History WMG / BeastMachines

And by "comrades", I mean "everyone who betrayed, annoyed or died near Megatron during the Beast War". Dinobot, Silverbolt and Blackarachnia all changed sides; Tarantulas had his own agenda; Rampage was a psycho who Megs needed to keep on a leash; the Tripredacus Council & Ravage didn't trust him (the former also being too cowardly in Megatron's eyes); Dinobot II eventually turned on him; Waspinator quit on him; and both Inferno and Scorponok, his only real loyal henchmen, perished (not at the same time, but still). The fact Megatron was tied to the Autobot shuttle shortly after most of this happened probably gave him all the time he needed to contemplate no longer valuing his existence as a Predacon. In turn, that thinking likely [[Main/JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope lead to loathing all animal, then living, and finally organic matter]].

And by "comrades", I mean "everyone who betrayed, annoyed or died near Megatron during the Beast War". Dinobot, Silverbolt and Blackarachnia all changed sides; Tarantulas had his own agenda; Rampage was a psycho who Megs needed to keep on a leash; the Tripredacus Council & Ravage didn't trust him (the former also being too cowardly in Megatron's eyes); Dinobot II eventually turned on him; Waspinator quit on him; and both Inferno and Scorponok, his only real loyal henchmen, perished (not at the same time, but still). The fact Megatron was tied to the Autobot shuttle shortly after most of this happened probably gave him all the time he needed to contemplate no longer valuing his existence as a Predacon. In turn, that thinking likely [[Main/JumpingTheSlipperySlope lead to loathing all animal, then living, and finally organic matter]].

Notice how Silverbolt rejoined the Maximals despite Jetstorm making very clear that he did not want to be Silverbolt again ? That was because his brutal reformatting deleted both his shell program and his Vehicon programming. Unlike him Rhinox only had his memories awakened, he wasn't reformatted. Based from what he says to the Diagnostic Drone we can assume he overrode Megatron's shell program, but he was still in a Vehicon body with a Vehicon programming. Thus he got the Vehicon boost in agressivity and megalomania, coupled with hatred for all organic life, and it affected his personality. Besides when Rhinox dies and joins the Matrix he reverts to his Beast Wars personality and admits his actions as Tankor were wrong, further suggesting he wasn't himself during this time.

[[WMG: In 'Beast Machines'', the virus did affect the Transmetals, just to a lesser extent]]

His spark with be orange in color, and he will be a physical LightningBruiser, both in beast and robot mode.]]

[[WMG: In Beast Machines, the virus did affect the Transmetals, just to a lesser extent]]

** This works except for the fact that Cheetor had a ''very'' strong emotional bond to Primal in WesternAnimation/BeastWars where the two had a sort of father/son relationship
*** Which also works in this theory - as noted elsewhere on the wiki, Cheetor seemed to have lost that bond entirely, acting almost Starscream-like. Easily explainable as feeling betrayed by his father figure due to the fanaticism and lack of support, and then the virus making it go overboard from a feeling of emotional betrayal into outright resentment and desire to replace.
** Nightscream was onworld when the virus hit, and only survived due to freak accident. Presumably, the virus enhanced his childishness and emphathizing ability. If you'll notice, the effects were related to enhancing of emotions. Optimus too trusting and emotionally dependent, Rattrap lost empathy, Blackarachnia was consumed by longing, Cheetor lost his sense of fun, when resurrected, Silverbolt was consumed by grief and regret... it seems all the virus did was either enhance negative emotions and character traits, or suppress positive ones.

Remember how crazy Megatron became after carrying his namesake's Spark around towards the end of WesternAnimation/BeastWars? That was because G1 Megatron was slowly overwriting BW Megatron's mind, slowly but certainly metastasizing inside his unwitting vehicle and writing a shell program around his mind, which lingered even after the Spark was removed. G1 Megatron's Spark was then sanitized by the Maximals so he could never take advantage of the knowledge stolen from his future namesake, but the shell program remained inside BW Megatron. Learning that humankind was responsible for the Decepticons' losing the Great War turned this new Megatron violently anti-organic, and the sheer trauma of the experience coupled with the knowledge that the free will of the Autobots would shatter his grand visions for the future drove him completely insane, prompting him to wage war on the "curses" of individuality and free will. Becoming a PhysicalGod was either always his master plan, or a product of his newfound intellect. His agenda even reached behind the scenes of Beast Machines, freeing G1 Megatron's actual spark from whatever prison the Maximal Elders kept it in and constructing the [[FanNickname Big Floating Head]] to house it (the Spark was mutated from the touch of Unicron, hence its strange properties seen in Season 2). But Optimus Primal threw a spanner in the works and destroyed BM Megatron once and for all in "Fallout," as well as shunting G1 Megatron's Spark into an organic form.

