TRANSFORMERS: THE BASICS on THE GREAT WAR

[Music] when it comes to talking about the basics of the world of the transformers there are few concepts more foundational than the war between the autobots and the decepticons which has gripped cybertron for millions of years but how did the war start and why are these two factions fighting we'll find out today in the basics on the great war the transformers franchise was born during a period of increased tensions in the cold war between the united states and the soviet union the conflict had a significant impact on the culture of the era including children's cartoons which now filled the airwaves with stories of democracy-loving heroes defending freedom against evil empires out to conquer the world and it was this climate that shaped the story of the transformers from the very start built around an ages old war between the forces of good and evil it was the decepticons who were responsible for beginning the war and the reasons the original series gave them for doing so were straightforward they did it because they craved power wanting to conquer first cybertron then the rest of the galaxy forcing the autobots to take up arms to stop them in the years since different transformers series have taken different approaches to certain aspects of the war such as how it started or what it's being fought over but this simple premise of good versus evil of the decepticons being motivated by the pursuit of power has remained consistent for most of the brand's history it's only in the last decade or so that their motives and the origins of the war have begun to be explored in a more nuanced way one of the most influential early stories about the beginning of the war was 1986's state games a prose story from the united kingdom that detailed how the struggle began in the world of the marvel transformers comic book long ago a race to control cybertron's natural resources led to the planet splitting into various city-states when relations between the militaristic cities of tarn and vos broke down the two briefly went to war and destroyed one another seizing the opportunity a power-hungry gladiator from tarn named megatron rallied the survivors of both cities to his side by blaming the autobot city-state of ayakon for not stepping in to stop the conflict dubbing his new followers the decepticons megatron declared war against the autobots intending to conquer cybertron and turn it into a huge cosmic battleship with which to attack and enslave other planets the war went poorly at first until the ruling council of iacon turned over command of their armies to a brave soldier named optimus prime who proved able to effectively organize the autobots to fight back later issues of the comic suggested that the difference between autobot and decepticon wasn't just an ideological one but that there was some fundamental genetic difference between the two factions that made each the others natural opposite two halves of a cosmic hole each existing to balance the other one good one evil which made war between the two inevitable this idea of the war being the unavoidable result of genetic determinism was also featured in the transformers animated series in which the decepticons were presented as being inherently warlike and power hungry because they had originally been built by the alien quintasons to function as military hardware in this universe there were multiple autobot decepticon wars down through history rather than a single unbroken one after years of such fighting the autobots were able to defeat the decepticons by inventing transforming technology and brought a golden age of peace to the planet until the creation of megatron who reorganized the defeated decepticons and began the conflict the cartoon would name the great war in response autobot elder alpha trione rebuilt the young autobot orion pax into optimus prime to lead the fight against megatron's army but eventually after millions of years of combat cybertron became dreamed of energy forcing the transformers to leave their dying home world this last concept has remained a staple of transformers storytelling in the 21st century but not every idea about the war from classic media has carried over into newer series for instance the original comic and cartoon depicted the autobots as being on the losing end of the war with the decepticons in control of much of cybertron but most modern series have presented the two armies as being on fairly even footing on their homeworld and while the action of the cartoon was driven by the broad objective of finding new sources of energy to revitalize cybertron in other series the war has often been fought over a very specific source of power such as the energy boosting minicons or most famously the allspark the source of transformer life introduced by the live action movies and featured in several tv series where optimus prime and megatron had previously been depicted as simply rival commanders who rose to power around the same time another key concept first established by the movies was that the two leaders had once been allies and that their falling out was part of the inciting incident that began the war we were brothers once once but perhaps the story that has most significantly influenced the modern depiction of the war was idw publishing's 2008 comic book miniseries megatron origin which revisited marvel's vision of megatron as a gladiator who amassed an army of followers and introduced the idea that before the war cybertron had been a world of severe social inequality ruled over by a corrupt senate megatron had been a minor laboring under this system and he united his fellow downtrodden working class bots to violently tear down this broken social order and seize power for himself all these different ideas about the origins of the war were brought together in the aligned continuity a new modern unified vision for transformers lure that debuted