History YMMV / ExoSquad

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Did Phaeton ever truly care about helping his fellow Neosapiens, and was he ever truly TheAtoner for what he did at the end of the first rebellion, or was he just an evil, power mad tyrant manipulating everyone to further his own ambitions? Was he one of these things all along or did he [[DynamicCharacter start as the former and gradually transform into the latter as a result of repeated failures of his regime and his own deteriorating health]]?

* FoeYay: Even though he's asexual, Phaeton seems to spend a ''lot'' of time obsessing over Marsh. Some of his interactions with Marsala have quite a bit of HoYay as well.

* WhatAnIdiot:
** Not putting melee weapons onto the Exoframes to deal with the Neo Warriors and Neo Lords, thus the Exoframes being mostly helpless whenever they get to melee range. (This may be due to ExecutiveMeddling.) Doubly baffling considering some of the E-Frame toys did in fact have melee weapons.
** The making of the Neosapiens. Leaving aside the ethical concerns of creating a SlaveRace aside, maybe making it so said slave race both is physically superior to humans and even has an intellect on par with them, and having them perform forced menial labor wasn't such a good idea, guys.

** [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Governor General Phaeton]] is the falsely-noble despotic [[BigBad ruler of the Neosapien Order]] who manipulates his people into throwing their lives away to increase his personal power. Considering this show takes influence from World War II, [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything think long and hard about]] [[UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler who Phaeton could represent]]. Once a Neosapien rebel, Phaeton cowardly sold out his cohorts to save his own skin, then rose to power while ordering the [[KillAllHumans genocide of humanity]] while consolidating his grip on the Neosapiens. Running brutal death camps, Phaeton has any who resist his orders taken there to be killed and proves a horrific war criminal, with tactics including forced starvation and labor. With cloning technology, Phaeton takes advantage of [[WeHaveReserves an unending supply of troops]] and [[BadBoss cruelly executes his commanders]] for even minor failures only to replace and replenish his army. A completely disgusting madman, Phaeton eventually sends so many of his loyal followers to pointless deaths that even his most loyal aide abandons him when he discovers Phaeton's endgame involved wiping out his own race to guarantee victory.

* HeartwarmingMoments:

** [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Governor General Phaeton]] is the falsely-noble despotic [[BigBad ruler of the Neosapien Empire]] who manipulates his people into throwing their lives away to increase his personal power. Once a Neosapien rebel, Phaeton cowardly sold out his cohorts to save his own skin, then rose to power while ordering the [[KillAllHumans genocide of humanity]] while consolidating his grip on the Neosapiens. Running brutal death camps, Phaeton has any who resist his orders taken there to be killed and proves a horrific war criminal, with tactics including forced starvation and labor. With cloning technology, Phaeton takes advantage of [[WeHaveReserves an unending supply of troops]] and [[BadBoss cruelly executes his commanders]] for even minor failures only to replace and replenish his army. A completely disgusting madman, Phaeton eventually sends so many of his loyal followers to pointless deaths that even his most loyal aide abandons him when he discovers Phaeton's endgame involved wiping out his own race to guarantee victory.
** [[InsaneAdmiral General Draconis]] is the Neosapien Governor in charge of Venus. Cruel even by the brutal standards Phaeton has set for their species, Draconis doesn't even have Phaeton's pretense of trying to help the Neosapien people. Everything Draconis does is [[ItsAllAboutMe for his own advancement]]. Draconis enacts a scorched earth campaign on Venus, creating a planet-wide famine that wipes out the majority of the civilian population, with the few survivors sent to toil in forced labor camps. Draconis's treatment of his own race is little better, even murdering two Neo Megas assigned to him as advisors because he felt their "suggestions" undermined his absolute authority. As a contingency if Venus fell out of his control, Draconis rigged a hydrogen bomb to the city of Vesta, intending to spite his enemies by murdering thousands of human civilians. Draconis assigned a noble soldier named [[AntiVillain Thrax]] to detonate the bomb in order to "redeem" himself for showing mercy to an Exo Squad member. Except Draconis lied about there being a timer for the bomb, and once Thrax activated it, he and Draconis's remaining Neosapien soldiers would've died in the resulting blast. Draconis's lust for power was so great, he plotted to [[TheStarscream betray Phaeton and usurp control of the Neosapien Empire for himself]]. He eventually seized his chance by leaving what he thought was Phaeton to die in an exploding ship.
** [[EvilutionaryBiologist Dr. Albrecht Ketzer]] proves that [[HumansAreBastards Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]--into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a rather horrific process. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]. Injecting Medusa with the same formula, Ketzer later reappears to kidnap Nara again and finish his "work" on her.

