Machinima Transformers Combiner Wars Behind The Scenes Video

Tyrannacon wrote:After reading through the constructive criticisms about the episode here I went ahead and watched the first episode again with that in mind. I still feel mostly positive about it despite the short length. Actually I put it into the perspective when I did this that this is a web series and in some ways it's an entirely different media than say television. Yeah it sucks they can't get the voice actors we like and we instead get Internet celebrities, but it's really not terrible. That doesn't make it terrible in my mind because there's some decent effort put into the performances to make them sound familiar and also believable too in some ways. In terms of a web series, the production values are definitely high in this case I feel.

I just figured I'd offer a different perspective here with how I saw it now this time after reading through the thread and trying to look at it from different angles. I usually give a TV show an entire season if I didn't otherwise loathe the first couple episodes for a myriad of reasons for them to get the flow. So I can see how and what their larger story line or story arc is here. Web series, in this case, usually have their entire run equate one or one and a half 25-50 minute episode of a TV series.

thanks for looking at it from an open minded perspective. I have my bones of contention, (mostly the synching was startling) but I'll see how it is for a few episodes. I think a good story told my be worth it. its just difficult to get a feel for the story in such a short period of time.

Stuartmaximus wrote:
Agreed coz that's what i said(about Menasors voice) many posts back

It does seem to lack the power. For an individual character that is only one mind it probably would suit.

Interesting that the recording studio was BangZoom entertainment. I recognize them from several Anime Expos where they held panels on how to be voice actors. I remember they specialize almost exclusively in Anime and redubbing a cartoon after it's been animated, so this might expalin the lack of acting quality style. It's possible that they are more used to casting voices that are popular in the anime crowd and not the American transformers crowd, or that they pulled a large portion of their actors from their other anime casts or even their training classes.

But that's only speculation on my part, who knows.

Just finished watching episode 2 - https://www.go90.com/profiles/va_e80879ee86ff49d4b169fba67d53e1c7

Anyone outside the U.S. see if it's on Machinima's YouTube channel? I couldn't see episode 1 listed from my end last week, so I presume that the international YouTube versions are only visibly listed for non-U.S. viewers.

As to my thoughts on this one, it wasn't as miserable as the first episode, with this being more of an expositional episode than anything, but the robot animation (particularly Starscream's flight and descent at the episode's start) is still very choppy despite the animation for the camera movement and for the background set pieces being just fine.

And the acting for the Council was very so-so. Starscream's probably the best one, being the mot consistent in his acting level, while Rodimus had some hiccups in his lines that could have stood to have had another take or two. The Mistress of Flame, however, was extremely wooden in her performance, sounding the most, well, robotic of the three. Really hoping the acting of the latter two improves overall as the series progresses.

Meanwhile, the CGI models for Starscream and Rodimus were particularly familiar. Starscream is essentially his CW Leader class toy with some slight modifications (blue shoulders instead of gray, his stabilizer wings shifted down to match the position of his main wings, more G1-looking null rays, etc.), while Rodimus has seams on his torso that are taken straight from his MP-9 Masterpiece toy (though, his face is distinctly his younger Hot Rod face rather than his wrinkled Rodimus Prime face, despite his being Rodimus Prime in this show).

Watched it myself and I do mostly agree as well. I didn't think the person doing Rodimus was that bad actually. I will say the Mistress of Flame actress had a very wooden performance. I was kind of bothered by the whole "Sound the alarm!" thing she did at the end. It felt...clunky. Overall I'd say I like this episode a little better, but I'm a huge fan of exposition. I do have a more positive feeling for the series than I did after watching this one overall too.

Am i the only one who can't watch it? Every time you post the episode, i'll click the link and it says " Video has been removed" or "Video not available".

This episode was fine. Though with only 5 minutes, it would be fun if it didnt take one whole minute before anything happens.

Also, I really thought this would be a different story. I really thought the decepticons and autobots would be at war and dish out all their combiners in one go, rather than create an army of combiners or preventing that.

Also, that was quite the delayed reaction to Starscream getting shot and a very weak sounding alarm.

I love the character designs though, looking good!

Sabrblade wrote:

william-james88 wrote:Also, I really thought this would be a different story. I really thought the decepticons and autobots would be at war and dish out all their combiners in one go, rather than create an army of combiners or preventing that.

We were told from the press releases that this would be a post-war show with the Autobot/Decepticon civil war long over.

Was just expressing my thoughts from when I first heard we would get a series. And saying I would have preferred that.

This was better, but still a bit of a mess. The opening scene didn't look great, and ended up eating more than a fifth of the episode. Storyline-wise, this was far more interesting than the first, even if characterization is all over the place. Starscream is the reasonable one, Rodimus is the warmonger, and Windblade is still playing the role of IDW Arcee. I don't fault Machinima for wanting to tell a different story than the comic, but the disconnect between this and the comic version of the story, on top of the bizarre personalities of the characters involves, leaves me wondering why they wanted to tell this story at all.

Also, the council seems to have some... INTERESTING architectural decisions.

Don't want people to know you have the Enigma? Keep it in a massive glass case that according to Windblade's sniper rifle, can be seen by anyone with a decent case of binoculars.

Talking of Windblade's sniper rifle, that's another interesting architectural decision. The place where the Council, the leading party of Cybertron in a time of war, unease and crisis; is a wide-open area with not even glass between them and a bullet from miles away. Like... wow. How has no-one taken out these morons before now?