The Energon Pub

[D-Maximal_Primal]

Thanks to the Digital Fronts Conference, we now have a new sneak peak at Machinima's upcoming Combiner Wars Animated Series! Unfortunately, there is no video preview, but rather a pair of images showing off the scenery and the artwork design for the series. The Director will be Kenji Nakamura and the staff includes Eric Calderon, FJ Desanto, and George Krstic. Below you will find the information and pictures included in the sneak peak. The series will be coming in July.

Lastly but not leastly is passion platform Transformers, which you undoubtedly recognise if you were ever a child. There’s 10bn views of Transformers content on YouTube, not to mention four theatrical films, which saw $3.7bn in global revenues.

Machinima’s contribution to the canon, Transformers Combiner Wars, is 40 years removed from previous events. It’s a time of peace. Cybertron is ruled by a triumvirate … but an ancient technology has emerged, enabling a new threat to take the stage. As in the case of Robocops, there is no trailer we can share for this, but it was worked on by “some of the world’s leading creative minds”: Eric Calderon, FJ Desanto, and George Krstic. It is directed by Kenji Nakamura. License partners are welcome.

Here is some glorious artwork. This is the planet Cybertron, in which you get a sense of the filmlike cinematography (“This is not a children’s cartoon!” exclaimed Gutstein).

[o.supreme]

Umm...okay... mountainous terrain, and *seemingly* a body of water on Cybertron? it is definitely its own thing...or perhaps 40 years after BM ?

[Va'al]

Duuuuuuuuuude...

Purdy!

[D-Maximal_Primal]

It's gonna have some nice scenery to blow up won't it

[Sabrblade]

Looks more like comic book artwork than animation artwork.

[Deadput]

The dude who directed Mononoke is in this.


I have good hopes for this show.


Edit: Never mind just realized that it's not PRINCESS Mononoke that I was thinking about but some other tv show over there.

[Deadput]

Looks more like comic book artwork than animation artwork.

Concept art I would believe.

[Va'al]

Looks more like comic book artwork than animation artwork.

Concept art I would believe.

Not necessarily! Could also be cutscenes or promotional material.

[Deadput]

Not necessarily! Could also be cutscenes or promotional material.

That could very be the case as well!

Concept art was just the first thing that popped into my head thats all.

[RodimusRex]

Not necessarily! Could also be cutscenes or promotional material.

That could very be the case as well!

Concept art was just the first thing that popped into my head thats all.

They may also be pulling the Batman: The Animated Series style trick of using fully painted characters with limited animation for some close-ups or special shots. It CAN be a budget saving move but it's stylistically one of those things I like as a gimmick in traditional animation.

It does sound like this will be set in a nebulous post-G2, pre-Beast Wars continuity (albeit one where combiners may be a new thing). All I can say is that this may encourage me to pick up some figures and G2 reprolabels for my G2 shelf.

[RodimusRex]

As a side note: this could be an interesting way to work in the G2 store box sets if the G2 repaints are featured in flashbacks and the idea is that the characters dropped their G2 forms after the war.

[BERSEKAEL]

As long as they keep working on legion class I am happy. And g1 legion class even happier.

[Rainmaker]

Looks like RiD's animation, never really liked the animation in that show

[Sabrblade]

Looks like RiD's animation, never really liked the animation in that show

The animation of either RiD cartoon does not look like that.

[Rainmaker]

Looks like RiD's animation, never really liked the animation in that show

The animation of either RiD cartoon does not look like that.

What, I swear it does.

[Sabrblade]

Looks like RiD's animation, never really liked the animation in that show

The animation of either RiD cartoon does not look like that.

What, I swear it does.

It looks too grim and serious to be like the bright and cheery look of either of the RiD cartoons.

[no-one]

Those are some pretty snazzy images. I'd be proud to slap those on my trapper keeper or more realistically, my phone's background. Either way, gimme some high res version for DL

[Ultra Markus]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

[Sabrblade]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

Most likely it's just a nebulous Autobot/Decepticon war whose exact events are unimportant to expound upon, much like how Beast Wars and Animated each took place in a post-war setting.

