Shockwave (Movie)
| The name or term "Shockwave" refers to more than one character or idea. For a list of other meanings, see Shockwave (disambiguation). |
- Shockwave is a Decepticon from the live-action movie continuity family.
Shockwave was left to watch Cybertron by Megatron long ago, arriving on Earth to hunt for the AllSpark shortly after Megatron. A peerless scientist with deadly efficiency and a cold devotion to logic, he is one of the very few who could rival Megatron. Shockwave is ready and willing to destroy the Autobots with his arm-mounted AstroMag Cannon.
| “ | Emotionless, coldly logical, utterly ruthless... killing is all Shockwave lives for. | ” |
Fiction
IDW live-action film prequel comics
Eons after the Dynasty of Primes were vanquished, Cybertron fell into dark times. The AllSpark had been buried somewhere within Cybertron and been dismissed as a legend, and the planet itself lacked a star to orbit. As energy became more and more scarce, Cybertronians segregated into tribes. Shockwave chose to rally behind Sentinel Prime, who claimed to be descended from Primus himself. However, he faced opposition from the non-believer Thetacons, and Shockwave joined Megatron, Optimus, and several others in repelling their attacks. Ultimately, Sentinel Prime won the day, as he and Wheeljack were successful in locating the lost AllSpark and harnessing a new sun to orbit. This, however, did not please Shockwave. Now that the war was over, he was dissatisfied, and he no longer knew his purpose. This shocked his old friend, Megatron, and Shockwave explained that it was the journey he enjoyed, not the destination. Plus, well, that new sun was kind of bright. Foundation #1
The next day, Megatron detailed to Shockwave how he had eavesdropped on a conversation between Sentinel and Optimus, where Sentinel had tried to pass on leadership to Optimus, who refused, unable to accept he was also a Prime. At the outskirts of Thetacon, they encountered a Driller, a subterranean lifeform that had been brought to the planet's surface by the new energy flowing through it, which was attacking a group of Hatchlings and their protector Starscream. Shockwave was amazed by the creature and called it "magnificent". After besting it, he joined the Cybertronian Defense Force that Sentinel placed under Megatron's command, rooting out dissident Transformers. Foundation #2
After the war broke out he joined the Decepticons. As Starscream was asking what to do next minutes before the Nemesis went to space, Shockwave told him that they would obey Megatron's orders without any question. Foundation #3 When the Autobots attacked Simfur Temple, Shockwave attempted to apprehend Elita-One, but with no success. When Starscream blew up the ship carrying Sentinel and his secret weapon, Shockwave ordered the annihilation of the retreating Autobots, but Megatron made him stand down, gleefully predicting Optimus would return with a vengeance. Foundation #4
Shockwave returned with Megatron to his citadel during Optimus's revenge attack. Foundation #1 Shockwave asked Megatron if he could kill Optimus Prime and Ironhide after they had been stuck by the smelting pool, but Megatron was disappointed by Shockwave's lack of vision. Foundation #3 Optimus got inside to fight Megatron, while Starscream and Shockwave attempted to kill their former comrade Ironhide. Suddenly, the skies darkened: the Autobots had attacked the citadel to distract the Decepticons from their true goal of stealing the AllSpark from the temple. Optimus blasted Starscream and Shockwave, and the two Autobots escaped. Foundation #4
Some time later, after the Autobots sent the All Spark into space, Starscream left Shockwave in charge of the Decepticons still on Cybertron as he went in search of his prize. During a battle with a team of Autobots, Shockwave heard the scream of the AllSpark when it was found by Sector Seven. Leaving Dreadwing in charge of the Decepticons on Cybertron, Shockwave set out in an impossibly fast ship, swearing not to return without the AllSpark. He crashed in Tunguska, Siberia in 1908.[1] He remained buried there in stasis lock, healing until Soviet Russia found him ten years later. Using stolen research from the U.S., who had found Megatron the same way, the Russians reverse-engineered his technology to invent nuclear power plants. Rising Storm #2 Frozen
There were no digital records of Shockwave's existence, and the physical documents pertaining to him were lost, burned, shredded or stolen in the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse. The Siberian facility was abandoned and Shockwave was left forgotten. Convergence chapter 4
Titan Magazines
While Starscream doesn't like or trust Shockwave, he respects his intelligence and, if he had to choose, would give the nod to Shockwave being his successor. #21's Star Screams
Revenge of the Fallen film
At some point during 2009, Shockwave was caught on film and the event was written up for a newspaper article. A newspaper page with the headline "Mysterious Robot Spotted" was discarded in Egypt, where it was sucked up by a rampaging Devastator. Revenge of the Fallen
IDW Dark of the Moon comics
Soundwave discovered the satirical article and its photograph, and deduced it was based on stolen Soviet documents. Convergence chapter 4 In 2010, Megatron freed Shockwave and brought him to his "base" in Namibia, where he was eager to get back to killing Autobots as soon as possible. Rising Storm #2
Shockwave and Astrotrain made their presence known on Earth near Dalian, China, where they quickly disposed of the Autobots Longarm and Salvage and stole material for a mysterious construction project.
