Transformers: One - New Animated Prequel coming September 20th, 2024 - New Toy Official Images!
- Thread starter Undead Scottsman
- Start date
My overall impression is positive. Part of the hype for this was blurbs saying this is the "best Transformers movie", but that's... As low a bar as it gets. It's not particularly mind-blowing it memorable just yet, but it is very good.
Visually I'm not super into the models and faces. Most of them have this odd wasp waist thing with wide rectangular torso halves. But when they don't (Bee, Elita, Seekers) the models look great. The faces are also not really my cup of tea, but they're serviceable. Everyone does have a distinct face structure (Sentinel's is very wide, Megatron has a nice lean angular cheek to chin) which is a nice characterization thing. It's nice seeing the distinctiveness of each model look through each upgrade (miner, with cog, powered up by Matrix/Megatronus cog), although multiple reformats kind of wears the device a bit thin.
Beyond that, though, this Cybertron is gorgeous. Love the wildness of the surface and the sheer kid magic of trains and transports on self-extending roads and tracks to who knows where. Some of the altmodes are particularly neat (I MUST have a Studio Series Airachnid, and I hope a beefier and more detailed Studio Series Alpha Trion is due too).
The music is by Brian Tyler and is nice, with some bits actually weaving the transformation sound into them (at least once, at the High Guard hideout). The continuous hopeful bits while Orion falls into Cybertron are nice. The requisite "pop song we didn't use in the movie" that plays over the credits is "If I Fall", which is not very good.
The voice acting is a mixed bag. It's the most emotive I've ever heard Scarjo, and I like her Elita. Brian Tyree Henry is great, just great, as D-16/Megatron. Jon Hamm does the smarmy politician voice very well with Sentinel Prime, although I could have done with a bit more of an edge when the character's shift is done. Keegan-Michael Key's B-127 is... Okay. Idk how I feel about Bee being this motormouth comedy machine (Badassatron was one of the weakest jokes in the trailer, and sadly but unsurprisingly it's a runner), but it doesn't take over the storytelling and he's good at it in any case. Buscemi is PERFECT for Starscream, and I love that they worked in a momentarily screechy voice glitch. He's one of my favorites in the whole thing, just above Fishburne as Alpha Trion.
Finally, Hemsworth as Orion Pax/Optimus Prime... is kind of what I expected from the trailers. It's a serviceable performance, and Hemsworth's strength of good comic timing and banter is great for a looser, young, pre-leader figure OP. But so much of his effort seems to be going into suprressing his accent, making his words rhotic (if with a bit of a lisp sometimes), that the acting kind of falls a bit flat. Not that the script gives him as much to act with as Brian. For instance, the speech he gives to the miners feels like it loses steam halfway through; allthough the scene is trying to sell us on how inspirational he is now that he's grown into the role, after the borrowed line from Alpha Trion he feels like he's trying to get through it. (The big closing speech, which I liked that the movie had, was undercut by how he kept saying Autobots as Auto-Bots. Like yes, I get it, auto- as in autonomous, you said.) I almost would have preferred that he just keep his accent if it let him speak more naturally, because this was a bit wooden (and not in a good way).
That said, for the most part the characterization is great. B-127 is kind of automatically the weakest here as he's basically pigeonholed into being the punchline machine, although ciphers like Soundwave and Shockwave get much less for now. Elita is established very well as a bot with her own aspirations and standards, an equal to the others. Everyone gets some good lines, and occasionally there are some extra good bits ("You have neither the touch nor the power").
The bond between Orion and D-16 is palpable and believable, although the progression of each character is a bit clunkily done. Everything after the cave and the reveal about the Primes has the right pieces (Orion believing the truth will free the people, D swearing a murderous revenge and swearing off leaders, then leaning into the "might makes right" credo of the High Guard) but could have been done better. Part of this is complicated by how compsct the timeline of events seems to be. These big sweeping character alignment shifts would benefit from time for reflection or resentment to go to work.
Love the way the movie plays with the lore bits it needs for the story. Starscream and the High Guard going off on their own is a nice twist on "the Decepticons are the military hardware kind", and them hiding out in the surface and plotting against Sentinel is interesting enough that they should get their own miniseries.
The 13 were well used here, with an interesting new take. It was surprisingly thrilling seeing Vector Prime on the big screen, basically looking as we know him. Still rolling my eyes at the continued use of "Megatronus" (FFS, just call him Megatron) but giving him the Tarn look of having the Decepticon sigil for a face/mask is a great move. Can't recall if it's been done, don't care. It's good here. I like that this uses Zeta as the 13th, neatly avoiding any Arisen nonsense, although it's interesting that the 13th is essentially the Matrix Bearer, so any inheritor is kiiiind of like the Arisen, but at least that's not explicitly a thing. Loved the designs for the most part (seeing them all in the group shot bracing for the betrayal was cool), but reusing dead 13 member t-cogs was a bit awkward. The whole timeline of the 13 essentially not being THAT ancient (50 cycles?) is certainly something to think about.
