Cybertron IS Earth
Grebo Guru
Okay, I tossed this subject out here a few years ago, when Beast
Machines was going on... Seeing as how BW and BM is being discussed
again, I figure I'll see what people have to say now.
Before I begin, Id like to admit that Im one of those people who enjoys
shoehorning all the continuities into one universe. I'm gonna yammer
about that very topic later, but for now just keep it in your minds, as
it has some bearing on my current subject.
My theory: Cybertron IS Earth. Cybertron has ALWAYS been Earth.
I dont know for certain how or why... but I can think of about a zillion
different possibilities. And, of course, I have a favorite theory.
I guess this line of thinking first hit me when the Maximals went down
through Cybertron's underlevels in BM. They passed through abandoned
cities and all sorts of stuff. I was fascinated by this idea... I had
never before considered the possibility that Cybertron was once a
regular planet which got "paved"! (By the Quints or Primus or whoever.)
But when I consider the mining of Cybertonium (or whatever that mineral
was) from Cybertron's depths on the G1 cartoon, and the presence of the
Transorganics in same, and the presence of the "demons" in Furman's
comics... Well, clearly Cybertron was once a planet with its own fauna
(and probably civilization).
Now here are the two bits (and they're little bits!) which make me think
that Cybertron is Earth:
1 - In Omega Point, Unicron's dark essence is found on ancient (Beast
Wars) Earth.
2 - The animal skeletons found within Cybertron are Earth animals (like
the bat skeleton Nightscream scanned).
Number two is the kicker for me, but number one is resonant as well.
Epecially when you also consider:
3 - DiTillio and Forward have said that the story behind the Vok was
that they were the descendants (or maturation, or whatever) of the
Matrix-purified Swarm, and that out of guilt they were trying to
"recreate" Earth in such a way that it would not be tainted/ruined by
Transformer meddling. This means that either they were conducting their
experiment in another time/space dimension, or they had somehow "cloned"
the Earth.
Ssssssooooo... Here's my guess:
1 - In The Future (probably the FAR future, after BW, even BM, even
Omega Point), the Vok decide to recreate Earth without transformer
interference. So they take the dead, Far Future Earth back in time
several zillion years for use as a seed of recreation.
I'm convinced that Earth is dead in the Far Future because DiTillio and
Forward were considering that (based on the Swarm's voracious acts in
G2) AND because planet Gaia from BW2 (concurrent with the BW future) is
Earth, and human civilization is gone. Either way you slice it, Earth in
the future is no longer populated by humans.
Oh, you didn't know Gaia is Earth? Well it is, its utterly clear.
Watching either the BW2 tv show or reading the BW2 manga renders this
unquestionable, IMO.
ANYWAY!
2 - So several gazillion years ago, thanks to the Vok, there are two
Earths. They coexist in the same universe, but located at different
points in space.
Earth-1 is the young Earth, the "true" Earth, the one that the Ark will
crash on, and that the BW cast will travel back in time to (also) crash
on.
Earth-2 is the one that the Vok brought back, the one that has the
tattered remnants of human cities and such all over it, and also may or
may not still have Earthen animals still on it. (It certainly has
Earthly fossils on it, in any case.)
3 - Unfortunately, Earth-2 gets turned into Cybertron.
How? Well, either the Quints come along and choose Earth-2 as a good
planet to turn into their robot factory -OR- Primus chooses it as his
planetary prison. Or both! I dont necessarily think these ideas are
mutually exclusive. (Thats a subject for another posting, of course.)
4 - In any event, the Vok can't work with Earth-2 anymore, so they have
to opt to try working on Earth-1. Unfortunately, this is the planet that
UNICRON gets stuck in.
See, if Primus and Unicron are both gods, its conceivable that the same
type of world would be suitable for "hosting" them. If Primus "inhabits"
Earth-2, its conceivable that Unicron would be trapped in Earth-1.
4 - Unicron's dark essence sits in Earth, stuck, for eons. That's why
its there when Shokaract comes back in Omega Point. Eventually, Unicron
either frees himself and forms his robo-planet body from other material
-OR- Primacron uses his essence as the "AI" or "Lifeforce" for the
experimental robo-planet he's made.
Now I know the comics say that Unicron was able to shape his prison into
his new body, but that detail may or may not fall by the wayside
depending on which continuity(ies) get followed.
ANYhow! My point is that I think Cybertron and Earth have had so much to
do with each other for so long because they're actually the same planet.
It explains why Unicron's Dark Essence is on Earth in the Omega Point
story, it explains the trickiness of the Vok's pet project, and it
explains the presence of Earth animal skeletons on Cybertron in Beast
Machines. (That last part being the most urgent question, in my mind.)
Of course, I have other theories:
I suspect that Unicron has plagued (and will plague) the TFs forever -
that he has been Devil Z, ViolenJiger, Dark Nova, and perhaps even the
Liege Maximo...
I suspect that Primacron is a being affected by both Primus and Unicron;
he might evem be Prima (the 2nd Matrix holder) after corruption by
Unicron...
I suspect that the Quintessons may be connected with humans and/or the
Vok in some way...
I have way too many theories.
Phooey. All those deserve more discussion, so for now, skip 'em! At the
moment what I'm offering up is a vision of universal TF timespace; a
vision in which there are always 2 Earths:
Primus' prison and Unicron's prison...
The Vok's project and the Quints' project...
Earth and TFG1 Cybertron...
Gaia and BW2 Cybertron...
What the future holds for Cybertron is unclear (thanks a load, Beast
Machines!) because I think Armada/MicronDensetsu, Machine Wars, and Car
Robots/RiD must "originate" from the time between G1/G2 and Beast Wars.
The future for Earth, beyond the 2000s, would seem to be clearer: Human
civilization (if not all Earth life) comes to an end and the planet
takes a trip back in time, courtesy of the Vok.
Im not saying I know what's going on. Im not saying all this was planned
from the beginning. Im not saying DiTillio and Forward, or Furman, or
Skir were thinking along these lines. Ive just tried my best to find a
way to reconcile a few questions.
What are your thoughts, guys?
Grebo
PS - Please don't flame me, its such a waste of everyone's energy...
XGrimlock2002
In the geneation 1 1984-1986 series Megatron & Galvatron bring Cybertron into
Earth's orbit in order to power up Cybertron with energy.
DKhan1
(Armada and Beast Wars just should not co-exist in the same universe), this
theory makes a tremendous amount of sense. Plus it would actually be an
incredibly interesting plot point and would make a wonderful story to be told.
Id love to see some fan fics on this.
Chris
"XGrimlock2002" <xgriml...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20030216234011...@mb-mt.aol.com...
Uh... Did you read the entirety of the post? Just curious.
Chris
David Willis
> >
> > In the geneation 1 1984-1986 series Megatron & Galvatron bring Cybertron
> into
> > Earth's orbit in order to power up Cybertron with energy.
>
> Uh... Did you read the entirety of the post? Just curious.
Well, I was about to ask Deathy the same question, but then remembered the
particulars of the scene he mentions. When Cybertron is brought into
Earth's orbit, it looks to be much smaller than Earth itself. If Earth is
indeed Cybertron without all the extra fun layers of metal cities and
whatnot, shouldn't Cybertron be much much bigger?
Of course, you could ask how much stock one should put in the accuracy of
the animation involved... But if you assume Cybertron's size was a mistake,
then so might the bat skeleton in Beast Machines.
--David
www.itswalky.com
Jonathan S. Latu
"David Willis" <wii...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:aa_3a.32622$A%3.40...@ord-read.news.verio.net...
> > > That theory of yours fails because of the following details:
> > >
> > > In the geneation 1 1984-1986 series Megatron & Galvatron bring
Cybertron
> > into
> > > Earth's orbit in order to power up Cybertron with energy.
> >
> > Uh... Did you read the entirety of the post? Just curious.
>
> Well, I was about to ask Deathy the same question, but then remembered
the
> particulars of the scene he mentions. When Cybertron is brought into
> Earth's orbit, it looks to be much smaller than Earth itself. If Earth
is
> indeed Cybertron without all the extra fun layers of metal cities and
> whatnot, shouldn't Cybertron be much much bigger?
It depends on how much mining and conversion of materials had taken place.
Let's assume that the TFs don't run on solar power, or at least in bulk.
That means they'd have to mine for sources of energy. Now, that energy
would be given off in the forms of work, light, heat, and energy, all of
which disperse.
Steven Acevedo
Oh please. (Rolls eyes!)
Ethan Hammond
up Cybertron in Headmaster? And then there is still
a Cybertron in Beast Machines. We would have to assume
this is different and new Cybertron, that was found and
built by Rodimus Prime and his group.
--
All Purpose Cultural Randomness
http://www.angelfire.com/tx/apcr/index.html
Autobot Super Deluxe Grade
hallucination/dream that Primal had (from a bad side effect of merging the
spark of G1 Prime and his) on the way back home after winning the Beast Wars.
So I guess anything is possible. ;)
Seriously... I dont see the possibilities, but to each their own.
****************************
G++++ G1++ G2+++ BW++ MW++ BM+++ FR FW- M+ #700 D+++ ADA N++ OQP BC++ CN+++ OM+
P312
Wanna see my collection?
http://members.aol.com/autobotsdg//collection.html
a guy called Weapon X
On Mon, 17 Feb 2003, 3:24:32 GMT, Grebo Guru 'Grebo' <ana...@aol.com> wrote
in <anafiel-0DEB33...@newssvr19-ext.news.prodigy.com>:
> Hello all,
> Okay, I tossed this subject out here a few years ago, when Beast
> Machines was going on... Seeing as how BW and BM is being discussed
> again, I figure I'll see what people have to say now.
> Before I begin, Id like to admit that Im one of those people who enjoys
> shoehorning all the continuities into one universe. I'm gonna yammer
> about that very topic later, but for now just keep it in your minds, as
> it has some bearing on my current subject.
> My theory: Cybertron IS Earth. Cybertron has ALWAYS been Earth.
[snip]
> I guess this line of thinking first hit me when the Maximals went down
> through Cybertron's underlevels in BM. They passed through abandoned
> cities and all sorts of stuff. I was fascinated by this idea... I had
> never before considered the possibility that Cybertron was once a
> regular planet which got "paved"! (By the Quints or Primus or whoever.)
>
[snip]
> 2 - The animal skeletons found within Cybertron are Earth animals (like
> the bat skeleton Nightscream scanned).
Well, that bat that you saw in BM could have just happened to "look" very
similar to bats from Earth, much like how Transformers themselves "happen to
look" like humanoids and how some animals on Dagobah (*See Star Wars)
"happen to look like" animals on Earth.
I'm not telling you you are wrong, just offering an explanation (for what
you saw).
> Grebo
> PS - Please don't flame me, it's such a waste of everyone's energy...
D/L the TF Armada show credit:
http://pages.prodigy.net/transformer_mtmterid/Transformer_MTMTErid/fanmade_project/Computer_movies/mini-TF_Armada_credits_file.mpg
a 'heavily armed' PowerMaster Prime custom setup! See him at:
http://pages.prodigy.net/transformer_mtmterid/WWW-pages/toys/mix-n-match/toy.html
Springer
>
> Let's assume that the TFs don't run on solar power, or at least in bulk.
> That means they'd have to mine for sources of energy. Now, that energy
> would be given off in the forms of work, light, heat, and energy, all of
> which disperse.
>
>
>
TF's use Energon, which can be mined on some planets........
Springer
>
> How? Well, either the Quints come along and choose Earth-2 as a good
> planet to turn into their robot factory -OR- Primus chooses it as his
> planetary prison. Or both! I dont necessarily think these ideas are
> mutually exclusive. (Thats a subject for another posting, of course.)
>
> 4 - In any event, the Vok can't work with Earth-2 anymore, so they have
> to opt to try working on Earth-1. Unfortunately, this is the planet that
> UNICRON gets stuck in.
This is a paradox. If the planet is dead, then the quints wouldn't order
slaves to mine it, and i doubt the quints could have taken it from the
vok...
Now if unicron were in this husk and then primus were in it there would be
chaos. They could not co-exist and primus would not go into the cage that
held and may still hold Unicrons essence.
Unless in the future the chaos bringer somehow seeing the horror through the
eyes of his victims or too weak to fight anymore decides to hide, he reverts
to his pure spark and inhabits the earth again (according to your theory)
and hides there watching as the planet is scorched by wars and famines, and
begins to die along with the planet. right about now the vok are trying to
find a way to atone for their sins and upon choosing there plan they take
the husk once known as earth and fling it back in time. once back in time
they begin reparations on the planet with the former Unicron inside.
without realizing it they reenergized the greatest foe cybertronians had
ever battled, but he remembered none of that. Being so low on energy his
essence had to conserve itself. It first let go of unnecessary functions,
but when those were gone it had to let go of more and more. well after the
turbulent trip through time the only thing left was his horror at the
atrocities he had created. well once the vok realized their mistake, they
fled from the monster they had awoken. However Unicron did not attempt to
harm them or even chase them, he simply began to look around, and for the
first time, this monster of chaos saw the beauty of peace. He watched as
staars emerged and planets were born, but after watching this young universe
for awhile he saw something that horrified him to the core of his essence,
he saw the chaos bringer destroying the universe he had come to enjoy and
even love. he knew then what he must do, he recalls something familiar
about this situation, a dream perhaps, he would take up arms against this
utter chaos, and using the name from his dreams he would battle this being
and all would call out his name knowing that it was he that saved the
universe. they call out to Primus...
Mighty Maximal
place...
Anyone ?
'Grin'
Oh & I wouln't put it past someone sometime in one of the media to suggest
it as well.
It's not more or less outragious than Making Cybertron organic in the first
place.
Ethan Hammond
>
> Now I'm waiting for the arguments that Gobotron & Cybertron are the same
> place...
There is a Gobotron?
Richard Mistron
> Mighty Maximal wrote:
> > Now I'm waiting for the arguments that Gobotron & Cybertron are
> > the same place...
>
> There is a Gobotron?
Where else do you think Speed-Bot, Gorilla-Bot and Buzzer-Bot live? ;-)
--
http://home.sprynet.com/~orioneos/
"Bumblebee needs assistance at the tuna plant!" - Zeatha Mistron
When I say "Turkey!" You say "Corn!"
"Turkey!"
Ethan Hammond
>
> Ethan Hammond wrote...
> > Mighty Maximal wrote:
> > > Now I'm waiting for the arguments that Gobotron & Cybertron are
> > > the same place...
> >
> > There is a Gobotron?
>
> Where else do you think Speed-Bot, Gorilla-Bot and Buzzer-Bot live? ;-)
And Cykill and Leader 1 as well dare I dream?
Grebo Guru
Im glad my post has gotten a lot of interesting responses from you all.
Thank you! I'm going to address everyone's postings on this subject,
because I enjoy getting to hear other people's viewpoints -- I could
never think of all the angles!
But before I get to the responses, I'd like to explain that while I dont
think Cybertron was ALWAYS (like since the G1 cartoon and comics)
intended to turn out to be Earth -- but I do honestly believe that Bob
Skir had this in mind. I think that if Beast Machines had gone on
longer, he would have sprung this revelation on us.
Of course I cant know for sure, but it seems to me that the entire
"point" or "intent" of Beast Machines was to come up with a solid reason
why all TFs now (that is, then, during the height of the Beast-toys age)
turned into animals. The BW TV show made it clear that the beast forms
came out of necessity, and were a phenomenon peculiar to the castaways
on ancient Earth. Beast Machines' purpose was to apply a beast paradigm
to the entire Cybertronian race and environment.
To me, that seems to be what the show was "for".
To that end, Skir came up with the idea of Oracle and its push to render
the planet Techno-Organic. I think he went too far, and I dont like how
he did it, but the basic idea was actually good. At the time, it seemed
that all TFs were now beast transformers, and he was shooting to explain
why. Too bad for him that original, machine-TFs came back into style
even as his show progressed. (Lucky for most of us tho.)
I do look forward to The Wreckers' storyline invalidating the Oracle
(that seems to be one of its major points) and perhaps even "rectifying"
Cybertron's present/future.
Anyway, on to the responses!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Ok, let's see here. In article
<2v44a.6210$_c6.6...@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
"Springer" <spri...@Cybertronlife.net> wrote:
> This is a paradox. If the planet is dead, then the quints wouldn't order
> slaves to mine it, and i doubt the quints could have taken it from the
> vok...
Why not? Just because the planet has no life on it doesnt mean its not
still chock full o' minerals.
And as for taking the planet from the Vok, they didnt necessarily have
to. Perhaps the Vok "misplaced" Earth when they timejacked it - moving a
whole planet through spacetime could be fraught with complications - and
the Quints then found it and used it... Perhaps (or even probably)
without even knowing it was Earth! Another possibility would be that
timejacking Earth drained the Vok of all their power for a while, and in
that time the Quints were able to overpower the Vok and take the planet.
Or perhaps the Quints tricked the Vok into letting them have it? There
are a zillion possibilities.
> Now if unicron were in this husk and then primus were in it there would be
> chaos. They could not co-exist and primus would not go into the cage that
> held and may still hold Unicrons essence.
By the time Earth is dead and timejacked by the Vok (i.e., the farrrrr
future), Unicron would be long gone from it. He got transplanted into
the planet-eater body way back when - before the TF movie, if not
countless years before then even.
Oh! I also thought of another thing that made me think Earth might be
Cybertron: In Headmasters, when the TFs go looking for the Matrix, it's
found on Earth. Why? Well,perhaps because Earth (that is, Earth-1, the
one that is "our" young Earth) is the same planet as "old"-Earth
Cybertron and thus Primus' spirit (the Matrix) would be attracted to it.
Perhaps thats even the same reason that the Zodiac shows up there,
underground, in Zone.
ANYway...
> Unless in the future the chaos bringer somehow seeing the horror through the
> eyes of his victims or too weak to fight anymore decides to hide, he reverts
> to his pure spark and inhabits the earth again (according to your theory)
> and hides there watching as the planet is scorched by wars and famines, and
> begins to die along with the planet.
Thats an interesting idea. When would this happen again? Now Im getting
confused...
> right about now the vok are trying to
> find a way to atone for their sins and upon choosing there plan they take
> the husk once known as earth and fling it back in time. once back in time
> they begin reparations on the planet with the former Unicron inside.
> without realizing it they reenergized the greatest foe cybertronians had
> ever battled, but he remembered none of that. Being so low on energy his
> essence had to conserve itself. It first let go of unnecessary functions,
> but when those were gone it had to let go of more and more. well after the
> turbulent trip through time the only thing left was his horror at the
> atrocities he had created. well once the vok realized their mistake, they
> fled from the monster they had awoken. However Unicron did not attempt to
> harm them or even chase them, he simply began to look around, and for the
> first time, this monster of chaos saw the beauty of peace. He watched as
> staars emerged and planets were born, but after watching this young universe
> for awhile he saw something that horrified him to the core of his essence,
> he saw the chaos bringer destroying the universe he had come to enjoy and
> even love. he knew then what he must do, he recalls something familiar
> about this situation, a dream perhaps, he would take up arms against this
> utter chaos, and using the name from his dreams he would battle this being
> and all would call out his name knowing that it was he that saved the
> universe. they call out to Primus...
Heh! Now THAT's a cool and totally twisted idea!!!
However, as I pointed out, Unicron would have vacated Earth long before
it was timejacked. But man that idea is cool - talk about fanfic fodder!
Cheers to ya!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Alrighty then. In article <3E50AE5D...@prodigy.net>,
a guy called Weapon X <QSBA1...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> Well, that bat that you saw in BM could have just happened to "look" very
> similar to bats from Earth, much like how Transformers themselves "happen to
> look" like humanoids and how some animals on Dagobah (*See Star Wars)
> "happen to look like" animals on Earth.
Yes, indeed it could have. Of course, there's also the bird that
Silverbolt scanned, and all the other skeletons they saw down there. It
seems like an awfully big coincidence...
I mean, Im not saying you're wrong. It is indeed possible that earthlike
creatures evolved on other worlds, but that answer isnt terribly
satisfying to me. Not when this massive implication that Cybertron was
Earth is being dangled so tantalizingly before us...
> I'm not telling you you are wrong, just offering an explanation (for what
> you saw).
Seems we're both on the same page here. Thanks for your commentary!
Grebo
Jonathan S. Latu
"Springer" <spri...@Cybertronlife.net> wrote in message
news:WU34a.6172$_c6.6...@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net...
You usually mine your own planet first bud. Otherwise, how do you have the
resources to go anywhere else?
Grebo Guru
Ethan has a very good point. In article <3E508D...@worldnet.att.net>,
Ethan Hammond <esha...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> Even if Cybertron was Earth what Scorponok blowing
> up Cybertron in Headmaster? And then there is still
> a Cybertron in Beast Machines. We would have to assume
> this is different and new Cybertron, that was found and
> built by Rodimus Prime and his group.
Yes, that is indeed a good point. I have thought about this one a lot.
The straightforward answer is this:
The Japanese Headmasters anime does not exist in US continuity, so
Cybertron is still around in Beast Wars and Beast Machines. Simple
enough.
The Japanese Beast Wars shows dont seem to pay any attention to
continuity. Cybertron still exists in those shows too, implying that
either Japanese Beast Wars shows are a new continuity (like Car Robots
and Micron Densetsu) or the producers just didnt care. More likely the
second, IMO.
However, we do care. And since I enjoy trying to shoehorn all the
continuities and universes into one coherent timeline, its especially
problematic. I see two or three solutions to this massive continuity
problem.
1 - Cybertron was not destroyed, because the Deepticons blew up a decoy
planet. The Autobots disguised some other world as Cybertron and thats
what Scorponok blew up.
Yeah, right.
2 - Cybertron was blown up in Headmasters and the Cybertron we see in
BW, BW2, BWNeo and BM is a new "cyberformed" planet named after the old
one. Possibilities include the planet Master, Planet V, planet Zone, and
a host of others -- including Earth! In fact, Earth is a very good
possibility. It would explain why BM Cybertron seems nothing like TFG1
Cybertron. Doesnt look the same, has different cities, etc.
Of course, problems crop up in that this "New Cybertron" has the Plasma
Energy Chamber, Vector Sigma (in the BW Neo anime), the Key to Vector
Sigma, and other such Cybertronian landmarks on/in it. This could be
explained by asserting that when Cybertron was blown up, its survivng
chunks were used in the "cyberforming" of the new Cybertron (which may
very well have been Earth once).
(Truthfully, I think this answer is actually more likely than my theory.
But, I like my theory better because its more twisted and circular.
Splipsystic.)
2 - Cybertron was not destroyed. The only way this is possible, I think,
is to sort of "hybridize" the events of The Rebirth with those of the
2-part story in Headmasters which sees Cybertron destroyed. (Episodes 9
and 10, "Seibertron is in Great Danger") In both stories, Scorponok
attacks Cybertron. Basically, in this hybridization situation, the
re-energizing of Cybertron to a new Golden Age takes it out of the
storyline as effectively as if it was destroyed -- It becomes
unassailable and and a land of peace, and the Move/TF2010 characters
(Rodimus, Blurr, etc) busy themselves running things, leaving the war
stories to the heroes of Headmasters, Masterforce, Victory, Zone, etc.
Now I know this is kinda bogus, very farfetched, and full of holes. Dont
be too rough in ripping it apart, please, because I'm well aware its a
shaky (if not outright lame) idea, but its the "best" way I can think of
to rationailze the two divergent stories and keep Cybertron around. If
any of you all can come up with a better idea, I would absolutely love
to hear it!
Anyway, on to the next post...
Salud,
Grebo
Grebo Guru
On and on and on I go. Dont I ever shut up?!?
