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TRANSFORMERS!


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“TRANSFORMERS! MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE! TRANSFORMERS! ROBOTS IN DISGUISE!”

Oh Transformers. How I adore ye. Since 1984, Hasbro and Takara have been showering us with transforming contraptions in their loveable die cast and plastic bodies. Comics and TV shows have spawned, and let us not forget movies of the Autobots and Decepticons, and by extension, the Maximals and the Predacons. The Transformers brand is strong, and thanks to the recent success of Bayformers, is back as one of the most popular and successful toy franchises out there. I myself have a reignited spark for the series as a whole thanks to Bayformers 2, the not so Revenge of the Headless Fallen and would like to dedicate this topic to the franchise and the big rig himself.

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-"This is why movie Transformers can be badass"

Many people don’t know that Hasbro and Takara got together in a joint venture to sell toys to both the US and Japan. The original line consisted of many different toy series that premiered in Japan. Hasbro wanted a cut of the pie, named the line “The Transformers,” created a big toy advertisement (aka: the show) and let it loose in the Western market. Man, did we eat that stuff up. Most of the toys came from Japan’s Diaclone and Microchangers series, though there was some Robotech (Macross) stuff in there too.

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-"BURNING JUSTICE"

Today, we’ve got many continuities, series, and mythos, there is a bunch of backlog on Transformers. We've got shows and movies like G1, G2, Headmasters, Beast Wars, Beast Wars Neo, Beast Machines, RID, Armada, Energon, Cybertron, Bayformers 1&2, Animated, with various other toy lines like Classics, Masterpiece, Universe, Alternators, Alternity, and Henkei on top on fan add on sets from TFC, Fans Projects, and comics/manga like Dreamwave, Marvel, and Kiss Players (I think I left a few out too).

For the media I enjoyed Beast Wars/Machines, Animated, and the Bayformers 1. I think The second movie and Cybertron were ok, the rest are bad, and Energon and Kiss Players needed to die terrible, terrible deaths.

It’s hard to be a fan of all the media and not own any of the toys. I just pick up what I tend to like. I own more Primes (not just Optimus) though than anything else, mostly because they tend to be damn good. I’ve got a good few Animated and Movie figures too, though with a bit of classics/henkei and Cybertron thrown in for good measure. I’ve got a bunch of Armada figures as well since that’s what got me into the series in the first place. I also eat up anything that Fan’s Projects dishes out. They are fans of the series who have gotten themselves their own business that produce incredible add ons (and soon, figures) for Hasbro/Takara figures. I don’t think they’ve made a dud yet.

I can’t get pictures of what I own because I’m in college, but I did bring along a few favorites to remind me of home.

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-Fanproject's upgrade kit came with a trailer that coverts to armor and a BFG for Prime! From left to right, Henkei Hotshot, Cybertron Scattershot, Henkei Hot Rod, and the back has Classics Prime in the Fans Project upgrade kit.

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-"And who could forget the masterpiece edition of you, Mr. Prime?"

Character wise my favorites are:

From all of them: Optimus Prime,

G1, Grimlock, Soundwave

Beast Wars: Optimus Primal, Rattrap

Beast Machines: Rattrap, Blackarachnia

Armada style: Hotshot.

Cybertron: Vector Prime, Scattershot

Animated: Bulkhead, Grimlock,

Movies: Brawl, Long Haul,

tl:dr? Transformers are awesome and share you're like/dislike for the brand!

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-"Me Grimlock like fire thingy."

