Home Soil
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 "K-K-Kill meeee..." | ||||||
| "Home Soil" | ||||||
| Production company | Mainframe Entertainment | |||||
| Airdate | March 15, 2000 | |||||
| Written by | Meg McLaughlin | |||||
| Directed by | Dennis Heaton | |||||
| Animation studio | Mainframe Entertainment | |||||
| Continuity | Beast Wars continuity | |||||
A spaceship crash-lands on Cybertron, releasing a tentacled alien monster. The Maximals and Vehicons both rush to take control of the vessel's secrets.
Synopsis
High above the planet of Cybertron, a mysterious spaceship and a cluster of asteroids prepare to make planetfall. But the automated space-cannons manage to destroy the asteroids and badly damage the ship, sending it plummeting towards the planet. Flying above the city streets, Silverbolt sends word of the ship to base.
Underground, a worried Optimus examines the wilting technorganic trees and ponders their survival and the future of Cybertron should they die. Cheetor tries to console him, but to no avail. Suddenly, Rattrap bursts in, telling the Maximals about the ship's crash. Megatron has also found out about the arrival of the ship and orders Thrust to destroy any survivors of the crash. Thrust obediently heads towards the site, turning this into a race against time.
As the Maximals head towards the crash site, Thrust and his troops whiz by them. Several of the drones peel from the squadron and about-face, turning to fight the Maximals. Transforming into robot mode, the Maximals make short work of the Vehicons, but they have lost time. Primal splits them into three teams: He and Cheetor will travel on the surface, Rattrap and Blackarachnia will go underground, and Silverbolt and Nightscream will take to the sky.
In the air, Nightscream and Silverbolt destroy a squadron of Aero-Drones, but Nightscream still treats newcomer Silverbolt rudely, even after the latter compliments their teamwork together.
In the sewers of Cybertron, Blackarachnia laments to Rattrap of Silverbolt's lack of affection, even after she freed him from his Jetstorm slave form and reformatted him into his present condor form. However, the conversation is cut short as two mole drones burst in from the sides. Blackarachnia destroys one and Rattrap commandeers another, and the duo head towards the site much quicker.
On the surface, Cheetor and Primal are surrounded by a group of drones. The two flying Maximals arrive to help them, and together they destroy the drones.
Eventually, the Maximals arrive at the ship. Stepping inside, they discover that the walls are covered with plant matter. They are suddenly attacked by a tentacled plant beast, but when they fight it, it turns tail and heads underground, towards the Oracle and the technorganic orchard. Primal fears that the fast-growing seeds the alien leaves in its wake will contaminate and destroy the orchard.
However, he has a plan: Tapping the power of the Oracle, he attempts to reformat the monster. Cheetor protests, seeing as only "Cybertronians" can be reformatted, but Primal goes ahead with his idea, and the alien is bathed in a white light. The organic components of the creature begin to merge with the technological, and a technorganic, sentient plant emerges. The creature explains that she too is of Cybertronian descent, and that several years ago, she and her crew embarked on a mission of exploration similar to the Axalon's (except without all the guns, violence and killing). Reaching a planet covered with aggressive, mobile plants (in other words, "talking trees"), she and her crew took the natives' forms to study them and avoid predation. The plant says that Megatron's attack had "shorted out" both her ship and her higher mental functions, so she was merely acting out of self-preservation.
But the plant-bot is cut short as a phalanx of Tank Drones attack, beginning to ravage the orchard. The newest member of the Maximals takes action, transforming into her robot mode. Shooting one drone with electrical energy, she uses a "chain-lightning" attack, with the energy leaping from one tank to the next, until the deadly circuit is completed and the drones are destroyed.
Examining the poor state of the plants, the robot notes that different plants need different lighting, and she throws a bomb-like device onto the lights currently used. As the light changes, the technorganic plants flourish, and the new Maximal introduces herself as Botanica.
Above, Megatron (encompassed within the big floating head) notes the newest arrival and transforms into a "spaceship mode", destroying the remains of Botanica's ship and the rampant plant growth around it. As Thrust gripes about the ever-increasing odds against him, Megatron declares that it is time to put an end to the Maximal "infestation" for good.
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Maximals | Vehicons |
|---|---|
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Quotes
"Don't worry, legs, I know the drill."
- —Rattrap, about to take out a mole drone.
