Miko Nakadai
- Miko is a human from the Prime portion of the Aligned continuity family.
Miko Nakadai is a 15-year old girl from Japan with a strong love of American pop culture... as long as it's loud pop culture! Speed metal and wild punk outfits are her thing, and she's always searching for thrills, causing trouble for her mates Jack Darby and Raf Esquivel. She's started to hang out with the Autobot Bulkhead too, helping him get over his fear of hurting his tiny partner and encouraging him to get in trouble with her. However, when the chips are down, she'll look out for her pals and Bulky has her back.
Fiction
Prime cartoon
- Voice actor: Tania Gunadi (English)
When living in Tokyo, Miko had two loving parents and two purebreed cats, Chi Chi and Ding Dong. She went to the best school, and took piano lessons since she was three, but she found it so boring, and she jumped at the chance to transfer to Jasper, Nevada. Once there, she quickly realized the brochure had lied about it being "the entertainment capital of the world", and soon piano lessons seemed pretty good in comparison. Darkness Rising, Part 4
Miko was sitting outside her high school sketching Arcee, who was parked in motorcycle mode. She received a phone call from her host parents, but decided to ignore it. When Jack rode off on Arcee, she decided to follow the motorcycle because it was the coolest ever. She caught up to Jack in an alley in time to overhear Arcee, who had transformed to robot mode, asking Jack to go back with her to Autobot headquarters for his own safety. When Jack hesitated, Miko encouraged him to go.
Since Miko now also knew about the Autobots, Arcee took both of the humans back to headquarters. When Ratchet was surprised to see three humans, Arcee wryly explained that the youngsters had multiplied. Miko introduced herself to Bulkhead and promptly asked a barrage of questions, leaving the Autobot at a loss for words. Optimus Prime arrived and explained about "autonomous robotic organisms" and the Transformers' civil war. Darkness Rising, Part 1
Ratchet picked up Cliffjumper's signal, but believed it was a computer system error, since Cliffjumper had previously gone offline. Prime went to investigate anyway. Miko offered to help, but Prime told the humans to remain with Ratchet, to both Miko and Ratchet's dismay. When the humans had to return home, Prime assigned Bulkhead to watch over Miko. Darkness Rising, Part 2
Bulkhead didn't need much encouragement to take Miko on an offroad jaunt on their way back to base. When they eventually reached their destination, they were deserted by pretty much all of the other Autobots, leaving them at the base with Jack and Raf. Miko decided to make the best of things by organizing those remaining into a band, and she kicked off with a solo on her electric guitar. Fortunately for the others, Agent Fowler picked this moment to make a return visit to complain about the energon mine explosion. The kids hid behind Bulkhead, but Miko's guitar gave them away. It was only Bulkhead's intervention that stopped Fowler from taking them into custody then and there. After the agent left, the base equipment picked up a distress call from his helicopter, suggesting he'd been captured by the Decepticons. When Bulkhead used the ground bridge to mount a rescue mission, Miko tagged along, unseen until it was too late. Bulkhead noticed her when she spoke up, but so did one of the Decepticon sentries, leading Miko to seeing Bulkhead disemboweling the 'con. (He'd warned her not to look, but she thought it was awesome anyway.) They were joined a short time later by Jack and Raf, who accidentally attracted the attention of the sentries on the Decepticon ship. Darkness Rising, Part 3
Miko rode in Bulkhead's back seat as he swooped in and picked up the two other kids...and then stayed in there as he drove under the ship, transformed, scaled a nearby cliff, and fought some Decepticons. After spewing on his floor mats, she knocked, and he let her out. She then discovered that the middle of a fight between Bulkhead and some Decepticons was no place for a young human to be. Once they moved into the ship, he was forced to slide her along the floor to keep her safe. They quickly ran into Arcee and Bumblebee with the two boys and, after some more fighting, the Autobots cleared a room for the kids to hide in. Miko and Jack began arguing, which upset Raf, and the pair had to console him. They then noticed a computer screen displaying important info, but before they could make a copy, a Decepticon appeared. Jack yelled to Miko to get a photo with her cell phone, but after she snapped a picture of the 'con did he clarify that he meant the readout. They were subsequently rescued once again by the Autobots, and Miko observed on the way back to base that they'd succeeded in rescuing Fowler.
