Parents and Transformers

Discussion in 'Transformers General Discussion' started by BumblebeeFan71, Apr 25, 2016.

  1. BumblebeeFan71

    BumblebeeFan71 Loyal Starscream Follower

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    So I was kind of inspired to create this discussion topic after reading bellpeppers's topic. So here's basically the question, what is your interactions with your parents when it comes to Transformers?

    Well as I stated in bellpeppers's topic, my dad was a huge Transformers fan but I never got the chance to talk to him about it. But my mom on the other hand is a whole different story. See my mom who was eighteen at the time watched the original Transformers with her young cousins and loved it. While she wasn't a huge fan, she was able to understand who Optimus and Megatron was.

    The year 2009 had came and my mom noticed how I had taken a small interest in Transformers when she noticed me and my brother watching Animated together. Excited at this prospect, my mom took me to go see Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen. She even whispered to me in the theater "They got the original actor for Optimus!" to which I stared at her in confusion due to not being a huge fan yet. XD

    Around now, when my mom visits, I tend to watch original series and she seems to enjoying asking me questions, she even does this now whenever we watch the Bay films. She always turns to me to ask which character is which or what their story is.

    As for my step-dad, he isn't very interested and asks me many times " You're a full grown woman, why do you watch this?"
     
  2. MrAngry

    MrAngry Proud to be Geek!

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    My grandmother (who raised me) would watch the original G1 cartoons with me every day. She even took me to see the movie when it came out. She fed my interest in TF and GI Joe as a kid, and so did the rest of my large family. There were very few I didn't wind up with.

    Eventually, I was bounced between her and my mom, because my mom would constantly try to win me back. My gram was always tehre to come get me when things fell apart for mom again, and did her best to keep track of any of my original toys that she could. I was crazy careful with all of them, but my brothers and sisters weren't. Sadly, all I had left were the body to Scorponok and a complete boxed MEtroplex I passed to my son as well.

    I fell out with TF as a teen, because cars, motorcycles, and girls took over. Then, I had kids and married one of those girls.

    My wife is the nerdy type, too, and we started focusing on retro gaming through the early 2000's. I tried getting back into TF, but Armada and Energon, just no...Aside from Unicron. Grabbed that beast the second I saw it!

    Fast forward a couple years, and a wide open internet later, plus 3 kids and a son with interest in TF. Add in the Masterpiece line and all the 3rd party stuff I discovered because of it, and I was sucked back in hook, line, and sinker.

    As an adult in my 30's with disposable income, and children to share the love, I'm able to buy these awesome figures that remind me of the few good parts of childhood. TF was my escape, and a large connection with my gram. She passed away just before last Christmas, and every time I buy a new bot, I think of her. She would play with them with me for hours, even though she couldn't always figure them out.

    I've actually struggled to find a connection with my son, who is now 11. Not that we had a bad relationship, but he's not a car person, not a bike person. He's very much like his mom (who's wonderful). More interested in life science and gaming. But when I stepped away from cars and bikes, and dove back into TF, it was like the flood gates were opened.

    So, now I get to be the parent. I get to share a love and passion with someone I love more than life itself. And I get to see the joy in his eyes. I get to see the smiles, and the giggles.

    I get it now. I get why my gram sat there with me all those years playing with TF. Every time I sit down and play TF with my son, or we get a new bot, or he puts together some elaborate story with them, I get it.
     
  3. MrAngry

    MrAngry Proud to be Geek!

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    Oh, as a bonus, my 3 year old daughter is obsessed with TF now, too.
     
  4. Starscream 91

    Starscream 91 Mech With A Mouth

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    Back in 07 I never heard of Transformers and in elementary school, one day me and my dad went into town and we stopped at Burger King. I had gotten one of the Transformers toy promotions and it was Optimus Prime. Curious I asked my dad if he knew who he was and he told me about how he would sometimes watch some of the old cartoon with my older brothers. So really my parents had probably never heard of Transformers till I got into Transformers, just like the Marvel movies.