Edited by Rauzaruke
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Hah, well, I certainly wasn't around for the '80s TV show, having been born in '92, so I believe my first transformer could have easily been a Beast Wars or Beast Machines toy (Most likely Transmetal Optimus Primal from Beast Wars) however, the one line that I tried to follow and buy all the toys from was the Armada series in 2003. I've got almost every single team of Mini-Cons, most of the autobots and a few decepticons. I watched and loved the cartoon at that time, my childish ignorance essentially gliding over all the animation and translation errors in the story. I still haven't got all of the line, though, so...the hunt goes on, I assume. :P I've ended up crossing into other lines too, though-Many of the transformers toys I didn't get as a kid due to being born after the original G1 series had finished (Ironhide, Sunstreaker, Galvatron, etc.) I've bought from the Classics/Universe line, as well as several Mini-cons from the classics range (Feel free to look up these terms if you don't know what I'm on about. ;) ) and heck, even a few figures from the live action movie continuity, such as Sideswipe (I love Corvettes!) Sideways (An Audi R8 is fine too) and Landmine (Most articulated toy in my collection for a while)

TL;DR, Transformers is one of my favourite franchises and I've collected a ton from it. :)

Edited by Draco 2.0
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Transformers was awesome, even though I wasn't around to see most of it, however the first movie was amazing; nobody expected it to be decent, and it was pretty damn good!

TL;DR, there's too many people posting TL;DR these days. ._.

Edited by RainbowLizard
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TL;DR, there's too many people posting TL;DR these days. ._.

What is TL;DR?

On topic though. I was never a big fan of Transformers when I was young, but man, I LOVE the Transformers live-action movie. I haven't seen Revenge of the Fallen yet, but I really want to.

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Hah, well, I certainly wasn't around for the '80s TV show, having been born in '92, so I believe my first transformer could have easily been a Beast Wars or Beast Machines toy (Most likely Transmetal Optimus Primal from Beast Wars) however, the one line that I tried to follow and buy all the toys from was the Armada series in 2003. I've got almost every single team of Mini-Cons, most of the autobots and a few decepticons. I watched and loved the cartoon at that time, my childish ignorance essentially gliding over all the animation and translation errors in the story. I still haven't got all of the line, though, so...the hunt goes on, I assume. :P I've ended up crossing into other lines too, though-Many of the transformers toys I didn't get as a kid due to being born after the original G1 series had finished (Ironhide, Sunstreaker, Galvatron, etc.) I've bought from the Classics/Universe line, as well as several Mini-cons from the classics range (Feel free to look up these terms if you don't know what I'm on about. ;) ) and heck, even a few figures from the live action movie continuity, such as Sideswipe (I love Corvettes!) Sideways (An Audi R8 is fine too) and Landmine (Most articulated toy in my collection for a while)

TL;DR, Transformers is one of my favourite franchises and I've collected a ton from it. :)

You know, that's weird because that's exactly how I came into the series. Though I also wasn't around for the beginnings (I went back and followed it this summer though), I first got a few random Transmetal toys as gifts but I was never into the show. Only during Armada did I start to pick up on them and I have quite a library from the series. The mini-cons were so addictive and full of play value that I had to have them too. It wasn't until ROTF did I get the urge to actually complete some of my old collection, and thus I bought Jetfire and Hotshot (my old one was broken) to complete the Jet Optimus Overload combiner. (and my love for Hotshot). Well that grew into the movie figures, which were brand spanking new so I picked up on Sideswipe, Leader Prime, the the rest of the autobot movie crew. That lead into Transformers Animated, which I am hunting down. Well that grew into a hunt for collecting Primes, and then after lot's of Ebay, I wanted to get Fans Project repaint of the city commander mold to go with my new Classics Prime. Then I got addicted to Classics which leads me into today.

I am currently trying to hunt down a few Animated, Beastwars, Classics/Henkei, and Movie figures. I'm actually looking for Movie Longhaul and Brawl, which is weird because they are the first Decepticons I've wanted to buy. The most recent I had gotten was Armada Megatron, which was from back when I was a kid. Oh and I'm trying to get a good deal on the Superion kit from Fans Projects. and Hopefully the movie Superion so I can make the actual set full of win and not suck.

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-Piece of shit.

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-epic win

I'm also awaiting Animated Rodimus, Arcee, and Ironhide, Fan's Projects Protector kit for my Henkei Hot Rod (makes him Rodimus Prime), and anything the new series will dish out.

