I have been a huge fan of the original G1 Transformers since it's inception in the mid 80's. For those of you who are not old enough to remember the genesis of our Robots in Disguise, The Transformers started as a toyline from Japan, Takara Tomy's Diaclones and Micro Change. These were toys that could transform from robots into vehicles and other inanimate objects like cameras and cassette tapedecks. As far as the Japanese were concerned, these were just kids toys. The stories behind these incredible figures only began when the decision was made to bring these transforming robots into USA. The task of fleshing out the main players and their back stories fell on the shoulders of Bob Budiansky. Thus began the war between the heroic Autobots and the villainous Deceptions, on the pages of Marvel Comics The Transformers. The now iconic TV series from Sunbow Production would soon follow, introducing the whole world to amazing voice actors such as Peter Cullen, the voice of Optimus Prime and Ironhide, Frank Welker as the maniacal Megatron and Chris Latta as whiney Starscream. This series ran for four glorious seasons , with some outstanding episode like the first seasons five parter A Certain Doom, of which Dark of the Moon was loosely based on. In this story arc, Megatron works with a evil genius, Dr Arkavil to enslave the human race through a mind control chip to build a space bridge. The master plan was to bring Cybertron to earth. Other memorable episodes include SOS Dinobots, where Wheeljack creates the Dinobots after Spike Witwicky discovers dinosaur fossils in a cave adjacent to Autobot headquarters. And how about War Dawn when the cocky Aerialbots learn to respect Optimus Prime and not idolize Megatron after they accidentally travel back in time and witness the events that transformed Orion Pax into Optimus Prime. The cartoon was so popular, it spawned a full length animated film, Transformers the movie. I will be reviewing that movie in a Flashback Friday segment so stay tuned!
Transformers in the 2000
Transformers continued to reinvent itself over time. The late 90's saw the introduction of Beast Wars. I must confess that by the time this came around, I was no longer into the Transformers, so I won't pretend to know about the primals. For me, G1 will always be my era. Then the first of Michael Bay's Transformers hit the silver screen screen in 2007! The movie featured stunning visual effects and radical and modernized designs, and an incredible soundtrack by my friend Steve Jablonski. His work on Transformers spans the five movies, Transformers, Revenge of the Fallen, Dark of the Moon, The Age of Extinction and The Last Knight. It's a shame Steve didn't score the later non Bay movies. While not exactly memorable movies by any means, these summer blockbusters did provide some highlights. I personally only liked the first two, the ones with Shia LaBeouf as Sam Witwicky and Megan Fox as Mikaela Barnes. These two movies felt the most connected and had the least contradictions.
The first movie, sees the Allspark hurtling towards earth. The Decepticons track it to earth but are not able to pinpoint it's exact location. It is Sam's great grandfather Archibald Witwicky that accidentally discovers the location of the artifact when he stumbles across Megatron, who is frozen in ice. Bumblebee, the first Autobot to arrive on earth befriends Sam and summons Autobot leader Optimus Prime, who arrives on earth with first lieutenant Jazz, weapons specialist Ironhide and medical officer Ratchet. The Autobots quickly move to secure the Allspark, but the Decepticons free Megatron. Optimus and Megatron duke it out while Sam tries to protect the Allspark. The movie ends with Sam destroying Megatron by putting the Allspark in Megatron's chest. Only a shard of the Allspark is left and the Autobots allow the army to safeguard the shard.
The second movie introduces us to the Primes. Despite the negative press, rotten tomato meter scores and the writers strike, this entry into the franchise remains my favorite of the Bayverse. Based loosely on the graphic novel The War Within, we explore the legend of the Fallen Prime. In this iteration, he betrays his brothers and seeks to harness the energy of the sun, and destroy the earth in the process. He enlist the Decepticons help and resurrects Megatron to eliminate the last of the Primes. We get the best live action battle sequences in the whole franchise with the face off in the factory and then the forest where Prime takes on the might of Megatron, Starscream and Grindor. He best all of them, but falls prey to Megatron's cowardly backstab. It's up to Sam, who has cybertronian symbols running through his mind ever since being exposed to the Allspark energy to locate the tomb of the Primes. He has to retrieve the artifact that can reactivate Prime, the matrix of leadership. Sam gets help from a former Decepticon Jetfire. The elderly robot tells them the history of the original thirteen Primes and how the Fallen betrayed and murdered his brethren. Jetfire later sacrifices himself so Optimus can stop the Fallen and the Decepticons.
I will not get into the details of the final Sam Witwicky installment as I didn't think that it meshed with the first two. It also murdered one of my favorite Autobots from the Bayverse, Ironhide. And as if that wasn't bad enough, Bay also finally completed the character assassination of Optimus Prime when he turned Prime into a homicidal maniac that executes his former mentor and primary antagonist, Sentinel Prime and Megatron in cold blood. And don't even get me started on the next two cash grabs. Shia LaBeouf gets replaced with Mark Wahlberg. The only bright point are the introduction of the Dinobots.
The best of the bunch : Bumblebee
After the debacle of The Last Knight, Paramount decided to give the stale franchise a soft reboot. No more bombastic earth shattering end of the world shenanigans. In its place a much smaller scale and back to basics story about a girl and her car. Hailee Steinfeld plays Charlie, a teen living her 'loser' life in the 80's. Her life turns around when she is gifted a junker VW Beetle by her boss at a bodyshop she works at. This is none other than Bumblebee. Of course Bumblebee comes with his baggage, in the form of John Cena's Special OP's Agent Burns, who has a run in with Bee when he first crashlands on earth, and Decepticons Shatterstar and Dropkick, who wants to question Bee about the location of the Autobots. We get great flashback scenes of the final days of the war for Cybertron, where we see Decepticons Shockwave, Soundwave, Ravage, Starscream and the Sweeps, and Autobots Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, Cliffjumper, Wheeljack, Ironhide, Ratchet, Arcee and Brawn in their G1 glory. This showed that the boxy designs from the 80's cartoons did translate well to the silver screen. This low brow production actually revitalized the franchise and we now have Rise of the Beast to look forward to in June this year. Let's see if this is any good.
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