    As a Transformer fan since then my parents are very supportive of me (mostly my Mom), we have all gone to see every film since then with at least some members of my family. Heck in 2011 and 2013 my dad went with me to Botcon! Of course my parents could only name Optimus Prime and Bumblebee but they recognize Ironhide as black not red.
     
  5. BumblebeeFan71

    BumblebeeFan71 Loyal Starscream Follower

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    Wow, that's so touching to hear. Well I'm glad your getting to share your joy with your kids.
     
  6. moreprimeland

    moreprimeland Optimus told me to do it!

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    Mr. Angry, you made me tear up there.. D'awwww.

    My parents are gone, but I know they always supported my hobbies, even gave me the $$$ to buy whatever special bot/space craft, etc. I was into atm. They even stored my TF/Star Wars collection when I was moving back from working around the world... until we found a new home.
    As an adult I buy what I want..... but I get the greatest joy bringing along my nephew into the TF fold... I've been at it with him for most of his 11 years and we haven't slowed down yet.
    He called me over the weekend to tell me he found orig. RID Trio Pack... in the sealed package at a local Flea Market.... lucky for him I wasn't there. :lol 


    Robots in Disguise Predacon Trio Giftset Archives - Transformers Toys - TFW2005
     
  7. supernova222

    supernova222 junkion

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    half my family is like "whatever, if that's what you're into" while the others are like "it's all cartoons and kid stuff and you need to grow up"

    it is hell
     
  8. shibamura_prime

    shibamura_prime Food Truck or BMW Moderator

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    My dad is an engineer and growing up he really liked the G1 toys, especially the Trypticon he got me for Christmas (he would race him against the other battery-powered walking toys I had). My mom would watch the G1 cartoon with me when I was a wee nerd and constantly tells the story of me not letting her start the car without saying "Transform and Roll Out!"

    When I started college and was still collecting Transformers my mom was worried that I "wasn't growing up right" to which my dad responded "he's not spending money on drugs so who cares?"

    So yeah, my parents are cool with Transformers. :D 
     
  9. Pinpoint

    Pinpoint Banned

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    My parents are pretty indifferent to it, but they know some of the main characters. My dad likes to watch the Bay movies with me, even if they do kinda suck.
     
  10. Feralstorm

    Feralstorm Good Morning, Weather Hackers! TFW2005 Supporter

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    Back in the (g1) day, I liked to bring my newest toy to my Dad and basically dare him to transform it. It was pretty much just for a personal ego boost for me to feel great that I was better changing them than he was.

    I played Atari games against him for the same reason. :) 
     
  11. BladeStorm

    BladeStorm All Prime, All the time!

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    Despite always asking for an Optimus Prime my parents never let me have Transformers when I was younger (1980's) because they were BOY toys. (their logic, not mine)

    Fast forward to present day and my parents think I am silly/ridiculous for having "boy toys" in a glass cabinet that are mine and not my sons in my house. They can not comprehend WHY I would want to buy myself Transformers or collect them. In fact they can't understand why I let my kids have so many Transformers either. My hubby meanwhile reckons our home wouldn't be smothered in Optimus Primes if they had let me have the damn transforming toy truck in the 80's... but he's cool with it. ;) 

    My son loves Transformers, my daughter loves Transformers. I don't restrict them like my folks did. They ask for whoever they want... normally based on their intrigue from watching the characters. My daughter wanted Predaking for Christmas one year - she got it and STILL adores it. My 9 year old son is a huge G1 fan (loves the show more than RID 2015, Animated or Prime) so he is LOVING that the CW line had all his favourite characters to collect and play with.