If you don't mind my asking, want to you need for Armada? I don't really care for the line anymore, and am willing to sell a good few of them.

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I remember getting into the franchise with Beast Wars, but I did catch a few G1 episodes and the G1 movie as well. I honestly enjoyed the movies nowadays. (though genital jokes + giant robots= bad attempts at humor)

Anyway, I think my first one was Armada Unicron. (Damn that toy was big.) Now I have 2 titanium minifigs of Megatron (From Beast Wars) and Optimus Primal, a remote control Barricade car, and Movie 1 Optimus Prime.

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I liked the Transformers back in the day, but it was kind of before my time a bit, so it was harder to find. The recent movies got me somewhat back into it, but I had a hard time figuring out where to start watching it again. The original show isn't very good from the beginning, but I recall it getting better, so I'll have to look around a bit.

On the other hand, the Bayformer movies are kinda crappy. I actually think the reviewsof the second movie are more entertaining than the movie itself.

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I liked the Transformers back in the day, but it was kind of before my time a bit, so it was harder to find. The recent movies got me somewhat back into it, but I had a hard time figuring out where to start watching it again. The original show isn't very good from the beginning, but I recall it getting better, so I'll have to look around a bit.

On the other hand, the Bayformer movies are kinda crappy. I actually think the reviews of the second movie are more entertaining than the movie itself.

Most of the original show was trash anyway. If you want to know what happens or brush up on characters, check the TFwiki and read the entertaining summery. The community there is a good bunch. They make fun of everything because they think not all wiki's should be bore-fests. There's a big header on every editing page that states "THE FUNNY STAYS."

A good place to start would be the better series like Beast Wars saga or Transformers Animated. I would say Animated would be you're best bet because it's recent and pretty darn good. It's also worth noting that Beast Wars and Beast Machines are aging, but beat the snot out of Energon and Cybertron's CGI animation. (Beast Machines especially). Both can be found easily on Youtube. RID, Armada, Energon, and Cybertron can kill you're enthusiasm if you are expecting quality. The Unicron saga is filled with terrible plot, bad animation, and horrid production values.

For example, take Energon...the worst of the bunch. (both in show and toys, that series was god awful)

From the very same TFWiki above:

Of course, any Transformers series exists to sell toys, but in promoting the abilities and gimmicks of its toyline, Energon frequently ignored common sense to the most amazing degree in order to shoehorn these concepts into a setting and story where they didn't make sense.

In choosing to set most of its action in the void of space, Energon foolishly robbed the Transformers of any real reason to transform. They can all happily fly in robot mode (in space, on planets, anywhere), inviting the question of why transformation is necessary. But, to promote the fact that the toys transform, characters would routinely change to vehicle mode anyway, even in outer space. Cue innumerable scenes of cars, trucks, and snowmobiles driving through space. Characters would even transform to vehicle mode on the ground, and then drive away into the air. Everyone could control their flight with no problem in either form, completely invalidating the need for any variety in alternate mode. Conversely, on occasions when it might actually make sense to transform to a speedy vehicle form for fast or long-distance travel, characters often choose to run to where they're going instead.

Edited by Rauzaruke
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I remember having Transformers toys as a little kid. I didn't become obsessed with them like some people and get every single toy I could get from the franchise. I never watched the show though. I only watched clips and pieces and bits of it, it doesn't really interest me. As for the movies, I don't really get the hub bub over 'em. Just to be fair, I may watch 'em both once to check out why it's so hyped up.

