Sentinel Prime (G1)
Sentinel Prime was an Autobot in Generation 1 continuity.
Sentinel Prime was the Autobot leader until Megatron killed him. Not built to be a military leader, the Decepticon uprising overwhelmed him, and his reign was followed by the legendary campaign of Optimus Prime.
Fiction
Marvel Comics Continuity
Sentinel Prime is mentioned frequently in the recitation of Primes before Optimus, but little or nothing is known of him.
The retelling of Unicron's origin in the UK comics included a brief glimpse of a dying Template:Tooltip passing the Matrix of Leadership to Optimus Prime.
Dreamwave Comics Continuity
The War Within
8.2 million years BG1
Sentinel Prime went to reason with Megatron, seeking to reach him sermon and doctrine, he failed and tortured and destroyed by Megatron.
But, Megatron was chagrined to discover, Sentinel Prime (suspecting he may be killed) had not brough the Matrix with him into battle.
The Matrix used a vision of Sentinel Prime to strengthen Optimus Prime's resolve during a battle with Megatron by confronting him with the claim that Megatron had chosen Optimus to be Prime, knowing that he was weak.
Megatron's alleged influence over the Prime selection proscess was never substantiated.
The Keepers subsequently created a robotic duplicate of Sentinel Prime to confuse Optimus and undermine his confidence. Though posessing all of Sentinel Prime's considerable abilities, Optimus eventually realised that the duplicate had been created from his own memories of Sentinel Prime, and was incapable of doing anything new. Optimus destroyed the duplicate of Sentinel Prime, having largely overcome his own doubts about his fitness to be Autobot leader.
