TF Views

There was a discussion on the Allspark regarding whether or not the Autobots have been losing their moral compass as of late. After reading 19 pages of circular debate regarding Prime executing Demolishor in ROTF, I chimed in with this:

Remember Paradon? Pacifist planet populated entirely by Autobots. Conquered and held by Decepticons for about a day. The Cybertron-based Autobots led by Rodimus and Ultra Magnus employ a scorched Earth mentality when they decide to destroy the entire planet rather than let it remain in Decepticon hands. Really, it showcases the Autobots inability to affect a good strategy with which to drive off a handful of Decepticons and retake the planet. But since this was Paradron, populated by Autobots, and not Earth populated by humans, Rodimus and Magnus showed little hesitation in blowing it up. Not to mention that this took place during season 3 when the Autobots ruled over Cybertron and were well supplied, while the Decepticons were in shambles much of the time. And on top of that, the Autobots appear to win most all of the skirmishes that take place on Paradron, likely because the pacifist Paradrons decided to take up arms after Sandstorm and Rodimus rallied them to defend their homeworld. Note Sandstorm's choice of words:

Sandstorm: "It's time we fought for what we believe in: our freedom, our planet, our lives!"

Clearly, the Paradrons are no longer content to let the Decepticons run rampant on their planet any longer and have united to drive the invaders out. The final bit of hilarity is when Galvatron orders all Decepticons to evacuate the planet, because he saw Ultra Magnus run away from a fight. He deduces that "something's wrong" and flees. If Galvatron is that easy to scare off, I'm sure it wouldn't have been too difficult to trick him into thinking they were going to blow up the planet instead of actually doing it.

After watching Paradron vanish in a spectacular explosion, this exchange between Sandstorm and Rodimus follows:

Sandstorm: "It's as beautiful in death as it was in life."
Rodimus: "Well, no need to get all mushy. Cybertron's a better place anyway. Not so. . . perfect."

Rodimus' comment always struck me as incredibly callous. Considering that it was he that made the choice to destroy Paradron (Sandstorm even tried arguing against it), with no input or consent from the population, he could at least show a little remorse. Instead he comes off as smug. Destroying Paradron was the quick and easy way out. I know this episode is supposed to highlight the need to defend what you hold precious instead of letting people walk all over you, and that message was conveyed when the Paradrons rose up and chose to fight back. Blowing up the planet afterwards doesn't add anything to the message and instead makes me wonder what the hell was going through Rodimus' mind.

POST 2:

I was thinking about this a little more today, and we can take it a step further. Okay, so Rodimus blew up Paradron because he didn't want the Decepticons getting hold of a new resource that would tip the balance of power. Okay. This is supposed to be a heroic act.

Then in the Headmasters episode, "Cybertron is in Grave Danger parts 1 & 2", we see much the same situation. Vector Sigma is producing a new alloy, which will tip the balance of power even further in the Autobots' favor. Galvatron leads an all-out invasion force to Cybertron and tries claiming the planet. Rodimus rushes in with his soldiers to drive them off. So far all very similar to the Paradron incident. But then the Decepticon, Zarak (Scorponok?), comes to the conclusion that he can't chance a Decepticon loss; the new alloy would spell total defeat for them if the Autobots got it. So he enacts a plan to destroy all of Cybertron.
Just like Sandstorm objected to Rodimus' plan to destroy Paradron, Galvatron objects to Zarak's plan to destroy Cybertron. And just like Rodimus, Zarak justifies his decision with an almost identical argument; they can't allow even the possibility that the other side might benefit from this new resource whether it's huge stockpiles of energon or a new metal alloy.

Cybertron is destroyed as Rodimus and the Autobots look on in horror. Sad music plays in the background as our heroes grieve. Then the ultimate kicker; Rodimus decides to go find a new home for the Transformers. But not just any home. He wants to find a planet, "without war for the Transformers to settle on." What planet does that sound like? Yeah, Paradron!

So basically, the Decepticons took the very same actions in this episode that the Autobots took in "Fight or Flee", yet this time it's portrayed as villainous despite the motivations being the same. This time we're shown the Autobots grieving over the loss of their homeworld, whereas before Rodimus told the Paradron refugees to stop their whining.

It's really sad when the most heroic action taken during this episode belongs to Galvatron as he rushed to the center of Cybertron to try and stop the bomb that Zarak and his Headmasters had set. I didn't see Rodimus down there.

Thoughts?

Well, Headmasters was Japanese writers. There's your inconsistancy right there.

Yeah, consistent morals in a Japanese cartoon....


Joking aside, I see what Crab is saying. Rodimus was an arse, if only for how he went about things in "Fight or Flee".