"Real fair. One of me, six of them."
"Seven! ... now. As we remain static, the organics grow yet stronger. Clearly this infestation must be exterminated, once and for all."
- —Thrust groans about unfair odds, while Megatron makes with the foreshadowing.
Notes
- This is the only episode where Grand Mal Megatron transforms.
- The destruction of Botanica's ship in the last scene is reminiscent of Rampage's destruction of Depth Charge's starhopper in the last scene of "Deep Metal". In both cases, the writers were cleaning up a loose end, since giving the heroes access to a working spaceship would've derailed the story.
Animation and technical errors
- The Maximals are missing from the background when Thrust orders his drones to turn back and attack them.
- When Rattrap hides behind Nightscream after being spooked by the plant creature, he's clipping through Nightscream's leg-wing.
- As Cheetor slashes about with his swords during the fight with the tank drones, his right sword first clips into his right thigh, and before he jumps away, his entire left arm clips through his left leg.
- In the closeup of the tank drone driving over the plants, one leaf on the ground pops into existence between frames.
Continuity errors
- Primal doesn't suffer any weakness post-reformatting, as he did with Nightscream in "Forbidden Fruit".
- Like Nightscream, Botanica is able to transform to robot mode immediately after being reformatted. Then again, like Nightscream, she was reformatted by Optimus Primal directly, instead of the Oracle, which might be a deciding factor in the new transformation process. Although that still doesn't explain it with Silverbolt.
- Rattrap usually transforms into robot mode in order to interface with computers. In this episode, he transforms out of robot mode to do it.
- It apparently doesn't occur to Optimus to use his jet boosters to reach the downed spacecraft first. Plus, even if they have to stay in Beast Mode, why do they stick together rather than sending Cheetor out on ahead? Or are they seriously suggesting that every Maximal has the same top speed? (This isn't the first time this has happened.)
- Why does a Maximal shuttle look exactly like a four million year old Autobot shuttle, instead of, say, the Axalon, one of its contemptories? It also has a very inconsistent size. Botanica fills the exit door when she leaves the ship in the flashback, whereas Rattrap and the other Maximals were tiny against it when trying to break in.
- Apparently Botanica (or at least one of her crew) can change her alt-mode just from receiving information from a DNA scanner, without the need for a CR Chamber.
- So, er, what happened to Botanica's crew then?
Transformers references
- Nightscream wonders aloud if the new arrivals might "spread some sort of virus" while glaring at Silverbolt, a reference to the events of last episode.
Real-world references
- Nightscream and Silverbolt declare "Do not pass 'Go!' Do not collect $200!", a clear reference to the popular board game Monopoly.
- Nightscream at one point refers to Silverbolt as "Typhoid Mary", a reference to both the previous episode and the infamous real-life carrier of the Typhoid virus.
Trivia
- The planet that Botanica and her crew were sent to explore is apparently Planet Jungle from Mainframe Entertainment's other toyline-based cartoon Shadow Raiders/War Planets. Whether this is an intentional crossover or simply due to the recycling of backgrounds and animation models for budget reasons is unclear.
- Botanica's pre-plant form, seen only in shadow, is another reuse of the Giant Robot model from ReBoot, which was previously used for Megatron's pre-beast form and in a number of other places during Beast Wars. As used here, it has what looks like Depth Charge's head.
- For some reason, Blackarachnia checks herself out after Botanica gets reformatted. Jealous at no longer being the only girl, Legs? (She also has the most over-the-top look of shock on her face imaginable.)
- When Thrust's drones surround the Maximals Thrust extends one of his fingers and holds his hand up as if he's giving Optimus the finger, making this the second time Thrust has displayed obscene hand gestures to his enemies. Optimus is not amused.
Foreign localization
French
- Title: "Terre Natale" ("Native Land")
- Title: "Provenance" (Canada, "Source")
Japanese
Spanish
- Title: "Su Tierra Natal" ("Her Native Soil")
Home video releases
- DVD
2005 — Super Lifeform Transformers: Beast Wars Returns — Volume 5 (Geneon Entertainment) — Japanese audio only.
2006 — Beast Machines: Transformers — The Complete Series (Rhinomation)
2007 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Season Two: Volume One (Sony)
2007 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Complete Season Two (Sony)
2009 — Transformers: Beast Machines — Intégrale Saison 2 (Sony) — French audio only.
