Shockwave (G1)


 * Shockwave is a Decepticon in the Generation One continuity family. He was also briefly known as Shockblast.

Shockwave has been referred to as "a computer on legs." This is not far from the truth. Logic rules Shockwave's thought processes and is the source of his every inspiration. He sees emotion as a weakness and a distraction. His cold and calculating modus operandi is supported by his frightening and exceptionally powerful form.

Shockwave is possibly even more powerful than Megatron, who he appears to be loyal to. Perhaps logic may one day dictate that the time to replace Megatron's flawed, emotion-fueled rule is at hand.

Japanese name: Laserwave  Italian name: Brutal  French-Canadian name: Onde de Choc 

Marvel Comics continuity
(Note: Events from the UK-only comic stories are in italics.)

After the Autobots had successfully destroyed the asteroids threatening Cybertron, Megatron and the other Decepticons attacked the Ark while Shockwave remained behind on their ship to pilot it. When the Ark subsequently crashed on Earth, deactivating all those within, Shockwave followed the ship down, but a malfunction in his guidance systems caused him to land half a world away, in the tropical Antarctic jungle known as the Savage Land. The Ark's dying computer detected his presence there and reactivated five Autobots, rebuilding them in the shapes of the Savage Land's native dinosaurs. These "Dinobots" battled Shockwave, but he eventually trapped them in a tar pit; Slag, however, did not go quietly, and fired a parting jet of flame which collapsed a mountain on Shockwave, ensuring that he joined the Dinobots in darkness.

In 1984, when the rest of the Transformers aboard the Ark were awakened by a volcanic eruption, the Autobots attempted to track down their five missing comrades. A sensor drone tracked them to the Savage Land, but inadvertantly wound up reactivating Shockwave, who headed straight for Oregon. He arrived just as the Autobots had claimed victory over the Decepticons, and his explosive entry saw all the weakened combatants knocked off-line. Rounding up the bodies, Shockwave took control of the Ark, strung up the Autobots, decapitated Optimus Prime and restored his fellow Decepticons back to health. This came as something of a rude shock to Megatron, who awoke to find that Shockwave had decided it was only logical for him to take over leadership of the Decepticons in light of Megatron's failure. After Shockwave attacked the offshore oil-drilling platform of tycoon G.B. Blackrock to secure it as a secondary base of operations (consequently crippling Josie Beller and leading to her transformation into Circuit Breaker), a weakened Megatron engaged him in combat for leadership, but was soundly defeated, and grudgingly vowed to serve Shockwave.

Under Shockwave's command, the Decepticons took control of the Blackrock Aerospace Planet, and used its facilities to create the bodies of the Constructicons, which were then brought to life with the power of the Creation Matrix drained from Prime's head. However, when Shockwave discovered that he could not bring his next creation, Jetfire, to life, he deduced that Prime had transferred the Matrix into the mind of the human, Buster Witwicky. Shockwave programmed Jetfire to capture Buster, but the boy was able to use the power of the Matrix to bring the robot under his own control to turn the tables on the Decepticons. Under Buster's control, Jetfire knocked out Shockwave and Optimus Prime was reunited with his body, leading to a climactic battle between Shockwave and Prime, which ended when the Decepticon leader was buried in a swamp.

Finally extricating himself from the swamp after being trapped for several months, Shockwave returned to leadership of the Decepticons with some new ill-fated plans that variously involving stealing sonic energy from a rock concert attempting to exploit Bumblebee as a weak link in the Autobot forces.