    My kids LOVE that they can drag me over to watch the tv shows and movies with them or that I'll get down on the floor and play with them. We'll research our next purchases in co-ordinated efforts together, go toy hunting in the HK toy malls together and my daughter even comes along to HK ani-com with me every year. As a mum it give me a way to relate with my kids, get them to open up and have fun without the parent-child barrier in the way. I'm just lucky both of my kids adore Transformers I guess. XD
     
  12. D-Unit

    D-Unit #1 Heel

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    Both my parents were prety well-versed on Transformers (and other big 80s cartoons) and the characters. I remember watching the first G1 episodes with my dad when I came home from school and they had pre-empted He-Man. My dad bought me Bumblebee as my first Transformer when he came back from a trip after we had watched the show together. He also took me to see TF the Movie in the theatre when we were on vacation and knew a lot of the characters from buying me the toys. My mom was the same way, she would tape the shows for me when I would come home from school late (VCRs were a new thing back in the 80s) and she was pretty familiar with the characters as well. Always good memories
     
  13. BattleUpSaber

    BattleUpSaber Result.

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    My parents were the ones who introduced me to Transformers, albeit inadvertently, with the 07' movie. While these days they want me to focus less on collecting and more in my studies, they for the most part understand that this is my hobby and have grown to accept it. That said, their attitude regarding my hobby flip-flops from being full on into itto leaving me to my own devices. Apart from a few incidents my relationship with them regarding this hobby has been mostly steadfast. Lots of good memories made. Even if they may not be fully supportive, I'll always appreciate them for getting me started in the first place.
     
  14. Haywired

    Haywired Hakunamatatacon

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    My parents rather preferred me having LEGO or TFs over more "violent" toys. The puzzle aspect was winning here.

    They didn't know TF background lore, mind you...
     
  15. Ninjanicktf

    Ninjanicktf Mushroom Samba

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    I don't really have any memories of my parents and Transformers, mainly because my parents didn't give two craps about transformers. Whenever I talked to them about it they always just sat there pretending to listen occasionally going "uh huh" (which is them listening to most of my interests, tbh)

    The only one I can really think of was when the first Transformers movie came out, and I remember really thinking they looked cool. The only Transformer I ever really got was Cybertron Undermine (Which I didn't know was a real one at the time, as I was only 7) and I remember for my 8th birthday my parents got me a first movie bumblebee, which slowly started my mad descend into transformers.
     
  16. WishfulThinking

    WishfulThinking The world has moved on...we've always said.

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    My mother would buy me Gobots and Transformers in exchange for scraping the dead skin off her feet.
     
  17. Hazekiah

    Hazekiah Banned

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    Annnnd shit just got weird, lol.
     
  18. Ninjanicktf

    Ninjanicktf Mushroom Samba

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    Okay then...
     
  19. Fretburn

    Fretburn We need Instrument TFs

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    In in my thirties with a kid and a professional career. I am well past the point of caring what my parents think of me buying kids toys as a hobby. And they don't really care either. To them it's just one of their son's hobbies. If I start talking about Transformers I'm sure they'd tell me to "shut up, we don't care"...because why would they? This is an area that so many nerds miss: The average person does not care about our somewhat juvenile obsessions.

    As for what other people think of my hobby...again, I don't really care. I have a few out on a bookshelf with my books and other things, they get rotated with other figures fairly often. It just looks like an odd quirky hobby to people. Few really know that I have a few hundred of these things stored.

    Now, if I was like a lot of people in the fandom that have whole rooms dedicated to showing every figures, or every flat surface in their bedroom and living room has an Transformer on it, I'm sure my parents and many other people would think it's weird. Which it is. A lot of you guys need to learn the "less is more" approach.
     
  20. WishfulThinking

    WishfulThinking The world has moved on...we've always said.

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    I'm not joking. Her feet would build up massive callouses so she'd hand me a defoliation device that had the texture of extra rough sandpaper and I'd get to work. I never thought twice about it...but many folks kind of get green when I talk about it.

    On the other hand, my wife appreciates the fact I can give great foot rubs.