Delta Star, that may be so. But there may also be a good reason many don't want Raksha's voice to be heard. In my experience, the TransFormers fandom is more down to earth than other fandoms. I think most of us would prefer to keep living normal lives without having to make our affiliation as TransFormers fans an embarrassing secret. That's hard enough when you collect childrens' toys without some very high-profile members of the community loudly endorsing a move into deep left field. If we let that sort of thing go unchecked, we could end up with a reputation like the one that the Furries have to put up with. The fandom itself needs to maintain some integrity, not just its members. It would be nice if ridicule wasn't the primary method of policing the fandom, but it is terribly effective, and many people don't take a hint before bringing that ridicule down on themselves.
As I've heard it, someone came on the boards saying that Peter Cullen would be voicing Optimus in Armada. When asked to back up his claims, he just said "He tell me!"
That's pretty much the gist of it, as I remember it. There was a lot of bad English, allcaps posting, and hilarity all around.
I'm glad Raksha is gone. She flamed anyone who dared say that Megatron was not in love with Nightbird. That is INSANE. Megatron saw IT as nothing more than a weapon, and Nightbird wasnt even alive in the same capacity as a Transformer is. He was no more in love with Nightbird than he was in love with his ruby-crystal cannon. Her theories were complete misinterpretations of everything Transformers have ever put forth, and you were her enemy if you dared point this out. I never talked directly to her though, I watched from the sidelines.
Welcome. "She's" actually in there for a good 3 seconds at least of animation. Oooo...I found a youtube link for the section of the episode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yVXXyN-UXQ&mode=related&search= Start looking around 6:03 in that link.
In that pic, Skywarp and Thundercracker look a little effeminate too. I doubt it was intended to be a female.
I suppose this is a weird thread for a first post, but I felt like I should say something. Back in the days (like, oh, 8-9 years ago or so), I was a lurker and infrequent poster on ATT and other TF usenet groups (under a different username), as well as a webmaster of a Decepticon fansite. As such, I had several conversations with Raksha at the time, both on ATT, ATTCM, and over e-mail; she was always polite, her points were well thought-out, and, what's important, she never attacked me over my own opinions, which were quite different from hers (for instance, I dismissed the whole "Decepticons are victims of Autobot propaganda" spin, and I never saw Nightbird as anything other than a plot device; btw, Google for "Abebird" and "Echowarrior" to read some funny stuff from the period). I've never attended BotCon, but, from what I know, BotCon wouldn't have even existed without her. Without her and other older TransFans, such as Ben Yee and Dave Van Domelen, Hasbro would have never achieved the level of understanding with the fandom they have today. She had limitless energy and passion, even if they were, at times, slightly misguided. So, even if you don't respect her opinions, respect what she did. Without openly geeky fans, closet fans wouldn't have anything to look forward to.
Cool, this thread wins. Now I even know what all that HE TELL ME crap is all about! I watched the 'Lady In Purple' episode last night, and frankly, in that scene, all the seekers look a bit fem-shaped, even the ones that are coloured as Thundercracker and Skywarp. So it's a no-sale to me. Just gonna have to accept the dearth of female characters in cartoons aimed at pre-pubescent boys. And I think I will read more about and by Raksha. I do like a fan-controversy-gossip-fest, even if it is a few years out of date.
This is a quote from Michael Bay concerning the movie Trailer, emphasis added: OMG, Raksha was right! LOL!! Edit: BTW, just watching this YouTube link, I've always thought from day one that it was insanely stupid of Megatron to not kill Starscream where he stands, in the episode. I mean, Starscream pretty much blatantly comes out and says, "Hey Megatron, I'm gonna overthrow you."
Daymn you guys think she's bad. I used to run in Trekkie circles (and I'll call my damn self a trekkie even if some people take offense, which sounds even dumber) and we had at LEAST one Raksha per convention if not more. I was usually "that's very interesting, moving along now." As for her points on Decepticon superiority (at least before the train flies off the track as it did in Hearts of Steel ) I've pondered ofther viewpoints on Transformers history myself and the G2 Marvel run made a pretty good argumet about this as well. But back to the SUBJECT. Decepticon Female Seekers kick ass. And although rationalizing female transformers in general makes my head hurt I would love to see them cannonized in one of the books. And I can't quote sources but there is some really great art out there feminizing the Seeker design. High heels, turbo-chests, and wings. I've seen some pretty cool interpertations. Which makes this LiL argument pretty sad when I finally saw that pic. The animator was half assing it and the colorist fudged up. Nothing more.
Damn. That's... well the closest thing I can relate this to is those crazy ass anime chicks I run into while working at Metrocon that are into crap like Gundam Wing Trowa and Quatra stuff or those that constantly coin the phrase fannon*. *Fannon is a fan made up term for supposedly cannon fan fiction or what fans except as cannon even though there is no evidence leading for such a thing to actually be as long as there's no evidence to against it. It was once described to me as something that the writers leave ambiguous and don't ever expressly say no about. I've got no problem with people having a differing or even altogether different interpretation of fantasy than I have, but when people start considering things fannon or even consider their fantasies to be the real cannon... well that's called not living in the real world and frankly quite sad. Kind of like furries... they live in a fantasy world where they believe that they actually are their fantasy spiritually... it's a sad state of affairs. Normally, I still say to each their own if that's what they want, but when they start using their "fannon" as an outlet for their own sexual (or worse) fantasies... well, that's just a weed that needs to be plucked. That and it seems that people who are into this type of thing tend to be rather hypocritical. Such as doing things like flaming another individual who disagrees with you, but than ranting that you want your opinions to be respected... On the subject at hand... that femme seeker looks horrid. I like the idea of a female seeker and have seen many many many fan made renditions of them in artwork and even some decent fan fiction, however, that looks nothing like anything, but lazy animation and bad coloring. Which G1 was notorious for to begin with.
Er, no offense, but tell that to the girl you're defending. Most of us know it's not female, this was her idea. I've always found the Starscream/Megatron relationship to be insanely ******ed. Starscream is too dumb to hide his plans (like Shockwave or Bludgeon would) and Megatron is too dumb to punish him. And even in the comics, where Megatron is marginally smarter, he STILL keeps Starscream around, even going so far as to say he doesnt know WHY he does it (in G2). Some people see their interaction as the peak of G1 storytelling, I see it as the main reason G1 flops. Also, I've never read anything of Raksha's (other than that interview I skimmed through earlier in this thread), but I can sort of see how she'd come to the conclusion that the Decepticons were actually the victims. Because despite their description as powerful tyrants, they're hardly ever actually shown winning. The cartoons always depict them as getting soundly thrashed by the Autobots.
It is better to have a known traitor in your midst, in the same manner that it is better to keep a known spy nearby and feed him false data than to dispose of him and have a new (unknown) one replace him. You can see this exact same thing in the Beast Wars episode Dark Designs. Additionally, I always saw it as Megatron's way to tell the other Decepticons that he encourages competition - because it keeps him in shape. He was secure enough about his leadership and the loyalty of other Decepticons to allow Starscream to plot and scheme, knowing that he would come out on top of them and prove his supreme leadership.
Each to their own with the way they see the universe, but the way some people see things is just plain scary...and some of those links are proof positive. And HE TELL ME! - priceless. Birthplace of a great many '= JERK' posts.
