Bob Budiansky, the writer for the Marvel Comics series stated in an interview that the name "Megatron" is a portmanteau derived from "Megaton" and "Electronic". Originally Hasbro took issue with the name, saying it sounded too dangerous, like an atomic bomb. Budiansky responded that as the lead villain, that was the whole point. Hasbro saw his reasoning, and approved the name.
He would become his own character in the 1984 series. Wizard Magazine rated him the 68th greatest villain of all time.
Controversy
The Megatron toy has been seized by Customs in Sydney because it can be mistaken for a real weapon. Customs seized more than 50 MP-05 Masterpiece Megatron Transformers in inbound foreign mail. U.S. Customs has also forbidden imports of Masterpiece Megatron toys unless the boxes are opened by the seller and an orange muzzle cap is placed on the toy. Imports without the cap are liable to be seized by customs upon entry.
Personality
Megatron is very powerful and utterly ruthless. His imposing robot form is dominated by his primary weapon - his arm-mounted fusion cannon, capable of leveling a city block in one blast. During one episode of the first series, Megatron fell victim to his own weapon, when Autobot Brawn managed to get a hold of it and fired it at him.[citation needed] He can also sub-dimensionally link the weapon to a black hole, generating even more powerful antimatter blasts (capable of destroying a small planetary body).[citation needed] However, this ability is almost never used, as it leaves him extremely weak and vulnerable.
There have been several interpretations of his character; some see Megatron as a strategic leader who calls the shots from afar, whilst others see him as a tactical battlefield commander who leads by brutal example. Unlike many other villains in popular fiction, Megatron was not generally depicted as overly chaotic or insane (at first). He was highly aggressive and a megalomaniac, but there was usually a consistent rationale behind his actions, albeit that Megatron was often the only one who could perceive this.
There have been some sparing occasions where Megatron displays a personal sense of fair play and even honor, a complexity that is most evident in his complicated relationship with Optimus Prime. There is an unspoken mutual respect between the two leaders, born of each knowing the other better than anyone else. Megatron at times seems to derive enjoyment from the perpetual conflict that exists between them — the pleasure of ending the life of Optimus Prime will be Megatron's and Megatron's alone, and to ensure this, he has aided Prime in the face of greater threats, such as the Combaticons or Jhiaxus's second generation Cybertronians. In instances such as these, the two have come to face the fact that were it not for their diametrically opposed ideology and views, in another life, the two could be comrades — a fact that Optimus Prime views as a tragedy, but which provides Megatron with amusement.
Abilities
Originally, Megatron was able to transform into a Walther P38, delivering more focused energy blasts. He can shrink and reduce his mass as he transforms, assuming sizes that comfortably allow either another Transformer or even a human being to wield him. In one instance (the episode Dinobot S.O.S.), he retained his full size and connected to jet-mode Starscream's underside.
He has a secondary weapon barrel mounted on his back, and can retract and replace his right hand with an energy flail. He can fire electrical blasts from his hands, laser blasts from his eyes on at least one occasion (The Autobot Run) and can reprogram computers with a port in his head.
According to his original tech spec, Megatron has no known weaknesses. This does not, however, spare him from defeat at the hands of his enemies. For all his famed battle prowess and tactical ability, Megatron's complacent overconfidence often causes him to overlook some vital strategic detail. Also, he has a bad habit of ordering a retreat at the first sign that the tables have turned against his side in battle (even when the Decepticons still maintain the overall strategic advantage). Another factor that could contribute to his losses is his rough relationship with some of his own troops (most specifically Starscream). Despite his lust for galactic domination, one of Megatron's key priorities remains the safety and health of Cybertron; and from his viewpoint, the best way to accomplish that is for him to conquer it.
Marvel Comics
Megatron's beginnings are much simpler in the world of Marvel Comics — here, rising from his beginnings as a gladiator for the city-state of Tarn, Megatron and the Decepticons were the ones who developed transformation first, using it to begin the war against the Autobots, who fought back by mimicking the technology. Megatron is known to have competed with Sureshot and Optimus Prime in a sharpshooting competition some time in his past.
The war grew so fierce that Cybertron was shaken from its orbit and fell into the path of an asteroid cluster. Optimus Prime used his troops in the Ark to destroy the asteroids, but immediately afterward, Megatron and his troops attacked, forcing Optimus Prime to crash the Ark into prehistoric Earth. Four million years later, in 1984, the Transformers were reawakened, and Megatron was defeated twice by Prime.
That would be all the U.S. comics saw of Megatron for quite some time, but their sister title in the UK, which produced its own material, interspliced with the U.S. stories, soon brought back the great slag-maker for more adventures. Prior to Megatron's seeming death, there had been a story in Marvel UK #99 which after being attacked by the Predacons had seen both him and Prime transported to Cybertron. The disembodied local Decepticon leader, Lord Straxus, attempted to possess Megatron's body as his own had been mostly destroyed in a battle with Blaster. The attempt failed as Prime and Ultra Magnus defeated Megatron as the two minds warred for dominance. With the now insane Megatron threatening to destroy Polyhex with his antimatter powers, Ratbat teleported him back to Earth with amnesia in time for his U.S. "death" in issue #25.
