Of Masters and Mayhem

The twelfth, and final, six-part story arc of Transformers Timelines, Of Masters and Mayhem functions as an epilogue for the whole saga. Taking place in a universe inspired by the original Marvel comic, though in a world where humanity never evolved, Of Masters and Mayhem focuses on the last two unresolved plot threads from the Collectors' Club years of comics, the humans and Pretenders from Transformers Classics and Ramjet, the herald of Unicron.

Tropes used in Of Masters and Mayhem include:

• Absent Aliens: The ones who brought the dinosaurs to Chicxulania. The Raptoricons suspect that they abandoned the planet when they lost control of the dinosaurs.
• Adaptation Name Change: Probably to avoid trademark issues, Marvel's Mekaans are renamed the Teklaans. The authors rationalize it as the race having evolved without Torgo around to enforce a Space Age Stasis.
• Adaptational Badass: In the mainline Marvel Universe, Torgo and the other Mekaans were human-sized and strong enough to match the Fantastic Four. The Teklaans are taller than Cybertronians with the strength to match. They also reject Space Age Stasis, having expanded to multiple planets.
• Almighty Janitor: Averted for Spin-Out. He was 49th in line for command of his unit and when the forty-eight people ahead of him are killed, he has no idea how to be a leader.
• After the End: Cybertron is in ruins and the Cybertronians are a Dying Race.
• Ambiguous Situation: Who was telling the truth about Harmonex? Punch or Counterpunch? Impactor is pretty sure that Harmonex once existed but can't be sure.
• And Then What?: Alpha Bravo wonders this about Impactor. After devoting so many stellar cycles to getting revenge on Thunder Mayhem, does he even plan to live beyond that?
• Anti-Hero: Every single one of the Wreckers.
• Avengers Assemble: Everyone comes together at the end to fight off Thunder Mayhem.
• Badass Bookworm: Fractyl is a geologist.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Unsure as to whether he's really Punch or Counterpunch, he decides to be an Autobot based on this.
• Black and Gray Morality: The Mayhem Attack Squad want to kill all life in the universe. The Wreckers, while fighting them, aren't motivated by altruism or a desire to protect innocent lifeforms but rather a desire to avenge their homeworld. It's made clear several times that Impactor doesn't give a damn about aliens and he's only expressed interest in avenging Cybertron, not any of the other planets that the combiner destroyed.
• Blue and Orange Morality: The Teklaans genuinely see nothing wrong with resurrecting perfect and incurable virus strains when they reconstruct planets for endangered species, reasoning that the viruses have just as much a chance at life.
• Break the Cutie: Alpha Bravo, the nicest character in the setting, has his quiet life as a rescue worker uprooted as he's dragged into a mad quest for vengeance. After the initial combination scares him so much, he takes it upon himself to kill his best friend to make sure Wreckage dies and gets bisected by Toxitron.
• Combining Mecha: The story is built around this premise. The Decepticons engineered Thunder Mayhem as the ultimate weapon and Wreckage was created to defeat him.
• Composite Character: Knock Out mixes his Prime and Micromaster counterparts.
• Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story: Punch hails from Harmonex which was utterly destroyed by the Decepticons in the early stages of the War and left him as the Sole Survivor. When Counterpunch shows up, he claims to have invoked this trope so the Autobots wouldn't question this perfect spy.
• Curb Stomp Battle: The Great War in this timeline seemed to have been slanted heavily in the Decepticons' favour before Thunder Mayhem unleashed another Curb Stomp Battle on the whole planet.
• Deadpan Snarker: Megatron has never shied away from this but this version of him might very well take the energon cake.
• Demoted to Extra: Optimus Prime and Megatron only appear at the very end.
• Denser and Wackier: Inverted. The Great War is presented in a much more realistic manner, featuring officer meetings and infantry numbering.
• Dirty Coward: When a Cybertronian extinction seemed imminent, Megatron fled Cybertron, saying that he had to survive so that the Decepticons could one day return.
• Dying Race: The Cybertronians are repeatedly said to be on the brink of extinction.
