Pretender to the Throne!

Since Optimus Prime's destruction, Ethan Zachary has been using the copy of Prime's mind he had saved on a floppy disk at that time to play video games. Although Prime is sentient and able to converse with Zachary, he believes himself to be nothing more than a computer game character.

In an attempt to convince Optimus Prime that he is more than this, Zachary tries to phone Buster Witwicky, but ends up talking to his father, Sparkplug. Embittered by recent events,^[1] Sparkplug rants at Zachary, then hangs up.

Fortunately, Spike Witwicky bugged his old man's apartment and overhears the mention of Optimus Prime. He, Goldbug, and Brainstorm, on board the Steelhaven, discuss the possibility that Prime might be alive, and Goldbug travels to Earth to investigate. Goldbug traces the phone call to Alternate Reality, Inc., Zachary's computer game company.

Nobody will connect the giant alien monsters with the giant alien robots! Heck, we'll practically be invisible!

Zachary and Goldbug meet, compare notes, and surmise that sending Optimus Prime on a mission might help him understand that he is more than a program. They send Prime into the computer of a genetics lab that has been seized by the Decepticons. There, Optimus learns about the experiment by Headmaster Decepticon leader Scorponok to create the Pretenders. Copying the data from this experiment, Prime returns to Goldbug and Zachary, but his computerized presence does not go unnoticed. While Goldbug and Zachary transmit this data to the spacecraft above, thus creating Autobot Pretenders, the Decepticon Pretenders trace Prime back to Zachary's software company and launch an attack. The computerized Prime coordinates the Autobot Pretenders' successful defense of the company's headquarters, and the Decepticons are repulsed. However, this experience does nothing to convince Prime that he is a real, living robot.

Featured characters

(Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.)
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans	Nebulans	Others
Optimus Prime (2) Air Raid (5) Grapple (6) Hot Spot (7) Brainstorm (15) Fortress Maximus (16) Goldbug (17) Highbrow (18) Landmine (27) Cloudburst (28) Waverider (29) Groundbreaker (30) Sky High (31) Splashdown (32)	Scorponok (9) Mindwipe (10) Ratbat (13) Iguanus (21) Bomb-Burst (22) Submarauder (23) Skullgrin (24) Bugly (25) Finback (26)	Ethan Zachary (4) Carla (8) Buster Witwicky (11) Sparkplug Witwicky (12) Spike Witwicky (14)	Vorath (19) Zarak (20)	Mechabots (1) Bombasticons (3)

Quotes

"Maybe this will ring a bell..."
"Bell? I hear no such sound."

—Ethan puzzles Optimus Prime with idioms.

"OP?! You mean Optimus Prime?! That rusty pile of junk? Him and his transformer pals have been nothin' but trouble for me and my family!"

—Sparkplug has had it with these motherf@%$ing robots on his motherf@%$ing planet!

"Besides, if I die, you can always re-create me. Isn't that right?"

—Optimus Prime has no clue how meta he's being.

"Describe what you see, Bomb-Burst."
"A building with six humans guarding it."
"Cast them aside and enter the building!"
"But they're awfully big for humans."
"Idiot! That only means their cowardice is greater!"

—Scorponok and Bomb-Burst

"Could this be the same Optimus Prime of Autobot legend? What's he doing here?"

—Scorponok says what we're all thinking.

Notes

Artwork and technical errors

We won't even go into the issue of how these things can walk and stuff when they're completely hollow.

Page 6: Goldbug is missing his hood in panels 3 and 4.
Landmine's shell is drawn with multiple segments opening up to release his inner robot form. However, the opened sections are non-contiguous, meaning his robot limbs would have to detach in order for him to exit the shell.
In the 5th panel of the last page, Waverider (foreground) is colored like Cloudburst.

Continuity errors

The Autobots manage to replicate the innovative and unprecedented Pretender creation process really quickly–like, seemingly within hours or less.
Goldbug comments that he is well known for his optical prowess on page 9, but... he's in a brand-new, untested body, so how can he be sure it's still got the same special abilities? He even experiences an optical malfunction on page 25!
Goldbug claims to have seen Prime's body launched into the Earth's sun for burial. When the funeral bier is launched in "Funeral for a Friend!", Bumblebee/Goldbug is not listed among the Autobots present, presumably because he is still a pile of parts, due to events in G.I. Joe and the Transformers. (Although this problem doesn't apply to the UK printing, which didn't include the crossover.) Also, we learn later in the series that the bier was not launched into the sun in the first place.
The Autobots' plan is totally dumb–they run away for like 2 seconds, then turn around and fight. There's no springing of a trap, no tactical advantage, no anything apart from unveiling of the Pretender shell gimmick.

