Revisiting BEAST WARS

Post by **Onslaught Six** » Thu Nov 06, 2008 9:39 pm

I've been wanting to do a pic like this for a while, it's just now that I felt like doing it:

It's not like we've never seen Faceplate Primal before or anything, I just felt like doing it.

Post by **onslaught86** » Fri Nov 07, 2008 12:11 am

Man. Faceplate Primal is badass. We need more Faceplate Primal.

Mako Crab · Post by **Mako Crab** » Fri Nov 07, 2008 4:55 am

[Bruce Campbell] Groovy. [/Bruce Campbell

Post by **JediTricks** » Fri Nov 07, 2008 2:35 pm

Damn, that is badass. I miss BW!

Mako Crab · Post by **Mako Crab** » Sun Dec 14, 2008 10:58 pm

Sorry for the long hiatus. College takes precedence, I'm afraid. But now the term is over and all major projects (and stress) are done with. Back to Revisiting Beast Wars!

Gorilla Warfare
written by Greg Johnson

on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFI9BEBjAyI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9BZ3olKw60&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEwoJpHYMa8&feature=related

This is one of my favorite season 1 episodes of Beast Wars and not just because Optimus goes on a Pred-stomping rampage. For one, the episode opens on one of the more unique locations and a personal favorite; a cliff-top lake that forms twin waterfalls. It really stands out compared to the generic mountains and flat plains that we've seen so far.

Primal's conducting a survey of the local plant-life with Dinobot along as backup in case of Predacon ambushers. As one might expect, Dinobot thinks the whole mission is a waste of time. He and Primal go back and forth a little on how best they could be spending their time.

Dinobot: "Strategy!"
Primal: "Knowledge!"
Dinobot: "Tactics!"
Primal: "Exploration!"

Actually there's a great line in here that perfectly sums up Primal's opinion of the Predacons and the Beast Wars overall at this point in time.

Primal: "Dinobot, I signed on for this mission as an explorer. Just because we bumped into Predacons is no reason to stop learning new things."

He's right, of course, but his attitude indicates that he doesn't really view the Preds as much of a credible threat. Right now he seems to still be in the mindset that Megatron and his crew are just a ragtag band of small-time Predacon rogues. Oh how quickly he's about to change his mind...

The weird plant they're observing spits out a spiked ball that latches onto the back of Dinobot's neck right where he can't reach. He's all freaking out and Primal just laughs, seeing how Dinobot was outsmarted.

Primal: "That's how it spreads its seed. You see, we've learned something."
Dinobot: "Yeeees. From now on I shoot my dinner salad before I eat it."

Hehe. Dinobot would've been a riot to have around during Beast Machines. But anyway, Scorponok pops up right about then and starts shooting at them. He's picked a wonderful spot to ambush them from; right at the edge of the waterfall. Primal and Dinobot dive for cover behind some boulders and exchange fire.

One of the things I really like about this episode is the use of terrain. For example, Scorponok blasts a boulder and sends it crashing down on Dinobot, pinning him between two boulders. Then Scorpy tags Primal with a special Cyber-Bee, but not before Primal can return fire and knock Scorpy back onto a log. The log gets dislodged and goes over the waterfall. Nice stuff. It's like whoever designed this particular set-piece was trying to find a couple cool ways they could use the environment to make the battle a little more fun.

Dinobot hefts the boulder off of himself and carries Primal back to base. Aaand sometime later... Primal is in the CR chamber getting repaired while Rhinox delivers the grim analysis. The Cyber-Bee has rerouted all of Primal's vital functions into itself. There's no way to remove it and he can't transform with it attached. If they do yank it off, Primal has all of a minute to live and then the Cyber-Bee explodes, taking out everyone, "within sprinting distance."

Dinobot recongizes the symptoms and informs the group that Scorponok's Cyber-Bee is intended to turn Primal into a coward incapable of leading. And about that... shots are fired from inside the CR chamber! Primal tears the door clean off its hinges and steps out of a thick cloud of steam.

Primal: "Alright, who wants some?"