In article <20030217030453...@mb-cp.aol.com>,
autob...@aol.comicron (Autobot Super Deluxe Grade) wrote:
> Well we all know that the Beast Machines saga was just a bad
> hallucination/dream that Primal had (from a bad side effect of merging the
> spark of G1 Prime and his) on the way back home after winning the Beast Wars.
I often feel that way myself man! I was sooooo disappointed in Primal's
behavior in BM. He never even said "That's just prime"! He was a nutcase
in that show... sad. I wish the show had been different, perhaps even
never been made. But it was... and therefore, I am annoyingly compelled
to do something with it.
> So I guess anything is possible. ;)
Let's hope so, eh?
> Seriously... I dont see the possibilities, but to each their own.
I hear ya man. Farfetched, I know...
Grebo
Grebo Guru
dkh...@aol.com (DKhan1) wrote:
> U know, other then u trying to squeeze every Transformer continuity together
> (Armada and Beast Wars just should not co-exist in the same universe)
Why not? As far as I can tell, the Armada TFs came from Cybertron before
the Beast Wars age. (All those familiar G1 TFs running around when the
signal is detected makes me think that.)
The Minicons could have been sent away on a transwarp ship that
travelled back in time and across the dimensions to crash on the earth
and moon of another dimension millions of years ago -- A parallel earth
that was never otherwise visited by TFs. When the signal is sent, it
crosses the dimensions to Cybertron in our universe, and the TFs we know
make the trip to the parallel universe (like Fire Convoy's team did, tho
to another alternate earth) to fight there over control of the Minicons.
That's my take on how Armada fits into this all-encompassing
"Transfinity". Well, part of how it fits in...
> this theory makes a tremendous amount of sense.
I am flattered!
> Plus it would actually be an incredibly interesting plot point
> and would make a wonderful story to be told.
Im really glad you think so!
> Id love to see some fan fics on this.
Ive been tempted to write it... Or to run a TF roleplaying game about it
with my friends.
Anyway, thanks DHkan1!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Hmmmm. In article <20030216234011...@mb-mt.aol.com>,
xgriml...@aol.com (XGrimlock2002) wrote:
Errrr... I thought I made it pretty clear that throughout time, there
would be TWO earths? Cybertron (old dead Earth timejacked to the past)
and Earth (young Earth that we live on). So, there would be no
contradiction... Im sorry if I didnt make that clear enough.
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Interesting! In article <aa_3a.32622$A%3.40...@ord-read.news.verio.net>,
"David Willis" <wii...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Well, I was about to ask Deathy the same question, but then remembered the
> particulars of the scene he mentions. When Cybertron is brought into
> Earth's orbit, it looks to be much smaller than Earth itself. If Earth is
> indeed Cybertron without all the extra fun layers of metal cities and
> whatnot, shouldn't Cybertron be much much bigger?
That IS a good point... I hadn't thought of it.
I would say that earth's outer layers could have been stripped away in
the process of its conversion to the Cybertron we know, but that wouldnt
leave the ancient cities underground. Theyd be gone too. So that shoots
that answer.
> Of course, you could ask how much stock one should put in the accuracy of
> the animation involved...
Yes, basically that's my take on the situation.
> But if you assume Cybertron's size was a mistake,
> then so might the bat skeleton in Beast Machines.
Yes, it might. But one doesn't *have* to consider the bat a mistake just
because one considers the planetary scales depicted in the G1 show a
mistake. Especially since they were done by different artists and
writers in different decades. And since G1's story *and* animation often
contradicted itself.
But in the end, you have an excellent point there. Drat!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Okay now. On the subject of Cybertron's size relative to Earth -- In
article <RV_3a.40$U4.1...@news.iquest.net>,
"Jonathan S. Latu" <white_n...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> It depends on how much mining and conversion of materials had taken place.
>
> Let's assume that the TFs don't run on solar power, or at least in bulk.
Yeah, if they did they probably wouldnt have constant energy shortage
problems...
> That means they'd have to mine for sources of energy. Now, that energy
> would be given off in the forms of work, light, heat, and energy, all of
> which disperse.
True... but its hard to imagine Earth shrivelling like a raisin but its
layers of cities staying intact, so that cybertron's new surface can be
built atop them. Hmmm.
This is quite a pickle!
Grebo
Orson Christian - Sidecutter
"David Willis" <wii...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:aa_3a.32622$A%3.40...@ord-read.news.verio.net...
> Well, I was about to ask Deathy the same question, but then remembered the
> particulars of the scene he mentions. When Cybertron is brought into
> Earth's orbit, it looks to be much smaller than Earth itself. If Earth is
> indeed Cybertron without all the extra fun layers of metal cities and
> whatnot, shouldn't Cybertron be much much bigger?
I'd just like to point out that, depending on the perspective, the size of
Cybertronian architecture, etc., Cybertron's apparant relative size means
little. It could be quite far away, or quite close. If it was as big as or
larger than Eath, it could indeed be very far away, far enough to seem small
in those shots, and still have the necessary terrible gravitational effects.
Jefferey Mark Bowman
could still be Earth, what if the Autobots came through time instead of just
simple space?
What if the earth COVERED the metal? It would explain Botanica, and the
whole Beast Machines movement.
OR! Earth was rocked by a cataclysm, and the barren husk was terraformed
into Cybertron...
Basically I'm going with the idea that they are one and the same, and
somehow ended up in the same time period, eventhough one form of it is older
than the other.
"Grebo Guru" <ana...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:anafiel-8E056E...@newssvr13-ext.news.prodigy.com...
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The Kurgan
i don't post in here much, i usually lurk, but, i've been following this
theory, and found it to be very interesting
now, bear in mind that i've not actually seen much of beast wars and beast
machines, because whenever it was on the telly here, i was always at work
(they're showing beast machines on saturday mornings, so, i'm having a
chance to catch up)
anyhow, heres my thought, if the old and battered earth was dragged through
time/space/dimension into the past to become cybertron, theres nothing to
say that it wouldn't have, say, become 'compacted' somehow, either by its
molecules compacting somehow, or just because of a side effect of the
process used to drag it through time
but i'm trying to get a grasp of science and quantum physics and all that
crap after 3 hours sleep in one week, but, thats just a thought i
had...........
Gabi T.M. D'Galvatron
(snipped)
I'll admit it -- this is one heck of a theory ! :-)
And no , I won't go into the why *I* think that it's wrong , after all
, it might be right .
However I'll point out that whatever insights this theory has , it has
little to no value in regards to RiD and Armada .
I'm saying this cause the "allmigty" Hasbro -- who have one or two
things to say about TF's , after BM , they decreed that the only
constant that they have in mind for TF's is Optimus/Megatron/Cybertron
.
With such loose parameters , I think that untill/if the new "TF
Universe" books re-cannonise the cannon , there the two standard
preferences :
Either we take each show as is , or we can try to "make sense of it
all" (as you have done).
If we're talking theorys , I for example think that Vector Sigma is a
sentient linear entity , that became aware at one point in time and
from that point on it is in contact with itself through all points of
time in wich he/it exists , thus he/it forsees it's own doom in the
timestream and shapes the behavior of the TF's to alter such disasters
.
M'kay , so it's way too Trekish ... :-p .
-Gabi.
Gabi T.M. D'Galvatron
> I often feel that way myself man! I was sooooo disappointed in Primal's
> behavior in BM. He never even said "That's just prime"! He was a nutcase
> in that show... sad.
I admit that that's the way I felt too , and it took me over two
years to start likeing BM for what it is , instead of what it isn't .
And actually , the Primal / zellot angle is one of the "deeper" more
philosophical and darker side to this show , wich I've come to
apprittiate .
I still cannot make the connection (in my head) betwen BW and MB
caracters like Primal , Megs , Rattrap and perhaps even Rhinox ... ,
allthough at least with Rhinox there is the "Evil Rhinox" ep in BW
wich we can fall back on .
And BM also touches a little on Vehicon (ex-Predacon / Decepticon)
subjects , souch as "we're friends ? " and Obsidian's *consort* Strika
.
Seeing how the Cons treated each other in G1 , or how the Predacons
behaved in BW , this was an interesting insight .
>I wish the show had been different, perhaps even
> never been made. But it was... and therefore, I am annoyingly compelled
> to do something with it.
Wanna explaing how Botanica was able to burrow straight through levels
of metal that were strong enough to hold up a gestalt or even Fort Max
? :-)
-Gabi.
Grebo Guru
On and on and on I go and where I stop not even Vector Sigma knows.
Anyway, in article <caff4fa7.03021...@posting.google.com>,
gabitmdg...@hotmail.com (Gabi T.M. D'Galvatron) wrote:
> I'll admit it -- this is one heck of a theory ! :-)
Thank you very much sir!
> And no , I won't go into the why *I* think that it's wrong , after all
> , it might be right .
Appreciated. I actually think I am wrong in the long run, but I like the
idea. As I said earlier, I also think that "Dead Earth" being colonized
as "New Cybertron" by Romdimus and company after Cybertron was blown up
in Headmasters makes more sense that Cybertron always haveing been
earth. But, I am so enamored of my original idea's circularity that Im
sorta dedicated to it.
> However I'll point out that whatever insights this theory has , it has
> little to no value in regards to RiD and Armada .
Well, officially of course not. I do feel to me that CR/RiD and
Armada/MD could be shoehorned in as time/dimension travels that started
from Cybertron after G2 but before BW... but I digress.
> I'm saying this cause the "almigty" Hasbro -- who have one or two
> things to say about TF's, after BM they decreed that the only
> constant that they have in mind for TF's is Optimus/Megatron/Cybertron.
Sad, but understandable. From Star Wars to Star Trek to Gundam, across
the board the big franchisers have apparently given up any pretense of
continuity, instead simply employing "branding". Figures.
> With such loose parameters , I think that untill/if the new "TF
> Universe" books re-cannonise the cannon , there the two standard
> preferences :
I wouldnt hold your breath for that one...
> Either we take each show as is , or we can try to "make sense of it
> all" (as you have done).
Yes, that is my effort. I cannot stress enough that I dont think Ive
uncovered some kind of canon secret. I DO think I've sussed out
something that wacky guy Skir was working towards, but these days its
kinda a moot point. I just really enjoy Making Sense Of It All.
> If we're talking theorys , I for example think that Vector Sigma is a
> sentient linear entity , that became aware at one point in time and
> from that point on it is in contact with itself through all points of
> time in wich he/it exists , thus he/it forsees it's own doom in the
> timestream and shapes the behavior of the TF's to alter such disasters.
I'll admit it - this is one heck of a theory! (wink!)
Thanks a lot Gabi!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Where was I? Oh yeah. In article
<caff4fa7.0302...@posting.google.com>,
gabitmdg...@hotmail.com (Gabi T.M. D'Galvatron) wrote:
> Grebo Guru <ana...@aol.com> wrote in message :
>
> > I often feel that way myself man! I was sooooo disappointed in Primal's
> > behavior in BM. He never even said "That's just prime"! He was a nutcase
> > in that show... sad.
>
> I admit that that's the way I felt too , and it took me over two
> years to start likeing BM for what it is , instead of what it isn't .
Yes, BM did indeed have much to offer. I mean geez, compared to the
original G1 cartoon its freakin' poetry! Its only looks so shabby
because followed such a superlative show -- Beast Wars.
> And actually , the Primal / zellot angle is one of the "deeper" more
> philosophical and darker side to this show , wich I've come to
> apprittiate .
Yes, it was definitely the darkest TM story every to be animated. Not a
bad thing, that!
> I still cannot make the connection (in my head) betwen BW and MB
> caracters like Primal , Megs , Rattrap and perhaps even Rhinox ... ,
> allthough at least with Rhinox there is the "Evil Rhinox" ep in BW
> wich we can fall back on .
Agreed. It's like the story happened in some kind of mirror universe.
Say... that's an interesting idea right there!
> And BM also touches a little on Vehicon (ex-Predacon / Decepticon)
> subjects , souch as "we're friends ? " and Obsidian's *consort* Strika.
Am I confused, or weren't Obsidian and Strika originall Maximals before
they got Vehicon-ized by Meggy?
> Seeing how the Cons treated each other in G1 , or how the Predacons
> behaved in BW , this was an interesting insight .
Indeed. The whole issue of gender in TF is one I'm reeeeeally afraid to
get too deep into.
> Wanna explaing how Botanica was able to burrow straight through levels
> of metal that were strong enough to hold up a gestalt or even Fort Max
> ? :-)
Ummmm... Botanica's tunneling abilities made use of personal warp gate
technology? Hell I dunno!
Thanks again Gabi!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
I having way too much fun with this thread! In article
<b2teeo$9oa$1...@news6.svr.pol.co.uk>,
"The Kurgan" <kur...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
> i don't post in here much, i usually lurk, but, i've been following this
> theory, and found it to be very interesting
Im very happy you found it interesting to de-lurk and comment, Kurgan!
> now, bear in mind that i've not actually seen much of beast wars and beast
> machines, because whenever it was on the telly here, i was always at work
> (they're showing beast machines on saturday mornings, so, i'm having a
> chance to catch up)
You're in for a treat dude. BM is full of bumps and lumps, but its a
fascinating thing to view.
> anyhow, heres my thought, if the old and battered earth was dragged through
> time/space/dimension into the past to become cybertron, theres nothing to
> say that it wouldn't have, say, become 'compacted' somehow, either by its
> molecules compacting somehow, or just because of a side effect of the
> process used to drag it through time
I like that explanation a lot. Who knows what effects timespace
hijacking has on basic geomorphology? After all, this is verrrry lose
sci-fi here.
> but i'm trying to get a grasp of science and quantum physics and all that
> crap after 3 hours sleep in one week, but, thats just a thought i
> had...........
I love quantum mechanics. That stuff is so strange it may as well be
religion!
Muchas gracias, Kurgan!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
OK! More fun. In article <3e5201fc$1...@corp.newsgroups.com>,
"Jefferey Mark Bowman" <JBow...@zoominternet.net> wrote:
> Someone mentioned earlier that Cybertron was smaller than Earth. Well...it
> could still be Earth, what if the Autobots came through time instead of just
> simple space?
I pretty much depend on that idea for shoehorning in Car Robots and
Armada.
> What if the earth COVERED the metal? It would explain Botanica, and the
> whole Beast Machines movement.
Errrrr... Grebo confused. Jefferey explain?
> OR! Earth was rocked by a cataclysm, and the barren husk was terraformed
> into Cybertron...
Yeah, thats basically what I was saying. I think...
> Basically I'm going with the idea that they are one and the same, and
> somehow ended up in the same time period, eventhough one form of it is older
> than the other.
I'm tickled you like my loony theory enough to go with it yourself!
Watch out for insane computers and hibernation chambers, mister Bowman.
We'd hate to lose ya!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Round and round I go with the Cybertron is Earth theory, I am loving
this! In article <J4n4a.146757$2H6.2873@sccrnsc04>,
"Orson Christian - Sidecutter" <sidec...@insightbb.com> wrote:
> I'd just like to point out that, depending on the perspective, the size of
> Cybertronian architecture, etc., Cybertron's apparant relative size means
> little. It could be quite far away, or quite close. If it was as big as or
> larger than Eath, it could indeed be very far away, far enough to seem small
> in those shots, and still have the necessary terrible gravitational effects.
Another good point Sidecutter. Much appreciated!
By this point, the relative size differences of Earth and Cybertron seem
to have been negated as a problem. Between the vagueries of perspective,
the open-endedness of the effects of timespace hijacking, and the
notorious sloppiness of G1 cartoon animation, I think this fish has been
suitably fried.
Anyone else have any thoughts on what I consider the biggest problem?
That is, the destruction of Cybertron in Headmasters? Keep in mind I am
shooting to include all continuities - Cartoon, comics, UK comics, Beast
Wars, BM, Armada, CR/RiD, and Japanese BW2 & Neo - with as little
"faking" as possible. Some is utterly necessary of course. MY favorite
explanation remains a sort of "fusing" of Headmasters episodes 11 and 12
(Cybertron is in Grave Danger) and The Rebirth. But I'm 100% open to
other suggestions...
Thanks all!
Grebo
Jefferey Mark Bowman
> Hey all,
>
> OK! More fun. In article <3e5201fc$1...@corp.newsgroups.com>,
> "Jefferey Mark Bowman" <JBow...@zoominternet.net> wrote:
>
> > Someone mentioned earlier that Cybertron was smaller than Earth.
Well...it
> > could still be Earth, what if the Autobots came through time instead of
just
> > simple space?
>
> I pretty much depend on that idea for shoehorning in Car Robots and
> Armada.
>
> > What if the earth COVERED the metal? It would explain Botanica, and the
> > whole Beast Machines movement.
>
> Errrrr... Grebo confused. Jefferey explain?
Well...what if Cybertron was there originally, and pieces of Earth, and rock
slowly formed over the surface due to comet impacts, meteors...and so
on...and Botanica is the first and only surviving link between the two forms
of the planet.
>
> > OR! Earth was rocked by a cataclysm, and the barren husk was terraformed
> > into Cybertron...
>
> Yeah, thats basically what I was saying. I think...
>
> > Basically I'm going with the idea that they are one and the same, and
> > somehow ended up in the same time period, eventhough one form of it is
older
> > than the other.
>
> I'm tickled you like my loony theory enough to go with it yourself!
>
> Watch out for insane computers and hibernation chambers, mister Bowman.
> We'd hate to lose ya!
>
> Grebo
Mark Brown
> Where was I? Oh yeah. In article
> <caff4fa7.0302...@posting.google.com>,
> gabitmdg...@hotmail.com (Gabi T.M. D'Galvatron) wrote:
> > Grebo Guru <ana...@aol.com> wrote in message :
> > And BM also touches a little on Vehicon (ex-Predacon / Decepticon)
> > subjects , souch as "we're friends ? " and Obsidian's *consort* Strika.
> Am I confused, or weren't Obsidian and Strika originall Maximals before
> they got Vehicon-ized by Meggy?
They almost would've had to be. Though they might've been something
different before the Great Upgrade (most people assume Decepticons, but I'm
sticking to my "two houses" theory).
*SNIP*
> Indeed. The whole issue of gender in TF is one I'm reeeeeally afraid to
> get too deep into.
Meh. The toon continuity explains it well enough; the Quintessons created
"male" and "female" units for variety, and to appeal to different markets.
> > Wanna explaing how Botanica was able to burrow straight through levels
> > of metal that were strong enough to hold up a gestalt or even Fort Max
> > ? :-)
> Ummmm... Botanica's tunneling abilities made use of personal warp gate
> technology? Hell I dunno!
Or maybe she had "roots" that were small enough to serve as monofilaments
(thin enough to slice through the dense metal of the architecture, but too
short to be effective as weapons in anything less than a grapple). Her
spinning would let the m-filaments shred the metal structures into filings,
and then just shift the resulting rubble around her out of her way.
Mark
"A helpful survival trait on a metal world."
William Rendfeld
>> things to say about TF's, after BM they decreed that the only
>> constant that they have in mind for TF's is Optimus/Megatron/Cybertron.
>
>Sad, but understandable. From Star Wars to Star Trek to Gundam, across
>the board the big franchisers have apparently given up any pretense of
>continuity, instead simply employing "branding". Figures.
>
I don't know. With Gundam we still have the Turn-A Theory (Thank you, Tomino!).
Perhaps some ways down the line we'll have a 'Transform'-A Theory (Pardon the
pun).
Just some minor hope of mine.
William Rendfeld
Creator of Echowarrior, the Pokémon Resistance, and Alex Masters
178,000 Excellent Author Points
1 'I knew odd pokefacts that confused a bread crumb' point.
20 Y2Tech Points
Jackpot
>
> Am I confused, or weren't Obsidian and Strika originall Maximals
> before they got Vehicon-ized by Meggy?
No allegiance was ever mentioned. Their purpose in life was to "defend
Cybertron," but that could apply to either faction. Some folks have
noted Obsidian's admiration of Optimus Prime as evidence of Autobotness,
but that could just as easily be respect for a worthy adversary. Also
notable is the fact that one of the Maxies (Primal?) claimed that Obs
and Strika had never lost a battle. Since the Autobots won the Great
War, that means that a) the two were Autobots, b) they were Decepticons
who went down without a fight (perhaps surrendering with the rest of
their faction before they personally had had a chance to do battle), or
c) the statement is an exaggeration.
So you can see that there's plenty of ambiguity and certainly no clear
answer. I'm personally tempted to think of them as 'Cons/Preds, since
the general vibe of their personalities seems to lean that way. Also
because the show was too often silent about the fact that both Maxies
AND Preds had been victims to Megatron, so the notion of them originally
being baddies adds a little balance to the mix.
Oh yeah, and also because their decision to stick with Megs
post-"Sparkwar," rather than hooking up with Primal's Maxies, doesn't
seem like something a Maxie would do. On the other hand, Megs has
certainly screwed with other characters' heads before, so this really
isn't good evidence of ANYTHING pre-BMach. But it still pushes my
thoughts about them in the 'Con direction.
- Jackpot
--
| To contact me, please e-mail aquamandible [at] yahoo [dot] com.
|
| _ _ ______ http://spektakle.com ______ _ _
"The `k's are for the kwality!"
Jackpot
>
> See, if Primus and Unicron are both gods, its conceivable that the
> same type of world would be suitable for "hosting" them. If Primus
> "inhabits" Earth-2, its conceivable that Unicron would be trapped in
> Earth-1.
>
> 4 - Unicron's dark essence sits in Earth, stuck, for eons. That's why
> its there when Shokaract comes back in Omega Point. Eventually,
> Unicron either frees himself and forms his robo-planet body from other
> material -OR- Primacron uses his essence as the "AI" or "Lifeforce"
> for the experimental robo-planet he's made.
I can see that you have no problem changing bits of continuity (which is
really a necessity if you're trying to combine EVERYTHING), so it's
probably a moot point to mention, but... Unicron's Dark Essence on
Earth came from his destruction in 2005. As his body was exploding, he
threw his own metaphysical self back through time and space and ended up
on prehistoric Earth. Of course, it's still a chin-scratching
coincidence that he happened to end up on a planet that would be so
important in TF history. But the fact remains, if you abide by the
whole "Omega Point" story, then his Earth-bound Dark Essence wasn't the
result of his original battle with Primus.
Interesting hypothesizing, though. And your suggestion that Skir may
have been intending to reveal Cybertron's Terran past isn't *too* far-
fetched, especially considering Primal's first vision of an Earthlike
world being cyberformed.
Mark Brown
news:Xns93277E1A...@216.174.194.50...
> Grebo Guru wrote:
> > Am I confused, or weren't Obsidian and Strika originall Maximals
> > before they got Vehicon-ized by Meggy?
> No allegiance was ever mentioned. Their purpose in life was to "defend
> Cybertron," but that could apply to either faction. Some folks have
> noted Obsidian's admiration of Optimus Prime as evidence of Autobotness,
> but that could just as easily be respect for a worthy adversary. Also
> notable is the fact that one of the Maxies (Primal?) claimed that Obs
> and Strika had never lost a battle. Since the Autobots won the Great
> War, that means that a) the two were Autobots, b) they were Decepticons
> who went down without a fight (perhaps surrendering with the rest of
> their faction before they personally had had a chance to do battle), or
> c) the statement is an exaggeration.
Or (D) ~they~ were winners, but the Great War was lost out from under them
by an incompetent leader, and they were left with no choice ~but~ to
surrender.
There's a ~reason~ G1 Megatron only seemed to have "morons on [his] team."
*SNIP*
> Oh yeah, and also because their decision to stick with Megs
> post-"Sparkwar," rather than hooking up with Primal's Maxies, doesn't
> seem like something a Maxie would do.
