I have long found Starscream to be the single most interesting
and multi-faceted character among the Transformers. Not my very favorite,
mind you, there's a difference - and while he certainly makes my top-five list by now, I must admit that at first I actively disliked him. Here was someone who was constantly trying to undermine the imminently qualified leader whom I thought very highly of, and under the rules of "my friend's enemy is my enemy," I had Starscream pegged early as a contemptible and power-hungry jerk. Fortunately I didn't shut my mind completely and dismiss him after that negative first impression, because if I had, I'd have missed out on what is perhaps the most fascinating interpersonal relationship in the entire Transformers mythology, far more engaging than any one-dimensional Decepticon/Autobot conflict simmering in the background.
If we look at the interactions between the two characters, a most
curious pattern emerges. They snap and snarl at each other. They insult each
other. They've even, on rare occasions, fired on and physically damaged
each other. But, when either one of them has had the opportunity to finish
the job and finally kill the other, they drew back. There was a line they
wouldn't cross, much as they claimed to despise one another.
Starscream, let's be honest, has done some pretty unforgivable
things to Megatron. At the top of the list would surely be shooting Nightbird
in the back, and his actions in "Starscream's Brigade" - but really it's an
ongoing barrage of trouble-making, mouthing-off, undermining of authority,
and generating additional distraction and tension that a commander fighting
a war could surely do without. It's baffling, if you think about it, that
Megatron has every single time forgiven him, when anyone else who acted
that way, would have been a pile of molten scrap after the second
warning. The question is, Why?
I've heard a good number of attempted explanations for the
continued tolerance between Starscream and Megatron, ranging from the
extreme "Starscream was once Megatron's lover" to the banal "the
characters couldn't be written out of the show as long as the toys were
still on the shelves." It's also often been suggested that Starscream's
flying skills were simply so exceptional and valuable that Megatron
couldn't afford to kill him, but I don't buy that for an instant. Starscream's
flying and battle skills are beyond question, but they hardly outweigh all
the problems he made, and threatened to make. A single Starscream
could be replaced by a few additional jets from Cybertron - not as
efficient, perhaps, but in the end equally functional. There's something
more personal at stake. Which leads me to a conclusion of my own,
one that I find no less likely than any of the others, given all the evidence.
Quite simply, my contention is that Starscream and Megatron
were once good friends. The episode that handed me the full-blown
realization of this, remains one of my favorites to this day: "War of
the Dinobots." As is typical of character-development for Decepticons,
it's the most fleeting of scenes, and you have to look sharp and listen
close, but there it is: at the end of the episode, where the meteorite is
about to explode, Starscream takes note of it and warns Megatron to
get out of the way. I'll repeat that again, because it's so significant:
rather than simply taking to the sky and leaving Megatron in the blast
range, Starscream warns him. It was at that point that something
clicked in my mind; there was more going on here, if you'll forgive
the cliché, than meets the eye.
And then there are all those odd little scenes and snippets:
Starscream's exuberant running commentary during the fight in
"Heavy Metal War," full of pride and admiration for Megatron's fighting
skills; "Divide and Conquer," where Starscream was honestly seeking
Megatron's approval for a mission well-led, and was clearly hurt upon
not receiving it ("Surely you wish to commend me for my efforts...?");
and numerous other examples.
I would guess that Starscream once idolized Megatron as "the
leader who could do no wrong," and Megatron was pleased with the
idealistic and highly skilled young warrior who so looked up to him,
and from that they built a companionship, a friendship, a mutual trust.
All of that has long since gotten buried in the endless cycle of verbal
attacks and counter-attacks and testing of boundaries and punishment
and ritualized forgiveness which we see on the show, but enticing glimpses
of it remain. We can only wonder what may have happened to destroy
the friendship that was once so firmly in place that neither wants to entirely
let it go. My suspicion is that even the best of commanders isn't unfailingly
perfect, and some drastic, inadvertent error on Megatron's part was such
a disillusion to Starscream that he felt compelled to "get even." And what
better way to get even, than to try to take from Megatron the one thing
that meant most to him, that was most closely tied to his identity - namely,
his command position? Nevertheless, when it came to actually putting a
gun to Megatron's head and pulling the trigger (he might easily have done
so near the beginning of "Starscream's Brigade," for instance), he couldn't
bring himself to do it.
How much of this "failure to finish the job", on both sides, was
conscious, and how much was subconscious, is open to question, of course.
For my part, I see Megatron as the more "enlightened" of the two, for all that
he surely feels betrayed by Starscream's turnabout, while Starscream seems
blindly caught in the grip of his own inner turmoil. Perhaps Starscream too
realizes somewhere within himself that Megatron is still trying to give him a
chance (Starscream could wallpaper his quarters with the number of "final
warnings" he's received!), but I don't believe he dares examine the notion
too closely. As a result he cannot clearly assess his situation - but the
subconscious forces tugging at him are too powerful to be totally invisible
to his team-mates.
I came to see Starscream as someone who had been terribly
wounded by his disillusionment, and as a result was lashing out at the rest
of the world and those around him - which of course made the situation
even worse for him. He'd painted himself into a corner. In a way he very
much wanted to be accepted and liked by the others, but his arrogant
and hostile behavior patterns had been so well established by now, that he
didn't know how to break the vicious circle, and feared that any attempt at
doing so, would look like weakness. So he watched the others share in
their companionship and hated them for it (notice that he was always most
hostile toward those whom Megatron thought especially highly of), because
underneath all his bristling he was excruciatingly lonely ... and maybe
Megatron was well aware of it, and maybe that's why he was forever
giving Starscream second chances. Because if Starscream were someday
to seek reconciliation, Megatron would almost certainly accept. Old friends
can't make up their differences if one of them is dead.
In the endless dance of internal tension and resolution between two
fascinating and strong-willed characters, it was ultimately the lack of conflict,
the reconciliations, the cooperations, the forgiveness, which far overshadowed
the superficial power struggle and made the interaction truly captivating. Most
intriguing of all, to me personally, is the notion of one day seeing those differences
settled, and it's this hope that keeps the Megatron/Starscream interaction
eternally mesmerizing.
--Raksha the Plumed Serpent
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