Transmutate (episode)
| This article is about the Beast Wars cartoon episode. For the spotlight character of this episode, see Transmutate (character). |
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 You cried. Don't lie! | ||||||
| "Transmutate" | ||||||
| Production company | Mainframe Entertainment | |||||
| Airdate | March 10, 1998 | |||||
| Written by | Christy Marx | |||||
| Directed by | J. Falconer Sean Osborne George Samilski | |||||
| Animation studio | Mainframe Entertainment | |||||
| Continuity | Beast Wars continuity | |||||
A strange creature emerges from a damaged stasis pod, and both Rampage and Silverbolt find a strange type of kinship with it.
Synopsis
Within the Predacon base, Megatron dozes in his quarters, an opportunity which Rampage uses to make a grab for his spark. His efforts earn him nothing but painful punishment and a sharp rebuke from the suddenly-awake Predacon leader.
Elsewhere, Rattrap, Silverbolt, and Cheetor are searching for another Predacon jamming tower in a mountainous, seismically unstable region; Megatron monitors them, and sends Inferno and Rampage to deal with them. Worried about the growing earthquakes, Optimus Primal heads out to back up his teammates. A huge earth tremor emits strange energon discharges, knocking out Rattrap and Cheetor and burying them under a rock slide. The quake also uncovers a buried stasis pod; Megatron immediately sends Inferno after it; Rampage follows.
Inferno arrives at the pod, which is badly malfunctioning. Silverbolt arrives and takes him out of the picture. Rampage arrives, intrigued by the pod's contents. As its computer warns that "deconstruction" is "imminent", he urges the powerful spark within to fight its way free. With a mighty shriek, the pod explodes, releasing its passenger.
Rattrap and Cheetor free themselves, and behold the new arrival: a strangely misshapen, almost skeletal creature. Rampage is impressed. He urges the newcomer to destroy the Maximals; Silverbolt counters that they offer friendship. The new robot doesn't seem to know what to make of either side, until Inferno returns, opening fire on the Maximals but hitting the new arrival instead. In response, it unleashes a sonic shriek that shorts out the Maximals and drives Inferno off. As the last one standing, Rampage leads "Transmutate" away, telling it that he is its only friend.
Away from the others, Rampage examines Transmutate. Inferno catches up and demands to return the creature to Megatron. Rampage is prepared to fight it out, till Megatron sends a holo-communicator to speak with the new creature. When it can't even transform, he deems it worthless and orders it destroyed; Rampage pleads to give it a chance to destroy the Maximal to prove its worth. Megatron agrees.
Optimus Primal and Silverbolt split up to hunt for Transmutate, sending the others back. Rampage uses Transmutate to lure Silverbolt into an ambush; he and Inferno blast the Maximal unconscious. When Transmutate hesitates to finish off Silverbolt, Inferno bashes it aside and prepares to finish the job himself. Transmutate responds by blasting him over the horizon. Primal arrives and buries Rampage; Silverbolt's intervention keeps Transmutate from blasting Primal in defense of its friend. Primal and Transmutate take Silverbolt away, Transmutate revealing that it can fly. Rampage breaks free and promises that Primal will not have the creature.
At the Maximal base, Rhinox scans the creature and finds that its malformed structure and datatrax make it a danger to itself and everyone else. He recommends putting it into stasis, a suggestion that angers Silverbolt. As the team argues, Transmutate wanders off, then bursts out of the base in response to a call from Rampage. A still-fuming Silverbolt stalks off. Optimus Primal orders the team to find Transmutate.
Rampage welcomes Transmutate, but Silverbolt arrives, and a fight ensues, with Transmutate watching unhappily. As the two struggle, they eventually launch weapons. Transmutate lands between the opposing missiles of its two friends with a cry of "Stop!"; its energies destroy the missiles but overloads the creature, destroying it.
Rampage cradles the creature's head in his hands as its spark fades out. As Optimus Primal arrives, Silverbolt urges him to leave Rampage be; they are "brothers" for the moment, both mourning the loss.
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Maximals | Predacons | Others |
|---|---|---|
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Quotes
"Man, I am tellin' ya, the things coming out of these pods is just getting weirder and weirder."
- —Rattrap on spotting the title character.
"Do not speak. None shall hurt you now. Come with me, come. I will protect you... I am your friend. Your only friend."
- —Rampage shows his compassionate side to Transmutate.
Inferno: "Speak up! I won't have you freaks plotting behind the Royalty's back!"
