Autobot/human relations: Single biggest difference between TF cartoons and comics?

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Our great leader hath fallen...

Originally Posted by Spoon And Sage is a poo. But if poos could have a heart of gold, then Sage would.

Each media followed different precedence. The alienation factor is pretty established in superhero comics, likewise the naive focus on teamwork/ interaction with cool characters cliches were commonplace in cartoons.

For me to be wrong, that would make you right.

And the universe would be a sick, desolate, unholy place if you were ever right.

So therefore, YOU must be wrong sir

It depends on how it's written. It has bothered me for a long time that people in comics often seem so dense that they can't tell friend from foe in BLATANTLY OBVIOUS situations.

Yeah...that sort of habit of "stretching" the truth would probably be noticed because if someone goes that far to distort a situation, it's unlikely that's the only time the NCO (I'm assuming) in question has done it.

Military personnel also usually notice when a target never shoots back, or so I've heard. Heck, an examination of the battlefield would show a single trace of an alien weapon being fired (Prime's) and obviously fired as a warning.

Also, those civilians would be questioned incredibly thoroughly. There's no way the military would let their first-hand accounts go unrecorded.

I have to agree, it makes the armed forces look kind of stupid. I've never been in, but I seriously looked into it after being scouted by the Navy in 2002 (also had relatives that were in the Navy) and have known enough people to know how thoroughly and clearly the military in general can do "detective work". When "Sergeant Hyperbole's" account doesn't square up with the civvies' or the evidence on the scene, he's likely going to be questioned again.

Not to get political, but while the reasons for any conflict can be affected by political concerns, when the military has no political stake in the outcome (again, having to only fight half of the alien machines would sound like a great damn idea to most), they usually do a good job of determining what really happened.

Oh yeah, in addition to the "speaking English" thing, they also wear coloured badges. I'd imagine the order "Shoot the purple badges!" would be given at least once, somewhere.

Heck, several people in the armed forces in the IDW books know for a fact about the factions and that all of them aren't a threat. It would be criminally negligent for Colonel Witwicky to not make the fact known that many of the alien machines won't harm humans unless directly attacked (and sometimes not even then) because then he's directly risking the lives of troops by not passing that info along.

Again, I don't see this as being as simple as the cartoon made it, but really, humans aren't so single-minded that they wouldn't eventually notice that maybe not having to fight half of the powerful, alien war-machines might not be such a bad thing.

There would absolutely be mistrust, some paranoia, some calls for extermination, and so on, but once the notion that many of the alien machines aren't killers and threats got out, it would be debated on TV, on the internet, books would be written, and all of that.

Oh and again, the big question, "Are we alone?" has been answered with a resounding "Nope!". Many humans would be irrationally predisposed to trust the alien machines simply because they are aliens. Good for the 'bots, bad when they end up trusting some 'cons.

- Coeloptera

While the idea was quietly dropped later on, one early G1 episode showed that humans had actually developed and were mass-producing anti-Transformers weaponry for use against the Decepticons, so they weren't complete fuckwits.

Like the military general who thought that dressing up a comic book hack writer/artist as the fictional supervillain of his cancelled, second rate title and claiming mastery over all of the giant robots was a good idea?

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If groups of Hippopotamuses (Hippopotami) roamed your city fighting each other, I'd guarantee they'd all be shot in the interest of public safety. Regardless of whether they are the type with a red pimple on their forehead that appear less hostile to non-hippos, or the ones with longer ears that seem to attack everything.
Human beings will always want to put their house in order personally. Having control is what makes us feel safe.

In the case of Transformers in a comic book, the reader has the luxury of being able to identify with the robots, as they are privy to motivations, and other relateable aspects of their personalities. Most people aren't however, and would likely treat all with suspicion.
All things considered, G.B. Blackrock [sic] eventually came to a realisation based on his continued exposure to the robots.

Personally I find the Marvel comic's portrayal ( reaction, not actual RAAT units) far more realistic than the movie's with its idealistic NEST cooperation, as opposed to a power struggle.

Unfortunately, in comicland, everyone will totally believe him, and everyone who was there will back it up because all they saw was "giant scary robot doing stuff".

In a comic where a robot who is larger than a tank is "too small to hit" for humans, nothing surprises me anymore.

I must completely disagree with your hippopotomus comparison.

Hippos don't use technology or have a language. Hippos are also (somehow) less dangerous than Transformers would be. A war against 2 "factions" of hippos isn't one we'd be worried we might lose, despite hippos being pure evil.



- Coeloptera

The hippo part of it wasn't really the point. Unless they're advanced alien hippos with robot modes.
So far we've not encountered anything battling on our planet other than humans and animals and generally we understand the motivations of both and know how both tend to act. Giant alien robots going at it would be something we have no knowledge base to go from and I'd imagine the natural human reaction would be to (attempt to) kill everything we're not familar with. Even now one group of humans will lump another group of humans together based on a few attributes or sterotypes. Having something as out of the range of knowledge comfort as giant rampaging alien robots would probably make the humans that control the armies and weapons of this planet to see the robots as all one force of threat.
I would say the only point humans would start to look for a way to get on the good side of the robots would be once we've had our arses severely handed to us by them and we have no choice but to look closer at them. Initially I bet we'd be taking a 'shoot first ask questions later (or never)' approach. Of course how trying to make peace after being trounced goes would then depend on if we tried to make contact with the Autobots or the Decepticons first as one side is far more likely to not shoot us right away than the other. I'm sure in that case there would be some kind of threat assessment of which robot to approach, but I doubt we'd be doing that based on the assumption that one group is good and the other evil, more just hoping we can find a less dangerous individual robot we might be able to make a connection with. How long that would take to happen would depend on how long the human leaders take to realise humanity and its weapons aren't as all-powerful as their egos think.