*SNIP*
Hmm. Side with the Maximals and get turned into beast-bots, or hang on to
your superior technological natures by sticking with Megatron. ;)
Mark
"I'd imagine a lot of old G1 'bots would've found themselves on Megs' side
in that one."
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> Since the
>> Autobots won the Great War, that means that a) the two were Autobots,
>> b) they were Decepticons who went down without a fight (perhaps
>> surrendering with the rest of their faction before they personally
>> had had a chance to do battle), or c) the statement is an
>> exaggeration.
>
> Or (D) ~they~ were winners, but the Great War was lost out from under
> them by an incompetent leader, and they were left with no choice ~but~
> to surrender.
Well, that's basically what I meant. Whether or not there was a battle
immediately preceding their surrender, the fact is, they would've had to
have stopped fighting and turned themselves over willingly in order to
have still "never lost a battle."
>> Oh yeah, and also because their decision to stick with Megs
>> post-"Sparkwar," rather than hooking up with Primal's Maxies, doesn't
>> seem like something a Maxie would do.
>
> Hmm. Side with the Maximals and get turned into beast-bots, or hang on
> to your superior technological natures by sticking with Megatron. ;)
>
> Mark
> "I'd imagine a lot of old G1 'bots would've found themselves on Megs'
> side in that one."
Somehow the idea of having your soul absorbed by Megatron would strike
me as being anathema to the Autobot/Maximal nature. Not that it's
necessarily part of the 'Con/Pred nature either, but the cartoon 'Cons
always struck me as being more rigidly divided between The Leader and
The Followers. (The best example of this is how they decayed between
TF:TM and FFoD, wasting away until SOMEBODY finally took charge - first
the Quints, then Galvy.)
- Jackpot (And it's a sad state of affairs when GALVATRON, of all
'bots, is your guiding star.)
Grebo Guru
Benn quiet about this thread for a while, but I'm still chewing on it.
And so have some others, such as my man Jackpot, who wrote in article
<Xns9327807D...@216.174.194.50>:
> I can see that you have no problem changing bits of continuity (which is
> really a necessity if you're trying to combine EVERYTHING),
Yeah, pretty much. I'd really love to integrate everything without
changing any continuity points at all. BUT, considering that the G1
cartoon regularly contradicted itself, I dont feel too bad about
tweaking things here and there...
> so it's probably a moot point to mention, but... Unicron's Dark Essence on
> Earth came from his destruction in 2005. As his body was exploding, he
> threw his own metaphysical self back through time and space and ended up
> on prehistoric Earth. Of course, it's still a chin-scratching
> coincidence that he happened to end up on a planet that would be so
> important in TF history.
AND that it happened to manifest on Earth at the time when the Beast
Wars was occurring - that's a pretty darn narrow window of time, right
there!
> But the fact remains, if you abide by the whole "Omega Point" story,
> then his Earth-bound Dark Essence wasn't the result of his
> original battle with Primus.
Hmmmm. True, true. I suppose the story could be tweaked less... saying
that the reason Unicron's Dark Essence hurtled back through time to
Earth (as opposed to any other destination) is that Earth is one of two
planets suitable for God-hosting (the other being old, dead Earth, aka
Gaia, aka Cybertron) and it having been his home/prison way back when
before his essence was removed to be installed in the Unicron body.
> Interesting hypothesizing, though.
Thank you!
> And your suggestion that Skir may
> have been intending to reveal Cybertron's Terran past isn't *too* far-
> fetched, especially considering Primal's first vision of an Earthlike
> world being cyberformed.
Thanks again. I'm convinced that's what he was thinking... And, like I
said, I think its more likely for BW Cybertron to be Earth cyberformed
after the destruction of the original Cybertron in Headmasters than it
is for Cybertron to have always been Earth... but I like the latter idea
better.
Besides, if BW Cybertron is not the same planet as G1 Cybertron, it
becomes pretty hard to explain the presence of the Plasma Energy
Chamber, the Key to Vector Sigma, and Vector Sigma itself (in BW Neo).
Plus, if BW Cybertron is dead Earth cyberformed after the destruction of
the original Cybertron in Headmasters, then Gaia (from BWII) becomes
really really inexplicable.
Hoo boy. This is a lot to chew on. Fun though!
Grebo
Ethan Hammond
> Thanks again. I'm convinced that's what he was thinking... And, like I
> said, I think its more likely for BW Cybertron to be Earth cyberformed
> after the destruction of the original Cybertron in Headmasters than it
> is for Cybertron to have always been Earth... but I like the latter idea
> better.
How about when that time ripple happened at the end of Beast Wars
Season 2 it caused a rift so that Cybertron was not actually
destroyed in HM. ^_-
--
All Purpose Cultural Randomness
http://www.angelfire.com/tx/apcr/index.html
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> Of course, it's still a
>> chin-scratching coincidence that he happened to end up on a planet
>> that would be so important in TF history.
>
> AND that it happened to manifest on Earth at the time when the Beast
> Wars was occurring - that's a pretty darn narrow window of time, right
> there!
Well, we don't know how long the Dark Essence had actually BEEN on Earth
before the time of the Beast Wars. Uni may have been sleeping there for
millions of years before the Beasties showed up.
> Besides, if BW Cybertron is not the same planet as G1 Cybertron, it
> becomes pretty hard to explain the presence of the Plasma Energy
> Chamber, the Key to Vector Sigma, and Vector Sigma itself (in BW Neo).
Unless VS just survived the destruction of the original (and a new PEC
were built). "Before Cybertron was, I was." VS is probably one tough
cookie.
Grebo
Endless ruminations upon the origins and fate of Cybertron, ah what
fun! Apparently Ethan Hammond agrees:
> How about when that time ripple happened at the end of Beast Wars
> Season 2 it caused a rift so that Cybertron was not actually
> destroyed in HM. ^_-
You know, that's not such a bad idea...!
Grebo
Ethan Hammond <esha...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<3E6101...@worldnet.att.net>...
Grebo
Cybertron... Gaia... Earth... Is it all one big stew? A cosmic melting
pot (or smelting pool)? My man Jackpot says:
> Well, we don't know how long the Dark Essence had actually BEEN on Earth
> before the time of the Beast Wars. Uni may have been sleeping there for
> millions of years before the Beasties showed up.
Another good point. Hmmmmm. That solves that little problem right
there.
> > Besides, if BW Cybertron is not the same planet as G1 Cybertron, it
> > becomes pretty hard to explain the presence of the Plasma Energy
> > Chamber, the Key to Vector Sigma, and Vector Sigma itself (in BW Neo).
>
> Unless VS just survived the destruction of the original (and a new PEC
> were built). "Before Cybertron was, I was." VS is probably one tough
> cookie.
Hey... HEY... that's a very good point! "Before Cybertron was, I
was"... Damn, you got a real point there! Even though Megazarak
planted the bombs ON Vector Sigma, as you said, he's probably one
tough cookie. Hm! Very fascinating indeed...
I think I'm leaning more and more towards the likelihood that BW
Cybertron is the dead future Earth cyberformed after original
Cybertron's destruction by Megazarak.
Interesting...
Grebo
Ethan Hammond
>
> Hey all,
>
> Endless ruminations upon the origins and fate of Cybertron, ah what
> fun! Apparently Ethan Hammond agrees:
>
> > How about when that time ripple happened at the end of Beast Wars
> > Season 2 it caused a rift so that Cybertron was not actually
> > destroyed in HM. ^_-
>
> You know, that's not such a bad idea...!
Its true, when in doubt retcon!!!!
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> Well, we don't know how long the Dark Essence had actually BEEN on
>> Earth before the time of the Beast Wars. Uni may have been sleeping
>> there for millions of years before the Beasties showed up.
>
> Another good point. Hmmmmm. That solves that little problem right
> there.
Though, if you have a mind for unsolved TF mysteries, "Omega Point" DOES
present one: What was Shokaract so afraid of that he sent minions back
in time, starting a chain of events that ended up erasing himself from
existence?
I'll explain what I mean, but before I get started, I should warn you
that this train of thought exploded into a very long mental masturbation
session just now. This post is much longer than it has any right to be,
but, well, tough. Also, for reference, it's a good idea to check out my
Big-Ass Treatise on BotContinuity. The Google IDs are:
Part 1: 3CA3C1BB...@hotmail.com
(Summary of the BotCon stories)
Part 2: 3CA3C203...@hotmail.com
(Analysis thereof)
Anyway. So Shokaract, in a distant future beyond the BMach era, sends
Heralds back to the Beast Wars to find a "dimensional key" that is
somehow a grave threat. It's odd that anything in the past could be a
threat to him, since, well, it's the past. If it was going to do
anything to him back then, it would've already done it. Y'know, being
in the past and all.
But anyhow. He sends his Heralds back, but they screw up, and as more
and more 'bots start getting involved, he decides to go back himself.
Unfortunately for him, though, even that's not enough, as Megatron
attacks the Dark Essence, uprooting it from the past. (Presumably, Uni
is pulled back to 2005, from whence he had come. Where he may well be
awaiting destruction in the Matrix's power.)
With the Dark Essence now gone from the Earth, it's no longer there for
the Hunter to merge with in the future, and thus Shokaract - and most of
the "Omega Point" storyline - cease to exist.
Originally, as I described in my Big-Ass Treatise, I had a problem with
this, since it creates a causality loop. That is to say: If all of the
BW-era "Omega Point" stuff wiped itself out.... then wouldn't that reset
everything to the way it was before, leaving the Dark Essence untouched?
So the Hunter, then, WOULD be able to become Shokaract, and the whole
thing would repeat?
But I could dismiss this as just bad plotting. It's not like the BW
show time-travel wasn't a pit of nonsensical contradiction too. It IS
possible to write good, consistent time-travel... but it doesn't lend
itself to drama as well as just ignoring all your own rules for the sake
of a plot twist or retcon.
However, maybe the BC temporal wackiness CAN work... if we take another
look at Shokaract's goals. He sent Antagony back to find a "dimensional
key." He sent Cataclysm back to check up on her and the Dark Essence.
It's not a far leap to assume, then, that the dimensional key posed some
danger to the Dark Essence. What WAS this "key"? We don't really know
for sure, but when Antagony showed up, she homed in on a Predacon
"artifact" that Apelinq was also going for (and which he succeeded in
grabbing). Going by his Journals, this could've been one of two things:
1) the canister of anti-virus he'd brought back from his home time of
BMach, or 2) the "transfer interlink" that he could use to open
transwarp portals or create objects (such as his weapons and CatSCAN).
It seems a LITTLE more likely that the canister would've had a Pred
homing beacon on it than his transfer interlink, but the latter
certainly sounds more like a "dimensional key." And, who knows, maybe
he'd stolen the thing from the Preds.
Now, it's entirely possible that the dimensional key was something else
completely, something we never saw, and Antagony was just mistaken in
going after Apelinq's stuff. Maybe there was yet another time-traveler,
this one from Shokaract's own era, running around prehistoric Earth
trying to find the Dark Essence and destroy it. For dramatic effect,
usually characters have at least a little bit of leeway to pursue a
time-traveler from their own time. Like, "Oh no, he just went back to
the 1700s and is going to assassinate George Washington! We've got to
stop him!" So maybe Shokky was chasing after some unmentioned, unseen
temporal vigilante that had just left right before the Shokaract-era
"Omega Point" events.
But I don't like that idea. I prefer not to insert entirely new
elements (like characters) into a story to explain things. I'd rather
work with what we're given.
So what do we have? We have the Beast Warriors and Apelinq. Could
Shokaract have felt threatened by the Beast Wars in general? One thing
that nixes that idea right off the bat is that BW-as-we-know-it seemed
to already be a part of Shokky's history. When Windrazor arrived from
Shokky's time, he immediately recognized Megatron's dragon form.
Moreover, Shokky himself spared Megatron later because he considered
Megs important to his own existence.
So, it seems, nothing we saw on the BW show is the threat that Shokky
was so worried about (up until the end of "Master Blaster," anyhow). So
what other loose elements exist... besides Apelinq? So what's up with
him, anyway?
Could he be a "temporal vigilante" that Shokky was pursuing? The only
problem with this idea is that 'Linq came from around the beginning of
BMach season 1. Shokky's future HAS to be after that point, since
Megatron's dragon form wouldn't have been known to anyone until after he
returned to the BMach era. In fact, Shokky's era has to be LONG after
that point, since Shokky still has to rise to power and conquer a
significant portion of the galaxy. So... sure, like I said, I can give
a little leeway for someone to have the opportunity to chase after a
time-traveler who just jumped into the past. Maybe a few hours, days at
the most... but the years, if not CENTURIES, that it would take for
Shokaract to become a mighty galactic emperor? Sorry, but whatever
damage 'Linq was going to do... really should've caught up with Shokky
by then.
So basically, Shokky should've just been sittin' pretty in his
far-distant future. There was no reason at all for him to muck around
with ancient Earth. Unless.... what if the threat wasn't actually from
HIS point of view at all? What if we look at it from the perspective of
Unicron's disembodied self on prehistoric Earth?
Let's start with the premise that Uni can see and interact with
"possible futures," as Furman wrote it in the US G1 comics. So Uni has
thrown himself - his Dark Essence - back in time to avoid his
destruction in 2005, and he's sitting in a cave on Earth for millions of
years with nothing else to do but look around at his possible futures.
Let's say that most of his possibilities point to him being found
eventually by the Hunter, who he turns into Shokaract, and everything's
golden. So Uni is content to wait.
But he knows that, among the fringe possibilities, there's this fellow
named Apelinq in the BMach era who just might get accidentally thrown
back into the upcoming Beast Wars. And let's assume that 'Linq could
use the transfer interlink to force Uni back to 2005.
But, like I said, it's just a fringe possibility. With the
nigh-infinite branches of probability in the universe, Uni can't worry
about every remote chance. So he sits tight... until the unthinkable
happens. Suddenly Apelinq appears on prehistoric Earth. After all,
even though it was a very remote possibility, it was still A
possibility. And now Uni finds himself in sudden danger. Not
*guaranteed* danger - 'Linq might not find the cave, after all. He's
not even LOOKING for it, and he has no idea that the Dark Essence is
even there. But 'Linq, ever the explorer, is going to be snooping and
observing the Beast Wars for a while, and maybe the spot he landed in
makes it extremely likely that he WILL find the cave eventually.
At any rate, Uni is worried. He's suddenly seen all of his potential
futures shift as an unlikely event happened, so now the Shokaract
futures are in the minority. However, he can't just reach through time
and pull a Galvatron out or something; as a disembodied essence, he
can't really do much at all. But what he CAN do... is send a message to
a future self. Reaching out into one of the few remaining Shokaract
futures, he gives a command to that Shokky via the Dark Essence he
carries: Send time-travelers back to secure or destroy the transfer
interlink in the BW era.
Uni succeeds in delivering the order, but Shokky's best efforts fail
anyway. While Apelinq doesn't, in fact, end up using the transfer
interlink on Unicron... Megatron just blasts him with fiery halitosis,
to the same effect. Bye-bye Uni, bye-bye Shokaract.
But what about the causality loop? Well, let's follow the chain of
events. No Shokaract means no one for Uni to call for help, at least in
that timeline. Perhaps Uni would then simply use a different Shokky
future. It may well be that the "Omega Point" story we saw was just one
of a thousand permutations that Uni went through, but each one ended up
with Shokky's defeat, until finally Uni just ran out of victorious
possible futures. In which case, there was simply nothing to do but
wait for the inevitable end.
Now, this does present strange questions about the nature of temporal
physics. It's easy to talk about "possible futures" from the present
POV, but Shokky's future was pretty damn real from its own perspective -
nothing "possible" about it. So what would've happened if Shokky had
refused? What if he'd said - quite rightly, I would think - that his
own history benefitted him, and there's no reason to go fooling with it?
If the unaided BW-era Uni found himself uprooted by Apelinq, what would
happen to that uncooperative Shokky? By one model, the answer is:
nothing. His timeline would continue on as it ever had. His Dark
Essence would've avoided the danger of 'Linq, while some other
timelines' Dark Essences would've been defeated. But the problem with
this model is that it doesn't allow for the self-cancelling causality
loop. (Which isn't really a "problem," since it makes for less
complicated stories, but we're not dealing with a less complicated
story here.) By this model, if you travel back in time, you create a
whole new cluster of possible futures, but your own past - the one where
no time-traveler ever appeared - is still preserved.
The only other option, as I see it, is that "possible futures" are both
real and very much in danger of obliteration, since as time marches on,
all those possibilities keep getting reduced to one actual outcome.
This is quite bizarre, since it necessitates the idea of one "real now"
that cements history, and then an infinite number of "fake nows" in the
future that people are somehow living in. Hell, WE could be living in
one of those "fake nows," just waiting for some event in the past to
change when the "real now" catches up to it, destroying us in a
heartbeat.
On the other hand, just to make it a LITTLE more palatable, maybe this
is tied to Unicron's temporal powers, specifically. Maybe "possible
futures" don't manifest themselves independently unless he MAKES them do
so. So when he scans possibilities, he's really just *scanning
possibilities,* until he finds one that he wants to actually grab
something from. THAT one, then, he causes to solidify into the future.
And then it very much IS in danger of destruction if its history doesn't
come to be.
That bastard, Unicron.
(By the way, none of this really applies to the US comic Unicron. He
pulled Galvatron out of a future that, it seems, can now never exist.
Yet, despite that fact, Galvy was not erased from the present day. So
that temporal setup is nice and clean and safe from all this insanity.)
Anyway. I don't know if that helps your thoughts on Unicron and
Cybertron and whatnot, but... well, you've read it now, so it's in your
brain cells forever. Ha, ha, ha.
>> Unless VS just survived the destruction of the original (and a new
>> PEC were built). "Before Cybertron was, I was." VS is probably one
>> tough cookie.
>
> Hey... HEY... that's a very good point! "Before Cybertron was, I
> was"... Damn, you got a real point there! Even though Megazarak
> planted the bombs ON Vector Sigma, as you said, he's probably one
> tough cookie.
Heh. What THAT how Megazarak did it? That'll teach me to spout off
about an episode I've never seen.
Well, if we run with the idea that VS survived anyway, then that must
mean it's damn well near indestructible. Given its mystical properties,
though, I guess that's conceivable.
Derik Smith
Let's begin by defining what the transfer interlink is then;
http://www.tsarchive.net/tsarchive/america/botcon/Apelinq.jpg
It can 'download' digital objects into reality. Cool, he's like an early
90's Mavel cyber-villain!
Apelinq's journals indicate that he was able to create the cure by mapping
the energy patterns of Rodimus' spark. What you want to bet he used the
transfer interlink to do that?
Journal entry 15 indicates that the interlink beoke free of his frame when
he crashed on earth;
http://botcon.com/story/2001/journal15.html
…yet the subsequent entry has him, apparently right after the Botcon 98
encounter, saying that he retrieved the anti-virus AND the interlink. I think
they're one in the same; the interlink is his means of creating the anti-virus,
and his means of opening the transwarp gateway home.
Oh, narration in the Botcon 200 comic explicitly calls the spindle the
artifact. Well, there you go.
Perforce, the interlink must then also be the 'dimensional key,' and the
Predacon artifact Antagony searches for.
Here's a whimsicly-named picture of Linq retrieving it;
http://botcon.com/story/2000/donnybrook.jpg
Before Linq retrieves it, Onyx Primal has a chance to examine it, and
claims it's clearly of Pred design (he would know,) but also that it's
'futuristic.'
This runs into a problem with the Furman/Hallit timeline. In Furman's
Botcon timeline, Beast Machines takes place many, MANY years after the Axalon's
departure- basically they returned later than they intended. (Perhaps they
overshot because they jettisoned some weight.)
In Halit's timeline, BM appears to take place 4 years after the Axalon
departure.
Guess which version I favor for this discussion, given that Shokaract's
origin requires the longer timeline?
So, the device can be 'futuristic' from BM-era, and not necessarily from
further in the future. You seemed uncertain of what era Shokaract was from by
the by- he was from the 32nd century. (Mentioned in the Botcon 2000 comic,
everyone go buy a copy.)
Now we get into the ephemerals of just WHAT the damn transfer interlink
is. A 'dimensional key,' that seems easy enough, it shifts stuff from VR to
the real world, I can call that a fitting description.
But the VR is curious because beast machines had a virtual object- the key
to Vector Sigma, that had a pragmatic physical reality once downloaded into the
real world. Just pointing it out.
Apelinq's specialty was xenosciences, alien technology. Yet Onyx believes
this is a Pred artifact. (No reason it can't be an alien artifact belonging to
the Preds I suppose.)
*researches*
Cataclysm indicates that transwarp portal technology itself is alien,
adapted by Cybertronians, but not developed by them…
Antagony knew her destination was Ancient Earth…
Do you have the Botcon 2000 comic? The version of herald on the website
is SEVERELY truncated, the full version is included with the comic.
Quoting;
SHE WAS A HERALD OF SHOKARACT, HIS CHOSEN EMISSARY, AND AS SUCH SHE HAD
JOURNEYED BACK IN TIME, HER MISSION TO LOCATE AN ARTIFACT, A KEY CAPABLE OF
BREACHING - OR INDEED SEALING - THE DIMENSIONAL WALL. SHOKARACT HAD SPOKEN OF
A GREAT UNREAVELING, A DISRUPTION TO THE TIMELINE THAT HAD TO BE RIGHTED.
Oh good, Megatron talks to himself later in the comic, filling in what's
going on. There is a temporal rift around the dark essence, from where it fled
in time. That rift has been exacerbated by Megatron's own timestorm, and grows
unstable.
…this is the great unraveling Shokaract seeks to prevent. The
unraveling of his own timeline. However it appears even more serious than
that. To prevent the unraveling, Shokaract first sends troops back to the
Beast Wars, then comes himself, engaging the Maximals and Predacons in a battle
they, frankly, cannot win. This is a problem because The Hunter, who will
BECOME Shokaract, found the Dark Essence while on a mission for Megatron in
BM-era. Thus the very desperate actions Shokaract takes to preserve his
timeline throw an ENORMOUS spanner in the works, making it hugely unlikely that
Beast Machines will occur as it's supposed to. This, paradox, in addition to
the timestorms and all the othert time-travel, including people from 3
different eras, in a battle outside Mt. Saint Hillary (I believe) is just…
too damn much for the timestream to sort out. Time and reality begins to run
like snot and collapse, and alternate Beast Warriors appear as timelines
collapse in on themselves. This is the Omega Point.
Shokaract seeks to prevent this. Leonicus saw the time-walker, the
Chronarchitect, shredding in response to this.
So what is Shokaract out to do?
SHE HAD JOURNEYED BACK IN TIME, HER MISSION TO LOCATE AN ARTIFACT, A KEY
CAPABLE OF BREACHING - OR INDEED SEALING - THE DIMENSIONAL WALL.
In context of Furman's omega point work, this clearly means the dimension
of Time. (it's consistent in language to a bunch of other references to time
travel.)
Antagony wants to take the transfer interlink and SEAL the temporal vortex
around the dark essence in the past, trapping it there and assuring it will
still be there when the Hunter comes to meet it.
I now believe that the Transfer interlink is indeed an artifact of
Shokaract's timeline, futuristic Predacon technology, or at least alien
technology adapted by the Predacons of the 32nd century, to seal that time
rift.
…so why did Apelinq have it in the year 2321?
This finally fills in one of the great missing things for me in Omega
Point. I could never figure out WHY Cataclysm hated time-travel so much.
Obviously he'd have a previous experience with it that went poorly- but there's
no real indication that Shokaract's empire did a lot of time-traveling, indeed
cataclysm regards the transwarp portal that's going to be used to send him back
as dangerously untried technology.
