Recap / Transformers Prime S 3 E 8 Thirst

In this The Return of the Living Dead send-up, Knock Out and Starscream's experiments with synthetic energon lead to a Zombified Cylas threatening to take over the Decepticon ship and unleashes another old enemy.

Tropes

• Alien Arts Are Appreciated: Knockout attends drive-in movies often enough to be familiar with common horror film tropes.
• And Then John Was a Zombie: Villain variant: Airachnid.
• An Arm and a Leg: If you look carefully at Knock Out's monitor, you will realize that Silas lost all of his limbs when he was crushed by Nemesis Prime. Doubles as a Freeze-Frame Bonus.
• Asshole Victim:
  • After every egregious thing he and MECH has done to both 'Bots and 'Cons, it's doubtful that anyone will miss Silas when he expires. Airachnid simply brushes off his thanks after he finally does by her hand. Same goes for Airachnid herself for being too much trouble for both sides, especially involving Arcee.
  • Starscream nearly got the entire ship turned into Terrorcons and tried to pin the blame on Knock Out. No tears are shed over Megatron's implied beating of him.
• Awesome, but Impractical: Knockout states the SynthEn is this because the more he uses on a subject the faster they burn through it, thus reaffirming that it's the Cybertronian equivalent of a steroid.
• Bait-and-Switch: When it looks like Starscream is finally about to sound the alarm, he asks a bunch of Vehicons if they have noticed unusual activity, only for them to reveal they are Terrorcons, in true zombie movie fashion.
• Back for the Dead: Silas/Cylas, though he lasts much of the episode.
• Big "NO!": Airachnid lets one out when she gets dumped onto one of Cybertron's moons by Soundwave.
• Big "WHAT?!": Knock Out says this twice. First when he and Starscream are running away from Terrorcon!Cylas and Starscream tells him to hold him off. And again when he and Starscream run into Megatron and Starscream promptly tells Megatron it was Knock Out's fault and Knock Out agrees, until he realizes what Starscream said.
• Bittersweet Ending: For the Decepticons, at least. Airachnid and Cylas are out of the picture and the plague is cured, but they've lost the Insecticons and over half of their remaining Vehicons, severely depleting their military strength. For the Autobots, this is a pretty good way for things to turn out for them, with the Decepticons' Elite Mooks and the majority of their forces wiped out.
• Blood Lust: Or energonlust, if you want to be technical.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Silas/CYLAS returns after a long absence.
  • Breakdown is also back having been revived as a zombie much like Cliffjumper has.
  • Airachnid near the end.
• Cassandra Truth: Megatron does not believe Starscream and Knock Out's story about Cylas until he is forced to kill an attacking Terrorcon.
• Callback: The Friendship Moment Starscream and Knock Out have echoes Arcee's and Optimus Prime's moment back in "Scrapheap". Knock Out's "you know the worst part?" moment even reflects what Arcee said way back in that same episode - not that he'd know it.
  • This isn't the first time Soundwave sidesteps a confrontation by Bridging the opposing party off the Nemesis. It's not even the first time this season he uses that built in Bridge remote to resolve a battle in Megatron's favor.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Silas/Cylas has clearly been on the receiving end... "for science."
• Comically Serious: Megatron, in one the few cases where his aggravation towards his troops is Played for Laughs.
• Continuity Nod: Knock Out explains he got a sample of Synthetic Energon way back in "Stronger and Faster". Knock Out also notes the aggression issues using the stuff causes.
  • Megatron berates Starscream for tampering with Dark Energon and trying to create a warrior with it "again". That episode also showed us the result of the last time Megatron had to punish Starscream "the only way" he understands.
  • Knock Out references "Flying Mind" when talking about how Dark Energon once affected the Nemesis. Though Starscream wasn't there at the time, he still acts like he knew about it. ^note  Someone probably told him; it's pretty hard to keep something like the ship gaining sentience and stunning everyone on board to yourself.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Airachnid, when she sees Soundwave, leads her entire Insecticon legion at him, wanting to defeat him...cue him simply creating a bridge to send her and all of the Insecticons to one of Cybertron's moons. He never even seemed concerned.
