A Look Into the Psychology of Megatron x Rodimus
I'd like to preface this by saying: I am not here to rain on anybody's parade. I do ship them as well, but this is one of the most unhealthy (origins-wise) and complicated ships in the fandom psycology-wise, and I think it's interesting to look into the fine details of it and how we actually get to a good place where they can be together without any issues ) :)
Hot Rod starts by having a neutral opinion on Megatron and the Decepticons as a whole since they stood against Zeta's oppression and fought against it. He even agrees to have an audience with Megatron to hear him out, much to Bee's chagrin.
Here is where things change. Hot Rod gets to see firsthand that Megatron is no better than Zeta. He's just as cruel, and having lived under oppression his whole life, there is no way he'd accept someone like Megatron to be in a leadership position, so he follows his heart and morals, saves Bee, and they leg it.
As the war goes on, Hot Rod starts to dislike the warlord even more, and this grows into fear and hatred when Megatron essentially kills him when he goes to retrieve the Matrix.
As for Megatron, he starts by having a level of respect for Hot Rod over what he did in Nyon, but he still displayed his usual domineering tendencies. He wanted Hot Rod to bend to his will, but Roddy wouldn't, and that, among the many times this brat interfered with his faction and plans, which led to a high level of disdain and disregard that only grew by the time he ended up on the Lost Light.
I am not going to go through every single thing here because that will take us forever and a half lol, but I have a few moments of note that I'd like to highlight.
First, Rodimus hated Megatron enough to want him dead by the time the war ended, and for good reason. He was still afraid of him, but having him be a prisoner kinda gave him a sense of safety to go bare his heart to him.
We do see that Rodimus still had enough compassion left in him to deliver Megatron's message to Optimus, though, which is very interesting. We can attribute that to Roddy being a prisoner of war and having sympathy for the ex-warlord because he can see himself in his spot, and Roddy being a bot led by his emotions and heart more than anything else. Megatron must at least have a modicum of gratitude for that, despite the smugness he felt at being able to manipulate the "idiot" into doing his bidding. That was just the start of Roddy chipping at his hardened interior ) :)
I think a big part of Megatron having a hard time understanding Rodimus is the age gap. He seems childish and brainless with how emotional and impulsive he seemed during their time together on the Lost Light. Roddy's trauma was in overdrive by that point because he keeps losing people, and it all feels like his fault, and he's just SPIRALING by that point. I honestly believe that Roddy was both taking stock (he literally has an alter for the people they've lost) and hiding because he's so stressed out over Megatron being not only on ship with him, but being in a leadership position. Yes, the guy who shot and killed his is equal to him now, and all sense of safety is out the window!
Megatron spends most of their time together criticizing and scrutinizing him and his every move because he has a set ideal in mind for who can lead, and Rodimus was not adhering to it at all. Ironically, that scrutiny and initial disdain led to him understanding that different doesn't mean bad, and that Rodimus' supposed flaws are what made him a wonderful bot at heart. The Lost Light was not a tight ship, which led to a lot of mishaps, but it was also a fertile ground for love and healing. There was an actual sense of community and belonging sprouting all around, and despite Rodimus' dislike for him, he did his best to tolerate him, and even looked out for him and physically dragged him to safety during evac despite his protest.
This is HUGE. Roddy is afraid of Megatron, but still chooses to act responsibly here, and you'd have to imagine Megatron has not been touched for good reason in AGES! The two still bicker, with Roddy accusing Megatron of causing the ship to disappear, but that's why this moment is so big. He could've left Megatron floating in space to hopefully die and blames it on whatever the hell caused the ship to disappear, but no, he drags him to safety even though he might be scheming something. No one gets left behind was always his motto, after all, even if it's this crazy scary bucket head he feared and hated ) :)
We also have a lot of moments where Rodimus seems to be making an effort to kinda rehabilitate the warlord, one of which is giving him a Rodimus Star for "abandoning his evil ways" 🤭
(I'd like to take a moment to appreciate how happy Magnus is over his star. It's so fucking cute ( > ⌔ < )💞~!)
