| NOTE: This page is only about the Transformers: Prime version of the Megatron as his Cybertron Games incarnation was not voted as Inconsistently Heinous. and thus only the Transformers: Prime version of the Megatron's info and crimes should be put here. |
| “ | Behold! The age of the Decepticons! | „ |
| ~ Megatron, whilst activating the Omega Lock, using it to revive Cybertron and terraform Earth. |
| “ | And one shall fall... you, Optimus Prime! | „ |
| ~ Megatron right before his duel with Optimus |
Megatron is the main antagonist of the 2010 animated series Transformers: Prime.
He is the tyrannical founder of the Decepticons and the former best friend-turn-archenemy of Optimus Prime who started the Great War that devastated Cybertron. Having already set up operations on Earth, Megatron goes on a 3 year absence on a hunt for the prophesized 'Blood of Unicron', Dark Energon.
He was voiced by Frank Welker, who also voiced Mor'du in Brave, and his Korean dubbing voice actor is Goo Ja-hyeong.
His Evil Ranking
What Makes Him Heinous?
Background
- While Megatron didn't really have a great start, being a slave miner with no name that had to fight in gladiator battles to call out the oppressive caste system that placed him there and sought to reform it. However, as it turns out, Megatron had only cared about his own selfish lust for power than getting justice for his society or even inflicting the misery he had as a slave to others thus becoming the very thing he swore to destroy.
- Megatron's past has absolutely nothing to do with any of his actions and his only motive is simply a lust for power and control, thus his Freudian Excuse is invalid, at least until Unicron tortured him by possessing and giving him a fate worse than death, causing him to remember what he originally fought for.
- Upon seeing his ambitions for power crushed, he wages the devastating Great War that sees millions of Cybertronians killed and the entire planet ravaged.
- He crushed Bumblebee's voice box while torturing him to try to get him to talk during the Battle of Tyger Pax.
- He ordered the creation of the Cybonic plague that was explicitly told to have wiped out millions of Transformers across Cybertron by corroding them to death.
- He created the bioweapon Tox-En to wipe out whole units of Autobots as Bulkhead witnessed.
- He infected the Core of Cybertron.
- Although Orion now known as Optimus Prime was able to cure it, Cybertron was rendered uninhabitable and forced the Transformers race into exile. Megatron shows no remorse for his actions despite being aware of the consequences.
- He had Shockwave use his Predacon clone army to successfully wipe out all Autobots on Prehistoric Earth and take Energon.
- He left Insections in stasis back on Kaon to kill anyone who entered the city.
Season 1
- Upon returning for his 3 year absence and assuming leadership of the Decepticons, he torturously revived Cliffjumper as a mindless Terrorcon zombie using Dark Energon.
- Unlike Starscream who was disturbed (albeit for his own cowardice and self interest), Megatron just looks on and does nothing to stop the zombie Cliffjumper from slaughtering countless of his own troops.
- He bisects the zombie Cliffjumper when he tries to attack him yet states that Dark Energon is the key to his army and actually celebrates the fact that Terrorcon zombies are mindless killing beasts who destroy anything in their path even his own allies.
- He fused himself with Dark Energon so he could control his undead army of Terrorcons.
- When Optimus and Ratchet arrived, he revived the remains of an ancient Transformers battle as his Terrorcon army and unleashed them on Prime and Ratchet to kill them. He not only desecrated the remains of those fallen Autobots but only his own Decepticons as Ratchet points out.
- He opened a space bridge to Cybertron and bombarded it with Dark Energon to revive all the dead as his Terrorcon army and bring through to conquer Earth, explicitly portrayed as something that will lay waste to the entire planet and cause countless casualties.
- He defeated Optimus Prime and nearly killed him before the other Autobots destroyed the space bridge and seemingly killed him.
- Although he agreed to give Bumblebee (who went into his mind through the cortical psychic path) the cure to the cybonic plague when Optimus was infected with it, Megatron only did that because he wanted to see and kill Optimus by his own hands and he immediately changed his mind anyway and was able to go into Bumblebee's subconscious when Bumblebee disconnected from the patch.
