A little post-Thanksgiving bonus before the Christmas specials start.
It’s rare to get a movie based on a TV show. I don’t mean these reimagined garbage movies that bear little to no resemblance to the source material unless it’s outright mocking it. I mean the show itself having a movie. You had the occasional reunion like Star Trek: The Motion Picture or The Return Of Maxwell Smart, but an active movie, especially a kids cartoon, getting a theatrical exclusive? Not likely. Then there was The Transformers: The Movie, a 1986 movie that altered the timeline of the cartoon. The movie was set in the far off year of 2005, with season three taking place in 2006. It introduced a new cast while killing off a huge amount of the old one to do so, as Hasbro wanted to push the new toys and didn’t realize the kids had connected so strongly to the old characters.
In Japan, kids are used to watching their heroes die to be replaced with new characters whether there were toys involved or not. Instead of the final three episode miniseries “The Rebirth”, they got The Headmasters, which killed off Optimus Prime (known in Japan as “Convoy”) a second time, after having to explain his death in Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers 2010, since they opted to go five years beyond the American timeline. It wouldn’t be until after The Headmasters, Masterforce, and even Victory that select events got to see a Japanese subbed version of the English movie, and even longer before a Japanese dub of the movie would be made. Tonight I bring you that dub with English subtitles, bring things a bit full circle. You can learn more about the history at the TF Wiki.
You may be wondering why you should even bother watching that version when you already have the English version available to you, or at least you’ve seen it. That’s where the first of our extras comes in, also a way to make this post viable if the feature presentation is every taken down. TJ Omega is how I learned of this version of the movie showing up on YouTube, and he explains why it’s worth watching. Of course, you might want to wait until after you see the movie, to see if you can spot the differences first and then wait for TJ to list them all. That’s one of two extra bonuses before we get to the movie itself. Enjoy.
BW Media Spotlight 
BW’s Saturday Article Link> The Real Culture/Politics Power Dynamic
What does this have to do with the topic? Admittedly little. I just needed an image and it’s Aquaman riding dolphins to chase the Penguin. I need no other reason.
We’ve heard that “politics is downstream from culture”, the idea that affecting the culture may in turn affect how people act politically. Making a case against that expression is author and commentator Brian Newmeyer, who makes the case that politics has more control over culture than you might realize. I’m not saying it’s necessarily wrong, but it may actually be more cylindrical, an oryborous of political culture. Culture can affect people when it sneaks past politics while the current climate will affect what draws people in culturally. So everybody’s right…except the people who are wrong.
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Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on November 29, 2025 in Uncategorized and tagged commentary, Politics, stories and culture.
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