Transformers: Prime

Transformers: Prime is an animated television series which aired from 2010 to 2013. It is part of the Transformers franchise. Its plot is broadly the same as most Transformers series: the heroic Autobots, led by Optimus Prime, fight the evil Decepticons, led by Megatron. It's notable for being aimed at an older demographic than most Transformers series, and thus being distinctly darker; characters die frequently and often gorily, especially relative to earlier series. 
== Fandom ==
As of April 2014, Transformers: Prime is the most popular Transformers animated series on Archive of Our Own, with over 1100 fanworks. While Generation One has several times more works, it is a multi-media tag. Transformers: Prime does not have its own category on FanFiction.Net, so stories based on the Prime universe are typically posted in the Transformers: Beast Wars category. It does, however, have a World filter.
Much of the Transformers: Prime fandom is on Tumblr. Fanart, videos, and meta are all often posted there; fanfiction is more commonly posted elsewhere and linked. Askblogs are also popular. 
== Characters and Pairings ==
Megatron is the most popular character to write according to AO3's stats, and the most common pairing is Megatron/Starscream. The second most common character, Optimus Prime, is commonly paired with Ratchet, a pairing largely specific to this show and based on their canonical extremely close friendship. Another popular character is Knock Out, an original character to the show, who is notable because based on Word of God given during a panel at BotCon, Knock Out is one of the few canonically gay Transformers characters. A few paragraphs down. Accessed January 26, 2015.
== Continuity ==
Transformers: Prime is officially part of the same universe as the War for Cybertron and Fall of Cybertron video games, the Transformers: Exodus, Transformers: Exiles, and Transformers: Retribution novels, the 2012 animated series Transformers: Rescue Bots, and the 2015 sequel series Transformers: Robots in Disguise 2015. However, there are discrepancies and contradictions among the different media (see Transformers: Prime Continuity at the Transformers Wiki). The video games, novels, and other series are considered to be part of the Aligned universe, which Transformers: Prime is the core of, making it one of only two Transformers series to have an expanded universe (Generation One is the other). 
== Notable Transformers: Prime Fanworks == 
Steve
Due to budget concerns, Transformers: Prime features a small cast of individual characters and the Decepticon ranks were filled with countless identical Transformers who turned into either a black car or a jet, known as Vehicons and/or Eradicons. 
Steve is a fandom created character, invented by a number of fanfiction writers and fanartist. It became an inside joke among the fandom that one of the Vehicons was named St3v3, pronounced Steve. According to popular consensus, every time a Vehicon suffered a minor accident or Starscream struck or yelled at a Vehicon, that was Steve. Steve's other defining characteristic was that he was madly in love with Starscream.
Steve first began appearing in fan works in 2011 and saw a surge in popularity in 2012. A Vehicon was later canonically given the name Steve in a Robots in Disguise comic published in 2015. Many fans guessed it was a nod to the fan character.
== Resources ==
* Transformers: Prime fanworks at AO3
* Transformers: Prime fanworks at Fanfiction.net
== References ==
Category:Animation 
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