Shockwave began following the exploits of Earth's stranded Transformers from afar, and derided its war's combatants as idiots after watching a skirmish in California. After contacting Astrotrain for an update on their project, he tracked Divebomb's radiation trail back to Starscream's current base of operations, in a junkyard on the outskirts of Mexico City. Blasting his way through the Decepticons unwise enough to try defending Starscream, Shockwave informed the treacherous air commander that Megatron had "requested his services." Before the conversation could go any further, Astrotrain radioed Shockwave with some bad news: the "brain unit" scrap drone that held the control software for the machine he was constructing had escaped. Shockwave charged Starscream and his followers with recovering the drone. Rising Storm #1
Shockwave contacted an angry Starscream who thought he was promised the Autobots would be occupied. Shockwave countered that they were occupied, but, you know, with Starscream, leaving Shockwave free to leave a message for Optimus Prime at the NEST Headquarters in Diego Garcia. After killing Knock Out, Dune Runner, and other Autobots who stood in his way, Shockwave confronted the trembling humans left to fend for themselves. When Shockwave asked who was in command, Theodore Galloway told him that he was. Shockwave killed Galloway and the other humans save one, and he asked his question one more time. Rising Storm #3
After killing Jolt, he and Fearswoop left Diego Garcia, then he arrived in Philadelphia killing Elita-One in the process and shot down Wheeljack and Mirage. Enraged by the death of Elita-One and the other Autobots. Optimus Prime battled Shockwave destroying half of his face and body, Prime was about to kill Shockwave, till Shockwave's "pet" came to save his master. the badly damaged Shockwave returned to Namibia along Starscream and Soundwave. Rising Storm #4
Dark of the Moon film
- Voice actor: Frank Welker (English), Jirō Saitō (Japanese), Miguel Ángel Ghigliazza (Latin American Spanish)
Shockwave and his pet Driller attacked the Autobots when they were summoned to Chernobyl by the Decepticon agent Voskhod. This was done as an act of misdirection to ensure that the Autobots did not realize that the Decepticons actually wanted them to find the fuel cell from the Ark located within the facility. After Optimus retrieved the fuel cell from the Driller, Shockwave emerged from it to reveal himself to Optimus, and the pair quickly retreated underground, leaving Optimus very disturbed to see Shockwave on Earth.
Later, Shockwave took part in the invasion of Chicago. He and the Driller emerged from beneath the convoy of Autobots, and the Driller separated Optimus from his trailer. Shockwave left the Driller and proceeded to track down the Autobots. The Wreckers were sent to distract him, peppering his armor with fire from their machineguns. He used a car as a shield and fired at them, and once they drove off he menacingly began to pursue them down the road, missing the two small Autobots, Wheelie and Brains, who quickly fled.
Later, he noticed humans inside a building, and sent his Driller into the fray to topple a building and kill Sam Witwicky, Carly Spencer, Robert Epps, and the other humans inside. However the beast was killed by Optimus Prime using his flight gear, and Shockwave, enraged by the death of his pet, opened fire on the Autobot leader, briefly disabling him and taking him out of the fight.
