WARNING: This post turned out to be much longer than I had intended it to be. Apologies in advance for its ungodly length.Okay, I've gone back and looked over the entirety of the vintage Zone fiction, and I now completely rescind my suggestion about Zodiac having been involved in the restoration of Cybertron and Mars (unless some new JG1 fiction comes along and says otherwise, but I digress).
When searching through the story pages, the single manga chapter, and the single OVA episode that was adapted from said manga (btw, if anyone wants either the story pages or manga chapter in English, PM me), I found that the majority of information about the nature of Zodiac was, indeed, given in the episode. I checked not only the
Karyuudo Fansubs version but also
another fansub from several years ago (which I presume took its subtitles from the old Zone/Scramble City DVD bootleg that was in unofficial circulation back in the 2000s). These are what was said about Zodiac in the episode:
Karyuudo Fansubs versionDai Atlas: "The Destrons' target is the super mineral that's laying dormant within the Earth. The Zodiac."
Holi: "Zodiac?"
Sonic Bomber: "The mysterious energy that has the power to create a universe."
Dai Atlas: "If they use our Cybertron energy, the Energon Z, together with it, then they could create super energy as powerful as a star."
Dai Atlas: "Essence of the Earth, grant us the power that created the universe!"
Kain: "What is the Zodiac really?"
Dai Atlas: "This Zodiac is the power that originally created the Earth and the galaxy."Older fansub version (typos included)
Dai Atlas: "The Destrons goal on Earth is to get the component Zodiak."
Holi: "Zodiak?"
Sonic Bomber: "The mysterious energy that has the power to create a universe."
Dai Atlas: "If they fuse it with Cybertron's super energy Energon Z then they can create a new planet."
Dai Atlas: "Soul of the Earth, grant us the power that created the Universe."
Kain: "What is exactly the Zodiak?"
Dai Atlas: "Originally it's the power that created the Earth and the Universe."And then in the final story page for Zone, the Powered Masters used the power of the Zodiac to transform a desolate planet of darkness into a lush paradise teeming with life.
One of the two main reasons I had supposed Zodiac could have been involved in the restoration of Cybertron and Mars was because of all those statements given above, as well as its use on that planet. If Zodiac could make stars, planets, or even an entire universe, it seemed like it would be no sweat for it have helped in repairing both Cybertron and Mars.
But the other reason I supposed it was because I knew that there was more than one piece of Zodiac out there in the universe, not just the one piece hidden within the Earth. I had figured that they could have used a piece from somewhere else, since the one seen in Zone seemed like it had only been first removed from within the planet in that episode for the first time ever. Dai Atlas even refers to it as "Chikyū no tamashī" (地球の魂 "Soul/spirit/essence of the Earth"), which to me sounded like the Earth's fragment of Zodiac was an important component of the planet that was vital to its survival. If so, then both Cybertron and Mars would each require a different piece of Zodiac needed for their revivals, ones not that weren't already being used to support an inhabited planet.
But what killed my idea of Zodiac being used to restore Cybertron and Mars was when I dug deeper, beyond just the Zone fiction. I looked into the story pages of the sequel to Zone, The Battlestars, and found something I had overlooked. Zodiac was used to resurrect Convoy as Star Convoy in that series. At first, I remembered that there was some kind of quest involved in the revitalization of Convoy, but had forgotten what this quest was for, specifically. I misremembered it being a quest for more Zodiac, when it was actually a quest to find Convoy's body after it had been stolen by the series new big bad villain, Dark Nova. As it turns out, the piece of Zodiac that was used to revive Convoy was apparently the very same piece of Zodiac from Earth in Zone. There's even a pic of Dai Atlas literally handing it over to the new Autobot Sky Garry.
So then, if this is all the same single piece of Zodiac between Zone and The Battlestars, then it couldn't have been used to fix Cybertron or Mars if it was only first found later in Zone. It also couldn't have been a different piece that was used because everyone acts like the one on Zone and The Battlestars is the only piece that exists. But wait, I did say before that there are more pieces out there. Well, I originally thought that that information had come from Zone and/or The Battlestars, but it turns out that it actually came even later, from the Legends manga. Near the very end of it, even, in 2019!
Somehow, it never clicked with me beforehand that neither Zone nor The Battlestars had ever actually said that there was more than one piece of Zodiac in the universe, so when a bunch of them showed up at the end of Legends, it just seemed normal to me. Maybe that "soul of the Earth" bit from the Zone OVA made me think that every planet/star/celestial body had its own piece of Zodiac, when it wasn't until Legends that more than one piece actually ever showed up at once. Go figure.
