Starscream's mutant spark and Rampage's mutant spark might have a Blitzwing-y vibe to it, I think.

Starscream's spark more "inhabited" Waspinator than merged with Waspy's spark. Otherwise we might have seen TM waspinator (had he not fallen in the CR tank).

That's the other thing, CR-chambered bots were shielded from the wave, or rather their superstructures would have been continuously repaired at a molecular level to prevent mutation from holding.

If the magma had anything to do with it then we would have seen poor Scorpy and Terrorsaur come out super-charged. I'm still holding out hope that a future iteration of BW would find them Transmetalized in stasis lock inside volcanic glass.

There is a period of Earth Prehistory where a bunch of animal species kinda dead-ended. I would like to see a return to Earth in that period of saber-toothed cats and ostrich-raptors and mammoth rhinos and 30-foot sloths for some interesting alt modes.

 

Some sources say that Terrorsaur and Scorponok did become transmetal and survive, but were stasis locked inside the magma. Which is kind of a horrible fate, really.

 

Sources?

may I ask what those sources were?

I wouldn’t say what happened between Waspinator and Starscream can be said to be a case of one body containing 2 sparks

Primes and G1Megs sparks became “dependent “ on the bodies of Primal and Beast Megs because they couldn’t survive outside of a body of sone kind just to survive and to me that suggest a different kind of connections.Maybe Something more Symbiotic in which the sparks of the two involved in in case intermingled to some degree

That’s not the case with Starscream , Starscreams spark did not require any life support connections, his spark did not “Intermingle” with that of waspy, it just took over

 

Beast Wars sourcebooks, even if those are obviously kind of their own continuity.

 

thanks a lot

 

I will say, Transmetals remain one of my favorite bit of Beast Wars lore and I don't mean just because the toys and design were great and unique. Previously, Transformers changing form was usually done via some external pseudo magical source with cosmic powers (The Matrix for Rodimus, Unicron for his minions/heralds, Actionmaster Optimus in the comics being reborn) or a rebuilding of their form (such as Goldbug from Bumblebee or Optimus from Orion Pax). Yet in spite of all this, the change was generally mostly done by something which was Transformers-derived, be it some godly figure or its implement or someone or something rebuilding the cybertronian. While I know the Vok do have ties to the Swarm in supplementary material, the quantum surge which erupted from the destroyed planet buster was a complete and utter fluke which produced particularly unusual results. Its a rare case of some induced power up that is born of an utterly alien source.

There's just something which fascinate me about the quantum surge and the mutations it produced. Some could say its bad writing, that it came out of nowhere and that maybe the writers could have just found some way to make Transmetals a willing upgrade. Yet they didn't. The Transmetals just exist as some really weird mutation to the partially organic (yes, there's organic material inside the BW cast) cybertronians seen during the Beast Wars. There's just something so utterly weird and random about its existence yet it also follow its own bizarre internal logic that it doesn't come off as complete nonsense. Transmetals are visually coherent in esthetic (that infamous inside-out look) and their abilities are mostly defined (their weapons change, they gain a vestigial third mode and they resist energon build up). Sure, they were born of a toyetic gimmick to refresh the line but I find them interesting because they also heralded the return of more classical mechanical animal Transformers, like in G1, while also having their own unique style. As a kid I remember finding them very striking visually when I saw them in store, with their shiny chromed parts. At the very least they accomplished the goal of being new and shiny for kids.

Yet story-wise they remain quite an oddity. Fleshed out enough to make sense, but never quite enough to be completely resolved as a mystery. Was the inside out organic and mechanical look meant to tie them more to the Vok in the show, whose technology had a certain organic quality? Was it simply thought out as a toy gimmick and fleshed out on its own? Or was it, at one point, possibly a way to introduce the Vok themselves since season 2 hinted the cybertronians exposed to the quantum surge had acquired certain Vok-like qualities? Was there a vague plan, story-wise, at some point to maybe introduce new Transmetal characters as Voks? Was this what was left over in the plans for Tigerhawk?

 

I agree. I've always liked the quantum surge as a mechanic for sweeping change. I only wish Rhinox had gotten some of that chrome action  

 

One interesting detail the Transmetals had is aside from a few toys they lacked ranged weapons, which is what led to the various moments of kibble repurposing. For Rhinox I'm curious of the writers wouldn't have just kept his chainguns of doom but recolored, same as Rattrap and his gun. By the way, since I'm in the mood of overthinking Transmetals: an early concept was for them to absorb and release the Energon radiation. Its possible they were originally going to be lacking guns and instead rely on energy projection.

Precursor to Beast Machines, maybe?

 

They are shown absorbing radiation - a specific example is in Bad Spark - Cheetor mentions his transmetal bod absorbing TOO much energon, leading to a fart joke.

They appear at the least to be immune to energon radiation overload.

Outside of Rattrap and Rampage, all the transmetals fire energy pulses rather than ammunition (Rattrap has his hand gun and Rampage has a variety of missile weapons).