Welcome back to yet another edition of Lost in Transmission where we look back at the original Transformers with a critical eye, mostly because we are joyless and destroy everything we touch. If you've missed past editions you can find them here. This episode is our final look back at the first season of the original Transformers cartoon with the final three episodes Countdown to Extinction, A Plague of Insecticons, and Heavy Metal War. Let's get into it shall we?
Countdown to Extinction
The Dope
Okay, now wet your lips. Now work it, work it. The camera loves you baby!
Following the events of the Ultimate Doom the Autobots spend about 30 seconds helping to fix the planet wide devastation. Soon they are in a race against time to stop the Decepticons from obtaining Dr. Archevil's Exponential Energy Generator. However, unknown to everyone, Starscream has set it to explode in the hopes of absorbing all the energy from the planet's destruction. Naturally, both the Autobots and Decepticons figure out what Starscream is up to and stop this plot before the Earth explodes. Also, Dr. Archevil is seriously wounded and left a crippled cyborg.
Half-Assed Job
While it's good to see the Autobots cleaning up after the Decepticons they brought to Earth cause yet another doomsday plot. However, the Autobots don't even get anywhere near finishing the job before they race off to stop yet another Decepticon plot to destroy the world... again! By this point, the Decepticons have been responsible for four extinction level events that were narrowly stopped by the Autobots. The Autobots also believe they had killed Megatron three different times only to be corrected. With that sort of failure rate, the human race should tell the Autobots to stay in their little volcano and try and solve the problem themselves.
Aside from this poor track record, when it comes to fixing the mess they made, the Autobots would rather spend their time aimlessly driving around in the desert to try and find a mad scientist's lab. Granted, they did stop the world from being blown up (again), they sure spend a lot of this episode spinning their ties -- pun intended.
Credit Where Credit is Due
Say what you will about Starscream and his incessant whining about wanting to be the leader of the Decepticons, when he's in a leadership position he doesn't fuck around. Why slowly bleed a planet dry when you can blow it up and take all the energy in one go. Starscream doesn't go for looting crystal mines or plundering oil fields, he's thinking of the big picture.
Most people scoff at Starscream for his constant whining and shrill voice, he does have the big ideas that make for a great leader. He's a one and done kind of guy. "Yeah, but Nick" you might be saying "wasn't he going to blow up the planet with his fellow Decepticons still on it?", he sure was, because they all dicks to him, I would do the same damn thing.
Compare this to Megatron in this episode, who calls retreat after a 30 second battle with the Autobots because -- in his own words "they are too hero programmed to know when to quit". First of all, what does that even mean? Possibly one of the most embarrassing departures made by the Decepticons, who are well known for hasty retreats, it was like they weren't even trying.
Only trust an officially licensed Decepticon for your planetary extermination needs!
Also, he finds a good use for Dr. Archevil...
This is why you don't let a robot do your make over.
Plague of Insecticons
The Dope
The Autobots answer a distress call from the nation of Bali and discover three insect based Decepticons. When Megatron and his crew find them, the Decepticons team up with the Insecticons to plunder a nearby oil refinery. The rest of the episode is pretty much formulaic at this point, so let's just get down to it....
Baliwood
The majority of this episode takes place in the nation of Bali. As with past episodes, the depiction of the people who live in that country is absurd. You could interchange them with the Peruvians in Fire on the Mountain and you couldn't tell the difference. The interesting thing about this episode is that Sparkplug appears to have an intimate knowledge of Bali. Sparkplug previously stated that he worked in the crystal mines of Berma, Geographically speaking, Bali and Myanmar are not that far from each other. Sounds like he spent some time in Asia. But whatever for? Well, I should point out that Indonesia is one of the most popular places in the world for sex tourism, which makes Sparkplug's past even shadier.
Squeegee kids in Bali are aggressively ceremonial.