Continuity notes

A single panel of the empty, abandoned, and smoldering Mount St. Hilary marks our last visit to the spot in the series.
The computer game in which Prime fights includes the "Mechabots" as the good guys, the "Bombasticons" as the bad guys, and "Hyper-Fax" (or possibly "Hyperfax") as the land/city/planet that Prime fights to defend.
Goldbug's original body was destroyed by Triple-I in issue #37, and he was rescued by the Autobot Headmasters in issue #38.
Sparkplug flashes back to his troubles with the Autobots in issues #4, #37, and #39.
The Autobots and Decepticons that became Pretenders in this issue have apparently been part of Fortress Maximus and Scorponok's crews the whole time, keeping a very low profile.
Scorponok's mind gets uploaded into the computer system. How this works in conjunction with the Headmaster process is unclear.
Decepticon Pretenders display the ability to fly in their shells.
Virtual reality Optimus Prime transforms and drives around without his trailer (and Roller).
Within vintage Generation 1 fiction, this is one of very few cases of Scorponok being a maverick technological innovator. (He also seemed to spearhead the creation of the polymir bubbles in "Love and Steel!".) Writer Simon Furman would revisit this aspect of the character both in the 2005 IDW continuity and in the Regeneration One series.
With something more like a whimper than a bang, this issue marks the final appearance of RAAT; a few vehicles show up for half a page only to be slagged by the Decepticon Pretenders' weapons and by the time "The Human Factor!" rolls around they have been replaced by the Neo-Knights.

Real-life references

We briefly stop into Portland to check up on Sparkplug.

UK printing

Issue #162

Backup strips: Action Force - "The Battle of Springfield" and Combat Colin
Free Gift: Pretenders sticker
In Grim Grams, Grimlock attempts to explain why the Seacons exist if Transformers don't know about the existence of water and expounds on his extreme distaste for being called "Grimmy Babes".^[2]

Issue #163

Backup strips: Action Force - "The Battle of Springfield" and Combat Colin

Other trivia

This issue is one of the most obvious examples of Hasbro dictates getting in the way of the story, as twelve new characters are introduced for no other reason than to promote the latest batch of toys (which began hitting shelves shortly after this issue was published.)
The solicitation for this issue on p5 of Marvel Age #61 makes interesting reading: "Transformers 40 Grimlock vs Fortress Maximus! It's a fight to the death on the moon for the leadership of the Autobots! But there may not be any Autobot to lead, for the Decepticons are launching the most savage attack ever! "S.R.O. (Slaying Room Only)" is written by Bob Budianski, pencilled by Jose Delbo and inked by Dave Hunt." That sounds awfully like the next issue "Totaled!". Was "Pretender to the Throne!" a late replacement for the intended story which was the printed in the next issue under a new title?
In this story, the Internet is portrayed as a series of tubes.

Bot Roster

Ark Autobots: 34 active, 6 bodyless Throttlebots, 11 in repair bay. (51 total)
Steelhaven Autobots: 28 active. (No change since narratively, the Pretenders were already present as unnamed, unseen background members of the crew.)
Ratbat's Decepticons: 32 active; 12 offline/missing (44 total)
Scorponok's Decepticons: 25 active.

Courtesy of my...

Finback attacks with a "grease blower" that dissolves the RAAT vehicles.
Skullgrin is very enthusiastic about his slagmaker.
Bomb-Burst is similarly proud of his slimeshooter.
Submarauder calls out his weapon's torpedo blasts.

Covers (3)

US issue #40 cover: Skullgrin and Bomb-Burst, by José Delbo and Dave Hunt.
UK issue #162 cover: Cloudburst emerging from his shell, by Jeff Anderson and David Elliott.
UK issue #163 cover: a variation of the US cover, by Lee Sullivan.

US issue #40 - Hey look, its THOSE GUYS who have been here the whole time HONEST!
UK issue #162 - Tutankhamun eat your heart out!
UK issue #163 - Thus starts the 'so WHICH way do they open?' debate

US

Captain Power toys - inside front cover
New England Comics - between pages 4 & 5
Olympic Sales Club - between pages 5 & 6
Marvel Super Hero Pins / Star Games - between pages 7 & 8
Marvel Super Mart - between pages 8 & 9
Sales Leadership Club - between pages 16 & 17
Sketchy ads - between pages 17 & 18
Bullpen Bulletins and checklist - between pages 19 & 20
Various comic distributors - between pages 20 & 21
Transmissions
Marvel subscription service
Konami NES video games posters - inside back cover
TSR Top Secret/S.I. RPG (back cover)

UK

????

Reprints

Transformers: Maximum Force TPB: Scorponok, a Targetmaster gun, the Steelhaven and half of Skullgrin's head, by Andrew Wildman.
Transformers: Maximum Force HC: Skullgrin, by Peter Snejbjerg.
Classic Transformers Volume 3: retro art from various interior issues.
The Transformers Classics, Vol. 4: Starscream, by Guido Guidi.
Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 11: The Legacy of Unicron: Wreck-Gar (from Dreamwave Productions' More than Meets the Eye profiles, by Don Figueroa, over an interior image of Unicron (from UK issue #148), by Dan Reed.

Transformers: Maximum Force TPB
(Titan Books, 2004)
Transformers: Maximum Force HC
(Titan Books, 2004)
Classic Transformers Volume 3
(IDW Publishing, 2009)
The Transformers Classics, Vol. 4
(IDW Publishing, 2012)
Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 11: The Legacy of Unicron
(Hachette Partworks, 2018)