Maybe the missing characters are significant: 8-E-U-N. Still can't work it out.

What a banging start to the second season.  

 

That's what I love about MTMTE, they don't just leave easter eggs, they put in clues, and relevant background material, so if you're the type who pays attention to these things, it's very rewarding!

 

wanted to review what jaszmeister has posted today and a wall of text I put up s couple night s agp at 2:30 in the morning.

so I'm gonna quote myself below, in the hopes that people read my wall of text, cause it seems to have mostly missed the first timev around.as it happens I'm going to end up repeating release some of what I said and I from that quote pages back

I went back and checked up on the two people that handled the memory stick as well don't I think that's the source of corruption of the data. I'm thinking maybe overlord crafted his own mnemotic triggers in Chromedome when he took charge of the mnemosurgery session. or someone did something on Cybertron during Megatron's trial. Skids explains that Chromedome had been sulking in his hab suite since the trial ended. but during remains in light and dark Cybertron Chromedome was like up, and fighting, and punching prowl and whatever. and then during Megatron trial apparently he is fine. so what happened in that time frame that returned Chromedome into a grieving shut in?

did overlord plant a mnemotic suggestion that triggered somehow?

as jazz said, is it possible brainstorm did something?

is there another person that may have affected Chromedome that drastically, that he returns to catatonic grieving widow mode all over again.?

in any case, we hear rewinds message 3 times in this issue, twice ending in I love you, and the third time (while Megatron is talking about little edits) we hear someone scream instead of rewind saying I love you.

is this the first time Chromedome has h has heard the scream? cause he has got shock lines around his face when Megatron us saying little edits, and his visors is all wide eyed.

as for the coffin, the one they've pulled on board in this issue looks very much like it's pieced together from pieces of the coffins shown in issue 16. the caskets Pipes etc e were in were all symmetrical, uniform, and clean - the one seen in the very last panel is asymmetrical, lined with exposed bolts and rivets. but still has the same color scheme and the autobrand. I personally think the casket contains overlord , and he is sir if using the casket as a Trojan horse of sorts.

.they also mentioned being not far from Thunderclash's last known position iirc as Megatron entered the bridge, for whatever that is worth.


going to repost something from the quote below as well , something to consider on a meta level

I also think it interesting that Roberts said in the last interview that Megatron was not originally intended to be captain in season 2, but that it ended up working anyways. the conversation between Megatron and Rung just as easily could have been Rodimus debriefing with rung regarding the events in season 1, his failure as a captain etc, the little edits could have been framed as the little lies we tell ourselves to get through each day, and it all could have been tied back to the game if Chromedome hearing rewinds scream at the end if his edited message.




s sorry if leaving this makes for a long pretty but there's done other stuff that may have significance is anyone picks through it.

 

Mmm... If I recall, it was either Rodimus or Brainstorm that told Chromedome he needed to get out and do stuff somewhere in MTMTE 17, so he could get his mind off Rewind, or at least not hole himself up in his room brooding over Rewind... then all the stuff happened in the "Remain in Light" arc. Probably left him little time to think about grieving.

After RiL, Dark Cybertron went down. Skids probably doesn't know what Chromedome was doing since he was off in the Rodpod with the others, but safe to say from the few glimpses we got that Chromedome was busy fighting off the Ammonites with the others, both on the Aquatic world and on Cybertron. But as we see during the downtime between the defeat of the necrotitan and the arrival of the Ammonites, Chromedome was standing on that cliff alone. He had just turned down Magnus' request for a mnemosurgeon. Maybe the grief was catching up to him there, and then Prowl came along and poured a bottle of salt in the wound.

Then the Ammonites attacked and Chromedome was forced to put his grief aside again, in favour of survival. Once Dark Cybertron concluded came Megatron's trial, and Optimus asking him to use the needles again. So taking all that into account, it's possible that it was only after the trial that Chromedome finally had the distraction-free down time to actually sit in his room and properly grieve without the world blowing up around him.

I think Overlord was still unconscious in the slowcell when Rewind made the recording. We see the memory stick fly out before Rewind pulled the sword out, so I doubt Overlord had any influence on what went into the memory stick. My chief suspects are Rewind himself, Brainstorm, or the Lost Light.

Re: the coffin and thunderclash. Was re-reading MTMTE 22 yesterday and there was this comment:

First Aid: The Vis Vitalis is a life-support machine. A giant, wireless life-support machine. Thunderclash is this far from total shutdown, and that's no secret; he'll happily show you his wound.

Ratchet: As long as he stays within distance of the V.V he's safe. He turned his life-support machine into a space ship.