He soon joined Soundwave and Barricade to round up the other Autobots. Brains and Wheelie forestalled the Decepticon's from further executing their prisoners by taking control of a Decepticon gunship, and dropping fighters onto the battlefield. Shockwave retreated further away with Barricade and some other Decepticons. However the human soldiers had set a trap, and while firing at them, Shockwave was blinded by one of their parachutes, and his eye was then shot out, causing it to dangle by its wires. Optimus Prime then came charging back into the battle, and when Shockwave fired at him the Autobot dodged the shot, donned a set of knuckle-spikes, and punched Shockwave so hard that part of his abdomen shattered. Even this did not put Shockwave down, but Prime did not let up - he punched Shockwave again, pinned the Decepticon down and tore his dangling eye out through his throat, finally ending the Decepticon's life. Optimus then used Shockwave's cannon to shoot out the control pillar set up in the city. Dark of the Moon
Games
Transformers: The Game (console)
- Voice actor: Daniel Riordan
Under the orders of Starscream, Shockwave attacked Tranquility in an effort to interfere with Optimus Prime's attempt to rescue Bumblebee from Sector Seven. Prime actually had a grip on the helicopter net that held Bumblebee, but the force of Shockwave's entry mode's impact knocked him off, allowing Sector Seven to get away.
Landing in downtown, the triple-changing Shockwave adopted a helicopter and an artillery emplacement as his alternate modes, promptly transforming into the latter and lobbing explosives around the city. Prime, forced to cut off his rescue, charged in and pounded Shockwave until the goliath transformed and retreated to another position. Prime doggedly kept at Shockwave, following him every time he retreated, eventually defeating the Decepticon and saving Tranquility. Transformers The Game (console)
Later, when the Autobots returned to Cybertron, Shockwave appeared on the planet alongside (and presumably leading) an army of Decepticon drones. Optimus quickly defeated the drones and once more defeated Shockwave.
Transformers: The Game (PSP)
- Voice actor: Daniel Riordan
The massive Shockwave might look like he's purely about muscle and firepower, but he's actually remarkably shrewd and cunning. Coveting the position of Decepticon leader for himself, Shockwave has been working to oust Megatron for years. As you might imagine, he and Starscream don't get along very well.
When the Decepticons arrived on Earth in search of their lost leader, Megatron, Shockwave adopted a tank as his alternate mode. Shockwave was supposed to join Blackout in his attack on the SOCCENT Forward Operations Base in Qatar, but instead busied himself surrepticiously searching for leads to the location of the AllSpark. After receiving a communique from Frenzy, who informed him that the Autobots were on Earth and had discovered their own leads to the location of Megatron, Shockwave had Thundercracker airlift him to Qatar, where he helped Blackout take care of the last few military units opposing him. He relayed Frenzy's message to Blackout, then departed for the Arctic with Thundercracker, intending to investigate the site where Megatron's body was discovered.
In the Arctic, Shockwave and Thundercracker faced resistance from an Autobot unit in the area, but fought their way through them to discover that Megatron's body had been moved by Sector Seven. The trip was not a wasted one, however: after scanning a computer terminal in the cavern, Shockwave discovered that Megatron had brought an army of drones with him to Earth to help in the search for the All Spark. These drones were presently lying dormant all over the Earth, and Shockwave schemed to reactivate them so that they could serve him as his personal army. The signal required to reanimated the drones had to be broadcast from a great height, so Shockwave and Thundercracker quickly made their way to a rocket launch site, where Shockwave programmed the code into a rocket that subsequently beamed the signal down over the Earth from space. Drones sprang to life all over the planet, and began attacking the Autobots. Shockwave's control of his self-made army was short lived, however, as Autobots Trailbreaker and Hound successfully transmitted a virus that shut the drones down. Simultaneously, Shockwave received another message from Frenzy that the he had discovered the location of Megatron, and that the Decepticon leader was about to reawaken.
After the Autobots defeated Megatron and most of the other Decepticons in battle in Center City, Shockwave retreated back to Cybertron, as did Starscream. Back on their homeworld, Shockwave and Starscream faced off for leadership of the Decepticons, with Starscream ultimately claiming victory. Transformers The Game (PSP)
Autobot Stronghold
Shockwave was used as the basis for an army of drone units, who were part of the constant attacks on the Autobot's LG Stronghold. For some reason, these drones had two Sparks. Autobot Stronghold
Transformers: Dark of the Moon - The Game
- Voice actor: Isaac C. Singleton Jr. (Wii version only)
(Xbox 360/PS3)
Shockwave had crashed on Earth thousands of years ago and fell into stasis mode. He was later discovered by the Russians and a facility was built to contain him, where he was frozen to prevent him from waking up.