- He possessed Bumblebee and forced him to attack Ratchet and Raf.
- He successfully used Bumblebee to retrieve a piece of Dark Energon to revive his body and retake control of the Decepticons.
- Although he technically saved Optimus from Starscream, it was completely accidental and a coincidence as Megatron only did that to brutally capture Starscream and tell Starscream how he was going to torture him and tell him that "It would be a miracle if you survive what I have planned for you."
- He only decided to spare Starscream because he took sadistic amusement at Starscream's failures and instead beat Starscream to near-death and place him in the infirmary so he could visit to constantly taunt Starscream about it.
- He left Breakdown to die and refused to go rescue him from MECH, stating that if Breakdown got captured by inferior humans then he deserved to die.
- He decided to kill Starscream for his numerous failure and tried to kill Arcee and Jack when they interfered.
- When rubble collapsed in on him and Jack found him, he tried to corrupt Jack into killing him in cold blood and once he got himself out and found Starscream hold the boulder to stop the whole mine from collapsing, he decided to prolong Starscream's suffering before letting him out with a smirk to taunt him.
- He refuses Optimus Prime's deal to temporarily give the Autobots the data cylinder to save Bulkhead who accidentally absorbed its contents and whose mind was going to be destroyed even though Prime sincerely promised to give back the full data cylinder and the contents to the Decepticons.
- Instead he sics Vehicons to kill Prime and the others while ordering Knock Out to find and kill Bulkhead. Once the Autobots defeat the Vehicons, Megatron crushes the cylinder out of spite and left.
- He brutally injured a Synth En enhanced Ratchet and left him to die while telling Knock Out to get a sample of the Synth En from a bleeding out Ratchet.
- He ambushes Bumblebee and infects Raf with dark Energon, seriously injuring Raf and causing him to begin dying.
- When confronted on this, he taunts the Autobots saying he swatted a bee and crushed a bug.
- Although he offered and made a deal to help the Autobots destroy Unicron and save Earth, he explicitly admitted it was only because he wanted to conquer Earth himself not to mention he originally tried to join Unicron but left after Unicron refused to give him the power he wanted and left him.
- After Prime relinquished the Matrix of Leadership to defeat Unicron, he tries to kill Optimus when he was down before realizing Optimus was amnesiac and reverted back to Orion Pax, taking Pax with him and manipulating and lying to Pax that the Autobots were evil and destroyed Cybertron to trick Pax into working for the Decepticons and decoding the Iacon Project.
Season 2
- Once Pax realized the truth, Megatron threatened to kill him and coerced him back into working on the Iacon Project.
- Once Pax escaped and realized his true allegiance to the Autobots, Megatron brutally beat him and was about to kill him before Arcee came back through the space bridge and attacked. He would later taunt Prime after he regained his memories and the Matrix about how he tricked Prime into locating relics for the Decepticons.
- He shoots Bulkhead in the back to get the Forge of Solus Prime and threatens to kill him to force Optimus and Arcee to let him escape.
- He ordered the assassination of Airachind (albeit she deserved it) even though she was currently loyal to him because of her past actions.
- When she escaped, he decided to try and kill her himself and murdered an Insecticon she bewitched into fighting him.
- He betrayed Dreadwing's orders to the Vehicons to not fight the Autobots after the Autobots agreed to let him go and ordered them to kill the Autobots, showing he lacks any honor whatsoever.
- When surrounded by Starscream's clones, he took advantage of their treacherous nature to kill all of them but one and sent the survivor to kill the actual Starscream.
- He sent the Decepticons across the Earth to find the decoded Iacon relics.
- He worked with Silas to get control of his superweapon Project Damocles which would allow him to use a satellite to pinpoint any of his enemies and wipe them out with lasers, but when Silas failed, Megatron handed him over to Knock Out for dissection.