• Darker and Edgier: This episode not only kills off CYLAS/Silas ^note  He will not be missed and banishes Airachnid (alongside whatever Insecticons were left), but shows the Nemesis dealing with a straight up zombie apocalypse.
• Dirty Coward: Starscream, big time.
  • Starscream refuses to sound the alarm for the entire Nemesis because he doesn't want Megatron to know anything about zombie Breakdown, knowing that Megatron will beat him up. This sort of cowardice just makes the Zombie Apocalypse go From Bad to Worse.
  • Then when the situation gets so loud and out of hand that even Megatron suspects something is up, Starscream points at Knockout and screams it's his fault.
• Due to the Dead: Defied. Despite Starscream's concerns, Knock Out has no problem experimenting on what's left of Breakdown, as he feels that his old friend would agree it's worth making Cylas suffering more. Given how much Breakdown hated Silas and humans as a whole, Knock Out's probably right.
• Dumbass Has a Point: Despite the entire situation being his fault, Starscream has a moment when Knock Out asks the Predacon can't be sent to kill zombie Breakdown. He points out it would be too dangerous given that even though the Predacon can easily snap Breakdown in half with its jaws, it would also get infected and make the contagion exponentially worse. Even before that, Starscream retorted that Megatron should reconsider making more than one unruly, primitive beast machine like the Predaking, claiming it's dangerous to create an entire legion of beasts far more powerful than their own masters.
• Easily Forgiven: While Starscream gets another beating for going behind Megatron's back again, he gets off pretty easy. Megatron lets Knock Out off even more so, but demotes him from director of scientific research to simply Shockwave's lab material fetcher.
• Elite Mooks: Starscream actually says that the ship has, in his own words, "highly trained Vehicon troops". Considering that the Vehicons we've seen are a Red Shirt Army, then Starscream is either blatantly lying or under some serious self-delusion.
• The End... Or Is It?: The final scene reveals Airachnid has been infected, which she begins to spread to her Insecticons. As this is her final appearance, it's unknown if she will escape the Cybertronian moon for revenge or starve if/when she runs out of fresh Insecticons.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Knock Out thinks Starscream's idea to use Dark Energon in his experiments is a mistake. Naturally, he is right.
  • Knock Out knows that Megatron will be mad if he and Starscream report that they created a Terrorcon that is running loose on the ship, but has the decency to want to report the failure to prevent things getting out of hand. Likewise, he wants to raise an alarm when it turns out that the undead menace is turning their troops into more Terrorcons.
• Everyone Knew Already: Starscream and Knock Out's attempts to keep their mistake away from Megatron proved meaningless, since their leader already suspected something off thanks to the Dark Energon pulsing within his Spark.
• Face Death with Dignity: Silas doesn't seem that upset about dying. No one seemed sad to see him go.
• Family-Unfriendly Death: While not violent like his Breakdown body, Silas silently succumbs to Airachnid's attacks, making it the first (and only) completely onscreen human death in the series.
• Fate Worse than Death: Airachnid and the Insecticons get stranded on one of Cybertron's moons. With Airachnid revealed to have been infected, she has to feed on her Insecticon mooks to survive. Even though there are many Insecticons, they're not infinite, and Airachnid will eventually exhaust them all and starve.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Airachnid calls for one of her Insecticon troops to come before her, the viewer will get to see the bite mark Cylas left on her neck seconds before she is revealed to have been infected.
• For Science!: How Knock Out justifies his experiments.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Megatron asks Shockwave to speed up Project: Predacon.
  • Starscream asks what would happen if Predaking gets infected. In "Predacons Rising" a resurrected Unicron brings a whole army of Predacons back from the dead as undead Terrorcons, and they are only stopped when their master is destroyed.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: A blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot of a computer screen shows that Silas has no limbs.
• From Bad to Worse:
  • In true zombie horror fashion.
  • Also at the end, what's worse than a horde of slow-walking Decepti-zombies? Airachnid breaking free from her captivity and regaining control of the Insecticon legion!