The new story working of Sentinel selling out the race to the Quintessons, and the Quintessons continuing to be in power, is a bold move I really like. I do wish the Quintessons looked more like the Quintessons of old, but that's a minor concern. When Sentinel and his guard bent the knee I was as taken aback as the characters were. Sentinel having betrayed the Primes, and going on to tamper with newborns to dictate their destinies, is a deliciously evil thing to give to a character, and would have been nice to really explore if not for the kid movie of it all.
The big fight at the end was... Interesting if weird. Big frenzied shootout, great use of space in aerial combat blocking. Elita chasing down Airachnid was a great sequence. Crashing the train was great, miners flying in for the rescue was a good, well-paced development. Etc. The combat in general is great, mixing typical punchy punchy with more dynamic and inventive melee spots (Prime ripping off Megs turret and hitting him with it, only for it to... Transform back into part of Megs' body, I think).
But the killing of Sentinel lost something in being intercut with Orion being given the Matrix. Threw the pacing off by a lot, and the rest felt a bit repetitive because we'd already seen both get upgraded and get physical.
Even Megs letting Orion fall after taking the shot was a little thin by itself as a character beat. "I'm done saving you" works as a callback/twist on all the saving they'd done for each other, but a line about not saving someone who was only in danger because of protecting a liar and traitor would've added some substance to that.
And the ending was... I'm not sure I get it. It seems like it would've made more sense for Optimus to offer to work together to rebuild, or for Megatron to lead the High Guard and protect Cybertron, and for Megs to soundly reject that because he'll put up with no more leaders, and no more corruption and deception. Instead it's "I cut your cannon, get out." (And then as soon as they leave, the Autobots turn the Energon back on.)
The big closing speech... Are the Quintessons not just hovering above Cybertron constantly? Are the Autobots not going to take the battle to them? Or are they waiting for the Quintessons to return and then fight them into leaving for good?
Anyway, a very good bit of Transformers media with nice lore play and worldbuilding. I particularly love the twist that the constantly-transforming surface of Cybertron is now where the secrets are, rather than the core, which is now more the world they know (although the Matrix still being "there" is okay too). Way more cameos and existing designs and names thrown in there than a single viewing can parse out (I kinda marked out at Cordon on the leaderboard for the Iacon 5000). There's what, only a handful of new names and designs here -- Behemoth and one other racer I didn't catch, the name Darkwing given to the big angry boss guy) -- and almost every shot has someone or four you'll recognize.
Already making plans to see it again.
Visually I'm not super into the models and faces. Most of them have this odd wasp waist thing with wide rectangular torso halves. But when they don't (Bee, Elita, Seekers) the models look great. The faces are also not really my cup of tea, but they're serviceable. Everyone does have a distinct face structure (Sentinel's is very wide, Megatron has a nice lean angular cheek to chin) which is a nice characterization thing. It's nice seeing the distinctiveness of each model look through each upgrade (miner, with cog, powered up by Matrix/Megatronus cog), although multiple reformats kind of wears the device a bit thin.
Beyond that, though, this Cybertron is gorgeous. Love the wildness of the surface and the sheer kid magic of trains and transports on self-extending roads and tracks to who knows where. Some of the altmodes are particularly neat (I MUST have a Studio Series Airachnid, and I hope a beefier and more detailed Studio Series Alpha Trion is due too).
The music is by Brian Tyler and is nice, with some bits actually weaving the transformation sound into them (at least once, at the High Guard hideout). The continuous hopeful bits while Orion falls into Cybertron are nice. The requisite "pop song we didn't use in the movie" that plays over the credits is "If I Fall", which is not very good.
The voice acting is a mixed bag. It's the most emotive I've ever heard Scarjo, and I like her Elita. Brian Tyree Henry is great, just great, as D-16/Megatron. Jon Hamm does the smarmy politician voice very well with Sentinel Prime, although I could have done with a bit more of an edge when the character's shift is done. Keegan-Michael Key's B-127 is... Okay. Idk how I feel about Bee being this motormouth comedy machine (Badassatron was one of the weakest jokes in the trailer, and sadly but unsurprisingly it's a runner), but it doesn't take over the storytelling and he's good at it in any case. Buscemi is PERFECT for Starscream, and I love that they worked in a momentarily screechy voice glitch. He's one of my favorites in the whole thing, just above Fishburne as Alpha Trion.
