An Interesting Idea

[rurudyne]

Today I came across an interesting idea put forth in a G1 related fanfic.

Essentially, the author seems to be working on the basis that TFs only reproduce themselves via Vector Sigma ... but with an interesting twist added.

Wheeljack, unsure that Vector Sigma will remain available and apparently operating under inspiration from 'observing' humans, is portrayed as asking the entity/super computer for a limited number of sparks that are able to function as true females (as opposed to merely be femmes). The stated reason he would do this, fear that Decepticons would monopolize access to Vector Sigma once they outright owned Cybertron, is actually a reasonable one.

The first part of the story is here: www.fanfiction.net/u/1177558/.

At this point the story could go any way even though this first bit looks to be taking it in the "mostly harmless" category compared to some of the REALLY weird stuff out there. The writing seems good too.

I'd like to see what you folks thought about her concepts. I'd like to not discourage her (not that I think anyone else here would want to), so if anyone wants to really lay into the concept I would ask to keep that here if possible.

[Andy Turnbull]

It certainly manages to avoid some of the more disturbing trappings of TF fanfic when it comes to gender. That being said I didn't think the idea was all that interesting and it raises some rather pointed questions.

Creating Transformers solely for the purposes of propagating the species seems out of character for the Autobots. What if the TF has no wish to be involved in the process, what are they going to do then?

Also why the need to assign a gender to a Transformer who just has some modified abilities, it's arbitrary and makes no sense. Why would a mechanical race with no gender status adopt male and female roles in the way of another species simply to procreate when the gender of the Transformers has no real bearing on the actual process of procreation?

Andy

[rurudyne]

Andrew ... good questions.

As to the first — and assuming that Vector Sigma wouldn't have some built in measures to prevent it creating another vector sigma (I'm not gonna assign job security issues to a computer ) — I can't say that propagation is any less potentially valuable than fighting (as was the case with the Arielbots). But not wanting to fight might be comparable to not wanting to "reproduce" ... so maybe they would be ok with it since they don't seem to mind pacifist "soldiers" (like First Aid, if drawing a parallel is reasonable here)? Have to see what this writer has in mind. I did find it a bit worrisome that Ratchet was presented as interested right off the bat. I mean ... why always Ratchet ... re: the Truth about Ratchet seen over at the Allspark forums (warning if you actually do go there: very immature and crude adult material)?

The second is trickier and is something that the writer alone may be able to answer. She may have not even thought about it that clearly as you just evidenced doing ... maybe it's nothing more than her projecting us on them? Or maybe she's assuming that Wheeljack, having "observed" humans (please, no jokes about robots and porn ... I would recommend Bad Press for robots and bad fanfics: www.avif13.dsl.pipex.com/tentacle/text/tf-badpress.html ) will simply adopt our "conventions" where femmes are the ones who have the babies (sort of an innocent counterpoint to the intentionally humorous and therefore recommended Robots in Disguises: tfarchive.com/creative/showentry.php?s=605 ). Don't know, but it would be nice if Wheeljack's inspiration were a bit better presented.

Personally, I think it conventional in cartoon canon that fraternization (but no sex, because they simply aren't sexual beings) just happens. Femmes certainly seem much rarer than guys (in my Genesis story they are about 7% of the population before the Great War). Also, it seems like they don't even know why there are femmes at all (I think the different product lines reasoning — femmes as secretaries and whatnot — owes itself to Marvel comics, not sure though). That they don't know is actually something I have a doctor in my story, a femme no less, confess to Magnus, the central character.