Optimus Prime died 35 years ago today...
- Thread starter Uzumaki Goku
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Kup saying he feels like a piece of shit at his age followed by Prime instantly deciding to call him shitpiece gets me every fucking time.
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I love this video but I might like the Shockwave one better.
This is the hotest take I have ever read. 8 year old me didn't need any help understanding Rodimus was a punk ass bot.
Here's how I see it: Megatron's redemptive arc was good, but it wasn't fitting for the character as depicted in IDW.
If this was, like, Transformers Prime Megatron or G1 it wouldn't be a problem, those guys were just cartoon assholes who got defeated by the heroes every weekday. IDW Megatron started with the noble intention of freeing his race from an oppressive fascist dictatorship and then along the way he just decided to be a massive racist and eradicate entire planets because he hated organic life that much.
The concept of "Megatron is an Autobot now! He's on a ship with all these dysfunctional weirdos!" is genuinely too good to pass up and Roberts wrote the hell out of it, mostly. Megatron did eat a shitton of panel time (which, like, of course he did, he's Megatron and you're gonna focus on him), but the more pressing issue is that eventually the idea simmering in everyone's brain, why does Megatron get to redeem himself, became a textual element with Getaway's mutiny, where the story starts reminding us "oh yeah he's the worst war criminal in the history of the universe."
And then the story just decides you like Megatron now. The mutineers were wrong and either completely evil like Getaway or just dupes who were so misguided in hating Rodimus, a guy who built a ship in the shape of his own head. He's redeemed, he's a hero, actually his war against all organic life was the lesser of two evils.
In fairness the series is a bit better about this than I may be giving credit. Megatron's redemptive arc is given a lot of focus in Season 2 and come the relaunch into Lost Light he's gone after issue six and only reappears late into the story, but Lost Light had a lot of problems on its own so it didn't get to flourish as well as the preceding 55 issues did.
So to sum it up: a good story, just maybe not for this particular incarnation of the character.
It was all started with HeMan. The whole point of all of those cartoons was an ingenious marketing strategy to get kids attached to the characters and buy the toys.
When did this stop working? There was TMNT and Power Rangers in the 90s. I was older but I feel like once SpongeBob and Nickelodeon seemed to take over this went away and never came back.
I liked Hot Rod as a kid in the movie. Even Daniel was cool (I loved those robot suits). But in the tv shows afterward he was kind of weak. Honestly the whole thing was weak after the movies. Even the revival of Optimus.
Looking back I am cool with that. It had a hell of a run and the movie was absolutely hold on to your butts stuff. It makes sense to end it there.
In terms of "selling action figures to boys" then yeah I guess it's not as prominent, at least in the exact same way. Teen Titans Go still sells a lot of merch.
Most of the most vocal folsk against this are also the same ones who yell G1 or die. They'll never, ever, let the canon evolve and be something more than what the G1 cartoon was. They're the worst of the worst fans
I have kids and anecdotally kids still like toys, but outside of active things like board games and water guys or nerf the most popular one seems to be Lego. I rarely see kids play with any kids of dolls or action figures anymore.
Yup. Dunno why, if the Quintessons were supposed to be able to resurrect the dead, repairing them shouldn't be past their abilities?
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Supposedly, there were scenes addressing this where the doctors would repair him but they didn't make it into the episode.
Often forgotten is they briefly brought him back as an evil zombie in Dark Awakening. He fights Rodimus and sacrifices himself to save the Autobots again. I thought that was a middle finger from the writers who were sick of people asking for Optimus to return.
Then they actually bring him back and he literally saves everyone.
Then they actually bring him back and he literally saves everyone.
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That came out a month after the movie.No, I think you'll find it was longer ago than that.
Remember, when Optimus Prime had himself blown up because he lost a video game against Megatron (who used the Konami code to get infinite lives)?
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That's not true. The episode was in production before the movie came out.
Yesterday I watched the newly released 4K Blu-ray of this- it was still really good. So many good songs!
And Spike says "shit!"
Except I still hate Wheelie.
And Spike says "shit!"
Except I still hate Wheelie.
