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Starscream, Soundwave, and Shockwave concept art from Transformers One production designer Jason Scheier and Industrial Light & Magic

THAT SCENE

I don't know if anyone else has already taken the same reference and if so, I'm sorry. But I couldn't get this idea out of my head.

SPOILERS for TFone

“Why are you built like a roblox my love”

Optimus qiut the prime

Maybe… he quit his job because he won the lottery:]

cybertronian food

Megatron's first night after battle

Dinner.

hey girl

Devotion

Megatron & Glitch by Alex Milne

Clean scan

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The story behind this image:

This is the commission request I sent to Alex before TFCON:

“…we never saw in the comic Glitch and Megatron interacting before Glitch became “Tarn,” and I really would’ve loved to have seen it.  Not in a shippy sense, but in the sense that Glitch was obviously starstruck by Megatron and Megatron obviously encouraged him to use towards his own ends…  I just really wanted to see the two of them together, prior to the “Tarn” rebuild,  and I was wondering if you would like to make that happen.”

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Basically, I considered the adage “commission the art you want to see in the world,” realized I really wanted to have seen this moment in the comics and it wasn’t there, so I commissioned it.

And here it is.

issue #50 got me fucked up

th...them...

For megop week day 5: heat/scars!

Also for lord_squiggletits' fic there's nothing left but mouth-to-mouth combat! Everyone go read it pls I read it and went into a fugue state for like a month and a half and learned to animate bc I was compelled by it, it's delightful and also short and sweet so you can go read it right now! (it’s nsfw! as a heads up)

The full gif was unfortunately way too big to post on tumblr so here's some close ups and the static image under the read more!

Also my favorite wip screenshot I took while figuring out how to size the text lmao

D-16 and Megs...Because I love them soooo much

I’m comic-ifying a fanfic that’s…super cute and had me rolling my eyes (affectionately). I’ll link to it if I ever finish this.

One thing that I absolutely love about TFOne's writing is that it manages to avoid a lot of the heavier criticism I've seen regarding MegOp's hero/villain dynamic over the years (trust me, the mid-2010s TF discourse was crazy)

*Spoilers Below*

First of all, the narrative benefits so much from the main 4 cast members all being a part of the same exploited mining class. So many takes on MegOp have Orion being of a higher status (an archivist, a cop, etc) while Megatron is much lower down on the social latter (a miner, a gladiator, often in the context of being a slave).

I've seen many people be put off by this, because it feels as if Megs is being villianized for being rightfully angry at the system that deeply harmed and exploited him, while Orion/Optimus is praised for taking a more pacifistic stance despite him not suffering as much from or in some ways even benefiting from the system he claims to oppose. I don't find their dynamic to be as simple as that, and I do find these takes to be a bit reductive, but I do very much see where they are coming from.

I am definitely one of those people who's very frustrated with the way pacifism is hailed as the one true path of morality, and the inherent implication that taking any sort of revenge on the people who abused/exploited you makes you just as bad as them. Also, Marvel's particular brand of demonizing any form of radical political action, despite the system clearly being broken and corrupt, but being completely unwilling to offer any other alternatives to meaningfully change things for the better.

When looking at what I described above its pretty easy to see how a lot of versions of MegOp's hero/villain dynamic unfortunately fits into that trope. Bringing it back to TFOne, you can see how Op and Meg coming from the same political/social status subverts this. The existence of Elita and Bee only further illustrates that out of the 4 people of the mining class who were all deceived, exploited, and literally mutilated in the same way it is only D-16 that completely loses himself to his rage, even to the point where he loses compassion for his own companions and disregarding the safety of the other miners (when he decides to "tears everything down" and Elita exclaims he's going to "kill everyone").

What I think I love most about the characterization in TFOne is that Orion is the radical one. Not only that, but he is praised by Elita and by extension the narrative for it. He is constantly challenging authority, and is the first to have the suspicion that their society is structured in an unjust way.

Meanwhile D-16, to be frank, is kind of a bootlicker. He fully believed in the system and that Sentinal Prime, as someone with power, had the right to decided "what was best" for those who are weaker/lesser (I wish I had the specific quote from D-16 to support this, but the movie's still in theaters). It illustrate that D-16 already held certain fascistic ideals, and that he and Orion already have fundamentally opposing moral/political values, it simply hasn't been of any consequence yet. It shows that their eventual falling out was inevitable, even if they had decided to rebuild Cybertron together.

It should also be noted that D-16's feelings of anger and betrayal do not necessarily have anything to do with the unjust system itself, but that said unjust system was predicated on a lie. Hence his fixation on deception in the post-credits scene and him naming his faction the Decepticons. Meanwhile, when Orion learns the truth he's just sort of like "yeah, I always kinda knew something was up" because again, he understood on some level that their system was predicated on injustice.

Even D-16's obsession with Megatronus Prime, while initially an endearing aspect of his character, is also an indicator of the questionably large amount of value he puts on one's strength. It foreshadows the "might makes right" ideology that the decepticons follow, and is a key part of their ideological characterization across continuities.

Instead of the narrative we often see in Transformers media were Optimus is idolized by the narrative for being more moderate and Megatron is villiainized for being radical (or so people often claim), it is instead Optimus who is rewarded and praised by the narrative for being radical, and Megatron who is villainized and punished by the narrative for holding potentially fascistic values.

I do agree with some criticism I've seen that the whole thing with killing Sentinel and D-16's final turn into villainy felt a bit rushed and more than a little cliche, but I also understand it both had a limited runtime and that it is ultimately a family film meant to be accessible to children. More importantly though, I think the movie set the groundwork early on that, no matter how this final act played out, D-16 was always going to turn to darkness, and Orion would not have been able to stop him.

Its perfectly tragic, the way all MegOp should be, while also feeling really well thought out from a thematic standpoint. I love it.

Lost Light Fest Day 4