Recap / Transformers G 1 Autobot Spike

A Decepticon attack leaves Spike wounded. To save his son's life, Sparkplug helps the Autobots transfer Spike's mind to the body of an experimental robot called Autobot X while the doctors at the hospital work on repairing Spike's real body. The experiment works like a charm and Spike's mind is in Autobot X, temporarily becoming Autobot Spike. Unfortunately, the procedure has a side effect, making the state of Spike's mind to become questionable.

Tropes

• Animation Bump: Minor example: The animation and character models become more refined starting this episode, with more consistent shading on the robots compared to Season 1.
• Art Shift: The animation becomes noticeably rougher several times in the second half of the episode than the first. This is most evident when Spike trashes the Ark and escapes.
• Bloodless Carnage: Despite Spike receiving severe injuries from Bumblebee crashing, there's no blood or evidence of said injuries.
• Coincidental Broadcast: Spike watches a Frankenstein movie just as his mental state becomes questionable, making things worse.
• Contrived Coincidence: Sparkplug and Wheeljack spend the start of the episode building an experimental Autobot X body and discuss once they work out the kinks, it will be an effective spare body for any Autobot in need of future repairs of their own. When Spike is hurt in battle, a doctor just happens to discuss if there was a way to transfer his mind to another body while Spike is treated. His dad takes a risk in having Spike temporarily occupy Autobot X.
• Despair Event Horizon: The Frankenstein movie scene is this for Spike. Maybe he should have picked a different movie...
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: “Should I use my new size, my power, to help the world like Optimus Prime does?“ asks a pondering Spike.
• Easily Forgiven: Autobot Spike causes a lot of damage and trouble, including temporarily turning against the Autobots. However, once he starts thinking straight, he apologizes for his behavior. Sparkplug and the Autobots readily forgive him, as they were the ones who put him in that situation in the first place, and know that he wasn't in his right mind (er, body).
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: Spike asks Bumblebee if they made the right decision in driving into the heat of the battle. Bumblebee says he's not sure. Cue Soundwave and Megatron shooting at them, causing Bumblebee to crash.
• Forced Friendly Fire: After coming back to his senses, Spike, while wielding Megatron in his gun mode, shoots down the Decepticons.
  Megatron: You fool! You've turned my power against my own warriors!
• Foreshadowing: Spike refers to Autobot X as a pseudo-Frankenstein Monster. Guess what he ends up watching in Autobot X’s body?
• Frankenstein Monster: Spike calls himself this when he goes mad and flees the base.
• Friend-or-Idol Decision: Megatron uses this to get away clean by shooting at Bumblebee with Spike inside. The Autobots can either let Megatron get away and save their friends, or go after him and let them die. For the Autobots, it's not a hard choice.
• Gone Horribly Right: Spike was broken from the moment he entered Autobot X’s body.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Megatron has Autobot Spike use his gun form to blast his fellow Autobots. After his mind clears, he uses Megatron on on the Decepticons.
• Hollywood Healing: While we aren't given many details on how serious Spike's injuries are, they're bad enough that everyone agrees that it would be a good idea to transfer Spike's mind into Autobot X. Yet it still doesn't seem to take more than a few days for Spike's body to heal.
• Ignored Aesop: The intended lesson about it being incredibly unsafe to bring a human teenager along to fights with Decepticons was forgotten in later episodes as Spike still tags along.
• "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: The Autobots try this on Spike when he starts fighting them with the Decepticons. It's only after Sparkplug shows up that they get through to him.
• Laughing Mad: Spike when his Sanity Slippage reaches its absolute lowest point.
• Mad Scientist: Wheeljack is called this once or twice. Sparkplug, too, as Autobot X was his project.
• Manipulative Bastard: After learning that his actions led to Spike's mind being transferred into a robot, Megatron exploits the former human's predicament by making him join the Decepticons.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Sparkplug when he sees his son attack the base when he wakes up in Autobot X.
  • Spike in Autobot X has this reaction later after he almost kills his own father.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Autobots drive the Decepticons away from the launch site, but end up destroying it by accident. They agree to help fix it after helping Spike.
• Opening Narration: The start of the episode has one, one of the handful of Season 2 episodes to do so.
• Papa Wolf: Sparkplug stops at nothing to save Spike, and clearly loves his son, whether he's a teenaged human or a forty-foot-tall Autobot/Frankenstein. He's even willing to run onto a battlefield and face Megatron (or at least his gun mode) if it means helping Spike.
• Pet the Dog: Megatron tells Reflector to keep an eye on Autobot Spike until he can get there. Once Megatron and the others arrive on the scene, he actually thanks Reflector and tells him he did a good job.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: Spike loses himself a little after being put into Autobot X (and its unstable CPU). He has a moment of this shortly before Megatron approaches him, calling himself a monster and not like Optimus Prime.
  Spike: Should I use my new size, my new power to help the world like Optimus Prime does? No! I'm not like Prime! I'm a monster! A metal Frankenstein Monster! With enough power to conquer mankind!
• Whole-Plot Reference: The Autobot X experiment is exactly like Frankenstein. Sparkplug and Wheeljack building a makeshift Autobot; Spike going mad after his mind is transferred into its body. At least he lives and is restored back in the end.
• Would Hurt a Child: Even if Megatron didn't know that Spike's only a teenager, he still probably would have shot at him. Bumblebee also counts, as he's one of the youngest Autobots and was also injured.
• Writer on Board: Don Glut was a major nerd when it came to the story of Frankenstein, and thus all characters refer to the more accurate “Frankenstein’s Monster” rather than the more common “Frankenstein”.
• You Called Me "X"; It Must Be Serious: Usually, unless they're pawns in one of this schemes, Megatron doesn't acknowledge or care about humans. This is one of the few episodes where he refers to Spike by name.
• Your Little Dismissive Diminutive: Megatron transforms and has Soundwave use him to shoot Bumblebee, who's in vehicle mode with Spike inside, in order to cause a diversion so the Decepticons can retreat unscathed. Bumblebee flips over, causing the Autobots to shift focus.
• Your Television Hates You: The first thing the television plays while Spike's mind recovers in Autobot X? Frankenstein. Needless to say, the sight of the Frankenstein Monster coming to life makes him go on a rampage.