Miko was exuberant over their experiences as she handed over the picture, but Jack was furious that they'd all almost gotten killed. After he opted to return to his normal life, Miko paid him a visit and unsuccessfully attempted to convince him that the exciting life they had with the Autobots was much better. Darkness Rising, Part 4
When they discovered that the Decepticons were using a radio dish array in Texas for their space bridge, Miko accompanied Jack and Raf there to do some on-site hacking. It wasn't long before Soundwave spotted them and sent a tentacle to attack them, knocking Miko and Jack aside. Miko tried to strike at the appendage with an axe, only to miss and have the tentacle snatch up the weapon. They chased it into the next room, where Soundwave had severed the computer system's hard line. Miko took a picture of the Decepticon as he flew away, and he responded by snapping a picture of the three of them. Defeated, the kids returned to base, where they monitored the Autobots' progress in destroying the space bridge. After the Autobots returned, Miko wondered if Optimus would now ask them to go home and forget everything that happened. (The answer, apparently, was no.) Darkness Rising, Part 5
Tasked with creating a science project for school, Miko decided on a model of the solar system. Bulkhead helped her by holding it up so she could paint it, however Ratchet somehow took over all of the kids' projects, leading her to observe he was a bit of a control freak. He produced a scale model of Cybertron for her which was not well received at school, and Miko presumably did not achieve a high grade on it. Masters & Students
The kids arrived at base one Saturday just as Optimus and Arcee were heading out on a mission. She challenged Jack to a video game, but soon found herself on the losing end, at least until a random power fluctuation stopped the game. The reason for the malfunctions was revealed when Raf returned to the control room with a small metal critter the Autobots called a Scraplet. The day proceeded to be a series of surprises for Miko. First when Raf killed the Scraplet he'd found with a crowbar after it attacked Bumblebee, and second when she was Scraplet-hunting with Bulkhead and discovered that the large Autobot screamed like a little girl. After they returned to the control room, she helped Jack and Raf fight the Scraplets off their Autobot friends. A plan was formulated to rid the base of Scraplets using the ground bridge, which meant the three kids had to repair an energon fuel line rupture. After the successful expulsion of the invaders, they helped repair Bulkhead and Bumblebee, but Miko was scared off by an itsy bitsy spider. Scrapheap
Miko was excited by the news that a new Autobot, Wheeljack, was coming to Earth, but figured if he was going to stick around, he'd have to find his own human. She hit it off with Wheeljack right away, and when the Autobots decided to celebrate, brought out her electric guitar. The kids listened to Bulkhead's tales of the old days on Cybertron, and then Wheeljack asked Miko to show him around the base. She answered all of his questions about where the base was and the contents of the armory, but after they returned to the control room, Bulkhead unmasked Wheeljack as a Decepticon impostor. The impostor took Miko hostage, threatening to squish her. After the ground bridge was activated, the real Wheeljack came through and hit the impostor, knocking Miko out of his grip and into Bulkhead's waiting hand. Once the impostor was disposed of, they again partied and Miko played her guitar some more. The three kids turned out to see Wheeljack off as he left for space, and Miko snapped off a picture of him and Bulkhead on her cell phone. Con Job
 Plot details for Convoy (episode) follow. |
When the Autobots helped Fowler move a hi-tech device, the kids observed their progress from base with Ratchet. The Dynamic Nuclear Generation System was in danger of being captured by MECH, and Miko had the bright idea that Ratchet could ground bridge them onto the speeding train it was on. With some help from Raf, Ratchet got Jack and Miko on the train, and Miko grabbed a fire ax to try and defend the device with. The MECH goons ended up retreating after seeing Optimus. Silas blew up the track ahead of the train, and for a few moments Jack and Miko thought they were doomed — Miko even asked Raf to make sure Bulkhead got her beloved electric guitar — but Optimus managed to stop the train in time. Convoy
Toys
Prime
- "Entertainment Pack" (5 figure gift set, 2011)
- A PVC figurine of Miko comes with figurines of Jack Darby and Raf Esquivel, plus small-scale, transformable toys of Optimus Prime and Megatron.
Notes
- During the Transformers: Prime presentation at San Diego Comic-Con 2010, Miko was given the surname "Tezuka", likely an early name for the character. [1] With the surname change, the franchise was sadly robbed of having a priestess of Astro Boy.
- According to the producers, Miko is Polygon Pictures' favourite character, so they add more expressive motions to even her simplest actions in the script.[2]
- In both "Darkness Rising, Part 5" and "Convoy", Miko's weapon of choice is an axe.
