The Energon Pub

First things first, this is not a whiny anti-Bay topic. It's just something I thought of and found interesting.

I dig the new non-humanoid looks, befitting of alien creatures, which TFs are after all. What I found particularily interesting was how some had heads which resemble different types of animals, many of which fitting the TF's characters quite well. As I thought of this and went through the different movie characters, I came up with the following comparisons:

-Decepticons-

Megatron - Gorilla, especially with the broad nose, the fangs and the high swept back forehead. His overall body is likewise ape-ish and overall it goes great with the cliché of monster gorillas.

Starscream - obviously a wasp but also a subtle eagle, with a beaky mouth, rounded head and broad neck as if he's feathered. Now, with both being areal creatures, this design is a no-brainer.

Frenzy - a grasshopper, especially the mandibles, bug eyes and antennae. Frenzy likes to jump around a lot and is quite difficult to catch, just like real grasshoppers. I should know, I fetch and package them on a nearly daily basis in the pet shop I work at.

Barricade - a bat, with those high ears, vampire fangs and ev0l eyes. His bat features continue in the skinny fingers and winglike protusions on his shoulders (attached to the front wheels) Bats are thought of as mysterious creatures of the night and ofcourse associated with evil. Sam yelling 'Bad dream!' goes with the theme of bats as classic horror images from our nightmares.

Blackout - an eagle owl. The type with earlike feathers. Blackout shares this plumage, a similar beak shape and is overall a mysterious creature of the dark (similar to Barricade actually) he's also a flying creature, can cover long distances (unlike short range jet fighters) and those folded up rotors are like folded bird wings.

Scorponok - Scorpion. Probably the most obvious of all.
'nuff said.

Brawl - a toad because of the squat head, the wide mouth and the eyes set apart quite a bit. That and he's green. There's not much of a connection to his personality or maybe there is, because Brawl lacks any, just like toads. They just sit there, eat the crickets I hand them and sit there. =D Also, toads are pretty tough and short tempered, they are quick to bite you. And then they just sit there.

Bonecrusher - some sort of rodent, like an evil hamster, or a possessed groundhog. He seems to have earlike protusions and rounded cheeks, along with a muzzle. Hamsters are pretty vicious for such cute-looking critters. Male ones constantly bicker, fighting till they bleed, forcing us to put them in different cages.

-Autobots-

Optimus Prime - probably the most humanoid-looking (and most G1 accurate design at that) of all movie TFs. His head is most reminiscent of a knight, which fits his noble character and compassion for all. Ofcourse, just like bats, knights weren't quite what we think of them either. But Optimus fits the chivalreous stereotype of the heroic knight.

Bumblebee - a bumblebee ofcourse and they managed to mimic not only the head and the colour scheme, but they gave him a buzzing voice (at the end) to boot. The bumblebee reference is actually more fitting for the G1 incarnation than his 2007 namesake. Back in the day, he was indeed a bumbling youthful, not the heroic warrior portrayed in the movie. Still, he's obviously young for an Autobot and still has his quirks.

Jazz - his pointy ears and snout-thingy make me think of a cat, along with his visor resembling a cat's glowing eyes in the dark. With cats being all nimble and agile, but also laidback and relaxed, they fit Jazz quite well.

Ironhide - his head is like a bull's, complete with the horns and nose-ring. Bulls are short tempered and quick to resort to violence, just like Ironhide. And also just like Ironhide, they slam their weapons to the ground to boost them further, in order to avoid crushing slo-mo into a screaming woman when there happens to be one in their way. What, you didn't know that? Well that's because bullfighting has been abolished in alot of countries for so long already.

Ratchet - A walrus. Yeah, or an ancient Chinese monk. His head isn't really much like any animal, he just has these whisker/moustache/sabretooth thingies that are difficult to discern. Sure, he's a medic and that's not really something you associate with walruses. But there's no official medical mascot from the animal world is there? Perhaps a snake? That could fit with his fang thingies...

I don't have anything for the movie-style TFs which weren't featured in the film itself, but maybe you can add them to the list.

impressive indeed i'll give you 10 points for observation skills...

i only figured ironhide's face... really bull like

I disagree with you on a few of them.

Megatron's early concept art was obviously based on mummies and the face on the cgi model still resembles a decayed face with sharpened teeth more than anything primate-like, the nose looking more like a collapsed septum than an actual broad nose. If anything, it looks similar to Gary Oldman as Dracula in bat form in Bram Stoker's Dracula.


Starscream I think may be a case of seeing what you want to see when it comes to the eagle. The concept art indicated that they were trying to incorporate a samurai helmet into his face and from there they went more insectoid. Maybe it's there, but I personally don't see it and his mouth looks nothing like a beak to me.

Bonecrusher's face I'm almost completely certain is based on an owl's. The round shape, the large eyes set nearly half down his flat face, the widow's peak, and the swept-back crest over his eyes like feather tufts all remind me of a young horned owl's face. His body, on the other hand, is like a cross between an echidna and a tree sloth.

Frenzy I think may be a mix of grasshopper and close relatives, as opposed to just grasshopper, especially stick insects and mantids.

Barricade I think you're dead-on about, but the mandible-like forms above the mouth and multiple eyes lead me to believe they wanted to mix some spider traits in there as well.

Ratchet I can't make sense of, although my guess has been something like a cross between an orangutan and crocodile. I never considered walrus, but it probably comes closer than mine.


