round the decay of that colossal wreck contains examples of the following tropes:
Tropes #-F:
- Abuse Escalation: Megatron to Starscream, told in recall.
- Action Politician: Most of them.
- Adaptational Heroism: Megatron, and more broadly Decepticons.
- Adaptational Villainy: Optimus, and more broadly Autobots.
- Affectionate Nickname: There are several throughout the Wreckverse; one of the most frequently used is “little princess,” directed to Kestrel.
- The Ageless: Cybertronians in general.
- Aggressive Categorism: Functionism.
- Amicable Exes: Megatron and Starscream, eventually.
- Alternate Self: A few instances, inter alia:
- The Poet and Warrior Kestrels.
- The two instances of quantum-duplicated Lost Light crew.
- Anti-Hero: Most of them?
- Appeal to Force: Thank you, Optimus Prime, for legal ethics 101…
- Assassination Attempt: As most of the main cast are prominent public figures during periods of war and civil unrest, most of them are subjected to a few.
- Badass Bookworm: Several of the main cast. It helps that they're written by nerds.
- Badass and Child Duo: Megatron and Kestrel.
- Balcony Speech
- Befriending the Enemy: Many such cases.
- Big Book of War: The Autobot Code.
- Bittersweet Ending: Megatron dies, cared for by his Endurae and others, still reviled by much of the general public, after millennia spent terminally ill on house arrest. There is hope for Cybertron, there are people who will remember him fondly, and Kestrel is still writing poetry.
- Bodyguarding a Badass: Kestrel with Megatron.
- Broken Pedestal
- Starscream and Megatron.
- Megatron and Terminus.
- Calling the Old Man Out
- Cast Full Of Gay: Of the main cast, all but Ravage could be described as being in a same-gender relationship, and experiencing same-gender attraction. This is not commented on, as Cybertron does not have societal expectations of heterosexuality.
- Celebrity Power Couple: Windblade and Starscream.
- The Chain of Harm: A key theme of colossal wreck.
- The Chains of Commanding: A supporting theme of colossal wreck.
- Class Struggle: The roots of the original conflict that spiraled into 4,000,000 years of war in the primary universe and 819 years of war in the Functionist universe.
- Color-Coded Eyes: Autobots commonly have blue eyes, and Decepticons commonly have red eyes.
- The Comically Serious: Both Megatron and Minimus have their moments in this role.
- Cool Crown: Kestrel, Starscream, & Optimus all have one.
- Convicted By Public Opinion: A supporting theme of colossal wreck.
- Corporal Punishment
- Corrupt Politician: …Most of them. Even Windblade.
- Courtroom Episode: Two of them.
- Crazy Workplace: All of them.
- Crowning the Criminal: Starscream.
- Custody Battle: Everybody wants Kestrel.
- Defacement Insult: The door to Megatron's cabin aboard Lost Light.
- Democracy Is Flawed: A supporting theme of colossal wreck.
- The Dictatorship
- Diplomatic Impunity
- Disabled in the Adaptation: Everyone <3.
- Divine Right of Kings: Heavily deconstructed.
- Does This Remind You Of Anything?: Many such cases.
- Do Not Go Gentle: The Trope Namer poem is the author-assigned poem of Part II.
- The Dreaded: The DJD.
- Earned Stripes
- Election Day Episode: Two. One for Starscream, and one for Windblade.
- Emergency Authority
- Emotional Hospital Visit
- At Kestrel's berthside, during her come-down after her brief coup during Part I.
- At Megatron's berthside, during the climax of Part II.
- Enlightened Self-Interest
- Et Tu, Brute?: Megatron does not take the revelation that Terminus lied to him well.
- Even Evil Can Be Loved
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones
- Evil Parents Want Good Kids
- Expendable Alternate Universe: Subverted with the Functionist Universe; played somewhat straight with the duplicate(s) Lost Light.
- The Extremist Was Right: The Decepticons weren't wrong about what needed to change; where they failed was in not perpetuating the same harms they endured under Functionism. Throughout the story, they are ideologically vindicated.
- Face-Heel Turn
- Famed in Story: Most of the main characters are well-known public figures.
- Fantastic Caste System: The Grand Cybertronian Taxonomy.
- Fantastic Terrorists: The AVL.
- Fantastic Underclass: Cold-constructed mechs, under Functionism.
- Fate Worth Than Death
- Flower Motif: Sparkflowers, both blue and red; for lives taken and for lives saved.
- Force-Feeding: Megatron, in prison; as it goes wrong, an Inciting Incident for his transfer to house arrest.
- Forgiven, but Not Forgotten
- Full-Circle Revolution: A supporting theme of colossal wreck.