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Ohhhhhhhhh I think you're the first hardcore TF collector I've ever seen on a sonic site XD its usually the other way around ususally. I've been into transformers since I was a wee lad when I got a G2 Optimus prime (it was the reissue of G1 prime, ya know the one with the kickass sound effects) for a while I jsut briefly watched snippets of the series, and while not that great a show I was really pulled back in by armada, the first half was a little annoying since the animation did not live up to that first ep when megs and op fight in their cybertronian modes but the second half kicked my ass left right and center, the unicron battles were awesome. After buying smokescreen from armada my collection kicked off, I usually attempt to finish a series and get all the toys but I discovered very quickly I have not got the budget for it, though lately I think I may just finish animated since it had so little characters compared to most shows and some of the nicest molds I've ever seen (heck I even bought three repaints of the starscream mold with thundercracker being the last to complete the seeker set C: ) XD

But that didn't stop me collecting shitloads though XD I always attempted to at least get leaders and epic toys, like the planets, even today both Primus and Unicron are the Gem pieces of my collection, screw masterpiece prime, these guys are where its at C:

Also just to show off mah collection, and hoepfully get others to show theirs C:

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Ohhhhhhhhh I think you're the first hardcore TF collector I've ever seen on a sonic site XD its usually the other way around ususally. I've been into transformers since I was a wee lad when I got a G2 Optimus prime (it was the reissue of G1 prime, ya know the one with the kickass sound effects) for a while I jsut briefly watched snippets of the series, and while not that great a show I was really pulled back in by armada, the first half was a little annoying since the animation did not live up to that first ep when megs and op fight in their cybertronian modes but the second half kicked my ass left right and center, the unicron battles were awesome. After buying smokescreen from armada my collection kicked off, I usually attempt to finish a series and get all the toys but I discovered very quickly I have not got the budget for it, though lately I think I may just finish animated since it had so little characters compared to most shows and some of the nicest molds I've ever seen (heck I even bought three repaints of the starscream mold with thundercracker being the last to complete the seeker set C: ) XD

But that didn't stop me collecting shitloads though XD I always attempted to at least get leaders and epic toys, like the planets, even today both Primus and Unicron are the Gem pieces of my collection, screw masterpiece prime, these guys are where its at C:

Also just to show off mah collection, and hoepfully get others to show theirs C:

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Holy crap! That's way more Transformers I'll ever see in a lifetime! Makes me wish I still had my Unicron, but that collection is just incredible!

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Holy crap! That's way more Transformers I'll ever see in a lifetime! Makes me wish I still had my Unicron, but that collection is just incredible!

Trust me, that's just a "few" compared so some collectors out there. XD

@ SP the Shrew:

You've got a much bigger collection than I do. I've basically got a bunch a Primes from all over, a good many Armada + Minicons, a few Animated and Movie figures, and then a dash of other series sprinkled all over the place. I can make out a ton sets from Cybertron, Movie, Classics, Armada, and Energon in there. It's cool to know that you like the massive planet figures. I'm guess they're your favs? (PS: You're classics Ultra Magnus is naked.)

I was hoping to get more Classics and Animated figures though. The new Animated figures look great. It's a damn shame the line is getting the shaft though.

EDIT: When I get back home, I'll bump this thread with my collection. It shouldn't be too long now.

Edited by The Engineer
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Trust me, that's just a "few" compared so some collectors out there. XD

Then I'm afraid to see some larger sets out there than that.

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Then I'm afraid to see some larger sets out there than that.

http://tformers.com/...le.php?sid=7961

Brace yourself. :3

Anyway, I think that next on my chopping block is the Rail Racer from RID. It looks like a really nice combiner set that I never really noticed. I don't think anyone here would know, but is he a good buy? They are just a few reviews out there and none of them are too helpful from what I watched. :/

Edited by The Engineer
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Transformers isn't my most favorite franchise, but i like it. My first exposure to the franchise was the G1 cartoon when it re-aired in the early 90's, when i was about 7-8 years old. I never saw any other incarnation untill Armada, and i thought the Unicron saga was awesome, so that is what revived my interest in franchise. Once youtube showed up i re-watched a couple of episodes of the original series, now as an adult, and... dear God, what an awful, awful show it is. It's almost completely void of any qualities whatsoever. But oh well, the second half of Armada still kicks ass, and what little i have seen of Animated seems good, and the Bay movies... well, they suck pretty bad (the second one more than the first), but at least they are entertaining, which is more than you (or at least i) can say about the G1 cartoon they're based on.