Three years after Megatron was wounded, the Decepticons took refuge in that same Russian facility to repair themselves. His leader Megatron decided to release him, since he was needed for the upcoming operation. The base came under fire, however, thanks to Starscream leading the Autobots straight to Megatron. The 'Cons abandoned base and left Shockwave to thaw out.
Optimus discovered Shockwave and ordered Ratchet to activate more freeze tanks to keep him frozen. Unfortunately, Shockwave's pet awoke from its slumber, and lashed out at the intruders. The attempts to keep him frozen eventually failed, and Shockwave woke up and decided to destroy the Autobot leader. Years under stasis meant that he wasn't fully combat ready, and it was something Optimus took advantage of when he attacked the Decepticon assassin. Shockwave soon managed to fully recover and lashed out at Prime with everything he had. Autobot reinforcements arrived to help in Optimus' assault, but were dispatched quite easily. During their skirmish, Optimus Prime (with a little help from Ratchet) deduced his weak spot as the three cylinder-shaped generators mounted on his back. With this knowledge, Optimus Prime was then able to take down Shockwave with his jetpack/machinegun upgrades, until the Driller decided to intervene, and blocked off the shots while retreating with its master.
Shortly after, Shockwave met up with Megatron, Starscream, and Soundwave in Nambia, Africa. He was ordered to find a device in a nuclear power plant called Chernobyl. Shockwave agreed, and Megatron told him and the others of Operation Pillar...
Toys
Dark of the Moon
Cyberverse
- Shockwave / Fusion Tank (Cyberverse Action Set, 2011)
- Series: 1
- Number: 006
- Japanese ID number: CV19
- Accessories: Battle Cannon/Particle Wave Blaster, rubber hose, arm blade, missile, Chicago
- The Cyberverse Commander class Shockwave is cast in a lighter purple than his Voyager class figure. Like that larger toy, he transforms into a Cybertronian tank, and features a removable cannon, blade, and hose. He also has a back component that attaches to his vehicle to form a "Fusion Tank," and that can separately transform into "Ground Weapon" and "Battle Base" modes.
- Shockwave's alternate mode has some rather annoying problems with the treads refusing to straighten out or peg onto his body and front "wheels" securely. As a result, combining him with the action set to form the "Fusion Tank" mode will result in the back treads becoming parallel with the rest of the tank... while the front treads split open and detach from the wheels.
- Like other action sets, Shockwave comes with a cardboard backdrop. In his case, it’s a scene of Chicago under attack. Oddly, the box bio mentions Shockwave's ability to drill through the ground, with no mention of his friend.
Voyager Class toys
- Shockwave (MechTech Voyager, 2011)
- Japanese ID number: DD05
- Accessories: MechTech Battle Cannon/Particle Wave Blaster, rubber hose, arm blade
- Part of the second wave of Dark of the Moon Voyager Class MechTech toys, Shockwave transforms into a purple Cybertronian tank. He has a large, detachable MechTech Battle Cannon on his right arm with a rubber tube which connects to his back, and a removable blade on his left arm. When a lever is pushed on the rear of his arm cannon, MechTech gearing opens up the cannon wider with more barrels and blades. C joint rungs are located on Shockwave's arm-blade, one concealed underneath said blade, and two on his AstroMag cannon, two more on his backpack, and two more on his feet. Other MechTech weapons can peg into Shockwave's hands, on the barrel of his cannon, and behind each shoulder blade. Due to the nature of his MechTech weapon being integrated with his arm, it is not a prime candidate for swapping with other toys, due to the shape and color of the weapon.