Tropes G-L:
- "Get Out of Jail Free" Card
- Good Colors, Evil Colors: Deconstructed. As Nautica points out, it's lazy and dangerous to think of the world that way.
- Graffiti of the Resistance: You are being decieved.
- Grey-and-Gray Morality: Nobody, other than the DJD and the Functionist Council, is really a villain. There are some villainous and heroic actions, but not a Villain-Hero character binary.
- Hazy Feel Turn: As to be expected with a Morality Kitchen Sink.
- He Who Fights Monsters
- Heel-Face Turn
- Hero With Bad Publicity
- Honor Thy Abuser: Obligatory ‘It’s complicated, but…’ See Hypocritical Heartwarming below.
- Hypocritical Heartwarming: Starscream will say everything bad about Megatron, but woe betide anyone else who insults his legacy.
- I Can’t Feel My Legs!
- "I Can't Look!" Gesture: Megatron makes one when seeing Chromedome's needles.
- Infamous, But In Charge:
- Starscream's leadership of Cybertron.
- Megatron's co-captaincy of Lost Light.
- Inherent In The System: The torture just goes with prison systems.
- Insistent Terminology: Co-captain.
- Insignia Rip-Off Ritual
- Interclass Friendship: Many such cases; Kestrel and Terminus are a stand-out.
- It Runs In The Family
- Joker Jury: Megatron's first trial is in a military court of the opposing faction's military, where the judge is his archnemesis, the prosecutor is an Autobot who wants him dead, and the defence counsel's loyalty to the Autobots is legendary. He calls this out.
- Keeping the Handicap: Kestrel, Rubicon, and Whirl, for three.
- Kingmaker Scenario
- La Résistance: The Anti-Vocationist League.
- Landslide Election: After Starscream steps out of the race, Windblade wins by a large margin.
- Last Stand
- Lingering Social Tensions: A significant element of post-War Cybertronian society.
- List of Transgressions
- Longer-Than-Life Sentence
- Luxury Prison Suite: Megatron's apartment.
Tropes M-Q:
- Maligned Mixed Marriage: Megatron and Minimus, from a certain point of view.
- The Man in Front of the Man: Invoked by Starscream during Megatron's trial.
- Martyrdom Culture
- Meaningful Name: Generally apt, as a convention of the franchise.
- Mercy Kill: Considered by Ravage, and averted.
- Misery Builds Character
- Misfit Mobilization Moment
- Morality Kitchen Sink: The character with the strongest moral compass might be Soundwave, whose compass is aligned decidedly blue and orange.
- Nepotism
- Never Be Hurt Again
- New Era Speech: Windblade delivers one after her election.
- New Old Flame: Megatron and Soundwave.
- No Place For Me There
- Not So Above It All
- Odd Couple: Megatron and Minumus.
- Off On A Technicality: Megatron, twice. Much like Braigwen.
- Old Friend, New Gender: Megatron and Starscream.
- Old Soldier: Megatron in the AVL. Soundwave with the militant Deception remnants.
- One World Order
- Opposed Mentors: Played with, with Megatron and Starscream’s rather lowkey (by their standards) rivalry over Kestrel.
- Outdated Hero vs. Improved Society: This happens to both Megatron and Optimus.
- The Outsider Befriends the Best: Windblade and Starscream, for a certain definition of “best.”
- Pariah State: Cybertron, to the rest of the galaxy.
- Passing the Torch
- Police Brutality: From Whirl to Lex Lata, and probably ever onward.
- Poppies for the War Dead: Played with.
- Population Control: Practiced by the Functionist Council.
- The Punishment is the Crime
- Questionable Consent
Tropes R-Z:
- Ragtag Bunch Of Misfits: Applies to both the crew of Lost Light and to the Anti-Vocationist League.
- Rank Scales With Asskicking
- Realpolitik
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Windblade; Megatron, to the AVL.
- Redemption Quest
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: Discussed.
- Released to Elsewhere: Megatron held the suspicion that this happened to Starscream.
- Renegade Splinter Faction: The militant Decepticon remnants. They mostly collapse after Soundwave leaves them.
- The Republic
- Resigned in Disgrace
- Revenge Is Not Justice: A central theme of colossal wreck.
- Rousing Speech
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: What they do tends to be kicking aft.
- Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: Several occasions, the most notable being Windblade’s decision to pardon Starscream.
- Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!
- Secret Police: The Badgeless.
- Self-Disposing Villain: Averted.
- Sentenced Without Trial
- Shell-Shocked Veteran: Most of the veteran characters (that is, most of the characters), since War Is Hell.
- Shrine to the Fallen
- Sleeping Their Way to the Top: Shockingly averted.
- Sleeping with the Boss: Not shockingly, not averted.
- Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace: Megatron and Minimus leave a space for objects in their Conjunx ceremony, to which they have prepared rebuttals. To their surprise, nobody actually objects. Even Starscream.
- Spousal Privilege: Averted with Megatron and Minimus, who deliberately choose not to become Conjunx Endurae before Megatron’s second trial.
- So Proud Of You:
- Megatron to Kestrel.
- Starscream to Kestrel.
- Megatron to Starscream(!).
- Still Wearing the Old Colors: After the war is over, many former soldiers continue to define themselves by Autobot or Decepticon affiliation, and/or to wear their badges.
- Strapped to an Operating Table: Megatron, on Messatine.
- Suave Sabre: Soundwave makes Kestrel a bespoke sabre with the Decepticon symbol, gold inlay, and sentimental engraving.
- Symbolically Broken Object: Megatron’s badge, damaged when Whirl punches through his subspace (and into his black hole).
- Symbolic Mutilation: Empurata.
- The Theocracy: Functionism.
- Thoughtcrime: As implied by the existence of shadowplay.
- Thousand-Year Reign
- Time to Step Up, Commander: Kestrel, after Megatron’s Career-Ending Injury.
- To Be Lawful or Good: One of the core themes of colossal wreck is the fact there is often dissonance between what is legal and what is right, and that sometimes there is no simple ‘good’ option.
- Tragic Keepsake: Megatron gives Kestrel a vial of innermost energon. Kestrel collects a number of other similar keepsakes during her time with the AVL.
- Unconventional Courtroom Tactics: Exercised by Megatron and Ultra Magnus—and, debatably, by Seawing’s strike team.
- Unequal Pairing
- War Crime Subverts Heroism
- War Is Hell: Every character who's been in war is severely traumatized by it.
- Was Too Hard On Her: Megatron comes to realise this about his treatment of Starscream.
- We ARE Struggling Together!
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Many of the early Decepticons.
- What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?
- What the Hell, Hero?: Many, due to the themes and motifs and such.
- Megatron to Windblade.
- Everyone to Optimus.
- Won the War, Lost the Peace: For a certain definition of “won” the war: the Autobots claim victory in the Cybertronian Civil War, but ultimately hold little sway during the reconstruction of Cybertron.
- World of Bad Cops: Truth in television.
- Written by the Winners
- You Cannot Kill An Idea
- Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters
Character Tropes
(Ex-)Decepticons
Kestrel
- Badass Adorable: She is very cute and very deadly.
- Break the Cutie: You try being cute and sweet after watching all of your friends die under your command for 819 years.
- Break the Haughty: In terms of attitude, she took quite strongly after Starscream. More than 800 years of war changed that.
- A Child Shall Lead Them: While Cybertronians don’t truly have childhoods, Kestrel is only five years old when named Air Commander of the AVL.
- Eating Lunch Alone: Kestrel habitually refuels alone.
- Elective Mute: Kestrel often prefers to turn her vocaliser off, and to communicate chirolinguistically.
- Electronic Speech Impediment: A recurring vocaliser malfunction.
- Ensign Newbie: In the AVL.
- Everyone’s Baby Sister: A natural result of being small and likable as one of the youngest Cybertronians.
- Extremely Protective Child: Don’t threaten Megatron in front of her. He won’t be the reason you regret it.
- Eye Colour Change: From blue to red, as part of her reformat.
- Foster Kid: To Starscream.
- Fright-Induced Bunkmate
- Horrible Judge of Character: Except when she isn’t.
- Inappropriately Close Comrades: With Rubicon, in the Functionist Universe.
- Lady of War
- The Lancer: To Megatron’s Leader, in the AVL.
- Little Miss Badass: She starts out her warbuild life with an exact copy of Starscream's strat-tac module. Then she improves it.
- Mad Scientist’s Beautiful Daughter: Originally. For certain values of “mad scientist” and “daughter.”
- Mommy's Little Villain
- Politically Active Princess
- Pretty Princess Powerhouse
- Rebellious Princess
- Rich Kid Turned Social Activist: She had the best life Starscream could provide for her. She still chose to fight for something bigger.
- Sheltered Aristocrat: Before running away; and, to a lesser extent, before her time in the AVL.
- Uptown Girl: To Rubicon.
- Young and in Charge: Five-year-old Air Commander, at your service—or, if you are not aligned with the AVL, at your disservice.
Megatron
- Afraid of Needles: Megatron has mnemotrypanophobia, the debilitating fear of mnemosurgery needles.
- The Alleged Boss: Becomes this in his latter centuries in the Anti-Vocationist League.
- The Atoner: After causing so much harm, Megatron is determined to make things better. He knows he can never make up for everything that he's done, but he wants to help people to tilt the scales back just slightly, as much as he can.