It's more that Optimus was literally carrying the Autobots. If you rewatched the first season as an adult, it all becomes clear the Autobots can't do shit without their glorious leader. Most of the Autobots are completely useless until around the second season where the focus lied more on the new Autobots to sell the hottest new toys.
Prime's death, ignoring the toy selling aspect, forced the Autobots to mature. You could see glimpses of that in season 3 where, not only Rodimus, but for example Grimlock, First Aid and Sandstorm struggled with their roles in the Autobot ranks and robot societies. It's a shame most of season 3 was shit though. Because there are some good episodes buried in there.
Oh shut up.
No, because it's true. Any time folks are the most vocally outraged at modern Transformers, esp MTMTE, it's for this very reason. The tfw boards are littered with folks is makes these comments. They loathe everything from those comics.
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you should see the Transformers Animated worship, to the point where they loathe Prime for replacing it.
Other than the OG movie and Beast Wars, MTMTE/Lost Light are the greatest things to ever have happened to this franchise, and I don't care about the opinion on some weirdos on the internet who are either homophobics in disguise or can't see past "it's different, I don't like it". G1 worship can get so goddamn weird.
This is not what happens, though -- he's never forgiven for what he did by the Cybertronian population nor does he ask to be. The ending has Megatron choosing to get executed for his crimes in spite of what Rodimus wants. Before that, ike two/three issues prior, it's even teased Megatron built a gigantic army to invade his universe again and both the audience and the main characters believe this is what's happening for a minute exactly because it's what the old Megatron would have done.
No see I like how Megatron is handled in those last issues of Lost Light, particularly in the final issue (which, I'll be blunt, I think totally redeems the entire Lost Light series). The problem, specifically, is how the mutineers are treated by the narrative and how Getaway somehow becomes the worst person in the universe, and it feels bloated to make him look worse than the jackasses he's lashing out at.
I thought they did a good job of writing Megatron post trial to show many of the struggles of the folks on board with trust. People accepted him enough to do their mission but any time something went wrong he was the first to be accused.
One of my favorite moments was during their visit to the Necrobot and Megatron looks for his statue. You could kind of feel the remorse coming through the panel
This is completely sensible and understandable because Animated was a thousand times better than Prime.
Getaway was a monster not because of what happened after the mutiny but what happened before. A large amount of issues are dedicated to a subplot where Getaway is literally grooming Tailgate and the issue where it all comes together is possibly the most vile thing I've read in the entire run of nearly 100 issues. It's brilliant work to make you loathe a character for how far they could go in their misguided concept of "justice".
But even before that, the moment Getaway is introduced we get an hint that he worked for the Institute and that he was a cover-ops operator working under Prowl and whatever other extremely corrupt bastards there were under Autobot leadership. The whole point of the IDW run was to showcase that in war there are no good and bad sides -- there are fucking sadistic monsters everywhere and they always manage to get on top of leadership.
Anyway, it's not surprising Getaway managed to slowly manipulate enough people for a full on mutiny. Even when those under his thrall finally learn the truth (plus the whole zombie gun thing), they apologize to Rodimus for what they did, not to Megatron, because nobody forgot what he did. This last point is important because they knew that Megatron would eventually be put under trial again after the Lost Light quest was over, they just got manipulated intro trying to do justice by their own hands.
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I'm saying that MTMTE could have done a more nuanced job of showing why a character could have a beef with Turbo Mecha Genocide Man's Six Million Year War To Slaughter Life He Finds Beneath Him that he resolves by going "my b" over instead of leaving meaningful criticism of Megatron to the guy who feeds his crew to a cannibal serial killer.
Yes his redemptive arc was compelling and yes it ended in a way I found perfect, but when you've got a character like IDW Megatron you need to do a better job being even handed to the guy who hates him so goddamned much.
Not in my timeline. :P Didn't have easy access to international releases back then... Surprised to see this, because it seems like it came a long while earlier.
One of those movies that it fucking terrible and yet I can't help but love it. It was also super unpopular at the time, yet I'd argue has now grown to become iconic.
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May Primus rest his Spark.
From this:
... to this:
Note that unlike Optimus, the truck cab is not independent; if you detach it you're left holding the front half of a truck cab attached to two robot legs.
Indeed he did, which is funny because G1 Hot Rod is a pretty great toy and a beauty in car mode. Worst. "Upgrade". Ever.
