Rampage (Transformers)

Rampage is the name of 2 different fictional characters in the Transformers universes

Transformers: Generation 1
Rampage was a member of the Predacons, the other members being Razorclaw, Divebomb, Headstrong, and Tantrum. He can combine with them to form Predaking, becoming the right arm. His alternative form is a giant transmetal tiger.

His tech spec indicates that Rampage is little more than a raging psychpath, in a constant state of rage that leaves even the other Predacons afraid of him. Rather oddly, there is one way ofkeeping Rampage under control - he is mesmerised by mindless television entertainment.

Plans for a repaint of Energon Battle Ravage as a homage to Rampage for Botcon 2006 were never realized, but a hand painted prototype figure was made.

Animated series
The Predacons made their dramatic debut in the year 2005, as the Decepticon/Quintesson alliance began its attack on the Autobots on both Earth and Cybertron. With the Autobots Blurr and Wheelie and the human Marissa Faireborn stranded on Io, one of Jupiter's moons, while attempting to deliver the transformation cog that would allow the Autobot battle station, Metroplex, to transform and fight back, communications officer Blaster attempted to contact Cybertron for reinforcements, revealing his allies' plight. The transmission was intercepted by the Quintessons, however, and upon learning the location of the cog, they dispatched the Predacons to Io to ensure it would not reach Earth. After an initially poor showing in their individual robot and animal modes, the team merged to form Predaking, but were confronted by the massive Autobot Sky Lynx and bested, leading to an enmity between the two.

The Predacons were in their element for their first mission in 2006, operating in the wilds of the planet Dredd, where they again battled Sky Lynx and several other Autobots, but were defeated when they were buried in an avalanche created by the planet's native Chaos monster. Later, they participated in the invasion of Paradron, with Divebomb pursuing escapee Sandstorm and Razorclaw co-ordinating the shooting down of the Autobot reinforcement vessel he returned with.

What was perhaps the Predacons' most prominent adventure came when the Quintessons struck at the Transformers by animating the dreams of Daniel Witwicky. Having penetrated Cybertron's defenses for an unspecified mission, the Predacons attacked Rodimus Prime, Ultra Magnus and Springer, but when the whole group were then attacked by monsters conjured from Daniel's subconscious, the two groups were unwillingly thrust together to survive. Razorclaw and Springer were captured by a dragon and were forced to team up to defeat the creature and escape, while the others faced the threat of a giant Galvatron who injured Headstrong. With Daniel rescued, the damage sustained by Headstrong prevented the team from combining into Predaking, forcing them to flee.

While en route to Chaar at a later date, Predaking intercepted an unusual Quintesson signal and tracked it to a jungle planet, where they came upon a group of Autobots who had done the same and discovered an electronic journal recording Quintesson military transactions. The team merged into Predaking, who immediately targeted Sky Lynx among the group, seeking revenge for his past defeats; Sky Lynx out-manoeuvered the Decepticon, but, rather than best him in combat, had to get his fellow Autobots to safety. When the Decepticons then acquired the journal, Predaking was reluctant to retreat until having finished off Sky Lynx, but stood down in the face of Galvatron's wrath.

When the ancient genius Primacron unleashed his energy-absorbing creation, Tornedron, on the universe, Primacron's assistant sought to foil his former mentor by amassing a team of "Primitives" - Transformers with animal instincts that could hopefully thwart Primacron's complexities. The Predacons were among the Transformers summoned from a battle on Earth's moon to a dead world at the center of the universe, where Tornedron confronted them. Refusing to run from him, the Predacons formed Predaking and battled Tornedron, who took the shape of a giant warrior, absorbing all energy Predaking threw at them until he had been drained of life. Of all the Primitives, only Grimlock survived, and was subsequently able to stop Tornedron and Primacron, restoring the Predacons and the others to life.

After participating in the Decepticon attack on Japan, the Predacons were among the Transformers infected when the madness-inducing Hate Plague swept the universe. The animosity bred by the plague did not prevent the Predacons from combining into Predaking and pursuing the uncontaminated Galvatron, however, only to be forced to retreat by a squad of uninfected Autobots led by Optimus Prime. When Prime subsequently released the wisdom of the Matrix, the plague was cured.

Headmasters
The Predacons continued to put in short appearances in 1987's Japanese-exclusive spinoff series, Transformers: Headmasters, usually fighting alongside and against the other combiner teams in various battles. In 1990's Transformers: Zone, Predaking was one of the nine Deception generals in the service of the mysterious insectoid Violenjiger, and met his end when Autobot leader Dai Atlas cleaved his body in two (somewhat bizarrely revealing what appeared to be an organic brain within him).

