Pharma (G1)

Pharma is an Autobot from the 2005 IDW portion of the Generation 1 continuity family.

They call me Mr. Pharmaceutical.

Pharma is the chief medical officer at Delphi, an Autobot infirmary located on the planet Messatine. Despite being a haughty control freak, he is acknowledged as an excellent doctor. He hates Decepticons with a passion, but seems to be willing to take self-preservation a bit farther than any good Autobot would.

Fiction

2005 IDW continuity

First appearance: "Bullets" (text story); More than Meets the Eye #4 (depicted on-panel)

He worked at Zeta's New Institute
Just another face in a red jumpsuit

In the early days of the war, Pharma and Ratchet were friends and colleagues at the Deltaran Medical Facility. House of Ambus He also worked at the New Institute where he tended to Tumbler after the mnemosurgeon was injured when Overlord attacked the facility. Remembrance Day Pharma and Ratchet accompanied the team that arrested Roadbuster for his brutal murders of his cadets, though they were only able to save the life of one victim: Hubcap. Sins of the Wreckers #4

In the early 2000s, Prowl's orders made Ratchet and Pharma go their separate ways as the former was ordered to Earth and the latter requested to go "to Delphi of all places". Pharma intended to say no until he heard Ratchet was going to be deployed and tried to ask his friend for advice, only to see that, rather than say goodbye, he'd snuck away while his back was turned. Our Steps Will Always Rhyme

With Delphi serving as an obvious target, given its location within the territory of the Decepticon Justice Division, Pharma was forced to make a deal with the division, providing their transformation-obsessed leader with transformation cogs in exchange for the facility's safety. The arrangement worked for a time, as Pharma harvested cogs from patients that could not be saved, How Ratchet Got His Hands Back and business proceeded as usual at Delphi: though for Pharma, "as usual" included such incredible feats as performing a four-way fuel pump transplant while being one of the donors himself. Life After the Big Bang

On the night after the Surge, Pharma caught First Aid reading Wreckers: Declassified instead of working, and ordered him to check on Roulette. Bullets

"I am—and always shall be—your friend."

Over time, Tarn's demand for transformation cogs began increasing, and Pharma found himself first euthanizing struggling patients, and then outright murdering others in order to meet his quota. Knowing he couldn't simply run away without facing repercussions, either from the D.J.D. or Autobot High Command, Pharma saw the closure of Delphi as his only way out of the deal, and so developed a plague triggered by transformation that he could anonymously unleash to bring Delphi to its knees. Pharma hired Genericons Sonic and Boom to infiltrate Delphi and spread the plague; when they arrived, claiming to be seeking asylum, Pharma deliberately misidentified them as Monoformers in order to both lower his fellow Autobots' vigilance against them, and to ensure that there would be no issues with placing them in a cell together. Once ensconced in the same cell, the pair detonated a "soundbomb" laced with Pharma's virus, infecting all who heard it; Pharma had intended to protect himself by entering a CR chamber, but finding that they were all occupied, he was forced to take refuge in Delphi's quarantine chamber, which sealed shut automatically, locking him in. Thinking he could break out once everyone had died, Pharma soon had other problems to deal with: Ratchet, Drift, and Pipes arrived to investigate Delphi five days later, having received a message from First Aid, and freed Pharma from the room. Life After the Big Bang

"Nope! Couldn't say that with a straight face!"

To avoid being found out, Pharma quickly freed Sonic and Boom and ordered them to kill everyone, only for the two Decepticons to be destroyed by an angry Fortress Maximus. Pharma tried to turn the blame on Ambulon, but Ratchet and First Aid quickly worked out the truth. His corruption detected, Pharma shot out a life support machine and escaped though a secret tunnel in a CR chamber in the ensuing chaos, but Ratchet pursued Pharma, and was able to infect him with the virus, prompting him to produce the vaccine he had developed. The two combatants' battle carried them to the building's roof, where Pharma wound up toppling over the edge, clinging on for dear life, unable to use his jet mode to fly to safety without activating the virus within him. Pharma attempted to shoot Ratchet in the back, but was foiled when Drift suddenly appeared and sliced Pharma's hands off, sending him falling to his presumed doom.

The Autobots did not look for Pharma's body, though Ratchet soon found a use for the two remaining fragments of the traitorous doctor: replacing his own worn-out hands. How Ratchet Got His Hands Back Pharma, meanwhile, survived his fall. He was found by Chief Justice Tyrest, who used him to test the universal killswitch developed to wipe out all Cybertronians who were constructed cold. As Pharma was famous for being forged, Tyrest was able to prove the switch wouldn't work on those like him. Arm the Lonely In return, Pharma got a new set of hands with capabilities far beyond those he'd lost, and the use of Luna 1's medbay. The Divided Self

Groovy.