Finally, Hemsworth as Orion Pax/Optimus Prime... is kind of what I expected from the trailers. It's a serviceable performance, and Hemsworth's strength of good comic timing and banter is great for a looser, young, pre-leader figure OP. But so much of his effort seems to be going into suprressing his accent, making his words rhotic (if with a bit of a lisp sometimes), that the acting kind of falls a bit flat. Not that the script gives him as much to act with as Brian. For instance, the speech he gives to the miners feels like it loses steam halfway through; allthough the scene is trying to sell us on how inspirational he is now that he's grown into the role, after the borrowed line from Alpha Trion he feels like he's trying to get through it. (The big closing speech, which I liked that the movie had, was undercut by how he kept saying Autobots as Auto-Bots. Like yes, I get it, auto- as in autonomous, you said.) I almost would have preferred that he just keep his accent if it let him speak more naturally, because this was a bit wooden (and not in a good way).
That said, for the most part the characterization is great. B-127 is kind of automatically the weakest here as he's basically pigeonholed into being the punchline machine, although ciphers like Soundwave and Shockwave get much less for now. Elita is established very well as a bot with her own aspirations and standards, an equal to the others. Everyone gets some good lines, and occasionally there are some extra good bits ("You have neither the touch nor the power").
The bond between Orion and D-16 is palpable and believable, although the progression of each character is a bit clunkily done. Everything after the cave and the reveal about the Primes has the right pieces (Orion believing the truth will free the people, D swearing a murderous revenge and swearing off leaders, then leaning into the "might makes right" credo of the High Guard) but could have been done better. Part of this is complicated by how compsct the timeline of events seems to be. These big sweeping character alignment shifts would benefit from time for reflection or resentment to go to work.
Love the way the movie plays with the lore bits it needs for the story. Starscream and the High Guard going off on their own is a nice twist on "the Decepticons are the military hardware kind", and them hiding out in the surface and plotting against Sentinel is interesting enough that they should get their own miniseries.
The 13 were well used here, with an interesting new take. It was surprisingly thrilling seeing Vector Prime on the big screen, basically looking as we know him. Still rolling my eyes at the continued use of "Megatronus" (FFS, just call him Megatron) but giving him the Tarn look of having the Decepticon sigil for a face/mask is a great move. Can't recall if it's been done, don't care. It's good here. I like that this uses Zeta as the 13th, neatly avoiding any Arisen nonsense, although it's interesting that the 13th is essentially the Matrix Bearer, so any inheritor is kiiiind of like the Arisen, but at least that's not explicitly a thing. Loved the designs for the most part (seeing them all in the group shot bracing for the betrayal was cool), but reusing dead 13 member t-cogs was a bit awkward. The whole timeline of the 13 essentially not being THAT ancient (50 cycles?) is certainly something to think about.
The new story working of Sentinel selling out the race to the Quintessons, and the Quintessons continuing to be in power, is a bold move I really like. I do wish the Quintessons looked more like the Quintessons of old, but that's a minor concern. When Sentinel and his guard bent the knee I was as taken aback as the characters were. Sentinel having betrayed the Primes, and going on to tamper with newborns to dictate their destinies, is a deliciously evil thing to give to a character, and would have been nice to really explore if not for the kid movie of it all.
The big fight at the end was... Interesting if weird. Big frenzied shootout, great use of space in aerial combat blocking. Elita chasing down Airachnid was a great sequence. Crashing the train was great, miners flying in for the rescue was a good, well-paced development. Etc. The combat in general is great, mixing typical punchy punchy with more dynamic and inventive melee spots (Prime ripping off Megs turret and hitting him with it, only for it to... Transform back into part of Megs' body, I think).
But the killing of Sentinel lost something in being intercut with Orion being given the Matrix. Threw the pacing off by a lot, and the rest felt a bit repetitive because we'd already seen both get upgraded and get physical.
Even Megs letting Orion fall after taking the shot was a little thin by itself as a character beat. "I'm done saving you" works as a callback/twist on all the saving they'd done for each other, but a line about not saving someone who was only in danger because of protecting a liar and traitor would've added some substance to that.
And the ending was... I'm not sure I get it. It seems like it would've made more sense for Optimus to offer to work together to rebuild, or for Megatron to lead the High Guard and protect Cybertron, and for Megs to soundly reject that because he'll put up with no more leaders, and no more corruption and deception. Instead it's "I cut your cannon, get out." (And then as soon as they leave, the Autobots turn the Energon back on.)