''When Wheeljack and Ratchet built Buster a mechanoid battle suit, the human test-drove it by attacking Frenzy. Shockwave responded to the attack, only to be briefly blinded when a desperate Buster flung a handful of sand into his optic sensor. The darkness this brought about revived memories of his four-million-year burial and his humiliating swamp submergence, and an enranged, barely-sane Shockwave disregarded logic in a desire for revenge that saw him pursue Buster throughout the night. As the new day dawned, Busted made one final attack with all the suit's power, which destroyed it but merely injured Shockwave. Seizing the boy in his hand, Shockwave was about to crush the life from him when the Autobot forces arrived to rescue him. His rationality returning, Shockwave realised that Buster could potentially be a powerful tool to use against the Autobots, and had the Constructicons attempt to abduct him, but during the battle, Soundwave discovered that the Matrix had planted in Buster's mind a vision for the future of the Transformer race.  Shockwave watched intently as Soundwave tapped into Buster's dreams, and witnessed a vision of combiner Transformers battling. Little did he know that Soundwave was also beaming the vision to Megatron (now operating independant of Shockwave), who decided that it was time for him to retake Decepticon leadership. Shockwave and Megatron battled once more, but with Megatron at full health, the fight was much more evenly matched and drawn-out, and was even televised by the Decepticons' unwilling human ally, Robot Master. To prevent the Decepticons from being made to look like fools, Soundwave demanded they cease fighting and consent to a joint leadership. Begrudgingly, both agreed.''

This joint leadership did not last long. Leaving Shockwave in charge of the Decepticon's Wyoming coal mine base, Megatron led a team of Decepticons to attack the Autobot base, only for the majority of their number to be deactivated and captured by Omega Supreme. At the same time, however, the Autobots attacked the Decepticon base to draw out Devastator, to learn more about the combiner process. With the day having firmly been won by the Autobots on both fronts, Megatron argued that although he may have charged into a trap, Shockwave had been ineffective enough to do nothing, and had allowed a trap to spring up around him. Bowing to the logic of this argument, Shockwave stepped down and allowed Megatron to resume sole command.

''Shockwave's movements were unknown for the brief time that followed this embarassment. He was absent from the Decepticons' base when the time-travelling future Decepticon Galvatron arrived from 2006 and temporarily disposed of Megatron, but returned not long thereafter. Wondering where everyone was, he was met by Thundercracker and Frenzy, who had escaped their confinement in the Autobot base, but then, abruptly, all three were mass-displaced into limbo when three future Autobots travelled back in time to thwart Galvatron's plans. In limbo, Shockwave and his two companions battled alongside the similarly-displaced Optimus Prime, Prowl and Ratchet against the deadly illusions created by the dimension's native lifeforms, before returning to their natural place in space and time when the time-travellers returned to their point of origin.''

''It was not long before Shockwave began scheming to return to the position of leader, and when Megatron summoned the Decepticon hunters the Predacons to Earth to stalk Optimus Prime, he saw his opportunity. Conspiring with them, Shockwave arranged for the team to turn on Megatron during the hunt, depriving him of his weapons, expecting that he would have no chance against Prime one-on-one. When Megatron did not return, Shockwave believed him dead, but in truth, he had escaped to Cybertron - though this was of little concern to the cyclopean schemer, who took up the mantle of leadership in his absence again. It was not long after this that Galvatron returned, having travelled back from the future once more, and now dancing dangerously on the edge of sanity. Fearing the threat Galvatron might pose to his own leadership, Shockwave had the Decepticons aid the Dinobots in battling him, and Galvatron departed rather than fight his own future troops. Shortly thereafter, Megatron returned from Cybertron with a case of amnesia, sparing Shockwave any retribution for his actions.''

Not long afterwards, Optimus Prime perished in a video game duel with Megatron, but the Decepticon leader grew progressively more paranoid, fearing his foe had survived. Apparently attempting to shock Megatron back to his senses, Shockwave had the Predacons come to Earth and force him into a combat situation, implanting a copy of his personality program in the team so that he could "be part" of the battle from a safe distance. Events culminated in Megatron's apparent death when, having fully plunged into insanity, he blew the space bridge up while standing on it. Once again, Shockwave was leader.

