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"The Return of Blurr"
Original presentation	12:00pm June 21, 2015 (BotCon)
Written by	Marty Isenberg
Directed by	Derrick J. Wyatt
Continuity	Animated cartoon continuity

While on a field trip to the Metroplex with her classmates, Sari stumbles upon a certain incapacitated Autobot Intelligence agent.

Contents 1 Synopsis 2 Featured characters 3 Notes 3.1 Continuity notes 3.2 Transformers references 3.3 Real-world references 3.4 Other trivia 4 External links

Synopsis

Sari Sumdac, having joined her Autobot friends on Cybertron to learn more about her heritage, is joining Arcee's class on a field trip to the Metroplex. While Arcee welcomes her to the group, her classmates Nightbeat, Hosehead, and Siren are a bit hung up on her techno-organic nature. As the class enters the Metroplex, Sari gets out a burger and cup of soda from Burger Bot, which her father has sent her via the SpaceBridge. Her classmates are openly disgusted by the Burger Bot fare and the idea of anyone ingesting it.

Embarrassed, Sari decides to quietly dispose of her soda cup in a disposal hatch, but she loses her balance and tumbles down the chute along with it, unnoticed by Arcee and her classmates. Sari lands in a dark room, on top of a pile of trash and debris, and touches a compacted metal cube. The cube then begins to glow and starts speaking, revealing itself as Blurr. While Blurr very quickly recaps how he ended up in this state, Sari realizes that some lingering AllSpark energy from when she upgraded herself must have reactivated Blurr.

Sari searches for an exit and comes across an access panel. Making use of her ability to communicate with machines, she attempts to use the panel to open a door. She succeeds, but in doing so also inadvertently awakens an energy-based being, which the narrator reveals to be Kremzeek.

Meanwhile, Arcee takes a headcount once her group reaches the Council Chamber, finally noticing that Sari is missing. An alert sounds, saying there's an intruder in the recycling center, and Arcee takes it as a clue to Sari's whereabouts.

The scene cuts back to Sari and Blurr, who have ended up on a conveyor belt in the Central Cybertronian Recycling Plant that leads to a variety of nasty machines designed to reduce recyclables to scrap. Blurr informs Sari that the plant has thankfully been non-operational since the Great War, but unfortunately Kremzeek zaps into the machinery and reactivates it. Blurr voices an adamant desire to avoid repeating his compacting incident—or facing a smelter. Sari attempts to communicate with the machinery and discovers Kremzeek's presence. Kremzeek in turn lashes Sari to the conveyor belt to prevent her escape and trap her and the Blurr Cube on a course to the furnace.

All hope seems lost, and the narrator pauses for dramatic effect...before revealing that Arcee's group has made it just in time. Using Hosehead's hoses, Arcee's laser blades, Siren's sonic power, and Nightbeat's adhesive-spewing pellets, the team frees Sari and the Blurr Cube and destroys the machinery. The narrator laments that the scene would have looked fantastic in animation, if only Season 4 had been produced.

Blurr, in typical rapid fashion, recaps the story so far for the rest of the group. When Arcee hears of the being made of pure energy, she recalls info from her intel days and identifies Kremzeek as a Decepticon Trojan program that will continue to jump from system to system until it is contained. Sari realizes that the plant's machinery is now void of Kremzeek's presence, but it turns out that's because it has jumped into Nightbeat. The Kremzeek-controlled Nightbeat attacks Sari and takes off in vehicle mode. As Kremzeek conveniently states, it's headed for Fortress Maximus, the Cybertronian defense hub. Arcee is able to close the security doors and cut off Kremzeek's exit just in time, while letting the team know that an invasion of Fortress Maximus' systems could destroy the entire planet.

The Kremzeek-possessed Nightbeat attacks Arcee, and she deflects with her laser swords, which she reveals were a gift from Ratchet. Cornered, Kremzeek jumps from Nightbeat into Siren, using his sonic abilities to blast a hole in the wall of the building. When Hosehead traps Kremzeek's host body with foam from his hoses, Kremzeek jumps bodies once more (this time into Hosehead), and flees through the hole. Sari pursues Kremzeek on a jetpack she produces from her conveniently appearing scooter and catches up to it in a tunnel. However, just as she grabs its host, it leaps from Hosehead into her jetpack, blasting off toward Fortress Maximus on its own.