The big closing speech... Are the Quintessons not just hovering above Cybertron constantly? Are the Autobots not going to take the battle to them? Or are they waiting for the Quintessons to return and then fight them into leaving for good?
Anyway, a very good bit of Transformers media with nice lore play and worldbuilding. I particularly love the twist that the constantly-transforming surface of Cybertron is now where the secrets are, rather than the core, which is now more the world they know (although the Matrix still being "there" is okay too). Way more cameos and existing designs and names thrown in there than a single viewing can parse out (I kinda marked out at Cordon on the leaderboard for the Iacon 5000). There's what, only a handful of new names and designs here -- Behemoth and one other racer I didn't catch, the name Darkwing given to the big angry boss guy) -- and almost every shot has someone or four you'll recognize.
Already making plans to see it again.
Yeah, every time the movie mentioned "cycle" took me out of it for a bit. Probably the most famous uses of "cycle" before now were in Beast Wars and Animated, in which it was roughly the equivalent of one minute. Going by that, the Primes have only been gone for less than an hour. 
Looking at other uses of it, Simon Furman defined 1 cycle as being 1 hour and 15 minutes (1.25 hours) in IDW1, the Marvel UK story "Target: 2006" identified 10 cycles as being 5 Earth days (which would make 1 cycle = 12 Earth hours), Brian Ruckley said 1 cycle is 1 day (but shorter than an Earth day) for IDW2, and the Dreamwave Energon comics used "cycles" to refer to "years".
Going by all of that, the Energon comics' usage feels the closest to this movie's use of "cycle", as we also know it can't be the Cybertronian word for "day" since D-16 uses the word "day" in the same context as it's used by us Earth humans. However, my inner nerd still feels that only 50 years isn't nearly long enough. We need a length of time long enough not just for the Primes to disappear but also for the collective memory of the entire planet's population to completely forget that miners were ever born with cogs, as well as for the mining industry to really become a fully integrated thing in Cybertron's society to the point that it doesn't feel like some new development at all.
At minimum, I'd say 1 cycle in this movie's universe should equal no less than 1 decade, meaning 50 cycles would be 5 centuries. Or if we want to go bigger, 1 cycle could be 1 century, making the 50 cycles be 5000 years. That sure seems big enough.
Looking at other uses of it, Simon Furman defined 1 cycle as being 1 hour and 15 minutes (1.25 hours) in IDW1, the Marvel UK story "Target: 2006" identified 10 cycles as being 5 Earth days (which would make 1 cycle = 12 Earth hours), Brian Ruckley said 1 cycle is 1 day (but shorter than an Earth day) for IDW2, and the Dreamwave Energon comics used "cycles" to refer to "years".
Going by all of that, the Energon comics' usage feels the closest to this movie's use of "cycle", as we also know it can't be the Cybertronian word for "day" since D-16 uses the word "day" in the same context as it's used by us Earth humans. However, my inner nerd still feels that only 50 years isn't nearly long enough. We need a length of time long enough not just for the Primes to disappear but also for the collective memory of the entire planet's population to completely forget that miners were ever born with cogs, as well as for the mining industry to really become a fully integrated thing in Cybertron's society to the point that it doesn't feel like some new development at all.
At minimum, I'd say 1 cycle in this movie's universe should equal no less than 1 decade, meaning 50 cycles would be 5 centuries. Or if we want to go bigger, 1 cycle could be 1 century, making the 50 cycles be 5000 years. That sure seems big enough.
I think this is just the limit of having a sub-two hour movie to work with. If this story played out over a season of tv you'd likely get more time to flesh out Orion's willingness to trust the people once they learn the truth and build up D-16's simmering rage. As it was they had to condense things and I get it. I agree it's a bit sudden but it still works.
I liked the Thirteen here. This is probably my favourite incarnation of the concept. This movie even made me ok with "Megatronus Prime" as an idea. I hate that name but this made it work better than Aligned or IDW ever did. And just tossing Zeta in is great. The Arisen is dumb so hopefully this sticks going forward.
The "recent" feeling really depends on how long a "cycle" is, but I like the idea of the
Thirteen as sort of this Knights of the Roundtable group betrayed by one of their adjuncts, so all in all I'm not too worried about it.
I think it works because it can be read in two different ways.
D-16 may feel like Orion has betrayed him by suddenly siding with Sentinel. He's done saving Orion because after so long Orion "saving" Sentinel is the one f-up on his part D-16 can't forgive.
From Orion's perspective though... he doesn't like Sentinel. He doesn't side with him... but as he said the new Cybertron can't use a public execution as its foundation. It's very poignant if you look at history.
