The Energon Pub

I was browsing tfu.info yesterday, looking over the Targetmasters(they didn't get much media attention anywhere), and noticed that the animation/comic models are very different from the toys!

Crosshairs:





Pointblank:





Sureshot:





Triggerhappy:





Granted they spruce up the designs for the show/comic every once in a while, but it looks like they went out of there way to make completely new heads for these guys! What's up with that?

And to make it more interesting, what other figures have had a major head redesign, Barring Ratchet/Ironhide. They got new faces, we know that.

I think Chromedome and Zarak had different heads in the U.S. cartoon (but the Headmasters animation models were closer to the toys).

Also, it depends what one calls a 'major' head redesign. Obviously, Bumblebee had a change.

I thought about Chromedome too, but once I actually looked on tfu, it's not as different as I thought:





Oh yeah, and Hosehead/Nightbeat switched faces in the comic.

As for major re-design, hmm. First season bots were designed to look more "friendly", but it was mainly just adding a mouth instead of a faceplate in most occasions. But I think Huffer constitutes a new design:





The animation face is more detailed, and his "bonnet" has been moved to where it's more behind the head.

Oh yeah, and the Stunticons/Arialbots got some new heads too! Almost all of them look pretty different. Some of the most obvious ones(and they do look more distinctive in this case):







The goggles do nothing!! :P











The Airialbots suffer for the worse though(in my opinion). I liked how Dreamwave drew them toy accurate:

Quite a few of the early Autobots got new faces, some more radically different than others.

Most of the original minibots, including Huffer, Bumblebee, Windcharger, Gears and Brawn; later on Beachcomber.

Trailbreaker got a fairly heavy rework.
Obviously there's Wheeljack, whose eyemask got moved down for the 'toon, and Astrotrain developed an extra eye. Perceptor and Tracks lost faceplates, and Blaster's face opened up a lot when he lost his eyemask.
Red Alert and Slag got all embarrassed.

The Coneheads. Need I say more?

Mixmaster developed a mouth, while Bonecrusher grew a whole face...
Devastator's mush was all over the place - did he he have one eye or two? Who can decide?

Jetfire kinda goes without saying.
Omega Supreme also got a face where previously there was none.

And that's what I can come up with from the first couple of years.

<edit>
For some reason, the Aerialbots (except Silverbolt and Slingshot) and Stunticons tended to get radically different head designs, while the Protectobots and Combaticons got off more or less scot-free. Although some of the Combaticons (particularly Onslaught and Swindle) got complete body overhauls in the same manner as the Stunticons.

Sandstorm's face is designed very differently in the 'toon.
Oh, and Reflector...
And Wreck-Gar, who somehow never trapped his Fu-Manchu in bike mode.

With the 'Masters, I don't think Chromedome got much of an overhaul, but Cerebros and Hardhead certainly did. Highbrow got a bit of a tweak too, and Triggerhappy gained a faceplate (in an unusual twist).
And Punch flipped. On the toy, Punch has a faceplate, and Counterpunch has a mouth; in the 'toon it went the other way round.

Uh, guys, those pics youse posted aren't working. Oh, and Wheelie and Blurr got changed a bit, too. Blurr looks like a Sweep who finally had a shave, and Wheelie has a head in the middle of his chest.

Blurr had a bit of a change, but not much.

The reason the pics aren't working is because TFU doesn't allow remote linking.

Ramrider wrote:Blurr had a bit of a change, but not much.

The reason the pics aren't working is because TFU doesn't allow remote linking.

Oh, oops .

They were working yesterday.

And Wheelie is different, I forgot! I've read that the designs were done first and then turned into toys, but Wheelie looks almost completely different. Wasn't it something to do with Flo Drery's designs and a falling out with Hasbro and how they weren't allowed to use most of them, and that's also why Wreck-Gar ended up so weird?

I'm shocked no one mention Broadside.........not only did he have a head redisign but they redisign his whole body and would switch from 1 design to the other between episodes.

Blaster looked different in the cartoon, too. Viewfinder got a different head and obviously all of the Reflector robots had different bodies.

Didn't realise about Broadside; I only remembered him appearing in one ep (I vaguely recall him landing on Devastator in ship mode), but I've no idea which. And the cartoon image TFU have of him matches the toy; I knew the TF Universe model was different, but didn't remember if it matched the cartoon at all.

Ramrider wrote:Didn't realise about Broadside; I only remembered him appearing in one ep (I vaguely recall him landing on Devastator in ship mode), but I've no idea which. And the cartoon image TFU have of him matches the toy; I knew the TF Universe model was different, but didn't remember if it matched the cartoon at all.

He had 3 episodes in season 3 but right now I only remember 2 of them......In two of the episodes he had the comic look and only in 1 of the U.S. toon did he have the toy look.In "Carnage in c minor" he had the comic look and in the "burden hardest to baer" he had the toy look

I wonder which other characters would've been redesigned for TV? I know for a fact that Flywheels, Battletrap, the Sparkabots and Firecons would've been if they'd continued season 4 and gone into season 5.