* IdiotPlot: The Earth Resistance captured the Neo-Sapien scientist that allegedly invented the GRAF shield. Marsala and some Resistance member start arguing over their next course of action. [[TheMole Diana]] take advantage of this to untie the scientist who escaped [[FailedASpotCheck with no-one noticing]].
* NightmareFuel: If you stop to think about it, quite a bit for a saturday morning cartoon. Aside from the normal carnage of war (shooting and explosions and what not), we see characters get [[ThrownOutTheAirlock exposed to hard vacuum]], starved half to death, put in cargo containers and launched towards the sun, and the effects of the GRAF Shield, which crushes starships (and their occupants) like soda cans. That's just the first season, by the way. The second season gets much worse. They outright call what Draconis is doing to the humans a genocide.

* TearJerker: The first season's climax sees J.T. fighting through Phaeton's sectret Neo-Lord lab alone to rescue his team, a gauntlet that includes going against the Lords' SuperPrototype and then Phaeton (who is wearing his own AceCustom E-Frame). The gauntlet gets Marsh's E-Frame increasingly damaged, and it finally (and fatally) malfunctions as Marsh escapes, forcing him to eject and see it fall into lava. The thing that puts this scene firmly into this territory is the fact the E-Frame's computer says "goodbye, J.T. Marsh" as it melts, which J.T. claims should be impossible because the Frame wasn't active. Cue Marsala saying:

** Not putting Melee Weapons onto the Exoframes to deal with the Neo Warriors and Neo Lords, thus the Exoframes being mostly helpless whenever they get to Melee Range. (This may be due to ExecutiveMeddling.)

* PropagandaPiece: The entire episode "Mindset" was dedicated to Neosapien propaganda and Terran collaborators.

** [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Phaeton]] is the falsely-noble despotic [[BigBad ruler of the Neosapien Empire]] who manipulates his people into throwing their lives away to increase his personal power. Once a Neosapien rebel, Phaeton cowardly sold out his cohorts to save his own skin, then rose to power while ordering the [[KillAllHumans genocide of humanity]] while consolidating his grip on the Neosapiens. Running brutal death camps, Phaeton has any who resist his orders taken there to be killed and proves a horrific war criminal, with tactics including forced starvation and labor. With cloning technology, Phaeton takes advantage of [[WeHaveReserves an unending supply of troops]] and [[BadBoss cruelly executes his commanders]] for even minor failures only to replace and replenish his army. A completely disgusting madman, Phaeton eventually sends so many of his loyal followers to pointless deaths that even his most loyal aide abandons him when he discovers Phaeton's endgame involved wiping out his own race to guarantee victory.