Shockwave established regular contact with Cybertron Decepticon commander Ratbat, ''and had the Seacons sent from Cybertron so that they could use their aquatic abilities to help fortify the Decepticons' new artificial mobile island base. It was while they were performing this task that Galvatron returned, advancing on the island, much to Shockwave's distress. He ordered the Seacons to attack, but Galvatron tore through both them and the base walls - he had, he claimed, come in peace, but that Shockwave's attack had made an enemy of him, putting all Decepticons in danger. This of course, was a complete lie, but it turned the Decepticons against Shockwave, thereby disrupting the one-eyed warrior's command.''

After interfering in a scheme of Ratbat's, Buster Witwicky was captured by the Decepticons and brought to their island, which Shockwave then transformed into spaceship mode and took to the fringes of Earth's atmosphere. Autobot Headmaster leader Fortress Maximus pursued the craft and battled Shockwave in the void of space, where he defeated him and sent him tumbling back through Earth's atmosphere in free-fall. ''Although thought dead by many, Shockwave in actuality survived and returned to the Decepticons' original fortress base, where he concentrated on resolving the threat posed by Galvatron. Seeking to use the missing Megatron as a weapon against him, Shockwave had the small number of Decepticons still under his control recover a clone of the departed leader from the Thames river, which he and Snap Trap repaired and brainwashed using the psycho-probe. Around the same time, Galvatron's fellow time-travellers Cyclonus and Scourge had joined up with Shockwave's Decepticons, but, chaffing in his service, Cyclonus wound up accidentally blurting out that they would be responsible for killing him in the future of 2008. Seeking to preserve his continued existence, Shockwave unleashed the Megatron clone upon them, resulting in the death of Cyclonus. Satisfied with the clone's performance, he dispatched him against Galvatron. The battle had an unexpected conclusion, however, when "Megatron" found a kindred spirit in Galvatron and actually joined forces with him.

''This unfortunate chain of events led to Shockwave losing his grip on sanity. Unable to logically fathom the situation, he slipped into despondancy, stringing up the remains of Cyclonus on the walls of his castle as a twisted trophy. What Shockwave did not realize, however, was that the repeated time-travel and the death of Cyclonus had caused a rift in space-time that threatened the stability of reality. Hoping to restore the balance by returning all time-travellers to their proper place in time, Scourge attempted to reclaim Cyclonus's body, but was shot down by Shockwave for his trouble. At Scourge's urging, Ravage was able to present events logically enough to Shockwave to restore some semblance of coherency to his thoughts, and Shockwave himself deposited Cyclonus's remains in the rift, and sealed it with an x-ray blast.''

It would be some time before Shockwave next resurfaced, emerging from sea on the coast of Blackpool, England, and killing a human who had seen him. Seeking to established his own faction of Decepticons, he saved Starscream from Circuit Breaker, and the pair, along with Ravage, recruited those who had grown disenfranchised with the leadership of the current Decepticon Earth commander, Scorponok. The small group staged an attack on Scorponok's New Jersey base, and Scorponok and Shockwave battled in the waters around Manhattan before being interrupted by the super-team, the Neo-Knights. Shockwave used the ensuing confusing to implicate the Autobots in an attack on the human team, but was later recognised by Circuit Breaker as the robot responsible for crippling her, and was blown out of the sky by her powers. Abruptly, the battle was ended when the Transformers were all teleported to Cybertron to face the threat of Unicron, but even Shockwave's data grid could not compute the vastness of the threat the chaos-bringer posed.

After Unicron was destroyed, Shockwave teamed up with Starscream once more to find the remains of the Autobots' Ark, which had crashed during the battle. The pair succeeded in getting the craft airborne again, but were unaware that the numerous damaged Transformers in the ship's stasis pods had been reactivated with nucleon - Megatron among them - and that an alternate future version of Galvatron was also on board. Conflict erupted when Megatron and Galvatron met, but the sight of Shockwave saw the two Decepticons team up against him. To put an end to things once and for all, the revived Ratchet sent the Ark crashing to Earth. There was no indication that Shockwave survived, suggesting that his evil had once and for all been put to rest.

