Nothing beats the original

Belle Ende

So, who was in with The Transformers from the start (1985 in Europe / 1984 in the USA)?

Me, for one.

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Anyone who prefers the Sunbow cartoon to the Marvel (UK/US) comics needs their head checked. The comic book stories and characterisations were miles ahead of the cheesy cartoon show equivalents.

Rozie

I mainly loved the comics. Bludgeon kicked ass. I wasn't there from the start, I came along a couple of years before G2.

fish-head

I remember sitting up as a young 5 year old and watching it after Sesame Street during/after breakfast. Pure unadulterated genius.

10 years later I bought the DVDs in forbidden planet which gir wrecked by my little bro but at 18 I can say, the Transformers were an important part of my life and still inform the way I live(sometimes).

Rozie

Belle Ende, are you a girl?

Girl Transformers fans always have a soft spot for that certain someone

Belle Ende

I think Starscream IS a fun character, but is not one of my personal favourites.

BlitzKrieg

It is embedded deep in my childhood.

Its one of three cartoons I was born with (born on 1985) so I have these natural transformers sense (the other cartoons were Sherlock Hound and Catch the Pigeon.)

monkeyfudge

I remember when it first started getting shown on ITV.. I think they stuck in it on TV-AM and it each broken up into tiny little maddening chunks and you'd have to sit through a half hour or so of boring talking before you'd see some more.

The first ever bit of the cartoon I remember is Optimus Prime and Megatron fighting on top of the dam with those cool energon axe and mace.

Starscream was the first transformer I ever got actually.. my parents were of the mind that it was like getting two presents, a robot and a plane... it anyone else get fed that line?

I have issue 2 of the comic book... and got it sparodically up to about issue 70 when I started getting it every week up untill I felt I grew out of toys and comics somewhere around issue 230.. I missed out on the whole Matrix Quest thing as a result.

constitutionus

monkeyfudge wrote:

I remember when it first started getting shown on ITV.. I think they stuck in it on TV-AM and it each broken up into tiny little maddening chunks and you'd have to sit through a half hour or so of boring talking before you'd see some more.
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that was "wacaday" mate, i dont blame you repressing the memory you really do have to question the notion of cutting up a 20min cartoon into 8min chunks. its not like i was gonna watch the rest of that crap program, god save us from timmy mallet

been there from the start myself and have to admit its "my" toy craze. my brother was mad into star wars and while i got some of that too nothing captured my imagination like the transformers. which im delighted to say im still following to this day in the IDW comics. i'll never forget the day marvel cancelled the original comic, i was absolutely gutted. nothing hit me with that affect outside a family loss which shows just how much furman managed to get me invested in these strange characters. ive seen a lot of comics bite the dust but TF was the one i nearly went mad waiting for from the publishing schedual . particularly a certain issue 75 i truely believed that that was it, no more TF stories (i never new about the japaness stuff till i got on the net in 2003!) so you can imagine how happy i am to be getting this stuff again.

i thought the other iterations were so so to appalling (armada in particular was very slow to take off), the exception being beast wars and the excellent but controversial beast machines but i'll always regards the G1 cast in furmans hands to be MY transformers. that said im actually looking forward to the film. ok it wont be what we expected but hey it'll look cool as hell and watching the deceps kick the hell out of the american military should be an immense load of fun:D

who knows guys, it might work out after all. look how different xmen was to the book and they still kicked arse as films

i never

DBK

Didn't they start in 84 over here with the comics? I remember buying the 1st one in Tuthills in clondalkin village.

Rozie

What ever happened to Energon and Cybertron here? I haven't seen them being showed at all. I did see a young kid with a Vector Prime/Starscream boxset so surely there must be some show or something; Cybertron isn't really a line that can sell on it's own merits that much since all the designs are so spacey.

BlitzKrieg

they were shown on toonami i thought?

projectmayhem

Rozie wrote:

What ever happened to Energon and Cybertron here? I haven't seen them being showed at all. I did see a young kid with a Vector Prime/Starscream boxset so surely there must be some show or something; Cybertron isn't really a line that can sell on it's own merits that much since all the designs are so spacey.

are they actually good though? i've seen the DVD's in tower records (dublin), but never thought to buy them because of the bad rep they seem to have attained

monkeyfudge

xanthor wrote:

After that Sky got the rights to the cartoon, and it was not seen on terristrial UK TV again. Which can't have been good for toy sales. In fact since then, the only two TF cartoons that have been on terristrial TV since are Beast Wars and Armada, and both got passed around like a bad penny.

I remember when Sky had it. They showed season 2 on Saturday afternoons... you had to sit through an awful Pat Sharpe music show before it came on.

Then when season 3 came around they showed it on their Saturday and Sunday morning Fun Factory slot.