I think Cataclysm fucked up. He fucked up, and he lost the transfer
interlink in the past, it falling into Apelinq's hands. (I'm a bit wry of this
idea, because Apelinq then happened to arrive in the Beast Wars, the era when
the interlink was most needed, by a separate contrivance, and I don't' trust me
reasoning there.)
But I do think Cataclysm's past bad experience with time travel is related
here. And I think that this answers some of the why's around what Shokaract
was doing, he was going to seal the rift created when the essence fled 2005.
The fundamental nature of the transfer interlink itself is unknown.
Shokaract intended to use only one aspect of it's varied powers. Myself I
think that if the interlink is any previously established piece of TF lore,
it's either somehow tied to the key to Vector Sigma, or the Zodiac Component.
-Derik
"You have zero talent. Give up writing." -Yuki Eiri, Gravitation
"How does this thing stand up?" -Chris Funaro, on Dana Mitchell
I probably don't care what you think.
Jackpot
>
> In Furman's
> Botcon timeline, Beast Machines takes place many, MANY years after the
> Axalon's departure- basically they returned later than they intended.
Why do you say that?
> You seemed uncertain of what era Shokaract was
> from by the by- he was from the 32nd century. (Mentioned in the
> Botcon 2000 comic, everyone go buy a copy.)
Was it? I've heard that number mentioned before, but I was never sure
where it came from.
...I was going to say that it didn't really matter, since we don't know
when BW was set, but since "Wreckers" #1 puts the end of the Great War
around the time that Daniel was a young man, we can then use
Blackarachnia's "300 years" (assuming she meant Earth-years) to place the
BW-future in the 24th century. And there certainly aren't any signs that
BMach took place much later than that - a few years, maybe, but not
centuries. Which means that Shokky had no reason at all to think of
Apelinq's time-jump as a threat to himself, considering that the time-jump
had happened 800 years previous. If Apelinq's actions in the past hadn't
caught up to Shokky by then, I don't think they ever would.
(Unless, as I mentioned in the other post, Shokky wasn't living in the
"true now," but rather was somehow in the objective future and was put at
risk by anything happening in the "true now" of prehistoric Earth.)
> But the VR is curious because beast machines had a virtual object- the
> key to Vector Sigma, that had a pragmatic physical reality once
> downloaded into the real world. Just pointing it out.
Interesting. I never thought of that connection. That certainly makes
Apelinq's amazing gadget more palatable within the TF world.
> Do you have the Botcon 2000 comic?
Yes.
> Oh good, Megatron talks to himself later in the comic, filling in what's
> going on. There is a temporal rift around the dark essence, from
> where it fled in time. That rift has been exacerbated by Megatron's
> own timestorm, and grows unstable. ...this is the great unraveling
> Shokaract seeks to prevent.
Hm. That certainly helps explain how the Transfer Interlink could be used
against Unicron.
(Just for the record, I don't think the timestorm alone would've been
enough to eventually undo Uni's hold on prehistoric Earth. I'll explain
why in a moment.)
> I think Cataclysm fucked up. He fucked up, and he lost the transfer
> interlink in the past, it falling into Apelinq's hands. (I'm a bit
> wry of this idea, because Apelinq then happened to arrive in the Beast
> Wars, the era when the interlink was most needed, by a separate
> contrivance, and I don't' trust me reasoning there.)
I agree that it would be a monumental coincidence - but only if it were
necessary for Antagony to use it to CEMENT the Dark Essence, not just
remove the threat. (In fact, the idea of Cataclysm having lost the device
in the BMach era is an entirely separate coincidence.)
So, in order to avoid the coincidence, we have to assume that the
timestorm alone was no real threat. It only helped open the door to the
real threat - the Transfer Interlink. Sure, if Antagony had gotten it,
she might've used it to "seal the dimensional wall," just for good
measure. But, for the sake of internal story logic, we should regard that
as an unnecessary action.
To sum up: There's no coincidence involved if Shokky sends troops to just
take out a threat on prehistoric Earth. There IS coincidence involved if
the device Shokky needs to fix the timestorm damage on prehistoric Earth
just so happens to ALSO be on prehistoric Earth for no related reason.
> But I do think Cataclysm's past bad experience with time travel is
> related here.
Maybe. On the other hand, he may have had no bad experiences at all, but
rather was just rightfully wary of dangerous technology (a fear he proved
justified with his own death).
By the way, I just rewatched "Unbreakable," and for some reason, my mind
read your post in Samuel L. Jackson's voice. Something about the writing
style - and maybe the subject matter too - seemed to fit with his delivery
in that flick.
- Jackpot (who, as a matter of fact, HAS been sick and injured in his
life, thank you very much. You can move along now.)
Derik Smith
>Derik Smith wrote:
>>
>> In Furman's
>> Botcon timeline, Beast Machines takes place many, MANY years after the
>> Axalon's departure- basically they returned later than they intended.
>
>Why do you say that?
Reaching the Omega Point part 3: Paradox
____________
As the gloom fell around him like a shroud, he wondered again how it had all
gone so badly wrong, how the Hunter had become the hunted? During the many
years since Megatron gained dominion of Cybertron he had grown accustomed to
being the giver rather than receiver, routinely running lone Maximals to ground
and summarily executing them. But, perhaps inevitably, complacency had set in,
and recently there had been a noticeable shift in the balance of power, a more
concerted, organized fightback. The Hunter had found himself targeted,
isolated, cut off from support, and forced to ditch here, on this backwater
world. Now he could only hope to live to fight another day. Whatever happened,
his future looked bleak.
____________
This is the Hunter being run to ground and encountering the Dark Essence
for the first time.
The epilogue to the Botcon 2000 comic shows these exact same events taking
place after the timeloop closes, only he finds the cave empty. Ergo, the
backstory given here should still be valid for the BM timeline. Megatron rose
to power many years ago, he employed individual Predacons like the Hunter to
hunt down remaining Maximals. (Possibly to lead his drone army? Who knows.)
Begs the question of why the Hunter was off world to be run to ground
here. Was BM Megs expanding his sphere of influence? (Tank drone WERE
transferring supplies at Cybertron's spaceport in Revelations part 2 for no
apparent reason.) This fightback could refer to the BM 'toon crew, or the
Wreckers, or the Dinobots or Mutants or… any number of things, though they
all appear to show up at more-or-less at the same time. (By my math, Wreckers
#1 takes place after the episode 'The Key.')
I take Glen's date for BM from Apelinq's journal entry, 316 AU- 316 years
after unicron, or 2321. 'Linq's entries mention the Axalon investigation
coming to a final, unsatisfying close, and Depth Charge's recent disappearance
(going by memory.) Thus I conclude that BM takes place 4 years (megacycles)
after the Axalon left. Megatron had not been in power for years, as in
Furman's timeline, but months.
Furman's timeline also rather explicitly places the Maximal/Pred
reformation at about 80 years before BW, while Glen's has Hot Rod gushing
fanwankily about the Maximization process circa 2020. (The general timelines
are also just… different, It's been awhile since I went over it, but IIRC the
Apelinq's journal date for BW/BM in early 24th century is about a century
earlier than Furman's broad date of it, or 100 years later. It's late, and I
forget which it is.)
Generally I just prefer Furman's gap because… it leaves the BW era…
'open,' instead of suddenly snapping it shut 4 years after it began. (with 2
japanese series taking place during years 2 and 3 respectfully.) Plus the gap
helps soothe the irritation of getting a new maximal symbol. And Nightsceam
mentions that everyone got built in DNA scanners in the last Quantum Upgrade,
something that surprises Rattrap.
>> You seemed uncertain of what era Shokaract was
>> from by the by- he was from the 32nd century. (Mentioned in the
>> Botcon 2000 comic, everyone go buy a copy.)
>
>Was it? I've heard that number mentioned before, but I was never sure
>where it came from.
Page 5 of the Botcon 200 comic story. (Counting the double-page spreads as 2
pages.) Shokaract, seeing Windrazor says;
EH? YOU ARE NOT A PLAYER IN THESE BEAST WARS -- YOU REEK OF 32nd CENTURY,
HYBRID.
>...I was going to say that it didn't really matter, since we don't know
>when BW was set, but since "Wreckers" #1 puts the end of the Great War
>around the time that Daniel was a young man, we can then use
>Blackarachnia's "300 years" (assuming she meant Earth-years) to place the
>BW-future in the 24th century. And there certainly aren't any signs that
>BMach took place much later than that - a few years, maybe, but not
>centuries. Which means that Shokky had no reason at all to think of
>Apelinq's time-jump as a threat to himself, considering that the time-jump
>had happened 800 years previous. If Apelinq's actions in the past hadn't
>caught up to Shokky by then, I don't think they ever would.
Right. Apelinq was not a threat- Windrazor, however, was.
>(Unless, as I mentioned in the other post, Shokky wasn't living in the
>"true now," but rather was somehow in the objective future and was put at
>risk by anything happening in the "true now" of prehistoric Earth.)
>> Oh good, Megatron talks to himself later in the comic, filling in what's
>> going on. There is a temporal rift around the dark essence, from
>> where it fled in time. That rift has been exacerbated by Megatron's
>> own timestorm, and grows unstable. ...this is the great unraveling
>> Shokaract seeks to prevent.
>
>Hm. That certainly helps explain how the Transfer Interlink could be used
>against Unicron.
See, I don't think 'used against Unicron' ever comes into play here. I
mean- the Hunter, instead of just becoming an avatar of Unicron around whom
Unicron would rebuild his body (as he did around Rodimus Prime in 2010) instead
somehow became the dominant personality (though arguably a stronger
personality) with Unicron's dark essence contained inside the Matrix of
Conquest.
Unicron was never in danger, Unicron's dark essence, if it felt
threatened, would slip away through the time rift- still open from it's
arrival, and emerge in another time. But if it did so- the Hunter would never
become Shokaract. Shokaract was worried that the timestorm and other temporal
shit of BW had aggravated the rift, and made it more likely that the Dark
Essence was going to flee.
Do he wanted to use the Transfer Interlink to seal the rift, thus forcing
the skittish Dark Essence to, stick it out, staying hidden on Earth until the
2320's.
>> I think Cataclysm fucked up. He fucked up, and he lost the transfer
>> interlink in the past, it falling into Apelinq's hands. (I'm a bit
>> wry of this idea, because Apelinq then happened to arrive in the Beast
>> Wars, the era when the interlink was most needed, by a separate
>> contrivance, and I don't' trust me reasoning there.)
>
>I agree that it would be a monumental coincidence - but only if it were
>necessary for Antagony to use it to CEMENT the Dark Essence, not just
>remove the threat. (In fact, the idea of Cataclysm having lost the device
>in the BMach era is an entirely separate coincidence.)
>
>So, in order to avoid the coincidence, we have to assume that the
>timestorm alone was no real threat. It only helped open the door to the
>real threat - the Transfer Interlink. Sure, if Antagony had gotten it,
>she might've used it to "seal the dimensional wall," just for good
>measure. But, for the sake of internal story logic, we should regard that
>as an unnecessary action.
Hrm, so shokaract wasn't just making sure the barn door was shut on his
own history, there were reasons he HAD to keep the dark essence from fleeing,
otherwise it WOULD?
Or are you arguing that the transfer interlink was going to be used
against the DE somehow?
>To sum up: There's no coincidence involved if Shokky sends troops to just
>take out a threat on prehistoric Earth. There IS coincidence involved if
>the device Shokky needs to fix the timestorm damage on prehistoric Earth
>just so happens to ALSO be on prehistoric Earth for no related reason.
Well, given a temporal worldview (and Shokaract can probably peer through
time, Unicron can,) maybe he just chose the shitty timeframe of the Beast Wars
to do this because he knew Apelinq, who had the interlink, a device capable of
sealing the rift, would be there at the time. Easier to borrow the interlink
and seal the rift during the period he lost it than to steal a rift-sealer
someplace a chance being followed to a delicate time period they're trying to
avoid disrupting.
…of course for reason I stated previously, I think the interlink is a
32nd century piece of Predacon technology. Why does Apelinq have it?
Every story is ALLOWED one big coincidence, basically I'm looking at just
where to PUT the coincidence here to cover the circumstances.
>> But I do think Cataclysm's past bad experience with time travel is
>> related here.
With the TI already missing 8 centuries earlier than it should be created?
There's an extra, undocumented bit of time travel in the story already, and
Cataclysm has a fear of it. 'm just saying.
>By the way, I just rewatched "Unbreakable," and for some reason, my mind
>read your post in Samuel L. Jackson's voice. Something about the writing
>style - and maybe the subject matter too - seemed to fit with his delivery
>in that flick.
One man sitting back in a chair delivering a detail-rich monologue
building an argument case by case with unrelenting intensity.
But purple's not my color.
Speaking of breakable men, have you see Amilee? I highly recommend it.
Jackpot
>
> The epilogue to the Botcon 2000 comic shows these exact same events
> taking place after the timeloop closes, only he finds the cave empty.
> Ergo, the backstory given here should still be valid for the BM
> timeline.
Interesting point. I hadn't thought of that.
> Megatron rose to power many years ago, he employed individual
> Predacons like the Hunter to hunt down remaining Maximals. (Possibly
> to lead his drone army? Who knows.)
Assuming this is the same Megatron. The G1/Beast timeline already has
two (or three, if you count the legendary Megatron of religious
significance - who BW Megs interpreted to be himself, but who also has a
sort of separate existence as a larger-than-life literary figure that
would-be villains are inspired by).
(Also, yes, I know that Shokky considered BW Megs important to his own
history, but that could be for the simple fact that, if Shokky's rise to
power happened after BMach, then he realized that the world-altering
events of BMach were necessary for him to exist, even if that necessity
was indirect.)
Plus, somehow... the idea of Megs employing free Preds to hunt down
Maxies on other worlds doesn't seem to fit his BMach M.O. BMach Megs
seemed much more inwardly-focused, concerned with "cleaning up"
Cybertron and letting the automated satellite defenses deal with the
outside universe. Plus the fact that the Hunter is referred to as a
"Predacon" makes me think it unlikely that he would side with BMach
Megs, who annihilated Cybertron's entire population - Maxie and Pred
alike. If his spark had been recycled into Vehicon form, I could buy
it, but...
Granted, it's not *impossible* for the Hunter to have been under BMach
Meggy's reign. But those are the reasons why I consider it unlikely.
> (By my math, Wreckers #1 takes place after the episode 'The Key.')
I'd say the Megahead nixes that idea. It has to be sometime in season
2, post-Savage/Noble-arc.
> I take Glen's date for BM from Apelinq's journal entry, 316 AU- 316
> years after unicron, or 2321. 'Linq's entries mention the Axalon
> investigation coming to a final, unsatisfying close, and Depth
> Charge's recent disappearance (going by memory.) Thus I conclude that
> BM takes place 4 years (megacycles) after the Axalon left.
Where did you get the four-years number from?
> Furman's timeline also rather explicitly places the Maximal/Pred
> reformation at about 80 years before BW,
Sorry to keep asking this, but... It does? Where was this said?
> It's been awhile since I
> went over it, but IIRC the Apelinq's journal date for BW/BM in early
> 24th century is about a century earlier than Furman's broad date of
> it, or 100 years later.
Once again... where did Furman apply numbers to that?
> Generally I just prefer Furman's gap because... it leaves the BW
> era... 'open,' instead of suddenly snapping it shut 4 years after it
> began.
I agree that the transition as shown in "Apelinq's Journals" seems too
quick. Though, to me, it's because Meggy's rise to power appears to
take maybe DAYS to happen. When 'Linq is first writing, it sounds as
though everything is as peaceful as can be. Then, from out of nowhere,
there's this virus - and before you know it, Megatron is overrunning the
planet with drones, and the Axalon is falling out of the sky. I know
*I'd* like to imagine a lot more buildup than that, even if it *doesn't*
involve the Hunter's story.
> EH? YOU ARE NOT A PLAYER IN THESE BEAST WARS -- YOU REEK OF 32nd
> CENTURY, HYBRID.
Ah yes, I remember that now.
> Right. Apelinq was not a threat- Windrazor, however, was.
Sure. Why are you mentioning that, though? Windrazor wasn't a threat
until he followed Shokky's second Herald through the time-tunnel.
Therefore, there must've been some OTHER threat that Shokky was first
trying to counteract. My point in bringing Apelinq up was to
demonstrate how he COULDN'T have been that first threat.
> I mean- the Hunter, instead of just becoming an avatar of Unicron
> around whom Unicron would rebuild his body (as he did around Rodimus
> Prime in 2010) instead somehow became the dominant personality (though
> arguably a stronger personality) with Unicron's dark essence contained
> inside the Matrix of Conquest.
We really don't know the inner workings of the Unicron/Hunter fusion.
It may be a more equal balance than that. Or the Hunter THINKS he has
Uni's power safely in a box, but Uni is very slowly expanding his
influence over his host, just as he did to Roddy.
> Unicron was never in danger, Unicron's dark essence, if it felt
> threatened, would slip away through the time rift- still open from
> it's arrival, and emerge in another time.
I got the distinct impression that, if Uni let go of prehistoric Earth,
he would be sucked back to 2005 - to the moment of his destruction. The
fact that he was trying to get AWAY from that moment means that he fears
something there - likely, his own complete death. Or, if this follows a
more cartoon-based history, then his imprisonment inside his disembodied
head. Either way, it seems clear to me that he only has two choices on
the matter - ancient Earth or 2005 Cybertron.
> Shokaract was worried that the
> timestorm and other temporal shit of BW had aggravated the rift, and
> made it more likely that the Dark Essence was going to flee.
But why would he be worried about that in the 32nd century? Uni had had
his chance to flee, and he didn't. Nothing was going to change that
unless someone went back in time. (And the Beast Warriors and Apelinq
don't count, since they were already a part of Shokky's history, and
whatever dangers/opportunities the timestorm may have presented to Uni,
nothing ended up coming of it.) Therefore, if Shokky was worried about
Uni escaping, then the LAST thing he would do about it would be sending
troops back in time, where they could screw everything up.
Unless...... hm.
Okay, let's set aside any notions of Uni wanting freedom from the Hunter
in the 32nd century. Maybe he does; maybe he doesn't. Instead, let's
look at it from the perspective of Shokaract, lord of all he surveys,
considering the possibilities inherent in transwarp tech. He's no doubt
imposed many restrictions on time travel; however, he must realize that
someday an assassin might succeed in jumping back into his past to
change things. As Shokoract, he's probably always been alert for
assassination attempts, so an assailant from the future would have just
as much trouble as one from the present. But he also knows that the BW
timestorm made the Dark Essence's grasp on its Terran refuge weak.
Luckily for Shokky, the DE was still there when he needed it, and
everything turned out fine. But if a time-traveling assassin ever
discovered that weakness and knew how to exploit it, Shokky would be in
serious trouble. And, depending on how time-travel works, Shokky might
not have ANY opportunity to react after this hypothetical rebel made the
time-jump.
However, Shokky also knows that a device capable of sealing the breach
DID exist on prehistoric Earth during the Beast Wars - Apelinq's
Transfer Interlink. Therefore, Shokky sent his Heralds to get the TI
and firm up Uni's hold on time and space. That way, a potential
assassin would have to either attack the Dark Essence in the narrow
window between the timestorm and the Heralds' sealing, or he would have
to prevent the Heralds from doing their job, THEN attack the DE. Either
way, the assassination would be much tougher to pull off than before.
So one question arises: Since transwarp tech had been around since the
days of the Hunter or before, why did he finally decide to put a
temporal-assassin defense in place after the untold years or centuries
it took to build his empire across the stars? My best guess: The TI
itself. Either he didn't realize it existed until then, or it didn't
exist at ALL until then. (That's where your
TI-as-a-32nd-century-artifact theory gains credence.) In fact, the TI
may have even been built by Shokky SPECIFICALLY for that purpose. Maybe
there was an ill-fated first attempt to seal the rift which somehow
ended with the TI being lost to Apelinq in the 24th century. However,
this change didn't alter history enough to erase Shokky's reign, so
Shokky was able to take another shot at the TI later.
Now, regardless of the TI-as-a-32nd-century-artifact theory, the fact
that Apelinq would eventually be catapulted by accident to the Beast
Wars sometime around the timestorm - the exact spot in space-time that
Shokky wanted to use the TI - becomes a monumental coincidence again.
But, as you said, perhaps we can allow any story at least one big
coincidence.
> Or are you arguing that the transfer interlink was going to be used
> against the DE somehow?
I *was* arguing that, yes... (after all, Antagony's thoughts mention its
capability to seal OR breach the dimensional wall). But now that I've
thought about how Shokky might have been trying to protect himself from
hypothetical temporal saboteurs from his own time, I think I've changed
my mind. Saying that the threat came from someone already involved in
the Beast Wars could only work from the Dark Essence's viewpoint in that
time, and that just brought in all that messiness about "possible
futures" and whatnot. Plus it made questionable any of Shokaract's
motives for actually helping the past Unicron out, since his own
particular history worked out so well.
But this protect-against-time-travelling-assassins idea... I think I'm
really fond of it. Questions of motive are finally settled. However...
it DOES still bring up the problem of the time-loop. If Shokky
initiated the time-travel misadventures in the first place, then his
absence from the timeline would reset everything to normal - but
"normal" includes his existence, so the timeline would keep bounching
back and forth between the Shokky and non-Shokky alternatives, stuck in
an infinite loop. And I really so no way around that.
> Speaking of breakable men, have you see Amilee? I highly recommend
> it.
I've not seen it. But you're not the first person to recommend it to
me.
- Jackpot (who has a thing for big-eyed girls, too.)
Derik Smith
…crap, I was reading my wrong note. (BM's expanded continuity is hard
to keep track of, I keep notes.) The Beast Riders take place around The Key,
my bad.
>> I take Glen's date for BM from Apelinq's journal entry, 316 AU- 316
>> years after unicron, or 2321. 'Linq's entries mention the Axalon
>> investigation coming to a final, unsatisfying close, and Depth
>> Charge's recent disappearance (going by memory.) Thus I conclude that
>> BM takes place 4 years (megacycles) after the Axalon left.
>
>Where did you get the four-years number from?
Just assuming the same amount of tiem had passed 'at home' as in the Beast
Wars, as was the case during The Agenda.
Apelinq's war journal appears to refer to the axalon's disappearance in
the revent past, and Depth Charge going rogue in the VERY recent past,
consistent with that convention.
I fear the trail has come to an end. Without an additional trace referent,
there seems little hope of locating the Axalon, or the lost Marshal who broke
ranks to locate the ship on his own.
See, the investigation is coming to a close. Sure, it COULD be a 20 year
investigation- but I doubt it.
>> Furman's timeline also rather explicitly places the Maximal/Pred
>> reformation at about 80 years before BW,
>
>Sorry to keep asking this, but... It does? Where was this said?
]The zemstvo was convened at the commencement of the
]sixth partcycle. It had been a span of decades, perhaps
]longer, since the twelve had gathered in the Stentorium,
]and then only to discus a somewhat routine shift in the
]power structure on post-war Cybertron, one that had been
]anticipated, run through the probability filter, and extrapolated
]to death long before their rather moot debate had begun.
Pardon my incorrect memory, but I remembered 'Span of Decades' as 80
years. At any rate- there you go. Several decades before BW, not centuries.
(This is consistent with the timeline Furman used for Alignment.)
>>> It's been awhile since I
>>> went over it, but IIRC the Apelinq's journal date for BW/BM in early
>>> 24th century is about a century earlier than Furman's broad date of
>>> it, or 100 years later.
>>
>>Once again... where did Furman apply numbers to that?