I have come around on the killing in RotF. A friend of mine points out, (based on evidence from the movie), that the whole point was that the Autobots are still kind of warlike, not unlike the Decepticons. Even Prime, with his face grabbing and prisoner-shooting. (Again, I had not problem with Prime killing Demolishor so much as I had a problem with the almost recreational feel of it.)

The problem is that many fans seem to conflate having a moral compass with the heroes doing the most idiotic thing at any given time. There is nothing noble about letting a dangerous enemy go to continued their killing and plundering, just as there was nothing noble about Prowl's actions in the first issue of the current ongoing comic.


Dom
-Crab should go read some recent posts in the "Star Trek" thread....

There is nothing noble about letting a dangerous enemy go to continued their killing and plundering

TFA Prime had a choice at the end of Animated to kill Megatron. Megatron even urged him to do it and finish him off. Prime instead destroyed Megs' canon and took him prisoner back to Cybertron. I find it significant, because in that series I wasn't sure if Prime would actually do it or not. Choosing to imprison Megatron comes across as the more noble act.

Of course, in the Bayverse it seems as though their entire society has crumbled, so there may be no higher authority to hand Demolishor (or anyone else) over to. Whereas in TFA the Cybertronian culture was still very much intact.

Dominic wrote:Yeah, consistent morals in a Japanese cartoon....

I meant inconsistant between S3 and Headmasters. Not unlike inconsistant Blaster or Grimlock portrayls due to different writers.

Heroes give us something to aspire to, a standard to set for ourselves. When the hero gets written in a way that falls short of that, it's disappointing. I would say that the Autobots are being portrayed a little more realistic, they are at war and killing does have to be a part of that for survival if nothing else, but it's not something we're used to in TFs. You can have a non lethal war in a 30 minutes Saturday morning cartoon, but that doesn't work for translating that into a "realistic" live action movie. Dom's right it's like the Trek argument. Sure the Enterprise crew should have used Hugh to defeat the Borg and we all know that in real life they would have, but the characters are heroes to some people and we like to think our heroes value life more than that, even if we don't.

Well most people do, one of my heroes in Shockwave who very logically, could give a flying fuck about life.

The thing I do not even see anything admirable about what Picard did with the Borg. He betrayed the interests of those he was obligated to, (the Federation), in favor of the Borg. One could also argue he sacrificed the interests of many other species who might otherwise been uninvolved to further Borg predation.

The example Crab gives has Rodimus being a dingus, cracking jokes after blowing up an inhabited planet. Even if the planet were fully evacuated, he created a large number of refugees and destroyed as many homes.


Dom
-and the Bayformers were having a party with all that killing.

I totally agree with you about the Borg and in fact I not only think that if that were real life the crew would not only go through with it, but they would dissect and reverse engineer whatever they could before returning him to anhilate his people.

In the case of Rodimus, I think his jokes were to show his youthful immaturity left over from Hot Rod. It's a case where the writers tried to show characterization from the Tech Specs and it didn't really work and actually had the opposite effect.

Bottom line, in real life our heroes wouldn't be as heroic as they are on screen.

Shockwave wrote:I totally agree with you about the Borg and in fact I not only think that if that were real life the crew would not only go through with it, but they would dissect and reverse engineer whatever they could before returning him to anhilate his people.

I couldn't imagine in real life the crew would be considering the annihilation of an entire species. In the wake of the Holocaust, genocide was ruled to be a crime according to international law. I'd have to imagine with the development of the Federation, they'd have similar laws, as well as against medical experimentation. I have to say, it surprises me how willing some of the characters were to go through with the plan at all. Defending/attacking is one thing, but annihilation is something else.

Anyway, I'd have to agree Rodimus' decision to blow up Paradron and reaction comes off as very callous and even uncharacteristic for the Autobots. Blowing up a planet for them should be a bitter, no other choice decision. Given they had convinced the locals to fight back and had the support from Cybertron, not to mention their retreating was enough to get Galvatron to fall back, clearly, the Autobots had more options. It really just looks like Rodimus gave up on defending the planet too easily. Zarak's decision to blow up Cybertron is easy to understand as a villainous "If I can't have it, no one will" thing, but that's not something the Autobots would resort to.

Defending/attacking is one thing, but annihilation is something else

The point of the attack would be to cripple one's opponent. Wiping them out would do just as well. (And, killing them sooner, rather than later, would have saved more Federation lives in the long term. That should have been Picard's first, if not only, concern.)


I like how the Autobots were willing to blow up a friendly planet with real infrastructure....but never once launched a "kill 'em all" attack on Charr.


Dom
-also recalls Rodimus feeling bad for the Decepticons in FFoD.