DBK

It was original shown on TV:AM at about 8.55 in the mornings. Many a time I was late for school for that 5 minute slot

constitutionus

Rozie wrote:

What ever happened to Energon and Cybertron here? I haven't seen them being showed at all. I did see a young kid with a Vector Prime/Starscream boxset so surely there must be some show or something; Cybertron isn't really a line that can sell on it's own merits that much since all the designs are so spacey.

energon was on RTE2 at 8.30 monday and wednesdays untill recently. im not sure if cybertron took over after it ended but its a good bet seeing as energon replaced armada and im sure ive seen some of it. problem is ive seen alot of cyberton on the net so i could be confusing it. energon isnt actully all that bad, certainly alot better than armada, and its really cool towards the end but cyberton doesnt seem the best. and yes i know primus is in it at the end but far too many of these shows start off crap and take tool long to get good so i couldnt be arsed waiting anymore.

best bets to wait for the new series thats to come out after the movie. at least it'll be american made and should at best make some sense

Dominatorx

constitutionus wrote:

energon isnt actully all that bad,

Two words for you
Ironhide,
Kicker

nuff said

Dominatorx

xanthor wrote:

...ah but Alpha Q made up for it.

Ah yes i had repressed the memory of that abomination

Thanks for opening old wounds

hellboy99

have to say Armada was very good, better than RID i think.

DarthWraak

I saw an episode of Armada where the autobots had to destroy unicron (running out of storyline ideas, eh). Then there was a silly battle between OP and Galivtron. There was too much babble. The humans were there, saying stuff like "Dont fight!" and "Cant we all be friends" and all that **** stuff. OP looks so gimpy and childlishly drawn in it, and talks childlishly too.



I know when g1 was out it was intented for children, but it had class and genious. Does this mean that todays generation of children are idiots?

Dominatorx

DarthWraak wrote:

Then there was a silly battle between OP and Galivtron. There was too much babble.

I know when g1 was out it was intented for children, but it had class and genious. Does this mean that todays generation of children are idiots?

Was that the battle where they beat the ever loving crap outta each other ?
I quite enjoyed that , one of Armadas high points Yeah the obligitory brats were annoying as hell but they pale in comparrison to the poster boy for whingy brats Kicker

As for g1 being genius
you obviously never saw the following
city of steel
bot
or Surprise party
Admitadly by season 3 they had started to get their act together storywise but the animation was woefull
if the word genius had to be applied to any tf series it would have to be Beast wars and its sequel Beast machines

DarthWraak

Let the flaming about which Transformers series is the best begin!!!

monkeyfudge

Dominatorx wrote:

city of steel

City of Steel wasn't too bad. I liked how the Constructicons took Optimus Prime apart and used his bits to make an alligator.

One of the best things about the original series was that it wasn't full of preachy messages like the other shows around at the time. I watched an old episode of He-man the other day on youtube and the final message was actually about what to do if some touches you inappropriately... But having Orko playacting in the message seems to make light of the subject somehow.

Dominatorx

monkeyfudge wrote:

One of the best things about the original series was that it wasn't full of preachy messages like the other shows around at the time. I watched an old episode of He-man the other day on youtube and the final message was actually about what to do if some touches you inappropriately... But having Orko playacting in the message seems to make light of the subject somehow.

Amen to that. saw Bravestarr on tv this morning talk about PREACHY
lets b thankfull that the public service announcements were not put in the eps (you all know the ones im talkin about the dont steal cars and the like one )

_Kaiser_

Started watching in 84/85 on Sky Channel. Season one and two on Saturdays right through till season 3.

I've since tried watching Armada and Energon (I think) but aside from the fact that I'm not a big fan on the pokemon-style animation they use now or the voice acting, I just can't help thinking "that's not Prime/Megatron and why is Galvatron there at the same time??" etc)

Original series and movie ftw!

Rozie

I just watched some "Webisodes" of Armada and urgh, it's pretty bad. It's too Pokémonish. I don't understand it, they know they have an adult collector and nostalgic audience, why don't they play that up more? Beast Wars was a fantastic cartoon that I can really enjoy. I think the mid 90s was the peak of Kids' "Intelligence" and it sloped from there; the Liefeld types finally won their battle.

I can't believe that it spawned such a dark, moody and cool PS2 game.

DarthWraak

Kaiser2000 wrote:

Original series and movie ftw!

Word

projectmayhem

armada was really just... not good.

it was the kind of series that would have a huge battle building up, but prime would decide to put out the rain forest fire first, before kicking ass. by the time ass kicking came, the decepticons were gone

stop giving the kids a "message" and shoot some damn lasers. i spent my childhood watching robots and turtles kicking the bejaysus out of each other, and i turned out fine!

Rozie

projectmayhem wrote:

armada was really just... not good.

it was the kind of series that would have a huge battle building up, but prime would decide to put out the rain forest fire first, before kicking ass. by the time ass kicking came, the decepticons were gone

stop giving the kids a "message" and shoot some damn lasers. i spent my childhood watching robots and turtles kicking the bejaysus out of each other, and i turned out fine!

Actually, most of the time is spent doing the "Strike a pose" thing. IT takes up at least 8% of the show's air time, no joke.

Galvasean

If you havn't seen Beat Wars you can't comment. It was far and away the best transformers TV series.
+check out the G2 comics (you can pick up the hardbacks in Forbidden Planet), they'll blow you away.

Rozie

Beast Wars was the best cartoon, but G1 probably had the best characters, designs and ideas abstract from their implementation.

Agamemnon

Kaiser2000 wrote:

Original series and movie ftw!

QFT. They made me what I am today, along with Action Force.