Hosehead laments that they'll never catch Kremzeek in time, but he gives Sari an idea. She connects the Blurr Cube to her backpack and somehow manages to infuse herself with Blurr's abilities. Arcee latches onto Sari, and the three of them zoom off after Kremzeek. Blurr remarks that this phenomenon is probably stretching the limits of credibility. They zip past Cheetor and Sideswipe, establishing the timing of this story as some point during "The Stunti-Con Job". As the team continues to zoom toward Fortress Maximus, Blurr and Arcee banter over the best route to take.

The scene cuts to Shockwave and Megatron, held in stasis lock inside Trypticon Prison. The narrator makes note that we can't hear them because of Corey Burton's absence, but he describes as Shockwave somehow realizes that his failsafe Kremzeek program has been activated and is out to destroy Cybertron. When questioned by Megatron about the reasoning behind the program, Shockwave admits that the Decepticons weren't supposed to be on Cybertron when it activated.

Inside the Fortress Maximus Control Center, Sentinel Magnus fails to notice as Kremzeek flies into the room and jumps from Sari's jetpack to the central control system. Jetfire and Jetstorm are alarmed to notice that the photon pulse cannons are activating and targeting Iacon. Sari, Arcee, and the Blurr Cube rush into the room, and Sentinel demands to know how they got past security. Blurr starts to answer, but Sari cuts him off by going straight for the control panel, attempting to gain control over the system and shut down the cannon.

As Arcee attempts to warn her, Kremzeek jumps from the control system into Sari. However, since Sari is techno-organic, Kremzeek struggles in its attempt to take control of her, and Sari is able to burp it up, quickly trapping it in her empty soda cup from earlier.

With the day saved, the narrator cuts to the CyberNinja Dojo, where Optimus Prime and Jazz restore Blurr to his original form using the power of the AllSpark. Arcee encourages her class to show some gratitude to Sari for saving them all, but of the three, only Nightbeat appears to take the instruction seriously, summing up the "[don't] judge a datatrax by its Techno-Organic cover" message. Blurr does gleeful laps around the dojo, ecstatic that he's been restored in time for Season 4. Upon learning that there is no Season 4, he decides to have his agent get him involved with Robots in Disguise, or perhaps, asking Sue Blu's input, he'll get into voice directing.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Notes

• The cast:
  • Susan Blu: Arcee, Kremzeek
  • John Moschitta: Blurr, Sideswipe
  • Frank Todaro: Narrator
  • Jon Bailey: Siren, Announcer, Shockwave (ad-lib), Sari's burp (ad-lib)
  • Laura Hale: Sari, Jetstorm
  • Brian Orms: Hosehead, Cheetor
  • Laura Knapton: Nightbeat, Jetfire
  • Jim Sorenson: Sentinel Prime Magnus
• Brian and the two Lauras were the winners of the So You Think You Can Voice Act? auditions held earlier in the day.
• Characters mentioned include: Bumblebee, Bulkhead, Ratchet, Prowl, Tutor Bot, Sari's dad, Starscream, Skywarp, Thundercracker, John Moschitta, Cliffjumper, Transformers: Prime Arcee, Corey Burton, Ultra Magnus, and Susan Blu.