- Be All My Sins Remembered: After his spiral into despotism, Megatron doesn't trust his own judgement, and is hesitant about being granted any authority or admiration.
- Berserker Tears: After Ravage is injured, when fighting Tarn. They’re made of antimatter.
- BFG: Sometimes, a fusion cannon is just a fusion cannon. Sometimes, it's a BFG.
- Born Into Slavery: Like many cold-constructed mechs of his era, Megatron onlined into conditions of modern slavery, fed and berthed by his ‘employer’ in a way that made it impossible to leave--and programmed to obey.
- The Captain: On Lost Light. Well, co-captain.
- Career-Ending Injury: He takes one four centuries into his time in the Functionist Universe; from then, he can no longer participate in battles, and leadership of the AVL gradually falls to Kestrel.
- Dark Lord on Life Support: From partway through II to the finale.
- Dented Iron: As he is made of metal, almost literally.
- Determinator
- Driven to Villainy: He resorted to violence, as he tells Optimus, only upon realising the system has been designed to withstand other forms of dissent.
- A Father to His Men: Or a grandfather, in the AVL.
- Feeling Their Age: “Look at me, Ravage. I’m old. Old and weak.”
- Four-Star Badass
- Frontline General: Until his Career-Ending Injury.
- Glasses of Aging: Acquires reading glasses, in his ‘retirement.’
- Had to Come to Prison to Be a Crook: Discussed in Towards Peace, in which he invokes this trope.
- Kicked Upstairs: After his Career-Ending Injury.
- Killed Off For Real: Eventually.
- Large and In Charge: He is, well, large, and in charge of the AVL--at least in name.
- Manifesto-Making Malcontent: Towards Peace.
- Mentor In Sour Armor: To Kestrel, initially.
- Person of Mass Destruction
- Post-Injury Desk Job
- Retired Badass: His fusion-cannon-wielding destroyer-of-worlds days are over.
- The Scapegoat: Megatron takes the fall, both legally and in the court of public opinion (and, in part, according to Censere), for everything done by Decepticons. Optimus, one must note, does not take the same responsibility for the actions of Autobots.
- Sheep in Sheep's Clothing: He really is determined to do better and not cause harm. Unfortunately, most people find this difficult to believe.
- Silent Scapegoat: He was going to be. And then Starscream took the stand.
- Tears of Blood: Tears of antimatter.
- Translator Buddy: For Kestrel, and sometimes Soundwave.
- Troubled Fetal Position: After “Minimus” (actually scraplings controlling the Magnus armor) sexually assaults him.
- Tough Leader Façade
- Your Days Are Numbered: In Part I, it's a looming death sentence. For the rest of the story, terminal illness takes its place.
Ravage
- Adaptational Gender Identity: Some continuities use he/him pronouns for Ravage; some use she/her, and some, such as IDW1, use both. colossal wreck uses they/them.
- Cats Are Snarkers: Ravage certainly is a snarker.
- Wisdom from the Gutter: Ravage, who explicitly describes themself and Soundwave as being ‘in the gutter,’ teaches Soundwave how to focus.
Soundwave
Starscream
- Adaptational Gender Identity: Through different Transformers media, Starscream has been presented in some way or another as experiencing frame dysphoria, and/or with ‘feminine’ mannerisms. colossal wreck goes with the interpretation that she is a trans woman.
- Breaking the Cycle of Bad Parenting: With Kestrel. At least, she is better. One can safely say that there was an attempt.
- Hot Consort: To Windblade.
- Mama Wolf: To Kestrel.
- Paranoid Autocrat: During her tenure as Emperor of Cybertron.
- Royal Favorite: Evades her own Longer-Than-Life Sentence in part by being the conjunx endura of the First Delegate. Gets a reformat out of it, too.
- Royally Bad Parent: To Kestrel, though with the best of intentions.
- Social Climber: Like a crab in a bucket.
- The Starscream: Trope namer. Ironically, by the time of colossal wreck, most of her usurpation attempts are behind her.
Tarn
(Ex-)Autobots
Minimus Ambus | Ultra Magnus
Optimus, formerly Prime
Ratchet
- Healing Hands: Ratchet regards his hands—forged hands—as key to his medical ability.
Rodimus
Rung
Prowl
Other Characters
Rubicon
Terminus
- Ascended Extra: In More Than Meets The Eye, Terminus is there for part of Megatron’s backstory and to pull him around the plot in two issues. colossal wreck expands on his role.
- Finding Judas: He was saving a universe, but he still betrayed Megatron in the process.
- Mentor Occupational Hazard: Twice, in fact.
- Sadistic Choice: He was faced with the choice between leaving a Cybertron under the heels of an unchecked, despotic Functionist regime, or condemning his mentee and his mentee to live in it. He chose the latter.
Windblade