I don't know what was up with the writers on this one, but either they didn't know much about Bali, didn't have much of a plot idea, or both, since this episode has a plot point where the Autobots are delayed by a parade of people blocking their path. Instead of doing something practical like honking their horn, the Autobots decide to drive off the beaten path and tunnel their way under the parade of people. This chews up about five minutes of plot. I would have rather watched the parade, to be honest, that would have been more entertaining.
Less of a Plague, More of a Nuisance.
If you thought the Dinobots were bad, the Insecticons aren't much better. These three characters also have speech impediments, causing them to repeat certain words at the end of a sentence. From there, the writers establish the Insecticons as having weapons that aren't that deadly but are annoying. I'm surprised this episode didn't end with the Autobots building a massive fly swatter to deal with the problem. One of the most perplexing things about the Insecitcons is that they can make an army of duplicates. Everyone starts calling them clones. However, since these are not organic creatures, so calling them clones is not accurate. Even then, calling the Insecticons a plague is like calling televised poker a sport. The only people who believe it are the advertisers.
"Pull my finger, finger."
The worst thing they do is injure Skyfire so he crashes and making him incapable of flying until he gets repaired. That's not very hard to do. Anyone who read my last few reviews can tell you, making Skyfire crash is not exactly a challenge.
At the end of the episode, the Insecticon known as Shrapnel commands the power of lightning to attack the Autobots. Their salvation comes when Spike suggests that they use their rubber tires to insulate themselves against the lightning. Actually, the rubber tires of a car would not insulate them from the effects of lightning at all. Otherwise, the tires would protect them even when they were in robot mode.
Also, why are the robots taking a science lesson from Spike? Shouldn't the technologically advanced space robots have some kind of method of protecting themselves from bursts of electricity? You can fry a circuit with static electricity for crying out loud, you'd figure space robots would come up with a means of insulating themselves from just about any sort of electrical surge.
At any rate, Wheeljack offers to make Spike a "Transform", and suggests a motorcycle. Spike declines, saying that he is old enough to drive yet. First of all.... We've seen what Starscream did to Dr. Archevil, the idea of Wheeljack operating on Spike's body to make him a Transformer is a horrifying prospect. Also, Spike isn't old enough to drive yet? Which again, brings me full circle to what I asked back at the start of this: Why was Spike working an oil rig and not in school?
Also, I just want to say that any opportunity for the Insecticons to battle the Dinobots, something you'd figure would be an obvious bout, never happens in this cartoon. What a wasted opportunity.
Heavy Metal War
The Dope
The construction unions on Cybertron are very aggressive.
Megatron builds the Constructicons so they can build a device that gives him all the Decepticons powers. He then challenges Optimus Prime to a battle where the loser agrees to exile themselves in space.
*Snore*
There's nothing really much you can say about this episode. It's underwhelming. Especially since it was used to sell the Constructicons who only make a brief appearance at the beginning and the end of the episode. Most of the episode is about a fight between Megatron and Optimus Prime fighting each other. We've seen that before, give us more of the six construction vehicles that can turn into a giant robot!
Instead, we watch Megatron use a power that he doesn't regularly have, then cut to one of the Decepticons going "that's my power!", it all pretty silly. When the Autobots realize that Megatron cheated, they fell Devastator with a hologram and send all the Decepticons falling into a pool of lava.
This episode is so unremarkable and boring that it is unworthy of my hilarious insights. So fuck it. I'm done here.
I really hope that's lava.....
Worst Transformer of the Season
The distinction for the worst Transformer in the first season goes to.... SKYFIRE!
Obviously.....
Skyfire is one of the most useless of the Transformers this season. First of all, he was a scientist back on Cybertron, but since his arrival on Earth, the Autobots have only used him as a taxi service. Nobody ever asks him to do scientific stuff even though Wheeljack and Ratchet are terrible at what they do (they did create the Dinobots after all). Then again, since Skyfire crashes in nearly every episode he appears in, perhaps it's just as well that they don't ask Skyfire to do more.
Next Time on Lost in Transmission....
Actually, I'm going to take a break to write about something other than Transformers. Check back, Lost in Transmission will be back to some point