D-16 is emotional. Angry. Righteously angry. He wants to tear it all down.
Orion is trying to think about what's best for everyone- tearing something down is easy. Building something up is harder. It's a good way to contrast the two. D-16/Megs wants to violence his way to progress, Orion/Optimus wants to build a better Cybertron that is rooted in fair and equitable ideas, not bloodshed.
the thing about the "50 cycles" is that it feels sensible for it to be 50 years, given Sentinel's ongoing excursions are still "fresh" enough that no one questions them just yet. But even as 50 centuries (which seems odd given the lack of a prefix for cycles, but again this is them doing their own thing so who knows), against the backdrop of the usual million-years stuff it's fairly recent. So less like "knights of the round table" and more like... The Beatles or the 90s Bulls?
I agree with all of that second bit LordGigaIce,
my contention was it would have been better if that were made explicit in dialogue. See how much of it you were able to -- indeed how much of it you had to -- extrapolate (as much as that's arguably supported by the background so far) vs. how little of that is explicit in the moment. Just closing the loop would have been nice.
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And this, I feel, stems from the fact that it's an animated Hollywood movie in general. Historically, animated Hollywood films have tended to be shorter in length than live-action films, as it seems there's still the belief in Hollywood of "casual moviegoers won't want to sit through a 2-hour cartoon", rooted in that age-old belief that live-action is better than animation because "live-action is for adults/matured audiences while animation is for children/losers/stupid people".
Looking at Wikipedia's list of longest animated films, the vast majority of films on the list are Asian in origin (Japan, China, Russia, India), and of the films listed as exceeding 2 hours in length, only seven are from the United States. And of those seven, four of them are independent movies. Of the remaining three, two of them weren't fully animated films as Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings used a hybrid of animation with live-action rotoscoping, while Disney's Fantasia had plenty of live-action segments interspersed between its animated segments. This leaves only one US film on that list that was completely animated and longer than two hours, that being Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which was itself a big gamble of a film leaving itself on such a massive cliffhanger, but which it could better pull off after having had such a successful preceding Spider-Verse film to help boost its own chances of success.
So, Transformers One being an animated Hollywood film was always gonna have an uphill battle in making its runtime be as long as it could be.
Looking at Wikipedia's list of longest animated films, the vast majority of films on the list are Asian in origin (Japan, China, Russia, India), and of the films listed as exceeding 2 hours in length, only seven are from the United States. And of those seven, four of them are independent movies. Of the remaining three, two of them weren't fully animated films as Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings used a hybrid of animation with live-action rotoscoping, while Disney's Fantasia had plenty of live-action segments interspersed between its animated segments. This leaves only one US film on that list that was completely animated and longer than two hours, that being Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which was itself a big gamble of a film leaving itself on such a massive cliffhanger, but which it could better pull off after having had such a successful preceding Spider-Verse film to help boost its own chances of success.
So, Transformers One being an animated Hollywood film was always gonna have an uphill battle in making its runtime be as long as it could be.
When watching the movie, a thought crossed my mind after the cave scene. If one wanted to, one could headcanon that the cogs of Prima, Onyx, Alchemist, and Micronus ould have influenced their new bearers in some way.
Orion goes from a laidback rule-bender to wanting to make a better world for everyone in a righteous manner. I like to think he got Onyx's cog, as the Covenant of Primus book described Onyx as a very kind-hearted and spiritual individual who sought balance in all things. Optimus wants to create a better world with fairness for all, which sounds very spiritual and balanced to me.
Meanwhile, D-16 went from a stickler for rules to an angry, embittered individual driven by rage and vengeance. I like to think he got Prima's cog, as while the Covenant of Primus book described Prima as a righteous, noble, and valiant individual, he was imperfect, with a sense of self-righteousness that led him to make decisions of poor judgement that only he felt were just and necessary. D-16 sees his revenge on Sentinel as just and righteous, when it's really just self-righteous and only beneficial for himself, a misguided judgement not unlike Prima's own misguidedness.
This also makes it all the more ironic when D-16 later switches out his cog for that of Megatronus, who is supposed to be Prima's polar opposite.
As for the other two, I like to think Elita got Alchemist's cog (he's the intelligent one and she's the smartest of the four), and B-127 got Micronus's cog (Micronus is the conscience and moral center of the Primes, and B-127 tried to keep D-16 morally in-check when the two were captured and beaten up by Sentinel).
Orion goes from a laidback rule-bender to wanting to make a better world for everyone in a righteous manner. I like to think he got Onyx's cog, as the Covenant of Primus book described Onyx as a very kind-hearted and spiritual individual who sought balance in all things. Optimus wants to create a better world with fairness for all, which sounds very spiritual and balanced to me.
