The Energon Pub

Tue Nov 04, 2014 10:42 pm

After an encouraging response on Twitter, I have begun a petition to Hasbro Studios President Stephen Davis to consider making a straight to DVD animated adaptation of Roche and Roberts' Last Stand of the Wreckers. DC puts out 18 Batman films a year, Hasbro could do one and make their money back! If you want non-Bay 'Bots on your screens, sign!

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/pro ... -film.html

News Credits: 226 · Tue Nov 04, 2014 11:10 pm

Saw the title and thought "hey good idea"

Read the post and though "hey good idea"

Got to the "If you want non-Bay 'Bots on your screens, sign!" bit and decided I just couldn't do it.

Sorry.

News Credits: 60 · Tue Nov 04, 2014 11:57 pm

For the young 'nes out there. Try looking for the original "Dirty Dozen" movies (iirc the 60 to the 70s versions only). Then convert them into 'bots and scream like a giddy fan...........that's what LSOTW would look like.

The 1986 Movie was "violent" enough and a lot of Parents were bellyaching. Despite a lot of goofy themes, the Japanese take on Headmasters, Masterforce and Victory (were not goofy), it showed a lot of wanton gratuitous violence that was relevant to the plot (Cobra's accidental death etc).

Try releasing one with such level would warrant a PG rating (which I'd like) but if it gets neutered to a G rating, well no thanks!

News Credits: 3 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 12:11 am

Why Last Stand of the Wreckers?

I ask because of the amount of set up it had in the comics, it drew on past events so much that as a stand alone story, I'm not seeing the angle.

News Credits: 60 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 12:59 am

ctrlfrequency

If you watched "Dirty Dozen", the grand daddy of all commando movies or better yet, kind of like the Trojan War with Odysseus (Springer?) sneaking into a fortified city , where a select group of military specialists fighting impossible odds.........of course all those interlocking flashbacks but then again, you need some back story to satisfy the readers no?

News Credits: 3 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 1:17 am

Despite my husbands love for it, I never could get into the Dirty Dozen.

In itself, the story would work fine, but (meant to have this in my earlier post) unless you are a reader of the comic books, certain points wouldn't make sense.
Like who Verity is and why she's flying around space with a bunch of bots (okay even those who read the comics don't know that last part)

Wed Nov 05, 2014 1:17 am

ctrlFrequency and fenrir72,

Like any adaptation I imagine there'd be a need to anchor it with some general public character recognition and some superfluous exposition - like Optimus Prime second guessing an order to send them in, and sharing some background with Bumblebee. The framework of the film could be structured to book end it as such so Hasbro can ensure it'll sell to a wider audience, but the core film and characters could stay intact.

My goal is to at least show Hasbro that there is a market and demographic that would invest in any similar production. If not LSOTW, maybe a Drift solo film, whatever. As long as it's geared slightly more to hard core fans then the movies and RID looks. There's a Transformers for everyone.

Burn,

Even if we'd want Bay, I doubt he'd do it. :KREMZEEK:

News Credits: 60 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 1:43 am

Yah, agree with the who the f*** is that Verity unless you've been familiar with the IDW Universe. Now, if by any chance, a project like this would be green lighted, we'd need to get things clear first.

1. Look of the series. Personally I'd like it to be G1. Style, 1986 Movie or Masterforce/Victory (hint hint, Japanese mecha anime style)

2. Characters: In their Bios I'd say Jazz (special ops), Blaster (com), Kup (the old guy type), UM or Prowl (the commanding stiffs), Whirl (the psycho), Springer ( kind of like Falcone to Duke), Arcee (sniper) or maybe take out Jazz and use Stepper as a sniper and Arcee as a bow wielder. Hubcap would make a great infiltration spy. Bumble bee is a spy but already exposed. CJ (the weapons nut) and Roadbuster as the heavy hitter guy

3. Plot (the 1st G.I. Joe comic by Marvel as a stepping stone, until a heavier plot could be introduced)

4. Level of Violence? Heavy Metal level or Dragon ball Z or Fist of Northstar level?

5. Someone gets terminated permanently?

Gigiddy!

