Name: Skyfire Occupation: Whipping Boy
I was watching some random Transformers episodes when I realized it REALLY sucks to be Skyfire. See in his debut episode, Fire in the Sky, the Decepticons are at the North Pole syphoning the energy out the Earth core. Prime is alerted to this, because it was snowing in the desert. Don't ask me how these incidents are linked, because I really can't follow this SuperFriends level logic myself. Anyways, while the Decepticons were doing this, they find Skyfire in a block of ice. Starscream wigs out and has everyone defrost the robot. This, of course, TOTALLY freaks Megatron out, because the idea of Starscream showing compassion to anyone is like having Japan take gender seriously, it rarely happens. Anyway Starscream reveals that the robot they found used to be a buddy of his, million years ago. Back when Starscream was a scientist. Yeah, I know, Starscream + Scientist does seem rather hard to believe. Especially considering his lack of patience and common sense, not that many of the Transformers have much of the latter. So the Decepticons thaw Skyfire out, repair him, and send him out to do their dirty work.
Well, things happen, Skyfire decides he doesn't like being a Decepticon, Starscream gets pissed and shoots the guy a few times along the way, and Skyfire learns his chum isn't the same guy he was millions of years ago, which REALLY makes you wonder what Starscream was like back in the day. Was he some crazy friendly nice guy? Who knows, who cares? We like out Starscream to be trecherous son of a bitch. Cause Starscream is cool that way, damn it! Whoa, I'm getting off topic. Back to the story, Skyfire decides he'd rather be an Autobot. Fights the Decepticons and at the end of the episode gets buried in ice (again) and is left for dead. Autobots mourn his death and then goes off to watch Night Court (or something).
Now fast forward to a couple episodes later, Fire On The Mountain, where Prime learns that the Decepticons are causing trouble in South America. What does Prime think is a better idea than driving his happy ass to South America? Sending Sideswipe and Wheeljack up to the North Pole so that they can dig Skyfire out of his ice prison, so that he can chaufer the Autobots to South America. No joke. Prime is willing to take all this extra time and have his peeps travel all that extra distance, just so he can have a chaufer to do the travelling for him. I'd like to call Prime a dick for this, but reasons I'll discuss later prove that shouldn't be the case.
To add insult to injury, upon uncovering Skyfire and getting him back online, Wheeljack instantly orders him to get his happy ass to Autobot HQ (aka The Ark for you non-Transfans out there) and take the Autobots to South America. The man... robot... doesn't even get a break. He's barely even thawed out and he's already being ordered around. To make this worse, at one point in that episode, Optimus Prime (while Skyfire is in his jet form) pats his nosecone like he's a frikkin' dog. Good, Skyfire, good boy. You want a Energon cookie? Huh, huh? Do you? Yeah, sucks to be Skyfire, doesn't it.
So here's my big question. Is Optimus Prime a dick? I find this idea hard to believe, because Prime generally seems to be THE NICEST GUY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. Seriously, he is. In the episode, War Of The Dinobots (wow all this episode refering is making me feel like a Trekkie), Grimlock along with his Dinobot buddies (and a bit of brainwashing by Megatron) damn near almost kills Prime and betrays the Autobots (soley because Grimlock is jealous of Prime being leader and not him), and by the end of the episode Grimlock realizes the errors of his ways and apologizes to Prime. Prime being THE NICEST GUY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH accepts Grimlocks apology and doesn't even punish Grimlock for damn near killing him, while anyone else would've demoted Grimlock to being the Ark's janitor or peel potatoes, or something. Nope, not Prime. He's just that nice of a guy.
So what's up with the Skyfire hate Prime's dishing out? Well, Skyfire is a pretty gigantic guy (this is before they need bigger toys... err... had bigger characters in the show) and he seems to be a bit of a putz. I can only assume that his self esteem is so obviously low that everyone feels the need to take advantage of him (this could explain why Starscream was friends with him to begin with). Either that or everyone is worried that his incredible height will cause him to defeat them all at Cybertron Basketball, thus they decide to berate and humilate him, so that he won't have the self confidence to play. Who knows. Either way, the point of this story is, it sucks to be Skyfire, because his occupation is being the Autobot whipping boy. Until next time... I HUNGER, COWARDS!!!
Well, things happen, Skyfire decides he doesn't like being a Decepticon, Starscream gets pissed and shoots the guy a few times along the way, and Skyfire learns his chum isn't the same guy he was millions of years ago, which REALLY makes you wonder what Starscream was like back in the day. Was he some crazy friendly nice guy? Who knows, who cares? We like out Starscream to be trecherous son of a bitch. Cause Starscream is cool that way, damn it! Whoa, I'm getting off topic. Back to the story, Skyfire decides he'd rather be an Autobot. Fights the Decepticons and at the end of the episode gets buried in ice (again) and is left for dead. Autobots mourn his death and then goes off to watch Night Court (or something).
Now fast forward to a couple episodes later, Fire On The Mountain, where Prime learns that the Decepticons are causing trouble in South America. What does Prime think is a better idea than driving his happy ass to South America? Sending Sideswipe and Wheeljack up to the North Pole so that they can dig Skyfire out of his ice prison, so that he can chaufer the Autobots to South America. No joke. Prime is willing to take all this extra time and have his peeps travel all that extra distance, just so he can have a chaufer to do the travelling for him. I'd like to call Prime a dick for this, but reasons I'll discuss later prove that shouldn't be the case.
To add insult to injury, upon uncovering Skyfire and getting him back online, Wheeljack instantly orders him to get his happy ass to Autobot HQ (aka The Ark for you non-Transfans out there) and take the Autobots to South America. The man... robot... doesn't even get a break. He's barely even thawed out and he's already being ordered around. To make this worse, at one point in that episode, Optimus Prime (while Skyfire is in his jet form) pats his nosecone like he's a frikkin' dog. Good, Skyfire, good boy. You want a Energon cookie? Huh, huh? Do you? Yeah, sucks to be Skyfire, doesn't it.
So here's my big question. Is Optimus Prime a dick? I find this idea hard to believe, because Prime generally seems to be THE NICEST GUY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. Seriously, he is. In the episode, War Of The Dinobots (wow all this episode refering is making me feel like a Trekkie), Grimlock along with his Dinobot buddies (and a bit of brainwashing by Megatron) damn near almost kills Prime and betrays the Autobots (soley because Grimlock is jealous of Prime being leader and not him), and by the end of the episode Grimlock realizes the errors of his ways and apologizes to Prime. Prime being THE NICEST GUY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH accepts Grimlocks apology and doesn't even punish Grimlock for damn near killing him, while anyone else would've demoted Grimlock to being the Ark's janitor or peel potatoes, or something. Nope, not Prime. He's just that nice of a guy.
So what's up with the Skyfire hate Prime's dishing out? Well, Skyfire is a pretty gigantic guy (this is before they need bigger toys... err... had bigger characters in the show) and he seems to be a bit of a putz. I can only assume that his self esteem is so obviously low that everyone feels the need to take advantage of him (this could explain why Starscream was friends with him to begin with). Either that or everyone is worried that his incredible height will cause him to defeat them all at Cybertron Basketball, thus they decide to berate and humilate him, so that he won't have the self confidence to play. Who knows. Either way, the point of this story is, it sucks to be Skyfire, because his occupation is being the Autobot whipping boy. Until next time... I HUNGER, COWARDS!!!