Phantom of the Sea

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"Phantom of the Sea"
Season	3
No. in season	4
Production company	Hasbro Studios
Airdate	November 15, 2014
Writer	Greg Johnson
Director	Nathan Chew
Animation studio	DHX Media Top Draw Animation
Watch this episode on YouTube

The Rescue Bots and the Burns family get on a ghost ship that emerges once every ten years.

Synopsis

A fog-shrouded night on Griffin Rock and most of the town's population is out on either the pier or the ferry, looking out to sea. With nothing much happening, the rescue team heads back to base, where Heatwave demands to know what's got the townsfolk so interested in a ship, but the others decide to leave it to Dani to explain, as she's the expert. While Dani goes to fetch her camera, Blades laments her strange compulsion to go ship hunting. Out on the sea, Doc Greene and Frankie are scanning from the floating lab when the S.S. Phantom Voyager appears. Back at the fire station, Dani explains the background of the Phantom Voyager — struck by lightning in 1915, this ocean liner vanished with only its captain aboard, and is said to reappear once every ten years. As the team rushes out to find the Phantom, Doc Greene spots someone at a porthole. The rescue team approaches on the Darby Ava, Dani in the middle of explaining that the ship's captain was to have wed Lillian, a Griffin Rock resident. As the distress call is still going, Dani and Cody fly over the ship in Blades, only for Blades to be snagged by a rope and the other three Bots board the ship with Kade and Graham to help. While they're getting Blades free, the energy around the ship spikes and it disappears.

Finding that the ship is hanging in a void, the team reasons that there must be a way to get the ship to return to reality, and split up to search. The Rescue Bots head down in the freight elevator and search the lower decks while the humans look around the upper decks. Dani is pleased to find the dining hall, Kade moreso, as there's still food there, though as he eats it, the others point out the food's a hundred years old. Hearing a thud, they move on. The Rescue Bots are searching the cargo hold when Blades spots the elusive Captain Ambrose, but when they give chase, they end up locked in the prow of the ship. The others reach the ballroom, where Ambrose reveals himself and demands to know why they've invaded his ship and where they got giant metal men. The rescue team explains about the fact that it's the future, shortly before another energy flare signals the ship's returned to reality.

The Rescue Bots manage to break out of their prison and join the other on the deck, where they spot Griffin Rock, but swiftly realize that if the ship is back in reality, then it must be ten years later. The Phantom abruptly collides with the Griffin Rock ferry, and a hi-tech helicopter piloted by Frankie and carrying Chief Burns and Doc Greene hovers into view. Accompanied by Ambrose, the rescue team swings into action to save the ferry passengers and stabilize the ferry itself. The rescue over, the team reunites with the Chief and Greenes, all three of them now ten years older. Doc Greene explains that from the readings he took during its previous appearance, the ship is emitting the same energies exhibited by the time machine they found under the lab, and Boulder recalls seeing something suspicious in the hold. Chief Burns agrees to let the team try to reverse the time machine rather than go home with him. As the helicopter lifts off, the ship disappears once again.

With the ship back in the void, the team finds the time machine in the hold, and Ambrose identifies it as the cargo of one Doctor Thaddeus Morocco. They soon realize that the lightning that struck the ship resulted in the time machine getting stuck in fast forward. They use some of Blades's spare energon to stabilize the machine and the ship reappears back in present day. Graham gives Ambrose instructions on operating the time machine, and the team disembarks before the Phantom Voyager disappears once again. Back at the fire station, Dani sounds the alarm so she can reveal that Ambrose made it back to 1915 and married Lillian. Kade tries to explain away an embarrassing squeal of excitement as him practicing for the next burping tournament, and Dani promptly shows him how it's done with a building-shaking burp.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"Someone who gets all 'EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!' about seeing a ship that's probably not even real."

—Graham defines a "shipper", caring not for your headcanons.

"Are we talking about the same Dani who came first place in the recent burping tournament?"
"Girl didn't even train for it."

—Chase and Kade

"(sighs) Lillian waited for him. Every 10 years, she would see the ship appear Just for a few moments."
"What a horrible story."

—Dani and Chase see the Phantom Voyager story very differently.

"OK, seriously, can we please get another flying Rescue Bot?"
"Let me in, Blades, or I'll dismantle you here and now."

—Blades and Dani

"Split up. We hit every aisle."
"Split up? Have you learned nothing from scary movies?"

—Heatwave orders a search of the cargo-hold, alarming the more genre-savvy Blades.

Notes

Continuity notes

• The time machine Doc Greene refers to was seen in "It's a Bot Time" and "Bot to the Future". As with this one, it was successfully powered with energon.

Transformers references

• (tbd)

Real-world references

• The story of the S.S. Phantom Voyager is a reference to the 1997 movie Titanic, including a tragic love story, a grand double staircase, and a flute melody in the episode's incidental music that should sound very familiar.
• A ship appearing as a ghostly apparition off the coast of a New England island strikes a similar parallel to an old prolific New England legend of the Palatine Light off the coast of Block Island in Rhode Island
• The whole "shipping" speech is obviously an affectionate nod to the brand's female fanbase, who have (mostly by themselves) created an impressive number of ships since Transformers was born. The famous fangirl "Eeeeeeeeee!" is even referenced.

Animation and technical errors

• (tbd)

Trivia

• Dani is a fangirl! Who knew?
• This episode apparently takes place in 2015, meaning that Season One took place in approximately 2013...thus setting the other Transformers series in the Aligned continuity family ahead by two or three years.
• Dani's impressive belch at the end was totally done by Maurice LaMarche.

Foreign localization

French

• Title: "Le vaisseau fantôme" ("The Ghost Ship")
• Original airdate: ?

Hungarian

• Title: "Az eltűnt hajó" ("The Lost Ship")
• Original airdate: 16 September 2016

Italian

• Title: "Il fantasma del mare" ("The ghost of the sea")
• Original airdate: 13 August 2017

Portuguese

• Title: "Fantasma do Mar" ("Phantom of the Sea")
• Original airdate: 1 June 2016 (Netflix)