I fell out of transformers way back in the 80s
RID opened my eyes a little (nephew's sideburn with CF hood almost got put in my pocket that day lol)
and I bought a couple of energon G1 homages.

but it took Alternators to really bring me back in.
now I am even watching BW and finding it fun and worth watching.
as a 31 year old I love things that homage the things from G1 most. but there are a lot of great toys out there...

all that said I only own one movie toy by gifting. the movies have brought TFs back.
(which means we get classics sideswipe and sunstreaker and silverbolt and starscream)
yesss!

TF forever! the lines are diverse just because they know everyone won't like everything.

 

this ftw:

We got MP Grimlock, which undeniably awesome. We got Alternity, which is amazing. As a bonus, we have been getting incredible 3rd party items (City Commander, anyone?). Oh, and Universe is coming back? Animated still has toys slated for release? There's a badass looking game in a few months? Oh a new show too? This, in addition, to catching up on older toys I've been wanting. Sounds like my wallet will be opening for a while now.

 

Transformers for me cannot truly die. I became a fan during the Beast Wars era, and after Machines came in, the kid in me gave up. Because I started with Beast Wars, I never really got into vehicle modes, so I skipped through RiD and the Unicron Trilogy.

Then the 2007 movie came out, and I was rather impressed. Having my love for toys reignited then (mostly due to DC Comics toys and Marvel Legends by Toybiz at that time) I went to check them out but the heavy price tags were too much because I was only a beginning college student in 2007 and Malaysian toy prices are crazy high!

Finally the 2009 ROTF came out. I wasn't quite so impressed by the movie, but I felt that if anything, I HAD to try out this line. I was hooked. I really was! Within half a year I bought over 30 figures, far more than I ever had as a kid!

Then I rewatched my childhood love Beast Wars and loved it. I tried Animated and went crazy for it. Now my Transformers love is strong and continues to be strong.

I feel that what I love cannot necessarily die completely. It'll take years but I'll come back to it. Heck, I last loved Power Rangers in 1995 and 14 years later, in 2009 I rediscovered my love for it. There will be periods of ups and downs, but if the creators provide good material, I'm all for it. If not, I'll lay back for a moment (or for many years!) and try something else. I find that I've developed many interests over the years, but I still go back to those that ignited my passion.

So what I'm saying is that maybe you feel it isn't much now because it's just something you aren't that interested in anymore. Too much of a good thing can be bad. Why not take a break and look around? That urge for TF will one day come back anyway.

 

Transformers died for me a little also after R.I.D. I mean, I grew up on Beast Wars, and always loved it and never stopped loving it.

I really enjoyed the R.I.D. cartoon (and would still like some region 1 UNCUT DVDs) and the toys were phenominal (still probably my favorite toyline).

But the Armada cartoon was such garbage I found myself forcing myself to watch it and try and like it. Same thing with the following two cartoons. And if I don't like the cartoon, then I'm not interested in the toys. I have a few Armada toys (Unicron, of course, is amazing, but I think of it more as G1 Unicron anyway lol as I'm sure most people do) and barely any Energon toys.

But then came 2007. Thank God for Michael Bay, and his amazing "Like G1, but different enough" movies. And thank God for the creative team behind Animated. The awesomeness of both Animated and Bay's movie have brought me back to Transformers and made me feel good to be a fan of current Transformers again ('cause, y'know, I still had and loved the DVDs of G1, Beast Wars, and Beast Machines lol).

So here's to hoping that the next cartoon will be good!

 

Myself, I'd hardly call RiD transformer's magnum opus, toy-wise. I mean, we did get really good, nay amazing, toys for Optimus, Ultra Magnus, X-Brawn, Prowl, and Side Burn; but on the other hand, everything else not so much. Good combination concepts with Landfill and Rail Racer, but execution was underwhelming. And Megatron's toy was so focused on giving us so many alt-modes that somebody neglected to make them that good ones at all; I only bother to put him in bot mode, hand mode, and two headed dragon mode. Out of 13 new molds in that line, I only call about 5 of them good. 38% success rate.

The Unicron trilogy had some great toys here and there (for example, Armada Tidal Wave, Energon Bulkhead, Cybertron Evac), but the focus on gimmicks definitely impeded overall quality and made the lines as inconsistent as RiD was.

Personally, I really love the movie lines because that's the closest we've gotten to the style of the 5 good molds from RID.

Animated was good all around. Show accurate and play friendly.

Classics I find great as well.

 

Like what a few people have said so far, Transformers will never die for me. Sure, there may be certain parts of the franchise that I don't particularly care for, but I focus on what parts of the franchise that I love... and that's all what matters, at least to me.

 

I hated the Robots in Disguise toy line; they were so cheap and reminded me of the beast wars toys. Those weird ball joints that would pop off so easily were just annoying.

 

I see this as the key part of your diatribe, Kickback. I think a lot of us older fans (the 25+ crowd) just have become extremely picky when it comes to which parts of this franchise we choose to embrace. For me, I haven't really been excited about Transformers since Alternators ended. Even then, Hasbro's boneheaded handling of that crush my love for that line. Not even Classics has come close to capturing the zeal that I felt for that line, and since then they maybe be one or two toys I enjoy but the spark isn't there anymore.

