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Generation 1S03E12Season 3 · 2010 · 1986–87

Surprise Party

Written by Steve Mitchell & Barbara Petty · First aired 1986-10-09 · Production code 700-97

Title card via TFWiki, fan-archive fair use

Synopsis

Young Daniel and Wheelie search Autobot records to learn Ultra Magnus's birthday and stumble into danger.

Spike and the Autobots throw a surprise party for Daniel, but it is interrupted by an attack from the Combaticons. Wheelie gets caught in the crossfire and Ultra Magnus throws himself over the boy Autobot to save him from being shot. After hitting the shuttle bay and destroying several ships, the Combaticons retreat. The attack was a coordinated effort by Galvatron to disrupt a peace conference to be hosted on Cybertron the next day.

Daniel and Wheelie want to throw Ultra Magnus a surprise party, but no one knows the date of his creation and it isn’t on file in the Hall of Records. An annoying and clumsy Custodiobot tells them that the information must be stored on the lost Autobot storage asteroid. Daniel and Wheelie steal a garbage ship and head out to find the asteroid and the info. Unbeknownst to them, their movements are being watched by Cyclonus, who evidently doesn’t have anything better to do than spy on garbage ships. Galvatron orders his troops to follow it.

Stuck in a meteor shower, Daniel and Wheelie crash on an asteroid that—surprise!—happens to be the asteroid they were looking for. While they are exploring they are attacked by scaly flying eels and take refuge in a cave, which turns out to be the opening to the records. Inside, sentry robots attack them for asking for the wrong file name. To make matters worse, the eels have found their way inside and attach themselves to Wheelie. Just as they are about to be shot by the drones and eaten by the eels, both menaces are destroyed by Cyclonus and the Sweeps, who take the pair hostage and interrogate them.

Cyclonus reprograms the asteroid into a collision course for Cybertron and then sends Spike a message that he’s holding Daniel hostage. The Autobots have two choices: destroy the asteroid and kill Daniel, or let the asteroid hit the planet and kill all the peace delegates.

Ultra Magnus takes Sky Lynx to the asteroid. The Sweeps attack, but Magnus makes short work of them, then heads after Cyclonus. They pound on each other as Wheelie sneaks by and presses the convenient self-destruct button. Cyclonus runs off and the Autobots and Daniel escape in Sky Lynx as the asteroid blows up.

Safe on Cybertron, Daniel explains how they got into this mess, looking for Ultra Magnus' birthday. Spike declares today as Ultra Magnus' birthday and everyone cheers.

Memorable quotes

—Daniel is led into a life of crime by Wheelie.
—The asteroid security drones are pissed over Daniel's use of incorrect syntax.
—Cyclonus vs. Daniel Witwicky
—Sky Lynx and Ultra Magnus
—The Autobots and humans make merry.

Notes of interest

  • This was one of twelve episodes of the original cartoon released as audio adventures by the German company Karussell Musik und Video.
  • Apparently no one is sad that the storage asteroid has been destroyed. How many priceless pieces of information have been lost?
  • Fly off into space with no plan. Fly right into an asteroid cluster. Run right into a meteor. Crash land at random. Still find your objective. Daniel and Wheelie are the worst - and luckiest - searchers in the entire universe.
  • So Blast Off can apparently become a huge troop-carrying shuttle, Astrotrain-style. Animation error, bad scripting, or little-used ability? You alone can choose!
  • This isn't the first time that Wheelie has almost been done in by a swarm of little flying brown alien creatures on some desolate rock.

Characters in this episode

Full roster →
Ultra Magnus
Wheelie

Screencaps

6 stills
Surprise Party screencap 1Surprise Party screencap 2Surprise Party screencap 3Surprise Party screencap 4Surprise Party screencap 5Surprise Party screencap 6

Screencaps via TFWiki (Teletraan I), used under fan-archive fair use.

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