Most of this information comes from the new Ask Vector Prime blog on facebook, this topic will go forward assuming that everything said by Vector Prime is 100% canon, even if in reality, it is not. (though i have no sources stating otherwise either) this topic is more for fun rather than trying to start "what is/isn't canon" war.

the return of "Ask Vector Prime" as been a great thing, we have learned so much! But there is a major inconsistency. There are now technically 17 Original primes.

We all know that Hasbro's dumb idea to make the Aligned continuity a "separate entity" backfired spectacularly, in fact this decision was recently reversed and the Aligned continuity is now just another normal multiversal cluster like every other transformers franchise. It has "rejoined the multiverse" which causes a problem.

All of the 13 (regaurdless of universe) are considered to be multiversal singularities. This includes the 13 from Aligned, they are not exceptions.

A multiversal singularity means that the beings in question cannot have any kind of alternate doppelganger of any kind in any universe. They are ALL the same entity.

Now, when aligned was separate from the the multiverse as a whole, this would not have been an issue but the fact that it has rejoined causes the problems. let me list the primes for you.

Multiverse:-----------------Aligned:
Prima
Vector Prime
Megatronus
Nexus Prime
Logos Prime-----------------Optimus Prime
Micronus Prime
Liege Maximo
Solus Prime
Epistemus-------------------Quintus Prime
Autonomous Maximus------Alpha Trion
Solomus---------------------Amalgamous Prime
Onyx Prime
Alchemist Prime

As you can see, there are four differences between the two teams. But if both teams are multiversal singularities, and the aligned continuity has "rejoined" the greater multiverse. What happens?

Well we know that happens. Ask Vector Prime gave us a perfect example. Shattered glass Alpha Trion. (whom was established as a multiversal singularity by Vector himself)

It was stated that during the Aligned universe's time away from the greater multiverse, that particular Alpha Trion began to act autonomously. (he was never an alternate reality Trion, he was simply cut off from the singularity that is Alpha Trion and began to act erratically) but now that the aligned universe has returned, SG Trion will hopefully rejoin himself to become part of the "Alpha Trion wavelength" again. But if not, oh well, there is still all the other Alpha Trions in the multiverse that would have no problem rejoining with Aligned Trion. But this doesn't stop Aligned Alpha Trion, member of the original 13 to stop existing.

Given this example, one can assume that same thing would apply to the overlapping members of each set of 13. Essentially meaning that aligned Vector Prime would rejoin the "Vector Prime singularity wavelength" once again and become whole. The same would go for every other overlapping member.

But what of the 4 unique members from Aligned? They cant overlap because of the lack of corresponding members. But i have already proven above that even though SG Trion may not have been one of the 13, he IS now because of the return of aligned into the multiverse and Trion's status as one of the 13 IN aligned.

Because of the 13's importance and status of multiverse singularities. you cant remove those things. It is FACT that Optimus Prime, Quintus Prime, Alpha Trion and Amalgamous Prime ARE members of the 13. Just as it is FACT that Solomus, Autonomous Maximus, Epistemus, and Logos Prime ARE members of the 13. These members cant overlap, but you cant just decide four of them don't exist. they DO.

Thus, in reality there are now 17 Original Primes within the multiverse. Not 13.
Prima
Vector Prime
Megatronus
Nexus Prime
Logos Prime
Micronus Prime
Leige Maximo
Solus Prime
Epistemus
Autonomous Maximus
Solomus
Onyx Prime
Alchemist Prime
Alpha Trion
Quintus Prime
Amalgamous Prime
Optimus Prime

 

In total there are seventeen.

Seventeen in the multiverse. Thirteen in the aligned.

 

13 is enough. 17 is just too many Primes.

 

Well as aligned is now part of the multiverse, the multiverse extra 4 would go the other way too. So it would just be 17 all around.

 

It takes a lot to make Prime stew
A pinch of shine and Logos too
A scoop of Onyx to add the spice
A dash of Solus to make it nice
And you've got...

Too many Primes!

 

The truth be told, this is why I always felt they should not have named all thirteen original Primes. You end up with issues like this where the continuities do not mesh.

My personal solution were I writing the canon would be to take the step back and say "right, these seventeen all claim to be of the thirteen. Some of them are lying. Others are deluded. Others are popular urban myths (Optimus Prime)."

To draw upon a real world example, it is like saying that the city of Rome was founded by Romulus and Remus. You know the city was founded. You can place habitation at the location to the approximate traditional dating of it. You know they got the name "Rome" from somewhere, and you know that traditionally, this was the name of the founder (and the ancients did tend to name cities for the founders). It's entirely likely the guy did have a brother. You don't know if he was named Romulus, or his brother was Remus. You don't know if he was nursed by a wolf, or killed his brother in a dispute. In short, you know some things, but there are others which are unclear or unknown.

An alternative, look to the Greek mythological tradition. Was Aphrodite born of seafoam and emerged from a clamshell, or did was she born of Zeus and Dione? Both versions were related in the tradition of the Greek people, recorded by different writers. Plato even acknowledges them and tries to explain them.