in 2010 in this version of the story as related in media like the novel transformers exodus and the transformers prime animated series pre-war cybertron operated under a caste system that locked individual transformers into specific jobs and positions on the social hierarchy from the moment of their birth based on what they transformed into minor and gladiator megatron wanted to see this regime abolished so that all cybertronians could be equal and he soon attracted a legion of fellow lower caste supporters his movement also caught the attention of idealistic young data clerk orion pax who became close friends with megatron though the pair disagreed over the best way to achieve megatron's goals orion believed that the system could be peacefully reformed but megatron favored violent revolutionary action and was already secretly directing his followers to carry it out when the pair were granted an audience with the high council to have their say the council were moved by orion's words of peace and appointed him the next prime optimus prime charging him with leading cybertron into the future furious at what he saw as his friend's betrayal of their shared ideals megatron cut off all ties with optimus and with his followers began the war to take the power he believed optimus had stolen from him as has become common with much of the lore laid out by the aligned continuity the basic idea of the war starting with optimus and megatron as friends who fell out while attempting to bring equality to a corrupt cybertron went on to become the definitive modern take on the concept and influenced most transformers media of the next decade including the transformers cyberverse and war for cybertron cartoons and the ideas would even feed back into idw's comics where they were expanded upon to more deeply explore megatron's descent into evil from well-intentioned beginnings and to draw greater parallels between the rise of the decepticons and the real life workers uprising that led to the founding of the soviet union in a sense bringing the great war full circle back to its cold war origins but as important as the war is to the story of the transformers franchise both the autobots and the decepticons fight in the hope that one day it'll end now neither the original cartoon nor the comic was ever able to show the end of the war at times the autobots seemed to achieve peace even retaking cybertron but these were only temporary lulls as the decepticons would inevitably return and the war would rage on the cartoons of the 21st century have been a bit more lucky in this regard with several being able to bring their versions of the great war to an end in their series finales most notable among them transformers prime which saw megatron lose the will to carry on the fight there have even been series that are set entirely after the war including beast wars transformers animated and prime zone sequel series robots in disguise which take place in future eras where the autobots have restored peace to cybertron rather than full-scale war these series featured only small teams of heroes fighting on other planets to stop rogue bands of villains from obtaining the power and resources they needed to launch a new attack on cybertron but the most in-depth look at the end of the war and life in peacetime was provided by idw's comics which brought the war to an end in 2011 and spent the next seven years of comics chronicling the challenges the autobots and decepticons faced as they tried to build a new future for their world together from the political struggles of building a new government and re-establishing contact with cybertron's long-lost colonies to facing attacks from other races seeking retribution for the pain the transformers war brought to the universe but nothing lasts forever and in 2019 idw rebooted their comics introducing a brand new universe with another new take on the beginning of the war in this world megatron was the populist leader of a political party named the ascenticons who believed that cybertron's autobot government was preventing the transformer race from achieving the power and greatness that he thought was rightfully theirs while maintaining a public face as a senator megatron secretly founded a terrorist organization known as the rise to stoke fear and unrest on cybertron paving the way for his party to stage a coup overthrowing the government in the name of protecting the planet from the threat that he had covertly created though this series does still feature the idea of optimus and megatron being friends before ideology drove them apart it marks a notable departure from the more sympathetic view of the decepticons as oppressed working-class revolutionaries that's dominated the last decade and along with other recent media such as the bumblebee movie and the war for cybertron cartoon also returns to the more generation 1 inspired depiction of megatron's army as the dominant power on cybertron with the autobots as a scrappy resistance to their rule suggesting that the way is open for future series to tell the story of the great war in new ways once again they say war never changes but in the world of the transformers change is constant and those are the basics on the great war if you've enjoyed this dive into transformers history and lore don't forget to subscribe and check out over a hundred more videos like it click the bell to be notified about future episodes or get early access to them by supporting the show on patreon [Music]

Channel: Chris McFeely

Views: 334,275

Keywords: generation 1, autobots, decepticons, optimus prime, orion pax, megatron, marvel comics, state games, armada, cybertron, unicron trilogy, animated, movie, the last knight, aligned, exodus, transformers prime, functionism, idw publishing, war for cybertron, bumblebee, siege, history, lore

Id: dyl1FmNvxTg

Length: 13min 6sec (786 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 11 2022