Blackarachnia (TFA)


 * Blackarachnia was once an Autobot but is now a Decepticon / Predacon from the Transformers Animated continuity family. She was previously an Autobot known as Elita-1 and is also known as Spider Lady.



In another life, she was Elita-1, an energetic, spunky Autobot Academy cadet. That was until a fateful trip to an alien world, where her teammates abandoned her to a horde of alien spiders. Now calling herself Blackarachnia, she hates her new body with a passion. Her loathing of her organic parts is slowly driving her insane, and she will do anything to get rid of it, no matter whom she has to crush in her path. Her mutation fueled a newfound hatred of the Autobot cause and a quest for revenge that led her to join Megatron in his war against them. However, she does not appear overly loyal to her leader.

In her hybrid organic form, she makes use of her newfound 'cyber venom' to paralyze her enemies, and combines this with her natural ability to download and mimic other Transformers' traits and weaponry for a limited amount of time with a simple touch. Hope nobody told Lockdown.

Blackarachnia acts differently around robots of the opposite "sex" depending on faction; she's biting and sarcastic towards the Decepticons, but seductive and manipulative towards the Autobots. However, these appear to be but shells worn by a being who desperately wants to be normal again. This desire, however, makes Blackarachnia her own worst enemy, as it's nearly led to her own death.

"It'll be a long time before I ever trust another Autobot. Especially you, Optimus."

- Blackarachnia

Animated cartoon continuity

 * Voice actor: Cree Summer (English), Christin Marquitan (German)



Blackarachnia was previously known as Elita-1. A thousand stellar cycles ago Elita and her teammates were exploring an alien world, looking for a Decepticon ship filled with energon. They accidentally fell into a series of caves. They were ambushed by giant spiders and, when escaping the massive energon explosion caused by the battle, Elita ended up being left behind. When poisoned by the spiders, her attempt of neutralizing the effects ended up with her reformating into her current form and using a nearby helmet to cover her face in horror. Because of her new, techno-organic nature, her signal did not appear on Optimus's radar, leading him and Sentinel to believe that she had perished in the explosion.

When the AllSpark was found by a group of Autobots, Blackarachnia was aboard the Nemesis with the other Decepticons, annoyed at Lugnut's emphatic, vocal loyalty to Megatron. She even suggested that Lugnut's speech of praise was hardwired into his mind. She also had conflict with Blitzwing, who touched a sore point by insulting her organic mode. Her retort to "blow it out your actuator, three-face" angered Blitzwing to the point that he...began to express his feelings in song. Later, at Megatron's orders, she scanned the Autobots' ship to determine the nature of their high-energy cargo. She confirmed the Autobots were carrying the AllSpark, or at least something just as powerful. When the Autobots escaped and it became clear the Nemesis was going to crash into an exploding space bridge, Blackarachnia fled in an escape pod.

Fifty stellar cycles later, while searching space for any trace of the AllSpark in the hope that she could use its power to purge herself of her organic mode, Blackarachnia stumbled across Starscream, still operating out of the battered shell of the Nemesis''. Realizing that Starscream was searching for the AllSpark as well, Blackarachnia proposed an alliance, but Starscream proved uninterested in sharing power and promptly booted her out into space. Before being ejected, however, Blackarachnia was able to plant a homing device on Starscream.''



Following Starscream and her homing beacon to Earth, Blackarachnia stalked Bumblebee, Bulkhead, and Sari on Halloween night. After she took out Bumblebee and Bulkhead, she attempted to sweet-talk Sari into handing over her AllSpark-powered key, but Optimus Prime arrived to intervene. Using Bulkhead and Bumblebee's stolen powers to overcome Optimus, Blackarachnia captured Sari and web-swung her way to the top of a skyscraper, with Prime in hot pursuit. In the ensuing fight, Prime finally realized who Blackarachnia truly was. Exploiting the opening, Blackarachnia bound Prime in her web amd seized Sari's key, activating its power in hopes of become fully mechanical. However, the energies unleashed caused any organic life in range, including Sari (and presumably any other fleshy), to shrivel and sicken. It almost killed Blackarachnia, but Optimus Prime pulled the Key out, restoring the organics. Prime tried to reason with "Elita", asking her to come with them in the hopes of curing her, but Blackarachnia stabbed him, saying that it would be a long time before she trusted him again. After she knocked out Prime, she cried her four eyes out.

Later, she again kidnapped Sari, who was running away after having the Key taken away from her. When she heard about the Key and how Sari felt totally mistrusted by the Autobots, Blackarachnia played on the girl's sympathies by saying she knew how Sari felt. BA noted how she was not a Decepticon until after the Autobots turned their backs on her, and how the AllSpark's power was the only thing that could cure her current form. Despite being kidnapped again and nearly being killed by Blackarachnia's previous use of the Key, Sari appeared to start seeing eye to eye with her captor.



At least, that was what she wanted Blackarachnia to believe. Leading her around in circles over the frozen Lake Erie, Sari was finally forced to admit that the Autobots' ship, which contained the AllSpark, was underwater. Blackarachnia's organic half couldn't withstand the icy water; incensed she prepared to kill Sari. Ratchet brought the ship up through the ice, and Sari bit Blackarachnia's hand, showing that her organic half couldn't withstand teeth either, causing her to drop Sari and allow Ratchet to grab her and get in the ship. As Blackarachnia tried to force the door open, the vessel accelerated, and Blackarachnia was thrown off the ship.



