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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Transformers the animated movie

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06:18 / 03.04.07

I don't really care to see the live action Transformers movie, and after doing a search that's the only kind of Transformers thread I could find around here. So I wanted to start one about the animated movie.

So I picked up a 20th anniversary special edition of the animated Transformers movie. The DVD is really cool, 2 discs, multiple commentaries (with a cool fanboy commentary), an only shown in Japan episode that came out right before the movie, toy commercials, a bunch of featurettes including the reasoning of killing Prime and a bunch of other cool stuff.

The film holds up pretty well. The best scene in the movie has got to be Optimus Prime transforming, rolling down a ramp running over Decepticons and then transforming mid air while doing some John Woo shooting and having his final battle with Megatron.

Starscream finally livin' the dream, throwing Megatron from Astrotrain and finally becoming leader of the Decepticons (for about 3 seconds anyways).

The Astrotrain scene was gold all around. The injured Decepticons pathetic little comic objections to being tossed off the train. Starscream, Devastator, and Soundwave "the uncharismatic bore", battling for leadership. They don't show the entire battle but according to the creators the storyboards showed Starscream hiding for the entire battle and then winning when the others were exhausted after the fight.

And what a violent fucking beginning for a 1980s cartoon movie. Megatron and crew killing the shit out of like four Autobots on their way to Earth. And a shot of Megatron aiming his cannon armor down at an injured Autobot and blasting him with the point blank killshot.

I did like the beginning a little better than the later part because they killed a lot of the characters I really liked, Starscream, Optimus, and Megatron (they turned him into Galvatron but they changed his voice and look so it wasn't quite the same).

They mention that the G1 era ends pretty much with the scene where Galvatron destroys Starscream and steps on his crown.

Anyone else watch this lately?

12:44 / 03.04.07

I know there's a lot of hate for this movie and there's a lot of love. I like the movie. It's good. The beginning is the best part of the whole thing... the melodramatic synth score introducing us to Unicron and the doomed planet. The painted matte backgrounds while Unicron drifts, seeking more sustenance. And then, "Transformerrrrrrrss! More than meets the Eye!!!!!!" Great intro. Of course, after the Autobot city scene, the movie derails hard, with bad writing, horrible dialogue and a plot that goes nowhere. It comes back a little when Unicron transforms and kicks the shit out of Cybertron. My little fanboy hearts soars when Rodimus Prime becomes who he is to the tune of... "You've got the touch [dun dun dun dun] You've got the powwwwerrrr! After all is said and done... [etc]". We listen to the soundtrack at work sometimes. I just wish the middle bits of the movie weren't so fucking horrible.

12:46 / 03.04.07

Oh yeah, and I picked up the two disc-er for like 15 bucks Canadian. Which is really cheap for a new release. Awesome packaging. I like how one disc is the Matrix and the other is the second best Transformer evah: Unicron. (Soundwave being the first, of course, and Starscream in the third position: Autobots are lame.)

14:38 / 03.04.07

Shutupwrongness

Optimus Prime is the coolest

The Natural Way

14:40 / 03.04.07

Soundwave, yes, ROCK!!, but what about that awesome Predacon with a lion's head for a chest? Razorclaw, was it? DOUBLE ROCK!!! Deserves a film all to hiself.

Mysterious Transfer Student

14:59 / 03.04.07

For anyone who has joined the board recently and is reading this thread, be aware that a good way to start an argument amongst longer-standing 'Lithers is to indulge in idle talk about the relative merits of the various Transformers.

Now, I was always a Wheeljack fan....

Our Lady Has Left the Building

15:00 / 03.04.07

Come on, let's have no hate for the Junkions.

uncle retrospective

15:34 / 03.04.07

Come on, let's have no hate for the Junkions

Put your drugs down and back away from the thread.
Weirdo.

15:35 / 03.04.07

There was a quote from Michael Bay or Jerry Bruckheimer or someone that was banging on about how bad the cartoon was and about how his film is going to be a million times better. For the record, I love the cartoon, and, thus far, think that the live action film looks shit.

When I saw it on the big screen, I nearly shed a tear at

S
P
O
I
L
E
R
(just in case)

Optimus dying

E
N
D

S
P
O
I
L
E
R

and the whack of the bass as Megatron first encounters Unicron was great,

I think I have given the DVD as a gift to about four people as well.

Phex: Dorset Doom

16:13 / 03.04.07

Three words: Orson. Fucking. Welles.

His third from last film role was playing Unicron in Transformers: The Movie. Citizen Kane playing a planet that eats planets. Life is good.

16:56 / 03.04.07

Phex, I was seriously JUST about to write: "Two words. ORSON. WELLES." Then I saw your post. Nice one!

17:02 / 03.04.07

The Junkions were shit. Especially Wreck-Gar.

One thing I liked about the movie is how they upped the scale of Transforming. Everything Transforms in this film. Even a city. Even a planet.

Prime and Megs duking it out, with the most baddest line in animation, "I'LL RIP OUT YOUR OPTICS!". Chilling goodstuff.

17:02 / 03.04.07

*Even Spike Whitwhicky! (when he has his Da's wheelsuit on)

The Natural Way

17:06 / 03.04.07

Triplets, there was a grand tradition of transforming cities/fortresses (see Scorponok and Metroplex) established long before the movie was released. Anyway, fuck that shit, I'm down with the Headmasters, the transformers that turned into giant robot heads.