However, unbeknown to all, Straxus made another attempt with a specially-crafted clone of Megatron created from a regular trooper, which was transported to Earth soon after the real Megatron vanished. The clone believed itself to be the real thing and after a battle with the mechanoid, Centurion, it was salvaged by Shockwave, who brainwashed the clone and unleashed it on Galvatron, a recreated future version of Megatron who had traveled back in time from the year 2006 and posed a threat to Shockwave's leadership. However, the clone and Galvatron teamed up to battle Autobots and Decepticons from both present and future in the apocalyptic "Time Wars". Subsequently, the clone returned to Cybertron, where it was confronted with the real Megatron — the Space bridge explosion had deposited him in the Dead End region of Cybertron. The clone subsequently destroyed itself to prevent Straxus, buried inside its mind, from taking over.
The stage was now set for Megatron's return in the U.S. comics, as he had his Micromaster Sports Car patrol capture the Autobot medic, Ratchet and forced him to recreate Starscream as a Pretender with his personality reprogrammed to serve Megatron without question. Ratchet did so, but also restored Grimlock, Jazz and Bumblebee as Pretenders in the same manner, as well as arranging for Starscream's old personality to resurface, thwarting Megatron's scheme. When Megatron then attempted to flee through a trans-time dimensional portal, Ratchet tackled him as his base then exploded around them, apparently killing them both. Soon after, The Ark was stolen by Shockwave and Starscream (as well as a stowaway Galvatron from a parallel universe. Megatron and Galvatron reunited. During their battle on board with Shockwave, the Ark crashed on Earth and supposedly killed everyone.
A few years later, the Transformers franchise was given a shot in the arm with the launch of the Generation 2 toy line and comic book series. To go along with his return to the toy line with a new M1A1 Abrams tank alternate mode, Megatron also returned in the comics despite his seeming demise. He collaborated with the terrorist organization Cobra to defeat Autobots. He also killed Bludgeon and entered an alliance with the Autobots to defeat Starscream, who had seized control of the Decepticon ship Warworld. The tale ended with the Autobots and Decepticons uniting.
Animated series
Megatron is a Decepticon, one of the lineal descendants of the military hardware robots created by the Quintessons on their factory world of Cybertron. Following a war between the Decepticons and the other robot race, the Autobots, the Decepticons were defeated by the Autobots' invention of transformation. The Autobot victory began the Golden Age of Cybertron, but the Decepticons too eventually developed transformation, leading to the creation of Megatron. Gathering a small number of troops together, Megatron killed the Autobot leader. However, the ancient Autobot, Alpha Trion reconstructed young robot Orion Pax into Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots as the war erupted again ("War Dawn"). The war drained Cybertron of most of its energy, necessitating that both factions seek out new worlds and new sources of power. Megatron and his forces attacked and boarded the Autobots' craft (the Ark in Beast Wars), causing it to crash on prehistoric Earth, entombing all on the ship in emergency stasis as it crashed into a dormant volcano. Over the following years, Megatron's schemes to obtain Earth's energies continued. Megatron even made a number of temporary alliances with the Autobots, although most of these alliances ended in double crosses.
Megatron conquered Cybertron by the Earth year 2005 in Transformers: The Movie. Megatron proceeded with an attack on Autobot City on Earth. Optimus Prime arrived there and confronted Megatron. Megatron mortally wounded Prime — but not before Prime delivered his own final blow to Megatron, fatally damaging him and forcing the Decepticons to flee. On the return trip to Cybertron, it became necessary to jettison excess mass. Wounded Decepticons were set adrift in space - including Megatron. The world-devourer Unicron offered him a new body and new troops in exchange for cooperation in destroying the Autobot Matrix of Leadership. Thus, Megatron is reformatted as Galvatron, while the rest of the wounded Deceptions were also recycled into Galvatron's new warriors. Megatron would later appear in flashbacks, during the season three episodes "Five Faces of Darkness" Part 4, and "The Return of Optimus Prime" Part 1.
Although this would be the end of Megatron in the U.S. animated series, he would make several more appearances in the animated segments of various Transformers toy commercials, where it was depicted that he became an Action Master, and eventually a CGI sequence of him in his first Generation 2 form and Combat Hero forms.
Megatron made a cameo in the pilot of the Transformers: Animated series on a historical video being viewed by Optimus Prime. This historical video was stock footage from the original animated series. He does not appear to be related to the Megatron who appears in this series though, and may not even have had the same name in the history of the Transformers: Animated universe.
Japanese Manga
In the Japanese exclusive manga stories accompanying Transformers: The Headmasters Megatron would make a number of appearances. On one occasion Galvatron used a massive army of Megatron clones to overwhelm the Autobots, only being defeated when Rodimus Prime destroyed Galvatron's control over them. Rodimus and Galvatron would also even team up to battle Guiltor, a hybrid of both Optimus Prime and Megatron.
With his transformation into Galvatron, Megatron departed from the Japanese G1 continuity (which took a different direction after the end of series 3, opting to replace the events of The Rebirth with those of Headmasters), until five years later, in the manga-exclusive storyline, Battlestars: The Return of Convoy, which, although not animated itself (told instead through one chapter of manga and color magazine spreads), continues the tale of the cartoon Universe.
In the previous Japanese-exclusive animated series, Transformers: The Headmasters, Galvatron had been apparently destroyed when he was buried on an iceberg. In the "Return of Convoy" storyline, a new evil force named Dark Nova recovers Galvatron's body, and restores him to life as Super Megatron (who transformed into a futuristic jet), pitting him against Star Convoy (the reborn Optimus Prime) and his Autobots.
Super Megatron subsequently gets an upgrade to Ultra Megatron, and for the final battle, merges with Dark Nova himself, becoming Star Giant. In the Japanese Generation 2 manga, he was shown to have survived and, in a body resembling his "Hero" toy, once again opposed Optimus Prime.
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