face of Death, but animation errors, and Quintesson face-rotating meant that these were not absolute rules. In Toei episodes, judges usually spoke from the Face of Death regardless of actor, and prosecutors got more screen time, with Cordic, as the "lead" Quintesson actor, voicing most of them. Numerous guest actors also played assorted "guest" Quintesson roles in various episodes.

Foreign names

• Japanese: Itsutsu-gao (5つ顔, "five-faced"), hanji (判事, "judge"), saibankan (裁判官, "judge"), Quintesson Judge (クインテッサンジャッジ Kuintessan Jajji)