17:10 / 03.04.07

I was just thinking about Headmasters, about how the comic had the heads as humans in suits, but the toys had them transforming by bending double - and just made me think, how uncomfortable it would be to be a headmaster head.

The Natural Way

17:19 / 03.04.07

But amazing. You would, after all, be a giant robot head. Sort of like Modok.

17:38 / 03.04.07

The Junkions were shit. Especially Wreck-Gar.

Oh Reginald!

I DISAGREE!

Not only was Wreck-Gar great because Eric Idle voiced him, it was the fact that they hung around on a planet full of junk spouting Human advertising slogans that just made them so random as to be truly great.

Philosophically, an entire junkyard planet filled with robots learning to speak from nothing but television commercials; what more could you ask for?

Now. As a plot thread, I grant you, it wasn't great. But the concept rocked.

Mysterious Transfer Student

18:10 / 03.04.07

I would like to dissent from the view that T:tM suffers any kind of slump after the first act. The pace drops, admittedly, and splitting the action into (quick count) half-a-dozen diverse plot threads doesn't help any, but there's some pure gold in there. Hapless survivor of planetary holocaust fed by Kafkaesque nihilist tribunal to mindless predators for no good reason at all! Dinobots pottering around! Hot Rod and Kup hiking through the metallic wilderness (one of the more slash-friendly pairings generated by the Transformers 'verse or so I've heard, officer). Galvatron actually being a bit crap, not improving on his predecessor's achievements and failing to understand what the Matrix is good for until it's too late! And my favourite piece of dialogue:

SPRINGER: "Kup and the Dinobots just bought it."
ULTRA MAGNUS: "I can't deal with that now."

Always a useful line to pull out when someone's bothering you at work.

18:22 / 03.04.07

... Ze says, carefully avoiding the Junkion debate.

18:24 / 03.04.07

I also have to pour one out for my homey, Orson fucking Welles. When you watch this movie, watch it with a good sound system (an LCD soundsystem?) just to hear that sweet perfect sexyscary baritone of Orson Welles: Turn up the bass!

And also, how awesome is the cast assembled for this flick. Leonard Nimoy is pitch-perfect and so is that other guy who does Ultra-Magnus... what's his name? Oh yeah, Robert Stack, motherfucker. Elliott Ness himself. The man who dared (to be stupid?) to say "Damn it" in a kid's movie.

20:28 / 03.04.07

Does the 2-disc DVD come with the full soundtrack? I swear to Grimlock I will buy the motherfucker if it does.

21:01 / 03.04.07

I have the soundtrack. Well, most of it. Look on Soulseek.

22:58 / 03.04.07

Heh, well, I think this was the first record I ever bought:

I should really get TTM on DVD, but I believe there are a couple of different versions out there. Might just be packaging, but does anyone know anything? I think it's about £3 in Fopp at the moment...

Brigade du jour

23:59 / 03.04.07

The man who dared (to be stupid?) to say "Damn it" in a kid's movie.

That's nothing. Spike says "Oh shit, what are we gonna do now?" at one point. At least in my copy of the DVD.

06:14 / 04.04.07

Yeah, they were talking about the "Oh shit" line. Back then they would generally stop showing animated movies past 4pm, unless there was cursing or something, so they threw in the "shit" line to keep the movie playin throughout the day and night.

Also, I believe the DVD I talked about up top is the newest, has tons of features, and runs only about fifteen bucks.

07:54 / 04.04.07

but what about that awesome Predacon with a lion's head for a chest? Razorclaw, was it? DOUBLE ROCK!!! Deserves a film all to hiself.

Who teamed up with his mates and became Predaking, who I vividly remember having his arse handed to him, then snatched away and eaten and shat out by the hardest of the fucking hard Grimlock and crew. But that would be in the British comic which = best by about a million miles.

Basically the film should have been written by Simon Furman. That is its greatest weakness.

10:48 / 04.04.07

Devastator was so best! The deep, extra bass-y Transformation sound when he combines still gives me sexbumps.

Bloody Dinobots.

11:17 / 04.04.07

Yeah I know, they kicked his arse too.

13:09 / 04.04.07

Round 1, my friend, Round 1.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

14:21 / 04.04.07

Grimlock, the Gene Hunt of the Autobots. You may now recast the rest of the Life on Mars characters to your hearts content.

18:58 / 04.04.07

Basically the film should have been written by Simon Furman. That is its greatest weakness.

The film is all preamble for Target: 2006, as far as I'm concerned.

19:03 / 04.04.07

Grimlock, the Gene Hunt of the Autobots. You may now recast the rest of the Life on Mars characters to your hearts content.

Must... Resist...

Aha! I am Klarion

19:20 / 04.04.07

Weird, this was playing in the comic book shop when I went in today.

19:46 / 04.04.07

Why were there no Decepticon dinobots? Don't even try to tell me that the Insecticons were the Decepticon answer!

NB - perhaps this should be changed into more of a thread to discuss the animated movie and series, as opposed to the live action film?

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

19:48 / 04.04.07

If we're including the series, there was a Decepticon Dinobot, called Dinobot.

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