Meanwhile, D-16 went from a stickler for rules to an angry, embittered individual driven by rage and vengeance. I like to think he got Prima's cog, as while the Covenant of Primus book described Prima as a righteous, noble, and valiant individual, he was imperfect, with a sense of self-righteousness that led him to make decisions of poor judgement that only he felt were just and necessary. D-16 sees his revenge on Sentinel as just and righteous, when it's really just self-righteous and only beneficial for himself, a misguided judgement not unlike Prima's own misguidedness.
This also makes it all the more ironic when D-16 later switches out his cog for that of Megatronus, who is supposed to be Prima's polar opposite.
As for the other two, I like to think Elita got Alchemist's cog (he's the intelligent one and she's the smartest of the four), and B-127 got Micronus's cog (Micronus is the conscience and moral center of the Primes, and B-127 tried to keep D-16 morally in-check when the two were captured and beaten up by Sentinel).
I actually like how ambiguous the movie kept it, because it shouldn't matter. Character development should come from character vs experience, rather than the soap opera-y "heart transplant leads to original heart owner possession" schtick and endless headcanoning like that. I'm surprised they named which four at all, and wish they hadn't. There's just zero benefit to it and it undermines the actual story they're trying to tell.
But I suppose that sets up Sentinel having stolen Megatronus'.
...but even then why is that a big deal? It's too on the nose. Ooh, Megatron got Megatronus' transformation cog.
But I suppose that sets up Sentinel having stolen Megatronus'.
...but even then why is that a big deal? It's too on the nose. Ooh, Megatron got Megatronus' transformation cog.
Which is why I'm leaning more towards "50 decades" rather than years or centuries. But I could be convinced to lean toward "50 years" should we get clarification that that's what was intended.
I took the cogs as having some "physical" form of power. Megatronus Prime is described as having been the strongest and mightiest of the Thirteen, and Sentinel taking his cog meant that he was able to get that powerful battle mode. When Megatron takes Megatronus' cog for himself he undergoes another form shift, becoming stronger and bulkier.
So I don't think the cogs imbued them with spiritual or ethical traits so much as it imbued them with some physical traits that perhaps reflected their previous owners.
Even then though... Transformers is science fantasy. Go back long enough and the roots of Transformers' mythological basis is stuff like Arthur pulling the sword from the stone because he was the one true king. Or Siguard being the warrior mighty enough to pull Odin's sword Gram from the world tree.
For all the cringe over "the Arisen" as a concept, artifacts that symbolize a great destiny to those chosen to wield them are baked into this franchise. Hell, the '86 movie is about Rodimus fulfilling a prophecy because of destiny.
So in that context the idea that the main characters would have these cogs because they were "chosen" in some way, and even take on elements of those cogs' power, doesn't bother me. It's fantasy and that's what this franchise is.
So I don't think the cogs imbued them with spiritual or ethical traits so much as it imbued them with some physical traits that perhaps reflected their previous owners.
Even then though... Transformers is science fantasy. Go back long enough and the roots of Transformers' mythological basis is stuff like Arthur pulling the sword from the stone because he was the one true king. Or Siguard being the warrior mighty enough to pull Odin's sword Gram from the world tree.
For all the cringe over "the Arisen" as a concept, artifacts that symbolize a great destiny to those chosen to wield them are baked into this franchise. Hell, the '86 movie is about Rodimus fulfilling a prophecy because of destiny.
So in that context the idea that the main characters would have these cogs because they were "chosen" in some way, and even take on elements of those cogs' power, doesn't bother me. It's fantasy and that's what this franchise is.
we can agree to disagree. I'm not bothered from a plausibility standpoint. I would just rather my characters acquire and change their traits on their own, not because they got a personality transplant on the back of another transplant.
I mean, even with the scene as shown, the characters were "chosen" (Alpha Trion didn't just send them away to build or find their own cogs, and they were worthy of inheriting these) and the cogs were "chosen" to a degree (we don't know if they were preferable to, say, Solus' or Amalgamous', or if they were just intact enough to pass on). No horoscopey hoopla about aligning character traits.
Even with Hot Rod the extent of inheriting Prime wisdom was Optimus' voiceover and a bunch of freaky visions; he stayed who he was until he got mugged for the Matrix, lol.
I mean, even with the scene as shown, the characters were "chosen" (Alpha Trion didn't just send them away to build or find their own cogs, and they were worthy of inheriting these) and the cogs were "chosen" to a degree (we don't know if they were preferable to, say, Solus' or Amalgamous', or if they were just intact enough to pass on). No horoscopey hoopla about aligning character traits.
