Spark Extractor

A Spark Extractor is a device that is used for pulling a Transformer's spark out of its mechanical body. This process can be accomplished even against the will of the target Transformer (as was, in fact, the norm). Once removed from its body, a Transformer's spark is more or less helpless.

When an extractor is near a Transformer and activated, even before the spark emerges, the Transformer often appears to be stunned or dazed such that they find it difficult to resist. The extraction itself is quite fast, taking well under thirty Earth-seconds in most cases. Extractors are therefore quite effective as weapons, requiring only that the victim be momentarily immobilized in order for the extractor to do its work.

3H comics
Spark extractor technology, of Cryotek's devising, fell into Megatron's hands when he returned to Cybertron from the Beast Wars and briefly worked with Cryotek.

Beast Machines cartoon
Spark extractors were used frequently, such as on Blackarachnia in several occasions. After interfacing with the Oracle, Megatron's own disembodied spark also had the ability to remove the sparks of living Transformers even without the technological aid of an extractor.

Prime cartoon
One of the class-A weapons confiscated from the Decepticons, the Spark Extractor was stored in the Iacon Vaults. When the Decepticons stormed Iacon, the Extractor was sent off-planet by Alpha Trion, and ended up on Earth. It remained buried until the Decepticons unearthed it many years later. Though Optimus Prime attempted to take it, Megatron threatened to trigger it, potentially extracting the spark of everyone present. As the Decepticon leader tried to return to his ship, Bumblebee stole the device from him and took it back to the Autobot base.

The Autobots attempted to deploy the Spark Extractor in an attack on the Decepticon warship, but the ship's newly-awakened intelligence put them all into stasis lock. Megatron ordered the ship to move closer so he could retrieve his weapon, only for the warship to change course instead. Jack later confirmed that the Spark Extractor was once again in storage back at the base, implying that the Autobots had recovered it.

When the Autobots were preparing to go to Cybertron, Smokescreen took the Spark Extractor from storage. During the later battle on Cybertron, he dropped the extractor in the middle of the Decepticon ranks, and it eliminated the Vehicons before Megatron impaled it with his Dark Star Saber.

IDW Generation 1 continuity
Spark extraction was developed by Mesothulas during the early days of the Great War as part of Prowl's efforts to contain prisoners of war. Mesothulas, unhappy with the technique, attempted to build the ultimate prison - the Noisemaze. When Prowl rebelled against his partner, the Noisemaze was forgotten and Spark extraction became the normal way of containing prisoners. Numerous criminals, both Autobot and Decepticon had their Sparks separated at Garrus-9.

Foreign names

 * Japanese: Spark Kyūin Sōchi (スパーク吸引装置 Supāku Kyūin Sōchi, "Spark Suction Device")