Rewind (G1)

This article is a featured article, and considered to be one of the most informative on this wiki.

This article is about the heroic Autobot Mini-Cassette know-it-all. For information on his evil counterpart, if you didn't know he had one, see Rewind (SG). For a list of other meanings, see Rewind (disambiguation).

Did you know that Rewind is an Autobot Mini-Cassette from the Generation 1 continuity family?

"Did you know that the names 'Rewind' and 'Eject' come from ACTUAL BUTTONS on a tape player? It's true, it's true!"

Did You Know that Rewind...

• Is the undisputed Autobot trivia master?
• Can store more data than even a floppy disk, whether in robot mode or mighty microcassette mode?
• Isn't terribly selective with the data he stores, gathering up every tidbit of information he can find until it gives him a splitting electronic headache?
• Can unleash the light from his internal data storage matrix to become a blinding beacon?
• Would never lose on Jeopardy!, but isn't always able to remember the useful things he knows until it's too late?
• Can tell you useful facts about New Jersey (both of them)?

(The Transformers Universe bio. New York: Marvel Comics, 1986.)

This all looks familiar! It's in my databanks someplace, but I can't quite...Rewind, "Forever Is a Long Time Coming"

Fiction

Generation 1 cartoon continuity

The Transformers cartoon

"Hey, did you know that my toy has a red eye visor but Eject has an orange visor? Let me tell you more."

Did You Know that Rewind in the Transformers Cartoon...

• Was voiced by Townsend Coleman in the English language, Yoku Shioya in the Japanese language and Héctor Vieyra in the Latin American dub?
• Became one of Blaster's cassettes sometime between 1986 and 2005?
• Helped Blaster and Perceptor defend the communications tower during the Battle of Autobot City?
• Successfully shot Ravage several times while doing so?

(Ron Friedman. The Transformers: The Movie. New York: Sunbow Productions, 1986.)

• Accompanied Blaster on a mission to investigate chronal energy signals emanating from an asteroid that had existed for 1,000,200,043 years and seven months?
• Travelled back in time to the First Great Cybertronian War?
• Successfully fought against both Sharkticons and Dark Guardians?
• Used his knowledge (after an initial false start) to recognize both the Guardians and the Quintessons attempt to change history by stopping the Autobot slave rebellion?
• Spoke 17 lines of dialogue with 154 words during the accounting of these events?

(Gerry Conway and Carla Conway. "Forever Is a Long Time Coming". New York: Sunbow Productions, 1986.)

• Helped Steeljaw track down a missing Daniel Witwicky by identifying what Steeljaw found to Ultra Magnus?
• Can translate ancient Quintesson inscriptions?
• Identified that a long-hidden chamber near the capital central of Cybertron was used for banishing criminals to a variety of alternate dimensions as punishment for their crimes?
• Successfully determined that Daniel was banished to Menonia?
• Participated in a Menonian battle against Mara-Al-Utha, a Quintesson exiled for practicing magic?

(Craig Rand. "Madman's Paradise". New York: Sunbow Productions, 1986.)

The Headmasters cartoon

Did You Know that Rewind in the Headmasters Cartoon...

"Did you know my weight is easily within the load bearing capacity of a cybercat? I just found out myself!"

• Was voiced by Ken Yamaguchi in the Japanese language?
• Helped find Soundwave and his cassettes while they were spying on Autobot forces in Autobot City?
• Joined the hunt to find the hidden Matrix of Leadership?

(Toyohiro Ando. "The Mystery of Planet Master". Tokyo: Toei Animation Co., Ltd., 1987.)

• Refused to go on missions because he was mourning Blaster's death?
• Was overjoyed when Blaster was resurrected as Twincast?
• Rode on Steeljaw as Twincast led them on a mission to stop the Madmachine?

(Toyohiro Ando. "The Great Cassette Operation". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Spied on the Decepticons as they planned to attack Cybertron?

