Optimus Prime meets the Mercenaries in first trailer for Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy - Earthrise

Netflix's Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy is about to enter its second chapter. After Siege introduced fans to this updated origin story of Autobots and Decepticons, Earthrise looks to head to a familiar battleground for Optimus Prime (Jake Foushee) and Megatron (Jason Marnocha) — though there will be plenty of new characters cropping up this time around. Fans can meet some in the first teaser for Earthrise.

Ahead of the final chapter, Kingdom, Earthrise is showcasing some of the fallout from an Allspark-less, dying Cybertron. When SYFY WIRE spoke to the Trilogy's showrunner, F.J. DeSanto, he teased that the second season would include something like space pirates. "It's rare that I get to make a Captain Harlock reference," DeSanto said. "That'll make sense in the second season." That'd be the Mercenaries, whom Optimus Prime meets in the first footage.

Take a look:

"There are no factions out here," the merc says as the camera zooms out to show the wasteland that Optimus and team are lost in. Just as intense as the first season, this footage looks as dramatic and fun as fans have become accustomed to. Now if only they added a really '80s soundtrack ...

As for what's next, DeSanto explained that it's all about the storytelling logic. "What I'm excited about is that we knew from the very beginning, almost two years ago, that Kingdom was going to be the third chapter," DeSanto said. "We spent a lot of time developing the trilogy as a whole, so what I'm excited about is people trying to figure out how we get to Kingdom. Siege to Earthrise to Kingdom: It's three chapters of a trilogy, but they're distinctly different even though they tell one large story."

Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy - Earthrise does not yet have a release date.