That's the problem though. Nobody knew exactly what Machinima was going to produce. I'll fully admit, I was 100% onboard with CW, hoping this was going to be something spectacular, after 1 episode, I knew it was a dumpster fire, hoping it might get better, and it never did. The micro series was fully produced, so its not like they could just stop there, they aired all the episodes.
Hasbro should have looked at the responses, not just the number of views. I cant imagine large percentage of viewers asked for, or wanted more.
Or maybe it was favorable in other markets...I don't know. After the negative response to Revenge of the Fallen (the highest grossing TF film US Domestic), it only took 3 more movies for the rest of the world to catch on that these were garbage...
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It's like a new bakery opening, If they sell 1000 donuts, simply because its a new store, but those donuts are awful, and they order 2000 more...All your going to have is a bunch of stale donuts. Unfortunately I know media isn't a consumable that goes *stale* per se, and frankly I don't even know how Hasbro profits from this. If its just to promote awareness, and not necessarily to purchase toys (I purchase Generations toys because they are the only TF line I care about, and provide a satisfying feeling of nostalgia)...in spite of how awful the Machinima series is.
If someone going in with a clean slate were to base all things Transformers solely on what Machinima produced, I would not blame them if they had zero interest in reading any of the comics, watching any other shows or movies, or purchasing any toys at all.
I still say Hasbro should go the route that WB/DC is. They provide 3 fully animated movies per year for the home market. Granted some are better than others, but they are drawn from all different DC stories and continuities. Hasbro can do the same, with 30 plus years of TF lore, who can tell me, they would not love, say 2 animated movies per years (70-80 minuets long), that explore original stories from everything. original Series (Sunbow and marvel comics), BW, RiD, Unicron Trilogy, heck I'd even love a film inspired by some of what Dreamwave did...
An argument I see against this all the time is... *It's too expensive* on that I call BS. DC's films probably cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 5M to produce. Paramount's 5 live action theatrical films made upwards of 3.5B world wide, I'm sure Hasbro made a nice profit off the residuals. Hasbro has its own animation studio, but if they wanted to partner with another animation house for funding, and split the earnings, that's fine too. I just refuse to hear about how something cannot be done, if they don't even try. For my money, the film Predacons Rising which served as an addendum to TF Prime was the best TF movie of the past decade.
