SOBBING VIOLENTLY, I’VE SPENT ALL DAY READING YOUR ‘BROKEN RECORD’ STORY AND I’M ABSOLUTELY DESTROYED.
It wasn’t a satisfying ending. But in no way do I mean that in a bad way. It wasn’t satisfying. What would have been satisfying is if after all that time, Smokescreen finally got to win. Just once.
But we didn’t get that. There was only one ending. That was what we were told at the beginning, and that is how it ended. There was only one choice. The best choice was the only. Choice. I love that. It’s bitter, and frustrating, but with how you wrote it? It’s what needed to happen. It wasn’t the ending we all wanted, it was the ending that needed to happen.
This was gut wrenching. Mind blowing. We got tears making rivers and oceans over here man 😭
This was wonderful, it really was. It was hard. It was difficult, but it ended, and when it did, it was just, meant to be. We were told it was unavoidable, Smokescreen was told it was inevitable, and it was in the end. He wasn’t ever going to get that chance to prove the Matrix and everyone else wrong.
You are just, SO good at doing this. At making something that is real, and important (to me anyway 😔).
I love how Smokescreen bonded with everyone. He knows, everyone. He has made memories with them that are his, and his alone. He can’t share them now. They’re remnants of times that no longer exist. He doesn’t get those bonds back. Not like the ones he had. And that’s hard. It’s hard for him, it’s hard for us, there’s no way for him to get satisfaction for those losses.
You’ve gotta be magic or something. Like, actually.
In my class today, I fr opened my physical, non-Transformers related book, and tried to find where I had left off on ‘Broken Record’, then did a 180 when I very quickly realized this book was not, in fact, your Tumblr page, and I was not, in fact, reading one of your stories 💀
You’ve infected my brain with the robos. Everything is a reference to your stories. (For example, Burgers: That one story if your were the humans purposely eat burgers and meat in the base to make the bots uncomfy cuz it’s funny to see their reactions.)
Anyway, back to the story, Optimus understood Smokescreen’s situation very quickly. And once it was made clear that he understood, it became very clear that these loops were not a new thing. For any of the primes. That makes me wonder how similar it had been for Optimus. Or rather, Orion Pax.
We know that he was once like Jack, from what Ratchet tells us in the show, but I can’t really see someone like Jack turning into someone like Optimus. Not naturally. I had always assumed that Orion became who he is as Optimus just by getting the Matrix, or just by being in the war. But you said “F that” and did something completely new. Orion having to go through those ‘trials’ like how Smokescreen did absolutely adds to the reasoning behind such a, seemingly drastic personality change. It seems drastic to everyone else, but, as you showed us with Smokescreen, it was gradual. It was a very, very gradual change. It was a change that came through many, many long hardships and challenges, and in the end he didn’t even succeed in his original goal. As it probably was for Orion. Smokescreen isn’t the bot he used to be. Not by a long shot. Nebulous Prime did not simply just, come to be. It’s who Smokescreen turned into.
(Makes me wonder if you’d be wanting to do a prequel for ‘Broken Record’ but for Orion 👀)
Anyway, to wrap it up, you’re incredible, your mind is incredible, thanks for being incredible.
Oh my goodness. I am just, in absolute AWE at this breakdown of the story. You APPRECIATE my writing and you have no idea how happy that makes me. I put so much effort into my work, and it never ceases to make me smile and want to keep on going when I read comments like yours. I am not being paid for this, I am not gaining anything from this in real life, but it is wonderful people such as yourself that keep me going, so thank you :)
Smokescreen's tale in "Broken Record" really is one of tragedy, and I adore how you have laid it out. The vision I had while writing was an inevitable slow march toward the apathy all Primes seem to have. Optimus always knows so much, has skills that one could see him having but still appear slightly out of place in light of his origin. He was the embodiment of skill and wisdom, and yet he was always tired.
I loved the idea of finding a core reason behind that exhaustion aside from war, a purpose behind the seeming aimless behavior Optimus exhibited upon no longer having a foe to fight. His trial, in my mind, was different from Smokscreen's.
I say this because I do indeed intend to write a prequel from Orion's perspective. I want to show how crushing it will be when his passion and drive are tempered through unexplainable loss and the revelation that he CAN'T fix everything. There is no happy story book ending, and Smokescreen now knows this well. Conviction turned to duty, love dulled to loyalty, idealism shifted into numbing apathy.
In light of this, can you see why the other Primes went crazy? Orion was a special case and without Optimus to serve as a foundation, Smokescreen would have joined the mad ranks of his predecessors. It is a sad story where the weak falter and the strong prevail. It was underlying, but it was also a hope of mine that it would be shown that no mech should want the Matrix. To be a leader is a burden, and in the world of "Broken Record", that is more than evident.
Thank you again for your lovely commentary! I look forward to writing more if only so that kind folks such as yourself have more to enjoy.