** [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Phaeton]], the [[BigBad ruler]] of the Neosapien empire, uses words like "equality" and pretends to care about the well-being and future of the Neosapiens, but his actions prove this is nothing more than manipulative rhetoric. Before the series started, Phaeton [[FaceHeelTurn sold out the Neosapien rebellion]] to save his own skin, and rises to power by initiating [[KillAllHumans genocide on humanity]], establishing death camps and killing any who resist--and those who don't. His tactics include forcible starvation, forced labor or just nasty executions. [[BadBoss Not even his men are exempt]], as Phaeton is very keen on executing them for minor failures and cloning them. Phaeton's ego and hypocrisy are manifest in how he sends so many of his loyal men to their own deaths on suicidal missions and, at the end, even his most loyal aide Livia deserts him for his plans that would have wiped out his own race to secure his own victory. If Phaeton ever held noble ideals, they're gone by the time he enacts his plan at the start of the series and he grows increasingly evil as he degrades physically and mentally. He is nothing more than a murderous, power-hungry, genocidal, cowardly fascist by the end, and one who would see the galaxy burn for the sake of his own power and advancement.

* TheScrappy: Captain Marcus is a prime example of a HateSink: a full-on GeneralFailure who consistently makes the wrong decisions by being overly aggressive and refuses to listen to others who point out flaws, earns a lot of fan-flack. Even his death, normally of the kind that would invoke AlasPoorScrappy, doesn't get him much sympathy. In fact, most viewers only wished he'd gotten killed ''sooner'', as it probably would have been better for Exofleet if he had.

* GeniusBonus: Some of the things the characters say don't make a lot of sense if you aren't familiar with, say, UsefulNotes/WorldWarII or even the UsefulNotes/VietnamWar. For example, when Able squad realizes they're about to be buried by a landslide caused by [[spoiler:[[UnfriendlyFire Marsala shooting the cliff above them]]]] , Maggie screams ''[[spoiler: FRAGGED!]]''

* NightmareFuel: If you stop to think about it, quite a bit for a saturday morning cartoon. Aside from the normal carnage of war (shooting and explosions and what not), we see characters get [[ThrownOutTheAirlock exposed to hard vacuum]], starved half to death, put in cargo containers and launched towards the sun, and the effects of the Graf Shield, which crushes starships (and their occupants) like soda cans. That's just the first season, by the way. The second season gets much worse. They outright call what Draconis is doing to the humans a genocide.

* TheScrappy: Captain Marcus, for being an outright incompetent HotBlooded JerkAss who consistently makes the wrong decisions by being overly aggressive and refuses to listen to others who point out flaws, earns a lot of fan-flack. Even his death, normally of the kind that would invoke AlasPoorScrappy, generally fails; most viewers only wished he'd gotten killed ''sooner'', it probably would have been better for Exofleet if he had.

** The making of the [=NeoSapiens=]. Leaving aside the ethical concerns of creating a SlaveRace aside, maybe making it so said slave race both is physically superior to humans and even has an intellect on par with them, and having them perform forced menial labor wasn't such a good idea guys.

** [[EvilutionaryBiologist Dr. Albrecht Ketzer]] proves that [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]--into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a rather horrific process. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]. Injecting Medusa with the same formula, Ketzer later reappears to kidnap Nara again and finish his "work" on her.

** [[InsaneAdmiral General Draconis]] is the Neosapien Governor in charge of Venus. Cruel even by the brutal standards the aforementioned Phaeton has set for their species, Draconis doesn't even have Phaeton's pretense of trying to help the Neosapien people. Everything Draconis does is [[ItsAllAboutMe for his own advancement]]. Draconis enacts a scorched earth campaign on Venus, creating a planet-wide famine that wipes out the majority of the civilian population, with the few survivors sent to toil in forced labor camps. Draconis's treatment of his own race is little better, even murdering two Neo Megas assigned to him as advisors because he felt their "suggestions" undermined his absolute authority. As a contingency if Venus fell out of his control, Draconis rigged a hydrogen bomb to the city of Vesta, intending to spite his enemies by murdering thousands of human civilians. Draconis assigned a noble soldier named [[AntiVillain Thrax]] to detonate the bomb in order to "redeem" himself for showing mercy to an Exo Squad member. Except Draconis lied about there being a timer for the bomb, and once Thrax activated it, he and Draconis's remaining Neosapien soldiers would've died in the resulting blast. Draconis's lust for power was so great, he plotted to [[TheStarscream betray Phaeton and usurp control of the Neosapien Empire for himself]]. He eventually seized his chance by leaving what he thought was Phaeton to die in an exploding ship.