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Always been a TF fan. It's like one of those things you grew up with to the point you don't remember the start. My fan-ship has no beginning. Beast Wars was pretty much the major jumpstart, though. I do collect a lot of figures. Though, I've slowed down lately, but I still think they're the best toys around. I joined Seibertron.com years back, but I can't get into it anymore. Sonic's my creative calling for the most part now.

http://tformers.com/...le.php?sid=7961

Brace yourself. :3

Anyway, I think that next on my chopping block is the Rail Racer from RID. It looks like a really nice combiner set that I never really noticed. I don't think anyone here would know, but is he a good buy? They are just a few reviews out there and none of them are too helpful from what I watched. :/

What would you like to know? He is a bit hard to stand and connect in combined form. Rapid Run is the best of the figures(more smooth connections than Railspike), Midnight express is the worst(big legs, cheap arms). Overall, he is a fun experience, but not without flaws, like all the original RID figures.

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Always been a TF fan. It's like one of those things you grew up with to the point you don't remember the start. My fan-ship has no beginning. Beast Wars was pretty much the major jumpstart, though. I do collect a lot of figures. Though, I've slowed down lately, but I still think they're the best toys around. I joined Seibertron.com years back, but I can't get into it anymore. Sonic's my creative calling for the most part now.

What would you like to know? He is a bit hard to stand and connect in combined form. Rapid Run is the best of the figures(more smooth connections than Railspike), Midnight express is the worst(big legs, cheap arms). Overall, he is a fun experience, but not without flaws, like all the original RID figures.

Well I'm sort of going on the combiner binge. I was just looking up some decent ones from the past. Superion is getting that addon and Universe Devastator isn't terrible when arranged right. It just looked like a decent set that I passed up at first when skimming RID. While I picked up Optimus and Ultra Magnus to create that monstrosity you see in that picture in the OP (not my picture) I kind of turned a blind eye to everything but Rail Racer. I didn't think I wanted him at the time, but now I kind of do. I know he's a bit hard to stand up, but I was wondering about the overall quality and articulation.

I also welcomed a new member into the family yesterday. :D

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I fucking <3 Animated so hard. Nearly every figure is a total winner. Blurr is no exception.

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I love Transformers, ever since I was a kid. I remember having a few miniatures and a fuckload of insecticons, but I really got into the actual mythos when Transformers Armada first aired on Cartoon Network when I was 9. Since then, I was hooked. Granted, Beast Wars/Machines was on before then, but it didn't really engage me; I only liked it because of the "cool robots and things that went boom", but even at that age, it wasn't enough to captivate me. Now that I'm older, I saw bits and pieces of the original TV show and movie, and I can see why people hail them as classics. The live action movies I thought were good, but I liked the second one much better. The first was...decent, and a lot of fun, but it didn't really feel like THE Transformers. Probably because we got no character development and little interaction between almost any of the robots, and there was less than 20 of them, on both sides. Transformers 2, on the other hand, felt like one of the older shows brought to life, albeit the lame humping and ball jokes. It had a lot more interaction (Starscream and Megatron FTW), it had more elements of the classic shows....MAN, it was cool.

As for the toys, I think the changed the action figure market and gave it something fresh and new, sparking many other toys which make them "imitated but never duplicated."

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks for the Rail Racer tip. I just got him on Friday and I have to say he is the most beautiful gestalt I've ever laid my eyes on. The paint and the overall head sculpts are stupendous. He doesn't even look like he's made up of 3 trains.

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I've recently gotten Classics BB, Classics Inferno, Classics Devastator, Energon Landmine and have tons of Animated, a few Henkei, Energon Superion Maximus, and one movie figure on the way. My binge is over and now I have to play the waiting game.

Edited by The Engineer
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I love Transformers! :D

But in all honsety I love the Beast Wars series the most. The fact that we have talking animals that transform into robots is cool. I used to have a collection of figures of them around but it's somewhere.

Speaking of Beast Wars figures.... I did see the original Optimal Primal and Megatron set once in Toys R Us. But that was like last year though. T___T I wish I had the money for it.