- While Silas is a vile villain and his desecration of Breakdown's corpse just to use as his own body to pilot is disgusting of its own right, Megatron is a straw hypocrite enforcing double standards because Megatron has desecrated the corpses of fallen Transformers, thousand times more than Silas has, for the sake of his own gain in ruling the cosmos, having just a few episodes later desecrated Liege Maximo's grave to graft his arm to his body, ultimately rendering this standard moot.
- He used a decoy to distract the Autobots and lead them astray while he got the Star Saber (which he took the whole mountain it was stuck in since only a Prime could wield the saber) and captured Smokescreen.
- Once Prime got the Star Saber, Megatron decided to drop the mountain on Prime to kill him.
- He desecrated the tomb of Liege Maximo to graft the prime's hand onto his so he could use Solus Prime's Forge to craft the Dark Star Saber, ambushing Arcee and Smokescreen and seemingly killing the latter before dueling Optimus Prime and destroying the Star Saber.
- Although he agreed to let Starscream rejoin the Decepticons, he admitted the only reason was that he realized having Starscream with him was more beneficial than if Starscream was against him as well as resolve the in-fighting that nearly destroyed the Decepticon ranks.
- He even kills Dreadwing, one of Megatron's most loyal minions who at the time has none known that Dreadwing had lost faith in him, to keep Starscream and bluntly states to Starscream to not make him regret choosing his life over Dreadwing's.
- While Megatron has voiced his dislike for Starscream saying killing a wounded and defenseless Cliffjumper as "hard work" compared to him slaying him on combat, this is not any sort of redeeming standard considering it is not only just an extension of Megatron's very own combat-driven ego, but is someone who is also willing to employ dirty tricks threatening the lives of civilians, be it using kids as hostages to force the Autobots to surrender, or previously unleashing a lethal plague that kills millions, showing he is still just as cold-blooded as Starscream, especially since he had no problem turning Cliffjumper into a Terrorcon.
- Once the Autobots took the Omega Keys from him, he and Starscream captured the Autobots' human friends in cages and he threatened to kill them all by exposing them to Cybertron's atmosphere to force the Autobots to give the Omega Keys back to him to activate the Omega Lock.
- He revealed he was going to use the Omega Lock to not only revive Cybertron to be his to rule, which Optimus notes will rewrite history and poison the minds of all future life in the planet through his propaganda, but is also unleashing its energy upon the Earth so that he can rule 2 domains, a process Optimus notes is going to be very catastrophic as the cyberforming of Earth will result in the complete annihilation of all life on the planet.
- After Optimus destroyed the Omega Lock, Megatron simply laughed as he had actually planned this as Optimus' reaction to use as a pretext to frame the Autobots as fugitives and not only attack the Autobot base, but invade Earth, showing he was just as willing to doom Cybertron for his own lust for conquest.
- He destroyed the Autobot base and mortally wounded Optimus Prime, forcing the rest of the Autobots to retreat.
Beast Hunters/Predacons Rising
- He ordered worldwide surveillance to find the Autobots and used Darkmount's fusion cannons to wipe out an entire human army that went to confront him.
- He defeated Ultra Magnus and ordered the execution of all the defeated Autobot attackers at Darkmount, mocking Ultra Magnus that he was no Optimus Prime and leader.
- To force the US military to not intervene, Megatron holds numerous metropolis hostage from his cannons, threatening to fire and lay waste to them should they further oppose him.
- Once Optimus Prime came back and plummet Megatron and destroyed Darkmount, Megatron tried to order everyone to keep fighting and vengefully kill the Autobots even though they clearly lost and Darkmount was collapsing in on them as Starscream pointed out. As that happens he even orders Darkmouth's cannons to fire and lay waste to the closest metropolis.
- He ordered the cloning of more Predacons by Shockwave and ordered Shockwave and Predaking to check on reports of Predacon fossils, looking forward to breed an entire army of them to trample humanity underfoot and conquer them.
- He delivers a special punishment (torture) for Starscream after he accidentally caused a zombie outbreak.