Marvel Comics
Shortly after Optimus Prime perished in a virtual duel with Megatron. Megatron himself had begun to descend into paranoid insanity, and Shockwave summoned the Predacons back to Earth and had them pose as Autobots, planning to have them hunt Megatron as part of a scheme to once again seize command of the Decepticons from Megatron (the UK comic rewrote some of the dialogue in its reprint of this issue to make it appear as if it was the Predacons' second trip to Earth). The plan did not go smoothly, however, as Megatron defeated them all, even in their combined form of Predaking. Realizing that Shockwave was to blame, Megatron was about to kill him when he revealed that he had duplicated his mind to disc to guide the Predacons in their mission. Believing (accurately as it turned out) that this was how Optimus Prime had survived, Megatron apparently killed himself by blowing up the interdimensional spacebridge while standing on it. Shockwave was left as Decepticon commander, and the Predacons were absorbed into his Earth-based Decepticon army.

The Predacons and Constructicons were soon dispatched to collect rocket fuel and raw materials with which the Constructicons converted the Decepticons' island base into a spaceship. Not long after, the government organization the Intelligence and Information Institute (I.I.I.) captured a group of Autobots called the Throttlebots. In response to intensive Predacons raids ordered by Shockwave, I.I.I. publicly threatened to destroy the Throttlebots as a perceived ultimatum. Not realizing that their captives were in fact enemies of the attacking robots, they were forced to destroy their bodies as planned. Decepticon co-commander and fuel auditor Ratbat led the Predacons on a mission to inspect the corpses. Discovering that the Throttlebots brain modules had been placed in toy cars by Triple I's sympathetic operate, Walter Barnett, the Predacons pursued them, demolishing a mall in the process.

Later, when the treacherous Decepticon Starscream manipulated Ratbat's Decepticons in fighting the forces of Scorponok, the Predacons were at the forefront of battle, but when Starscream's scheming resulting in him acquiring the cosmic power of the interstellar databank, the Underbase, the Predacons aided in the defence of Tokyo, but were among the legions of Transformers deactivated by the villain.

The Predacons remained deactivated for the remainder of the U.S. series, until it was rejuvenated as Transformers: Generation 2 a short time later. Although the Predacon toys were not re-released for the Generation 2 toyline, the characters were functional again for the comic book series - although that did not last long for some of them. Tantrum was destroyed in a head-on collision with Optimus Prime, while Razorclaw - attempting to kill Decepticon-turned-Autobot Manta Ray - was destroyed by his fellow defector, Leadfoot.

Dreamwave Productions
Dreamwave Productions' 21st century re-imagining of the Generation 1 universe had little time to focus on the Predacons before the company's closure.

The five team members were once warlords on Cybertron who were cast into exile in space. Settling on Planet Beest, home of the Battle Beasts, the Predacons sank into a feral state, and lived as inhabitants of that world for untold years, until Megatron arrived. Having been jettisoned into space by Starscream and restored from the brink of death by Wreck-Gar, Megatron now had his sights set on reclaiming the Decepticon leadership, and required the Predacons to bolster his army. Abandoning his personal weaponry, Megatron pursued Razorclaw through the jungle and soundly defeated him. Subsequently, he re-engineered the Predacons to give them the ability to combine into Predaking.

Taking the Predacons to Cybertron, Megatron put Shockwave in his service again while the Predacons dealt with his Triple Changer minions; Razorclaw was forced to destroy the resistant Blitzwing. The group then headed to Earth to deal with Starscream, where Predaking defeated Bruticus. The players were now all assembled... but unfortunately, Dreamwave's bankruptcy and cessation of publication left future stories of the Predacons untold.

Devil's Due
The Predacons would return in the third Devil's Due crossover between G.I Joe and the Transformers. Without Megatron or Shockwave's steadying influence the Decepticons had fallen apart in a series of internecine conflicts. One such was the Predacons taking on the Seacons. The Predacons seemingly had the upper hand, merging into Predaking and knocking the Seacons into the water. The Seacons emerged as Piranacon and prepared to do battle, until interrupted by a strange, tiny figure: Serpentor, a human military cyborg built with Megatron's memories. Using these memories to convince both combiners to join him, they then participated(along with the Stunticons) in the ambush that killed Bumblebee. They were then Serpentor's principal weapon, along with Piranacon and Menasor, in the attack on Capital City, where the three of them defeated Omega Supreme. They were among the Decepticon reinforcements that countered the G.I. Joe/Autobot jailbreak, but Rampage was taken out by Grimlock. Razorclaw and Motormaster were the ones who stopped Prime's attack on Serpentor, beating him near death, but were then killed by the Cobra Commander-controlled Serpentor.

Beast Wars (1998)
Rampage was a Predacon from the Beast Wars Transformers universe.

