Earthrise episode 3
From Transformers Wiki
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 I am going to die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy. | ||||||
| Episode 3 | ||||||
| Production company | Allspark Animation, Rooster Teeth, Entertainment One | |||||
| Airdate | December 30, 2020 (Netflix) | |||||
| Written by | Gavin Hignight | |||||
| Director | Takashi Kamei | |||||
| Animation studio | Polygon Pictures | |||||
 Watch this episode on Netflix
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Aboard an abandoned space station, the Autobots encounter a titanic threat. On Cybertron, Elita-1 and Scrapface swear to take down Shockwave for good.
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Synopsis
On Cybertron, Elita-1 leads her Autobot team and Scrapface's exhausted Decepticons to their current base, Ratchet's former clinic within a theater. They are approached by a Seeker search party sent by Starscream, and as the fugitives hide, Scrapface experiences the horror of constantly being hunted, a dread Elita and the Autobots know all too well. The Seekers double back, and the fugitive Decepticons fight back, shooting down two Seekers and forcing Jetfire to take to the sky to eliminate the third. Scrapface earns sharp words from Elita; even though he was trying to protect her, such rash action has exposed both the Autobot base as well as the weak Cybertronians in the clinic. She demands their obedience if they are to remain allies.
Inside the clinic, Scrapface is amazed at the care shown to Decepticons when a priority signal is received: Shockwave has sent a broadcast all over Cybertron recalling all Decepticons to Kaon Arena, promising to protect them. Scrapface and Elita strengthen their Autobot-Decepticon coalition, vowing to go to Kaon Arena not to submit to Shockwave, but to destroy his operations once and for all.
In space, Optimus Prime stands upon the hull of the Ark, doubting the wisdom of his decision to cast the Allspark away from their world. Bumblebee joins him and reassures Prime that he acted on good faith, and that he is not alone in the quest to retrieve the Allspark and save Cybertron. Prime notices that Bumblebee has finally chosen a side, brandishing an Autobot symbol on his chest. Prime is summoned to the Ark's bridge, where Wheeljack and Ratchet tell him some good news and some bad news. The good news is that the Allspark has been located; the bad news is that, because the Ark is so low on energon and has been flung so far into space after the battle of the spacebridge, they cannot close the great distance to retrieve it.
However, Ratchet immediately proposes a way forward: even though Megatron destroyed all the spacebridges on Cybertron, there is still a perpetually-active Spacebridge in the Nebulon system that they can reach. Even though the Autobots can't figure out why the bridge is perpetually active, it's their only feasible hope to reach the Allspark. Prime orders Ironhide to take the Ark towards the Nebulon system, wary of a potential Decepticon trap. Arriving at the Nebulon spacebridge, the Autobots easily understand why the Spacebridge is perpetually active: a space station remains immobile traversing the Spacebridge, nearly halfway through. Teletraan-1 detects no life-forms and minimal Energon present. The Autobots decide to board the station and determine how best to remove it from the Ark's path.
Aboard the space station, Wheeljack activates emergency power and deduces that shutting down the Spacebridge is impossible while the space is partway through due to a system fail-safe. As Ratchet has no success establishing control of the station, Wheeljack proposes a controlled explosion to shatter the station in two. Prime decides that the Autobots will lay charges over the station, but that he and Bumblebee will cross the Spacebridge and lay charges on the other side. As charges are laid, the Autobots are aware that even a small miscalculation could destroy the Spacebridge and not merely the station, trapping them far from home and condemning them to a slow death. As the Autobots set charges and wonder how the station came to be in its current state, they are suddenly attacked by Scorponok, who immediately skewers an Autobot on its stinger! It promises to punish the Autobots, whose return fire has little effect on it.
Prime and Bumblebee cross the Spacebridge and find themselves within the atmosphere of a planet resembling paradise. They detect no sentient life below, and wonder what destroyed the many structures on the surface, when they receive Wheeljack's distress call about Scorponok. As Wheeljack is being crushed, suddenly Omega Supreme appears behind Scorponok, ready to save the day! But "Omega" was merely a hologram generated by Mirage, leaving an opening for Optimus Prime to arrive and punch the mechanical scorpion in the face, using his axe to drive it down a shaft. But the behemoth scorpion transforms and returns up the shaft, threatening to punish those who "poisoned the sky", and killing another Autobot. The Autobots manage to get behind a reinforced door, but time is against them, as the charges have been set, and the raging Scorponok stands between them and their path back to the Ark!
Unbeknownst to the Autobots, the Nemesis is approaching the space station. Megatron intuits that Prime has journeyed this far to retrieve the Allspark and will not risk losing it again by destroying the spacebridge. Instead, he prepares a boarding party and will crush Prime with his bare hands!
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Decepticons | Others |
|---|---|---|
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Quotes
"They still search for us. And they won't stop."
"Eventually, you get used to it."
- —Scrapface and Elita-1
"Appearances can be more than meets the eye."
- —Optimus Prime won't waste an opportunity to quote a classic tagline
Notes
Transformers references
- On the Ark's bridge, Ironhide invokes the name of Prima.
- Wheeljack comments how the Nebulon space station is wedged into the Spacebridge tighter than Perceptor's receptor, in reference to Blaster's line of "Cover your receptors, Perceptor!" in The Transformers: The Movie.
- Likewise, Megatron dramatically swore to crush Prime "with his bare hands" in that same movie.
- Wheeljack refers to "Maccadam's".
- The planet Nebulon station was in the process of getting to matches with the Earthrise toyline's description of Biosfera, though the same toyline's map path from the station leads to Gigantion.
- Scorponok is on 'Nebulon' station and only injured from shots to the head, both references to the character's Headmaster origins.
Animation and technical errors
- Netflix's subtitles for "Maccadam's" misspells it as the more human-sounding "MacAdam's".
- When Optimus Prime transforms to punch Scorponok, his right forearm has a piece that jumps to somewhere else on his forearm between frames.