*checks Alignment* let's see… Grimlock says it was several centuries
since Unicron came, plus 50 years for Pinea Omicron, plus the political
reformation's several decades from OP.
If you read Pinea Omicron as just beuing the last 50 years of the 'several
hundred,' then I suppose you could crunch it down to fit the Apelinq's journals
timeline. Meh. At any rate, I think the journals date would dominate, since
it has an exact year.
>> Right. Apelinq was not a threat- Windrazor, however, was.
>
>Sure. Why are you mentioning that, though? Windrazor wasn't a threat
>until he followed Shokky's second Herald through the time-tunnel.
>Therefore, there must've been some OTHER threat that Shokky was first
>trying to counteract. My point in bringing Apelinq up was to
>demonstrate how he COULDN'T have been that first threat.
…depending on how BW's exer-altering temporal pseudophysics are working
today, yes. ; ) Since BW was predestined- yet could still alter the past…
>> I mean- the Hunter, instead of just becoming an avatar of Unicron
>> around whom Unicron would rebuild his body (as he did around Rodimus
>> Prime in 2010) instead somehow became the dominant personality (though
>> arguably a stronger personality) with Unicron's dark essence contained
>> inside the Matrix of Conquest.
>
>We really don't know the inner workings of the Unicron/Hunter fusion.
>It may be a more equal balance than that. Or the Hunter THINKS he has
>Uni's power safely in a box, but Uni is very slowly expanding his
>influence over his host, just as he did to Roddy.
Or Windrazor/The Cub in Omega Point when he tried to bond to him, right.
Actually that's a good argument that Unicron IS controlling Shokaract, at least
insofar that it was Windrazor's dual nature that let him resist Unicron.
>I got the distinct impression that, if Uni let go of prehistoric Earth,
>he would be sucked back to 2005 - to the moment of his destruction. The
>fact that he was trying to get AWAY from that moment means that he fears
>something there - likely, his own complete death. Or, if this follows a
>more cartoon-based history, then his imprisonment inside his disembodied
>head. Either way, it seems clear to me that he only has two choices on
>the matter - ancient Earth or 2005 Cybertron.
See, att he end of the BC2K comic, the DE flees intot eh timestream once
again. I think from there it flees to Gaea, not back to 2005.
>But why would he be worried about that in the 32nd century? Uni had had
>his chance to flee, and he didn't. Nothing was going to change that
>unless someone went back in time. (And the Beast Warriors and Apelinq
>don't count, since they were already a part of Shokky's history, and
>whatever dangers/opportunities the timestorm may have presented to Uni,
>nothing ended up coming of it.) Therefore, if Shokky was worried about
>Uni escaping, then the LAST thing he would do about it would be sending
>troops back in time, where they could screw everything up.
Right, if time flows only forward. But IMO, we're seeing a setup where
one of the POSSIBLE outcomes involving the DE in BW-era was the Omegs point-
when time runs like snot and timelines realities collapse onto another.
Couldn't that affect other 'nearbye' outcomes, even if it's averted? Those
extra Beast Warriors came from somewhen. I think if Omega Point was not FIRMLY
averted, it would have had a backwards unraveling effect, because of ALL the
paradoxes involved. Shokaract doing his Schrodenger cat impression wherein his
actions either do or do not negate his own timeline, the huge explosions we saw
so close to the ARK. If that history is changewd the beast wars will never
come to be, and thus there will be no explosion, and thus… PLUS the
timestorm. You're having 3.5 distinct eras ass intersecting here (Apelinq
represents .5, meeting Primal a few months earlier than he otherwise would, but
in a position to totally fuck his OWN timeline) each of whom can unravel
everything else and set up a chain of paradoxes. I think that's too much for
the universe to handle.
>Okay, let's set aside any notions of Uni wanting freedom from the Hunter
> in the 32nd century. Maybe he does; maybe he doesn't. Instead, let's
>look at it from the perspective of Shokaract, lord of all he surveys,
>considering the possibilities inherent in transwarp tech. He's no doubt
>imposed many restrictions on time travel; however, he must realize that
>someday an assassin might succeed in jumping back into his past to
>change things. As Shokoract, he's probably always been alert for
>assassination attempts, so an assailant from the future would have just
>as much trouble as one from the present. But he also knows that the BW
>timestorm made the Dark Essence's grasp on its Terran refuge weak.
>Luckily for Shokky, the DE was still there when he needed it, and
>everything turned out fine. But if a time-traveling assassin ever
>discovered that weakness and knew how to exploit it, Shokky would be in
>serious trouble. And, depending on how time-travel works, Shokky might
>not have ANY opportunity to react after this hypothetical rebel made the
>time-jump.
So you argue that he's doing the equivalent of putting a bicycle lock on
his stuff, taking reasonable precautions, and keeping the DE's window of
vulnerability as small as possible.
We don't know how long the DE was there. For all we know it emerged
around the time of the Timestorm. Traveling back in time, it emerged at a
point where the temporal fabric was already worn thin, like water seeking the
lowest point.
>However, Shokky also knows that a device capable of sealing the breach
>DID exist on prehistoric Earth during the Beast Wars - Apelinq's
>Transfer Interlink. Therefore, Shokky sent his Heralds to get the TI
>and firm up Uni's hold on time and space. That way, a potential
>assassin would have to either attack the Dark Essence in the narrow
>window between the timestorm and the Heralds' sealing, or he would have
>to prevent the Heralds from doing their job, THEN attack the DE. Either
>way, the assassination would be much tougher to pull off than before.
So, it's a matter of using local tools for the job, to minimize any
FURTHER complication to this snarl of paradoxes. Works for me.
>So one question arises: Since transwarp tech had been around since the
>days of the Hunter or before, why did he finally decide to put a
>temporal-assassin defense in place after the untold years or centuries
>it took to build his empire across the stars? My best guess: The TI
>itself. Either he didn't realize it existed until then, or it didn't
>exist at ALL until then. (That's where your
>TI-as-a-32nd-century-artifact theory gains credence.) In fact, the TI
>may have even been built by Shokky SPECIFICALLY for that purpose. Maybe
>there was an ill-fated first attempt to seal the rift which somehow
>ended with the TI being lost to Apelinq in the 24th century. However,
>this change didn't alter history enough to erase Shokky's reign, so
>Shokky was able to take another shot at the TI later.
I think the TI will come up more as Wreckers progresses, ,hopefully we'll
get some answers to it's ultimate nature that can aid us. Dfor all we know
it's an alien artifact from the 32nd century.
…of course, this being Wreckers, it'll probably forget Shoakract is
supposed to tie into the TI's origins and just make it a contemporary alien
artifact. Wreckers has a demonstratably limited grasp of the finer details of
Omega Point's interlocking time travel.
>I *was* arguing that, yes... (after all, Antagony's thoughts mention its
>capability to seal OR breach the dimensional wall). But now that I've
>thought about how Shokky might have been trying to protect himself from
>hypothetical temporal saboteurs from his own time, I think I've changed
>my mind. Saying that the threat came from someone already involved in
>the Beast Wars could only work from the Dark Essence's viewpoint in that
>time, and that just brought in all that messiness about "possible
>futures" and whatnot. Plus it made questionable any of Shokaract's
>motives for actually helping the past Unicron out, since his own
>particular history worked out so well.
>But this protect-against-time-travelling-assassins idea... I think I'm
>really fond of it. Questions of motive are finally settled. However...
>it DOES still bring up the problem of the time-loop. If Shokky
>initiated the time-travel misadventures in the first place, then his
>absence from the timeline would reset everything to normal - but
>"normal" includes his existence, so the timeline would keep bounching
>back and forth between the Shokky and non-Shokky alternatives, stuck in
>an infinite loop. And I really so no way around that.
BW's timetravel is horribly inconsistent though. And the Dark essence,
,even in the past, can probably still see through time, complicating any
attempt to second-guess causality issues. For all we know this is one of those
'have time to follow him back' issues on a colossal scale. The DE teeters in
the past, enough to make Shocky nervous.
I'm reasonably content, there are some unanswered questions of motivation,
but for the most part- we at least have a good idea what Shockaract was trying
to do, if not why he felt a need to do so.
> - Jackpot (who has a thing for big-eyed girls, too.)
Wow, you should watch anime!
David Willis
> years. At any rate- there you go. Several decades before BW, not
centuries.
> (This is consistent with the timeline Furman used for Alignment.)
Hm. Bob or Larry once mentioned that Cheetor was the youngest of the
original Beast
Wars characters, being about 70 years old. IIRC. Mind, that's not
technically
canon or anything, but it's always colored my perception of the G1-BW
intermission.
Even if the "span of decades" was an entire 80 years... he's still one of
the oldest Maximals.
Imagine an entire race of him, plodding around at nearly a century old and
still wanting to
go to Six Flags over Cybertron. Eep.
--David
Really, it'd make more sense if he were 2, BC fiction or not...
www.itswalky.com
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> Derik Smith wrote:
>>>
>>
>> I'd say the Megahead nixes that idea. It has to be sometime in
>> season 2, post-Savage/Noble-arc.
>
Okay, why do you say that? (It seems like the events of "Wreckers" #1
proceed pretty quickly and smoothly. It's hard for me to imagine
everything from "The Key" to... what, "Wolf In the Fold" happening
somewhere between scenes - especially the planet-rending climax of
season 1.)
> Apelinq's war journal appears to refer to the axalon's disappearance
> in the revent past, and Depth Charge going rogue in the VERY recent
> past, consistent with that convention.
>
> "I fear the trail has come to an end. Without an additional trace
> referent, there seems little hope of locating the Axalon, or the lost
> Marshal who broke ranks to locate the ship on his own."
>
> See, the investigation is coming to a close. Sure, it COULD be a
> 20 year investigation- but I doubt it.
Good point. Still, though, saying it was precisely four years seems
unjustifiably specific to me. I mean, we don't even know how long the
Beast Wars lasted in show-time. It was three years' worth of television
for us, but for them, it could've been over and done with in less than
twelve months. Or dragged out over five, six, or more years (though I
find shorter lengths of time more plausible).
>]The zemstvo was convened at the commencement of the
>]sixth partcycle. It had been a span of decades, perhaps
>]longer, since the twelve had gathered in the Stentorium,
>]and then only to discus a somewhat routine shift in the
>]power structure on post-war Cybertron, one that had been
>]anticipated, run through the probability filter, and extrapolated
>]to death long before their rather moot debate had begun.
>
> Pardon my incorrect memory, but I remembered 'Span of Decades' as 80
> years. At any rate- there you go. Several decades before BW, not
> centuries. (This is consistent with the timeline Furman used for
> Alignment.)
I can buy that Furman probably intended the "shift in the power
structure on post-war Cybertron" to have meant the rise of Maxies and
Preds. I'd mention that there's no reason why it HAS to correspond
thusly within the world of the fiction, but your intent was to
distinguish Furman's mindset from other writers', so your point stands.
>>> It's been awhile since I
>>> went over it, but IIRC the Apelinq's journal date for BW/BM in
>>> early 24th century is about a century earlier than Furman's broad
>>> date of it, or 100 years later.
>>
>> Once again... where did Furman apply numbers to that?
>
> *checks Alignment* let's see… Grimlock says it was several
> centuries since Unicron came, plus 50 years for Pinea Omicron,
Ah ha. I've never read "Alignment." In fact, I really don't know
anything about it. And since it's not part of the BC canon, I'll go on
happily ignoring it for the rest of this discussion. :)
>>> Right. Apelinq was not a threat- Windrazor, however, was.
>>
>> Sure. Why are you mentioning that, though? Windrazor wasn't a
>> threat until he followed Shokky's second Herald through the time-
>> tunnel. Therefore, there must've been some OTHER threat that Shokky
>> was first trying to counteract. My point in bringing Apelinq up was
>> to demonstrate how he COULDN'T have been that first threat.
>
> …depending on how BW's exer-altering temporal pseudophysics are
> working today, yes. ; ) Since BW was predestined- yet could still
> alter the past…
Well, if we're going to bring the BW show's time-travel "logic" into
this discussion, then we can just stop right here and call it a day.
Because Bob 'n' Larry were obviously working with NO underlying temporal
setup; they just wrote their time-travel stuff to fit whatever dramatic
tension they wanted to establish, and all of the supposed threats and
resolutions were entirely dictated by the story drama. So in the end,
nothing fit together, and almost every temporal event contradicted all
the others.
So, in trying to puzzle out the "Omega Point" motivations and dangers
and whatnot regarding time-travel, I see no choice but to analyze the BC
time-travel writing in a vaccuum. It can't fit with the BW stuff
because the BW stuff is already internally screwed. Bringing the two
together will only make the BC stuff equally hopeless.
>> Therefore, if
>> Shokky was worried about Uni escaping, then the LAST thing he would
>> do about it would be sending troops back in time, where they could
>> screw everything up.
>
> Right, if time flows only forward.
Well, it does. Cause and effect follow one another pretty regularly.
As I said above, if you want to try positing a nonlinear - or
reverse-linear or whatever - model, go for it. But you can't simply
brush away the fundamentals without REPLACING them with something.
Your summary of "Omega Point"s colliding timelines and potential
paradoxes is all fine and good, but your conclusion seems to be, "The
universe didn't like it, there was a big explosion, life went on."
Which, I think, does an injustice to the analysis we've been giving the
rest of the story. It's a cheap way out. When Glen replied to my
Big-Ass Treatise, he said that "Omega Point" was SUPPOSED to be a
paradox - which I balked at. How, I asked him, would the universe
determine any future path after the paradox? I mean, that's exactly
what's so dangerous about paradoxes - they prevent any one outcome from
occurring. But he never answered.
> So you argue that he's doing the equivalent of putting a bicycle lock
> on his stuff, taking reasonable precautions, and keeping the DE's
> window of vulnerability as small as possible.
Pretty much. It makes much more sense to me that he's taking
precautions against possible threats from the 32nd century or beyond (a
fear that the rebels might eventually try temporal sabotage) than it
does that he could possibly be threatened in the 32nd century by events
that had already happened millenia earlier. (Unless Omega Point was
precipitated by a 32nd-century agent who we never saw or heard of;
however, like I said a couple of posts ago, I prefer not to invent
characters to explain events.)
....
Unless.
What if an event in the 32nd century DID create a threat in the distant
past? Not an assassin leaping nefariously to prehistoric Earth... but a
simple accident. Someone - it could be Cataclysm, if you really want it
to be - takes the Transfer Interlink from Shokky's era into the past.
Maybe to put the "bicycle lock" on the Dark Essence, maybe for some
other reason. The point is, somehow he ends up losing the TI to Apelinq
in the 24th century. Shokky, still back in the 32nd century, instantly
goes, "Oh slag." Because he knows that part of Apelinq's life is
destined to be spent on prehistoric Earth... but, thanks to this
32nd-century screwup, suddenly 'Linq also has the means to "breach the
dimensional wall" while he's there.
So maybe Shokky has a window of, say, a few days or a week or something
before the accident's ramifications through the timeline will catch up
to him. I'm not sure WHY this window would exist, and I don't really
LIKE it (especially since he sure didn't get any window during the Omega
Point itself), but it happens often enough in fiction that I'm willing
to let it slide.
However, another option that I find more palatable is that Shokky's just
plain paranoid. He doesn't care if Apelinq unmolested will actually USE
the TI to unseat the Dark Essence during the Beast Wars; Shokky just
wants the damn MacGuffin out of Maximal hands - especially around the
DE. So his paranoia does him in, since everything would've been fine if
he'd left well enough alone.
> I think the TI will come up more as Wreckers progresses, ,hopefully
> we'll get some answers to it's ultimate nature that can aid us. Dfor
> all we know it's an alien artifact from the 32nd century.
> …of course, this being Wreckers, it'll probably forget Shoakract is
> supposed to tie into the TI's origins and just make it a contemporary
> alien artifact. Wreckers has a demonstratably limited grasp of the
> finer details of Omega Point's interlocking time travel.
Though there's no proof anywhere that the TI *must* have its origins in
Shokky's time. There are certain theories that rely upon that notion,
but not all do. In fact, one argument against it is that, after
Shokky's timeline was utterly wiped clean - including all his BW
interventions - 'Linq STILL had the TI. (Granted, he also still had his
memories of Omega Point, but at least the mind is a fuzzier, more
ephemeral subject. The TI is just a hunk of matter that really
shouldn't have remained in Apelinq's possession if he had originally
gotten it from Shokky.)
>> - Jackpot (who has a thing for big-eyed girls, too.)
>
> Wow, you should watch anime!
There's big-eyed, and then there's cuteness-to-the-point-of-deformity.
I'll take Audrey Tautou any day.
- Jackpot
Steve-o Stonebraker
> Derik Smith wrote:
I don't actually have anything to contribute because I don't know the
BotCon material in nearly enough detail, but I wanted to say that this
thread completely kicks ass.
--Steve-o
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Stonebraker | Transformers FAQ Keeper | Astrophysicist
sst...@yahoo.com | www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~sstoneb | AOL IM: srstoneb
David Willis
> BotCon material in nearly enough detail, but I wanted to say that this
> thread completely kicks ass.
I concur. Everything is totally over my head, so I can't really join in,
but it's a great read.
If overwhelming.
--David
Me am smart.
www.itswalky.com
ShadowWing
"Steve-o Stonebraker" wrote
>
> I don't actually have anything to contribute because I don't know the
> BotCon material in nearly enough detail, but I wanted to say that this
> thread completely kicks ass.
Last I saw it was all up at the Botcon website, so if you have a few
hours to kill, go for it. I can't contribute because I just haven't looked
at it in a while.
--
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David Willis
> > BotCon material in nearly enough detail, but I wanted to say that this
> > thread completely kicks ass.
>
> Last I saw it was all up at the Botcon website, so if you have a few
> hours to kill, go for it. I can't contribute because I just haven't looked
> at it in a while.
Oh, I have all the material, as I'm sure Steve-O does as well, but the Omega
Point
stories by Furman aren't exactly the most comprehendable read. I've tried
to
read the thing about five times by now, and I still don't know what the hell
is
going on.
--David
www.itswalky.com
Grebo
Whoof. Its taken me a long time to digest where the old "Cybertron IS
Earth" thread has gone! Let's see here... the mighty Jackpot wrote:
> ...I was going to say that it didn't really matter, since we don't know
> when BW was set, but since "Wreckers" #1 puts the end of the Great
> War around the time that Daniel was a young man,
I wouldn't be so sure about that. In the beginning of the Botcon 2001
comic, we get the establishing shot of the Nightbirds-crowded
battlefield and the caption "The not-too-distant future." Here we see
Daniel's death when he's a young man, but there is nothing to actually
indicate that these events corresponded to the end of the Great War.
In fact, notice that on the next page we get another establishing shot
(this time of Cybertron) and the caption "Several months after the Pax
Cybertronia."
This new establishing shot coupled with the new caption (one which
goes out of its way to specificall mention the time period) suggests
to me that these two events do not happen terribly close to each other
in either time or space. Arcee's moping scene (where she's looking at
the picture of Daniel on the wall) could easily happen hundreds of
years after Daniel's death.
I realize that on the next page Springer acknowledges Daniel's death
as the cause of Arcee's funk, but TFs live for millions of years. A
few centuries of moping doesn't seem all that unlikely to me.
To my knowledge there's only one solid source of information as to
when the war ended, and that's in the Marvel UK Transformers story
"Peace". It happens in 2510 -- although fighting does continue
(Autobot against Autobot) after this "peace", the war between the
Autobots and Decepticons ends there (according to this source). It may
have taken the Maximals a long time to take over and enact the Pax
Cybertronia... or it may not. They may well have been waiting for
their opportunity, and pounced when it arose.
> we can then use Blackarachnia's "300 years" (assuming she meant
> Earth-years) to place the BW-future in the 24th century.
Based on the "Peace" story, which puts the Great War's end at 2510, I
figure the Pax Cybertronia was enacted the next year, 2511. (The
one-year-later date is just for the sake of convenience and easy
bookkeeping. As ever, we have no actual info as to how long after the
Great War the Pax Cybertronia was signed.)
Anyway, this would put Beast Wars (which happens 300 years after the
end of the Great War) at about 2811, and thus puts Beast Machines and
Enter The Wreckers at about 2814.
> And there certainly aren't any signs that BMach took place much
> later than that - a few years, maybe, but not centuries.
Actually, I see nothing to suggest that Beast Machines didn't happen
immediately after Beast Wars. Hence my 2814 date. Conveniently, this
is still well before Omega Point's "age of Shokaract", which happens
in the 3100s.
> Which means that Shokky had no reason at all to think of Apelinq's
> time-jump as a threat to himself, considering that the time-jump had
> happened 800 years previous.
Well, 200-300 years previous by my reckoning, but still a long time
ago.
> If Apelinq's actions in the past hadn't caught up to Shokky by then,
> I don't think they ever would.
Word.
Grebo
Grebo
> I take Glen's date for BM from Apelinq's journal entry, 316 AU- 316
> years after unicron, or 2321. 'Linq's entries mention the Axalon
Interesting! I hadn't caught that. Of course, Unicron showed up
several times... In The Movie, later on in the UK comics (like 2008 or
something I think) and then there's his Beast Wars Neo appearance to
boot!
> investigation coming to a final, unsatisfying close, and Depth
> Charge's recent disappearance (going by memory.)
> Thus I conclude that BM takes place 4 years (megacycles)
> after the Axalon left.
I agree completely on this point.
> Megatron had not been in power for years, as in Furman's
> timeline, but months.
Im not convinced that Furman's timeline is supposed to apply to the BM
timeline. The Hunter comes from one possible future -- quite probably
one in which the BM Maximals failed to overthrow him. In that future,
Megatron could indeed have been in control of Cybetron for years,
employing Pred agents to hunt down Maximal stragglers. However, in
"our" timeline (that is, the timeline of Beast Machines) I still don't
see any evidence that BM takes place very long at all after the end of
BW.
> Furman's timeline also rather explicitly places the Maximal/Pred
> reformation at about 80 years before BW,
Whoah! I missed something. here did he make that assertion? Talk about
a monkey wrench...
> while Glen's has Hot Rod gushing fanwankily
Fanwankily is right.
> about the Maximization process circa 2020.
As I said in a previous post, I don't think that scene happens so
close to now. More like the early 2500s, IMO.
Snipping ahead...
> …of course for reason I stated previously, I think the interlink is a
> 32nd century piece of Predacon technology. Why does Apelinq have it?
Erp! Im sorry, I missed your previously stated reason. Could you
restate it, or point me in the right direction? Sorry...
Grebo
Grebo
> >> Furman's timeline also rather explicitly places the Maximal/Pred
> >> reformation at about 80 years before BW,
> >
> >Sorry to keep asking this, but... It does? Where was this said?
>
> ]The zemstvo was convened at the commencement of the
> ]sixth partcycle. It had been a span of decades, perhaps
> ]longer, since the twelve had gathered in the Stentorium,
> ]and then only to discus a somewhat routine shift in the
> ]power structure on post-war Cybertron, one that had been
> ]anticipated, run through the probability filter, and extrapolated
> ]to death long before their rather moot debate had begun.
>
> Pardon my incorrect memory, but I remembered 'Span of Decades'
> as 80 years. At any rate- there you go. Several decades before BW,
> not centuries.
Ohh, so that's where it comes from! Interesting... But Im not totally
convinced, considering that when the "zemstvo" convenes is not itself
nailed down very clearly in time. I mean, when exactly is the
"commencement of the sixth partcycle"? We have no way of knowing (I
think). What's more, the 12 Primus TFs are so old they can barely keep
track of time anymore:
"It had been a span of decades, perhaps longer, since..."