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  • 1 year later...

I haven't actively followed this series for more than a month, but I've seen good reasons why people both like or dislike it. If the original generation is really what the characters in War for Cybertron were like, then it's no wonder I never took interest in it at the time; the dialogue and voices were overacted and cliched on their own, but having it come out like that from the mouths of giant clanking robots is like how Gears of War expects me to sympathize with an hyper-proportioned gorillaman. I watched the Bay trilogy after that, and it actually made me see the appeal better, but maybe that's just from a relativistic standpoint because the robots were better actors and characters than the humans. Either way, this led me into Transformers Prime, and see, THIS is what I wanted to see from the franchise.

First of all, it's clear that they're going somewhere with it, and have a vision that goes beyond just this season. Aside from a few minor subplots that leave the core conflicts for some character development, there isn't a single episode that just meanders. Pokemon has more TV episodes than species at this point, yet the majority of them are just filler between the episodes that matter to Ash's journey. Fortunately, that is not the case here- even the episodes that at first seem to deviate bring something important to the direction of the story. It's only been 20 episodes, but it feels like double that with all the events this story has gone through- we've even seen the inside of Megatron's head by episode 13.

The heroes are as flawed as the villains in that neither side is completely perfect or incompetent- their both extremely well balanced next to each other (though those car-bots have that inverse ninja theory going for them.) The autobots aren't just Mary Sue-types; they have their own baggage and flaws. Optimus Prime is selfless but not invincible, Arcee is self-reliant but distracted by her past encounters, and Bulkhead is resilient and strong but often overprotective. Likewise, they can let the villains lose without making them look incompetent or shitting out a Deus Ex Machina- no, Megatron always seems like he has a plan up his sleeve, even when he's caught off guard. My only complaint about the cast is that the human kids just seem there to provide a group of characters relatable to the viewer; they felt really forced into the storyline, like they all just fell into the plot by chance. They're by no means bad characters, though- I think their relationships with their respective bots really adds something both ways. And I really like the introduction of M.E.C.H.- the idea of introducing Earth's own equivalent of Megatron. It provides a great frame of reference that makes the ideals of the Decepticons seem more understandable.

But as far as I'm concerned, the real star of the series is Starscream. I don't know why, but second-in-commands are often more awesome than the main villain. Shego, Ridley, Darth Vader... Maybe its just because they have the closest understanding of their leader that's still objective or that it's the figure with the most power that they can still characterize while still keeping the true villain enigmatic. But whatever the case, Starscream is an extremely interesting character to follow because he's a complete and total coward, but still the first to question Megatron's authority when he has the opportunity. And now that he's independent of either side, things are probably going to get really interesting. Plus, it's impossible for a guy with MISSILES on his ARMS to NOT be cool.

But the real villain? Hell, Megatron seems relatively tame compared to Airachnid at this point. Crisscross might be the most memorable episode if only because of how insanely dark it was. If you haven't seen it, Airachnid tries to get leverage with M.E.C.H. by kidnapping Jack's mother to bait Jack bringing Arcee so they can dissect her, while she hides Jack's mother from him and toys with him by saying she'll torture her and make him watch if he doesn't save her by midnight. I mean... FUCK! If this is what the show itself is like, I don't want to know what the guy who wrote Cupcakes could do with it.

I might check out older Transformers stuff at some point, but in the mean time, I love this freakin' show.

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I see Transformers and tokusatsu in the chit chat forum and I suddenly feel at home XD

I've been a TF fan ever since I was a little kid and had a two feature video of some G1 season 3 eps and Gi-Joe XD I even had G2 versions of Optimus and Megatron, the latter sits on my shelf, broken but still in one piece and I still have the old G2 soundbox from prime's trailer on my desk.