News Credits: 1 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 4:46 am

I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

Wed Nov 05, 2014 3:53 pm

I'm all for it, an actual violent Transformers animated show/movie is what we've been lacking since the 1986 Movie.

They could write out a lot of the setup to the Last Stand of the Wreckers. I mean DC did it with Flashpoint and that came out really well, can't see how IDW wouldn't be able to do it.

News Credits: 1350 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 4:37 pm

RhA wrote:I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

Ditto, signatures mean nothing, as it's not a contract saying they would 100% buy it.

Plus if IDW and Hasbro did this route I would want them to go one of two ways, first, start at the beginning and animate all major storyarcs, editing were appropriate. The second, just give us the more then meets the eye series as an web series or put it on a streaming service like netflixs.

I also would point out that, given Hasbro's target audience, they would make any movie like this accessibile to them, so expect violence to be toned down.

Why make the point about bay-bots? Since the films started we've had Transformers Animated, Transformers: Prime and Transformers" Rescue Bots on tv.

News Credits: 60 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 5:38 pm

ZeroWolf wrote:
RhA wrote:I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

Ditto, signatures mean nothing, as it's not a contract saying they would 100% buy it.

Plus if IDW and Hasbro did this route I would want them to go one of two ways, first, start at the beginning and animate all major storyarcs, editing were appropriate. The second, just give us the more then meets the eye series as an web series or put it on a streaming service like netflixs.

I also would point out that, given Hasbro's target audience, they would make any movie like this accessibile to them, so expect violence to be toned down.

Why make the point about bay-bots? Since the films started we've had Transformers Animated, Transformers: Prime and Transformers" Rescue Bots on tv.

Maybe in Japan like Star saber? I'm assuming the petition on who the next MP would be was online, company initiated of course.

News Credits: 226 · Wed Nov 05, 2014 7:11 pm

Nemesis37 wrote:Burn,

Even if we'd want Bay, I doubt he'd do it.

I never said anything about Bay being involved. You took a completely un-necessary pot shot at him, and that, is enough for me to not support this petition.

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 1:58 am

Nemesis37 wrote:My goal is to at least show Hasbro that there is a market and demographic that would invest in any similar production. If not LSOTW, maybe a Drift solo film, whatever. As long as it's geared slightly more to hard core fans then the movies and RID looks. There's a Transformers for everyone.

Exactly. Why Hasbro hasn't done any direct to dvd things is beyond me. I mean, they are in the business of selling toys. And not every toy gets featured in the X-current show, for whatever reason. Remember this guy?

He was in a book, and I guess an online game, neither of which I'm interested in. So yeah, I passed said figure up. However, if they featured him in a direct to dvd movie, well at least I'd have some knowledge of the character and something to go by, a voice, a transformation sequence, a cool fight, etc. Thus my interest could be piqued, and I may have considered buying it.

There's also all those Bayverse characters. To be honest, they don't possess that much personality. A direct to video Prime style CGI side story movie would be a great way to enhance the universe and build on the characters seen in the films.

News Credits: 3 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 8:34 am

I agree Hasbro should be releasing some direct to video. Disney does that all the time and it works for them. I don't know if it saves money not releasing to theaters first, but it is a viable option if you already have the fan base, of course Transformers does. And the perfect place to get the stories from is from the comics, built in fans there too.

I can only speculate why they haven't yet. Maybe it's finding a distributor (though now in days it would be possible to do a direct download and by pass the DVD pressing and distribution). Maybe it's fear of self righteous parent groups complaining about violence (though I would think that with direct to video they could avoid some of that because they could target a more narrow, appropriate audience... but then, never under estimate the crazy parents).

