Maximal, No More

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"Maximal, No More"
Season	2
No. in season	5
Production company	Mainframe Entertainment
Airdate	November 23, 1997
Written by	Patrick Barry
Directed by	Trenton Carlson
Animation studio	Mainframe Entertainment
Continuity	Beast Wars continuity
Watch this episode on YouTube

With the contents of the Golden Disks weighing heavily on his mind, Dinobot must decide which side of the conflict he truly belongs to.

Synopsis

Faster, Vermin! Toys "Я" Us closes at five!

Within the Maximal base, Dinobot compares Predacon installation locations with the symbols on the Golden Disk, and observes that Megatron's "plan proceeds, even without the disk". He ponders his fate should Megatron succeed, and wonders if he is willing to betray his Predacon heritage. Optimus Primal contacts him for a survey mission, and Dinobot puts his research aside for the moment.

Later, he rides vehicle mode Rattrap into Predacon territory, musing as he does that "there is always battle here". Rattrap ain't buyin' it, until Inferno bursts out of the ground and attacks. Inferno and Dinobot square off, while Rattrap gets the drop on Quickstrike. Silverbolt moves to assist Dinobot, but Waspinator shoots him down, causing him to crash into Dinobot, deactivating them both.

Inferno carries Dinobot off to the Predacon base, but Rattrap takes out Waspinator before he can carry Silverbolt away.

I'm bored.

At the Predacon base, Megatron is eager to chat with his former comrade-in-arms. Dinobot breaks free and reaches Megatron, sword in hand, but the guns of the other Predacons prevent him from doing any damage. Before the fight can continue, however, Dinobot offers to change sides. Unconvinced, the Predacons finally settle on a "Predacon challenge" to test Dinobot's loyalty. Quickstrike is selected as an opponent, an invitation he readily accepts.

Rattrap goes hunting for Dinobot, sending Silverbolt back to call in Optimus.

Quickstrike likes it rough.

After a brutal fight, Dinobot triumphs over Quickstrike. Megatron orders Dinobot to finish him, but Dinobot refuses, saying Quickstrike is an able fighter. Megatron accepts this, then demands that Dinobot return the golden disks. The alien disk is in Rhinox's hands, but the other is hidden from both sides. Megatron orders it returned immediately.

Rattrap observes Megatron and Dinobot flying past, and follows. At the mountaintop grotto, Dinobot uncovers the Golden Disk, and, with some trepidation, returns it to Megatron, wondering as he does if he's dooming his race. Megatron is about to run him through when Rattrap arrives, blasting Megatron aside—but Dinobot in turn blasts Rattrap.

No more Mr. Nice Guy.

Megatron orders Dinobot to finish off Rattrap as a final test of loyalty. After a long moment of hesitation... Dinobot turns his sword on Megatron instead, telling him that his ambitions are insane and will destroy Maximal and Predacon alike. With Optimus and Silverbolt incoming, Megatron retreats.

Dinobot confesses his betrayal to Optimus Primal. Having foolishly believed he wanted to share in Megatron's imminent victory, he now wishes to fight with the Maximals till they win or are destroyed. Optimus accepts this, but leaves the final call up to Rattrap, who finally relents after some obligatory insults.

Dinobot tells Primal he has a matter of great importance to discuss... back at base. Dinobot's final punishment is having to hitch a ride on Rattrap back to base.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"That 'bot sure does talk peculiar."

—Quickstrike calling the kettle black.

"Waszzpinator not serve. Waszzpinator RULES! Eheheheheheh!"

—Waspinator in his manic phase.

"Treachery keeps the wits sharp."
"Indeed—and yours are razor-sharp."

—Megatron and Dinobot

Megatron: Inferno, aid Quickstrike.
Inferno: Yes, my Queen.
Dinobot: I was not aware you had given yourself a new title.
Megatron: [quickly] The ant has some faulty programming.

[Rattrap shoots Megatron] "Looks like I got here just in time!"
"Wrong, as usual!" [Dinobot shoots Rattrap]
"...did I miss something?"

—Rattrap's attempt to rescue Dinobot goes wildly awry.

"You can't trust him, and he smells bad. Then there's the teeth; you ever seen him eat?"

—Rattrap also calling the kettle black.

"Maximal taxi on the way home! You need a ride?"
"So, I am to be punished after all!"

—Rattrap and Dinobot

Notes

Animation and technical errors

• Waspinator can be spotted without his stripes.
• Dinobot's beast mode texturing often appears to be very low resolution in this episode.

Continuity errors

• Whilst not "we must have a race!" levels of stupid, the idea of getting Dinobot to prove his allegiance to the Predacon cause by beating up another Predacon barely makes sense. Megatron would have been better served by just straight up asking for the Golden Disks the moment Dinobot asked to swap sides. Of course, you could read the whole situation as Megatron (and Blackarachnia) playing with Quickstrike and Dinobot, but still, you'd think Megs would want those Disks back as soon as possible.

Continuity notes

• This is the first episode that you can see Clone One's skin hanging on the wall in Dinobot's quarters.
• Dinobot stole the Golden Disks back in "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 1)".
• Lots of hint-dropping about Megatron's grand scheme in this episode. On the surface, it seems that Dinobot is dreading Megatron's plan to alter history. However, the matching locations of Predacon installations (presumably the same jamming towers seen in the previous episode) seems more related to the alien arrival which happens in the next episode, "Other Visits", as the jamming towers result in Tigatron and Airazor's abduction, and otherwise play little or no part in the history-altering scheme.
• The consequences of this episode will haunt Dinobot until the day he dies.
• Gadgets and powers:
  • Rattrap's massively-versatile forearm compartments carry over to his Transmetal body. This time, he tricks Waspinator into activating some kind of poisonous gas bomb.
  • He also possesses infrared vision.