To a TF who's as old as the universe, what's the difference between a
few decades and a few centuries?
> (This is consistent with the timeline Furman used for Alignment.)
GOD I want a copy of the conclusion of Alignment! I only have the
first part... Finding a copy of that story for sale is infuriatingly
hard.
> See, att he end of the BC2K comic, the DE flees intot eh timestream
> once again. I think from there it flees to Gaea, not back to 2005.
Aha!!! Finally Gaia is brought back into the picture. Gaia, aka the
Earth of the BW future (2813 by my reckoning) -- and why to Gaia?
Because its the same planet as Earth, a life-supporting planet which
is (for some reason) the ideal environment for a disembodied space
God. Go figure.
> Those extra Beast Warriors came from somewhen.
This subject has always really annoyed me. The presence of Fractyl,
Packrat, and Onyx Primal in the BotCon stories really gums up efforts
to shoehorn Omega Point into "our" continuity. Has there been any
discussion and/or explanation of this before?
> We don't know how long the DE was there. For all we know it
> emerged around the time of the Timestorm. Traveling back in
> time, it emerged at a point where the temporal fabric was already
> worn thin, like water seeking the lowest point.
Gack! That's brilliant! This idea not only gives us a likely spot WHEN
the DE entered the past, it can even serve to explain WHY the DE wound
up WHERE it did -- on Earth! Unicron threw his Dark Essence backward
through time to no time/place in particular, just wanting to get the
hell out of the moment of his destruction in 2005. His backwards-flung
DE is then drawn (like water, as you said) to the "drain" which is the
Timestorm on BW Earth.
Sweet. This is actually very freeing for my Cybertron = Earth theory
too...
Grebo
Grebo Guru
In article <slrnb6ibmo....@campbell.mps.ohio-state.edu>,
Grebo
Okay, by now this thread has broken off into two distinct subtopics.
"Cybertron is Earth" and "Omega Point". Im fascinated by both, but I
think this part of the discussion definitely deserves to stay here.
Specifically, Im referring to Jackpot's monmental essays on
BotContinuity:
> I'll explain what I mean, but before I get started, I should warn you
> that this train of thought exploded into a very long mental masturbation
> session just now.
Mental masturbation, yep. Cue the porno movie music!
> This post is much longer than it has any right to be, but, well, tough.
> Also, for reference, it's a good idea to check out my
> Big-Ass Treatise on BotContinuity. The Google IDs are:
>
> Part 1: 3CA3C1BB...@hotmail.com
> (Summary of the BotCon stories)
>
> Part 2: 3CA3C203...@hotmail.com
> (Analysis thereof)
Damn Jackpot. Those essays ROCK! Im sure you've been told this before,
but they do. And they're not so horribly long. They're a lot more
concise than most fanfics Ive read. (Talk about mental masturbation...
fanfics. Eesssshhhh.)
Now, on to my point(s). In your analysis, you wrote:
>The only other major sticky point is the Primus origin:
> It's stressed in every retelling that the asteroid-that-would-be-
> Cybertron was lifeless before Primus entered it. We hear it
> again in the thoughts of Leonicus, de facto leader of the
> Covenant, and being that his sole duty is to know EVERYTHING
> about Primus's plan as it unfolds, I would trust his words.
Indeedy. And, if you (or anyone else) particularly wants to buy into
my theory that this "asteroid-that-would-be-Cybertron" is actually the
dead Earth (timejacked from the distant future by the Vok or the
Quints or Primus or Unicron or someone) it still works.
> So does this square with BMach's premise of Cybertron having
> once been a world with organic life?
Sure does if you go with my "new Cybertron is old Earth" theory!
>And what's up with the chewy green center?
Yeah really!
> I suggest that the asteroid was, indeed, lifeless, but Primus
> introduced *organic* elements when he first began his work.
Or, perhaps, revived the elements of life which will/had die(d) in the
far-flung future.
> The green goop is, perhaps, actually part of Primus's essence,
> which is why it has strong effects on sparks.
Oh! That is BRILLIANT! I love it.
> He succeeded in creating a biosphere with complex creatures,
Or recreating Earth's biosphere...
> but he either decided to scrap it and go with robots, or the robots
> came to him (via a Quint invasion, perhaps?).
I am vry fond of the latter idea.
> Whatever the cause, the original biological setup was overrun
> by the mechanical, and the eons erased any common knowledge
> of it. This actually would present something of a rationale for
> Cybertron's technorganic destiny: Primus had always wanted
> to create organic life, but for whatever reason, robotic was his
> only viable option for ages.
Also explains the presence of Transorganics. When the Quints came to
proto-Cybertron they performed all sorts of messed-up experiments on
the local lifeforms as part of their development of cybernetic weapons
(i.e., their robot "product").
> So when the opportunity arose (after Unicron's destruction,
> maybe?), forces began to push TF life in a direction more
> suited to Primus's original intent.
Yes, precisely. Beast Machines had a lot of good ideas, IMO, just
less-than-satisfying execution. Anyway, further on, Jackpot says:
> Now, since BW and BMach were a hodgepodge of cartoon and
> comic references, the BC stories are actually right in step.
> But certain elements have very far-reaching implications -
> primarily, the Primus origin. Does this bar the BC continuity
> from existing in the G1 'toon continuity? Not necessarily.
Right on brotha! Its sortof a pet project of mine (and others, Im
sure) to rationalize the existence of both the G1 toon and the Marvel
comics and the UK comics in one continuity. At least as much as
possible. As was said in another post, in order to do this some
details do have to be changed, but by and large I dont consider the
two (three?) continuities to be all that mutually exclusive.
> Since we only know the Quint origin from Rodimus's near-death
> acid trip
LOL! Nicely phrased.
> and a few words from the Quints,
Who we all know are big fat liars anyway...
> we can't say that all of our historical information is necessarily
> complete and unbiased. Primus can be inserted into the
> background, a cosmic puppeteer who manipulated/allowed
> the Quints to bring about his own designs. It's not the most
> elegant solution, but it is a viable one.
And my favorite one! A combination of the Quints and Primus' influence
bringing about the Transformers as we know them is much more
satisfying, to me, than either one standing alone.
Moving on:
> The other comic influences are smaller hurdles to pass...
> Galvatron could eventually have been purged of his insanity
> and Unicronian tampering, becoming Megatron again.
Enter the Japanese continuity! In The Battlestars, Dark Nova frees
Galvatron from his icy prison and reforms him into Super-Megatron...
who gets beaten and turned into Ultra-Megatron... who gets beaten and
merges with Dark Nova as Star Giant... who gets beaten, the Dark Nova
element destroyed and the severely-damaged Megatron element winding up
allyied with Cobra so as to be repaired/upgraded into G2 Tank
Megatron... Etc etc etc.
BTW, have I mentioned my suspicion that Devil Z, ViolenJiger, and Dark
Nova were all hosts to the Dark Essence, much like Shokaract?
> Skywarp is trickier... but perhaps his mind still existed
> somewhere within Scourge or a Sweep or the other "Cyclonus"
"Armada", as some people call him...
> or whoever it was he was turned into, waiting to reassert itself.
Indeed. Especially since he (and Thundercracker) gets to show up late
in the G2 conflict as a Machine Wars flipchanger. Snipping ahead
again...
> My conclusion: There are fewer contradictions to circumvent if we
> put the BC stories into the G1 comic continuity; however, we need
> to add a lot of extra material (mostly in the form of 'toon characters
> and their backstories) to get there.
This sentiment (and the fact that BW/BM is presented as drawing on a
hodgepodge of G1 and Toon continuities) continually spurs me to try
and shoehorn the events of both continuities together into one
contiguous history. Its difficult, but not impossible. The largest
changes usually have to come in the form of altering dates -- for
example, the Furman issues of the G1 comic all happening AFTER The
Movie, like in the 2020s and 2030s.
> I find it most tasteful to assume what Bob and Larry said all along:
> That G1-as-we-know-it does not exist in the Beast universe as
> solid history, but rather as legendary tales. When we watch old
> G1 tapes or read old G1 stories, we're not getting factual accounts
> of pre-Beast events.
Yes. Yesssss... thereby giving me the leeway to do such wacky things
as change dates and such. How luciously indulgent! (Does a little
dance.)
> In fact, the G1-era snippets in "The Wreckers" are probably the
> ONLY competely valid historical scenes.
WHOAH... Now that's a radical concept! Must make Glen Hallit happy.
> Personally, I like my TF universe large,
I couldn't have said that better myself.
> and I rather enjoy how the BC stories expand the Beast world.
> I'll definitely appreciate any fanfiction, theorizing, or even official
> TF media that tries to work on that level.
Amen! Makes one salivate for "Transformers Universe" material, but I
really don't expect meaty background material from Hasbro at this
point...
> But in the end, it's all for fun, it's all a bunch of stories, and you're
> free to judge the evidence for yourself.
Hallelujah to that! You're one eloquent bastard, Jackpot.
> I just hope to have given as complete and straightforward
> a presentation of said evidence and its implications as possible.
Well I sure did find it useful! And entertaining! Hats off to ya man!
Grebo
Jackpot
Grebo wrote:
>
> This new establishing shot coupled with the new caption (one which
> goes out of its way to specificall mention the time period) suggests
> to me that these two events do not happen terribly close to each other
> in either time or space. Arcee's moping scene (where she's looking at
> the picture of Daniel on the wall) could easily happen hundreds of
> years after Daniel's death.
This is true. As you say, TFs are extremely long-lived, and that being
the case, they may experience long-term emotions (like grief) for more
time than we do.
However, the time-units in Apelinq's Journals - if we read them as
"years after Unicron" - give us around 300 years between Daniel's death
and the BW future-era. Taking Blackarachnia's "300 years since the end
of the Great War" into account, the margin between Daniel's death scene
and Arcee's post-war moping scene must be quite small.
Now, this conclusion relies upon a few of assumptions. "Date Index
316.075 AU" could mean ANYTHING. "AU" doesn't HAVE to mean "After
Unicron," and the 316 doesn't even have to refer to Earth-years. Nor do
BA's "300 years" need to be Terran revolutions.
But, for the sake of nailing the Beast future down to SOME spot relative
to the 32nd century, those clues are as good as any.
> To my knowledge there's only one solid source of information as to
> when the war ended, and that's in the Marvel UK Transformers story
> "Peace". It happens in 2510 -- although fighting does continue
> (Autobot against Autobot) after this "peace", the war between the
> Autobots and Decepticons ends there (according to this source).
Ah, but that was in the Unicron-imprisoned-in-the-Matrix future. (IIRC,
Rodimus even blames Uni's influence for helping the Autobot/Autobot
infighting flourish.) But in the BC timeline, Uni threw his own "soul"
back in time when his body was destroyed in 2005, then was stuck hidden
away on Earth until the Beast future-era; therefore, he wouldn't have
been around to make lots of UK-future stuff happen (such as the "Legacy
of Unicron" saga, as well as the black-and-white arc where Uni takes
over Roddy's body and attacks the Autobots). Those events are pivotal
enough that I'd consider the 2510 date of Autobot victory to be
inapplicable to a discussion of this Unicron-less future.
(Incidentally, this also answers your claim that "After Unicron" could
refer to some other Unicronian appearance after 2005.)
> The presence of Fractyl, Packrat, and Onyx Primal in the BotCon
> stories really gums up efforts to shoehorn Omega Point into "our"
> continuity. Has there been any discussion and/or explanation of this
> before?
To quote Glen Hallit's response to my Big-Ass Treatise:
"Characterization and origins of the other Beast Warriors (Fractyl,
etc.) will be delved into when Primeval Dawn, part 2 is unveiled. There
are some explanations in there."
Also, the first time I brought the subject of Fractyl & co. up was on
the BotCon Beyond message-board (which no longer exists). There, Tengu
told me that those characters DO have origins that fit into BW-as-we-
know-it, but it's just a matter of finding the opportunity to TELL those
stories. With the main BC tale being so big and sprawling, he didn't
think chances were high of that happening. But it was still (and, I
guess, IS still) a possibility.
- Jackpot
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> Also, for reference, it's a good idea to check out my
>> Big-Ass Treatise on BotContinuity. The Google IDs are:
>>
>> Part 1: 3CA3C1BB...@hotmail.com
>> (Summary of the BotCon stories)
>>
>> Part 2: 3CA3C203...@hotmail.com
>> (Analysis thereof)
>
> Damn Jackpot. Those essays ROCK! Im sure you've been told this before,
> but they do.
Thank you. They were a pleasure to write, too. Their creation helped
me sort "Omega Point" out in my OWN mind.
> This sentiment (and the fact that BW/BM is presented as drawing on a
> hodgepodge of G1 and Toon continuities) continually spurs me to try
> and shoehorn the events of both continuities together into one
> contiguous history. Its difficult, but not impossible. The largest
> changes usually have to come in the form of altering dates -- for
> example, the Furman issues of the G1 comic all happening AFTER The
> Movie, like in the 2020s and 2030s.
That's a pretty big change, right there. But possibly bigger than that,
in my mind, is the conflict between personalities as portrayed in the
two continuities: Compare, say, comics Shockwave and Blaster to their
'toon counterparts.
But, hey, if you've opened the gates to cutting and pasting, then I
suppose anythig goes. For myself, my personal tolerance for canon-
meshing depends upon on which series you regard as "fact." For
instance, if you're writing a fanfic, but you decide not to stick to any
previous canon absolutely, then that's all right, since your own
writings are the "factual" depictions of events, while the 'toons and
comics are the "mythological" depictions of your fanfic universe's
history.
However, if you're analyzing TF history by itself, and you feel like
mashing a few continuities together, then I find it necessary to regard
at least ONE series as inviolable, with everything else being changed to
conform to and enrich it. For instance, the G1 'toon and G1/G2 comics
being reworked and melded into a single history for the intact,
unchanged Beast series. Or (as Furman actually DID), changing dialogue
and whatnot in the US comics to conform to the UK stories. That sort of
thing.
Now, it sounds like you're trying to create an all-encompassing TF
history that includes major elements from EVERY continuity, making
alterations to all of them in the process. And, while I can't fault
that on any objective principle, on a personal level, I can't help but
think, "And what will you do with it when it's DONE?" If no series is
left unchanged, then it's ultimately inapplicable to any of those series
as they are. It's a history without a story to enrich. Now, if you
were to write a fanfic BASED on that history, I could certainly see the
value. But otherwise... I'm glad you're enthusiastic about it, but it's
hard for me to understand the appeal.
>> In fact, the G1-era snippets in "The Wreckers" are probably the
>> ONLY competely valid historical scenes.
>
> WHOAH... Now that's a radical concept! Must make Glen Hallit happy.
Heh. Well, this is all under the rubric of taking the BC continuity as
"fact" and then reinterpreting the rest of the mythos in relation to it.
> Amen! Makes one salivate for "Transformers Universe" material, but I
> really don't expect meaty background material from Hasbro at this
> point...
To be quite honest, I expect no effort whatsoever on Hasbro's part to
integrate "TF: Universe" with the BC "TF: Expanded Universe." I figure
TF:U will be yet another new canon with minimal connections to anything
else, just like all the other post-BMach material.
> Well I sure did find it useful! And entertaining! Hats off to ya man!
Thank you! And I'm really glad that it can provoke discussion like
this.
Jackpot
>
> the Omega Point
> stories by Furman aren't exactly the most comprehendable read. I've
> tried to read the thing about five times by now, and I still don't
> know what the hell is going on.
Well, what don't you get?
C'mon, look at this thread. "Omega Point" is as easy as "Dick and
Jane."
- Jackpot ("See Dick. See Dick run. See Dick send Spot into the
far-distant past to prevent the destruction of his own timeline and the
cessation of his existence in a futile bid that ultimately creates the
very catastrophe he'd hoped to counteract, shredding the fabric of space
and time in a maelstrom of paradoxical contradictions. See Jane OD on
Advil.")
Desperado00
>far-distant past to prevent the destruction of his own timeline and the
>cessation of his existence in a futile bid that ultimately creates the
>very catastrophe he'd hoped to counteract, shredding the fabric of space
>and time in a maelstrom of paradoxical contradictions. See Jane OD on
>Advil.")
I HAD that book in kindergarten!
-----
Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.
An egotist is a self-made man who worships his creator.
If we aren't meant to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?
No horse is too dead to beat.
Aaron F. Bourque
>> - Jackpot ("See Dick. See Dick run. See Dick send Spot
>> into the far-distant past to prevent the destruction of his own
>> timeline and the cessation of his existence in a futile bid that
>> ultimately creates the very catastrophe he'd hoped to
>> counteract, shredding the fabric of space and time in a
>> maelstrom of paradoxical contradictions. See Jane OD on
>>Advil.")
>
>I HAD that book in kindergarten!
Oh yeah? I *wrote* that book in kindergarten.
Aaron "The Mad Whitaker" Bourque; all right, all right. Second
grade.
--
Women supposedly mature at a faster rate than men
If that is true, how come they live so much longer then . . ?
Nothing says maturity like transforming robot toys for ten-year-olds
http://members.aol.com/aaronbourque/cryotekwarning.jpg
Grebo Guru
This just might be the most interesting Transformers discussion Ive ever
had. But then, Ive never been to BotCon... Anyway, snipping through
Jackpot's message, we start with trying to pin down when the Great War
ended:
> But, for the sake of nailing the Beast future down to SOME spot relative
> to the 32nd century, those clues are as good as any.
My rebuttal to this is to again cite the UK story's date of 2510, but
you address that further below:
> Ah, but that was in the Unicron-imprisoned-in-the-Matrix future.
I don't see that future as being irrenconcilable with the G1 cartoon nor
with the US comics... But I am eager to hear reasons why I might be
wrong.
> (IIRC, Rodimus even blames Uni's influence for helping the
> Autobot/Autobot infighting flourish.)
Makes a lot more sense than falling back on some unexplained resurgence
of the Hate Plague...
> But in the BC timeline, Uni threw his own "soul" back in time when
> his body was destroyed in 2005, then was stuck hidden away on Earth
> until the Beast future-era; therefore, he wouldn't have been around
> to make lots of UK-future stuff happen (such as the "Legacy
> of Unicron" saga, as well as the black-and-white arc where Uni takes
> over Roddy's body and attacks the Autobots). Those events are pivotal
> enough that I'd consider the 2510 date of Autobot victory to be
> inapplicable to a discussion of this Unicron-less future.
>
> (Incidentally, this also answers your claim that "After Unicron" could
> refer to some other Unicronian appearance after 2005.)
As ever, well put. BUT! My question here is simply this: Why can't the
UK timeline follow from this story?
In the climactic battle of Omega Point, Shokaract is destroyed and the
Dark Essence's temporal link is severed. As the caption says, "In an
instant the Dark Essence of Unicron is gone, sucked back into the
timestream." This doesn't have to be taken as meaning that the DE is
destroyed -- in fact, it reads to me like it's specifically saying that
its not destroyed. Rather, the DE returns to the timestream...
presumably to the moment when Unicron is destroyed.
From there you can follow the Dark Essence through either the G1 toon or
the UK comics:
In the G1 toon, the DE still resides in Uni's orbiting head, eventually
giving Starscream a new body. (And, possibly, going into the Japanese
shows to merge with Devil Z, then ViolenJiger, then Dark Nova, and
eventually winding up on Earth again when it's called Gaia in the Beast
Wars II & Neo shows.)
In the UK comics continuity, the DE remains within the Matrix,
corrupting it and Rodimus, eventually causing (maybe) the Autobot civil
war we see in 2510.
Since Apelinq's journal makes no specific reference to Arcee, Daniel,
the end of the Great War, the Great Upgrade, nor the Pax Cybertronia...
that "316 AU" date remains reeeeally vague.
Actually, I agree with you that the date was probably *supposed* to tell
us that these events are happening 316 years after the "primary"
destruction of Unicron. But I just personally don't like it, is all. So
I'm playing Devil's advocate here. Or devil's pest. Or something like
that.
> To quote Glen Hallit's response to my Big-Ass Treatise:
> "Characterization and origins of the other Beast Warriors (Fractyl,
> etc.) will be delved into when Primeval Dawn, part 2 is unveiled. There
> are some explanations in there."
Fascinating! As if I wasn't already drooling in anticipation of that
story...
> Also, the first time I brought the subject of Fractyl & co. up was on
> the BotCon Beyond message-board (which no longer exists). There, Tengu
> told me that those characters DO have origins that fit into BW-as-we-
> know-it, but it's just a matter of finding the opportunity to TELL those
> stories. With the main BC tale being so big and sprawling, he didn't
> think chances were high of that happening. But it was still (and, I
> guess, IS still) a possibility.
Also fascinating! So then is Glen the man behind Primeval Dawn II's
story, rather than Bob Forward? Annnnd Tengu... Im revealing an
embarassing neophyte-ness here, but exactly who or what IS Tengu anyway,
that he can speak with that much authority about the backstory of Beast
Wars?
Alright, off I go to other topics. Keep on, uh, Transforming!
Grebo
Grebo Guru
Again I fly in the face of continuity by trying to resolve
continuities... Silly me. On this topic, Jackpot wrote:
> > for example, the Furman issues of the G1 comic all happening
> > AFTER The Movie, like in the 2020s and 2030s.
>
> That's a pretty big change, right there.
I admit it, it's true. But it works pretty well, given enough nitpicking
and excuse-making.
> But possibly bigger than that, in my mind, is the conflict between
> personalities as portrayed in the two continuities: Compare, say,
> comics Shockwave and Blaster to their 'toon counterparts.
Or Grimlock! Yeah, you're 100% right about the characters... Of course,
the same problem exists between Beast Wars and Beast Machines, and their
coexistence within the same continuity is practically unassailable.
> But, hey, if you've opened the gates to cutting and pasting, then I
> suppose anything goes.
I admit I do play a little fast and loose with things. I suppose my
prime directive is "all-inclusiveness".
> For myself, my personal tolerance for canon-meshing depends upon
> on which series you regard as "fact."
I suppose I tend to look at the Japanese G1 animated continuity (which
include G1 TF, The Movie, etc., but excludes the super-stinky Rebirth
story) as "fact". Mostly.
> For instance, if you're writing a fanfic, but you decide not to
> stick to any previous canon absolutely, then that's all right,
> since your own writings are the "factual" depictions of events,
> while the 'toons and comics are the "mythological" depictions
> of your fanfic universe's history.
Well, I do have what I think is a pretty spiffy Machine Wars fanfic
brewing in my brain, but I am uncertain if I'll ever actually render it
in any readable format...
> However, if you're analyzing TF history by itself, and you feel like
> mashing a few continuities together, then I find it necessary to regard
> at least ONE series as inviolable, with everything else being changed to
> conform to and enrich it. For instance, the G1 'toon and G1/G2 comics
> being reworked and melded into a single history for the intact,
> unchanged Beast series. Or (as Furman actually DID), changing dialogue
> and whatnot in the US comics to conform to the UK stories. That sort of
> thing.
To completely mess up what I said in my previous paragraph, I am very
fond of the BW/BM approach, which mushes together the G1 toon and the
G1/G2 comics. I lump in the UK comics and Japanese anime shows as well,
because "I like my Transformers universe large" as you so eloquently put
it in your BotContinuity essay.
> Now, it sounds like you're trying to create an all-encompassing TF
> history that includes major elements from EVERY continuity, making
> alterations to all of them in the process.
I dont think I've suggested any alterations to BW/BM continuity, but
please correct me if Im mistaken...
> And, while I can't fault that on any objective principle, on a
> personal level, I can't help but think, "And what will you do with
> it when it's DONE?"
Well, I might try and write up some kind of "grand unified theory of the
Transformers universe" and post it...