• Emergency Transformation: To survive, Punch is stripped of his ability to take two robot modes and becomes a physical composite of his two selves.
• Enemy Mine: Autobots? Decepticons? Irrelevant terminology, they all just want to kill that which killed Cybertron.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Most Decepticons were not on board with Thunder Mayhem.
  • The Raptoricons eventually abandoned the war as it kept dragging on forever.
  • Fractyl is horrified by Toxitron when they first meet.
• Everyone Has Standards: If Counterpunch is to be believed, Harmonex never existed and the idea of Punch being its Sole Survivor banked on the idea that no one could possibly be tactless enough to dig up unpleasant memories.
• Evil Knockoff: Toxitron was rebuilt based on Optimus Prime's schematics. All the better to scare the Autobots.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • Cybertron taught its people to regard organics as "alien and unnatural." As a result, beast modes were not looked on in high regard.
  • It's quite clear that the Wreckers, a race of Mechanical Lifeforms, regard the Teklaans as Just a Machine and not alive in the same way that Cybertronians are.
  • After years of Cybertronian intervention on their old planet, the human race from the Classicsverse have had grown rather tired of Transformers.
• Flawed Prototype: Wreckage 1.0 is quite less stable than Wreckage 2.0. It's said that the latter's success is due to Impactor being able to command better from within and Bluestreak boosting his intelligence.
• For Want of a Nail: As said above, the main difference between this reality and the original Marvel comic is that humanity never evolved. As such, the authors rationalized that there was no Fantastic Four to free Torgo from the Skrulls, resulting in Cergo replacing him.
• Forced to Watch: Optimus Prime as Cybertron died.
• Four Lines, All Waiting: There are three stories to tell, all of which only interact at the end.
  • After the native Cybertron was razed, Impactor forms the Wreckers to get revenge on Thunder Mayhem.
  • The Classicsverse cast, humans and Pretenders, tries to adjust to their new Earth.
  • Ramjet tries to escape this universe and contact Unicron.
• Go Mad From the Isolation:
  • Bluestreak was the only living thing left on Cybertron for millions of years. Unsurprisingly, he's taken to talking to the corpses.
  • Thinking he was the last Cybertronian, Optimus became lethargic to the point that he just patiently waited for death.
• Going Native: Alpha Bravo was quite happy to stay on Abraxas as a rescue worker, even if meant posing as a non-sentient vehicle.
• Gone Horribly Right:
  • That tried and true cliche of the Mad Scientists wanting an ultimate superweapon.
  • In a slight adjustment from their backstory in the mainstream Marvel Universe, the Maarin built their robots to rebuild their world after war had devastated it. The Teklaans rebuilt Maarin in a "perfect" state but also brought back its diseases in such a state, wiping out the biosphere.
• He Who Fights Monsters: Alpha Bravo is seriously worried that Wreckage is this, noting that he has the potential to be just as destructive and uncontrollable as Thunder Mayhem. When combined, he even wonders if Wreckage is jealous of Thunder Mayhem's kill count.
• Heroic BSOD: Cybertron's demise triggered one in Optimus who was content to die forgotten on Earth before the Pretenders reawakened his fighting spirit.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Jetfire stayed behind to allow the engineering team to escape Toxitron. It's never outright said that he died but Toxitron's later survival doesn't speak well for Jetfire's fate.
• Hidden Depths: Much to Bluestreak's surprise, Impactor is not just a Hot-Blooded thug on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge. One day, he really would like to see Cybertron rise again up, even telling Bluestreak that the Teklaans' plan was viable.
• Hollywood Acid:
  • Toxitron spews it, though it's more a sludge than acid.
  • An enzyme secreted by the Mecannibal digestive system. It's noted that they have an exceptionally durable construction so that they're not melted from the inside out.
• Hope Bringer: Cybertron itself to Impactor. When he sees that it still exists and that it's possible to revive it, he lightens up significantly.
• Hostile Terraforming: Discussed. The Teklaans argue that the viruses are part of the biosphere and should be brought back with everything else while the Cybertronians see it as a wholesale genocide.