From this:
... to this:
Note that unlike Optimus, the truck cab is not independent; if you detach it you're left holding the front half of a truck cab attached to two robot legs.
I can name a dozen fandoms who are worse than Transfans. At least their fans aren't harassing creators or dismissing sexism and racism. Anyway, this isn't a pissing contest. I just don't like seeing hyperbole especially when you claim it in such a definitive manner.
I'm pretty sure they were saying that the Geewunners were the worst of the Transformser fandom, not that Transformers fans were the worst fandom ever.
Also, I wouldn't try and broadly claim that Transformers fans aren't harassing creators or dismissing bigotry. That shit's endemic in like every geek fandom.
I would probably argue that Chromedome is the main character, at least emotionally, but yeah, it's an ensemble story.
As for Optimus Prime... as a comic fan it was hard to really get attached to him. He was always just this generic hero guy with no nuance. Blaster, Grimlock and Fort Max had a lot more to actually do. Optimus didn't really come into his own until the later Matrix Quest stories and going into the Unicron story, where he was emotionally scarred and second-guessed himself.
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May Primus rest his Spark.
Indeed he did, which is funny because G1 Hot Rod is a pretty great toy and a beauty in car mode. Worst. "Upgrade". Ever.
From this:
... to this:
Note that unlike Optimus, the truck cab is not independent; if you detach it you're left holding the front half of a truck cab attached to two robot legs.
From what I understand, he was also too small to fight Galvatron.
Ultra Magnus was definitely the bigger, more expensive toy.
It's okay, he got better.
Well, first he came back as a sort of slave zombie. But the second time took!
Then depending on whether or not you're following american or japanese continuity, he either ushers in a new golden age for Cyberton then hangs out telling war stories to kids in an upgraded powermaster body, or he dies again sacrificing himself to save Vector Sigma from Galvatron.
(When Beast Wars was in development, future Optimus Prime was initially planned to return in the form of a lion. However as plans evolved that eventually became Optimus Primal instead.)
Well, first he came back as a sort of slave zombie. But the second time took!
Then depending on whether or not you're following american or japanese continuity, he either ushers in a new golden age for Cyberton then hangs out telling war stories to kids in an upgraded powermaster body, or he dies again sacrificing himself to save Vector Sigma from Galvatron.
(When Beast Wars was in development, future Optimus Prime was initially planned to return in the form of a lion. However as plans evolved that eventually became Optimus Primal instead.)
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Too soon... ðŸ˜
I wasn't able to see the movie as soon as it came out for some reason, probably sports, but the kids who did told everybody at school that Optimus dies in the movie and nobody would believe them. I was prepared for it but it was still upsetting for a young child. The major theory around the playground was that he'd be resurrected in the show as soon as the season started but of course that didn't happen and we were all very disappointed.
Rodimus sucked imo. I think my seven year old self would have more easily accepted Ultra Magnus as he looked like Optimus on steroids and actually came off as a leader going forward unlike Rodimus but alas it was never meant to be.
The Dr. SMOOV video of his resurrection is my own personal canon! 😄
I wasn't able to see the movie as soon as it came out for some reason, probably sports, but the kids who did told everybody at school that Optimus dies in the movie and nobody would believe them. I was prepared for it but it was still upsetting for a young child. The major theory around the playground was that he'd be resurrected in the show as soon as the season started but of course that didn't happen and we were all very disappointed.
Rodimus sucked imo. I think my seven year old self would have more easily accepted Ultra Magnus as he looked like Optimus on steroids and actually came off as a leader going forward unlike Rodimus but alas it was never meant to be.
The Dr. SMOOV video of his resurrection is my own personal canon! 😄
I thought the new Trilogy on netflix was pretty damn cool. Especially the way they tied multiple generations together.
IIRC, he was also suppose to come back in the post-Beast Machines series TransTech, but they canned that shit after Beast Machines turned out to be a total BM.
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Honestly, how terrible the voice direction was really hampered my enjoyment. I've said that before.
It's a shame because I think transtech would have been way cooler than beast machines
but nobody wanted to lay in that bed anymore after someone dropped a BM in it
still cant believe how dirty they did beast megatron