Mainly I think this because we've been exposed to every line and continuity series as they emerge. We're numb to them now. I see the enthusiasm newer younger members have for the movie series or the new video game, and a little part of me is jealous of that. It's new and exciting to them, kinda like discovering G1 for the first time or when I saw Beast Wars realizing that Transformers had come back. But for us, it will always be "been there done that," always.

So if I had to name the thread, I'd say Transformers died with Alternators for me. Though not the franchise dead, but at least for me, the franchise has become intellectually bankrupt with the success of the movies.

 

For people our age Kick, I honestly think that you're right. Armada/energon/cybertron had a few things that were nice homages to the originals, but for the most part things were too kiddy-fied by them. Then again, we finally got figures of Unicron and Primus  . As far as the cartoons went, I won't even go there. It hurts me to watch them now. Classics was a good tribute series, but I never got into Animated, and I wish I did now.

 

I bought Cybertron the series last month. I haven't made it past the second episode.

 

I hate Bay's rendition of Transformers because I've read better more interesting comics. But... Hasbro is trying... The following figs are examples!

ROTF Breakdown!
ROTF Mindwipe!
ROTF Brawn!
ROTF Sea Spray!

 

In terms of fiction, it died with Beast Machines.
Toy-wise it died many times. BW and BM, AEC. RID was everything we wanted, the return of the vehicles.

AEC was a huge step back, but I think Classics and Movie toys are exactly what I've wanted since RID.

 

I might have to argue with that. If it died with BW, BM, and the Unicron Trilogy, why would it still be going so strong, considering that RID was only a speck on the horizon compared to those 5 when it comes to the toyline and the series, and the movie was barely a thought during Energon, possibly Cybertron.

 

Kickback, you've given quite a good summary of the highs and lows of the TF fandom since RID, though I wouldn't go so far as to say TFs died after the RiD series. I do agree that the changes TFs underwent after the RiD series has been a mixed bag in terms of our reception and successes, but TFs has definitely, overall, being enjoying a major comeback in recent times with the rise of 80s properties again. And Bay's movies have capitalised on this 80s nostalgic resurgence.

I remember when this site was putting up Car Robots eps back in 2000 as they were being aired in Japan. Ah, those wonderful days... And the excitement at the return of vehicular TFs after the beast era.

I remember the collective groans as Armada began (largely because of the kid trio in the cartoon, *shudders* I HATED them too), tho' the series seemed to end well enough with the rise of Unicron.

I remember how Energon made me lose interest in TFs for a good while. I couldn't stand to watch the painfully-dubbed episodes and the Power Rangers-esque Optimus was just...what had they done to Optimus?!

Cybertron never managed to fully recapture my interest again, tho' it was a slightly more swallowable series to watch than Energon, tho' i never followed it closely.

I have to thank Bay's 2007 movie for actually getting my interest in TFs back. Even tho' the movies have been far from perfect by the standards of us fans, they at least have brought the TFs back in a big and cool way.

And Animated, yes, we all raged at our first glimpses of the art style, but as soon as the first eps aired, the writing quality and obvious enthusiasm of the creators won most of us over quickly. Now we all miss Animated terribly.

I remain hopeful that the future will bring us more things to be excited about with TFs. But i think also that we as fans need to be open-minded and fair in judgements about new interpretations and envisioniongs of the TFs. That's the only way to move forward.

 

Well said, Black Oracle. Well said.

 

I'm gonna agree with one thing you said there Kickback, and that RiD - While being an absolute arse storyline - was pretty innovative with its toyline. Sure, pretty much all the Decepticons were repaints. But the toys that were original were pretty damn fun to play around with. To this day, RiD Megatron and Prowl are two of my favourite figures.

But to say the franchise on a whole is worn out is a bit much... It's changed, it's shifted focus to try and keep up with the times. And yes, it's made some fuck ups along the way (Case in point, the dubs of the Japanese animes), but I honestly believe the changes were necessary. To do nothing would most likely have alienated a popular franchise to newer audiences, while it's current fan base grew up and perhaps lost interest. Yes, Transformers does have a big base of older fans, but there's still a lot of people who grew out of it.

I've accepted that Transformers had to change. Hell, Transformers is all about change. And it's gonna keep changing and, more than likely, those new changes probably will end up turning off a few old skool fans like you and me. But that is honestly the nature of the beast. But I've still got my happy memories, and my figures, and I'll still keep an eye out for anything that might catch my eye. I don't think Transformers will ever really die a death.

 

I get this. I´ve been growing tired of Transformers mostly because of the constant bickering that goes around here and the lack of concern or respect for people´s opinions (aparently I´m a macho juvenile fratboy for liking the movie Bee over the G1 BB). I´ve grown more and more distant of Transformers and moved on to stuff that interest me more and has a more tolerable fanbase (Green Lantern).

I´ve lost almost all will to colect tf stuff basically.

 

Bazinga!

 

What's this 'we' shit?  

I loved Beast Wars, with a passion. Beast Machines even more so in differing ways.

I liked some designs in RiD.

I enjoyed MANY toys out of the A/E/C.

There's some stuff I like about Bayformers.

Animated was very freakin' decent.

Transformers never dies. Ever. At all. Certain fans, the type always ranging, just give up on an incarnation or two.