In the alternate future timeline of Earth-120185, Shockwave attacked the unveiling of the first female Autobot Arcee in 1995, only to have his forces fended off by her. Years later, in 2004, he staged an attack on the opening day of Autobot City, but was defeated by the extremely illogical actions of Hot Rod - who threw him down a mountain, and jumped along with him for the ride.  ''After Unicron's attack and destruction in 2006, Shockwave assumed leadership of the Decepticons in the chaos that followed, and consolidated them into a strong force that ultimately resulted in a stalemate in the Cybertronian Civil War by 2008. It was then that Unicron's influence was felt again, as he mind-controlled Cyclonus, Scourge and the freelance peace-keeping agent Death's Head into assassinating Shockwave. After a hard fought battle, Shockwave was ultimately destroyed, his body blown to piece and his memory module crushed between Death's Head's fingers, ensuring that he could never return.''

Earthforce
''In the alternate timeline that is home to the Autobot Earthforce team, the 1990s were host to yet another Decepticon Civil War, as Megatron and Shockwave lead their own factions for dominance. In hopes of disposing of both of them, however, Starscream and Soundwave lured them into a trap that saw them sent on the run. Shockwave and Megatron subsequently organised a hit on Starscream, and then attacked him when it didn't go to plan, but were forced back by the Earthforce, who needed Starscream alive to help heal Snarl, afflicted with Corrodia Gravis.''

Animated continuity

 * Voice Actor: Corey Burton (US), Yutaka Shimaka (Japan)

(Note: In the Japanese dub of the Generation 1 cartoon, Shockwave's personality was altered from the American interpretation. Instead of being a monotone slave to logic he was presented like a grizzled old man with a raspy voice.)

Shockwave was a highly ranked Decepticon. Fanatically loyal to Megatron, Shockwave was entrusted stewardship of Cybertron by Megatron when the latter left to intercept an Autobot mission surveying for new forms of energy. Neither Decepticon suspected that Megatron's absence (and Shockwave's command) would last four million years. Little changed on Cybertron during those years, although Shockwave apparently lost his left hand and replaced it with a laser cannon.



He oversaw all the Decepticon activity on Cybertron, rarely leaving the planet. His keen scientific mind resulted in several incredible devices, including the space bridge and a time machine.

Shockwave commanded the Decepticon forces during the Unicron's attack on Cybertron, and may have been killed in the ensuing battle.

(Though Shockwave's death was written into the movie's script, it did not make it into the released film. However, IDW's 20th Anniversary comic adaptation did include Shockwave's death.  Shockwave's model did show up in season 3 episodes as possible animation errors.)

Dreamwave comics continuity


As a major player in the Decepticon army in Cybertron's past, Shockwave led the main attack on the Autobots' stronghold shortly after the appointment of Optimus Prime, and personally destroyed two guardian robots with one blast in space gun mode. After Megatron's apparent death in an early space bridge test, the Decepticon faction splintered, with Starscream creating his own faction, the "Predacons," and Shockwave leading the Decepticons through the "Dark Ages" of Cybertron. During this period, his logic allowed him to put aside differences with Jetfire and the Autobots in order to defeat the greater evil of The Fallen. As the Dark Ages came to an end, Shockwave was ready to sign a peace treaty with Ratbat's Ultracons and the Autobots, but the return of Megatron derailed the plan, though the Quintesson-created clones he brought back to the planet with him greatly intrigued Shockwave.