- Once he learned that the Predacons were sapient and could transform, he heeds Starscream's suggestion and orders him, Knockout and Shockwave to set up a trap that trick the Autobots into wiping them out by destroying the cloning lab to pin the blame on them.
- He ordered Shockwave to perfect the Synth En formula as it could create Cybermatter and decided to recreate the Omega Lock to attempt genocide on all Earth based life again and rule both Cybertron and Earth, with Ratchet even saying to Megatron's face he knows Earth will only be just the first of many planets.
- He ordered the capture of Ratchet when he realized he needed Ratchet to complete the Synth En formula and tried to corrupt him to work with the Decepticons. Once that failed, he threatened to destroy the new Autobot base which he discovered the location of thanks to Soundwave and kill everyone including the human kids to force Ratchet to work with the Decepticons. When Ratchet held up his end of the bargain, Megatron promptly gave him to Predaking to kill and use as a chew toy.
- He taunted Predaking who found out the truth of the Predacon extinction of Ratchet and, confessing about him organizing the genocide against his kind and stating how his biggest mistake was "not seeing the extermination true" and (seemingly) killing Predaking and expelling him from the ship.
- He destroyed Prime's jetpack and dueled him before ordering Shockwave to fire the Omega Lock and wipe out humanity.
- He sadistically murdered Bumblebee to prevent him from giving the Star Saber to Prime and defeated Optimus Prime, nearly succeeded in killing Prime before a revived Bumblebee stabbed Megatron through the spark with the Star Saber, giving him for everything he has done to bumblebee, ending the tyrant's life.
- Even after being revived, possessed and tortured by Unicron, he intends to get his revenge on Bumblebee for killing him and ruining his chance to conquer both Earth and Cybertron. However, that later disappears once he redeemed himself.
- While his torture at the hands of Unicron is played sympathetically, it doesn't make him a scapegoat because of all the atrocities he had committed previously, although it's still debatable whether or not he deserved it.
What Makes Him Inconsistent?
- He ultimately redeemed himself after being revived, possessed, and tortured by Unicron showed him the true meaning of oppression and he lost his taste for inflicting it. After Prime defeated Unicron and freed Megatron, Megatron refused to get corrupted by Starscream. Instead, he disbanded the Decepticons, ending the Great War and going into self-imposed exile never to be seen again.
- Speaking of which, his brutal torture by Unicron is portrayed sympathetically (especially when Unicron taunts Prime when Prime tries to get through to Megatron that Megatron might hear him but could not help him as Megatron would be enduring eternal suffering at Unicron's hands which we see), causing him to remember the time where he was a victim and slave of the caste system and serves as the catalyst for his villain realization and redemption.
Trivia
- With regards to the Aligned Continuity, only Megatron from the Transformers: Prime show counts as IH due to his redemption at the end of the series. whereas his counterpart from the War for Cybertron games was instead voted as Pure Evil.
- Had it not been for his redemption in Predacons Rising, he would have qualified as Near Pure Evil.
- He is one of the 2 incarnations of Megatron to be Inconsistently Heinous, along with his Cyberverse incarnation. And in common, Starscream in these two works is more vile than him.
- He is one of the 5 incarnations of Megatron to redeem himself, along with his IDW comics, Prime Wars, Cyberverse, and Earthspark incarnations.
- His backstory is based on his IDW counterpart, being a miner who was dissatisfied with Cybertron's Dark Age and snapped after being wrongfully imprisoned. Megatron had well-intentioned goals of bringing down the cruel caste system and bringing equality for all but began having a thirst for revenge.
- His voice actor, Frank Welker, has asked himself several times that Megatron is so angry all that time because there's "a lot of hurt" inside him, meaning he was meant to be a tragic villain.
External Links
- Megatron on the Villains Wiki
- Megatron on the Tfwiki.net
- Megatron on the Teletraan I: The Transformers Wiki
- Megatron on the Magnificent Baddie Wiki
- His game counterpart on the Pure Evil Wiki
 Inconsistently Heinous
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TV Shows Comics IDW: Megatron Fanon | ||