Renegade Rampage, Part I
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| "Renegade Rampage" Part I | |||||||||
| Production code | 0142-8524 | ||||||||
| Production company | Hanna-Barbera | ||||||||
| Airdate | October 15, 1985 | ||||||||
| Story by | Jeff Segal and Kelly Ward | ||||||||
| Teleplay by | Karen Wengrod and Ken Cinnamon | ||||||||
| Animation studio | Wang Film Productions | ||||||||
Cy-Kill targets the planet Tri-Ceti for conquest and sets his sights on its elders' magical Tramulet.
Synopsis[edit | edit source]
On the pyramid-shaped planet of Tri-Ceti, native Trindles Trevor and Troilene have their fruit-picking interrupted by Crasher and Cop-Tur. The Renegades have arrived to conquer the planet as the first stepping stone in a three-pronged scheme to claim dominion over Earth and GoBotron, and quickly set about imprisoning the Trindles, though Trevor, Troilene, and the three wise elders of their race manage to evade capture.
The Guardians learn of the invasion of Tri-Ceti when Scooter picks up a stray Renegade transmission. They immediate set course for the planet, picking up Matt, A.J., and Nick along the way when they cross paths with the humans on their way back from a resource survey mission out in space. Upon landing on Tri-Ceti, however, the Guardians and humans soon discover themselves trapped inside a huge, pyramidal forcefield that neither Turbo's brute force nor the Command Center's lasers can penetrate. They believe it to be the work of Cy-Kill, but in actuality, the field is being projected by the magical three-piece Tramulet wielded by the Trindle elders, who have mistaken the Guardians for the invading Renegades. The Renegades themselves observe the scene from afar and Cy-Kill, hungry to obtain the Tramulet's power, orders them to move in and take it for him. The Trindles scatter, which causes the forcefield to fade away, and the Guardians, now freed, rescue Trevor and the elders from the Renegades. Unfortunately, Troilene is captured by Cop-Tur and taken back to Thruster.
The Guardians are determined to keep the Tramulet out of Cy-Kill's hands and prepare to attack the Renegades at daybreak, Astrobeaming Path Finder and Blaster in for backup. Alas, during the night, the elder Cyrus is captured by the Renegades, and Troilene is released with a message demanding the surrender of the others. Despite the Guardians' wishes, the remaining two elders give themselves up, allowing Cy-Kill to obtain all three pieces of the Tramulet. The Renegade leader plugs the talisman into an amplifier that greatly increases the range and power of its forcefield, successfully testing the improved field on a trio of Zods. The Guardians soon arrive, but the field keeps them from getting close to the Renegades, until the ever-theatrical Cy-Kill decides to put on a display of his new power and attempts to surround one of Tri-Ceti's three suns in the forcefield. Tri-Ceti grows dark as the light from the ensnared sun is blocked out, but this exertion proves too much for the amplifier, which begins to overload. Cy-Kill removes the Tramulet and the Renegades beat a retreat, while the Guardians and Trindles dive for cover as the machine explodes.
After freeing the other captive Trindles, the Guardians go after the Renegades, only to find they have already constructed a second, sturdier amplifier. Leader-1 is injured when the Guardians attempt to destroy it, forcing the heroes to retreat. Seeing no other option, Trevor comes to the drastic conclusion that they must destroy Tri-Ceti itself in order to obliterate the Tramulet and prevent its power from being used for evil. While the Guardians position antimatter detonators at key points around the planet, the Trindles board a huge spacecraft that will take them to safety. Scooter broadcasts a phony signal on the Renegades' frequency to lure the villains—who have withdrawn to Thruster, in orbit—back down to Tri-Ceti, but Cy-Kill figures out their plan and instead uses the Tramulet to project a forcefield that traps the Command Center and the Trindles' ark on the planet, with only two minutes left on the detonators' unstoppable timer!
Featured characters[edit | edit source]
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Guardians | Renegades | Humans | Others |
|---|---|---|---|
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Quotes[edit | edit source]
"I've detected Renegade presence within one hundred and fifty meters."
"That's a big help."
- —Scooter's only trying to help, Turbo, lay off!
Leader-1: "We've got to get that Tramulet from Cy-Kill!"
Turbo: "I have an idea!"
Scooter: "You have an idea? What is it?"
Turbo: "Well... we'll... uh... uh... just take it from him, that's all!"
(Scooter looks into the camera like he's on The Office)
Scooter: "Brilliant plan."
Notes[edit | edit source]
Continuity notes[edit | edit source]
- Though his appearance is only brief, this episode features the broadcast debut of the Renegade Super GoBot Destroyer—though he doesn't actually show up in his full robot mode, only appearing in tank mode and the toy's in-between "gerwalk" mode (right), which was not actually part of the instructions for the figure's GoBots release. Chronologically, he will later turn up in the "GoBotron Saga" mini-series, which takes place before the events of this episode.
