Cheetor - Beast Wars

Beast Wars

Cheetor's original tech spec indicated he was a seasoned and confident warrior always in search of battle with the Predacons, seemingly in contrast to his youthful and impulsive portrayal in the original show. The tech spec released with his Tenth Anniversary Toy would be much more accurate to the show portrayal.

Cheetor is a speed freak and has a penchant for childishness. Everyone treats him like the rookie, which is appropriate, since he has been known to make brash decisions, like risking his life in an energon storm against Optimus' orders. Cheetor seems to have an affinity for Tigatron, as he is the only other with a feline beast mode, and Cheetor will often refer to him as "Big Cat", to which Tigatron would respond by calling him "Little Cat". An unusual trait of Cheetor's is his tendency to have somewhat-prophetic dreams from time to time, such as 'foretelling' Rhinox's words at the end of an episode, Tigatron and Airazor's return, Rattrap freeing him from a web, though where this talent comes from is unknown.

For the first half of the series, Cheetor idolizes Optimus Primal. He tries, with little success, to model himself after Optimus and gain his approval. He also commonly referred to Optimus as "Big Bot" (Optimus at one point calls Cheetor "little buddy"). He later begins to reject Optimus as a mentor after his second Transmetal change, which drove Cheetor to carve out his own identity within the group while still respecting Optimus as his leader; he also seemed to idolize Rhinox as well, willingly trusting Rhinox with his life to help Rhinox activate a new stasis pod. Cheetor had an unreciprocated love interest for Blackarachnia around the time of his second transformation. In pursuit of this, he conducted himself as he had in the beginning of the series with Optimus, by trying desperately to impress Blackarachnia and win her respect and admiration. He became jealous of Silverbolt for his relationship with Blackarachnia. His interest in Blackarachnia faded after she stated she was “sick of his stupid little crush”, although a later comment about how she was really something would seem to indicate that he still felt something for her. Cheetor's character was similar to that of a teenager in the early series, and that of a young adult in Beast Machines. He matures into one of the more competent and dependable Maximals outside of Optimus, becoming second-in-command and leading the team during Primal’s bouts of weakness, instability and over-reliance on the Oracle during the middle run of Beast Machines.