"Vis Vitalis" means "vital force" in Latin.... My money's still on Thunderclash being in that coffin (or I could be way wrong. Either way, can't wait to find out)

 

I'm willing to bet whatever's in the coffin is something we've as of yet been introduced to.

The immediate goal of catching up to Thunderclash feels very much like this season's version of, "Find the Circle of Light." ...which, in of itself, took most of the first season. The crew didn't reach their initial destination until the Annual, and didn't find Dai Atlas and his group proper, until Remain in Light.

 

but still, who edited in the scream Chromedome hears while Megatron is taking about little edits?


and why did he first hear it when the list light got within scanning distance of the makeshift coffin floating in space?

I'm not saying overlord is the only possibility, but to me he seems the most likely. whether or not Rewind survived the explosion, overlord could have pillaged his memories using mnemosurgery. ( ever since rewinds apparent demise, I've wondered if we would see him come back as Eject.)


and yea jazzmeister, perhaps Chromedome lapsed back into crushing grief mode after all the action of RiL and DC, but I still think there must have been a trigger of some sort, not just Chromedome finally getting time to himself and realizing that he still has hurt feelings. ( please say someone has seen that episode of flight of the Concords)

but to play critic to what I just said, what is a reasonable grieving period for a relationship that may have lasted 2 million years? .

 

Don't worry, mate...I'm vincible too.

 

Again, given the memory stick was made and ejected while Overlord was out of commission for a bit (and therefore very unlikely to have had anything to do with it), I doubt it. It IS possible that whatever's effecting the Lost Light, with the disappearing numbers and letters, also affected the memory stick. It could even be what was in the coffin. We still don't know.

It's not necessary to have a trigger to deal with grief, especially very fresh grief. I don't think that much time had passed between the events of RiL/DC and Megatron's trial. Sometimes all you need is time to yourself to let the memories resurface and bring on the grief. But if you want a trigger, then maybe even Prowl himself and that encounter on the cliff could have been a trigger.

Even Optimus getting him to threaten Megatron with the needles could have been a trigger. If Megatron had reacted differently, would Optimus have forced Chromedome to use the needles on him? Or was it a play because Op knew how Megatron would react? And would Chromedome have protested? We already know he turned Magnus down before.

 

You guys and girls are the BEST. I love reading the speculation/theories/explanations. I didn't notice the 8 on the pipe or wall over Whirl's head when he fights Megatron.

The ship is alive and is rearranging its own letters on the wall? Not an unlikely theory if the letters are painted on. But if they're signs placed on the walls... What about Mirage? The guy who turns invisible? Is he pulling some kind of prank?

I went back and looked, unless I'm mistaken I didn't see anyone mention that. I can't be the first? Someone?

-p2

 

I dunno about Prowl. It feels like someone who doing is not known for subtlety. I am not fan of Chromedome but I think there are so many enemies that will hate him for what he did. Those enemies could be on Lost Light.

 

This reminds of the Halo short story "Mona Lisa" where the humans find a coffin with the Flood and it ends up killing them one by one.

Could this coffin carry an undead/infected bot with some sort of disease?

 

I kinda like the idea some one said that it was Protoform X


We already Did the Plague thing.

 

Quoting this post since your other one was too long ^_^. I believe that Overlord may get a mention during Megatron's trial which might have brought back these memories. You may recall that Prowl in that awesome spread mentions how Megatron's action's contributed to the death of what was it, 100 billion life forms (definitely phase sixers material) so when the footage (which might also be rewind's footage since prowl is a cruel mofo) is shown, it upsets chromedome back into sulking mode?

 

Hate Plague would be awesome!

 

Given who has been handling the coffin are the first victims if that is the case.

I am going agree Hate Plague will be awesome. Heh it would make Whirl look sane.

 

I just realized something (don't worry it's nothing big or crazy): In the beginning of the issue when the bots are crowding around Rung's office to try to listen in on Megatron's meeting with Rung, they're all new crew-members, which makes sense seeing as Roberts just wants to show us who he got from RiD but it made me wonder, do none of the Lost Light vets care about Megatron and Rung's meeting? Then I realized, Rung mentions his office is sound proof, something the veterans would probably know (maybe they wanted to listen in on Fort Max's meeting) so they probably didn't even bother going to listen in on the meeting while the newbies would.

 

Hate Plague or Protoform X.

That would be awesome if that was indeed the case.

 

Okay, I'd like to start off with a TEENY flaw in Brainstorm's gun plan- it would require 100% compliance among all bots and cons to work, therefore it wouldn't. Bots and cons alike would specifically change them, or just tell him the idea is dumb and outright refuse to use them.