* TearJerker: The first season's climax sees J.T. fighting through Phaeton's sectret Neo-Lord lab alone to rescue his team, a gauntlet that includes going against the Lords' SuperPropotype and then Phaeton (who is wearing his own AceCustom E-Frame). The gauntlet gets Marsh's E-Frame increasingly damaged, and it finally (and fatally) malfunctions as Marsh escapes, forcing him to eject and see it fall into lava. The thing that puts this scene firmly into this territory is the fact the E-Frame's computer says "goodbye, J.T. Marsh" as it melts, which J.T. claims should be impossible because the Frame wasn't active. Cue Marsala saying:

* TheScrappy:
** The Exo-Scouts may be this for some fans.
** Captain Marcus, for being an outright incompetent HotBlooded JerkAss who consistently makes the wrong decisions by being overly aggressive and refuses to listen to others who point out flaws, earns a lot of fan-flack. Even his death, normally of the kind that would invoke AlasPoorScrappy, generally fails; most viewers only wished he'd gotten killed ''sooner'', it probably would have been better for Exofleet if he had.

* TheWoobie: Poor, poor, Xenobius and Nara Burns ...

* CrowningMomentOfFunny:
** Not much from this show, but "Target: Earth" has the whole "Amanda Live" bit which parodies talk shows- in this case it's a vehicle for the Neosapien rule- and a random Neo, Stentor, is the announcer, wearing a tuxedo. It's fairly surreal to see in this show, which already has a fairly high tolerance for the absurd.
** Also, from "Scorched Venus", J.T., Alec and Marsala trying to fix a busted Neosapien E-Frame. Right after getting out of the water, one of its' little arms falls off the frame with a "CLUNK"! And a few moments after, Alec succeeds in starting it like a car- as in, it makes "engine trying to turn over" noises. Since when did E-Frames run on car engines?

** [[EvilutionaryBiologist Dr. Albrecht Ketzer]] proves that [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]-into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a rather horrific process. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]. Injecting Medusa with the same formula, Ketzer later reappears to kidnap Nera again and finish his "work" on her.

** [[EvilutionaryBiologist Dr. Albrecht Ketzer]], who first appeared in season 2's "Dark River", proves that [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]-into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a rather horrific process. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]; in "The Night Before Doomsday", Ketzer injects Medusa with the same formula. Appearing next in the season 3 premiere "Beyond Chaos", Ketzer kidnaps Nara, referring to her as "an unfinished experiment" and planning to continue his work.

** [[InsaneAdmiral General Draconis]] is the Neosapien Governor in charge of Venus. Cruel even by the brutal standards the aforementioned Phaeton has set for their species, Draconis doesn't even have Phaeton's pretense of trying to help the Neosapien people. Everything Draconis does is [[ItsAllAboutMe for his own advancement]]. Draconis enacts a scorched earth campaign on Venus, creating a planet-wide famine that wipes out the majority of the civilian population, with the few survivors sent to toil in forced labor camps. Draconis's treatment of his own race is little better, even murdering two Neo Megas assigned to him as advisors because he felt their "suggestions" undermined his absolute authority. As a contingency if Venus fell out of his control, Draconis rigged a hydrogen bomb to the city of Vesta, intending to spite his enemies by murdering thousands of human civilians. Draconis assigned a noble soldier named [[AntiVillain Thrax]] to detonate the bomb in order to "redeem" himself for showing mercy to an Exo Squad member. Except Draconis lied about there being a timer for the bomb, and once Thrax activated it, he and Draconis's remaining Neosapien soldiers would've died in the resulting blast. Draconis's lust for power was so great, he plotted to [[TheStarscream betray Phaeton and usurp control of the Neosapien Empire for himself]]. He eventually seized his chance by leaving Phaeton to die in an exploding ship, only to discover it was a clone of Phaeton he killed.
** [[EvilutionaryBiologist Dr. Albrecht Ketzer]], who first appeared in season 2's "Dark River", proves that [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]-into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a rather horrific process. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]; in "The Night Before Doomsday", Ketzer injects Medusa with the same formula. Appearing next in the season 3 premiere "Beyond Chaos", Ketzer kidnaps Nara, referring to her as "an unfinished experiment."