• Humans Are Special: Gaea says as much but also tells Grimlock that the future of the Cybertronian race is not dependant on a bunch of tiny organics. That said, it's thanks to the superhumans that Wreckage is able to best Thunder Mayhem.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Alpha Bravo feels that Wreckage is Too Powerful to Live and kills Offroad to stop him from every forming again. That said, he feels quite guilty about it and accepts being killed as punishment.
• In Spite of a Nail: In the Marvel comic, the Transformers were birthed by Primus in response to Unicron. Despite Unicron, and seemingly Primus, not existing in this universe, the Transformers still popped up.
• Insectoid Aliens: The Vespoids.
• Insignificant Little Blue Planet: Even more so considering that it wasn't inhabited until a few years ago.
• Insistent Terminology: Toxitron does not have Hollywood Acid. He secrets a corrosive sludge.
• Locked Out of the Loop: The Raptoricons lived in peace on Chicxulania, blissfully unaware of Cybertron's destruction.
• Lost Colony: Paradron was this but then they found it.
• Just a Kid: Most of the Wreckers treat Alpha Bravo as such. Reality Ensues very soon afterwards as Alpha's young age means he's unprepared to cope with the trauma of combination and lets his emotions guide him afterwards.
• Just a Machine: How the Cybertronians, a race of Mechanical Lifeforms, view the Teklaans.
• Meaningful Name: According to Wreckage, his name reflects what Thunder Mayhem has made of the universe.
• Merchandise-Driven: Transformers Timelines has never shied away from this, but the comic story is almost painful in its promotion of the Thunder Mayhem figure. Though affectionally so.
• Motor Mouth: Bluestreak as always.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Optimus Prime is disguised as a gorilla. He even uses "Garry" as a fake name for bonus points. The planet that Fractyl was living on before being recruited, Chicxulania, is also clearly inspired by Beast Wars.
  • Thunder Mayhem's apocalyptic rampage is clearly inspired by Thunderwing's in the 2005 IDW comics. Fractyl even mentions the vague pseudo-science that drove Thunderwing in that continuity. Harmonex and cold construction are also mentioned.
  • Alpha Bravo and Offroad's initial situation is ripped from the pages of Rescue Bots.
  • In the Shattered Glass universe, Rodimus is hiding out in the Skuxxoid Cluster, referencing the alien race from The Transformers.
  • Wreckage tests out his powers by destroying a cell of Mechannibals.
  • Fractyl has Furmanite armor.
  • Impactor greets the group on Chicxulania with the universal greeting.
• Not So Different: Impactor and Bluestreak, which causes no small amount of friction between the two.
• Oh Crap: Fractyl when he remembers why he's heard of the Teklaans.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Both Ramjet and the Mayhem Attack Squad. Leads to a Villain Team-Up.
• Peer Pressure Makes You Evil: Not Evil, but Alpha Bravo's desire to be accepted by what remained of his species is what leads him to join the Wreckers and ultimately his demise.
• Person of Mass Destruction:
  • Toxitron is a walking vat of Hollywood Acid.
  • Thunder Mayhem levelled Cybertron, even killing off the other combiners. Once it finished with its homeworld, it began destroying other planets.
  • Wreckage is no slouch either, containing and redirecting enough energy to remake a Saturn-sized planet (Cybertron).
• Pyrrhic Victory: The Autobots under Spin-Out's command fought a holding action for seventeen cycles. Though as Spin-Out reflects on, what's left has to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Though heavily deconstructed. The Wreckers have little in common and butt heads more than once. The promise of brutal revenge is the only thing that holds the group together. At first anyway.
• Reality Ensues:
  • Impactor's lack of assurance on Harmonex. No one could possibly have visited every city on the planet or know someone who did.
  • How do the Raptoricons know that the dinosaurs aren't native to Chicxulania? A simple genetic analysis reveals that their base DNA doesn't match the rest of the environment.
  • Spin-Out was, essentially, his squad's cook. No one thought to give him any leadership training given that no one thought that his forty-eight direct superiors would all be killed. As he's taken to see Toxitron, he reflects that he has no idea what he's doing.