Shockwave was left behind on Cybertron while Megatron's forces pursued Optimus Prime and were subsequently lost on Earth for four million years, and became Decepticon leader on the planet. He began experimenting with cloning, and through studies of Astrotrain and Blitzwing, began to conceive the idea of a Transformer with multiple alternate modes. Cybertron, however, was steadily growing lower and lower on energy, and in an attempt to create new energy-conservative Transformers, Shockwave allied with the Autobots for a pooling of resources that created the Micromasters. This came back to bite him, however, when the Decepticon Micromaster Skystalker attempted to overthrow his command, knocking him offline and decapitating him to use in a grotesque puppet show, giving orders to the other Decepticons by holding Shockwave's severed noggin up to a video screen. When Skystalker was defeated, Shockwave was repaired, but eventually, he and all the other Transformers on Cybertron succumbed to stasis as the planet's energy ran out, and it entered a hibernation phase known as the "Great Shutdown."

3000 years ago, Unicron's herald Scourge located the dead planet, and reactivated Shockwave for study purposes. However, when Shockwave was attacked by a swarm of Sharkticons, Scourge intervened and saved him, only to be shot in the back by the Decepticon and captured. Dissecting and studying Scourge, Shockwave learned many secrets about the function and purpose of Transformers and Cybertron from the secrets hidden within him. Using that knowledge, Shockwave steadily worked to restore Cybertron, reactivating its population and solving their energy needs, ending the war and unifying the planet. He also continued his experiments into multiple transformations, yielding the unstable Duocons, and then successfully mastering the process with Triple Changers. Capturing Alpha Trion, Shockwave sought to unlock the full secrets of Vector Sigma, having already learned of the mysterious significance of Earth to the Transformer race. Revelation}} In preparation for the invasion of the planet, Shockwave subliminally influenced the population of Cybertron to become more violent, and prevented the return of Optimus Prime and Megatron aboard the Ark II by having a [[Robert Hallo|human agent blow it up.

In 2003, Shockwave made his move, heading to Earth with his Triple Changer troops and capturing Megatron and Optimus's forces, planning to try the two leaders as war criminals. Megatron was jettisoned into space by Starscream, while Prime escaped from his clutches and fell in with a rebel group. Mobilising the planet's Autobots, Prime led an attack on Shockwave's citadel, and confronted Shockwave himself, only to be defeated by the Decepticon, who ripped the Matrix from him. Using the Matrix to activate Vector Sigma, Shockwave downloaded the compressed contents of the mega-computer into his network, but before he had an opportunity to view the data, he was pulled into a battle with Ultra Magnus. In the course of the fight, the fuel line to his cannon was severed, and the resulting explosion destroyed his citadel and knocked him into a chasm.

While the rest of Cybertron believed Shockwave to be deceased, he had actually survived the explosion and gone underground in the wastelands of Cybertron. In addition to re-establishing communications with the Insecticons on Earth (who had been operating there as an advance squad preparing the way for his invasion), Shockwave continued his experimentation, resulting in the creation of Sixshot. Soon after, however, Megatron returned to Cybertron and bested Shockwave, taking him to Earth where he did the same to Starscream. But now, the three players were assembled, each knowing certain dark secrets of Cybertron's past...

''...and then Dreamwave went out of business. Dag, yo.''

IDW comics continuity
Shockwave was a Decepticon scientist on Cybertron six hundred thousand meta-cycles ago. He predicted the eventual destruction of Cybertron as a result of the Great War, and theorized that the war would spread across the galaxy. In anticipation of this, he seeded several worlds with an altered form of energon. (This is possibly the Ore 13 later found by Starscream.) After a long period of indeterminable length, at the beginning of the Ice Age on Earth, the Energon had become unstable, requiring Shockwave to place dampening devices across the worlds he'd seeded.



Before departing Cybertron, he was ordered to deal with an Energon raid by the Dynobots (by destroying the energon and severely injuring the team of misfits). Vowing revenge, they followed him when he left the planet.