** General Draconis is the Neosapien Governor in charge of Venus. Cruel even by the brutal standards the aforementioned Phaeton has set for their species, Draconis doesn't even have Phaeton's pretense of trying to help the Neosapien people. Everything Draconis does is [[ItsAllAboutMe for his own advancement]]. Draconis enacts a scorched earth campaign on Venus, creating a planet-wide famine that wipes out the majority of the civilian population, with the few survivors sent to toil in forced labor camps. Draconis's treatment of his own race is little better, even murdering two Neo Megas assigned to him as advisors because he felt their "suggestions" undermined his absolute authority. As a contingency if Venus fell out of his control, Draconis rigged a hydrogen bomb to the city of Vesta, intending to spite his enemies by murdering thousands of human civilians. Draconis assigned a noble soldier named [[AntiVillain Thrax]] to detonate the bomb in order to "redeem" himself for showing mercy to an Exo Squad member. Except Draconis lied about there being a timer for the bomb, and once Thrax activated it, he and Draconis's remaining Neosapien soldiers would've died in the resulting blast. Draconis's lust for power was so great, he plotted to [[TheStarscream betray Phaeton and usurp control of the Neosapien Empire for himself]]. He eventually seized his chance by leaving Phaeton to die in an exploding ship, only to discover it was a clone of Phaeton he killed. Selfish and ambitious, Draconis was so vile that he managed to avoid being overshadowed by Phaeton, who himself was based on UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler.
** [[MadScientist Dr.]] Albrecht [[EvilutionaryBiologist Ketzer]] [[note]]which means "[[BilingualBonus heretic]]" [[BilingualBonus in German]][[/note]], who first appeared in season 2's "Dark River", proves that [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters Terrans can be just as evil as the Neosapiens]]. It is revealed that he turned an entire village of natives in the Amazon--as well as [[ProfessorGuineaPig himself]]-into [[PlantPerson half-plant monstrosities]], a process that can be [[BodyHorror rather horrific]]. Later injecting Nara Burns with the same DNA formula he used on himself, he withholds the antidote unless the exotroopers attack a nearby Neosapien command station; while this may seem like a good cause, in reality this was for his own purposes. When the heroes point out that there were still Terrans in that area, and an attack would lead to Neosapien retaliation, Ketzer dismisses these concerns. Even worse, when the squad relents and attacks, Ketzer [[ILied reveals that there is no antidote]]; in "The Night Before Doomsday", Ketzer injects Medusa with the same formula. Appearing next in the season 3 premiere "Beyond Chaos" [[note]]which turned out to be the final episode[[/note]], Ketzer kidnaps Nara, referring to her as "an unfinished experiment."

* TheWoobie: Poor, poor, Xenobius...
Nara Burns

** Hmmm...a former soldier in a failed military campaign who turned south just to save himself, then came forward later saying he was sparking an uprising and who wanted to spread socialism and self-control and promoted eugenics, beginning a terrifying but short war marked with genocide and racial hatred and MASSIVE technological advancement...it's weird, I heard that [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler somewhere]] else! Maybe another sci-fi movie.

* SerialNumbersFiledOff: Playmates reissued some of their ''Exo Squad'' toys under the ''Tech Wars'' name in 2001-02; these were repainted/remolded toys with the Neosapiens modified into robots, and some still bore their faction markings and/or Universal copyrights (just unpainted).