Oooh, he's mad! He threatens to blow away anyone that tries to remove the Cyber-Bee! Rhinox grabs him and with the other Maximals they're able to get him to calm down some, but it's taking everything in Primal to fight his newfound aggression. He orders his crew to lock him up and disarm him. Apparently Scorponok's little invention backfired and made Primal into a war machine instead of a coward.

Short scene where we see Scorponok in his little corner of the Pred base... tinkering away with whatever junk he manages to find, I guess. It's just so hard to picture Scorpy as anything other than a dolt. It's weird to see him in an almost lab-like setting. We find out he has an antidote to the Cyber-Bee thing that's making Primal rage out of control.

Back at the Axalon Cheetor goes to visit Primal in the holding cell. Primal is still twitching mad and all, but he seems to have it under control some. He's still talking like his old self and says that if he can't stop the rage, maybe he can at least redirect it back at the Predacons. Yeah! Now that's the Primal I know! Cheetor sets him free and they both head to the bridge.

On the bridge Rhinox, Rattrap and Dinobot are discussing how to get the antivirus that Scorponok has surely developed. Things start getting a little snippy between Rattrap and Dinobot when Primal interrupts. They're all shocked to see him out of the holding cell, but he seems remarkably under control. Primal says that he intends to take all this newfound fighting instinct and aggression he's got and turn it right back on the Preds... with the help of his crew. It all sounds good, but Primal gets a little too excited and shoots a ceiling light. Alarms start blaring and red lights start flashing. Oooooooooooh! Loud, annoying alarms making Primal angry. Flashing red lights making him angry! He starts shooting the alarm klaxons! Everyone ducks for cover, but Rhinox makes a daring attempt to tackle Primal. Rattrap and Cheetor pile on but Primal throws them all off. Even Rhinox!

That does it! Primal's not waiting around anymore for his crew of losers to develop some courage! If they're not with him, then he's going to attack the Pred base all on his own!

Primal: "It's like Dinobot says- (coy look from Dinobot)- We've gotta' hit the Preds the only way they understand: hard, fast, and right where it hurts!"

Primal politely takes the elevator outside. I swear, I was expecting him to shoot a hole in the roof and fly out. It's been a while since I've seen this one.

Anyway! New plan! The Maximals contact the Predacon base and warn them that if they don't want to get slagged all to scrap, then they better hand over the antivirus. Sounds reasonable enough, yeah, except that Megatron isn't worried about one crazed Maximal. He's got a whole crew of battle-ready Predacons to deal with the situation. So great! All Cheetor managed to do was tip off the Preds that Primal was on his way. New plan! The Maximals all race to the Pred base to help out, because you know Primal's going to be needing that backup whether he wants it or not.

The Pred base! Primal's flying right for it and dons his "battle armor". Now for anyone reading this that's never seen Beast Wars before, Primal's battle armor doesn't consist of him combining with another Maximal, he doesn't have a trailer of any kind that becomes armor, he doesn't have a whole set of remote vehicles that become gestalt limbs, he doesn't gain any new weapons or anything. Primal's "battle armor" is a faceplate that covers his mouth. And that's it.

BECAUSE THAT'S HOW HARDCORE HE IS!!!

He blasts a hole right into the hull of the Pred base and flies in. Tarantulus is dispatched to deal with him. They meet within moments (Primal's making it real easy for people to find him) and Tarantulus fires his crossbow at him. Oooh, score one for the spider! Wait, what the- Primal CAUGHT the crossbow arrow! He waves his finger at Tarry in a, "Tsk. Tsk." motion and- OMG- he's walking forward!
Tarantulus unleashes the machine gun spider legs of doom! In what has to be one of the coolest scenes ever from season 1, Primal marches through all the bullets and lasers (or whatever he's shooting) until he's point blank with Tarantulus. He picks the Pred up off the ground and impales him to the wall with his own crossbow arrow. OH... MY... GAWD.

Waspy is sent in next and... why even prolong the suffering. Waspinator is scared out of his mind at the mere sound of Primal's footsteps. Primal tears through a wall, grabs Waspy, yanks him back through and plows him through another wall. And just for good measure, Primal blasts Waspy when he's down.