Even with Hot Rod the extent of inheriting Prime wisdom was Optimus' voiceover and a bunch of freaky visions; he stayed who he was until he got mugged for the Matrix, lol.
To be clear I don't think the cogs impacted their personalities. At most I think the cogs imbued them with some physical traits (Megatronus' cog giving Sentinel access to a battle mode, bulking Megatron up).
I'm just saying I think the notion of heroes of destiny finding magical artifacts is a trope that TFers has a long history with.
After seeing it again at today's "Fan Event", I noticed something I hadn't caught on my first go:
EDIT: the prints and keyrings from the "Fan Event"
Everyone attending was given One keyring and One print.
After the film, they left everything out for peeps to grab extras or finish a set.
the Decepticon brand in the post credits scene have FOUR-sided eyes.
EDIT 2: I realized that part was in the trailer. I remembered during a full part of work. Not watching garbage burn boring, but close
EDIT 2: I realized that part was in the trailer. I remembered during a full part of work. Not watching garbage burn boring, but close
EDIT: the prints and keyrings from the "Fan Event"
Everyone attending was given One keyring and One print.
After the film, they left everything out for peeps to grab extras or finish a set.
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Thinking more about this movie's take on the Aligned backstory lore of "Optimus and Megatron were once friends as close as brothers before falling out and becoming bitter enemies", a thought crossed my mind tonight about that backstory in general. Awhile back, there was some talk about this backstory in the Post Pictures thread, about how it was seemingly born out of a throwaway line in the 2007 movie, in which Optimus called Megatron "brother". But after seeing TF One, I got thinking about this notion and how the Exodus novel first established that the falling out between Optimus and Megatron was because of Optimus being chosen to be the next Prime--first by the High Council and then by Cybertron's Core--instead of Megatron. This left Megatron feeling embittered, betrayed, and jealous of Optimus. The more I thought about this, the more I realized how familiar this sounded. Then it hit me where I'd seen the same broad strokes of this story told before: Robots in Disguise 2001! In that series, Optimus Prime was chosen by Vector Sigma to be the leader of the Autobots and the bearer of the Matrix, which left his literal biological brother Ultra Magnus feeling embittered, betrayed, and jealous of Optimus, feeling that he should have chosen to bear the Matrix instead of Optimus. It's very possible that, when putting together the Binder of Revelation, Rik Alvarez and his team came up with the new backstory for Optimus and Megatron by taking direct inspiration from that initial brotherly feud between RID01 Optimus and Magnus, with Megatron swapped in for Magnus and made less a literal brother and more just a metaphorical one.
It's a fairly common brotherly plot arc throughout history (literary and otherwise), especially if the endpoint is to pit them on opposing sides. One Transformers Prime page alludes to its depiction in "Prince of Egypt", of all things.
The funniest fact about that origin is that Go-Bots kinda used it first.
-ZacWilliam, I mean about as well as Go-Bots did anything storywise but still...
-ZacWilliam, I mean about as well as Go-Bots did anything storywise but still...
I remember, back in the day (G-d I'm old), hearing that part of the first live action movie's backstory was that Optimus Prime and Megatron were brothers who ended up enemies. I remember thinking "oh that's a cool idea."
The first movie apparently had more of that stuff in earlier drafts until it all got cut save for Optimus going "you left me no choice, brother," at the end.
The official IDW prequel comics for the first movie did lean into that, though. They established that Optimus and Megatron were co-rulers of Cybertron, maybe not actual brothers but very close friends. Then Megatron's increasing lust for the power of the AllSpark drove him to try and claim everything for himself.
The prequels to DotM fleshed that out further, with Sentinel Prime described as the last descendent of the Dynasty of Primes, but he didn't believe he was the last and that there was one more left somewhere. He finds Optimus, who he recognizes as a fellow Prime, and later meets Megatron. And he ends up "raising" the two as his two most promising students but Megs always feels a bit inadequate because Optimus was a Prime like Sentinel and he wasn't. So real MCU Odin-Thor-Loki energy there. Megs later has these feelings manipulated by the spirit of The Fallen, all Palpatine-like.
Very little of this made its way into the film because by DotM the Bayverse had just given up on things like "character motivation" and it was up to IDW to do the heavy lifting.
DotM launched in 2011 which is interesting because Aligned was launched in 2010. So it's very likely that DotM was having its story- and backstory elements via IDW- worked on at the same time Aligned was being shaped. So it's likely that the Odin-Thor-Loki-esque relationship between Sentinel, Optimus, and Megs was done to draw the live action movie dynamics a bit closer to the Aligned backstory where the High Council and Core choose Orion causing Megs to get bitter.