Maybe it's a matter of copyright with IDW. I have no idea how those contracts work. Who has creative rights of the stories in the comics? That's a really good question, I'd love to know. If Hasbro simply licenses out the characters, they might have to buy the rights to use the stories. Copyright is so darn murky. Of course, part of the contract may be they also own the copyright to the stories about their characters as part of the image license.... it's very possible either way (if I were Hasbro, I'd have complete control over the IP).

Of course, for all I know it could be that Hasbro has a one track mind and really doesn't even entertain anything until something else is over (like the Bay Movies). Maybe it's financial, who knows.

After all my speculating... personally, I think they should just start at the beginning. Because of the potential of bringing in new fans to the comics from videos, just start at the beginning of the war and do a series. IDW has been trying to justify 30 years of broken storyline with their flashbacks and mini series, and even though we're in the middle of one of those now (Primacy)it will well long be over soon, this could be a chance to get everything plotted out and coherent. Doing every IDW storyline would be impossible, but they could reintroduce the history as it is written now in a linear timeline, then hit up some of the better mini series and sub plots that can sort of stand alone.

IDW has so much potential material sitting there, but if they started at the beginning it would help build the world for videos that followed (meaning more money, Hasbro!)... then someone entering in after a few videos were released (someone without any prior knowledge from the comics) would have something previously released to answer any questions rather than trying to take on the daunting task of the comics which may have a slightly different plot (as I'm not convinced you could directly pull any of the stories out of the comics without rewriting leaving out/adding in characters, changing parts of the story to fit without certain details being there already)

Thu Nov 06, 2014 3:23 pm

ZeroWolf wrote:
RhA wrote:I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

I also would point out that, given Hasbro's target audience, they would make any movie like this accessibile to them, so expect violence to be toned down.

Why make the point about bay-bots? Since the films started we've had Transformers Animated, Transformers: Prime and Transformers" Rescue Bots on tv.

I disagree, Gundam has made shows for kids like Gundam Age and G no Reconquista, but there is still a good amount of violence and death.

The problem is how parents overreact to **** like this, this is only a problem in the US. When I go to Greece they show DBZ and other anime Saturday morning without editing the language or violence, yet you don't see them shooting up schools. The same applies for Japan, Naruto was targeted at kids and that show has plenty of gory violence and death.

I would want IDW to do everything, only thing Hasbro needs to do is give the okay then stay the f*** away from it. But that will never happen sadly, a man can dream though! A Transformers movie/show with the IDW storyline and visuals that rival Fate/Zero and Gundam 00 would be absolutely epic.

Duke of Luns wrote:Exactly. Why Hasbro hasn't done any direct to dvd things is beyond me. I mean, they are in the business of selling toys. And not every toy gets featured in the X-current show, for whatever reason. Remember this guy?

He was in a book, and I guess an online game, neither of which I'm interested in. So yeah, I passed said figure up. However, if they featured him in a direct to dvd movie, well at least I'd have some knowledge of the character and something to go by, a voice, a transformation sequence, a cool fight, etc. Thus my interest could be piqued, and I may have considered buying it.

There's also all those Bayverse characters. To be honest, they don't possess that much personality. A direct to video Prime style CGI side story movie would be a great way to enhance the universe and build on the characters seen in the films.

This was a MAJOR problem with the Beast Wars toys that were produced as well. There were so many good looking Predacons and Maximals that I bought, hoping they'd be featured later on in the series, but nothing.

I agree with you on the Bayverse Transformer characters. I think the movies do a horrible job of explaining the characters and their backgrounds other than the first movie. Not sure why they deviated from this, I mean in the last movie the Autobot Helicopter guy dissapeared from the movie after they attacked the factory. It's a big red flag when I have to refer to someone as the "Autobot Helicopter Guy"..............

Thu Nov 06, 2014 3:27 pm

Sorry double posted, couldn't delete this post : /

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 4:04 pm

John Stamoist wrote:This was a MAJOR problem with the Beast Wars toys that were produced as well. There were so many good looking Predacons and Maximals that I bought, hoping they'd be featured later on in the series, but nothing.