Earth was the first world he visited to plant the devices on. Before he could leave though, his ship was destroyed and the Dynobots teleported down to attack him. The concept of the Dynobots illogical behaviour based off vengeance, along with the sheer force of their attack, left him off balance at first. Unable to win through logic, he developed thought patterns based off rage. This more brutal, violent Shockwave decimated the Dynobots, burning off the organic coatings shielding them from the planet's high energon fields, forcing them into stasis lock. Deactivating his new 'rage' program for further study, Shockwave was prevented by leaving the planet by a dead man's switch on the Dynobots ship. A massive beam of energy plowed into the ground, causing a volcanic eruption which consumed Shockwave and the Dynobots.

Megatron became suspicious of Shockwave's absence and assigned Bludgeon to search through Shockwave's files. Bludgeon's findings later inspired him in part to reattempt Thunderwing's mad plot which had, in the meantime, left their planet uninhabitable.

In 2006, a human archaeological team uncovered Shockwave's body.

Generation 1

 * Shockwave (1985)
 * Japanese ID number: 49




 * Shockwave transforms into a large Cybertronian handgun. He has light and sound electronics activated by his gun-mode trigger. The sound effects can be switched between two (fairly generic) blaster-sound frequencies with a small toggle on his battery pack.


 * Although Shockwave was depicted in the 1984 episodes of the animated series, he did not receive a toy release until 1985. Unlike the bulk of early Transformers that drew their molds from Takara Diaclone and Microchange toys, Shockwave's original form was first produced by ToyCo. As such, similar non-Transformer toys using the same mold were released in 1985, including a gray version called Astro Magnum and a Radio Shack exclusive called Galactic Man. A minor but amusing difference between the Radio Shack version, humorously called "Shackwave", and the Hasbro version, is that Shockwave's inconveniently placed trigger was remolded and appears less...inconvenient.


 * Shockwave with Fistfight (Action Master, 1990)


 * As an Action Master, Shockwave is a non-transforming action figure who combines elements of his cartoon model and original toy, with a few more details. He is compatible with any other Action Master weapon or vehicle. He came with his small robot partner Fistfight.


 * Reportedly, early "test market" releases came with a rubber hose that connects from his gun-arm to his back, like the original toy.

Alternators

 * Shockblast (Alternator, 2004)
 * Japanese ID number: BT-13




 * A retooling of the "Meister" Alternator, "Shockblast" transforms into a 1:24-scale Mazdaspeed-modified RX-8 sports car. He features working car doors, hood, and trunk. While the box has the name "Shockblast", the car's actual license plate is "SHKWAV".


 * Aside from colour and the laser cannon replacing his left hand, the main differences between Shockblast and Meister is that Shockblast has new front and rear fenders, doors, side skirts and a spoiler.


 * This mold was also used to make the Autrooper and Zoom-Zoom.

Merchandise

 * Shockwave (Bust, 2003)


 * In 2003, Hard Hero released a large polystone bust of Shockwave, based upon his Generation 1 cartoon appearance. This was released in two versions, the regular as shown in the picture and a limited edition 'metallic' version limited to 500 pieces worldwide.


 * Shockwave (Mini statue, 2004)


 * Diamond Comics Distributors also released a small, six-inch polystone statue of Shockwave made by Palisades, based upon Pat Lee's rendition of the character in Dreamwave's Transformers comic books.

Trivia



 * A Cybertronian battle scene in Comics Bom-Bom (reprinted in Transformers Generations) depicts Shockwave not in purple, but in the original grey color scheme of the Astro Magnum/Galactic Man toy.


 * In the cartoon, Shockwave would often switch between having two hands and having one hand, depending on the scene. Why he ever would have had a two-handed animation model in the first place is unknown. At one point, he is even depicted as wielding a miniature version...  of himself.


 * One of the earliest pictured versions of Action Master Shockwave features some awkward proportions and Fistfight with reversed colors. Another oddity of this version is that Shockwave's right hand is sculpted in an open position.


 * Shockwave is, of course, the basis for the Energon Decepticon homage character Shockblast.


 * In IDW's Transformers: The Animated Movie, Shockwave's demise appears to be confirmed, as Unicron is shown atomizing half his body with his laser eye beams.