- Shockwave's forearms seem to be backward in robot mode, with the screws holding them together facing out while the backs of his forearms are smooth and screw-hole-free. Also, his arm blade, when put in its proper place on his tank mode, is clearly backward. The blade has an obvious back, its left side, marked with gaps, whereas the mold detail on its right side is much cleaner. These may have been done to keep the screw-holes out of sight in vehicle mode and the gaps out-of-sight in robot mode as a form of compromise, instead. It should be noted that disassembling the figure's forearms and swapping them would change the cannon to the left and the blade to the right, which shouldn't be done because:
- 1) it's movie-inaccurate,
- 2) the wrists are each held together with a pin which can be tricky to remove,
- 3) you'll end up with the screw-holes visible in tank mode instead,
- and 4) the gun hose is clearly meant to go to the right in robot mode, otherwise it will restrict articulation or keep falling off - though it should be mentioned that the peg hole where the hose attaches to the gun can actually be rotated 180 degrees instead of 90 (with the slightly more flexible plastic used in these areas allowing such movement), thus enabling the hose to be positioned on either side of the weapon.
- The extra barrels in the cannon also feature gaps like the arm blade.
- The instructions tell you to keep the cannon attached to his right arm in tank mode, though it is possible to stick it in between the arms. This is done by sliding the cannon's bottom in between Shockwave's thumbs. It is fairly stable, matches some stock photography and makes for a more coherent tank.
- Shockwave's stock photography depicts him in a much, much brighter and bluer purple while the MechTech lever on the cannon is bright red. Although partly cropped, his packaging photography on the box-front depicts an alternative placement of his gun hose in tank mode, plugging into the port on the side of his rear treads, which actually aligns better than the awkward frontal position depicted in the instructions; in the box-back, there is no gun hose, but since the picture is taken from a left profile, it could just be covered by the toy itself, reinforcing the alternate placement. The stock photography shown also depicts Shockwave's hands to be articulated at the wrists, as the right arm in the photo has the hand rotated 90 degrees from the position actually possible with the figure. Also many more paint applications are present in the stock photography, not limited to the red lever on the cannon, but vents on the vehicle mode are picked out in silver as well as gold details on the hips and both halves of tread on each side of the body being painted silver. Overall, the colour scheme shown on the box photography is completely different from the actual figure within, with the stock photo's silver replaced with a metallic lilac on the hands, feet spikes and knees.
- Optimus Prime vs. Shockwave (MechTech Voyager 2-pack, 2011)
- Accessories: MechTech Battle Cannon/Particle Wave Blaster, rubber hose, arm blade
- Advertised as "SHOCKWAVE with CYBER METAL Armour" on the sticker, this Costco-exclusive two-pack contains a redeco of Shockwave along with an unchanged Dark of the Moon Voyager class Optimus Prime.
- His purple plastic was changed to dark blue and gray, the lilac was replaced by gray, and the gray on his face cover and feet was replaced by a dark purple, with all the grays being darker and cooler in general. Paint differences include the purple on his crotch being replaced by dark blue, the purple on his shoulders being replaced by metallic lavender, the purple on his feet being replaced by a silver that gradients towards the "toes", the bronze on all three of his "wheel" rims being replaced by pink, the bronze on the sides of his back treads being replaced by a "worn out" silver, the metallic lavender on his knee flaps being replaced by a dark silver, his spiky bumper, thighs, and head lacking paint in favor of having his ribs painted silver, and his treads and aforementioned ribs being painted in a much brighter silver than usual. His MechTech weapon has also been redecoed, with the purple housing and black hose being cast in a brighter, translucent purple plastic, the gray parts also being darker and cooler, the silver paint on the main barrel being replaced by the brighter silver, and the silver paint on the sides being replaced with a very faint and subtle brownish orange.
Notes
- Transformers: The Game Shockwave was designed by artist Ken Christiansen.
- The "Attack Copter", "Recon Chopper" and "Stealth Chopper" Create-A-Bot vehicle modes from the Nintendo DS video games transform into robot modes bearing some resemblance to Shockwave. The Attack Chopper is the only one that can be customized to appear purple, though.
- The photo on the newspaper article in Revenge of the Fallen is of Palisades's statue of Generation 1 Shockwave, with something digitally added in the foreground.