• Genre Blindness:
  • Starscream has faith in the Vehicon troopers. Given their record, Starscream is clearly too optimistic for his own good.
  • Starscream also thinks messing around with Dark Energon is a good idea. Causing Knock Out to point out this trope this time.
  • Airachnid thinks that she can take down Soundwave after the pummeling he gave her. And even with the higher numbers, she still doesn't remember that he can create Ground Bridges anyway.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: Starscream's plan to combine Dark Energon and Synthetic Energon, under the belief it will give Megatron full control over Cylas, due to his symbiotic link with Dark Energon. Not only does this turn Cylas into a Terrorcon that slowly infects the Decepticons on the ship, but it is discovered that Megatron actually can't control him anyway because the Synthetic Energon half is apparently disrupting his link.
• Good News, Bad News: Starscream finds Cylas's corpse and Airachnid's empty pod in the same minute, and then has to give Megatron an update. When he uses this line, Megatron braces himself for exasperation.
• Halfway Plot Switch: Starscream and Knockout are mostly out of the picture for the third act as the focus shifts to Airachnid, Soundwave and zombified Breakdown.
• Humans Are Insects: Starscream has no problem with Knock Out's experiments on Silas himself, he just finds what's being done to Breakdown's body a bit disturbing. Knockout justifies it by claiming that, after everything Silas and MECH put Breakdown through, he doesn't doubt that he'd be okay with it so long as CYLAS suffers.
• Ignored Expert: Being Megatron's physician and around for "Flying Mind", Knock Out knows more about the potential danger from Dark Energon than Starscream, so he falls into this role in the beginning.
• Innocuously Important Episode: While the loss of the Insecticon hive and damage done to the remaining forces are clearly important, Megatron punishes Knock Out by ordering him to transfer his projects to Shockwave's lab. Knock Out's Synthetic Energon samples being present for next episode's lab explosion kickstarts the final arc of the season and the effort to restore Cybertron.
• Ironic Echo: A dialogue from "Scrapheap" makes its way here, just slightly altered due to differing circumstances.
  Arcee: You know the worst part? After battling Cons all these years, getting smacked down, shot at, blown up, this is how our lights go out?
  Optimus Prime: Arcee, this may not be the finish that we had planned, but if this is indeed the end, if we are to become one with the Allspark...
  Arcee: It's been an honor serving with you, Optimus Prime...
  • to...
  Knock Out: I find it rather ironic that after battling Autobots all these years, getting smacked down, shot at, blown up, this is how our lights go out?
  Starscream: Drained of our precious fluids... if this is indeed the end, if we are to become Terrorcon chow, it has been an honor serving Lord Megatron with you.
  Knock Out: You're no Breakdown, though I must confess I've always admired your lustrous finish.
• It Has Been an Honor: Starscream and Knock Out when they both think they're finished. The moment is lost when Megatron demands an answer for what's going on and Starscream puts the blame on Knock Out.
• Knock Out Saw It in a Movie Before: At drive-in theaters!
• Jerkass Has a Point: Starscream and Knockout don't like having to kill the Terrorcon Breakdown themselves, but as Starscream points out, Megatron sending them is a more sensible decision than sending in the Predacon since if it got infected they would have an unstoppable Terrorcon on the loose.
• Killed Off for Real: Whatever part of Breakdown's systems MECH used to keep Sylas alive is severed thanks to Airachnid. With this, he finally dies.
• Klingons Love Shakespeare: Knock Out has watched a number of horror movies at drive-in theaters. Too bad it made him Wrong Genre Savvy for this particular incident. ^note  You don't kill zombies by cutting off the head, Knockout! Seriously...
• Laser-Guided Karma: Silas repeatedly performed experiments on Cybertronians to learn about them. He has been subjected to the same fate by Knock Out.
• Leave No Survivors: Shortly after being freed and killing Silas for good, Airachnid rallies the Insecticons to destroy every last Decepticon on the ship. Thanks to Soundwave, they never get the chance.