For a fact, now? Aside from getting more articulated character models (natch), what would have been different?

Ramrider wrote:For a fact, now? Aside from getting more articulated character models (natch), what would have been different?

Yes I would like to know as well.

Well, the Firecons never transformed, but Flywheels/Battletrap don't that different from their toy counterparts:















They appeared in Headmasters, btw.

Well look at how arse the Firecons looked, and I doubt they would've had the heads in the middle of their chests the way they did in the toys. And I mean, those animated versions of the Duocons are what I meant by different. I mean, they ahve legs, and Battletrap has real arms.

But that's completely different to what we're talking about. With the likes of the Duocons, they just played a little fast and loose with the proportions to make a better animation model. I'd have done the same thing myself, and I always stick to toy designs when I draw TFs.

We're talking about actually changing the aesthetics of the character, pretty much for the hell of it. Like Swindle, for instance, whose chest in the cartoon consisted of his jeep's front end when it should have been on his back. Or giving the characters completely different heads to the toys (like 5/6 of the original Mini-Autobots).

And I also thought that you were inplying that there show incarnation would be different then their comic book design...the Firecons did make it to the comics before it was canceled.

Flywheels did make it into true animation, even if it was only in the intro of season 4, but the redid his upper body from the images that you posted where the jet was only a small part of the front of his chest. The jet half of Flywheels is now his entire upper half from his chest to his shoulders. It's not just heads/faces they change in the cartoon either, if that were the case, Brawn would have had gripper hands instead of hands with fingers and Shockwave's figure did have the option of two hands or the one gun and a hand. Superion's figure had a mouth and nose as well, whereas the toon drew his face blank below the eyes and Hell at times in the early Marvel comics, they gave Soundwave a mouth instead of a faceplate

Hitokiri Recca wrote:Flywheels Did make it into true animation, even if it was only in the intro of season 4, but the redid his upper body from the images that you posted where the jet was only a small part of the front of his chest. The jet half of Flywheels is now his entire upper half from his chest to his shoulders.

The animation of Flywheels your speeking of really came from his toys comersial add not from the season 4 opener....the add came first.The sample that someone posted earlyer was from the Japanese Headmasters show.

sto_vo_kor_2000 wrote:

Hitokiri Recca wrote:Flywheels Did make it into true animation, even if it was only in the intro of season 4, but the redid his upper body from the images that you posted where the jet was only a small part of the front of his chest. The jet half of Flywheels is now his entire upper half from his chest to his shoulders.

The animation of Flywheels your speeking of really came from his toys comersial add not from the season 4 opener....the add came first.The sample that someone posted earlyer was from the Japanese Headmasters show.

The one posted earlier threw me off because it looks like what was done with the original Megatron commercial(the black helmat with the weird bolt-like top-knot)

Ah yes.... we can't forget about the Beat Wars and their faces as well before the cartoon came out or Cerebros, who didn't get a toy accurate face until RiD came on. At one point in second issue of the HeadMasters limited series by Marvel, they drew the Cerebros head onto Fortress Maximus after he went though the headmaster process and before Fort Max was upgraded to ultra class in the story.
There were even early Goldbug images by Marvel where all they did was chang his head and stuck it on the Bumblebee body until they introduced the rest of the Throttlebots

Hitokiri Recca wrote:Ah yes.... we can't forget about the Beat Wars and their faces as well before the cartoon came out or Cerebros, who didn't get a toy accurate face until RiD came on.

I may have mis-understood you.When most people say "toy accurate face" they are refering to the fact that the toy was later changed to match the show.....and if thats what your saying you might be mistaken...unless I'm getting your wording wrong.

Better put.....are you saying that the RID toy got a G1 show accurate face or that the RID show got a RID toy accurate face?

sto_vo_kor_2000 wrote:

Hitokiri Recca wrote:Ah yes.... we can't forget about the Beat Wars and their faces as well before the cartoon came out or Cerebros, who didn't get a toy accurate face until RiD came on.

I may have mis-understood you.When most people say "toy accurate face" they are refering to the fact that the toy was later changed to match the show.....and if thats what your saying you might be mistaken...unless I'm getting your wording wrong.

Better put.....are you saying that the RID toy got a G1 show accurate face or that the RID show got a RID toy accurate face?

I think it wasn't until RiD that the animation model matched the toy's face. At least that's how I interpreted that.

craggy wrote:

sto_vo_kor_2000 wrote:

Hitokiri Recca wrote:Ah yes.... we can't forget about the Beat Wars and their faces as well before the cartoon came out or Cerebros, who didn't get a toy accurate face until RiD came on.

I may have mis-understood you.When most people say "toy accurate face" they are refering to the fact that the toy was later changed to match the show.....and if thats what your saying you might be mistaken...unless I'm getting your wording wrong.

Better put.....are you saying that the RID toy got a G1 show accurate face or that the RID show got a RID toy accurate face?

I think it wasn't until RiD that the animation model matched the toy's face. At least that's how I interpreted that.

Your right...thats when it happened but I wasnt sure what "Hitokiri Recca" was sayin....its the way it was worded that got me confused.