But even in Legends, before the chapter that first showed a whole bunch of Zodiac fragments (pictured above), the single piece of Zodiac seen throughout its earlier chapters is likewise treated as the same single piece from Zone and The Battlestars. And the later-made Unite Warriors manga that was set one year after Masterforce in 2021 even ended with the strong implication that none of the Transformers on Cybertron had even heard of Zodiac yet, further making it impossible for Zodiac to have repaired either Cybertron or Mars during 2011-2020.
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So with all that said, if Zodiac is now no longer on the table for how Cybertron got fixed, I'm going back to your suggestion of their having used some other planet to fix it, and an idea has popped into my head.
Recall that Athenia was the Autobots' main non-Earth headquarters during The Headmasters, especially after Cybertron got blown up. I looked around and, within the greater JG1 cartoon continuity, Athenia is only ever seen or mentioned two more times after The Headmasters. The first time is one I'll skip for a sec, while the second instance was through a flashback in a Legends manga chapter. Said flashback could have happened shortly after or even during The Headmasters, as it's just an interrogation scene (shown in the top half of the page below):
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As for the first instance, it was mentioned in a printed text story released in Japan prior to Masterforce as a bridge between it and The Headmasters. Titled "
Master File No. 1", this summary of events is set in the early episodes of Masterforce, right around the time of the debut of the Headmaster Juniors' transtectors. While it mentions that the Autobots were still headquartered on Athenia at that point, this was obviously written with early ideas for Masterforce in mind, as it also mentions the Trainbots keeping tabs on Earth, the Autobot Pretenders, and the growing threat of Devil Z. Yet, the Trainbots were
never seen in Masterforce outside of a brief cameo in the theme song's first opening sequence.
Clearly there were supposed to be more ties between The Headmasters and Masterforce in the earlier stages of the latter's development, but those didn't pan out in the final version. Thus, if we wanted to imagine that Athenia was the planet that was used to restore Cybertron, we could say that Master File No. 1 is still technically correct (the best kind of correct) about the Autobots being based on Athenia during that time, as Athenia would have been integrated into Cybertron, making the two planets become one and the same.
The main reason I wasn't originally keen on this idea was because of how Beast Machines seemed to adamantly certain that the Cybertron in that show was the very same planet that it had always been since the time Cybertron was first created so many eons in the past. And the Japanese dub of it would have likely followed suit with that. But then I remembered how the G1 cartoon had already stated that Vector Sigma's chamber was at the core of Cybertron, which Beast Machines conflicted with by showing it to have an organic core instead. With JG1 placing both of those shows in the same continuity, Cybertron would have had Vector Sigma's chamber at its core, then get blown up and be rebuilt with a new core. Athenia possibly having been used to restore Cyberton would thus allow for the organic core in Beast Machines to have been Athenia's core.
Although, the organic core is still some weird orb of nigh-magical green-blue energy instead of a molten core that a normal planet like Athenia would have. This is where I feel Primus/Vector Sigma/Oracle would come into play, and that that green goopy energy would be related to him.
Recall that when I
previously summarized the events of the second Kiss Players storyline from 2007, I mentioned that Primus revealed himself to be both Vector Sigma and the assistant of Primacron from "Call of the Primitives". This decision to link Vector Sigma and Primacron's assistant was likely done for three reasons.
- First, in the Japanese dub of the G1 cartoon, both of those characters were voiced by the same actor, Toshio Ishii, whereas in the English version, VS was voiced by Corey Burton while Primacron's assistant was voiced by Gregg Berger.
- Second, in the dialogue script for "Call of the Primitives", the disembodied voice of Primacron's assistant was referred to as "Oracle". By pure coincidence, this is the very same name as the evolved form of Vector Sigma from Beast Machines, which was kept in the Japanese dub.
- And third, an as-yet unexplained sequence in "Call of the Primitives" showed what very much looked to be the Matrix of Leadership rising out of the destroyed body of Primacron's assistant, after Unicron rebels against Primacron and attacks his lab. Japan took this sequence literally and interpreted it as the origin of the Matrix in the cartoon, which was otherwise given no origin.
