Beast Wars - Optimal Situation

[Sojourna]

Haven't seen anyone else start a thread for this, so here goes.
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I liked "Optimal Situation" as a child, though given that Beast Wars was my first exposure to the Transformers franchise I didn't appreciate it nearly as much as older viewers. It wasn't until years later that I could familiarize myself with G1, and thus better understand both the story itself and the meta aspect of the episode.

And it did a great job on both those counts.

It shook up the status quo, had genuine character development, and a willingness to incorporate what came before in a respectful manner. (The last point of which feels all too rare these days, with either poor execution or downright hostility.)

"Optimal Situation" was a strong opener for the third season, though sadly the commercial aspect would also be much more obvious and negatively impact the story-telling as a result.

[Fianna]

I only just now realize why the Maximal base had to be destroyed: 'cause after Optimus's latest upgrade, he's too big to fit through the door.

[Wargriffin]

It does continue the through line of

Primal and Megatron's Namesakes

Optimus in Beast Wars is implied to have been honorable renamed as Optimus for his strength of character and potential

while Megatron is Megatron cause thats the name he choose for himself despite being an outcast in his own faction.

Optimus has basically become a mirror image of his namesake even taking on several of his literal qualities. *At this point Optimus is more then a match for the entire Pred team by himself...

Now Megatron is on the backfoot... I mean he still has Powerhouses of Inferno and Rampage

The resulting next couple of episodes show Meg's desperation to close that gap.

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[Jexulus]

As a counterpoint to this, I think there’s a good reason why no other Optimus got a permanent power boost like this before or since. Count how many episodes where the events of the plot directly take him out of commission through one way or another. Spoiler: it’s almost all of them.

[Nealithi]

As a counterpoint to this, I think there’s a good reason why no other Optimus got a permanent power boost like this before or since. Count how many episodes where the events of the plot directly take him out of commission through one way or another. Spoiler: it’s almost all of them.

Kinda like how in JL/JLU they had to side line Superman so others had a chance to shine?

[J!!]

I've always found it kinda funny how Clark is considered the game-breaking OP character, with his ability to fly around and punch things really hard, when Jon Stewart could've ended most episodes with a phone call.

[TGLS]

I've always found it kinda funny how Clark is considered the game-breaking OP character, with his ability to fly around and punch things really hard, when Jon Stewart could've ended most episodes with a phone call.

I didn't know the daily show guy was so powerful.

[Archanubis]

As a counterpoint to this, I think there’s a good reason why no other Optimus got a permanent power boost like this before or since. Count how many episodes where the events of the plot directly take him out of commission through one way or another. Spoiler: it’s almost all of them.

Yeah, they never really did do much with Primal after his upgrade. The ONE time he could have gone all out on an opponent, he doesn't and TM2 Dragon Megatron kicks his skidplates.

[Jexulus]

As a counterpoint to this, I think there’s a good reason why no other Optimus got a permanent power boost like this before or since. Count how many episodes where the events of the plot directly take him out of commission through one way or another. Spoiler: it’s almost all of them.

Kinda like how in JL/JLU they had to side line Superman so others had a chance to shine?

Truthfully, Optimal Optimus has it worse. In Superman’s case, the shows’ situation for each episode were more varied and usually couldn’t be solved by brute strength alone, but it could be solved by sone other cast members. He got sidelined quite a bit, yeah, but it was really only an issue for 1 season and later seasons rectified this.

The maximals, on the other hand, had a fairly uniform skillset in terms of technical skills and combat capabilities. Optimus could literally solve every combat situation on his own with how he was set up in episode 1 (besides the underwater ones), which was 99% of the conflict in Season 3.

Beast Machines kinda reset everybody to an even playing field on the Maximal side of things, but tonally the show was entirely different so it didn’t feel like a continuation of the team dynamic from Seasons 1 and 2.

[J!!]

I've always found it kinda funny how Clark is considered the game-breaking OP character, with his ability to fly around and punch things really hard, when Jon Stewart could've ended most episodes with a phone call.

I didn't know the daily show guy was so powerful.

it was the bush years, him and colbert basically wrote the sociopolitical narrative for the melenial generation.