One Cut Megatron Backstory straight out of Gladiator

The first mention of Megatron as a former gladiator is in “Transformers Annual 1986”, part of the UK-exclusive issue of Transformers comics published by Marvel. The issue features a prose story by James Hill called State Games. Set on prehistoric Cybertron, this story features Optimus Prime and Megatron as rival gladiators. (Prime represents the nation-state of Jakan, while Megatron represents the city of Tarn.) After a civil war between Tarn and its rival city of Voss, Megatron unites the survivors against Jakan, fighting under his banner as Decepticons.

Simon Furman, who wrote most of Marvel’s Transformers comics, must have remembered State Games. In 2002, he wrote a new humorous miniseries, Transformers: Civil War, another Cybertron prequel where Megatron was a former gladiator. (“War Within” was drawn by Don Figueroa and published by the now defunct Dreamwave.)

The 2007 comic The Origins of Megatron (by Eric Holmes and Alex Milne) again featured Megatron as a gladiator, adding to the idea that he was a low-class miner before this. This added a new dimension to the Decepticons: their struggle was not only for conquest, but also for class revolution, especially since the Autobots were originally depicted as the police of Cybertron. How then did the Decepticons become imperialists and the Autobots become freedom fighters? It’s a contradiction I believe that only Transformers One has squared. (More on that soon.)

Due to the constant reboots by different creators, the first two decades of Transformers are quite scattered. It wasn’t until the 2010s that parent company Hasbro began streamlining, character names and designs would be used more consistently, and each new Transformers series would have the same basic lore of who created the Transformers, why the war started, etc.

The first cartoon of 2010 was “Transformers: Prime”. to bring many previously exclusive comics to animation, including Gladiator Megatron’s backstory. “Prime” Megatron (voiced again by OG Frank Welker) defeated the mob, leading the masses of the city-state of Kaon to revolutionize Cybertron’s oppressive caste system. Of course, nowadays he’s the same old warlord as before – because all revolutions are corrupt, right?!

In Transformers: Prime, Megatron was shown to be very proud of his roots. In the episode “Crossfire”, he is ambushed and locked in a makeshift arena opposite powerful insecticon. However, he triumphs and, decapitating the bug, roars, “Let this be a warning to anyone who dares cross Gladiator Kaon, be they Decepticon or Autobot!”

In the 2012 video game Transformers: Fall of Cybertron, Megatron once again finds himself in the gladiator pits, destroying the treacherous Decepticons led by the usurper Starscrum. Megatron can boast that he has already proven his worth as a leader in that very arena. “That day is long gone, Megatron,” Starscream smirks, to which Megatron replies, “That day will live forever!”