Summary of Transformers Prime episode #1: "Darkness Rising" Part 1

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Earlier today, Seibertron.com received an advance copy from The Hub of the first two episodes of "Transformers Prime" for screen purposes. I am in the middle of doing the summary for the second episode as well as putting together my review for these episodes. I will be posting my actual review later today after the episode summaries. My one line review in the meantime ... "'Transformers Prime' is the darker toned love child of Beast Wars and the live action Transformers films without the cheesy humor." Stay tuned for more! In the meantime, here's our detailed summary of the first episode of Transformers Prime (after the spoiler space below). DO NOT CONTINUE UNLESS YOU WANT TO READ SPOILERS!





"Transformers Prime" - Part 1 of "Darkness Rising" (premiere: Friday, November 26, 4 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.) Optimus Prime and the Autobots investigate the return of the Decepticons while forced to account for a group of young humans who have unwittingly become involved in their centuries-old conflict.

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TRANSFORMERS PRIME EPISODE #1 SUMMARY
"DARKNESS RISING" PART 1
Running Time: 21:54 minutes

We start out with Cliffjumper and Arcee chatting over an intercom while cruising different landscapes, patrolling for Energon. Cliffjumper soon picks up a signal and finds a pit of Energon. He is quickly attacked by Decepticons. About a half dozen drones get ready to attack him.

Breaks to opening credits. No theme song. Just the primary "Transformers Prime" logo. Developed for television by Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci and Duane Capizzi & Jeff Kline. Kurtzman, Orci, and Kline are all listed as Executive Producers as well. This intro makes the intro to Scrubs look long.

Back to the action, Cliffjumper attacks the Decepticons. Scene jumps to Optimus Prime in vehicle form receiving a message from Arcee. Optimus contacts the other Autobots to head to Cliffjumper's location for backup. Cliffjumper's battle with the Decepticon Drones doesn't last long. After an Energon explosion, the Drones take the fallen Cliffjumper aboard their ship where Starscream awaits. Cliffjumper and Starscream share some brief dialogue before Starscream kills Cliffjumper by stabbing him through the left side of his chest.



The Autobots arrive at the Energon field. They find one of Cliffjumper's horns that fell off during his battle. Ratchet's monitor of Autobot positions shows Cliffjumper's "life signal" go offline.

Onboard the Decepticon shuttle, Soundwave reports to Starscream. I initially thought Soundwave had a rather unique somewhat melodized computer voice, but after listening to it several times and catching some of what he says, it sounds like he's repeating back lines from Arcee. Starscream's line afterwards is about Arcee as well so I'm not sure if that was a highly computerized playback of Arcee's voice or Soundwave actually talking.

The Autobots have a round table discussion near the edge of a cliff with a beautiful sunset in the background. Optimus talks about not letting the loss of Cliffjumper to impair their judgement. He also mentions that they are the only Autobots on Earth, they owe it to Cybertron, to Humankind and to their fallen comrade. Arcee sulks off as she transforms and leaves to "protect humankind".

Meanwhile, at a burger joint in a city, we meet the 16 year old human teenager Jack who's working at the drive-thru. His day doesn't seem to be going well. Arcee is en route to the city with her hologram "Sadie". She notices two Decepticon drone "twins" in her rear view mirrors. Jack has a conversation with his mother on his cell phone when he sees Arcee in motorcycle form sitting in the parking lot outside of the restaurant. He's mocked by two girls after they hear him talking to the Arcee motorcycle, proclaiming his desire to own a bike like her.



The two Decepticon drones race toward Arcee and Jack. Given no choice, Arcee must take off with Jack as her passenger with the Decepticon Drones in hot pursuit. The street battle continues through the city. Arcee loses the Drones for a moment so she lets Jack off in an alley after telling him that she doesn't exist. As she leaves him, she sees the Drones again in her rear view mirror. One of the Drones turns to chase after Jack. Move over "slag", the new slang on Transformers Prime is first heard when Arcee says "Oh, scrap!" as she turns around to take on the Drones in order to save Jack who is running for the Drone down an alley. Arcee comes to his rescue, Jack hops on her motorcycle form, and the battle/chase takes to the highway.



Bumblebee soon comes to the rescue by attacking the Drones. Jack and Arcee end up at the end of an unfinished highway. Arcee leaps to the underpass we saw in the 1st Transformers Prime trailer. Another young boy, Raf, is at the bottom of the underpass playing with his remote control car. Raf asks Jack what's going on right. The Drones, having knocked out Bumblebee moments earlier back on the highway, transform and attack Arcee. They battle. The action's pretty good. The Drones take out Arcee with a fire blast to the head. Bumblebee then reappears as he jumps off the highway overpass. This is the scene we saw from the first teaser trailer.



The Drones almost get the best of Bumblebee until Raf shouts out for the Decepticons to leave Bumblebee alone. The Drones then turn their attention from Bumblebee to Jack and Raf. They run down a large sewer pipe until the Drone can't reach them. Bumblebee and Arcee seem to be getting the "scrap" kicked out of them until Bulkhead arrives. With the tide turned against the Decepticons, the Drones transform and retreat. One of the few bits of humor is shown here when Arcee asks Bulkhead what took him so long. Bulkhead replies "traffic". Subtle humor ... not over-the-top like Animated was.

The scene cuts to Arcee and Bumblebee back at Autobot base giving Optimus Prime a briefing on what happened. Optimus states that anyone seen as one of their allies will be at great risk.

Jack walks out of his high school, past a Japanese exchange student, a girl named Miko, who is drawing the "awesome" motorcycle parked in the high school's parking lot. Jack sees Raf. Bumblebee honks his horn, pulls up alongside the boys, and has Raf get in. Arcee takes off in pursuit of Jack. She talks to him about understanding the situation. Arcee tells him that his safety is why Optimus Prime has requested his presence. Miko makes her presence known as she overhears their conversation. Arcee takes both Jack and Miko back to Autobot base to meet with Optimus Prime. The arrival at the Autobot mountain base is fairly epic. You truly get a sense of how large their base is.

The music when Optimus Prime walks into the main room is very reminiscent of the music that played when he first appeared in the first live action Transformers film. He announces that they are "autonomous robots from the planet Cybertron, also known as Autobots". The scene feels very similar to when Optimus introduced himself to Sam Witwicky. Apparently Cybertron is uninhabitable because of the Autobot civil war against the Decepticons. We get to see a stylized flashback to war ravaged Cybertron. This scene looks similar to an animated comic book, but it seems appropriate since it's a flashback scene. Optimus states that he fought alongside one he might consider a "brother", but in war ideals can be corrupted, then Megatron lost his way (awesome screen shot right here of Megatron's head). Optimus tells the human teenagers that he fears Megatron's return is imminent.

Back at the Decepticon base, Starscream states that the transmissions emanating from deep space would be a waste of Energon to intercept unless Soundwave is certain of its source. Soundwave nods, so the Decepticons activate their space bridge to retrieve ... MEGATRON!

To be continued ...