• Loophole Abuse: Megatron had ordered Knock Out to report all science-related projects to Shockwave for his approval. Starscream provides a workaround: because this Dark Energon-centered project on Cylas is to provide Super Soldiers, it falls under "military operations", which he is in charge of. This allows them both to proceed in secret, though it bites them in the chassis in the end when Megatron finally finds out. When the Cylas and Airachnid threats are dealt with, Megatron warns Knock Out about who he reports his projects to, regardless of intention and rendering the loophole moot.
• Men of Sherwood: When Soundwave reorganizes the troops into an extermination party, that's probably the most competent performance we've seen yet from the Vehicons.
• Mercy Kill: Unintentionally so. Airachnid kills Cylas, not knowing he was within Breakdown. He is grateful to be free of being a Terrorcon, but she doesn't care.
• Mythology Gag: "Beast Machine super-soldiers"... again.
• Never My Fault: Starcream and Knock Out do a downright hilarious case of this when Starscream starts saying everything is Knock Out's fault rather than his, even though as Knock Out points out, meddling with Dark Engeron was Starscream's idea.
  Starscream: Allow me to handle this... IT'S KNOCK OUT'S FAULT!
  Knock Out: Yes, precisely my- WHAT!?
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Thanks to Starscream and Knock Out experimenting behind Megatron and Shockwave's backs, the Decepticons have lost all Insecticon legions and over half of their military forces. The Autobots have gained a huge advantage just by sitting at home!
  • This has even more horrific consequences for the Decepticons later on. Thanks to Starscream's stupidity in this episode, Megatron orders Project Predacon to be sped up. This gets scrapped when Predaking reveals his sentience, which in turn leads to Synthetic Energon and CNA combining to merge cybermatter, which leads to Megatron rebuilding the Omega Lock, Ratchet telling Predaking about Megatron's treachery, and the Autobots storming the Nemesis, killing Megatron, and restoring Cybertron. Long story short, Starscream's debacle in this episode winds up costing the Decepticons the war.
• Nightmare Face: Starting with Sylas, all of the Decepticon mook infected possess ghastly mouths with a tendril that drains Energon and infect others.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Implied, as Megatron punishes Starscream "the only way" he will understand.
• Oh, Crap!: When Airachnid and the Insecticons suddenly come at him, Soundwave pulls back in sudden surprise.
• Pet the Dog:
  • The relationship between Knock Out and Starscream is sorta humanizing. Knock Out is willing to save Starscream from Breakdown!Silas. On the other hand, Starscream also shows concern for Knock Out at the beginning of the episode, where he asks if he is alright with dissecting Breakdown. There is also his It Has Been an Honor speech (despite it being ruined by Starscream putting the blame on Knock Out when they have to deal with an angry Megatron). It is clear that Starscream genuinely likes Knock Out to the extent that a Decepticon can.
  • Despite Knock Out's part in the mess, Megatron is surprisingly lenient with him since he was following Starscream's orders. He simply gives Knock Out a stern warning that science projects are still to be reported to Shockwave regardless and to now turn his remaining projects over to him. Considering Megatron typically punishes failure with harsh verbal or physical abuse (as happens to Starscream), this is generous by his standards.
• Put on a Bus to Hell: Airachnid is sent to one of Cybertron's moons by Soundwave as an energon-vampire and has to feed on her Insecticon troops to survive. The Insecticons are under her control, with no chance of escape. There's also the fact that she'll run out eventually...
• Reasonable Authority Figure: This is as close to this trope as this incarnation of Megatron gets. He makes it clear to Starscream he's running out of patience with him after giving him a second chance. He doesn't buy Starscream's sudden pinning of the blame to Knock Out, and when he's shown the truth about what's going on, he listens to a full report on it from the duo. While Soundwave and the troops head off to battle, he makes sure Knock Out and Starscream deal with Cylas personally for unleashing him in the first place. When all of this is said and done, and despite the heavy losses, he acknowledges Knock Out was only following orders from a superior officer and only sternly reminds him he answers to Shockwave, and orders him to turn over all projects to him. Starscream, on the other hand...
• Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain: Knock Out suggests shooting off the heads of the infected Terrorcons to eliminate them, saying he's seen it work in human horror films. Too bad these aren't ''human'' horrors...
