roblorbo central

He Who Shall Not Be Named.

Let's instead talk about BEAST WARS!

Beast Wars is a mid- to late-90s CGI cartoon as well as an official sequel to the Generation 1 cartoon! The animation and models are a little silly-goofy at times, but this show is FULL of worldbuilding that would become integral to the franchise as a whole. They established the existence of sparks and protoforms! AND the existence of the AllSpark as a Cybertronian afterlife!!! We can talk about that more later, though

Because today, we're talking about the iconic ladies of the Beast Wars! Unlike its predecessor where we didn't get a fembot until S2 (and didn't get a fembot who Actually Stayed until the movie), BW actually had a main-stay fembot introduced as early as episode 8! And it's a face you'll recognize – I'm talking about none other than Blackarachnia!

... Yeah, a breastplate was okay but apparently human hands weren't :/

Her origins in Beast Wars is actually pretty similar to her TFA backstory! It's just that instead of being an Autobot who got mutated and joined the Decepticons, she was originally a Maximal protoform that was stolen and reprogrammed by the Predacons.

And then in episode 15, we got Airazor!

A Maximal fembot that excelled in aerial reconnaissance and combat, she was often employed as a scout. While she had a good rapport with all the Maximals, she was PARTICULARLY close to the nature-loving loner Tigatron.

(Small fun fact, the Japanese dub chose for whatever reason to change Airazor into a man. Woman erasure... But oddly they kept the romantic subplot/undertones between her and Tigatron?)

Both Blackarachnia and Airazor saw a return to the Beast Wars screen during the Netflix Earthrise trilogy! (There's even a little scene where Blackarachnia kisses Airazor's cheek while being carried through the air... How yurious 👀)

Airazor also saw a silver screen appearance in the Rise of the Beasts movie a few years ago too!

She never transformed out of her bird mode. There aren't even any CONCEPT SKETCHES that anyone can find of a robot mode for her :[

The closest we'll probably get to RotB Airazor bot mode... Toy designers had to make that bot mode from SCRATCH. Which is a shame bc her bird mode is GORGEOUS and I can only imagine her bot mode would've been just as stunning

BROOOO I didn’t know Beast Wars was the origin of all that significant lore??? All I knew about her was that her animation was wonky lol.

Blackarachnia mention!!! It’s so fun to see iterations of characters across the different continuities, it kinda feels like tracing a species evolution. Totally see the design influences in her TFA incarnation!

Ooh I love Airazor!!! So refreshing to see a fembot that deviates from the skinny hourglass figure. Not the Japanese dub sacrificing a beautiful woman for yaoi… many such cases. My jaw DROPPED when you mentioned the little cheek peck between her and BlackArachnia… yuri senses TINGLINGGGG. So glad she finally got a bot design in BW!