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Transformers: A Retrospective

PostPosted: Fri Aug 20, 2010 6:16 am
by Bobton03
This posting will be a little broad, so here it goes:

Are there any ideas regarding Transformers that you are glad were not pursued by the toy manufacturers and/or comic publishers? Alternatively, is there any ideas that came to fruition within the Transformers Universe that you wish could be changed? Lastly, what ideas do you have to improve the Transformers Universe, whether it be in terms of the toyline, comic series, etc.?

Here are my inputs:

1.) I am glad that the Dinobots were never made into Headmasters -- it would have been odd having Grimlock subordinated to and/or sharing decisions with a human!
2.) I wish that the Transformers of the live-action movies resembled more of the classic Transformers. To me, save for Optimus Prime's face, none of the movie Transformers even look like what I think of as a Transformer. Really, could Megatron or Starscream look any more different than their established toyline/comic appearance?
3.) I wish that Dreamwave's 'War Within' story-arc could, at a minimum, be finished. It would be amazing for it to continue and develop into a longer series, but I will take anything right now to just tie-up any existing loose ends in the story-arc.


- Bob
:CON:

Re: Transformers: A Retrospective

PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2010 2:47 pm
by JetOptimus23
Bobton03 wrote:.) I wish that Dreamwave's 'War Within' story-arc could, at a minimum, be finished. It would be amazing for it to continue and develop into a longer series, but I will take anything right now to just tie-up any existing loose ends in the story-arc


Blame Pat Lee.

Bobton03 wrote:wish that the Transformers of the live-action movies resembled more of the classic Transformers. To me, save for Optimus Prime's face, none of the movie Transformers even look like what I think of as a Transformer. Really, could Megatron or Starscream look any more different than their established toyline/comic appearance?


Well ,you have to keep in mind that Bay had a whole bunch of people going to see that movie who had NEVER seen Transformers before. They made designs that appealed to onrmal people, while throwing in some stuff for the fans. Everybody Wins! :D

Re: Transformers: A Retrospective

PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2010 4:34 pm
by Windsweeper
With you on the Movie Designs. Some are fine but Scalpel, Wheelie, Frenzy, the Twins' heads, Jetfire and Starscream look nothing like the traditional TF look.

Optimus and Jazz are recognisable but why couldn't all of them have their traditional TF look. Hate the animalistic face of Ironhide and he's not a patch on G1 Ironhide in personality or appearance.

The Transformers always had a specific, recognisable look, well apart from Beast Wars/Machines.

Also think the whole Allspark thing was too Harry Potter (not a fan). Both the G1 cartoon and comics had the Decepticons as robotic Nazis bent on conquest and stealing resources ala the aliens in Independence Day. Don't know why that had to change.

I'm very tired of the constant G1 reboots. Loved Marvel and Dreamwave though was initially disappointed Dreamwave didn't follow on from Marvel especially with Simon Furman working for them.

An expansion on G2's Cybertronians could have been wonderful. There's a vast empire with thousands of colonies. Not all Cybertronians were necessarily desendants of Decepticons. We could have seen Autobot descendants such as Maximals and Omni-cons evolve on different worlds. Imagine if Armada took place in the G2 universe with the lost Mini-cons landing or evolving on one of these colonies with Armada Megatron under a different name still pursuing them.

The different Megatrons from each series could be Viceroys on their respective colonies with some aspiring to overthrow the Liege Maximo. We could have seen the G1 Autobots travel the Empire encouraging their descendants to rebel against the Cybertronian regime, this would probably be more in line with Grimlock than Optimus. Imagine Grimlock encountering law enforcer RID Ultra Magnus on his respective colony. Imagine those badasses challenging each other.

We could have had the Star Wars style single continuity a lot of us crave, while still retaining the iconic characterisations of say RID Scourge and Skybite or Armada Demolisher and concepts such as Mini-cons.

I'm tired of the babying down in the fiction as in ROTF and Animated. Both could have been great were it not for the childish humour whether through buck toothed robots or ridiculous human villains.

Look at Beast Wars/Machines and Marvel UK's Target 2006, Transformers is excellent Sci Fi when handled properly and doesn't need to be kiddied down. When I was a kid, I preferred the more intelligently written UK comics to the cartoon or indeed some of the US comics.

Miss the G1 style tech specs that have been replaced by one line of uninspiried writing. The tech specs elevated the G1 TF's above other toy robots as they had intelligent, well written characters. Slag it Hasbro, just print the MTMTE profile on the back. Dreamwave knew the characters very well.

Really hate the way cars AND jets are mostly deluxes. Especially the cars as they render the wonderful Diaclones obsolete despite sorely lacking the realism and detail the Diaclones conveyed. I'd take G1 Prowl and Sideswipe anyday over the plastic Classics versions. Heck, the custom heads on Ebay vastly improve G1 Ironhide. He's constantly being played with as opposed to the Classics version who I haven't seen in months since I put him in storage.