More Than Meets The Eye, Part 3

After a recap of what happened in the last two episodes, Optimus rolls all the way down a hill due to the explosion and all of the other Autobots gather around him. After putting him back on his wheels Optimus asks where Roller, the little car robot he sent out inside the mine, is and just then Roller returns to Optimus' trailer. Optimus then transforms and is okay, so the Autobots...
 

...start to remove the rock to find Bumblebee and Sparkplug who are trapped in the debris somewhere. After a while Jazz finds them both and gets them out. Since the Decepticons are dead, Optimus says that they can now resume their mission to find new energy sources and then return home to Cybertron, but before they can start their search again...
 

...but then there is another explosion behind them, and inside the now wrecked mine are the fully functioning Decepticons. The even better news for them is that all of the energon cubes they've made are undamaged so they can still use them, and with that they all fly out of the mine and head back to their base.
 

All the Autobots do is watch them escape and Ironhide, who is fed up of always letting the Decepticons win at everything, chases after them despite Optimus' protests. Bluestreak heads up after him too, but neither of them get to do much before Skywarp teleports behind them and blasts Ironhide out of the sky, meaning the Decepticons get away once again.
 

Ironhide lands in a river though and the Autobots head back to their ship to repair him. Later on Hound and Mirage have nothing to do but be evil dicks to Ravage and then Hound creates a hologram of Megatron for no real reason, and Mirage says that when they get back to Cybertron, he wants Hound to make him a hologram of a large house for him. This gives Hound an idea and he tells the other Autobots his plan: to make a hologram of something that will draw the Decepticons to them, and Optimus has an idea of what that something can be.
 

Hound then goes back to Mirage and tells him about a base nearby which has a lot of rocket fuel which they could use to make several trips to Cybertron, and then they both head off to tell Ironhide, but not before Hound on purposefully drops the key to Ravage's cage. Ravage then takes the key as they walk off and opens his cage, letting him run off before the Autobots can stop him. And then there is the part NOBODY understands:


"Ravage... he escaped."


"Perfect."


"OMFG PRIME WHY DID U SAY DAT???? (Even though we were supposed to let this happen)"
 

Ravage gets back to the other Decepticons and informs Megatron of this base with all the rocket fuel. Starscream then decides talk about how he should be leader and tries to shoot Megatron but his shot is blocked and he is put into his place by the Decepticon leader, who says that they'll attack the base at sunrise.
 

And the very next morning Megatron leads the Decepticons to the rocket base to start his assault... only to find all the Autobots there, including Windcharger^[1], in lab coats and ready to fight. The Decepticons start to attack but are quite quickly beaten down, and fall apart when hit. Realising that something is not right here, Optimus stops the Autobots and sees that Megatron is still standing up on a cliff.
 

Megatron reveals that he'd been onto Optimus' scheme from the start and with a little research, he found out where the real rocket base was and the real Decepticons are there right now attacking it. Megatron then flies off to join them and tells Optimus that he and the Autobots have lost, and soon arrives at the base where the Decepticons blow up all of the base's military hardware and then start to steal the energy.
 

Now that the Decepticons have gotten all of the energon they need to go back to Cybertron, the Autobots only have one option left: assault the Decepticon base and stop the enemy from escaping before it's too late. Every Autobot transforms and rolls out to the Decepticon base, where the Decepticons are about to board their new ship.
 

The Decepticons and Autobots fight each other, with the leaders of each side finally getting a proper one on one battle, complete with hilarious banter between the two.. Optimus soon manages to over power Megatron by throwing him to the floor, but...
 

...Ravage then pounces on him and knocks him down to the ground. Megatron then gives the order for all Decepticons to head to their new ship, and soon every Decepticon is onboard. The Autobots attempt to damage the ship with their weapons but it's too late as it blasts off, heading straight back to Cybertron, leaving Optimus no choice but to let out a really out-of-character scream.
 

Believing that it's now over and that they've lost, the Autobots pretty much give up but Optimus takes a desperate measure: he takes Sideswipe's rocket pack and despite warnings from Jazz saying that he'll never reach the Decepticons in time, he blasts off anyway... and then Megatron simply has one of the ship's guns shoot him out of the sky.
 

Optimus crash lands back on Earth but seems to be okay. But now, the Decepticons are gone and there is nothing the Autobots can do to stop them from returning to Cybertron. Sparkplug praises Optimus for heading out into space like that in the first place but Optimus isn't sure he put in enough effort to stop the Decepticons. Meanwhile the Decepticons are on their way back full throttle.
 

But Starscream once again decides he wants to be leader and points one of his null rays at Megatron. But Mirage then appears in the ship and quickly blasts a few control panels, which explode and the ship starts to lose power. Soundwave tries to stop the ship from going down but he can't, and soon the ship spins out of control and spirals back down to Earth.
 

Mirage gets shot by Starscream but has enough energy to pull himself back up again and then wishes the Decepticons a happy landing before jumping out of the ship. Megatron is not amused. The other Autobots see that the Decepticons are going to crash and watch as the ship plummets downwards and crashes straight into the sea.
 

Mirage then parachutes in and lands next to all of the other Autobots who congratulate him on stopping the Decepticons. Now that the Decepticons are (presumably) destroyed forever, the Autobots can repair their own ship, gather up energy supplies, and then return to Cybertron. Spike and Sparkplug want to tag along too.
 

The governments of the world have all agreed to give the Autobots the energy they need to head back home and soon the ship is repaired and ready to take off. Spike writes one last entry in his diary, saying that he's glad that they don't have to worry about the Decepticons any more, and then heads to the ship. But, the final scene of the episode reveals that the Decepticons are still alive and Megatron opens a hatch and swims out of the ship.

^[1]The reason I'm mentioning Windcharger here is because he never gets to do anything memorable in these opening three parts; heck, he isn't even called by name once. And he just seems to get beaten up otherwise.

Ravage also speaks properly in this episode when he tells Megatron about the rocket base; this is the only time in the American run of the series, though he does gain speech in Headmasters and can talk in Beast Wars. Hooray for retcons!

And I'll also mention here how Jazz seems to be the second in command in this pilot. I think it was just so Scatman Crothers had more lines to say.