Skids finds the strength to confront his past through kindness, and in the end, becomes someone who wants to protect that kindness in return. Through his patience, empathy, and quiet understanding, Rung helps Skids learn how to understand and accept himself. That gentleness gives Skids the courage to finally face the parts of himself he once tried to run from.
And once he gains that courage, what he wants to protect is no longer some grand ideal — it’s Rung himself, and the quiet kind of kindness that keeps caring for everyone else while rarely being cared for in return.
Also I do think Rung has a little bit of Anthy Himemiya-esque hidden slyness to him ^^
the confrontation between starscream and megatron in All Hail Megatron, is a concise way of showing their idealogical split and conflict between the two of them. it tackles the root of their issue immediately, by beginning the conversation with starscream sarcastically complimenting megatron's conquest, only to be met with sincerity from his leader. he was not seen, nor taken seriously as the second-in-command, despite his warning that there would be traitors after this victory. his voice was heard but not listened. he was treated like a petulant novice.
"your memory fails you, megatron. i was there even before there was a beginning. before you."
it came to a point where starscream reminded megatron of his position in the decepticon. he's not a confused, easily impressed warrior that megatron seemingly like to think. he has been fighting for the decepticon cause even before megatron came into the picture.
the wounds deepened when megatron disregard his words, and instead, attempt to appease starscream by complimenting him and compares him to a true decepticon. which, if anything, is a fucking insult to starscream as he's been reduced into a poster for the faction, and nothing more. yes, he does fight for the decepticon and he is willing to be the face of it, but megatron patronized him into a mere accessory.
which ironically led starscream to fulfill the prophecy on his own. he gather his own ally with his loyalist by his side, in order to usurp megatron.
it's interesting to see the source that cause the friction in their partnership. it was layered with secrecy for millennials, and starscream felt underestimated by megatron's perception of him, and megatron withhold too many information from his own second-in-command. there was no respect in this teamwork. there's an imbalance between the two of them which led starscream to distrust megatron and his objective for the decepticon.
energon shortage during the war should have chronic effects, especially on the younger bots. and maybe the larger bots as well? if they have higher energy needs that were more often neglected. Maybe smaller bots, especially those with light frame designs like Arcee, would’ve had it easier. Optimus, his commanders, and the medics would try their best to keep everyone on fair rations based on their size and needs, but it could never be perfect.
and that’s just physically, i’d love to see the mental effects of long term rationing/starvation explored, especially in post-war canon or fics. Like why is rid15 bumblebee not freaking out more about their supply at the beginning of the show? When they are cut off and don’t even have decepticon mines to steal from? He’s spent several years on a peaceful Cybertron, thinking that part of his life is behind him, and suddenly he’s back to dealing with one of the worst aspects of the war. Except this time it’s his duty to make sure everyone has enough fuel. Sure they have the stock from the crashed ship, but they have no idea how long they’ll be stranded. And they clearly didn’t get it all, or the decepticons would’ve been a very temporary problem.
It’s not an imminent threat. But Bee quickly organizes everyone’s daily rations, and he is military strict about enforcing it. Bee does not hoard. Instead he obsessively monitors everyone’s consumption. He inventories their supply, and then he does it again. And again. He doesn’t shortchange his own portion. He knows better than to be a martyr about this. Optimus and Ratchet both gave him plenty of lectures. About how under-fueling would impede cognition, reflexes, and eventually be more of a danger to his comrades than any kind of noble sacrifice. Optimus and Ratchet were giant hypocrites btw, but Bee never knew. Bumblebee’s own intake is measured down to the gram.
Strong arm was in a colony or in stasis for most of the war. She appreciates the structure and discipline of Bumblebee’s rules. But she doesn’t see more than that.
Grimlock and Drift were decepticons. The cons were always better at energon acquisition. And then Grim was captured and put in stasis. He never experienced shortages. When Drift defected, he was mostly a lone operator, and finding his own supply was part of that. He understands scarcity, but it was his problem to deal with. Now he looks after two students, and Bee has to keep an eye on him to be sure he isn’t neglecting himself to pass on his share to the minibots.
Sideswipe…Sideswipe hoards. Having a protected stash is ingrained in him to such a degree that it’s basically a subconscious decision to start slipping some out of storage. And Sideswipe is excellent at lying to himself. It’s only a snack stash, no big deal. He doesn’t have to do it, of course! it doesn’t settle a deep seated anxiety! He just doesn’t see the point of such strict rules!
Bee…does not handle this well at first. He’s not as good at spotting Sideswipe’s lies this early on. Or maybe he is, but he doesn’t understand the purpose of the lie. To Bee, it looks like an excuse to avoid getting in trouble. It’s irresponsible and selfish. Meanwhile, Sideswipe is doing everything in his power to pretend he is not freaking out about the energon. Which Bumblebee fails to recognize, because Bee is maybe, slightly, compromised when it comes to this issue. Things escalates when his anger and the ensuing argument lead Sideswipe to believe he’ll be kicked off the team, left to fend for himself.
slaughterhouse posting part 2 that isn't going to be polished at all and has been sitting in my drafts for days, but this scene is so interesting to me because i genuinely have no idea what megatron wants from ravage in this interaction- and i don't know if megatron knows, either.
megatron starts out by saying that the decepticons' loyalty isn't to him- its to the cause. ignoring how this is immediately striking me as completely, blatently wrong due to the times we see megatron rallying the decepticons around himself when other leaders fail to do the same (nevermind the fact that he started the cause in the first place), he then gets angry with ravage when ravage confirms that- yeah, actually. you're not the cause anymore. we have moved on with someone new. megatron gets so angry he stands up, he looms over ravage, he raises is voice and balls his fist- and why else would he do this if he wasn't upset that they're moving on without him?