The toy of Rampage was later repainted as Botcon exclusive Shockaract.

Animated series
The Transformer later known as Rampage was a former Maximal that was the test subject of the Maximal elders who sought to duplicate Starscream's immortal spark. They instead ended up with a powerful, psychotic creature who had a resilient, though not quite immortal spark. He had no name, and was referred to as Protoform X.

Although highly intelligent and articulate in speech, X degenerated into a murderous sadist who loved nothing more than death and destruction. Perhaps most terrifying of all, he is a self-admitted cannibal, calling the citizens of Colony Omnicron "tasty". Escaping his captors, X went on the rampage and cut a swathe across Cybertronian space. He completely annihilated Colony Omicron, earning the eternal hatred of the only survivor - the security officer Depth Charge. After years of destruction and mutilation Depth Charge finally captured X. However, the Elders, aware of his seemingly immortal spark, had him reduced to protoform stasis and charged Optimus Primal with dumping X on some lifeless rock. However, Megatron's theft of the Golden Disk forestalled this and X ended up jettisoned on prehistoric Earth.

Later awakened, X, with a new transmetal body with the alternate mode of a King Crab, awoke on Earth and went berserk, attacking everyone - Maximal or Predacon - he could find. He was eventually halted by Primal, Cheetor, Silverbolt and Blackarachnia. Megatron, however, forcibly recruited him by extracting half his Spark with an Energon blade.By keeping the removed portion in a box lined with energon needles, the Predacon leader could keep the formerly uncontrollable monster in line by crushing it whenever he disobeyed him, and thus tortured the rejected Maximal into becoming a Predacon. It was at this point that Megatron gave Protoform X the name Rampage - according to Megatron, an "honored name", a possible allusion to the Generation 1 character (and original Predacon) of the same name.

Rampage openly displayed hatred and contempt for all the other Predacons. He was insubordinate to Megatron whenever he could get away with it, and often threatened his fellows with torture, mutilation and cannibalism simply to unnerve them. When in battle he often threatened the same to the Maximals. He also had a tendency to slip into fits of manic laughter or lunatic battle rages, often roaring or snarling indistinctly in combat.

Although Rampage's love for pain, suffering, and fear is well known, many consider Rampage not to be inherently evil (unlike the Predacons) but to be a simply dark, disturbed, and lost Transformer who was shaped by the Maximals themselves (one of the numerous indications in Beast Wars that the Maximals, or at least the ruling elders, were not the "good guys" they appeared to be). When a misshapen protform became Transmutate, Rampage, knowing what it was like to be feared and rejected, claimed to understand her pain, and helped her to channel her rage and pain to hurting his enemies. However, he was opposed by Silverbolt, who was disgusted by Primal's willingness to possibly forcibly put her in stasis and wanted to help her. The two battled over Transmutate's fate, and, unable to stop her two friends battling over her, terminated herself. Surveying the wreckage, Rampage held her head in his hands, and let out an anguished cry, sinking him deeper into rage and hate.

Rampage went on to become one of the Maximals' most feared foes, with immense firepower and strength. Eventually his past caught up with him when Depth Charge arrived looking for him. Angered by the Elders' refusal to execute X, Depth Charge set out on his own to kill the beast and fell through the same transwarp tunnel that brought the Axalon to Earth. The two battled, with Rampage only escaping due to Quickstrike gunning down the enraged Maximal. Rampage would have the last laugh though, blasting Depth Charge's ship apart and stranding him on Earth. Depth Charge would later become obsessed with finishing the job. Later, Megatron used the extracted part of Rampage's spark to bring life to his Transmetal 2 clone of Dinobot. As a result, Dinobot was given the ability to hurt Rampage by squeezing their joined sparks, should he step out of line - as he often did.

Rampage met his end in the penultimate episode of Beast Wars, Nemesis Pt 1. Ordered to defend the Nemesis, Rampage again met Depth Charge, who had been ordered to destroy it. The two battled underwater for the last time, even dueling with shards of raw energon as swords. Pinned down by Depth Charge, Rampage unexpectedly dropped his guard and, laughing maniacally, allowed Depth Charge stab him right in the spark with a raw piece of energon. Rampage exploded, detonating the surrounding energon deposit, and killed Depth Charge in the process.

Last Words- I was your assignment and you failed.

Beast Wars Manga
In the Beast Wars Metals Manga on Bonbon magazine, Rampage was portrayed as a cannibalistic monster who attacked Optimus Primal, Airazor, and Rattrap when they investigated the vicinity of where his status pod was located. It was by luck, they managed to jettison him into space.

Transformers: Armada
Rampage is the Japanese name for the Decepticon character Wheeljack.