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I remember there being an old interview from the 90's on a Transformers site that is no longer around with someone who worked on the original series and they said that there was not supposed to be a big time skip between season 2 and TF: The Movie. I guess from what I remember they said that it was supposed to be like Scramble City where they introduce Ultra Magnus, Blurr, Kup, Hot Rod, Springer, Arcee and possibly Metroplex into Season 3 which would have taken place right around the 80's. There was even an old commercial I saw once on a tape that was taped around 1986's and it mentioned Season 3 coming soon and showed animation of Ultra Magnus running and it was not from an episode or toy commercial. It is a shame that that isn't how it could have gone. It would have been nice seeing those characters come to Earth from Cybertron and see how everything fit just before the movie. They could have had it where it showed them building Autobot City and even things like Spike and Carly getting married and maybe Daniel being born. Not to mention see what happened to Sparkplug and Chip Chase. Kind of makes you wonder if they might have had Galvatron and Cyclonus and the Sweeps not be from the Seekers and Insecticons but separate characters that came from Cyberton to bolster Megatron's ranks on earth. Maybe they would have why the Decepticon's all went back to Cybertron. Anybody recall ever reading anything like that in regards to how Season 3 was originally going to be before them deciding to have it take place after the movie?

"Sleep Soundly Earth Creatures. Your Awakening Shall Be Rude!" Long Haul in Five Faces Of Darkness

I can't say I remember reading anything about that, however, I don't doubt there might have been alternate plans. Usually there are a lot of ideas thrown around before settling on what actually got produced.
I agree it would have been cool to see what some of those season 3 characters were up to before the movie. Victor Carloi's narration at the end of the season 3 episodes says that the Autobots were rejoined by friends from across the galaxy. It's likely Magnus, Hot Rod, Springer, Arcee, Kup, Blurr, and Sky Lynx were fighting the war off planet already and/or searching for other sources of energy for the war effort. Optimus re-established contact with them and recalls them to look after earth so he can focus on taking Cybertron back. It would have been interesting to see what happened to Elita's resistance group, if Megatron had them hunted down or they simply disappeared deeper into Cybertron.
I also figured that whenever new characters showed up seemingly from no where in season 2, that they simply came Cybertron. We know Omega Supreme had been on Cybertron since he was the guardian of Crystal City. It's likely Perceptor, Blaster, etc. were called to Earth after keeping the fight going at home (as in the Marvel comic). In the cartoon, Shockwave is loyal to Megatron and thus would have sent him whatever troops he needed, which explains the Coneheads and Triple Changers showing up.
It might have been cool to see Spike and Carly get married. I'm not sure they would have shown Daniel's birth in an 80's cartoon though.

I imagine another reason for the time skip was that the Decepticons make massive gains and Autobots lose a lot of ground. Skipping over that means they don't have to explain in detail, how the largely ineffectual Season 1 & 2 Decepticons suddenly got a lot better.

The Mandela effect is A very strange phenomenon

LongHaul* wrote:I remember there being an old interview from the 90's on a Transformers site that is no longer around with someone who worked on the original series and they said that there was not supposed to be a big time skip between season 2 and TF: The Movie. I guess from what I remember they said that it was supposed to be like Scramble City where they introduce Ultra Magnus, Blurr, Kup, Hot Rod, Springer, Arcee and possibly Metroplex into Season 3 which would have taken place right around the 80's.

Forgive me if this sounds pushy but I believe you might be remembering either some fanfiction or something one of the writers may have been contemplating at the time

Like wise....

There was even an old commercial I saw once on a tape that was taped around 1986's and it mentioned Season 3 coming soon and showed animation of Ultra Magnus running and it was not from an episode or toy commercial.

..... I doubt very much that this exists in any form resembling your description or from a time before the choice to jump 20 years was finalized

My guess is your remembering something from a later date/years later

Kind of makes you wonder if they might have had Galvatron and Cyclonus and the Sweeps not be from the Seekers and Insecticons but separate characters that came from Cyberton to bolster Megatron's ranks on earth.

while the very early film drafts had Cyclonus,Scourge & the Sweeps being created by the souls (Life Sparks .Yes first mention of Sparks) of Ancient Decepticons given new life by Unicron

Galvatron was always intended to be a Resurrected Megatron

LongHaul* wrote:IAnybody recall ever reading anything like that in regards to how Season 3 was originally going to be before them deciding to have it take place after the movie?

I don’t like to speak in absolutes but the likelihood that you’re remembering this very accurately is not high ,but given the known facts about the production dates and the concept workings going into the films characters and toys, I doubt it was something that was considered very long

Additionally, I know you say your memory isn't referring to the commercials, but there were multiple Toy commercials featuring Ultra Magnus "running" around as you say. (using better animation, but still very much the same animation style of the show)

Also it only added to the confusion since Frank Welker (in his Megatron voice) narrated the Galvatron toy commercial speaking of him as his "City Commander". This was obviously not to spoil TF:TM, but it was a bit misleading.

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I imagine another reason for the time skip was that the Decepticons make massive gains and Autobots lose a lot of ground. Skipping over that means they don't have to explain in detail, how the largely ineffectual Season 1 & 2 Decepticons suddenly got a lot better.

I am pretty much certain the real world reason for the time jump was the choice from Hasbro to start designing new toys and move away from using the disclose back stock

Perhaps the change to 2005 was because the script needed a new boy (Daniel) for 'relatability reasons'. It takes time to establish a relationship (Spike and Carly), especially with a difficult Transformer war situation. Then it takes years more to raise a son. Still, 20 years seems a bit too long. I'm surprised that Carly was nowhere to be seen during the Movie. She wasn't even mentioned! What happened to her? Why wasn't she looking after Daniel while Spike was on Moonbase 2? She did reappear in season 3, though.

Since finding the original scrips, Sunbow has put them up and now we know that it was only meant to be 5 years, but as they reworked and reworked the script it changed to 20 years. Scramble City came up in the rewrites as well, and they kept the idea. If you haven't I'd check out the scrips it might help answer some of your questions.