As for non-film characters:

Wreckage has definite psittacine characteristics. Even though it's hard to tell from the actual mould, the package art gives his face a structure that resembles a small beak and the toy has unmistakable parrot-feet.

Arcee also has the face of some variety of bird. Probably a quail, considering the stupid 'hairstyle' she has on the package image and its similarity to the decorative head plumage of california quail.

You pointed out great similarities there, especially Ratchet being a gentle urang utan, I can see that work.

As for the Megatron/Starscream heads, I had the toy heads in my mind, not the movie renders. Leader Megatron's nose bridge is painted blue, which contrasts with the black face. It looks like a gorilla's nose to me.

EDIT: thanks for pointing out the similarities with the Bat Dracula. Megatron is my favorite design of the movie TFs and Bram Stokers Dracula is one of my alltime favorite movies =D

Very clever observations.

One thing I noticed about Bumblebee while I was playing the game was that his doors were split and mounted on his back like an insect's wings.

That's how you combine G1 and Beast War into a single new Movie!

Mr. Kemp wrote:One thing I noticed about Bumblebee while I was playing the game was that his doors were split and mounted on his back like an insect's wings.

Black and yellow stripes, anyone?

That photo of Megs with Gary Oldman just made me appreciated and more intimidated by movie Megs more than ever.

Prime resembles an ancient silverback if you ask me. Even more so with his mouthplate on.

Ironhide to me is the most obvious. A bull, duh. I like how Ratchet is gentle orangutan. Friendly and clumsy with wires.

Very interesting observations, i guess i can see those after u mentioned them

Raymond101 wrote:That photo of Megs with Gary Oldman just made me appreciated and more intimidated by movie Megs more than ever.

But Megatron's not meant to be scary :/ Not in that way, anyway. You have Bludgeon, Thunderwing, Jhiaxus, Liege Maximo and others for that. As if the guys making the movie ever read the damn comic books.
I don't care for "THIS IS NOT G1 MEGS", he shouldn't more resemble another G1 characters(face, ribbed body and a few other minor elements make him look a bit like a monochrome Thunderwing), and G1 IS the original, some people seem to forget, so it's ultimately the basis for these characters. While Megatron's characterisation wasn't near as off as, say, Starscream(since he wasn't a character at all), he still came off as being too monstrous. It makes me realise that Megatron was a lot more than the "Generic fascist badguy" that a lot of people think of him as. He's the proud general, among other things.

I liked his old one, but in this line he's more brute strength. True, the movie makes him look like a bit of a retard, but if you check out the background books and comics, it really makes sense. You get the same cunning general idea in this universe too - he betrayed Prime, in secret building up a Decepticon army, luring them with promises of domination and galactic conquest. He's a military genius - at least, he tortures Bumblebee and co. orders dudes around, and the only blunder he made was to pursue the Allspark so obsessively by himself in space. Oh, and to underestimate humans.

And add to the brute strength of this current Megs and you can have your cake and eat it too.

Nice eye. I'd never expect that.

great theory... although i see ratchet as more of a Koala bear than an ape

I always thought that Ratchet looked a little like a dog, because if you look closely at his face, he has a nose.

i think ironhide looks like a bull wearing a cowboy hat and his guns resemble six-shooters

Ratchet looks more like a parrot or another bird. Hence the colors and beak, If you look closely.

They look like animal and we look like monkey.

I always thought RAVAGE's head looks like that of a panther...

Ratchet definitely had a teddy bear nose.

I think BB's battle mask actually resembled a bumblebee's head quite a bit, and with his "wings" he lived up to his name.

And what is Ravage, anyway? A cat or a dog robot?

The body looks like a dog. The head looks like a cat.

Hybrid?

really interesting observations rushie and everyone else who commented. my mind is kinda blown now that i think about it. just to add, i can see movie jazz as a lynx, with the 2 "ears" being long and almost look furry or feathered, like a lynx, plus the eyes, jazzes quick speed and cat like reflexes.

Auto Bot wrote:The body looks like a dog. The head looks like a cat.

Hybrid?

PANTHER

What can you expect from a cassette tape??

Thanatos Prime wrote:

Auto Bot wrote:The body looks like a dog. The head looks like a cat.

Hybrid?

PANTHER

What can you expect from a cassette tape??

Realistic panther and full articulation! Hehe

I thought this interesting too, but I had a couple of different imaginings....

-Decepticons-


Starscream - obviously a wasp but also a subtle eagle, with a beaky mouth, rounded head and broad neck as if he's feathered. Now, with both being areal creatures, this design is a no-brainer.

When I thought of Starscream and saw the shape of his head, with all those teeth, and how he moved when he said "the humans have taken it", my first thought was "dragon".

Blackout - an eagle owl. The type with earlike feathers. Blackout shares this plumage, a similar beak shape and is overall a mysterious creature of the dark (similar to Barricade actually) he's also a flying creature, can cover long distances (unlike short range jet fighters) and those folded up rotors are like folded bird wings.

I thought of Blackout, with the way his wings folded, and the shape of his thorax and waist, as a wasp.


-Autobots-


Ironhide - his head is like a bull's, complete with the horns and nose-ring. Bulls are short tempered and quick to resort to violence,

I don't know why, but Ironhide's split lip made me think of one of the great cats

Ratchet - A walrus.

I saw an Old English Bulldog in Ratchet's face.

Just my own quirks I guess....