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Shipping Manifesto II: Megatron/Optimus
On to the second shipping manifesto!
I don't write Megatron/Optimus nearly as often as I write Megatron/Starscream. But I ship them. Hard. I write them less often not because I'm less interested, but because they're difficult to write. Optimus? Is tough for me. I'm good at bad guys. Good guys I'm never sure I'm getting right.
But I ship these guys like burning.
Recent continuities have given us all kinds of shipping fuel here. Starting with Transformers: Exodus and continuing through Transformers: Prime, Optimus and Megatron are presented as having once been on the same side. Megatron starts a revolution, and the idealistic Orion Pax (the guy who ultimately becomes Optimus Prime, for anyone unfamiliar) gets swept up in it, wanting a better Cybertron. It's only when Megatron grows bitter because Orion Pax is deemed the better leader that they break from one another and their close friendship becomes a bitter civil war. If that's not easily made shippy, I don't fucking know what is. :-)
And there's earlier precedent for that, too. Way back in G1, we see a young Orion Pax dazzled by "these new flying robots" (the Decepticons) and flustered and in awe when he meets their leader, Megatron. In that episode, Orion doesn't know that Megatron is evil until Megatron reveals his true intentions and tries to kill him, and that's how the war starts. But we still see that earlier worshipful adoration that is then poisoned by the revelation that hey, this awesome dude I totes had my eye on is evil. Scrap!
But it wasn't all this obvious stuff that made me ship them. It was a friend who shipped them, and who eventually convinced me of the awesome.
How'd she do that? After all, without all the backstory that newer fans have that makes them former besties, why ship them?
Megatron's the easy one here. Megatron is the leader of a faction that, as I see them, are basically pop-Nietzscheans. The strong rule and the weak either perish or serve. This is the order of things. The Decepticons are strong, powerful warriors who will stop at nothing to conquer. Those they want to subjugate are perfectly within their rights to fight back -- but if the Decepticons win, well, tough for our noble but weaker civilization.
(Caveat here: I do think this allows for many kinds of strength and weakness. A physically weak being may be intelligent, clever, or ruthless and offset its limitations. A physically strong being may be too stupid, naive, or ignorant to hang on to power by brute force alone. I don't think the most successful 'Cons are necessarily the most physically imposing ones.)
Which means that Megatron respects power where he finds it. I think he even has some respect for the strongest of those who do or would lose to him: you almost made it. He disdains and despises weakness (except in that I think he would approve of a weak being who struggled to become stronger, whether motivated by ambition or for the desire for revenge. That would make sense to him and he would respect it. Even if the motive were revenge against him.)
And although Optimus Prime's values make absolutely zero sense to Megatron, OP is nothing if not strong. OP is, in fact, the only thing strong enough to stand in his way.
He likes that. Hates the impediment and wishes OP would get the fuck out of the way already, but loves the feeling of finally encountering not just an almost-as-powerful (like Starscream, who he also has the mad hots for IMO, but in a different way), but a true equal.
He hates the idea that someone's as strong as he is, but yet is irresistibly drawn to it anyway. He's torn between wanting victory over that competing strength and never wanting to lose the rare treasure of someone else who actually measures up.
Optimus, for his part, is drawn to Megatron because Megatron is the only one he knows who can understand the burden of his strength. OP is a caring and honorable leader who hates to see his faithful followers hurt, damaged, pained, or deactivated, especially while serving him. And yet he leads his faction in a long, drawn-out, horrible war where they are all light-years from home. This makes him sad and deeply lonely. And while the Autobots care for him every bit as much as he does for them, they don't truly understand. They look up to him and have faith that he's the one who'll make everything all right. That faith honors and strengthens him, and yes, I'm sure he does confide in some of them sometimes. But no one else really knows what it's like.
I do think that Megatron, as I see him, does sometimes feel the burden of the crown. Yes, he's a villain, yes, he's evil, yes, he's a megalomaniac. But by his own value system, he's a mech alone. The mech closest to him in rank, Starscream, is always scheming to depose him, and even at the best of times is a seething roil of petulant and angry emotion. His most loyal lieutenant (Soundwave and in some continuities Shockwave) is cold and stoic and not someone he could confide in about feeling burdened.
That leaves Optimus.
I said in my previous manifesto that I see Megatron as Order + Evil and Starscream as Chaos + Evil. Megatron and Optimus are also opposites, but on a different axis. Megatron = Order + Evil. Optimus = Order + Good.
Just as I see Megatron and Starscream as relating deeply to one another on one level (their villainy/commitment to the Decepticon way of life) and opposites on another, Optimus and Megatron are diametrically opposed in one sense but deeply relate to one another in another sense. This creates, for me, a push and pull of attraction and repulsion that makes for both dramatic and erotic (since we're granting that the giant robots have some form of sex here) tension.
I love this ship because they can fuck wildly, talk philosophy, argue, and start all over again. I love it for the ways they can find common ground in one moment and be completely appalled by one another in the next.
I also love it because there's a part of me that has some very dark fantasies about corrupting innocence. I love the idea that Megatron is erotically obsessed with the idea of seeing Optimus's goodness break and turning him either into a Decepticon or at least into his little toy. I love the idea that he'll never totally manage it, because Optimus is every bit as secure in who he is as Megatron is. I love that Megatron knows this and gets off to trying anyway.
The one thing that's difficult about this ship is realistically bringing them together. It's easier with canon where they once were "brothers", partners in a revolution, close friends, etc. But this part does have to be handled with care for fear of silly.
And, as I mentioned, this is really hard for me at least to write to my own satisfaction. To really pull it off well, both characters have to be strong and vivid and different enough to truly be one another's equal and one another's match. That's hard.
