Bumblebee, Autobot

Total pansy

by Dave McAwesome

Before all this politically correct jazz, my childhood friends and I used to call Bumblebee the gayest of the Autobots. We didn't mean 'gay' in the sexual sense, we meant 'gay' in the "oh my god how lame is this?" sense. Of course, that kind of chatter is frowned upon these days. The best we can do now is call Bumblebee a pansy.

I don't have a problem with the 70s-era Volkswagen Bug. It's a cute little car. Bumblebee is a scout or something, so it makes sense that he's small. I still hated him. Maybe it was the fact that the head of the toy was a flimsy flip-up tile that looked more like a smashed bit of aluminum foil than a robotic head with a positronic brain. The cartoon didn't help. He was a wuss. He was barely taller than his human buddy, Spike. I swear he shrunk as the series wore on. Suddenly, he wasn't even tall enough to dunk a basketball. Darwin would've greased this genetic scrap heap eons ago.