The Killing Jar



Generation One >  Season 3

Ultra Magnus, Cyclonus, Marissa Faireborn, and Wreck-Gar are captured by a Quintesson scientist for experiments, but are sucked into a more dangerous problem - a black hole.

Detailed synopsis


A Quintesson scientist wanted to do a detailed analysis on the Transformers and their allies. They chose Ultra Magnus, Cyclonus, Marissa Faireborn, and Wreck-Gar as the typical specimens of their group, abducted them one by one, and placed each in a cage. The Quints placed them in experiments, i.e., situations where their reactions are hypothesized and then studied. Cyclonus was pitted against a false Galvatron, who he attempted to peacefully restrain, and the same was done with Ultra Magnus and a false Rodimus Prime. Wreck-Gar was lured aboard by a friendly clown and placed in a clean, junkless room, where it was anticipated that he would go insane from the cleanliness. He proceeded to tear up the walls to make the chamber more like "home sweet home". Marissa Faireborn followed an illusion of her father onto the Quintesson ship and attacked him when the illusion's head turned into that of a monster.

Eventually an escape attempt was started and suddenly stopped – nobody noticed that the ship was being sucked into a black hole, not even the automatic alarms of the ship! The ship was then pulled into the black hole, which was really some entrance to a negative universe where everybody changed their colours (imagine Cyclonus in yellow... or you can just look at the picture to the right). They all end up working together to fix the ship and return themselves back into their own universe.

Stats
Original airdate: September 15, 1986

Written by: Michael Charles Hill & Joey Kurihara Piedra

Featured characters
(''Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes
"This Ultra Magnus is a soldier first and foremost."

"This Decepticon and the Autobot are one of a kind. But he is good and one is evil. But to me, that is no difference at all."

"As an Autobot, this Junkion should have reacted as I predicted. Remarkable."

"Violence is always the humans’ way of solving problems."
 * -- Various observations made by the Quintesson scientist after capturing his test subjects

Ultra Magnus: "We wouldn’t be in this situation at all…" Cyclonus: "… if you had not captured us." Ultra Magnus: "Cyclonus, I can finish my own thoughts. I don’t need you to do it for me." Cyclonus: "Maybe the thoughts was not yours to begin with, Ultra Magnus."

Other Notes

 * Although he was not named, Marissa’s father has the same voice actor and sounds the same as G.I. Joe’s Flint, all pointing out to the suspicions that Marissa is Flint’s daughter. This suspicion was later confirmed.

Animation and/or technical glitches



 * The triple changer Broadside was the illusion that the Quintessons used to trick Cyclonus, which is really weird since Broadside is an Autobot.


 * Wreck-Gar fired his hand like a rocket to free Marissa, but he is incorrectly shown with both hands for two scenes before we see him picking the lost hand up and re-attaching it.

Continutity errors

 * Continuity errors

Transformers references

 * Inquirata refers to his guard's transformed mode as his alternate mode, the first use of that term in official ficiton.

Real-world references

 * References

Miscellaneous trivia

 * The background music which plays during the "working together" montage in the final act is is the first piece of new music composed for season three (besides the opening theme), and would appear to have been created specifically for the scene in question, as it is not re-used anywhere else in the series.

Keywords
(separate by commas and link each one so a page can be created for it if it does not already exist)

Black hole, experiments