* What about Nightscream?
** He ''was'' onworld when the virus hit, and only survived due to freak accident. Presumably, the virus enhanced his childishness and emphathizing ability. If you'll notice, the effects were related to enhancing of emotions. Optimus too trusting and emotionally dependent, Rattrap lost empathy, Blackarachnia was consumed by longing, Cheetor lost his sense of fun, when resurrected, Silverbolt was consumed by grief and regret... it seems all the virus did was either enhance negative emotions and character traits, or suppress positive ones.
*** As an extension, this was its purpose- emotionally cripple the cybertronians to the extent that the spark-extractor would find no resistance. The Transmetal qualities, and whatever saved Nighscream, was enough to keep them from being rendered functionally comatose, but not enough to leave their personalities intact.
* As an extension of the above, this emotional nature of the virus is why they found the Hate Plague later on- Megatron had been examining samples of it to produce his emotion-affecting virus.
** Can this get made into canon? It makes the series so much better for this troper to think of the show as having an added psychological level as opposed to being pure Character Derailment.
*** Agreed, it's fan-established-cannon.

* Would you be so sure that those inhabitants weren't taken down by Megatron's forces before the beginning of the series?
** The Demons trashed G1 era mechs, and ate them if I recall rightly. They're at least twice the size of them. Let me repeat that, *Twice The Size of Old School [=TFs=],* and it's actually closer to three times the size. They were basically immune to all weapons. The only way to kill them was to stuff them so full of energon that they exploded.
* Hell, maybe those inhabitants all died and became the organic goop?
** They survived up to G1/G2, why would they die and become goop suddenly? But that's more likely than Megatron defeating them.
* Or maybe they were reformatted into technorganics with everyone else?
** They'll be even better at being murder freaks.
* Or maybe the Techno-organic reformatting was cosmetic, and Cybertron is still a metal ball?
** The core? Sure, but the demons will get through the 'cosmetic' change. It's the surface that keeps them sealed. Assuming that some of the metal shell remains: organic things have a nasty/wonderful tendancy to creep. Eventually it will crack open the shield--life finds a way, after all.

** The Demons trashed G1 era mechs, and ate them if I recall rightly. They're at least twice the size of them. Let me repeat that, *Twice The Size of Old School TFs,* and it's actually closer to three times the size. They were basically immune to all weapons. The only way to kill them was to stuff them so full of energon that they exploded.

** Ahaha. No. The Demons trashed G1 era mechs, and ate them if I recall rightly. They're at least twice the size of them. Let me repeat that, *Twice The Size of Old School TFs,* and it's actually closer to three times the size. They were basically immune to all weapons. The only way to kill them was to stuff them so full of energon that they exploded.

** Oh good, they'll be even better at being murder freaks.

The only reason I didn't put this under the Fridge entry is because there isn't one. Remember how crazy Megatron became after carrying his namesake's Spark around towards the end of WesternAnimation/BeastWars? That was because G1 Megatron was slowly overwriting BW Megatron's mind, slowly but certainly metastasizing inside his unwitting vehicle and writing a shell program around his mind, which lingered even after the Spark was removed. G1 Megatron's Spark was then sanitized by the Maximals so he could never take advantage of the knowledge stolen from his future namesake, but the shell program remained inside BW Megatron. Learning that humankind was responsible for the Decepticons' losing the Great War turned this new Megatron violently anti-organic, and the sheer trauma of the experience coupled with the knowledge that the free will of the Autobots would shatter his grand visions for the future drove him completely insane, prompting him to wage war on the "curses" of individuality and free will. Becoming a PhysicalGod was either always his master plan, or a product of his newfound intellect. His agenda even reached behind the scenes of Beast Machines, freeing G1 Megatron's actual spark from whatever prison the Maximal Elders kept it in and constructing the [[FanNickname Big Floating Head]] to house it (the Spark was mutated from the touch of Unicron, hence its strange properties seen in Season 2). But Optimus Primal threw a spanner in the works and destroyed BM Megatron once and for all in "Fallout," as well as shunting G1 Megatron's Spark into an organic form.