But so, so fucking worth it when it works.
I don't write Megatron/Optimus nearly as often as I write Megatron/Starscream. But I ship them. Hard. I write them less often not because I'm less interested, but because they're difficult to write. Optimus? Is tough for me. I'm good at bad guys. Good guys I'm never sure I'm getting right.
But I ship these guys like burning.
Recent continuities have given us all kinds of shipping fuel here. Starting with Transformers: Exodus and continuing through Transformers: Prime, Optimus and Megatron are presented as having once been on the same side. Megatron starts a revolution, and the idealistic Orion Pax (the guy who ultimately becomes Optimus Prime, for anyone unfamiliar) gets swept up in it, wanting a better Cybertron. It's only when Megatron grows bitter because Orion Pax is deemed the better leader that they break from one another and their close friendship becomes a bitter civil war. If that's not easily made shippy, I don't fucking know what is. :-)
And there's earlier precedent for that, too. Way back in G1, we see a young Orion Pax dazzled by "these new flying robots" (the Decepticons) and flustered and in awe when he meets their leader, Megatron. In that episode, Orion doesn't know that Megatron is evil until Megatron reveals his true intentions and tries to kill him, and that's how the war starts. But we still see that earlier worshipful adoration that is then poisoned by the revelation that hey, this awesome dude I totes had my eye on is evil. Scrap!
But it wasn't all this obvious stuff that made me ship them. It was a friend who shipped them, and who eventually convinced me of the awesome.
How'd she do that? After all, without all the backstory that newer fans have that makes them former besties, why ship them?
Megatron's the easy one here. Megatron is the leader of a faction that, as I see them, are basically pop-Nietzscheans. The strong rule and the weak either perish or serve. This is the order of things. The Decepticons are strong, powerful warriors who will stop at nothing to conquer. Those they want to subjugate are perfectly within their rights to fight back -- but if the Decepticons win, well, tough for our noble but weaker civilization.
(Caveat here: I do think this allows for many kinds of strength and weakness. A physically weak being may be intelligent, clever, or ruthless and offset its limitations. A physically strong being may be too stupid, naive, or ignorant to hang on to power by brute force alone. I don't think the most successful 'Cons are necessarily the most physically imposing ones.)
Which means that Megatron respects power where he finds it. I think he even has some respect for the strongest of those who do or would lose to him: you almost made it. He disdains and despises weakness (except in that I think he would approve of a weak being who struggled to become stronger, whether motivated by ambition or for the desire for revenge. That would make sense to him and he would respect it. Even if the motive were revenge against him.)
And although Optimus Prime's values make absolutely zero sense to Megatron, OP is nothing if not strong. OP is, in fact, the only thing strong enough to stand in his way.
He likes that. Hates the impediment and wishes OP would get the fuck out of the way already, but loves the feeling of finally encountering not just an almost-as-powerful (like Starscream, who he also has the mad hots for IMO, but in a different way), but a true equal.
He hates the idea that someone's as strong as he is, but yet is irresistibly drawn to it anyway. He's torn between wanting victory over that competing strength and never wanting to lose the rare treasure of someone else who actually measures up.
Optimus, for his part, is drawn to Megatron because Megatron is the only one he knows who can understand the burden of his strength. OP is a caring and honorable leader who hates to see his faithful followers hurt, damaged, pained, or deactivated, especially while serving him. And yet he leads his faction in a long, drawn-out, horrible war where they are all light-years from home. This makes him sad and deeply lonely. And while the Autobots care for him every bit as much as he does for them, they don't truly understand. They look up to him and have faith that he's the one who'll make everything all right. That faith honors and strengthens him, and yes, I'm sure he does confide in some of them sometimes. But no one else really knows what it's like.
I do think that Megatron, as I see him, does sometimes feel the burden of the crown. Yes, he's a villain, yes, he's evil, yes, he's a megalomaniac. But by his own value system, he's a mech alone. The mech closest to him in rank, Starscream, is always scheming to depose him, and even at the best of times is a seething roil of petulant and angry emotion. His most loyal lieutenant (Soundwave and in some continuities Shockwave) is cold and stoic and not someone he could confide in about feeling burdened.
That leaves Optimus.
I said in my previous manifesto that I see Megatron as Order + Evil and Starscream as Chaos + Evil. Megatron and Optimus are also opposites, but on a different axis. Megatron = Order + Evil. Optimus = Order + Good.
Just as I see Megatron and Starscream as relating deeply to one another on one level (their villainy/commitment to the Decepticon way of life) and opposites on another, Optimus and Megatron are diametrically opposed in one sense but deeply relate to one another in another sense. This creates, for me, a push and pull of attraction and repulsion that makes for both dramatic and erotic (since we're granting that the giant robots have some form of sex here) tension.
I love this ship because they can fuck wildly, talk philosophy, argue, and start all over again. I love it for the ways they can find common ground in one moment and be completely appalled by one another in the next.
I also love it because there's a part of me that has some very dark fantasies about corrupting innocence. I love the idea that Megatron is erotically obsessed with the idea of seeing Optimus's goodness break and turning him either into a Decepticon or at least into his little toy. I love the idea that he'll never totally manage it, because Optimus is every bit as secure in who he is as Megatron is. I love that Megatron knows this and gets off to trying anyway.
The one thing that's difficult about this ship is realistically bringing them together. It's easier with canon where they once were "brothers", partners in a revolution, close friends, etc. But this part does have to be handled with care for fear of silly.
And, as I mentioned, this is really hard for me at least to write to my own satisfaction. To really pull it off well, both characters have to be strong and vivid and different enough to truly be one another's equal and one another's match. That's hard.
But so, so fucking worth it when it works.
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