(Yoshihisa Araki. "Cybertron Is in Grave Danger, Part 1". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Sneaked into the Decepticon base and spied on a conversation between Soundblaster and Sixshot about a meeting on Chaar?
• Accompanied Twincast to Chaar and took part in a fight with Soundblaster when they were spotted?

(Toyohiro Ando. "Explosion on Mars!! MegaZarak Appears". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Scouted planet Paradise with the rest of Twincast's cassettes?

(Yoshihisa Araki. "Head Formation of Friendship". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Helped comb Earth for information on the Decepticons' plans?

(Yoshihisa Araki. "The Emperor of Destruction Vanishes on an Iceberg". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Patrolled Earth with the other cassettes after the Decepticons abandoned the planet?

(Yoshihisa Araki. "Miraculous Warriors, Targetmasters (Part 1)". Tokyo: Toei, 1987.)

• Saved Chromedome and Hardhead from Mindwipe along with his fellow cassettes during the final battle to save Earth?
• Joined in the "Final Formation" to give Fortress Maximus enough power to destroy the Decepticons' Death Towers?

(Yoshihisa Araki. "The Final Showdown on Earth (Part 2)". Tokyo: Toei, 1988.)

Alternity

Did You Know that Rewind in Alternity...

• Became a member of the Protectors?
• Explained why Alternity Auto-avatars were based on early 21st century vehicles?

(Hirofumi Ichikawa. "Alternation". Tokyo: Tomy Co., Ltd., 2010.)

Marvel Comics continuity

Marvel UK future timelines

"Did you know that due to Marvel's practice of using blue to represent black, I can be easily confused with Eject?"

Did You Know that Rewind in the Marvel Generation 1 Comics...

• Was released from Blaster's chest along with his fellow cassettes by Hot Rod and Arcee to help even the odds after the other Autobots in Autobot City (including Blaster) were deactivated and crucified during a Quintesson attack on the city in 2008?

(Simon Furman. "Space Pirates!". London: Marvel Entertainment International Ltd., 1988.)

The Transformers 3-D

Did You Know that Rewind in the Transformers 3-D Comic...

• Was the historian of the Autobots?
• Was consulted by Optimus Prime after Blurr and Hot Rod retrieved a Logicon message tape that contained information on the Destructons?
• Considered both the Destructons and the Logicons to be myths from a primitive past?
• Was subsequently asked by Optimus Prime to work out the coordinates to planet Metascan Alpha, the apparent home of the Logicons?
• Noticed a spy in their midst and shot at him—but became confused by the spy seemingly being in two places at once? (It's because the Autobots were really facing Pounce and Wingspan!)

(Williams, Fuget, Haxo, "Noodles" and Stephenson. "The War Against the Destructons, Chapter 1 of 3". El Cajon, California: Blackthorne Publishing, 1988.)

Dreamwave Generation 1 comics

Did You Know that Rewind in the Dreamwave Generation 1 Comics...

• Was a frequent partner of Blaster throughout the millennia, serving under him and Perceptor during the Age of Internment?

(Simon Furman. The War Within: The Age of Wrath. Markham, Ontario: Dreamwave Productions, 2004.)

• Was a part of Hot Rod and Kup's resistance movement when the Unified Cybertronian Government was corrupted from within by Shockwave?

(Brad Mick. "Countdown to Extinction". Markham, Ontario: Dreamwave Productions, 2003.)

IDW Generation 1 continuity

Did You Know that Rewind in the IDW Generation 1 Comics...

• Was too prominent a character to continue summarizing his story simply as trivia factoids?

(James Roberts. The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye. San Diego, California: Idea and Design Works, LLC, 2012.)

This section covers fiction that is ongoing. It will be added to as the story progresses. If it isn't current, you can help by updating it.

"Did you know I am old, tiny, and looking for my mustachioed ex-husband?"