[RodimusRex]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

Most likely it's just a nebulous Autobot/Decepticon war whose exact events are unimportant to expound upon, much like how Beast Wars and Animated each took place in a post-war setting.

The "rule by triumverate" sounds like Prowl, Ironhide, and Silverbolt, aka Magnaboss. I can't think of another example of three rulers sharing leadership of Cybertron, particularly in a setting 40 years after the great war and several years after the deaths of Optimus and Megatron.

My guess would be that the convention comic this last year was directed to lead into the Combiner Wars show, albeit VERY loosely. Not the same continuity but one parallel to it in some key ways.

[ZeroWolf]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

Most likely it's just a nebulous Autobot/Decepticon war whose exact events are unimportant to expound upon, much like how Beast Wars and Animated each took place in a post-war setting.

The "rule by triumverate" sounds like Prowl, Ironhide, and Silverbolt, aka Magnaboss. I can't think of another example of three rulers sharing leadership of Cybertron, particularly in a setting 40 years after the great war and several years after the deaths of Optimus and Megatron.

My guess would be that the convention comic this last year was directed to lead into the Combiner Wars show, albeit VERY loosely. Not the same continuity but one parallel to it in some key ways.

Actually the triumvirate is likely to be Starscream, Windblade and one other. Maybe bumblebee, unless they killed him off in this timeline as well. I highly doubt it will have anything to do with the comic from bot con as combiner tech has already been introduced there.

[RodimusRex]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

Most likely it's just a nebulous Autobot/Decepticon war whose exact events are unimportant to expound upon, much like how Beast Wars and Animated each took place in a post-war setting.

The "rule by triumverate" sounds like Prowl, Ironhide, and Silverbolt, aka Magnaboss. I can't think of another example of three rulers sharing leadership of Cybertron, particularly in a setting 40 years after the great war and several years after the deaths of Optimus and Megatron.

My guess would be that the convention comic this last year was directed to lead into the Combiner Wars show, albeit VERY loosely. Not the same continuity but one parallel to it in some key ways.

Actually the triumvirate is likely to be Starscream, Windblade and one other. Maybe bumblebee, unless they killed him off in this timeline as well. I highly doubt it will have anything to do with the comic from bot con as combiner tech has already been introduced there.

I got the vibe that Windblade was more of our Bot on the Street, our point-of-view character.

I kinda suspect this will be in an alternate G1 kinda like Devastation but, much like Devastation, will treat some characters as new who might seem odd to be that new. Or when they say that combination is new, maybe they're saying that almost all Transformers are combiners in this setting, not that there were never combiners before. Like, maybe it's an oversimplification to get the point across.

The difference being that Devastation seems to take place a few years before its version of the Battle for Autobot City (they foreshadow TFTM throughout it) whereas this seems to be set in a version of the second Pax Cybertronia.

[ZeroWolf]

It's already been said, I think, that this is gpi b good to be closeish to the IDW storyline, which means that combiners are new tech aside from outliers like devy.

Just means the G1 timeline tree has a new branch on it. I don't mind that's it's not connected as I like seeing new takes on the characters and seeing how familiar events can play out under someone else's watchful eye.

[Microraptor]

what previous events are they talking about i seriously doubt BM or G2 have any part

Most likely it's just a nebulous Autobot/Decepticon war whose exact events are unimportant to expound upon, much like how Beast Wars and Animated each took place in a post-war setting.

The "rule by triumverate" sounds like Prowl, Ironhide, and Silverbolt, aka Magnaboss. I can't think of another example of three rulers sharing leadership of Cybertron, particularly in a setting 40 years after the great war and several years after the deaths of Optimus and Megatron.

My guess would be that the convention comic this last year was directed to lead into the Combiner Wars show, albeit VERY loosely. Not the same continuity but one parallel to it in some key ways.

Actually the triumvirate is likely to be Starscream, Windblade and one other. Maybe bumblebee, unless they killed him off in this timeline as well. I highly doubt it will have anything to do with the comic from bot con as combiner tech has already been introduced there.

It could be Bumblebee, Starscream and Metalhawk.

[Prowl4]

Ugh.....windblade. Pass.