But currently, Im arranging a Transformers roleplaying game with 5 of my
friends -- an oldschool, D&D style RPG. We're currently debating whether
it should be set in the "Intermezzo" period between G1/G2 and BW
(probably mixing in several elements from the Transmasters Uk stories,
Relentless, Alignment, etc.) and the post-BM (that is, Transtech) era.
Should be a hoot.
But even if I wasn't setting up the RPG I'd be doing this just
because... I dunno... I find it enjoyable. What can I say? I make lists
for the fun of it, for pete's sake! Im wierd that way.
> If no series is left unchanged, then it's ultimately inapplicable
> to any of those series as they are. It's a history without a story
> to enrich.
Id have to say Im leaning most towards enriching BW/BM, since BW was, in
my opinion, a really good show. The very best TF show ever, but also
just a damn good show.
> Now, if you were to write a fanfic BASED on that history,
> I could certainly see the value. But otherwise... I'm glad you're
> enthusiastic about it, but it's hard for me to understand the appeal.
Fair enough. I am indeed enthusiastic, and hopefully my TF RPG will go
over well with my players.
> To be quite honest, I expect no effort whatsoever on Hasbro's part to
> integrate "TF: Universe" with the BC "TF: Expanded Universe."
No no, neither do I. I actually doubt it'll even integrate well with BW,
BM, or G1 in any form. Like Armada.
> I figure TF:U will be yet another new canon with minimal
> connections to anything else, just like all the other
> post-BMach material.
Yep.
Speaking of Armada, I need to start another thread...
Grebo
Aaron F. Bourque
>> But possibly bigger than that, in my mind, is the conflict
>> between personalities as portrayed in the two continuities:
>> Compare, say, comics Shockwave and Blaster to their 'toon
>> counterparts.
>
>Or Grimlock! Yeah, you're 100% right about the characters... Of
>course, the same problem exists between Beast Wars and
>Beast Machines, and their coexistence within the same
>continuity is practically unassailable.
Weeeeellll . . . He changes from bumbling badass to bumbling
child between season 2 and season 3. Maybe he changes some more?
Aaron "The Mad Whitaker" Bourque
--
Grebo Guru
In article <20030309011516...@mb-da.aol.com>,
aaronb...@aol.commandment (Aaron F. Bourque) wrote:
> Weeeeellll . . . He changes from bumbling badass to bumbling
> child between season 2 and season 3. Maybe he changes some more?
Ummm, Im sorry, but who are we talking about here?
Grebo
Jackpot
>
> My question here is simply this: Why can't the
> UK timeline follow from this story?
>
> In the climactic battle of Omega Point, Shokaract is destroyed and the
> Dark Essence's temporal link is severed.
.....
You're right. But not for the reasons you think you are.
First: When Apelinq was writing his Journal, events were still headed
towards Shokaract's eventual 32nd-century reign. For that matter, the
same goes for when the Axalon left. All of their information - the "300
years since the Great War" remark, the "316.075 AU" date - came from the
timeline in which Uni was hanging out on Earth undisturbed until the
Hunter would eventually find him.
It's very telling that, after the Beast Warriors came back home, none of
that information seemed to have changed. (Megatron's virus and Vehicons
had still overrun the planet, Apelinq's fellow marshals were the same,
it all was apparently happening in the right century, etc.) Therefore,
Uni's presence on Earth or absence from Earth led to the exact same
future until at least the beginning of BMach. (Obviously, the future
would EVENTUALLY change with Uni's absence, but apparently not until the
Hunter found him, which must be after the time of Apelinq's Journals.)
From this, I had concluded that the BC continuity could never include
the events of the UK comic future. Unicron was just too active in the
UK post-Movie years for his presence or absence to have had no effect on
the Beast future-era. And, personally, *I'm* perfectly willing to leave
it at that. Makes things less messy to just put the UK comics and BC
stories in separate rooms and call it good.
But I know how you are. And if you want to bring the UK continuity into
the BC books while staying true to the former's ideas of the future...
well, I've realized that there might be a way:
The key is that there isn't just one "UK future." There's the UK future
up till the end of "Time Wars," which seems consistent unto itself.
This includes Roddy sucking Unicron's Essence out of his disembodied
head, into the Matrix. Later, Roddy would chase the time-traveling
Galvatron to late-80s Earth - ending with the destruction of Galvy, Cyc,
and Scourge. But the victorious Roddy returned to the future to find
that the timeline had changed, and a new Galvy was suddenly in control
of Cybertron. THIS is the future that led to the story "Peace," which
placed the end of the Great War at 2510.
Now, we don't KNOW what caused the future to change. Really, ANYTHING
the time-travelling Movie characters did in the past could've snowballed
into something big. Maybe Kup stepped on a snail that he shouldn't
have, sending the snail-centered ecosystem into a drastic new direction
that eventually made conditions right for Galvatron to conquer Cybertron
after the Movie and forego his ultimately self-destructive time-
travelling. Who knows?
All we do know is, things had changed somehow. What if... this new
future is the one in which Uni decided to retreat through time instead
of sticking around? Maybe the timestorm that Cyc and Scourge caused by
time-jumping without mass-displacement weakened space-time enough that
Uni COULD make his escape. So when Roddy returned, he returned to a
future in which Uni's head was an empty relic, and the Dark Essence was
now hidden away on Earth. In this Unicron-less future, for some reason
Galvy decided NOT to make the time-jump to late-80s Earth, and instead
was able to conquer the Cybertron of his own time. So. In pops this
old Roddy from the Time Wars - a Roddy who no longer "belongs." But
what's interesting is that he carries a Dark Essence inside of his
Matrix. So, while one Dark Essence slumbers on Earth awaiting the
Hunter, Roddy's Dark Essence can still do all that stuff it does in the
UK future, and the date of "Peace" can still be the true end of the
Great War, 300 years before the Axalon would depart on its fateful trip.
There's only one big discrepancy that comes to mind: How a "cancelled
history" will affect a time-traveler. If we play by "Omega Point"
rules, then Roddy should've have just been able to walk away from the
Time Wars. In the new future, Galvy didn't make the time-trip, so the
Time Wars never would've happened. But rather than erasing all those
late-80s events and eliminating this rogue Rodimus with a Dark Essence
he shouldn't now have, the timestream allows Roddy to just keep on
keepin' on. It seems that the chain of cause and effect is broken at
the moment of time-travel into the past. In terms of paradox-avoidance,
this setup is WONDERFUL. Someone from the future doesn't need to worry
about "killing himself as a baby" - even if he blows his infant self's
brains out, he's still safe because such alterations to history will
never chase him into the past. Which is the way time-travel OUGHT to be
written.
So how come Roddy gets go through history-changing time-travel
unscathed, but Shokky does the same thing and creates horrible
paradoxes? The only element I can think of is mass-displacement. When
Rodimus appeared in the past, Optimus was instantly shunted into limbo.
Perhaps somehow this makes for a different kind of temporal effect, a
"safer" method of time-travelling that allows the time-traveller to
change history without falling victim to those changes.
Anyway, that's as far as I've thought it through, and I think it
basically works. Like I said, *I* prefer keeping the UK comics and BC
stories apart, since the less time-travel, the better. But the option
of combining them DOES seem to exist.
> Annnnd Tengu... Im revealing an
> embarassing neophyte-ness here, but exactly who or what IS Tengu
> anyway, that he can speak with that much authority about the backstory
> of Beast Wars?
Tengu's an old-time Transfan who's gotten involved with 3H. I think he
may have written some of the BC stories, but I'm not sure. Someone else
here probably knows more than I do.
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> But possibly bigger than that, in my mind, is the conflict between
>> personalities as portrayed in the two continuities: Compare, say,
>> comics Shockwave and Blaster to their 'toon counterparts.
>
> Or Grimlock! Yeah, you're 100% right about the characters... Of
> course, the same problem exists between Beast Wars and Beast Machines,
> and their coexistence within the same continuity is practically
> unassailable.
Not to the same degree, though, I'd say. Plus the BMach characters had
an excuse: They were in a completely different environment with
different weapons for a different war, and their Oracle alterations may
also have been more than physical.
>> If no series is left unchanged, then it's ultimately inapplicable
>> to any of those series as they are. It's a history without a story
>> to enrich.
<snip>
> Well, I might try and write up some kind of "grand unified theory of
> the Transformers universe" and post it...
>
> But currently, Im arranging a Transformers roleplaying game with 5 of
> my friends -- an oldschool, D&D style RPG.
Ah HA! See now, that's what I'm talkin' 'bout. You're creating this
new TF world for the purpose of literally playing in it. THAT makes
perfect sense to me.
> But even if I wasn't setting up the RPG I'd be doing this just
> because... I dunno... I find it enjoyable. What can I say? I make
> lists for the fun of it, for pete's sake! Im wierd that way.
Hey, to each his own. Like I said, I'm glad you're having fun, no
matter your goal. I'm just describing how my own mind approaches this
kind of endeavor.
David Willis
> > "Characterization and origins of the other Beast Warriors (Fractyl,
> > etc.) will be delved into when Primeval Dawn, part 2 is unveiled. There
> > are some explanations in there."
>
> Fascinating! As if I wasn't already drooling in anticipation of that
> story...
Hrm... I don't *remember* that when I saw PDII, but okay....
> Also fascinating! So then is Glen the man behind Primeval Dawn II's
> story, rather than Bob Forward? Annnnd Tengu... Im revealing an
> embarassing neophyte-ness here, but exactly who or what IS Tengu anyway,
> that he can speak with that much authority about the backstory of Beast
> Wars?
Bob Forward wrote Primevil Dawn I and II.
Tengu's an oldschool fan who worked with 3H for a while, punched up some
dialogue
and scenes in Wreckers #1, wrote Wreckers #2, and then vanished into places
unknown.
The townsfolk claim you can still hear the whispers of his sarcastic
newsgroup replies over
the rolling meadow under light of a full moon.
--David
www.itswalky.com
Grebo Guru
Cybertron! Earth! Gaia! Where does it all end?!? Who knows? Maybe
Jackpot knows. He wrote:
> > Or Grimlock! Yeah, you're 100% right about the characters... Of
> > course, the same problem exists between Beast Wars and Beast Machines,
> > and their coexistence within the same continuity is practically
> > unassailable.
>
> Not to the same degree, though, I'd say. Plus the BMach characters had
> an excuse: They were in a completely different environment with
> different weapons for a different war, and their Oracle alterations may
> also have been more than physical.
Yes, you're absolutely right about this. It had occurred to me as well.
But in essence, I think their personality changes but intrinsicly annoy
me -- I miss all the "That's just prime", "We're all gonna die" and
"Yeesss" goodness that BW gave us. But anyway!
> > But currently, Im arranging a Transformers roleplaying game with 5 of
> > my friends -- an oldschool, D&D style RPG.
>
> Ah HA! See now, that's what I'm talkin' 'bout. You're creating this
> new TF world for the purpose of literally playing in it. THAT makes
> perfect sense to me.
Fair nuff. Though Im certain I'd be doing this even if I wasn't
concocting a TF RPG.
> Hey, to each his own. Like I said, I'm glad you're having fun, no
> matter your goal. I'm just describing how my own mind approaches this
> kind of endeavor.
Im pretty sure everyone here LOVES how your mind approaches such
endeavors, Jackpot. Your insights have been a big help to all of us.
Anyway, I think we've pretty much put this topic to bed. (Unless anyone
else has anything to add?) On to the Micromasters, Mini-Cons, and
Maximals!
Grebo
Aaron F. Bourque
. . .
Grimlock.
Bumbling badass in seasons 1 and 2, bumbling child in season
3. Maybe he changes some more, to fit in with his comics
character.
Grebo Guru
Gotta love this stuff. The all-seeing Jackpot says:
> Grebo Guru wrote:
> >
> > My question here is simply this: Why can't the
> > UK timeline follow from this story?
> >
> > In the climactic battle of Omega Point, Shokaract is destroyed and the
> > Dark Essence's temporal link is severed.
>
> .....
>
> You're right. But not for the reasons you think you are.
>
> First: When Apelinq was writing his Journal, events were still headed
> towards Shokaract's eventual 32nd-century reign.
<snip>
> From this, I had concluded that the BC continuity could never include
> the events of the UK comic future.
<snip>
> But I know how you are.
Ack! I've been found out! Uhhhhh... those bodies were buried in my
backyard when I moved here!! Ummm... yeah thats it!
> And if you want to bring the UK continuity into the BC books while
> staying true to the former's ideas of the future...
> well, I've realized that there might be a way:
Yay!
> The key is that there isn't just one "UK future." There's the UK future
> up till the end of "Time Wars," which seems consistent unto itself.
<snip>
> Roddy returned to the future to find that the timeline had changed,
> and a new Galvy was suddenly in control of Cybertron. THIS is the
> future that led to the story "Peace," which placed the end of the
> Great War at 2510.
Hoof... Well, I do have all of the UK comics on CD. I really gotta sit
down and read them all! Only gone through some of them so far. Its a lot
of material!
> Now, we don't KNOW what caused the future to change. Really, ANYTHING
> the time-travelling Movie characters did in the past could've snowballed
> into something big.
<snip>
Yes, this is precisely the sentiment I rely on as an excuse for much of
my theorizing. Or should I say fantasizing? Anyway:
> All we do know is, things had changed somehow. What if... this new
> future is the one in which Uni decided to retreat through time instead
> of sticking around?
<snip>
> So, while one Dark Essence slumbers on Earth awaiting the
> Hunter, Roddy's Dark Essence can still do all that stuff it does in the
> UK future, and the date of "Peace" can still be the true end of the
> Great War, 300 years before the Axalon would depart on its fateful trip.
Awwww yeah... NOW we're cooking with focussed fusion!
> There's only one big discrepancy that comes to mind: How a "cancelled
> history" will affect a time-traveler. If we play by "Omega Point"
> rules, then Roddy should've have just been able to walk away from the
> Time Wars.
<snip>
> So how come Roddy gets go through history-changing time-travel
> unscathed, but Shokky does the same thing and creates horrible
> paradoxes? The only element I can think of is mass-displacement. When
> Rodimus appeared in the past, Optimus was instantly shunted into limbo.
> Perhaps somehow this makes for a different kind of temporal effect, a
> "safer" method of time-travelling that allows the time-traveller to
> change history without falling victim to those changes.
Word up G!!! I like this theory a whole heckuva lot. It makes sense
inasmuch as anything having to do with time travel makes sense, and
establishes a "rule" specific to how time travel works in the TF
universe. Keen!
> Anyway, that's as far as I've thought it through, and I think it
> basically works. Like I said, *I* prefer keeping the UK comics and BC
> stories apart, since the less time-travel, the better. But the option
> of combining them DOES seem to exist.
It seems that in the world of the Transformers, anything is possible.
Schweet.
In the final analysis, I have come to really love the principle which
you said the writers of BW followed: That all the G1 comics and
animation are all "legendary" history, and that the BW/BM (and BotCon,
too, possibly) stories are fact. That suits me quite nicely indeed.
Grebo
Jackpot
>
> Jackpot wrote:
>>
>> and a new Galvy was suddenly in control of Cybertron. THIS is the
>> future that led to the story "Peace," which placed the end of the
>> Great War at 2510.
>
> Hoof... Well, I do have all of the UK comics on CD. I really gotta sit
> down and read them all! Only gone through some of them so far. Its a
> lot of material!
Yeah, I did almost all my UK reading online. And most of that, I only got
the chance to read once.
Anyway, the revelation of the changed future occurred in one of the later
black-and-white issues, so just reading "Time Wars" proper wouldn't clue
you in.
> Word up G!!! I like this theory a whole heckuva lot. It makes sense
> inasmuch as anything having to do with time travel makes sense, and
> establishes a "rule" specific to how time travel works in the TF
> universe. Keen!
Thanks. I'm a stickler when it comes to time-travel stories, but I admit
that it's all completely pseudoscience anyway. In reality, we have no
IDEA how time-travel would affect causality through history, so it's not
as though we can analyze a time-travel story through the eyes of actual
physics or anything. The only thing I insist upon, though, is that any
time-travel story play by its own rules. The writer is more-or-less free
to make up any set of temporal laws, but they have to make some kind of
intrinsic sense, and they have to be consistently applied through the
whole story.
You'd think those would be easy conditions to keep. But rare is the tale
that stays true to its own setup.
Jackpot
>
> Cybertron! Earth! Gaia! Where does it all end?!? Who knows? Maybe
> Jackpot knows.
[lick] One...
[lick] Two...
[lick] Three...
[**CRUNCH**]
Three.
> Im pretty sure everyone here LOVES how your mind approaches such
> endeavors, Jackpot.
If they know what's good for 'em. They wouldn't WANT to be wished into
that cornfield, would they?
> Your insights have been a big help to all of us.
Well, thank you. I do appreciate that.
> Anyway, I think we've pretty much put this topic to bed. (Unless
> anyone else has anything to add?)
Mr. Gla-- er, Derik's been quiet over there for a while. He's probably
brewing up some nefarious plot as we speak.
Merytneith
>>Im pretty sure everyone here LOVES how your mind approaches such
>>endeavors, Jackpot.
>>
>
> If they know what's good for 'em. They wouldn't WANT to be wished into
> that cornfield, would they?
Y'know, I'm used to being blown away by absolutely
fascinating though incredibly difficult to understand
material... in *class*. I think reading this thread is the
first time I've experienced that *here*. A lot like reading
Posner's _Economic Analysis of Torts_ for the first time.
(Just trust me on that one.)
>>Anyway, I think we've pretty much put this topic to bed. (Unless
>>anyone else has anything to add?)
>>
>
> Mr. Gla-- er, Derik's been quiet over there for a while. He's probably
> brewing up some nefarious plot as we speak.
After reading this stuff, I think I love you and Derik both.
(That's right! If my ancestors could do polygyny, I think it only fair that I get a shot at polyandry.)
--Mery...
=================================================
Marge: So, Mr. Hutz, does my husband have a case?
Hutz: I'm sorry, Mrs. Simpson, but you can't
copyright a drink.
Homer: [disappointed] Awww....
Hutz: This all goes back to the Frank Wallbanger
case of '78. How about that! I looked
something up! These books behind me don't
just make the office look good, they're
filled with useful legal tidbits just like
that!
=================================================
G.B.Blackrock
> In article <20030216234937...@mb-md.aol.com>,
> dkh...@aol.com (DKhan1) wrote:
>
> > U know, other then u trying to squeeze every Transformer continuity together
> > (Armada and Beast Wars just should not co-exist in the same universe)
>
> Why not? As far as I can tell, the Armada TFs came from Cybertron before
> the Beast Wars age. (All those familiar G1 TFs running around when the
> signal is detected makes me think that.)
>
I believe he was commenting more on the relative quality of Amada vs.
Beast Wars, and not commenting on any particular continuity
difficulties.
I myself am also of the opinion that one should not try to put these
intentionally separate continuities together, but your posts are
clearly proof that one can if one wants to hard enough. Very well
thought through, and you've certainly responded well to most of the
comments I've seen.
G.B. Blackrock
Derik Smith
>Derik Smith wrote:
>>
>> Jackpot wrote:
>
>Okay, why do you say that? (It seems like the events of "Wreckers" #1
>proceed pretty quickly and smoothly. It's hard for me to imagine
>everything from "The Key" to... what, "Wolf In the Fold" happening
>somewhere between scenes - especially the planet-rending climax of
>season 1.)
Ignore that, I was thinking of the wrong event.
Though since you bring up the Megahead era…
You said earlier that you have trouble resolving the Omega Point version
of BM (written, frankly, about beast Hunters since it proceeds the TV series)
with the TV series, specifically a Megatron that would employ Predacons to hunt
down Maximals.
I point out that After his drones were defeated, Megatron showed no
hesitation at creating 3 sparked generals. After 2 of those generals were
destroyed, he picked another 2. That's 5 in the TV show. Given Wreckers #1,
he had at least 3 more generals. Apelinq's journals mention a 4th (Mirage.)
Once he has 9 of these guys under his belt, (possibly more, given Scavenger and
possibly Cyclonus, albeit Cyclonus a failure…) I see it more as exception
than rule. Megatron was willing to work with subordinates.
I grant you, it's another order of magnitude to have Megatron working with
free-thinking Predacons than to have him brainwash his vehicon generals… but
we don't know the exact relationship with the hunter. For all we know he had
had his personality adjusted by Megsie to make him more pliable…
>Good point. Still, though, saying it was precisely four years seems
>unjustifiably specific to me. I mean, we don't even know how long the
>Beast Wars lasted in show-time. It was three years' worth of television
>for us, but for them, it could've been over and done with in less than
>twelve months. Or dragged out over five, six, or more years (though I
>find shorter lengths of time more plausible).
At the time the Agenda aired, we appeared to be looking at 2 years
(Seaclamp mentioned the Axalon's disappearance last Megacycle) passing on
Cybertron. A 1:1 passage of time on Earth and Cybertron- by no means necessary
witht ime travel, but a common convention.
Given that Apelinq's journals indicate a relatively short time since the
Axalon disappearance and Depth Charge going rogue… It seems illogical to
assumt that 1:1 ratio has been abaondoned.
>I can buy that Furman probably intended the "shift in the power
>structure on post-war Cybertron" to have meant the rise of Maxies and
>Preds. I'd mention that there's no reason why it HAS to correspond
>thusly within the world of the fiction, but your intent was to
>distinguish Furman's mindset from other writers', so your point stands.
Well that and Alignment pushes the Autobot/Con era well into the early
2300's. I also took THAT as an indicator of Furman's mindset.
Yes, Leonicus's ballpark date for the 'political realignment' on Cybertron
could refer to anything, but it is highly likely that it was meant to refer to
the Maximal/Pred reformation, and the timing of such would match other stuff
Furman's done.
>Ah ha. I've never read "Alignment." In fact, I really don't know
>anything about it. And since it's not part of the BC canon, I'll go on
>happily ignoring it for the rest of this discussion. :)
Pity, it has some excellent bits. ;)
>>> Therefore, if
>>> Shokky was worried about Uni escaping, then the LAST thing he would
>>> do about it would be sending troops back in time, where they could
>>> screw everything up.
>>
>> Right, if time flows only forward.
>
>Well, it does. Cause and effect follow one another pretty regularly.
>As I said above, if you want to try positing a nonlinear - or
>reverse-linear or whatever - model, go for it. But you can't simply
>brush away the fundamentals without REPLACING them with something.
Predestination is just a pretty way of saying 'history flows downhill.'
If there is a massive temporal event in the near future, it could well affect
events in the past. A… gravity well of destiny. Sufficiently large masses
warp space, why wouldn't sufficiently large temporal snarls warp time in every
direction?
>Your summary of "Omega Point"s colliding timelines and potential
>paradoxes is all fine and good, but your conclusion seems to be, "The
>universe didn't like it, there was a big explosion, life went on."
>Which, I think, does an injustice to the analysis we've been giving the
>rest of the story. It's a cheap way out. When Glen replied to my
>Big-Ass Treatise, he said that "Omega Point" was SUPPOSED to be a
>paradox - which I balked at. How, I asked him, would the universe
>determine any future path after the paradox? I mean, that's exactly
>what's so dangerous about paradoxes - they prevent any one outcome from
>occurring. But he never answered.
But this is not a simple paradox, vacillating between two possible
outcomes. Not just a timeloop of events on earth 50,000 years ago determining
the validity of events in the 32nd century.
This is also a timeloop occurring right next to Mt. Saint Hillary,
potentially derailing their entire history. It's a timeloop involving the
Beast Warriors- whose history yis dependent on the Ark's. Apelinq is visiting
and playing a bit part in the events that will lead to the era he himself comes
from, holding an artifact from the 32nd century, lost in the 24th, while in
50,000 BCE! Shokaract's own past is dependent not only on what happens to the
dark essence here, but on the exact circumstances of Megatron's defeat in the
beast wars and later rise to power.
