You knew I had to start with him, right?
Yes, last week gave us the preview of Transformers: Prime, a series that thus far does not have a toyline connected to it. Or so it seems, but I’ll get to that. First let’s talk about the show. Short story: it was pretty good.
The long story does come with some concerns. Let’s start with the character models first. I have no trouble with a CG Transformers series. On the other hand, these guys are no Mainframe Entertainment. (Now going by Rainmaker for some reason.) The humans and “sets” actually aren’t too bad. It’s the robots I have trouble with. Look at the above video and compare it to Beast Wars, produced in the 90’s.
Ah Waspinator, how we miss you. Anyway, that was season one, and the robots in Prime are weaker than this. It’s all smooth surfaces with no real texture, even less than the backgrounds. They kind of suffer a bit. Compare it also to the “Cyber Missions” online series Hasbro has been producing.
In a later episode Miko shows off her new bathing suit, leading to Raff and the Autobots to learn about puberty.
That brings me to another point. I find it interesting that the character models sort of pick over the previous two main lines. Optimus Prime and Bumblebee resemble the Movieverse versions, and with the same writers from the movies, Alex Kurtzman and Robert Orci, as two of the three producers you would say I shouldn’t be surprised. Arcee even resembles her Movie design, as originally intended in the first film. (Her first movie appearance would be in the second film with that stupid uniwheel design, but this was used in early IDW comics set in the Movieverse.)
On the other hand, Cliffjumper, who was brought in just to die, and Bulkhead are closer to Transformers Animated, just with new alt modes. Ratchet seems to borrow from a few different designs, but I can’t point at one specific. I can think of a few different reasons for this, but none of them make any sense. On the Decepticon side, Megatron resembles his War For Cybertron look, but Starscream is another hodgepodge and I’m not sure what Soundwave is supposed to come from.
Cliffjumper was the star of the IDW prequel but in the series he lasts one segment. Then gets zombiefied.
Actually, the Decepticons were the biggest disappointment as far as characters go. Megatron, Starscream, and Soundwave are the only ones with any character, the rest reduced to cannon fodder clone troopers. (No connection to the Clone Troopers of Star Wars: Clone Wars, as they have more personality than the Decepticlones here.) At least Frank Welker’s long awaited return as Megatron (since the first Movieverse-based game, replacing Hugo Weaving) was worth it. He made for a great Megatron.
Back to the Autobots, my only complaint is Bumblebee. He still can’t talk, but now he doesn’t even use his radio to talk. He just makes noises. Again, these are the guys who took away his ability to talk in the movies, but at the end of the first movie his voice box was restored by the Cube. The only reason he spoke through the radio again in the sequel was because Bay liked that aspect of Bumblebee so he lost the ability to speak at all. Otherwise, I like him, but my favorite is Arcee. She has a great personality. Bulkhead isn’t the idiot savant from Animated but more like Rhinox without the technical skill. Ratchet is a towned down version of his Animated depiction perhaps with some movie influence. Optimus Prime is Optimus Prime, so gold stars there. However, I think he looked better with the Movie lips than the mouth they gave him.
Why did Government Agency Unknown put Agent Fowler in charge of being the Autobots’ human liaison? He obviously doesn’t like them when we meet them. Jack may end up being the leader of the kids, but we’ll have to see where that goes in the series. Raff is a 12-year-old super hacker, make of that what you will, but it looks like he has some back-story due to one reaction when Jack and Niko are arguing. I could be wrong, though.
"It took long enough to just name the show after me."
The story itself is pretty good. The reasons for the human children being brought it was a bit weak but Raff at least was actually helpful. Megatron’s plan may well make him the cruelest Megatron yet, and using Dark Energon (taken from the game, much as the All-Spark of Animated ripped off the film) to create a zombie army is rather ingenious. Dead Cybertron comes from the Movie and IDW Comics, but I suppose we take the hand we’re dealt. I just hope the next continuity brings life back to the planet.
Overall I rather enjoyed it. Granted, I think I was more excited about Animated, but it will be a long wait until February when the series proper starts. (That’s a month more than Young Justice, give or take a week.) At least I recommend checking it out.
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