That was mainly due to the limitations/cost of cgi at the time, or so the internet says. For example, Wolfang was supposed to be in the show, but it was too costly to produce a new model from the ground up, so they modified Cheetor into Tigertron. Probably why they went for Black Arachnia as well, though she doesn't look as much like a clone. Insecticon was supposed to be in the show as well, but dropped for unknown reasons.

But hey, a lot of the extraneous molds did show up(albeit in different colors sometimes) in Beast Wars II and Neo. Or, you could always read IDW's Beasts Wars: The Gathering and Beast Wars: The Ascending.

I agree with you on the Bayverse Transformer characters. I think the movies do a horrible job of explaining the characters and their backgrounds other than the first movie. Not sure why they deviated from this, I mean in the last movie the Autobot Helicopter guy dissapeared from the movie after they attacked the factory. It's a big red flag when I have to refer to someone as the "Autobot Helicopter Guy"..............

He actually didn't disappear. That's Drift. He's a random triple changer. They don't mention this, just briefly show it, and even then not in great detail.

Thu Nov 06, 2014 4:14 pm

Duke of Luns wrote:
But hey, a lot of the extraneous molds did show up(albeit in different colors sometimes) in Beast Wars II and Neo. Or, you could always read IDW's Beasts Wars: The Gathering and Beast Wars: The Ascending.

He actually didn't disappear. That's Drift. He's a random triple changer. They don't mention this, just briefly show it, and even then not in great detail.

Ahhh wasn't aware that IDW had a Beast Wars comic, going to be b**** to find that's for sure.

Drift was a triple changer in the movie? -_-
^A giant example of what's wrong with the movies. Character development is essential, not sure why they deviated from the model. This is minor compared to all the nameless "Decepticons" that have been in the past movies.

I think the best Transformers movie would be IDW in charge of the storyline and character development, and Bay be in charge of everything else. Epic action, with good storyline and awesome CGI to show off the Autobots/Decepticons.

News Credits: 1 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 5:07 pm

Ahhh wasn't aware that IDW had a Beast Wars comic, going to be b**** to find that's for sure.

I wouldn't think it would be too hard to find. It's several years old, and they only had two 4-issue mini-series, "The Gathering", and "The Ascending". Both have been collected into TPB's. It ties into established continuity, but doesn't focus on the characters featured in the show, instead focusing on characters like Razorbeast and Optimus Minor, and Beast Wars Neo baddie Magmatron.

However, being only eight issues all together they could only do so much, and "The Ascending" isn't quite as good as "The Gathering", though it is a proper ending. There should have been another mini series in between.

IDW also published a 4-issue "Beast Wars Sourcebook" profile book, which I've never read, and reports say it's pretty error ridden, both in text and coloring.

News Credits: 1350 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 5:10 pm

Yeah Japan is different when it comes to shows for kids. However like in other parts of the world there is a completely different culture dealing with whats kids entertainment. Though Japan is clamping down and turns out a lot of anime is broadcast at 2 a.m. In the morning.

I don't think IDW have the sway yet to do their own direct releases, they would be better asking for help...Maybe if their Locke and key adaptation that has been rumoured does well.

Remember DC does well because they are owned by Warner Bros. As to Hasbro haven't done it, they don't need to. They own tonnes of properties so that would be a lot of effort to make something like that themselves. Hence why it's easier for them for someone to come knocking for the licenses. Besides Hasbro already have vehicles to get transformers to kids, robots in disguise and rescue bots.

News Credits: 3 · Thu Nov 06, 2014 6:51 pm

Crosshairs was the triple changer.

John Stamoist wrote:
ZeroWolf wrote:
RhA wrote:I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

I also would point out that, given Hasbro's target audience, they would make any movie like this accessibile to them, so expect violence to be toned down.

Why make the point about bay-bots? Since the films started we've had Transformers Animated, Transformers: Prime and Transformers" Rescue Bots on tv.

I disagree, Gundam has made shows for kids like Gundam Age and G no Reconquista, but there is still a good amount of violence and death.