So what I'm saying is… this isn't just a simple case of 'He assassinated
kennedy in the past, we have 2 minutes to follow him!' It's more… 'The past
is going wack, but with changes in the timestream traveling 20 years per
minute, I have a couple hours as it works it's way back down the chain of
interlocking paradoxes and gets to me, and even then, the paradoxes are
irresolvable, so my timeline will flip back on after a couple hours.'
Paradoxes flipping back and forth between impossibilities, trying to find
a 'stable' configuration of history and future-history- though none exists. In
such a situation with an… epileptic timeline tuning Shokaract in and out of
existence… he might be able to (since he's one of only 2 players in this game
who can actually see through time) consider, and then carefully insert his own
agents into the past to create a stable outcome that the universe will choose
by default- one favoring himself.
…of course I don't favor this theory. At some point, the universe has
to resolve paradoxes. You don't just get an error message saying;
UNIVERS.EXE HAS UNEXPECTEDLY QUIT
RESTART? (Y/N) _
But in science-fiction, it's so much more dramatic to see the heroes
valiantly resolving the paradox. So we don't see what happens when the heroes
fail to do so. Presuming that the universe is able to do so (and it must be,
in any world that permits time travel that is not perfectly predestined)
So, um… who are you to say that when the universe hits a really bad
paradox time doesn't turn to snot and slosh around until it assumes a workable
configuration? Prove that's not what happens in a paradox. ;)
'Timestorms' are nonsense too, but they apparently exist!
I'm also compelled to point out, if one of the transfer interlink's
abilities is to seal a rift in time, the blending of realities might be what
we'd see if it created one. (Though I don't think that's what happened.)
>However, another option that I find more palatable is that Shokky's just
>plain paranoid. He doesn't care if Apelinq unmolested will actually USE
>the TI to unseat the Dark Essence during the Beast Wars; Shokky just
>wants the damn MacGuffin out of Maximal hands - especially around the
>DE. So his paranoia does him in, since everything would've been fine if
>he'd left well enough alone.
Point, if you created a device capable of altering time, opening transwarp
portals, creating new life, and making thousands of julian fries, wouldn't you
be just a TCH nervous if the guy who found it after you lost it somehow just
HAPPENED to end up next to your prize potato crop?
And it's perhaps possible that the incipient snotification of time blocked
some of Shokaract's time-vision? All he knows is the TI shows up in the past,
there's this huge potential paradox, (remember, Unicron could search potential
futures) and he can't see anything beyond that point? That'd make ME nervous.
>> I think the TI will come up more as Wreckers progresses, ,hopefully
>> we'll get some answers to it's ultimate nature that can aid us. Dfor
>> all we know it's an alien artifact from the 32nd century.
>> …of course, this being Wreckers, it'll probably forget Shoakract is
>> supposed to tie into the TI's origins and just make it a contemporary
>> alien artifact. Wreckers has a demonstratably limited grasp of the
>> finer details of Omega Point's interlocking time travel.
>
>Though there's no proof anywhere that the TI *must* have its origins in
>Shokky's time. There are certain theories that rely upon that notion,
>but not all do. In fact, one argument against it is that, after
>Shokky's timeline was utterly wiped clean - including all his BW
>interventions - 'Linq STILL had the TI. (Granted, he also still had his
>memories of Omega Point, but at least the mind is a fuzzier, more
>ephemeral subject. The TI is just a hunk of matter that really
>shouldn't have remained in Apelinq's possession if he had originally
>gotten it from Shokky.)
Point. However, the TI was apparently an ALIEN artifact that Shokaract
got his hands on in the 32nd century. Even if Shokaract's timeline was erased,
that artifact would presumably still exist, somewhen.
Here's food for thought. Omega Point was predestined to happen, it was
mentioned in the covenant of Primus. Shokaract, Apelinq, the whole deal. A
PREDESTINED paradox that annihilates itself. That makes… no sense, unless
the timeline, or some PRODUCT of the timeline, was not entirely annihilated.
Perhaps the TI, a product of Shokaract's timeline, is necessary for the grand
plan, so Shokaract must exist, and then be erased, in order that the TI be
created. :-)
-Derik
"You have zero talent. Give up writing." -Yuki Eiri, Gravitation
"How does this thing stand up?" -Chris Funaro, on Dana Mitchell
I probably don't care what you think.
Derik Smith
>>far-distant past to prevent the destruction of his own timeline and the
>>cessation of his existence in a futile bid that ultimately creates the
>>very catastrophe he'd hoped to counteract, shredding the fabric of space
>>and time in a maelstrom of paradoxical contradictions. See Jane OD on
>>Advil.")
>
>I HAD that book in kindergarten!
I REMEMBER having it, but the book tiself was erased from the timestream.
Derik Smith
>(this time of Cybertron) and the caption "Several months after the Pax
>Cybertronia."
>
>This new establishing shot coupled with the new caption (one which
>goes out of its way to specificall mention the time period) suggests
>to me that these two events do not happen terribly close to each other
>in either time or space. Arcee's moping scene (where she's looking at
>the picture of Daniel on the wall) could easily happen hundreds of
>years after Daniel's death.
But Blackarachnia's comments in BW, frankly, put the great war 300 years
ago. Which fits the Wreckers timeline, but not Furman's.
I still prefer Furman's. ;)
>Based on the "Peace" story, which puts the Great War's end at 2510, I
>figure the Pax Cybertronia was enacted the next year, 2511. (The
>one-year-later date is just for the sake of convenience and easy
>bookkeeping. As ever, we have no actual info as to how long after the
>Great War the Pax Cybertronia was signed.)
But the date in the 'Peace' story is how long it took to kill every
Decepticon. That didn't HAPPEN in the BW timeline, the Decepticons were
defeated, or at least partially stalemated, and poth sides declared the war
over, but unresolved. This results in BW-era's Cold War.
>Anyway, this would put Beast Wars (which happens 300 years after the
>end of the Great War) at about 2811, and thus puts Beast Machines and
>Enter The Wreckers at about 2814.
...okay, I can see where you get that from, but I just disagree. It's a
valid interpetation of the dates, but I don't think it's one that anyone...
meant to be.
>Actually, I see nothing to suggest that Beast Machines didn't happen
>immediately after Beast Wars. Hence my 2814 date. Conveniently, this
>is still well before Omega Point's "age of Shokaract", which happens
>in the 3100s.
...I'm gonna have to think about this one. Omega Point arbitrarily picked
up the Covenant '200 years later' after their intial intro. By a conventional
timeline, this would be the 26th century, 200 years after BM with Shokaract
just beginning his purges. Which works. But in your timeline, it could
actually catch them up to Shokaract's 'present' in the 32nd century, and
Scorpius had gone missing by that point...
...I'm gonna have to think about that one.
Derik Smith
From: greb...@aol.com (Grebo)
Date: 3/8/2003 12:04 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id: <b4895029.03030...@posting.google.com>
Grebo wrote:
>> I take Glen's date for BM from Apelinq's journal entry, 316 AU- 316
>> years after unicron, or 2321. 'Linq's entries mention the Axalon
>
>Interesting! I hadn't caught that. Of course, Unicron showed up
>several times... In The Movie, later on in the UK comics (like 2008 or
>something I think) and then there's his Beast Wars Neo appearance to
>boot!
2010 was his last appearance, he formed a small version of his own body
(say, about Grand Maximus size) around Rodimus and attacked Cybertron.
>> Megatron had not been in power for years, as in Furman's
>> timeline, but months.
>
>Im not convinced that Furman's timeline is supposed to apply to the BM
>timeline. The Hunter comes from one possible future -- quite probably
>one in which the BM Maximals failed to overthrow him. In that future,
>Megatron could indeed have been in control of Cybetron for years,
>employing Pred agents to hunt down Maximal stragglers. However, in
>"our" timeline (that is, the timeline of Beast Machines) I still don't
>see any evidence that BM takes place very long at all after the end of
>BW.
Well, att he end of the botcon 2000 comic, we saw an epilogue of the new,
resolved timeline. It had the Hunter fleeting, just as he had in the text
portions of Botcon 99, and finding the cave empty instead of the DE. So the
events leading up to the hunter finding the DE must still be valid.
As for length... months just seems too damn short. Nightscream was the
ONLY survivor on the planet? He indicated that all the other survivors
(modelocked like him but otherwise immune) eventually shut down for lack of
energon. Nightscream survived because he found an organic fuel source. I
just... have trouble believing that everyone starved to death in months. this
si cybertron, where survivors eked out an existance on slim energy supplies for
millions of years.
Also, Rattrap seemed gobsmacked when Nightscream said they'd all gotten
built-in DNA scanners in the last quantum-cycle upgrade. (Though to be fair
this technology was under development in BW2.)
>> …of course for reason I stated previously, I think the interlink is a
>> 32nd century piece of Predacon technology. Why does Apelinq have it?
>
>Erp! Im sorry, I missed your previously stated reason. Could you
>restate it, or point me in the right direction? Sorry...
Onyx Primal briefly held the Transfer Interlink, and described it as a
Predacon artifact- but of some futuristic design. Presumably this refers to
Shokaract's era, not BM (which was only 3 years int he future at that point,
and thus not terribly 'futuristic.')
Derik Smith
>> (This is consistent with the timeline Furman used for Alignment.)
>
>GOD I want a copy of the conclusion of Alignment! I only have the
>first part... Finding a copy of that story for sale is infuriatingly
>hard.
http://makeashorterlink.com/?S56622DB3
>> See, at the end of the BC2K comic, the DE flees into the timestream
>> once again. I think from there it flees to Gaea, not back to 2005.
>
>Aha!!! Finally Gaia is brought back into the picture. Gaia, aka the
>Earth of the BW future (2813 by my reckoning) -- and why to Gaia?
>Because its the same planet as Earth, a life-supporting planet which
>is (for some reason) the ideal environment for a disembodied space
>God. Go figure.
But Gaea ISN'T Earth. Leastwise, I don't think it is. Lioconvoy's dream
sequence in the second issue of the BW2 Manga shows it populated by civilian
robots. (Presumalby this is before they rendered themselves extinct.)
http://makeashorterlink.com/?P5DC211C3
>> Those extra Beast Warriors came from somewhen.
>
>This subject has always really annoyed me. The presence of Fractyl,
>Packrat, and Onyx Primal in the BotCon stories really gums up efforts
>to shoehorn Omega Point into "our" continuity. Has there been any
>discussion and/or explanation of this before?
The extra Beast Warriors I was efering to are the ones from the Botcon
2000 comic, whe time collapsed we saw B.Boom, Transquito, Airhamer, Polar Claw
and others emerging from alternate timeline to figh Shokaract.
Do you have the BC2000 comic? (Just affects how much I presume you know
for this thread.)
Derik Smith
>From there you can follow the Dark Essence through either the G1 toon or
>the UK comics:
>
>In the G1 toon, the DE still resides in Uni's orbiting head, eventually
>giving Starscream a new body. (And, possibly, going into the Japanese
>shows to merge with Devil Z, then ViolenJiger, then Dark Nova, and
>eventually winding up on Earth again when it's called Gaia in the Beast
>Wars II & Neo shows.)
Well, or at least some fragment of the DE does. Unicron seems to be one
of those dudes who survives stuff in different ways.
In Dark Awakening, Prime's spark emerges from the matrix to inhabit his
dead body. In the US comics, a coopy of his mind is uploaded into a new body.
If BOTH of these had happened int he same continuity (and really there is
no reason they could not) would you then have TWO versions of Optimus Prime?
>In the UK comics continuity, the DE remains within the Matrix,
>corrupting it and Rodimus, eventually causing (maybe) the Autobot civil
>war we see in 2510.
Yet that future appears to be negated by Rodimus Prime dying on earth in
2356, his body corrupted by Unicron in the matrix. (events that are themselves
negated by Hot Rod runnign around on Cybertron in Wreckers, but hey.) You
COULD wriggle around and try and fit them all in, but I really wish you
wouldn't. They're different outcomes. More than anything (IMO) BW-era
proceeds fromt he latter-day japanese stuff.
Derik Smith
>The key is that there isn't just one "UK future." There's the UK future
>up till the end of "Time Wars," which seems consistent unto itself.
>This includes Roddy sucking Unicron's Essence out of his disembodied
>head, into the Matrix. Later, Roddy would chase the time-traveling
>Galvatron to late-80s Earth - ending with the destruction of Galvy, Cyc,
>and Scourge. But the victorious Roddy returned to the future to find
>that the timeline had changed, and a new Galvy was suddenly in control
>of Cybertron. THIS is the future that led to the story "Peace," which
>placed the end of the Great War at 2510.
Actually, there's 3 UK futures. The Earthforce stories take place in an
alternate branch-off of US #73. (well, the branch occours sometime between 69
and 73, we see definitve evicence of the branch in US #73.) In the US
timeline, Galvatron attack Cybertron and takes Emirate Xaaron hostake to awaken
Primus and destroy Unicron. As a result, Unicron (mistrustful of Galvatron and
having lost contact with him inside of Cybertron) cuts shortt he scenic route
he'd been taking to Cybertron, completely bypassing the planet Jhi, and arrives
in 1991.
In the UK branch however instead of attacking Cybertron, Galvatron goes to
the Ark in orbit of Earth and tries to recruit some damaged autobots to his
cause. They manage to outsmart him and clobber him. Unicron, who never has
his suspicious raised by Galvatron's absence, remains on the scenic route
towards Cybertron, and will arrive in 2005/6. (This I construe from Prime's
comments to Grimlock when touring Autobot Earth in the 'The 4 million year
ich.')
>Now, we don't KNOW what caused the future to change. Really, ANYTHING
>the time-travelling Movie characters did in the past could've snowballed
>into something big. Maybe Kup stepped on a snail that he shouldn't
>have, sending the snail-centered ecosystem into a drastic new direction
>that eventually made conditions right for Galvatron to conquer Cybertron
>after the Movie and forego his ultimately self-destructive time-
>travelling. Who knows?
Actually, I think it was shortly after time wars. 'Two Megatrtons.' In
the original timeline, Straxus-thinking-he-wasMegatron was destined to become
Galvatron. (Ravage explicitly says straxus-megs was the same one he fought
beside in the time wars) This galvatron would be defeated by Rodimus Prime in
TF:TM, and flee to the past.
But once Straxus killed himself, the REAL megatron was destined to become
Galvatron. As a result you have 2 futures- 'Rhythms of Darkness' where Galvy
killed Rodimus Prime and Unicron ate Cybertron, and the second UK 'future'
where Galvatron ruled Cybertron and sent Rodimus's autobots fleeing to Earth.
Buth a result of a stronger, arguably more stable, Galvatron.
Derik Smith
>Tengu's an oldschool fan who worked with 3H for a while,
>punched up some dialogue and scenes in Wreckers #1,
>wrote Wreckers #2, and then vanished into places unknown.
Didn't he also write Apelinq's journals?
David Willis
> >punched up some dialogue and scenes in Wreckers #1,
> >wrote Wreckers #2, and then vanished into places unknown.
>
> Didn't he also write Apelinq's journals?
Yessir.
--David
www.itswalky.com
Jackpot
>
> After reading this stuff, I think I love you and Derik both.
>
> (That's right! If my ancestors could do polygyny, I think it only
> fair that I get a shot at polyandry.)
...
.......
..............
Sure, okay. Just as long as I get multiple wives then, too.
- Jackpot (who envisions our web of marriages spreading its
tendrils through the world in a snowballing cascade of matrimony that
shall one day ensnare every man, woman, and, uh, legal adult on Earth.)
Thomas Hamann
through the wires of the web:
>Merytneith wrote:
>>
>> After reading this stuff, I think I love you and Derik both.
>>
>> (That's right! If my ancestors could do polygyny, I think it only
>> fair that I get a shot at polyandry.)
>
>...
>
>.......
>
>..............
>
>Sure, okay. Just as long as I get multiple wives then, too.
>
> - Jackpot (who envisions our web of marriages spreading its
>tendrils through the world in a snowballing cascade of matrimony that
>shall one day ensnare every man, woman, and, uh, legal adult on Earth.)
>
(Seeing as how the consentive age differs from country to country...)
Thomas Hamann...
--
Thomas Hamann's Website: http://www.geocities.com/hamann_td
"...you ain't no different than Ben Laden..." - The emminent Dr. J ranting about me on alt.toys.transformers.
Derik Smith
>Mr. Gla-- er, Derik's been quiet over there for a while. He's
>probably brewing up some nefarious plot as we speak.
Mostly I've been quiet becaue while I think there's a legitimate core idea
here- Cybertron COULD be earth, somehow time-displaced, that idea is mostly
lost in... sillyness. Rewriting a cannon with multiple parallel earths
becoming Cybertron and Gaea and such.
No one writes about earth becoming Char, damnit, despite Char having
devastated Earth-like cities.
For the record, here's what I have to say.
BW-era Cybertron is Cybertron, not another planet. It has Vector Sigma,
it has the Plasma Energy Chamber, it has Iacon, it has lower levels on which
Quintessonian alloys are found. It's the original Cybertron.
Cybertron was never DESTROYED in Headmasters. It was gutted by a chain
reaction. Given Cybertron's energy-poor status, this rendered it basicly
totaled. But TV magazine shit from Japane G1/G2 Intermezzo shows Cybertron
being refurbished sometime after Battlestars by an Autobt/Decepticon alliance.
Since Iacon was suddenly UNDERGROUND in Beast Machines, I construe they added
another layer to the outside of the planet.
Earth exists in BW era, we see Depth charge approaching ti before he hits
the time rift, the computer warns him it's a restricted system.
Gaea's inhabitants were robots, not humans.
There is no evidence directly pointing to Cybertron being Earth. Primal
had one vision where Earth became Cybertron, this was probably intended to
indicate a tie between the two worlds. Cybertron was once an organic world,
with organic skeletons on it's lowest level. This fits poorly with...
everything else we know abotu Cybertron, unless they were test animals for
Quiont experiments or something.
I fully expect sometime in the next 10 years we'll get a story about how
Cybertron really is Earth. Not because it's a good story, or even an inspired
one, but just because writers would rather tell a 'big' story than a good one.
But until that day, there is... really no connection.
Mery imparted thought to text as;
>(That's right! If my ancestors could do polygyny,
>I think it only fair that I get a shot at polyandry.)
Is that like when you wash a synethetic shirt?
Is it true the clockwork of female autobots has fewer teeth?
Steve-o Stonebraker
> There is no evidence directly pointing to Cybertron being Earth. Primal
> had one vision where Earth became Cybertron, this was probably intended to
He had a vision where an Earth-like world became Cybertron (or
Cybertron-like). There's really no reason to think it was Earth. It was
just a "class m" planet.
--Steve-o
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Stonebraker | Transformers FAQ Keeper | Astrophysicist
sst...@yahoo.com | www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~sstoneb | AOL IM: srstoneb
Grebo Guru
Man, this has become the most mind-bending thread I've ever read. BUt
luckily its mighty cool! See what Derik Smith wrote:
> Actually, there's 3 UK futures. The Earthforce stories take place in an
> alternate branch-off of US #73. (well, the branch occours sometime between
> 69 and 73, we see definitve evicence of the branch in US #73.)
Whoops! Errrrr... Wow, I didnt know that. Has it been officially
acknowledged as an alternate universe by Furman? I mean, its a good fix
considering how poorly it fits into continuity. Would "Another Time and
Place" be part of this "3rd Continuity" as well?
> In the US timeline, Galvatron attack Cybertron and takes Emirate
> Xaaron hostage to awaken Primus and destroy Unicron. As a result,
> Unicron (mistrustful of Galvatron and having lost contact with him
> inside of Cybertron) cuts shortt he scenic route he'd been taking to
> Cybertron, completely bypassing the planet Jhi, and arrives in 1991.
Okay, so that's 2 timelines now. Right? Or are you saying that the
Earthforce timeline is the US timeline? No wait, that can't work.
Anyway, so we're at 2. I think.
> In the UK branch however instead of attacking Cybertron, Galvatron goes
> to the Ark in orbit of Earth and tries to recruit some damaged autobots to his
> cause. They manage to outsmart him and clobber him. Unicron, who never has
> his suspicious raised by Galvatron's absence, remains on the scenic route
> towards Cybertron, and will arrive in 2005/6. (This I construe from Prime's
> comments to Grimlock when touring Autobot Earth in the 'The 4 million year
> itch.')
So this is the timeline that Target: 2006 and Fallen Angel come from eh?
Anyway, that's the 3rd one I guess.
> Actually, I think it was shortly after time wars. 'Two Megatrtons.' In
> the original timeline, Straxus-thinking-he-was-Megatron was destined to become
> Galvatron. (Ravage explicitly says straxus-megs was the same one he fought
> beside in the time wars) This galvatron would be defeated by Rodimus Prime
> in TF:TM, and flee to the past.
Muh.... ack! So that was Straxus-Megs in The Movie, and thus in Target
2006/Fallen Angel? Arrrrg, come on! (pulls at hair)
> But once Straxus killed himself, the REAL megatron was destined to become
> Galvatron. As a result you have 2 futures- 'Rhythms of Darkness' where Galvy
> killed Rodimus Prime and Unicron ate Cybertron
Yay!
> and the second UK 'future' where Galvatron ruled Cybertron and sent
> Rodimus's autobots fleeing to Earth. Both a result of a stronger,
> arguably more stable, Galvatron.
So then does this mean that the Galvatron in the Japanese Headmasters is
one of these UK future Galvatrons? Heh heh. He certainly was a lot
saner...
Grebo
Derik Smith
>> Actually, there's 3 UK futures. The Earthforce stories take place in
>an
>> alternate branch-off of US #73. (well, the branch occours sometime between
>
>> 69 and 73, we see definitve evicence of the branch in US #73.)
>
>Whoops! Errrrr... Wow, I didnt know that. Has it been officially
>acknowledged as an alternate universe by Furman? I mean, its a good fix
>considering how poorly it fits into continuity. Would "Another Time and
>Place" be part of this "3rd Continuity" as well?
Well... no. AT&P takes place after US #80, in like 1991 or 1992 or
something.
>Okay, so that's 2 timelines now. Right? Or are you saying that the
>Earthforce timeline is the US timeline? No wait, that can't work.
>Anyway, so we're at 2. I think.
The Earthforce timelien branched off the US timeline around US #73. In
it, Unicron does not arrive until 2005. (So the Earthforce timeline is one in
which MtMtE will still occour, and might result in both the Rhythms of
Darkness timeline and the 'The Void' timeline [US #67 and the post-timewars UK
future]. In both these timelines Galvatron... wins.)
>Muh.... ack! So that was Straxus-Megs in The Movie, and thus in Target
>2006/Fallen Angel? Arrrrg, come on! (pulls at hair)
Yup. A retcon introduced by Furman to explain away all the storylines he
wrote with Megatron before his reintroduction in the US- and one that happened
to explain away Galvatron too.
Alignment introduced the convention of refering to the second, 'actually
Megatron' Galvatron fromt eh US stories (and Perchance to Dream in the UK) as
Galvatron 2.
>So then does this mean that the Galvatron in the Japanese Headmasters is
>one of these UK future Galvatrons? Heh heh. He certainly was a lot
>saner...
He was stabilizing as early as RoOP in the US, and he was supposed to come
on strong in year 4 IMO. But I can hardly credit that to Hedmasters as
character insight. Headmasters was just written by people who couldn't handle
a complex, conflicted character so they turned Galvatron into... basicly
Megatron's personality.