which would, of course, make megatron a hypocrite. he left the decepticons and refused to take any effort to rejoin them- he clearly doesn't actually want to return to the fold. but when the decepticons unite themselves and move on from him, it's different. i can abandon you, but you cannot abandon me.
i've always took this reaction as being an immediate, no thinking, gut reaction to finding out the decepticons are moving on without him. he's angry, potentially feeling betrayed by them, when he... doesn't have much of a right to feel that way. and it's not like megatron wasn't given an option to join the decepticons again if that's what he actually wanted.
he was given a choice. he turned it down. he could of turned it down for any number of reasons, but no matter the reason, the point remains that he turned it down.
going back to panel after megatron snaps, ravage clearly takes megatron's outburst as him being upset that they've moved on without him. despite the aggressive way this interaction started with ravage attacking megatron, ravage spends most of this conversation attempting to reassure megatron. megatron gets angry that galvatron took over and they're moving on without him? okay- so then he wants to come back, right? he's upset he's been replaced?
well, galvatron isn't permanent. say the word and you'll be back in charge. megatron says that the decepticons aren't loyal to him, ravage reaffirms that they were loyal to him but now they've chosen a new leader since he left, megatron gets angry that they're moving on without him, and then ravage reinforces their original loyalty to him by saying if he wants to come back, they'll follow him.
and then megatron turns it around; yes he was just angry that the decepticons were no longer loyal to him, but now that same loyalty is toxic, actually. and it is! it absolutely is toxic. but i think ravage backed him into a corner here, even unintentionally. he can't sit down and actually address why the decepticons moving on makes him angry without admitting some part of him wants to return to the cons. or at the very least he still feels possessive of them and doesn't want them to function outside of his influence. when given the option to rejoin, he responds by insulting the decepticon's (and ravage's!) sense of devotion/loyalty and then quickly changes the topic to seawing and the trial. he doesn't say a solid yes or no answer because he doesn't actually have one to give.
ravage nails it down anyways. megatron has no idea what he wants from ravage in this interaction because he doesn't know where he stands anymore, let alone what he wants for himself. before ravage was revealed to be on the lost light, megatron was captain. he even seems content to BE captain- but ravage makes it complicated. ravage is a direct reminder of who he used to be and the people he used to surround himself with. worse, people he's abandoned and hurt in order to get to where he is as captain now. megatron left the decepticons behind with no command structure, no guidance, no plan- and ravage's mere presence is a bitter reminder that even if he's run off to the autobots, he can't escape that.
he's settled into a state of stagmentation with the autobots. one he's content with, maybe- at the very least one he can live with where the guilt isn't as heavy. it is the easiest way out megatron saw for himself.
Going by Wikipedia, BW's "proto-humans" would be australophitecus (probably afarensis or anamensis, since it's supposed to be the pliocene a bit after 4mya) since genus homo descends from a. africanus which descends from... some other australophitecus (modern humans might be australophitecus?)
Anyway, they should be fur-covered, 120-140cm tall on average (Rattrap is canonically 150cm, for comparison), and mainly herbivorous. Maybe some carrion eating or easy to catch small animals on the side sometimes??
talking to people while being a part of the transformers fandom is like playing dodgeball except one out of twenty dodgeballs have landmines hidden in them
related: saying defrag vs frag is like the difference between saying you're sleeping next to someone and saying you're sleeping with someone
it bothered me that Starscream had just been left trapped in Terratronus' head, BUT looking back at the sequence of events I think it does make sense actually. I will lay out my reasoning in a numbered list:
The Decepticons have no reason to rescue him - they no longer trust Starscream or want to him to be their leader. Also they're not very nice.
The Autobots aren't initially aware that they can even get into the dome, and even afterwards they have much more pressing concerns - tracking the stolen ship and then dealing with the hate plague.
None of this even matters at first because neither team can physically reach Starscream. The only person who can open the doors is Hashtag, and-
The last thing Hashtag saw Starscream do was murder two children. This is a bit speculative but I think it makes sense: Hashtag is herself a child with childish emotions so she was probably quite happy leaving Starscream where he was after what he did. It's also very likely that she didn't know how to get into the dome either.
And finally I'd like to point out that when the opportunity arose - when the Cons were gone, the Bots knew they could enter the dome, Hashtag was there to open Terratronus' doors and it synced with their plan - the Bots and Maltos did retrieve Starscream. They weren't very nice about it, but they could have just stunned him and left him there, and in being recaptured Starscream's back in a position where he can be a core character again.
Reasons Why I Think IDW2 Sentinel Prime Was A Still Technically A Young Prime/New First Senator By The Time We Meet Him - a mini meta
We are told that Nominus not only oversaw the final push against Exarchon - which happened like, 2000 years Before canon events - but also that he was the one who was in charge when Bumblebee and Cliffjumper were built - and Iacon was already rebuilt by that point, or at least mostly rebuilt from what we could see
2000 years to a species who can live up to millions, at very least, is like. Not a lot. At most a month or a year, something like that; Meaning that Sentinel could have only become a Prime at least 500 years after the War of the Threefold Spark ended, and that is if we are being generous with how quickly the Constructicon's finished Iacon and of Bumblebee and Cliffjumper's age.
So like. Sentinel, although he probably had been trained to take up the mantel of Prime by Nominus, was probably a young Prime by the time we met him
At most, he was like. A newly elected president who may not have yet fully completed a year on the job (maybe even less, enough to settle in with a new president but to still be considered a New President), because even though a lot of time passed to us for Transformers, it isn't, again, a lot comparatively to their life spans.
Also also: what better time to try and start a revolution/civil unrest? with a new leader that people are getting used to and is currently away.