That's where it stands though. Aligned came and went but every new continuity family since- and there's a very strong case that TF One is the start of a fresh one itself- has worked with some version of the "they were as close of brothers before becoming enemies" backstory.
Given how common it is as a plot device- lastmaximal mentioned Prince of Egypt, based on Exodus, I'll point to Cain and Able from Genesis- I'm shocked it took the franchise until 2007 to get there.
The first movie apparently had more of that stuff in earlier drafts until it all got cut save for Optimus going "you left me no choice, brother," at the end.
The official IDW prequel comics for the first movie did lean into that, though. They established that Optimus and Megatron were co-rulers of Cybertron, maybe not actual brothers but very close friends. Then Megatron's increasing lust for the power of the AllSpark drove him to try and claim everything for himself.
The prequels to DotM fleshed that out further, with Sentinel Prime described as the last descendent of the Dynasty of Primes, but he didn't believe he was the last and that there was one more left somewhere. He finds Optimus, who he recognizes as a fellow Prime, and later meets Megatron. And he ends up "raising" the two as his two most promising students but Megs always feels a bit inadequate because Optimus was a Prime like Sentinel and he wasn't. So real MCU Odin-Thor-Loki energy there. Megs later has these feelings manipulated by the spirit of The Fallen, all Palpatine-like.
Very little of this made its way into the film because by DotM the Bayverse had just given up on things like "character motivation" and it was up to IDW to do the heavy lifting.
DotM launched in 2011 which is interesting because Aligned was launched in 2010. So it's very likely that DotM was having its story- and backstory elements via IDW- worked on at the same time Aligned was being shaped. So it's likely that the Odin-Thor-Loki-esque relationship between Sentinel, Optimus, and Megs was done to draw the live action movie dynamics a bit closer to the Aligned backstory where the High Council and Core choose Orion causing Megs to get bitter.
That's where it stands though. Aligned came and went but every new continuity family since- and there's a very strong case that TF One is the start of a fresh one itself- has worked with some version of the "they were as close of brothers before becoming enemies" backstory.
Given how common it is as a plot device- lastmaximal mentioned Prince of Egypt, based on Exodus, I'll point to Cain and Able from Genesis- I'm shocked it took the franchise until 2007 to get there.
(Part of my point that I didn't make explicit that it was also kind of amplified and fleshed out in the movie, because the biblical account never really delves into that relationship much. So the notion of this almost archetypical plot arc for rival-brothers-turned-bitter-enemies is fully-formed enough that it works as its own device, sort of, just dropped in there.)
It IS a bit surprising that it's taken so long, but I like that we had such a run of Prime and Megatron being wholly independent characters. There's something to that too, something you'd see more in real historical clashing figures leading their distinct political factions. I wonder if we'll ever swing back to that, but this current situation seems like a very strong basis for stories too, so maybe not for a while if ever.
Well it should be noted that for much of human history different political factions (or what we'd call political factions today) were often led by various noble houses that were interconnected in some way. So the notion of two leaders in a civil war being related was common as far as civil wars went for most of human history. War of the Roses anyone? French Wars of Religion?
Even when that's not the case, you have something like the US Civil War. No, not feuding noble families, but many Union and Confederate officers were peers and even friends in the US Army and Naval academies before the War started, and the political leaders of both sides were former peers in the Federal government. So even when you move beyond the feudal the notion of former friendship among political rivals isn't so strange.
The other aspect of it is what I said earlier. Transformers' fictional mythology is part of a tradition that leans heavily into traditional fantasy tropes, that tend to revolve around feuding siblings or ruling families sundered in two. Often these fictional tropes were developed to reflect the real world political situations of the authors which, as I said above, weren't so far removed from that.
I mean you said it yourself, making Megs and Optimus former friends is easy drama.
To your point though... I think it will.
The biggest folly of Aligned was trying to establish a unified lore for Transformers that would be The Way Things Are Forever and that's simply not possible in a brand like this. There have been too many interpretations, too many variations that people are fans of. Everything, every alternate character interpretation, design, or story beat, regardless of how forgotten it may seem, is fair game to be revived whenever the next reinvention comes along.
At some point it'll be time for a new iteration of the franchise and someone will say "you know the 'brothers who became enemies' thing has been explored as well as it could be, let's do something else."
It's all cyclical and nothing is forever.
Probably should go to random imagines, but is also kinda topical here:
That explains a line back in IDW 1.0, where its said, every time the two clash, everyone else stops to watch them!