Rewind is extremely old: he can remember when Cybertron switched to the New Calendar, and predates the rise of the Functionists and their Grand Cybertron Taxonomy. Within the new caste structure the Functionists imposed upon Cybertronian society, Rewind's memory stick alternate made saw him labelled as a member of the Disposable class, who were little better than slaves. Fortunately, Rewind was lucky enough to wind up working as a data receptacle for Dominus Ambus, who treated him with respect and eventually became his friend, even fighting for civil rights for the Disposable class. Seeking a cure for the disease Cybercrosis, Dominus departed Cybertron to search for Luna 1, and Rewind accompanied him; their quest ended in failure, and when they returned to their homeworld, they discovered a civil war had broken out in their absence. Rewind joined the Autobot faction, but the war soon became a distant second concern for him when Dominus mysteriously disappeared. Rewind began a lifelong search for his friend, but when no sign that he still lived could be found, the archivist eventually started investigating the Relinquishment Clinics, thinking that his friend may have committed suicide, and at he could at least gain some measure of peace by learning his fate. It was while visiting such a clinic, where he was confronted with failure yet again, that Rewind was approached by Chromedome, another Autobot waiting to die who had found something inside himself touched by Rewind's anguish. Together, the pair gave each other a reason to live and began a relationship that lasted for millions of years, but Rewind never stopped searching for Dominus. With a camera mounted to his head at all times to record anything and everything around him, Rewind even began to plumb seedier and seedier depths, procuring footage of deaths of all kinds, in hopes of one day finding something that would reveal Dominus's fate to him. Despite being named Rewind's Conjunx Endura, Chromedome resigned himself to the fact he would only ever be the second most important person in Rewind's life. Before & After

"Did you know that I have a camera attached to the side of my head at all times so that I can record everything?"

Rewind was among the Autobots stationed at the Kimia Facility at the time of the Chaos event, and escaped an attack by Cyclonus and the Sweeps by fleeing in an escape pod with several other survivors. Kings Returning to Cybertron, he was tasked with putting his mastery of language to use translating the inscription found within the Matrix of Leadership, but even he struggled with it. The Death of Optimus Prime When it was deduced that the Matrix contained a map believed to lead to the long-lost Knights of Cybertron, Rewind elected to join Rodimus's crew aboard the Lost Light in following the map. On the craft's launch day, Rewind purchased some more death footage from Swindle before joining Chromedome and Ratchet in crossing the Mitteous Plateau to the ship, causing some grumbling from his partner that they were being forced to walk because of Rewind's non-mobile alternate mode. How to Say Goodbye and Mean It Upon launch, a malfunction of the Lost Light's quantum generators damaged the ship and hurled it into deep space; once the ship was set down on a planetoid, Rewind helped Chromedome and Hoist recover the damaged Cyclonus, who had been clinging to the hull. Returning to the ship, they met with Swerve and Tailgate, and then witnessed a battle between the newly-arrived amnesiac Skids and a group of mysterious robots, which Rewind gleefully recorded. Hangers On

No sooner was the Lost Light airborne again than Rewind was called upon to help investigate the death of Shock, identifying the murder as the work of a Sparkeater. The Chaos of Warm Things Rodimus later called Rewind up to give Tailgate a history lesson about the war: having been in stasis throughout the conflict, Tailgate had decided that he wanted to be a Decepticon, but a super-compressed summary of the villains' actions during the war beamed straight into his head by Rewind quickly disabused him of the notion. Life After the Big Bang

When Red Alert discovered the footage Rewind had bought from Swindle and brought on board, he dubbed them "snuff movies" and punished the little 'bot by having him replace rivets on the ship's hull. He was soon joined in his task by Swerve, and the pair were then pressed into action when Fortress Maximus took Rung and Whirl hostage. Rewind projected footage of Max's torture at the hands of Overlord at Garrus-9 through a window from outside in order to distract him, while Swerve took a shot at him, but wound up grievously wounding Rung instead. Interiors

"Did you know that although I appear to be flying in data slug mode in these panels, this is not in fact possible for me to achieve?"