• Required Secondary Powers: It's noted that Toxitron has internal forcefields to prevent his Hollywood Acid from affecting him or his weapons while also allowing him to non-lethally touch objects.
• Revisiting the Roots: Features the idea that Counterpunch is becoming a Split Personality to Punch, something that's never been touched on since the character's toy profile was first penned.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge:
  • Punch went on one to avenge his hometown of Harmonex. It got him impaled by a girder for his troubles. Maybe.
  • Impactor in a nutshell. Not having lived long enough to see his Hidden Depths, Alpha Bravo seriously wonders if Impactor even intends to live beyond Thunder Mayhem's demise or gave any thought to what might have happened afterwards.
• Sequel Hook: Ramjet and Megatron escape to fight another day and the Pretenders find that Stranglehold is now a wrestling champion while the Wreckers go off to try and revive Cybertron.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Megatron fled Cybertron when Thunder Mayhem began tearing it apart and was prepared to do the same when Earth was looking to share the same fate.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: Everyone. Even Toxitron's macabre attitudes cover up his trauma at being an experiment.
• Shout-Out:
  • As evidenced by the title, "Life Finds a Way" is dripping with references to Jurassic Park. The Raptoricons even state that the planet is probably an amusement park, or a wildlife preserve, that was overrun by the dinosaurs and abandoned.
    • The planet it takes place on, Chicxulania, is named after the Chicxulub impactor, believed to be what killed the dinosaurs.
  • "The Toxic Transformer" is a massive homage to The Toxic Avenger.
  • The planets Eska and Desna are named after the creepy twins from The Legend of Korra.
  • Two background Cybertronians on Paradron are styled after Peridot and Garnet and another looks rather like Bender.
• Sole Survivor: If Punch is to be believed, then he's the only citizen of Harmonex who outlived his city.
• Soul Jar: The Matrix of Malice holds Thunderwing's spark.
• Split Personality: Punch and Counterpunch. It's suggested that Punch is the original but there's enough ambiguity to prevent any certainty.
  • Split Personality Takeover: Though whether Punch or Counterpunch did it is left up to the reader to decide.
• Squishy Wizard: The Teklaans may be able to manipulate atoms and restructure planets but they're made of tin next to a Cybertronian.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: The Teklaans, though it's more accurate to say "Thou Shalt Not Directly Kill". Leads to quite a Curb Stomp Battle against the Wreckers, people who have no issue killing and barely regard the Teklaans as alive.
• Token Good Teammate: Poor Alpha Bravo was a snow white Autobot compared to everyone else's morally grey approach and he suffers greatly for it.
• Transplanted Humans:
  • The dinosaurs on Chicxulania.
  • The once empty Earth of this timeline is now populated by the inhabitants of the Classicsverse Earth.
• Twenty Minutes Into the Future: Published in 2016, the story took place in 2020.
• Underestimating Badassery: Assuming that Harmonex really did exist, then they dismissed the Decepticons as a bunch of silly upstarts that the military would soon put down.
• Ungovernable Galaxy: Cybertron has been destroyed, the Cybertronian race is near extinct, and there's a rogue combiner destroying whole planets and civilizations. The only ones who can stop him are a group of sociopathic loose cannons.
• Unwitting Pawn: Starscream was one during the Autobots' search for the Underbase.
• Villain Team-Up: Ramjet and Thunder Mayhem on the basis that both want to see a Cybertronian extinction.
• Villains Out Shopping: The Megatron native to this timeline has been living on Earth and has been doing this ever since humanity popped up.
• War Is Hell: And the story doesn't shy away from it. Cybertron was beautiful once but it's now a smouldering ruin with what remains of its people being traumatized.
• What Measure Is a Non-Cybertronian?: An inconvenience at best, just another enemy to be destroyed at worst.
• Wham! Line: Where's the distress signal coming from? Cybertron.
• You Don't Look Like You: Bludgeon looks nothing like his usual skull-faced samurai appearance.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Cergo confirms to Impactor that the cyberforming machines can't be turned off. Cue the Wrecker leader bashing the Teklaan's face in. Though Impactor notes that Cergo, probably, survived.