Rampage: "I was explaining what it means to be a Predacon. Deceit, treachery, mindless loyalty."
Inferno: "Loyalty comes first!" *nod*
- —Inferno has his priorities straight.
"Have I told you how much I like ants, huh? Especially fried in a subtle blend of mech fluid and grated gears?"
- —Rampage being creepy again
"NOOO! You will not have it, Optimus! The darkness of its Spark echoes my own! It belongs with me!"
- —Rampage
"Are we Predacons now?! Do we destroy whatever does not fit our definition of perfection?!"
- —Silverbolt, who is very pissed off that the rest of the Maximals want to put Transmutate into stasis-lock.
[to Transmutate] "I knew you wouldn't fail me. We are two of a kind. We belong together."
"Stop! This one is not for you."
"It is only for me!"
- —Rampage and Silverbolt
"Friend… good. Friend… dark. I… am… hurt."
- —Transmutate's last words
Notes
- When new, this episode was at the center of an April Fool's joke gone horribly, horribly wrong. A copy of the script was altered by persons unknown at Mainframe Entertainment to include some rather lurid scenes, such as Rattrap mounting Transmutate. Regardless of whomever the victim of the joke was intended to be, the altered script found its way onto alt.toys.transformers, to the horrified chagrin of the fandom.[1][2]
- As if that weren't bad enough, the script was leaked before the episode actually aired in the United States, leaving the fandom debating whether the entire story, and the naughty bits in particular, were actually legitimate.
- This episode features one of the rare instances of Inferno referring to Megatron by name rather than as "Royalty" or "my queen".
- This is the first episode of Beast Wars to not feature Waspinator. With this, Waspinator becomes the final of the first original ten characters to miss an episode, and ends his streak of being the only character of the original ten to appear in every episode consecutively since the show began, appearing in the first 35 episodes before missing this one.
- Also absent from this episode are Tarantulas and Blackarachnia (for the first time since "Law of the Jungle" for both of them). This is also the only episode of Season Two that neither of them are in (Blackarachnia actually appears in every episode following this one for the rest of the series run).
Animation and technical glitches
- At the very beginning of the episode, Megatron's energon-infusion bag disappears between two angled shots.
- Rampage just can't keep himself together in this episode. When Transmutate unleashes a burst of energy upon exiting its pod, Rampage is missing his robot mode "kibble". He is also missing it while he is trying to step on Silverbolt during the last battle. In many other scenes in this episode, Rampage's back kibble is present but out of alignment.
- Similarly, when Silverbolt declares to Rampage "This one is not for you!", he's missing his wing assembly.
- How the hell is Cheetor holding Rattrap in mid-air by the tail? His paws lack opposable thumbs!
- When Rampage drives up to the cliff where Transmutate's stasis pod in tank mode, just before he transforms to robot mode, his crawler treads just disappear. They don't retract, just vanish.
Continuity notes
- When leaving to help Cheetor, Rattrap, and Silverbolt, Optimus makes a remark about not wanting to lose any more friends. This is a reference to Dinobot (who died in the previous episode), and most likely also a nod to Tigatron and Airazor (who were abducted by the Vok a few episodes earlier).
Continuity errors
- Rampage matter-of-factly calls the protoform "Transmutate" several minutes before the sequence in which he asks it for its name and then slowly "figures out" that it should be Transmutate.
Transformers references
- Rattrap claims that Arcee is his great-aunt.
- This may be a double reference, considering both G1 Arcee and Transmutate share the same voice actress; Susan Blu.
Foreign localization
French
- Title: "Mutation" (Canada)
Italian
- Title: "L'arrivo di Convertor" ("The Arrival of Convertor")
Japanese
- Title: "Kani Jai!" (カニじゃい!, "I'm a Crab!")
- Original airdate: December 1 1999
Portuguese
- Title: "Transmutante" ("Transmutant")
Spanish
- Title: "Transmutante"
- Title: "Transmutante" (America)
Home video releases
- VHS
1998 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Series 2 / Volume 3 (Siren Entertainment)
2000 — Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers: Metals — I'm a Crab! (Pioneer LDC) — Japanese audio only.
2001 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Volume 7 (Universal)
- DVD
2000 — Beast Wars: Transformers: Metals — DVD Box 1 (Pioneer LDC) — English and Japanese audio.
2004 — Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Second Season (Rhinomation)
2006 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Season 2 (Madman Entertainment)
2009 — The Transformers: Beast Wars — Complete Collection (Madman Entertainment)