Against Rewind's wishes, Chromedome had begun using his mnemosurgery skills again, resulting in him reliving the experience of Skyfall's death. After helping calm his partner, Rewind accompanied him to Tailgate's Autobot Initiation Ceremony, during which Rodimus was seized by a strange compulsion and drew some ancient Cybertronian on Tailgate's chest, which Rewind translated as "let me out". Shortly after, Rewind was among those teleported to the planet Theophany by the Galactic Council to investigate the abandoned Crystal City. Beneath the city, they found a Metrotitan, whose psychic emanations were revealed as the cause of Rodimus's trance; the words, Cyclonus explained, were a plea from the titan that actually said "set me free". When the Autobots shrank the titan so it could teleport away, it sent them back to their ship and quantum-jumped them out of the Council's reach. Primus: You, Me, and Other Revelations

With Rung's body repaired after the hostage ordeal, Rewind determined to heal his comatose mind by gathering together a group of other Transformers to tell stories of their shared experiences that would notionally help Rung's unresponsive mind form connections. The first two attempts didn't work out, An Intimate Beheading so for the third try, Rewind got Chromedome, Ratchet, Skids, Drift and Whirl to help him tell a story about events set during the Clampdown. Post Hoc The story didn't appear to be having any effect, Patternism but Rewind was determined to keep going, having discovered that Rung was strangely ubiquitous in Cybertronian history, having been presented for virtually ever major event in the planet's span. In the end, it was not the story, but Skids's deliberate mispronunciation of the psychiatrist's name that awoke him. An Intimate Beheading

Rewind took part in an attack on a Decepticon battalion on Temptoria, which kicked off with an argument between him and Chromedome, as he had previously promised his partner that he would not put himself in danger in this manner any more. The argument was cut off when Whirl dragged Rewind away to take footage of him during the attack; while Whirl and Cyclonus took care of the combat end of the mission, Rewind and Tailgate explored the Decepticon base and discovered the villains were using pink alchemy to drain energon from the natives. A bomb was wired to the chamber, so Rewind helped Tailgate to defuse it, but when the process went wrong, he wound up locked in the bomb chamber with Cyclonus. The larger 'bot shielded Rewind from the explosion, but the archivist was still badly damaged, and would have died had not Whirl (secretly responsible for locking them in as part of a deluded attempt to kill Cyclonus) volunteered to take part in jumpstarting his spark. Before & After

After the crew and Rewind had recovered from the battle of Temptoria, Rewind was one of those invited with Swerve and his "gang" to the tourist planet of Hedonia for a night of R& R. Rewind was one of the group who had the opportunity to scout the organics-only bar using his holomatter avatar, a 20-something human called, appropriately, Joe Human. Cybertronian Homesick Blues While Swerve babysat a drunken Ultra Magnus, Rewind joined the others in the gift shop. Rewind suggested to them that if they were already in trouble with Ultra Magnus, they might as well get into some serious trouble by searching for the "dark secret" of Hedonia. He later convinced Rung not to buy any Hedonian tourist memory sticks, as he was recording his own version. Signal to Noise

Rung bought an Ark-1 model instead, which led Rewind to an impromptu showing of some ancient footage of the real Ark-1's opening ceremony. Before he could roll footage, an apparently drunk Cyclonus flew into a rage. With only twenty minutes to spare, Rewind helped the others to get a comatose Ultra Magnus back to the shuttle.Cybertronian Homesick Blues

Unknown to Rewind, Chromedome was busy interfacing with the secret Decepticon prisoner, Overlord, who would later use Chromedome's memories to escape from his slow-cell prison. Rewind suspected something was going on, and visited Brainstorm to relay some of his suspicions. At that moment, Overlord killed Pipes and the Lost Light was alerted to their emergency.

He followed the rest of the crew to find Overlord crippled by Trepan's Trigger, the mnemonic process Chromedome had installed in the Phase-Sixer as a failsafe. Rewind felt betrayed by Chromedome's return to mnemosurgery, a dangerous practice which Chromedome had previously promised Rewind would no longer do. (Remembrance_Day) Rewind told Chromedome that they would talk later, but the chance never came. When Fortress Maximus managed to put Overlord back into the slow cell, the doors had been wedged open by one of Drift's swords. The only way to close the cell was for Rewind to get into the cell and remove the sword from the inside.