  Starscream: Bah! Forget the head; go for the Spark!
• Revenge Before Reason: Airachnid should've known by now what special features Soundwave comes with that other Decepticons do not possess. She madly charges at Soundwave with her entire Insecticon legion, who proceeds to open a space bridge portal.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Airachnid is freed from her stasis pod, only to wind up on one of Cybertron's moons.
• Shout-Out:
  • This episode is a homage to the zombie film The Return of the Living Dead, where 2 idiots accidentally kickstart a zombie apocalypse by tampering with some chemicals that turn both the living and dead into zombies, blame each other for it and try to control the apocalypse on their own with horrible results. Starscream is Frank, Knock Out is Freddy, and Megatron is Bert.
    • Starscream and Knock Out even complain at one point that shooting a Terrorcon in the head doesn't kill it, when Knock Out had seen it happen in the drive-thru movie he’s seen. The same "movies aren't correct" statement sprang up in above stated film.
  • "It's alive!"
  • The Terrorcon's vampiricism, coupled with their Nested Mouths and the way their jaws split seems reminiscent of the Reapers from Blade II.
• Something We Forgot: The episode addresses the lingering plot thread of Knock Out acquiring a sample of Ratchet's Synthetic Energon way back in Season 1.
• Strapped to an Operating Table: Ever since he was made a Decepticon prisoner/Knockout's personal science project a season ago, CYLAS has been subjected to this trope while Knockout uses him as a test subject for Synthetic Energon.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Megatron is getting sick of Starscream's blundering this season, despite sparing him time and again. The quote below is before the situation got even worse for the Decepticons.
  Megatron: Let me just say, you have been awarded more chances for redemption than anyone in Decepticon history!
• Unstoppable Rage: The synthetic energon experiments cause instances of this for Cylas. At one point, he threatens to rip out Starscream's T-Cog and feed it to Knock Out.
• Villain Ball: Knock Out for deciding to go along with Starscream's plan in the first place. While he does raise reasonable objections, he fails to realize that the two energons could cancel each other out, which they do, resulting in a Zombie Apocalypse Transformers style that costs the Decepticons dearly.
• Villain Episode: Except for Predaking, this episode plays out as all of the Autobots's enemies in an all-out war to wipe each other out on the Nemesis.
• Villain Has a Point: Knock Out suggests using the Predacon to deal with the infected Sylas, but Starscream shoots down the idea immediately. The situation would go From Bad to Worse if the dragon becomes a Terrorcon.
• Villainous Demotivator: Megatron tells Starscream and Knock Out that their "fate remains to be seen"... before sending them on the mission to clean up the mess.
  • When everything is resolved, Megatron calmly reprimands Knock Out and orders him to hand over all of his experiments to Shockwave. Knock Out takes it in stride... probably because Starscream is going to get a far more hands-on and vicious punishment.
• Villainous Vow: Wanting to settle up with Soundwave, Airachnid promises to make him scream.
• Wham Episode: It seems Cylas is out for good, the Insecticons are gone, Airachnid is freed... and she's part Terrorcon.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Knock Out suggests decapitation as a tactic against the Terrorcons, citing human zombie filmography as his inspiration. The Terrorcon keeps coming despite the absence of a head. Had he defaulted to human vampire filmography, he would have had the right idea. Starscream gets the idea to blow away the spark instead, as that will keep the Terrorcons down permanently.
  Knock Out: Human horror films! Waste of time.
• You Have Failed Me: Megatron to Starscream; considering that Starscream's plan cost the Decepticons over three quarters of their standing army (not even G1 Starscream screwed up to that extent!), only getting a severe beating borders on Karma Houdini territory.
• You're Insane!: How Knock Out views Starscream's idea to mix Dark Energon with the already unstable synthetic energon. He calls Starscream being out of his mind to suggest such a thing considering what both energon types are capable of on their own, but gets ignored. They soon learn the hard way it was a really stupid idea.
• Zombie Apocalypse: One part Synthetic Energon and one part Dark Energon equals one zombie vampire plague.

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