Continuity notes

• The narrator hastily notes that this story takes place during the events of BotCon 2011's "The Stunti-Con Job" to explain Cheetor and Sideswipe's cameo, as Sideswipe retired and went to live on an Energon farm at the end of that story. Since cube Blurr appears at Team Stunticon's show, the story up to Kremzeek's capture must take place sometime before that scene, with the restoration of Blurr's body occurring later on.
• As Blurr relays, he was crushed into a cube by Shockwave so as to preserve the Decepticon's cover, in "Animated" episode "TransWarped". When we last saw him, "Longarm Prime" had Cliffjumper dump him down the trash chute; it wasn't obvious in the episode itself, but the animation model for the Blurr cube showed his spark was still pulsing, setting up the story here. It's also mentioned how he was lost in space with two Starscream clones after a space bridge accident; Blurr, Thundercracker, and Skywarp were sent through the bridge in "A Bridge Too Close, Part II".
• Arcee has taken back up her old teaching job, as was stated in Sari Sumdac's profile in The AllSpark Almanac II.
• Nightbeat and Siren were introduced in The Complete AllSpark Almanac, the former in her own profile, and the latter on the menu of Maccadam's Old Oil House. Hosehead makes his first appearance here.
• Sari came to Cybertron with the Autobots in "Endgame, Part II". It was in that episode that Prowl died, using his spark to help restore the AllSpark.
• Arcee mentions that she spent a long time in the infirmary of the Metroplex after having her memory wiped. Her memory was wiped by Ratchet when he overloaded his EMP to prevent Lockdown from recovering information she carried, in "The Thrill of the Hunt". She was seen in the infirmary in "TransWarped" and "This Is Why I Hate Machines".
• Sari remembers Blurr from Bumblebee's complaints about him; the two had something of a (one-sided) rivalry starting with "Velocity".
• Sari has residual AllSpark energy left over when she upgraded herself with her key in "TransWarped"; this energy helps bring Blurr back online. Sari gained technopathic abilities as a result of this upgrade, and used them to help bring Arcee back online in "Endgame, Part II".
• Sari received her transforming scooter as a Christmas present from her father in "Human Error, Part I".
• The Metroplex and the SpaceBridge Nexus were first seen in "TransWarped". Fortress Maximus was first seen in "This Is Why I Hate Machines".
• Autobot Boot Camp was seen in "Autoboot Camp". The Cyber-Ninja Dojo was seen "Five Servos of Doom". The Animated version of Maccadam's Old Oil House, along with the underground tunnels, were seen in "This Is Why I Hate Machines". Avalon Boulevard, Eronus Way, Dolrailer Spaceport, and Trypticon Prison were all first seen in The AllSpark Almanac II, deriving their names from a variety of sources, including the traitorous Autobot Avalon from the Dreamwave Energon comic; the High Council member Eronus from Dreamwave Productions' The Age of Wrath; Dolrailer, the Japanese name of Mega-Octane from Robots in Disguise; and of course the Decepticon city-bot Trypticon, though the prison was actually first created for the unproduced fourth season of Animated. The Decepticons were revealed to be incarcerated at Trypticon Prison in "The Stunti-Con Job".
• Ultra Magnus was assaulted by Shockwave in "Where Is Thy Sting?"
• The AllSpark Almanac II termed the Fortress Maximus' cannon as a photon pulse cannon, the weapons of Generation 1 Brainstorm.