Seemingly wanting to link together the Vector Sigma of the G1 cartoon that was stated to have both given life to the Transformers and preceded the existence of Cybertron, the Vector Sigma of Beast Wars Neo that was stated to be "the god of the Transformers", the evolved form of Vector Sigma from Beast Machines named "the Oracle", and the "Oracle" from the G1 cartoon who not only shared the same Japanese voice as Vector Sigma but also seemed to be originator of the Matrix, an elaborate backstory was crafted by the individuals at TakaraTomy who were responsible for organizing the mammoth JG1 timeline.
First mentioned in a timeline published with a Kiss Players/Teletraan 15 Go! Go! compilation book, this backstory began with the creation of Unicron by Primacron and his assistant, Oracle, who had life-giving abilities. When Unicron lashed out and destroyed Oracle's body, his essence within the Matrix escaped from Primacron and fled into space. He eventually found and arrived on the barren planet seen in "Call of the Primitives" and emptied his essence within the Matrix into this planet. He then used his life-giving essence to create a lush organic world filled with greenery and animal life.
But then, this peaceful paradise was discovered by the Quintessons, who used a mechanization ray (which would later come to be known as the Key to Vector Sigma) to terraform the planet into the metallic world of Cybertron. The Quints imprisoned the Oracle's essence within the Vector Sigma supercomputer and used the empty shell of the Matrix to control his power and create the Cybertronian race. This backstory was finally actually illustrated in full during the 2021 finale of the Generations Selects manga.
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Further additions to this backstory have also been made to smooth out some of its rougher edges, such as the Legends manga that came packaged with the Blue Big Convoy toy explaining how Vector Sigma went from being the Oracle in Beast Machines back to being a totally different-looking Vector Sigma in Beast Wars Neo, but saying the Oracle had evolved further into another new form upon the technorganic reformatting of Cybertron:
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And with the notion of the Matrix having been into the possession of the Quintessons after they conquered and terraformed the planet, this provided an opportunity for the Legends manga included with Grand Maximus's new toy to finally explore Devil Z's origin, revealing that he was created from evil energy built up within the Matrix when it was owned by the Quints; said evil energy was then dumped out of the Matrix and discarded to the far reaches of the universe once the Matrix had been reclaimed by the Autobots.
This energy, however, persisted in its existence and eventually evolved into a super-energy lifeform filled with hatred and a desire for vengeance for having been thrown away like trash. After stealing the transtectors that would later become Godmasters in Masterforce, this lifeform hid them within the Earth so that the transtectors could absorb the Earth's Zodiac and Angolmois Energies, evolving them into Godmaster transtectors. This lifeform also absorbed those same energies and further evolved itself, becoming Devil Z, and finally revealing what the "Z" in his name is short for:
His real name is "Devil Zodiac".
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And once Cybertron is rebuilt after The Headmasters, we see in the Unite Warriors manga that its Vector Sigma chamber now looks like the Oracle chamber from Beast Machines, and is no longer at the center of the planet, all in accordance to how things were in Beast Machines (the following is the only decent look at said chamber, but a lot of the dialogue boxes obscure much of it from view).
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But notice I haven't mentioned the "Primus" part of all this, as I've only been referring to the "Vector Sigma", "Oracle", and "Primacron's assistant" identities of this composite character. Well, that originated from the aforementioned 2007 Kiss Players storyline with all the time travel, in which he appeared as a golden redeco of Rodimus Prime, and ends the story by returning to his Vector Sigma form.
Why they decided to add the Primus wrinkle to this equation is a story for another day (as this post is already so
ungodly long as it is), but recall that I said that he emptied his essence into the planet that would later become Cybertron back when he first escaped Primacron. In the Legends comic with Devil Z's origin (pictured above), this essence is shown to be at the core of the planet, as if to say that it's the same thing as the organic core from Beast Machines. And said organic core juice already had sone pretty magical properties in Beast Machines. Primus said he wanted to create organic life on that planet, and the whole technorganic reformatting at the end of Beast Machines was some grand divine prophecy orchestrated entirely by the will of the Oracle, who is now Primus in Japanese continuity, so it all ties together.
But of course, this original core of Primus's energy would have been converted into Vector Sigma's chamber as seen in the G1 cartoon when the Quints took over the planet, but which would have then become this magical energy core again by the time of Beast Machines, following the restoration of Cybertron after its destruction in The Headmasters. Whether it was Athenia or some other planet that was used to fix it, that organic core of weird turquoise-colored life-giving goop being related to the life-making Primus/Vector Sigma/Oracle of JG1 would help explain why it is the way it is and isn't an ordinary molten core like what you'd expect to find at the center of any normal organic planet.
Phew!