We also have the effort Roddy has put into making Megatron feel good about helping organics and kinda shifting his perspective from pure repentance, which again, Roddy knows exactly what it feels like to be in that spot, and it's super sweet seeing him try to help ) :)
Notice how Rodimus carefully veils his concern by pretending to be incredulous about Megatron wanting to help the oragnics here. And then he encourages him by concurring and even puts his hand on his badge, which is basically over his spark. It's a very tender moment ) :)
This all leads us to the confrontation with the DJD. Megatron tried to save everyone by surrendering to no avail.
He wanted to save everyone because, despite his haughtiness, he's come to love them and being with them. They showed him a better way. They showed him that he fucked up and nurtured the desire in him to want to change, but of course he cannot do anything close to undoing all the pain and suffering he's caused. He knows that, and he's lost in the process of accepting everything, but here is where Megatron really starts to crack and fear his old self to the point he backed out from the final fight initially, which led to the moment where he refers to Rodimus as the "better leader".
I do believe that he did think of Rodimus as better than he thought by that point, but he was also being a bit manipulative and telling Rodimus what he thinks he wants to hear. Of course, everything is thrown to the wind when Ravage is mortally wounded, and Megatron goes berserk. Rodimus still goes to try to save his life though ) :)
By that point, Rodimus has softened up significantly to him, having gone through a wild goose chase in the past that led to saving his life, and has seen the potential in him to do better and stay on that path. He was also their comrade in that final battle and eliminated a huge danger that led to saving many lives, but there was a new problem at hand; Megatron was losing his shit. He's in his own trauma and is falling back on his old ways. Everyone was in danger. Megatron has a canon, and Ratchet was trying to placate him, to no avail.
Now, let me propose something wild, do you think Megatron would've taken it better if it was Rodimus touching him instead 🤔? I doubt it, but I think it would've put more of a dent since Ratchet has been gone for a long while and Rodimus was always there.
Anyway, kudos to their lord and savirour Terminus for waking up just in time to prevent a disaster from happening 😂
But, yeah, I think that incident reignited Roddy's fear and distrust of Megatron going into Lost Light. He literally admits to thinking he'll get shot whenever Megatron yells out his name and is not surprised that he "ditched" them, though he is angry because he thought he'd do better.
It's important to note that Roddy was angry and disappointed, but he also didn't want to leave before he heard "get away" which literally triggered him (you can read more about my thoughts on that in my Getaway and Roddy post because this post is already 7 years long 😂) and note just how sad Megatron looks over being left behind. He wanted to be with his "conscious" meaning Rodimus and Magnus/Minimus ) :) They grounded him and made him fight against his deep-rooted tendencies to fall on his old ways and do wrong. Lost Light cemented them as very important bots to him, just like Terminus is ) :)
Here, Megatron gets the chance to redo his revolution the right way, and he comes to cherish the Rodimus star he was given greatly because it was his only link to his original universe after losing Terminus, and guess whose face is all over it 😉
Something else we learn in Lost Light is just how people smart Rodimus actually is. He knows way more about people and how they function than they think (he literally has Magnus-specific distraction tactics to get him off his back which Megatron points out in MTMTE), which all stems from having to survive a lifetime of not being safe, which I think might support my theory of Rodimus being the silent-observer studying type which means he's been digging into Megatron's head for a while now ∑(´・ω・`) and while he's yet to crack him, he's come to belive in the good in him which is why he left his heart open for him despite the misunderstanding and even tried to build a case for him by allowing him to try to open the matrix when he got his arm blown off and even lied about him successeding becuase he was trying to save his life in the trial when they got back.
But of course, Megatron cannot escape his past and has come to a high point in healing in which he accepts his fate with open arms and is under no illusion that he deserves what was going to happen to him, despite Rodimus not agreeing with him. He still appreciated his and Ultra Magnus' sentiments, though. He didn't lose. He won ) :)
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