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Drift082111 wrote:I think Optimus and Megatron are the main perpetuating characters. They have helped to establish a great lore and I don't think there's any point in trying to establish 2 new factions into the future. I hope the story of Optimus and the Autobots vs. Megatron and the Decepticons will be told for generations. This comparison may be a bit off, but it'd almost be like trying to get used to the attempts I've witnessed with many newer comic book characters. I think it takes a certain amount of the right x-factor or indescribable quality to garner fandom and genuine love for such fictitious characters.

It could, in theory, work. Look at Star Trek: The Next Generation, that's often viewed as superior to the original series. It's just the first time it was tried with Transformers, it went horribly, due to the people in charge not realizing the impact it would have, and also the aforementioned animation decline.

Yeah maybe it could work at least on the comics it works, why not also on a TV series. Something I like to see once is in a TV show more in the past in the years from A3 or like the farest future (not Beast Wars) like the time where we can see after the Transformers TPB Chaos, when the new generations of the Autobots ask Ironhide and Alpha Trion more stories about the past, great stories about Optimus Prime. Something like that. That might be interesting as well.

Season 3 would have worked a lot better if the new characters had been introduced a while before all the old guys died.
Had they been around at the second half of season 2 and gradually received more and more screen time and character development the change would have been less shocking.

But yes, I would be up for a show without all the main cast, both sequel and side series type thing, as long as it's done well.
Kinda like in Beast Wars, where they would often reference the old stuff and gave a sense of mystical wondrous history to the whole thing.

I kinda think that's what Hasbro is going to do or at least plans to do with the new Aligned continuity, didn't they state that this continuity would last for at least 10 years? I'm hoping they gradually expand the cast and further the story so that if you look at the first episode and then the last it's like two completely different shows.

Burn wrote:Much like Rescue Bots. Only more violent.

I would love to watch a show about Transformers that aren't named Optimus Prime, Megatron, Starscream, Bumblebee, Ratchet, Soundwave, Arcee, et all. Even as much as I love TF Prime, the entire 2000s were filled with reboot after reboot that brought us new toys modeled and named after characters from an ever-aging 80s cartoon. I want to see a show about the guy who comes AFTER Optimus and Rodimus. Maybe several Primes later, to the point where the great Autobot/Decepticon war is the stuff of legend, and members of the two factions now coexist relatively peacefully. Maybe war could be rekindled by a rogue Cybertronian terrorist and members of both factions align both with and against him so you've got good guy 'bots and 'cons and bad guy 'bots and 'cons. They could come up with new unifying faction names to alleviate confusion, or they could ramp up the fact that you can't tell who fights for what just by what picture is on their shoulder like you could in the good old days. Or we could do splinter factions, or, or.....
There's a million creative possibilities that don't involve any (or many) of Hasbro's longstanding trademarked names.

That Bot wrote:Maybe several Primes later, to the point where the great Autobot/Decepticon war is the stuff of legend, and members of the two factions now coexist relatively peacefully. Maybe war could be rekindled by a rogue Cybertronian terrorist and members of both factions align both with and against him so you've got good guy 'bots and 'cons and bad guy 'bots and 'cons. They could come up with new unifying faction names to alleviate confusion, or they could ramp up the fact that you can't tell who fights for what just by what picture is on their shoulder like you could in the good old days. Or we could do splinter factions, or, or.....

That was actually the plot of Beast Wars. The Maximals and Predacons are actually at peace, and the one who takes the name Megatron is, along with his followers, actually a rogue faction. Even that part about having good guys rally to his cause is in there; any Predacons who weren't introduced in episode one were reprogrammed Maximal protoforms. As for bad guys on the good guys side, well, Dinobot and Blackarachnia took care of that, Dinobot even contemplates suicide because he can't figure out which side he should be fighting for. And then Tarantulas goes off on his own, so you have a splinter faction of a splinter faction.

That's the problem with any franchise that's lasted almost 30 years; anything you can think of, it's probably done before.

Man, I grew up on Beast Wars and I never even thought of it that way. Well, I'm thinking a bit before the Great Upgrade, when Autobots and Decepticons are still distinct, and they don't really trust each other. Sorta like how all the Maximals were wary of Dinobot, but they're all like that. And again, nobody's sure who's on whose side. That's something that has pretty much never happened. I figure there will be double agents and double-crossings and guys (like Tarantulus) with their own motivations independent of either side. I guess what I described is similar to Beast Wars but the way I'm imagining it, it's a lot less clear-cut. In BW you had the Maximals and the Predacons. Sure, at large they were at peace, but we only saw glimpses of Cybertronian life in their era, so we only knew the Predacons as the bad guys. And Beast Wars/Machines was 5 years of TV that happened once. Ever since then, it's been reboot reboot reboot Optimus Prime and his team of Autobots consisting of the yellow novice, the straight-laced medic, the big, tough guy, and Megatron and his devious lieutenant Starscream, his loyal sidekick, and his motley crew of assorted Decepticons who follow him more out of fear than anything. I want something different. I want somebody not named Optimus who doesn't act like an Optimus and a bad guy leader who has a different dynamic than being a slaughterhouse to anybody who doesn't follow him. If the Aligned continuity goes on for a while, I hope they explore that. They probably won't. Hasbro likes their trademarks.

I don't think that's even possible. It can't be "no one's sure who is on which side" for very long, at some point conflict has to happen and the lines are drawn. It's a war story, there's going to be fighting. You can have a couple sleeper agents here or there, but at some point they have to make themselves known.

I know I have said this time and time again, but ANIMATED.
I mean, yeah, it was OP and Megs. Yeah, it was Autobots vs Decepticons. BUT. It was fresh. Everything was different, and they had enough characters from every era of transformers to make the show go in a direction that no other series would have ever dare to tread. There was even a Beast Wars Cross G1 rythem starting to pick up.

But ROTF. For all of ROTF's shortcomings was it really worth it? I say NO.

I wish they would at least continue it in comic form. Continue it from the Stunticon Job. Have it explain everything, and continue the story even farther then animated ever intended to go. Art is cheaper than animation, right?