Washing ashore on Dinobot Island, Blackarachnia was taken in by the Dinobots, who gave her Meltdown's former base as a home. Using her charms, Blackarachnia was able to manipulate the Dinobots into doing anything she wanted. Grimlock was particularly attached to her, and reminded the other Dinobots of this through violence. Going over Meltdown's notes, she realized that he would be able to remove the organic half from her body. She sent the Dinobots to release him from prison, causing the Autobots to come investigating. Blackarachnia then poisoned Bumblebee and Prowl with her venom, and used the threat of an anti-venom to blackmail Optimus into helping Grimlock find the genetic modifier Meltdown needed for the experiment. Unfortunately, Meltdown turned the tables on them when the modifier was his, planning on removing Blackarachnia's technological half and leaving him with an organic transformer. Optimus was able to stop Meltdown before he succeeded, but the modifier was damaged and Meltdown presumed killed. Needing escape, Blackarachnia urged Optimus to hold her, causing Grimlock to attack in jealousy, and Blackarachnia fled. However, it appears that Blackarachnia left the anti-venom needed to save Bumblebee and Prowl beside them. This gave Optimus hope that beneath all of Blackarachnia's anger and manipulation, there was still something left of Elita-1 in there.



She later sent Swoop to retrieve an ideal Cybertronian test subject for her experiment using a transwarp cell to duplicate the process that made her techno-organic. When Wasp awakens, she sweettalks him into trusting her and entering the cell. Locking him inside, she inserts a small wasp into the opposite cell, and activates it, ultimately reformatting Wasp into Waspinator. Sentinel Prime arrived and was horrified to learn Blackarachina's identity. Refusing to accept her as Elita-1, he attempted to kill her. When questioned by Optimus Prime, she explained that she had created Waspinator as a lab rat; she hoped that she could reverse his transformation, and thus restore her own body to its original form.



Waspinator, over hearing Blackarachina's using of him, attempted to kill her in blind rage as his transwarp signature was becoming unstable from the experiment. Blackarachnia and the Autobots fled the lab to the island, as Waspinator chased her down. As Waspinator was about to explode, Optimus and Sentinel insisted that she escape with them, but Blackarachnia instead covered Waspinator and herself in a cocoon; the resulting explosion destroying a huge portion of Dinobot Island. Blackarachina and Waspinator survived, and awoke to find themselves on a planet inhabited by several familiar animals, much to her surprise.

Animated

 * Blackarachnia (Deluxe, 2008)
 * Accessories: Grapnel-hook


 * Blackarachnia transforms into a mechanical spider with some organic aesthetic. Many of her pointier parts are molded in softer plastic to keep unfortunate children from putting their eyes out. She comes with a grapnel hook accessory, which can fall victim to Clear-Plastic Syndrome. This is spring-loaded, with a jointed claw at the end of it. Pressing a button causes it to retract along the string. It may be mounted under her abdomen in spider mode or on her back in robot mode, via two different sets of pegs. There is also a peg hole in each wrist, for web-slinging action (getting the grapnel to stay in either hole is the hard part). The spider's head is mis-transformed in the package, making the first step of her instructions initially confusing. Furthermore, the pedipalps will easily come off if manipulated too much, and her transformation requires that they be turned around completely. Because of this, they will often fall off over, and over, and over...

Trivia



 * A non-final character model for Blackarachnia was included in the initial Transformers Animated press kit from Cartoon Network, and it was used briefly (in silhouette) for her first appearance in "Transform and Roll Out!". Though the toy shares the non-final model's spider-leg placement in robot mode, black belly, dark purple skin, and yellow Decepticon symbol, the rest of the toy adheres much more closely to the finished model.


 * The helmet she wore was among wreckage Decepticon warship near the energon cubes where she had her accident, wearing it to cover her freakish, spidery face until the episode "Predacons Rising" when Sentinel knocked it off by accident.


 * When her real face is shown, she appears to have two protrusions on the sides of her head, leading to the question of how the helmet fits over them. Unless they fold in or something...


 * So far, Blackarachnia's the only major Transformer character not to have a detailed on-screen transformation, much her Beast Wars counterpart and other Beast Wars characters.


 * Blackarachnia can swing off of tall, unseen buildings, with webbing that shoots out of her hands. Wow, we've never seen that befo—wait a minute...


 * As Elita-1, her head seems to be based on the pony-tailed Ariel, the younger form of Elita One, while her body's ornamentation homages Elita One herself.


 * Out of the five episodes she's appeared in, she's had to be rescued by Prime in almost half of them, from situations that are her own fault. Looking kind of damsel-in-distress there, Blackarachnia.


 * Blackarachnia's desperate quest to rid herself or her organic half is quite similar to that of Megatron in the Beast Machines-era, who also did countless attempts to get rid of his dragon-half (and eventually succeeded in doing so, only this guy created another creature in the process). She however, sees perks behind her Techno-oganic abilties. Another interesting fact about her mad quest to rid of her organic half, Blackarachnia, like her Beast Wars counterpart, either conducts experirments on herself or others. Well, that wasn't what she did to her lover...


 * Interestingly, Blackarachnia is depicted as being around the same height as most of the other Decepticons, but in later episodes she usually drawn as being shorter then Optimus. The thing is, the Decepticons are always drawn as being taller then him, sometimes towering over him. These animators can't make up their minds.


 * Due to her half-organic mode, Blackarachnia is the only Transformer in the series who is able to cry (seen after her reunion with Optimus in ''), feel sharp pains (like when Sari bit her on the hand) and possibly even catch diseases and other Earthly afflictions. It does not appear to affect her aging at all however.


 * There is a possibility that she does want to be good again. In Predacons Rising, she sealed herself and Waspinator in a cocoon of her web, moments before he exploded. Optimus and Sentinel then wondered if she meant to sacrifice herself, or was just trying to get away.