Transformers references

• Rattrap accuses Dinobot of trying to start "Great War 3".
• Dinobot references "those who came before" as potential victims of Megatron's scheme, a thinly veiled reference to the Autobots and Decepticons.

Real-world references

• Dinobot begins the episode by looking at a comparison of Megatron's outposts and the Golden Disk on a computer screen. Just after this, some Cybertronix text appears on the left. Translated to English, it reads "they killed kenny those bastards". That's some quick reaction, considering South Park just started its first season three months before the airing of this episode.
• Rattrap refers to Silverbolt as "Rin Tin Tin".
• The episode's title likely refers to "Spider-Man No More!"

Trivia

• Rattrap breaks the fourth wall during his encounter with Waspinator, talking to the "camera" several times.
• Even after changing his activation code, Dinobot never actually says "terrorize" to transform into his robot mode, although the voice of his onboard computer changes to that of the feminine tone used by the Predacons.
• When the view through Rattrap's scanner is shown, a small wedge of cheese can be seen in the bottom right corner.

Foreign localization

French

• Title: "Retour aux Sources" ("Return to Origins")

• Title: "Maximal en Danger" (Canada, "Maximal in Danger")

Italian

• Title: "Il tradimento" ("The Betrayal")

• Instead of talking about "Great War 3", Rattrap talks about a hypothetical "Third World War".

Japanese

• Title: "Yamemasu!" (やめます!, "I Quit!")
• Original airdate: November 3 1999

• When Optimus appears on the monitor to tell Dinobot he's needed for a mission, he informs him to "quit your mahjong game".
• As Quickstrike clings to the ledge with his cobra-hand, the cobra proceeds to whine that it can't hold on, while Quickstrike encourages his hand to hang in there. As Rattrap shoots Quickstrike off the ledge, he shouts "Sayonara!" dramatically. Quickstrike's cobra-hand screeches "Bye byyyyyyyye!" as it plummets.
• Beginning with this episode, the characters featured in the commercial bumpers now announce themselves to the audience, sounding off their names and their vocal tic.
• As he struggles to lift Silverbolt, Waspinator develops a new pet name for Quickstrike: "Gicchon-chan". This is a pun on Quickstrike's verbal tic of chanting "gicchon-chon" ("snippity-snip") all the time.
• Dinobot submitting himself before Megatron is played for laughs. As he bows, he says "Pleeeeeease!" in a goofy voice. The other Predacons all then react in bafflement in perfect unison. Megatron then proceeds with an inner monologue, expressing humorous shock at the situation. Whenever he talks to Megatron, he takes on a simpering, cowering voice, really hamming it up and making the insincerity of his switch all the more obvious to the audience.
• After dispatching Silverbolt to find Dinobot, as Rattrap rolls away and sniffs the ground, he mumbles that he can smell "Yamada-san's meal".
• As the Maximals and Predacons use the same command codes in the Japanese dub, the scene instead has Dinobot coyly asking Naviko-chan to add him to the Predacon roster. She responds by saying that Dinobot is now considered a "friend".
• After Dinobot fries him in battle, Quickstrike whimpers, "I'm all black..." before he passes out.
• When Megatron tosses the sword into the arena and orders Dinobot to finish Quickstrike, his declaration of "Finish him" is humorously understated and done in a very goofy, un-Megatron-like voice and delivered more like a casual, friendly suggestion.
• After the arena battle, when the story picks up with Rattrap, as he sniffs along the ground he mutters, "Ah, that's Sato-san's eel pie!"
• As Rattrap watches Megatron and Dinobot fly overhead, the two Predacons can be heard carrying on a casual, prattling conversation in the "normal" voices of their actors.
• While dramatically staring into his reflection on the Golden Disk, Dinobot sings to himself, "Mirror-san! Mirror-san! This is not meeee!".
• After delivering his "I always knew you were a Predacon" line, rather than remain defiantly silent, Rattrap proceeds to make pathetic comments, "You have no virtue" and "Where is your kindness?" He then segues into a sexual euphemism, asking Dinobot to penetrate him gently, as he heard the first time can be painful (stay classy, Iwanami).
• When swooping in with Optimus, Silverbolt sings out at the top of his lungs, "Thaaaaaanks foooooor waaaaiiiiitiiiiiiing!"
• As Dinobot removes himself from the Predacon roster and returns to the Maximals, Silverbolt whispers, "I'm happy! Are you happy?" Rattrap replies, "This is good!"
• Another pet name between characters, Rattrap begins calling Dinobot by the name "Dinoboke" ("boke" meaning "fool" or "bonehead").

Portuguese

• Title: "Chega de Maximals" ("Enough Maximals")

Spanish

• Title: "Maximal, Nunca Más" ("Maximal, No More")

• Title: "Maximal, Nunca Más" (America, "Maximal, No More")

Mandarin

• Title: "Bèipàn" (背叛, "Betray")

Home video releases

VHS

1998 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Series 2 / Volume 2 (Siren Entertainment)
1998 — Beast Wars — Optimus Lives! (Alliance Atlantis)
1998 — Robots-Bêtes — L'Empreinte D'Optimus (Alliance Atlantis) — French audio only.
2000 — Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers: Metals — I Quit! (Pioneer LDC) — Japanese audio only.
2001 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Volume 6 (Universal)

DVD

2000 — Beast Wars: Transformers: Metals — DVD Box 1 (Pioneer LDC) — English and Japanese audio.
2004 — Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Second Season (Rhinomation)
2011 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Seasons 2 & 3 (Shout! Factory)
2011 — Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Series (Shout! Factory)
2006 — Beast Wars: Transformers — Season 2 (Madman Entertainment)
2009 — The Transformers: Beast Wars — Complete Collection (Madman Entertainment)