by Bumblevivisector » Wed Jul 13, 2011 2:10 pm
As much as I remember every single TF I got for a birthday or Christmas (including all the Terrorcons I was missing in 1990, thanks to a D&C where time had apparently stood still for 3 years), and as euphoric as I was after seeing Transformers The Movie in the theater surprised the "s#!t" out of me (Optimus's death just made him an even greater leader as a memory to inspire future Autobots), what I've been most nostalgic for lately is the early days when TFs were just the strongest contenders in a sea of robot toys in the mid-80s. My mom would occasionally bring home a small carded one (I remember her buying me Cosmos because she said his bio was funny), though one of those Buddy L Bug Bots was just as likely, and almost as cool. When I was shopping with her, I naturally made sure that any toy she bought me was a TF, and I remember getting Warpath, Frenzy and Laserbeak, most of the Protectobots, Wideload, Battletrap, and Blot while out with her. Having most of the Mini-vehicles was cool because it gave Devastator opponents to really tower over without forced-perspective.
But the greatest trip was in the summer of '88. In some department store I saw Quickmix, and was surprised that he was small enough to be carded, as the only other -master figure I had was Skullcruncher. I guess I successfully argued that it made him a good bargain, because in addition to getting him, in a Toys'R'Us that same trip, I talked her into buying these weird new cassettes. Soundwave has always been my fav from the cartoon, so I was always frustrated that I couldn't find him or Blaster. Even without them to interact with though, the cassettes were probably my favorite part of G1, epitomizing my ideal of cramming complexity into the smallest, simplest design. 1988 was a good year for that with the Triggerbots/-cons, but I'd never heard of these red and blue cassettes that became vehicles(?!) and actually COMBINED! Slamdance became my favorite TF toy of all time; I know the bios say that Grandslam's arsenal is just defensive, and he and Raindance were mostly reporters, but Slamdance just looked so badass amongst the minibots, Throttlebots, and other cassettes, that his appearance spoke of being an under-appreciated Autobot warrior, able to waste cons 3 times his size. His archenemies Squalktalk and Beast Box soon followed and made worthy opponents, though Squalkbox looked like a robotic basketball player. The cartoon may have been gone, but 1988's awesome line made it seem like TF would just go on forever.
Then came 1989's line up, in which all TFs were either a little TOO tiny (though I still ended up with over half of all the Micromasters), or saddled with the clunkiest gimmick spawned the previous year. I knew the line was in trouble, and my optimism soon gave way to knowing that being a Transfan in the '90s would be about struggling to keep their memory alive. '91 was a pretty good Christmas though, what with my dog having puppies, a family friend giving me about half of all the US comics, and me receiving the final Micromasters and Action Masters my parents could find at Toy Liquidators, plus Horri-Bull from a Big Wheel store just before it went out of business; Fangry, from the same store, would become the last G1er I'd ever get outside of the secondary market the following Easter.
Though many argue the toyline went askew around the time of the movie, I've often wondered what might have been if it had evolved more naturally after the incredible variety that was '88, instead of diverting into just 3 overriding gimmicks until the end (I'm not bashing the later stuff, and I'm still happy with what I got out of it). I'd later learn the European line sort of got back to a similar aesthetic, but that was nothing compared to when I finally saw Victory: even if it was just for one more year before going all micronized like the US stuff, Japan had apparently made the 1989 line that I'd always wanted, and Star Saber, Victory Leo, Road Caesar, and especially LioKaiser became the only vintage foreign TFs that I've been willing to pay astronomical prices to get in their original packaging (I couldn't find Deathsaurus before prices shot even higher, and when you already have the Monster Pretenders, the Dino Force doesn't seem like as urgent a get. But someday...). When I bought all of those off Ebay in 2003, it was like finding some relic from the summer of '88 that I subconsciously sensed was there all along, without actually knowing it.
Okay, that was way too long for a non-story, but it's just what sprang to mind.