As the ejection countdown began, Rewind apologised to a distraught Chromedome for things not working out. As the cell fell away from the ship, Rewind turned to find Overlord looming over him. What was said between to two is not known as Chromedome, only too aware of Overlord's depravity, rushes to blow up the ejected cell rather than leave Rewind to a sadist's mercy... Under Cold Blue Stars

Later, a small red-tinted camera-unit floating in space was all that remained of Rewind, next to a fully intact and not-quite-dead Overlord.

Unknown to Chromedome, Rewind had the foresight to compose a message to his partner and eject it from the cell prior to the door's closing. After his in absentia funeral, Rewind's data-slug gave a grieving Chromedome a final message through a series of edited clips, finishing with the words I Love You. The Gloaming

Games

Transformers G1: Awakening

("Transformers G1: Awakening". San Francisco: Glu Mobile, 2010.)

Toys

Generation 1

"Did you know that the cassette-formers are at 1:1 scale for micro-cassettes? True fact."

• Rewind & Steeljaw (Cassette 2-pack, 1986/1987)
  • Did You Know that the Cassette 2-Pack Rewind Toy...
    • Has 2 "Adhesion Rifles" for accessories?
    • Transforms from a humanoid robot to a micro-cassette and vice-versa?
    • Is designed to fit in Blaster's chest compartment (though he rattles around a little bit...)?
    • Has two notable variants, one with gold-chromed weapons, and the other, more common version with silver-chromed weapons?
    • Has foil decals that give his "cassette side" its detailing (and cover the screws holding it together) in some versions, while other versions use tampographs?
    • May or may not have any correlation between the guns and detailing variations?
    • Had his mold used also to make Eject, Flip Sides, Rosanna, and Solarbot?
    • Has 19 moving parts, including shoulder pads that are adjustable?
    • Cannot hold his weapons in his fists, but has them mounted to the tape wheels inside his arms instead?
    • Is held together with 6 screws, 2 metal bolts, and 11 plastic rivets?
    • Came packaged with Steeljaw?

• Rewind (Cassettebot, 1986/1987)
  • Did You Know that the 1986 Japanese Rewind Toy...
    • Has the Japanese ID numbers C-67 and C-118?
    • Also has 2 "Adhesion Rifles" for accessories?
    • Was only sold individually, with silver guns and sticker detailing?

• Great Cassette Operation (2009)
  • Did You Know that this release of the Japanese Rewind Toy...
    • Has the Japanese ID number 15?
    • Also has 2 "Adhesion Rifles" for accessories?
    • Was only available in the Transformers Encore line of reissues in 2009?
    • Also came packaged with Eject, Ravage and Buzzsaw?
    • Featured a new for this release Autobot symbol tampograph on his torso?

Notes

• Did You Know that...
  • For the original draft of The Transformers: The Movie and several revisions, there was going to be only one humanoid Autobot Mini-Cassette, who was going to be called Bolts?
  • Between the original draft and actual product, Bolts's role was split in two? Bolts was supposed to fight Ravage, which Rewind ended up doing in the movie (Blaster dealt the described kick though). Bolts's attitude and tussle with Frenzy went to Eject.

Foreign names

• Did You Know that...
  • Rewind's Japanese name is Rewind, which is written in katakana as リワインド, which in turn is transliterated into the Latin alphabet as Riwaindo?
  • Rewind's French name in Canada is Mémorax?
  • Rewind's Mandarin name in Taiwan is Dào-dài (倒帶), which means "Rewind"?
  • Rewind's Mandarin name in China is Fatiao​ (发条), which means "Clockwork Spring"?
  • Rewind's Russian name is Reverse, which is written in Cyrillic as Реверс, which is transliterated into the Latin alphabet as Revers?

References

Did you know that the information on this article is from:

External links

Did You Know You Can Find Out More About Rewind...

• From his page at TFU.info?
• From his Universe profile at NTFA.net?