You see though how there is a lot of vagueness in there? You could use that kind of thing in the story of the Primes. With that, you can have as many powerful ancient Transformers as you want making the claim. It's up to the characters in universe (and the writers) to decide if they were for real, or if they were merely lying. Real life is not hard and fast about a lot of things in our own tradition - since the confusion exists in the fiction, this is one area where making the robots' traditions mirror real life would make sense.

 

Yeah some could be False claims, one was told by Alpha Trion, the other by Vector... Who is lying!

 

Alpha Trion stabbed that one guy, so...

 

he stabbed a guy? who?

 

Smokescreen? That is the only one who he could be referring to.

 

I'd be more inclined to believe Vector Prime. Alpha Trion can either be a dick or a total stab happy psycho depending on the depiction.

 

I honestly never cared if the Thirteen were multiversal singularities, nothing from the fiction of the multiverse has made the idea of multiversal singularities important to me. Unicron has far too many different origins and personalities like being a boring drone in Armada, being the core of the Earth in Prime, and being created by a fish monkey in G1, how is he a multiversal singularity when he's so different each time? XD

Personally I prefer The Last Autobot being one of the Thirteen that makes more sense than the WFC version of Optimus, but I'm not a fan of how Solomus and Epistemus are now members of the Thirteen Primes. It made more sense when they were Gods whose existences were brought into questions, like the Gods we have. And apparently Adaptus is another version of Amalgamous Prime, I never cared for Amalgamous anyway but Adaptus should not be merged with him like that. Also can someone please tell me how to pronounce Epistemus? XD

The Aligned continuity isn't the only other continuity that brings the multiversal singularity concept into question, what about the movie continuity where there were 7 Primes, not 13? Maybe this version of the Thirteen split after fighting Unicron or the Quintessons or something, but still there is a lot of inconsistency with the concept of the Thirteen. And didn't Hasbro deem Logos Prime as non canon? He's only ever existed in one bit of fiction ever, but I would prefer to have him over Amalgamous.

Still, at the very least, 17 is still a Prime number. XD

 

I'm guessing whoever runs the Vector Prime blog somehow got told that Nexus Maximus is somehow worth five Primes (which either means each of the five component bots ARE Primes and Nexus ironically is not, or the component bots were 4/5ths of a Prime each with Nexus counting as the fifth).

 

made my day!

 

Actually multiversal singularities having different origins from themselves is actually explained. In some cases a singularity is ONE being who hops from universe to universe, like Vector Prime, or they have multiple incarnations thought every universe that are all linked to a shared spark/mind, they experience every reality at the same time, like Unicron. Unicron can come into existence in many different ways in many different universes, but they are all Unicron himself regardless of how he manifests within a particular universe. They are all connected to one another very intimately and thus there are no alternate reality versions of Unicron as all Unicrons share the same mind/spark. It's a nearly identical situation as the army of Unicron stone golems in Transformers Prime. "we may be many, but we are ALL Unicron"

Actually if you look at the multiverse list of names, only 7 have the "prime" prefix in their actual names, that is how they worked the movie primes into the 13. though that doesn't count for the aligned as they where rewriting that entirely anyway, and having 17 overall fucks that up as well. though it can be easily rationalized as being the primes in the movies where the multiversal primes with the actual "Prime" prefix in their name, during the time when the aligned universe was cut off from the universe. Which is most likely the actual case, and thus still works.

17 is a prime number!? that basically confirms my theory all by itself! lol

 

Ahhh that guy he stabbed. Well that was shattered glass Alpha Trion, which doesn't count. That was an Alpha Trion that was cut off from the rest of the "Alpha Trion singularity" and had become a bit off kilter as a result of being separated from himself.

 

Nexus Prime is a bit of a beast. The 5 bots that make up nexus prime don't actually exist, or at least they weren't supposed to. Unlike traditional combiners (where multiple individuals fuse to become a new character who is the sum of their parts) Nexus Prime is ONE individual who can split himself into smaller copies of himself, they are ALL Nexus Prime. What happened is that after Nexus split, each smaller him went to a different universe to each guard a part of the Star Sabre. But between the distance and the amount of time apart the little Nexus Primes lost their memories and created new identities from themselves. only once they where reunited with one another did they remember who they where and effectively killing their new "identities" in the process. He could have split himself in to 300 different little characters and there still would have been only ONE prime, ONE Nexus.

 

...ok, so he does count for five because of toy reasons then?

Also, I encourage you to explore the powers of the "Multiquote" button! It'll make replying a lot easier, trust me.

 

I think every time somebody tries their hand at the 13 story they'll come up with different names (aside from mainstays like Prima and Vector). The easiest way to rationalize this would be by saying that somewhere in the space between there are 13 Prime Consciouses that manifest in each world, under similar but not always identical names. It makes sense that a voidwalker lime Vector Prime would be a constant because he would be aware of this. The others get by name recognition.