The problem is how parents overreact to **** like this, this is only a problem in the US. When I go to Greece they show DBZ and other anime Saturday morning without editing the language or violence, yet you don't see them shooting up schools. The same applies for Japan, Naruto was targeted at kids and that show has plenty of gory violence and death.

Don't even get me started on the American censors. Since the 90's it's been hell. I have never advocated the case for cutting out violence. If you want to stop kids from being violent? Teach them not to be, don't shelter them from it.

I have no problem letting my kids (6 and 4) watching even the Bay movies. Yes, they are violent. But we talked to the boys about it and told them what is acceptable (and the 6 year old is the one to worry about, he is always my potential problem child, but I get no reports from school that he's violent or aggressive.. they usually describe as sweet... and talkative). Showing by example and by explaining has worked for me so far.

News Credits: 1 · Fri Nov 07, 2014 12:09 am

ctrlFrequency wrote:Crosshairs was the triple changer.

Crosshairs is the green C7 Corvette Stingray(thank you tfwiki) voiced by John Dimmaggio.

Drift is the triple changer, though he has no triple changing toys, just two separate ones with different alt. modes. Granted his car mode is the most common of his six transformable toys, but he has a new mold one-step changer, and a voyager remolded from DOTM Skyhammer.

Now as for the violence topic, I really don't think it would be that much of an issue in a direct to dvd film. These are robotic alien life forms, you can get away with a lot of violence and weird imagery:

And of course Waspinator was dismembered on a regular basis.

As for on-human violence, provided there would be humans at all, you can show people getting hurt effectively without copious amounts of blood.

News Credits: 3 · Fri Nov 07, 2014 9:36 am

Seriously? I could have sworn the helicopter was green. My bad. I only watched the movie once though, and you know how it goes, I spent way too much time trying to figure out who was who that I wasn't paying enough attention to details, I guess

Edit:
Okay, I went back and watched the scene on Youtube. Time for a facepalm. How on earth did I get that wrong? So freaking obvious it's Drift and it got stuck in my head otherwise.

Fri Nov 07, 2014 12:53 pm

Burn wrote:Got to the "If you want non-Bay 'Bots on your screens, sign!" bit and decided I just couldn't do it.

Burn, I'm neither Michael Bay's staunchest supporter, nor his harshest critic. I know there's been alot of critcism heaped on Mr. Bay, both justified and unjustified, but I just didn't see it in Nemesis37's comment. He just said "non-Bay bots on screen". He didn't really state why. Just like Generations figures, or even Transformers Prime characters, aren't an afront on Mr. Bay's versions of characters, I don't think it was a pot shot at Michael Bay. However, don't get me started on how I think he should have portrayed the Wreckers of DotM. (Although, I enjoyed the forest fight of RotF) :grin:

"Transformers: Prime" did a better rendition of the Wreckers.

RhA wrote:I stand by my belief that internetpetitions do not work.

I know, RhA, but I took a leap of faith (again), and signed this one. "Transformers: Prime" kind of piqued my interest in Wreckers' lore.

Michael Bay probably wouldn't be interested - not in protest of this work, but because he's mostly working in the "Aligned Continuity", rather than the G1-esque setting for this story. However, if he did get involved, I would be behind it. He would ensure the grittiness of this story...

I'm on board with fenrir72, John Staomist, Duke of Luns, and anyone else in favor of some serious Wrecker's fighting. I've watched Scramble City, HeadMasters, MasterForce, and the early stages of Victory - I wouldn't mind if they went that route with animating this story. Also, DC's Flashpoint already showed that you could produce a PG-level DVD, and still get it to sell.

I think as long as their up-front about the TV rating, most reasonable parents don't mind. For example, "Transformers Prime" always clearly stated "TV-Y7" on it's title screen. I think they just don't like to be "surprised" with violence in a DVD...

Hmmm, could a serious retool of the Springer/Sandstorm Generations mold produced a viable Veyron/chopper Drift? I guess I can dream...