- Shockwave was heavily touted as the new main villain prior to the release of Dark of the Moon, no doubt in an attempt to conceal Sentinel Prime's unexpected betrayal halfway through the movie. A piece of information that commonly popped up in media coverage was the claim that Shockwave was the ruler of Cybertron while the other Autobots and Decepticons were duking it out on Earth.[2] The last bit could be written off as a case of chinese whisper: Shockwave got announced as the villain for Dark of the Moon, mainstream media (such as USA Today[3]) who aren't versed in Transformers lore looked up the character, found out about his Generation 1 namesake's role in the cartoon, included it as a piece of trivia to show they did their research, and then the trivia note got picked up as gospel by other media. Nevertheless, it was included in the official plot summary by Paramount's German branch (which also claimed that Shockwave was the robot discovered inside the Ark as seen in the trailer).[4]
- Despite being one of the most highly anticipated characters in the film, Shockwave has very minimal screentime. His only understandable line in the film is at Chernobyl: "Optimus," and seems more like a drone than Megatron's greatest assassin. In the comic adaptation, which was based on early drafts of the script, Shockwave had more lines during the Chicago battle.
- Shockwave does not have the same form in IDW's Transformers: Rising Storm and Foundation that he does in Dark of the Moon despite both being Cybertronian forms. His form in the comics is less skeletal in robot mode than his appearance in the film, and he also transforms into a Cybertronian jet, much like Megatron's original body, whereas his film design transforms into some form of Cybertronian tank. (Following the leader, maybe?) John Barber commented on his Twitter account that he isn't sure why Shockwave's appearance is different from that in the film, but that an explanation will be given in issue 4 of Rising Storm. [5] While the issue doesn't explicitly show how he gets his Dark of the Moon body, Shockwave is indeed badly damaged by Optimus Prime. Possibly because of this extensive reconstruction, Shockwave doesn't transform in the film (or the video game prequel before it, which displayed him with his current body instead of the old, G1-esque one).
- Generation 1 Shockwave's original voice actor, Corey Burton, expressed that he had no interest in voicing him for Dark of the Moon, explaining "[I] have practically no interest in that kind of mega-budget movie enterprise involvement" and that the inspiration for his Shockwave voice, David Warner, was rumored to have been considered.[6] In the end, Shockwave's almost-entirely-wordless-snarl-based role would have been something of a waste of Warner; the role ultimately went to Frank Welker. There's a nice touch of symmetry in the casting, with Welker taking over a Burton-originated role not long after Burton took on a Welker-originated character in Animated Megatron.
- Hasbro's online bio for Shockwave claims he had spent decades trapped under Chernobyl, but this was not reflected in any actual media; both the video game and Rising Storm comics have him held at a Russian facility from which he is freed shortly before the film's events, and the film itself doesn't give any indication that his appearance at Chernobyl in its opening scenes is an "escape" of any kind.
- Bucking tradition, this Shockwave has a mouth. Sure, it's more like a horrifying maw of teeth, but it's there.
- Shockwave's AstroMag cannon is a reference to the original Shockwave's toy mold being first released by ToyCo as the "4 Changeable Astro Magnum".
- Select ToysЯUs stores in the US had a promotion for a Shockwave poster with the purchase of any Transformers brand toy from June 5, 2011 to June 11, 2011.
- Although Shockwave's toy transforms into a Cybertronian tank, this alternate mode is never seen in the live-action movie nor the video game.
- While Shockwave's weapon of choice is described as a particle or laser cannon in most related Dark of the Moon media, it appears to be some variety of cluster missile launcher in the movie proper.
- Early artwork for Shockwave for Dark of the Moon showed Blitzwing as a working name for the character.[7]
- Shockwave appears to have the ability of flight in his robot mode.
Foreign names
- Japanese: Shockwave (ショックウェーブ Shokkuwēbu)
- Mandarin: Jèn-dàng-pō (震盪波, "Shock Wave") Zhengdangbo (震荡波, "Shock Wave")
References
- ↑ Rising Storm issue 2 reveals that Shockwave caused the mysterious real-life Tunguska event.
- ↑ "Transformers 3 Plot Summary Revealed", TFW2005, October 2010.
- ↑ "Next 'Transformers' is due for a switch", USA Today, June 2010.
- ↑ Official German DOTM site including faulty plot summary.
- ↑ http://twitter.com/#!/TheJohnBarber/status/60710221739339776
- ↑ Corey Burton's message board post.
- ↑ Josh Nizzi DOTM concepts.
External links
- Transformers: The Game Shockwave concepts, vehicle mode renderings, robot mode and head concepts, final robot mode rendering and transformation animation guide on Ken Christiansen's blog.
- Transformers: The Game video interview with Daniel Suarez, featuring Shockwave footage