Though for a while I didn't really follow TFs, I only occasionally caught Beast Wars on channel 5 over here in the UK when I woke up early enough, it wasn't until Armada that I really got back into the fray, the animation was shit, but a new TF cartoon absolutely floored me with the rare instances of good animation in the final moments of the first episode where protoform prime and megs duke it out in front of the kids. It also the point at which I became a figure collector XD starting with Smokescreen who was the only bot left in an argos in hastings!

Over the last decade I've just been living it up TF wise, I've loved almost every iteration of TFs (except kissplayers and that godfucking awful excuse of a second film) and am currently adoring TF: Prime, it's like finally a show that utilises the essence of the TF comics, whilst I feel it gets a bit too dark at times for a kid's show it's nice to see a show that doesn't talk down to it's audience. Same with animated actually, despite a reallly cartoony style it was amazing and was a really good insight into the political side of cybertron and it's take on Optimus was reallly refreshing. The moment Megatron finally calls out Optimus Prime's full name truly felt like things had come to a conclusion.

Anyway back to Prime, I feel like this is a really special Megatron. He's actually pretty fearsome, I haven't seen a megatron this scary in, well ever. Previous Megatrons have been failures (G1) classy (Beast Wars) or Tactical (Animated) This Megatron however just has a really dark air about him, despite him being incapitated for a good portion of the series, his return actually instilled some fear into me. He's deranged and absolutely mental and seeing how he handled Starscream upon his return makes him out to be a rather fierce individual. And the thing is, he's not even feral despite his appearance, he's fairly intelligent and downright creepy, especially in Rock bottom when Jack comes face to face with him. Despite his obvious disadvantage he still managed to play with Jack Mentally as if he was always in control.

Seriously one of the best Megatron's yet, now all he needs to do is actually do something concrete XD but I'm hoping the final few eps of season 1 should provide that.

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I am absolutely in love with this franchise. I almost love it as much as Sonic and Pokemon. And the new show Trans formers: Prime, keeps getting better and better. Hell that show is what the movies would've been like had bay not been involved.

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I've been watching a few of the first episodes of the older series to get a feel for the rest of the franchise. So far, I've seen Beast Wars, Animated and Robots in Disguise.

Beast Wars, I've heard good things about, but so far, I'm a bit torn. The characters seem promising, but the writing itself feels very awkward. While the premise of "giant robots that transform into animals" definitely seems like marketing gold for the toy industry, the combination doesn't exactly flow well in practice. It could, and may at some point in the series, but replacing "vehicles" with "animals" doesn't seem to change anything about the overarching story of conflict between the two sides besides outward appearances. That said, I'm getting a "Lord of the Flies" vibe from the way the Maximals and Predacons are stranded on a new, undeveloped planet waging war for dominance, and I hope it takes advantage of that path if nothing else. But whatever the case, part of me hopes it's not worth my time because this pre 21st century CGI is just ugly as sin. But if anything good came from what I've seen, it's definitely Waspinator.

Animated, I really like. I like this Teen Titans-y approach with Optimus and his friends being a young, inexperienced repair crew seeking an understanding of heroism rather than hardened, wise veterans with years of warfare behind them. Not sure how I feel about the character design and art direction, but so far it's well paced, has likable characters and overall I have no complaints.

Now Robots in Disguise, oh my God. Narm. Cliches. Bad acting. Overly elaborate character design. Every element of a work that can be called "so bad it's good again" is in play here. For starters, though they seem startled at best when giant sentient robots start appearing out of nowhere. That was my first warning light. Then Optimus calls upon the son of the kidnapped character to help him save his dad without ANY reason to take him along other than to have a character the audience can project on, or even a reason to know he exists. Then there's a robot shark that eats cars with a hilarious "OM-NOM-NOM" vocalization. But really, the entire Predacon force is like an army of Waspinators on steroids. Aside from the Autobot who hits on red sports cars, the Predacons are just fun to watch, the best scene being at the end of episode 2 when the shark one is angrily yelling at indecisive phrases in human literature like "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" and "To be or not to be."

But if RiD and Beast Wars have made me realize anything, it's that there is an inverse correlation between writing quality and the amount of times characters announce their attacks or change of form.

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