- Gadgets and powers:
- Leader-1 uses his tractor beam, previously seen in "Genius and Son" and "Cy-Kill's Shrinking Ray", to save two of the elders from the Renegades.
Continuity and plotting errors[edit | edit source]
- Setting aside the fundamental ridiculousness of a pyramid-shaped planet, the surface of Tri-Ceti is drawn as metallic when viewed from space, but when the characters are actually on the planet, it's a mixture of organic soil, rock, and plants, and prominent crystal formations.
- It's not an error, but it's odd how the episode feels it has to come up with an explanation for Matt, Nick, and A.J. to go to Tri-Ceti with the Guardians. The humans are only in space because they are returning from a resource survey mission, and happen to cross paths with the Guardians and go on to accompany them to the alien planet. The show's never needed a reason for the humans to just be on the Command Center with the Guardians in the past!
- The Tramulet forcefield is invisible, meaning light passes through it, so it wouldn't block out the sun.
- Destroyer appears out of nowhere suddenly in the final minutes of the episode after having not been present at any other point in the story, and doesn't get named. He then proceeds to immediately disappear for the rest of the episode again after the fight is over, and doesn't reappear in the second part! He's not an animation error, though—he's visually very prominent, and gets a line of dialogue.
Animation and technical errors[edit | edit source]
- The error is so common that noting every instance of it in the series would take up half our episodes articles, but it's worth pointing out that Cy-Kill spends the majority of this episode with only four fingers on each hand.
- Several luminous effects are poorly applied throughout this episode, exposing little bits of the empty black area of the cel beneath. These include the shockwave Crasher greets the Trindles; the second laser volley from the Command Center against the forcefield, the blast Cy-Kill fires at Leader-1 as he tractor-beams the elders to safety, and the bolts Leader-1 fires at the second amplifier.
- As Leader-1 and Turbo probe the forcefield, their chest-radios continue to flash even after Scooter has stopped talking through them.
- A.J. is briefly missing her lipstick as she and Matt watch Turbo crash off the forcefield.
- Turbo's neck blinks back and forth between red and grey as he cradles his head after said forcefield collision.
- As Leader-1 ascertains the shape of the forcefield, the empty space on either side of the pyramid's peak is featureless black. As the planet's sky ought to be visible there, presumably there's a luminous effect missing from this shot or something.
- As Cy-Kill chases down one of the elders, there are several "laser blast" sound effects before he actually starts firing lasers.
- There's a hair trapped in the bottom-left corner of the frame for about half the length of the scene of the Renegades listening in as the Tramulet is explained, then again as Trevor reports that the elders have surrendered to Cy-Kill.
- The shot of the elders trapped in Cy-Kill's energy cage shows them with the pieces of the Tramulet still around their necks, despite Cy-Kill having taken them already.
- When the Zods are surrounded by the forcefield, the fire breath of one of them is shown overlapping the edge of the field, as if it wasn't successfully containing it at all.
- After the Guardians crash off the Renegades' forcefield, Cop-Tur's cheeks are colored red like the "bags" under his eyes.
- As Cy-Kill struggles with the amplifier controls, his normally-black cheekbones are colored the same grey as his "stubble."
- When Turbo and Blaster go to Leader-1's aid, improper alignment of cels makes Turbo look like he's sitting on top of Leader-1's leg.
- When Turbo and Blaster fire on the amplifier, Blaster is missing the missiles on his forearms.
- When the Guardians retreat following their failed attack on the second amplifier, the scene transition can't decide if it wants to be a wipe or a dissolve. It starts fading into the next scene, but then stops halfway, leaving the transparent image of Crasher superimposed over the landscape of the next scene, and switches to a diagonal right-to-left wipe.
- In that next scene, the three elders are shown standing around the wounded Leader-1... then the scene continues to pan to the left, where... all three elders are also standing with Turbo, Trevor, and the humans.
Trivia[edit | edit source]
- Scooter informs Leader-1 that the Command Center can unleash "three megatrons of laser energy." Somebody phone Hasbro's lawyers!
- It is insane how padded-out this episode is. From the unnecessary scene of the humans joining the Guardians described above, to Troilene's capture and immediate release instead of simply allowing the elders to be captured directly, to the whole portion of the story surrounding the first amplifier that ends up destroyed after accomplishing nothing, everything seems done purely to stretch out one episode's worth of plot into two.
- It's kind of curious that the Guardians go out of their way to save the Earth on numerous occasions, but as soon as it's suggested, they're gung-ho to blow up Tri-Ceti.
- Apparently the population of Tri-Ceti is so small, it can fit onto one spaceship.
Home video releases[edit | edit source]
- VHS
1985 — Challenge of the GoBots — Volume IV: "Renegade Rampage" (Vestron Video, USA)
1986 — Challenge of the GoBots — "Renegade Rampage" (Vestron Video, UK)
- DVD
2015 — Challenge of the GoBots — The Series, Volume One (Warner Archive Collection, USA)