Why do I suspect given the way Brainstorm said "You intellectual types don't read the lost light insider" that that means it more like a tabloid than real information on the goings-on in the ship? (Also loved the dig at the transformers fans with the "and they're collectables. Collectable toys)

Have to agree with Rodimus on the whole "they're not you're people... they went insane and put you in charge... [they'll] realize what they've done and kill themselves." Or more likely Starscream himself.

Optimus lookd so flustered at Rodimus' recap, hard to believe if they'd been their long enough to repair the ship but THAT hadn't come up.

Rug looks weird with his "glasses" on... but even weireder with them off.

The "Crewditions" were hilarious.

I agree with the general concesus that Megatron probably hasn't had mnemosurgery performed on him before, that its still a reasonable thing to fear. BUT I don't think its unreasonable that it has been threatened to him before, and given his paranoia in other respects its also reasonable think he may be afraid something HAD been done to his mind, again, I don't think it was but in a society where perfectly normal looking people could be hiding those needles and take away the memory of the encounter... it is a sensable fear.

EUN8 or 8NUE, I think the order of the letters/numbers dissapearance may be a peice of the puzzle... phenetically maybe anew? I dunno, maybe just because if something was just taking letters it needed why not take the u out of fuel in stead or the e out of furnace? I dunno what though... But aside from that, how did Nightbeat notice the missing 8 but not that since they'd walked down the hall things had dissapeared off the wall? Must be off his game.

I think it is important about the edits thing with Chromedome to notice that he left out the "no injecting" bit out of his internal rhetoric. He probably took that part out because it isn't a "promise" he intends to keep. He knows he won't stick to it (heck, he may have used it in those six moonths time and took it out so he didn't hear Rewind saying it anymore, reminding him he couldn't keep his conjunx' death request. (I'll rant more on Chromedome at the end)

I agree that those messages on Megatron's door can't all be attributed to Whirl, I see at least 3 different "handwritings" and I don't think he'd have had the patients to come up with a umm poem about him living on borrowed time.

Side note to that particuular page, anyone know whats up with that odd little... sliver in the to left next to the panel of Megatron walking down the hall, its only like a centimeter wide and less than half the height of the pannel, it looks kida like someones arm or leg treads in front of a red wall, actually kinda looks like Megatrons arm from behind but I can't figure out why its there... just seems strange.

Nucleon Rods, letters/numbers, pyrobots, things dissapearing all have some connection to the fuel furnace... just a note...

I know everyones been saying thats Blaster, but it could be Bluster lol. And Megs looks too big for that captians chair.

Don't open the coffin. Did NO ONE think to give them that warning? The whole thing just to be safe? Or did they just say screw it a message apearently from the future can't be that important/helpful.

As I pointed out to a friend who also reads these, as most/all of the protectobots are on board, soon like his deceased friend First Aid will transform into a leg.(I may have said that in part because she was very sad when Ambulon died, he was her favorite medic)

Ehem, I'd like to say that while I don't think it was who Whirl was talking to, I think Chromedome is involved in what he was doing. Part of that thought is that, in the letter at the end of the book he says season is about revenge. And we know a few things about Chromedome, its that he is actually short tempered, has pretty much always been a mess, and that he doesn't really seem to know how to deal with problems he can't memory-wipe away. I think that he has turned blame away from himself, moved away from Overlord, and from Prowl, and finially moved on to Megatron, as it was his fault Overlord was so powerful in the first place.

Personally I'm not fond of Chromdome, and I think hes kind a selfish jerk. He didn't change Prowl's mind/memory becuase he threatened Rewind, he did it to protect his reputation TO Rewind. He wasn't concerned about his safety, he had been hiding something from him that Chromedome thought would make Rewind not trust him or whatever, not protect him from Prowl. Pefrsonally, given his reaction to that it wouldn't shock me if Rewind had ever tried to leave him, if he had forcably changed Rewinds mind on the matter(not that I think that if he did he wouldn't have later regreted it, but in a moment of fear or anger I think he is fully capable of that) and I think when you add his greif on top of that, he could be a VERY dangerous bot.

While I know what they are trying to do with Megatron, I don't think its in his character to accept he was wrong about anything. It just seems so... unlike him. I think they are doing well at showing him TRYING to change, but I don't think it could ever work.

Oh, I don't remember who it was a few pages back that pointed out that Megatron remembered Rung when everyone seems to forget him/his name, and mistyped his name as Ring- if that was on purpose that was awesome.

Rants over. I'll shut up now.

 

Well, the way he explains it, it sounds like the gun itself would recognise who's holding it. The user wouldn't change it, the gun would.

It's kind of his whole MO of trying to make weapons more intelligent than the people using them.