By this point the other Maximals have shown up. Terrorsaur and Blackarachnia are sent out front to deal with them. I just have to say that I like seeing those two working together. For some reason I always liked to imagine that if Blackarachnia hooked up with anybody else other than Silverbolt, it would've been Terrorsaur. They just seem to work fairly well together. So they're doing their thing out front and Cheetor manages to sneak his way inside the base...

... Great moment where Primal's walking down the dark halls of the ship. He looks tired and battered. He remembers what Cheetor said earlier about not letting this thing tweak him out of control. It's a nice moment and really stands out to me. You can see the real Primal come through during this sequence for a moment.

Primal reaches Scorponok's lab finally but the antidote is nowhere to be seen. Megatron, who's been in beast mode for this entire episode, steps out of the shadows holding the antivirus. If Primal wants to live, then he has to swear allegiance to the Predacons. Megatron smiles and chuckles at his clever self. This trick might have worked on a cowardly Primal, but Megs is dealing with super-heated, raging mad Primal and he's not having any of it!

Primal rips the Cyber-Bee off his chest and says, "Here's a little trick I learned from a flower!" No matter how he says that, it just can't sound cool or tough. The Cyber-Bee (now a bomb) latches onto the back of Megatron's neck and he runs for dear life to find someone to remove it.

Cheetor dashes in just in time to catch the antidote that Megatron had thrown up in the air (in terror, presumably) and injects Primal with it. I always notice the really bad animation during these 4 seconds. Whether it's Cheetor running over to Primal or the fact that his hand isn't on the handle of the antidote speargun half the time, it's just a really awkward scene. But hey, who cares. The rest of the episode's been awesome.

They flee the base and elsewhere... Megs finds Scorponok and has him remove the Cyber-Bee just as it explodes in their faces. The Predacons are dead! ... until the next episode. Seriously, this is like the second or third time now that the Beast Wars should've been over. Bah!

Sometime later... Primal is back in his quarters aboard the Axalon resting up. He wakes to find Dinobot watching over him. Claiming it was merely his shift to keep watch, Dinobot makes his way for the door. He states that he's glad to have Primal back home and back to normal and even cracks a smile. Awww. Primal looks over to his side and sees that there are some flowers on his desk next to the bed. They're the same flowers from the start of the episode. He looks back to Dinobot, but the scaley lizard is already half-way through the door and doesn't look back.

That pretty much sums up Dinobot's whole character, doesn't it? He actually does care but he'll never say it. I like it. It's a nice way to end the episode. Anyway, one thing I have to say before I wrap it up for this one. We've seen characters turn evil in many other TF shows and even later in Beast Wars itself. What makes this episode stand out is that Primal hasn't really turned evil. He's turned badass. He still gets to rampage and shoot his guns wildly and do all the things that the "turned evil" characters do (like all the Autobots turning evil in "Attack of the Autobots"), but it's still Primal underneath it all. He's not mindlessly evil. He knows what's been done to him and he's doing everything in his power to turn this weakness into a strength and use his newfound power against his enemies and not his friends. It makes for what is probably the most fun and most interesting take on the concept of having a good guy do and say radically different things that they normally never would.

Great episode. One of my favorite in the entire series. And coming up next it looks like we have "The Probe". Did I mention that the sequence of episodes on Rhino's dvd set is all screwed up? Yeah, it is. I'm going by the traditional episode guide, and not the order they put them in. Anyway, that's all for now. I leave you all with some pics.

Post by **Onslaught Six** » Mon Dec 15, 2008 7:17 am

What, no pics of Faceplate Primal, especially after all the hubbub we put up up there about it?

Mako Crab · Post by **Mako Crab** » Mon Dec 15, 2008 9:04 am

*L* Just for you, man.

Post by **Onslaught Six** » Mon Dec 15, 2008 12:37 pm

Snoogans.

Mako Crab · Post by **Mako Crab** » Mon Dec 15, 2008 3:41 pm

LOL! Totally worth it.

Post by **onslaught86** » Mon Dec 15, 2008 11:05 pm

Faceplate Primal never stops being awesome. Ever.

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Revisiting BEAST WARS

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