Following the arrival of the Lost Light, Pharma sarcastically (and figuratively) offered Ratchet a hand after the medic was blown off his M.A.R.B. by Decepticons. The Fecund Moon Having rendered Ratchet unconscious, he reported to Lockdown that he was returning to base to open up his "present". There, he revived the Autobot medic, showing off his new hands which could turn into anything, and taunted him by repeatedly asking him to guess what was in a large box. When Ratchet refused to play the game, Pharma gleefully revealed that the box contained Ratchet's body and that he'd reduced his former friend to little more than his head and spark casing. House of Ambus

Pharma tortured what remained of Ratchet for a little while, though Ratchet refused to scream and give Pharma any satisfaction. Ratchet asked Pharma if the act was one of revenge, and Pharma replied that although he had initially wanted revenge, Ratchet's theft of his hands back in Delphi had taken it to a whole different level. Pharma hadn't tried to take the hands back, even though the medbay was an embarrassment of repossessed technological richness. He feared Ratchet had booby trapped them to explode. Sensing a weakness, Ratchet challenged Pharma to a duel, to see who of the pair was the best doctor, and the winner could have the hands outright.

Unable to resist a decisive competition, Pharma reinstalled Ratchet in his body, initiating a race to see who could be faster in stitching together 'bots that had been cut in half. But instead of a "worthless Decepticon", Pharma had Ambulon and First Aid taken from the Lost Light. Ratchet pleaded to stop the race, but Pharma was committed to the game. Ratchet quickly told the two medibots to re-route their nervecircuits away from their waists to minimise their pain, however Pharma mocked Ratchet, and chain sawed Ambulon in half, lengthways. The Divided Self

Leaving Ratchet to fruitlessly attempt to revive Ambulon, an impossible task, Pharma scurried off to the control room to salivate over the universal killswitch. When Rodimus and crew later stormed the control room, Pharma shot Brainstorm before a request came from on high to stop shooting, on account of the large gun Rodimus had pointed at the Chief Justice's chin. Pharma was unaffected by the high-frequency signal Tyrest subsequently used to incapacitate everyone else. Arm the Lonely

IMMA PHARMAIN' MAH LASER! *CHOOM*

Once Tailgate disabled the signal, Skids seized Pharma. When he got his chance, Pharma used his new hands to slip his bonds and make a run for Tyrest's portal to Cyberutopia, only to find he couldn't pass through the guilt-detecting forcefield. Pharma offered to give himself up to First Aid, but infuriated by Pharma's smugness, the Autobot instead blew Pharma's head off. A short time later, metal tentacles dragged Pharma's headless body through the portal. This Calamitous Life Ratchet was very disturbed by this development and wanted his body found as soon as possible. The Sound of Breaking Glass

Mister P's on the rebound, baby!

Unknown to all at the time, the space bridge did not lead to Cyberutopia but rather into the mind of Adaptus. The deity had attempted to claim Skids as his avatar but had unknowingly taken Pharma instead. Though Pharma's brain had been destroyed, his spark still flickered, allowing a trace of his personality to survive within Adaptus. The Return of the King

In late 2016, Drift had a vision of Pharma leading an army of Worldsweepers and Sparkeaters from a blood-red sky. Some Other Cybertron

In 2018, when Adaptus's plans neared fruition, he had Flame rebuild his body in Pharma's likeness. Farsickness When Adaptus met with the imprisoned Team Rodimus, the sight of Ratchet was enough to rouse Pharma into trying to regain control of his body. The Return of the King Adaptus's sadistic torture of Solomus caused Pharma to reemerge, which provided the mortally wounded Solomus the opening needed to slay his foe, consequently destroying any remnant of Pharma. The Unremembering

The Functionist Universe

In an alternate timeline, Pharma had a chat with his old friend Ratchet. The Custom-Made Now

Kre-O online manga

Pharma was with Flame and Jet-kun as Onslaught declared himself the Combaticon leader. New Military Unit Combaticon! Bruticus, Combine!

Notes

• He turns into a jet.^[1]
• Pharma's name, besides the obvious medical connotations, was meant as a pun on "farmer" - because he was "farming" transformation cogs on Delphi.^[2] The Pharma/farmer pun works better in a British accent than an American one.
• Pharma, along with his boss Tyrest and fellow baddie Star Saber, represent three pillars of society (medicine, law, and religion) gone wrong.^[3]
• As per the usual with cameo Kreons, Pharma utilizes existing Kreon parts, in this case Prowl's helmet, and 2 clip-on wing pieces (and backpack pieces to hold them), and a chainsaw blade piece in the place of his left hand.

Foreign names

• Japanese: Pharma (ファーマ Fāma)
• Mandarin: Yào Shī (China, 药师, "Pharmacist")

References