Episode 9 of Transformers Prime was called convoy. The episode saw the introduction of the Human terrorist group called Mecha. The episode focused on the Autobots transporting a new power source for Agent Fowler across the US. Agent Fowler had been shot down by what he believed were the Decepticons. He requested theat the Autobots ground-bridge him and the volitile new power source to their intended destination, however Optimus Prime declined stating that it was too risky. Instead, the Autobot, Optimus Prime, Bulkhead, Bumblebee and Arcee, transported themselves to the agent's position, and transported the device in a trailer attached to Optimus Prime.
The episode saw the Autobot's remaing in vehicle mode much longer than they have done thus far, as they wanted to keep up their disguise in front of the Humans even though the terrorist group started to attack them. In the end, they were forced to revealed themselves only after a group of airbourne Eradicons attacked the Autobot Convoy on Starscream's orders.
During the chase, the Autobots had transferred the device into a train that, having now revealed themselves and become under attack from the Decepticons, was left under Human military guard. The Mecha group switched their focus from the Transformers back onto the train and with the Autobots pre-occupied, Ratchet was forced to Ground-Bridge both Jack and Miko onto the train whilst Raf once again hacked into another computer system.
There were some interesting moments in the show including hints that Jack may have feelings for Miko and the introduction of a bad Human element gives the writers another group with which they can fill the show. Once again Raf is shown to be better with a computer than Ratchet, though his laptop does get destroyed after he is discovered hacking into the train network. Its not shown how he would explain to his parents how come his laptop has literrally been blown up from an electrical feedback. Its nice to see the the vehicle mode renders being used a little more within this episode, and seeing Prime with a real trailer for the first time certainly adds to the look of his design. The designers decided to go with a sterotypical scarred villian being the head of the human terrorist group, which is more than a little cliche these days, but ah well. There are some nice little touches in this episiode, for instance whenever the human vehicles are disabled, flipped or crash, during the convoy chase, they make sure to show the audience that the drivers / passengers are all okay by leaving the shot on the vehicle and showing them moving or climbing out of doors. Its a nice touch to re-assure parents that they are not killing Humans characters and that the Autobots can disable their attackers without harming them. Towards the end of the episode when Jack and Miko are on the train having just been saved by Optimus Prime, Prime takes up most of the screen whilst Peter Cullen reads out his dialogue, but in the bottom right hand corner you can see Miko and Jack celebrating with Miko being enthusiastic with her body language and Jack being his uncomfortable / awkward self. They high-five and fist bump in what is a nice exchange that didn't really need to be added but is in keeping with their characters. I was also impressed that they decided to use a location that contained a lot of trees during some of the scenes, as I thought they would stick to desert and rocky locations as they are easier / cheaper to produce in CGI, but the trees and greenery actually come out quite nicely.
The Decepticons were not in the episode that much once again today, as is often the case with this show and its limited Decepticon past. One hopes that they did not decide to add in the Human group as a replacement and have the Decepticons play second fiddle for the next 5/10 episodes of filler before they decide to return to the main storyline and the Megatron returns angle.