Transformers references

• Nightbeat, Siren, and Hosehead are all part of the same class; their Generation 1 counterparts were all part of the 1988 line of Headmaster toys. Like his Generation 1 counterpart, Siren is very loud. The three are referred to on the cover of the storybook as "Headmaster Jrs.", in reference to the subgroup of Autobots from Super-God Masterforce: Minerva, Goshooter, and Cab, who were the Japanese versions of the molds for the aforementioned Generation 1 Headmasters.
• Siren, his only previous appearance being an image of his head in Transformers Animated: The Complete AllSpark Almanac, is revealed to share the Earth-mode body type of Bumblebee. Hosehead shares a body-type with the Earth form of Sentinel Prime.
• Nightbeat wonders if Sari is from one of the "Tri-Peninsular Torus States"; the Tri-Peninsular Torus State was introduced in Dreamwave Productions' The War Within comic mini-series. Nightbeat specifically mentions Protihex and Praxus.
• As usual with the BotCon script readings, there are plenty of meta, fourth-wall breaking jokes to be had:
  • The narrator notes that Blurr's revival will instill hope in fans "traumatized" by his seeming demise, and his voice actor John Moschitta.
  • The narrator tells the audience to go buy the complete DVD set of Animated if they don't believe him.
  • The narrator notes how Sari tended to accidentally cause trouble back in seasons 1 and 2.
  • The narrator claims that the action would have looked better in animation, and somewhat smugly asks the audience if they wished Season 4 had been produced.
  • Blurr explains that he was offline for a very long time-the rest of season 3. He also describes Sari's AllSpark saturation as a "plot device".
  • Arcee's swords prompt Sari to ask when she turned into her Prime counterpart, who also wielded a pair of blades.
  • The narrator claims that Sari's scooter appears out of nowhere conveniently, like a Beast Wars weapon. In the Beast Wars series, the guns appeared from out of nowhere, usually with the characters reaching behind their backs as if it were stored there, due to the limitations of 90's computer animation.
  • Blurr does a CinemaSins and complains about how unlikely it is that even with her upgraded form's strength, Sari shouldn't be able to hold onto him and Arcee and go as fast as she's going.
  • The narrator notes that season 3 of Animated implied Ratchet had deeper feelings for Arcee.
  • Arcee quips that her route has the only Cybertronian backgrounds that were designed.
  • The conversation between Shockwave and Megatron is entirely relaid by the narrator, because Corey Burton (the voice actor for the pair) is "very far away".
  • The narrator claims that Blurr's restoration causes one half of the fandom to be relieved, while the other half complains about a lack of real consequences for the universe.
  • At the end of the story, Blurr is ready to appear in Animated season 4, having heard Transformers is back on Cartoon Network. Upon hearing that it is the 2015 Robots in Disguise series, he says they've already used that title, twice. The first was 2001's Robots in Disguise, the English dubbed version of Car Robots. The second was in 2012 with the IDW Publishing Robots in Disguise ongoing comic by John Barber.
• Kremzeek was an energy being vaguely aligned with the Decepticons, seen in the Sunbow The Transformers episode "Kremzeek!". Like his counterpart, Kremzeek has the ability to enter machines, but differs in that he can control them, and has slightly higher intelligence.
• Arcee has gained a pair of laser blades, like her toy. She claims that she had Ratchet build her a pair of pointers for her lectures, only for him to get carried away.
• Cheetor shouts "jumpin' gyros" when Sari and the rest speed by, one of the catchphrases of Beast Wars Cheetor. Sideswipe notes that she kinda looks like a blue version of Cheetor; Cheetor's toy was redecoed from Animated Blurr's.

Real-world references

• Hosehead speaks like a stereotypical Canadian hoser, and mentions things like Newfoundlanders, hockey, and back bacon.
• Siren's speech patterns are inspired by comedian Bobcat Goldthwait and his character "Zed" from the Police Academy films.
• Sari disparagingly calls Nightbeat "Sherlock," after famous fictional detective Sherlock Holmes.
• "Fake-O Red-Bot Pop" is based on Faygo Red Pop, down to coming from Detroit.
• The narrator describes Blurr's speech as being as fast as a Micro Machines commercial; actor John Moschitta narrated the commercials for the small toy cars.

Other trivia

• Several of the ideas presented here-such as Sari's SpaceBridge portal to Earth and Arcee's "laser pointers"-are from Marty Isenberg's outline for the first episode of the un-produced season 4 of Animated.
• The live script reading was accompanied by eight illustrations projected on the screen, with lineart by Naoto Tsushima and colors by Josh Perez.
• The script and the eight accompanying illustrations were later published as a Big Looker-style storybook sold first at BotCon 2016 and later on the Collector's Club website (see right). New artwork included:
  • The cover, with a close up of the image of Blurr's crushed form, along with the character models for Siren, Hosehead, and Nightbeat, by Derrick J. Wyatt.
  • A "This book belongs to" page, in emulation of classic storybooks, accompanied by the character model for Jackpot.
  • Page breaks with the stylized Autobot symbol from Animated, which also appears alongside the stylized Decepticon symbol on the copyright page.
  • A new piece of art on the credits page by Marcelo Matere and Thomas Deer. It depicts Sari, Blurr, and the Headmaster Jrs running from the Metroplex as smoke and fire damage pours out of it, alongside Sideswipe, Cheetor, and two Autotroopers. Observing them in the background are Jackpot, Longrack, Minerva, and Flareup. This is an excerpt (specifically, the top-left quadrant) of a much larger piece titled "Stunticons on the Loose", which was sold in lithograph form at BotCon 2016.
  • An advertisement on the back for a fake storybook version of BotCon 2016 script reading, "The Hot Rod".

External links

"The Return of Blurr" live recording and original art:

• Video on YouTube