It's a shame a lot of that stuff, presumably in early drafts of the script, was cut out of the film. I particularly love the notion of Optimus as a hidden orphan, which reminds me of Zeus being hidden from Cronos, Moses being put in a basket, or Jesus being taken to Egypt while Herod killed the newborn infants.
The writers are probably laughing their heads off observing how much debate their less-than-stellar script is generating in places like this.
7 Primes?!? Thanks a lot, Orci. After the Movie Prequel novel/comic, Simon Furman (with IDW's planned comic), heck even the Ultimate guide set up nicely that there were 13 original Cybertronians, you had to reduce the number to make a comparison between the first TFs and some crappy human organization that is even defunct by the time the second movie plays? Thanks a lot, I bet this was the cause IDW cancelled "The 13", a comic which I have been looking forward for a long time now...
I reckon it was changed to seven was to actually avoid contradicting what we know of the original 13: they are not the same as the Seven Primes created by the All Spark.
So wait... Optimus Prime is an orphan in this timeline? Wow. So much for Orion Pax... or maybe that was his code name as a protoform :/ jD001
Or maybe "Optimus" was the code name they hid him under, and "Orion Pax" is his true name. They didn't start calling him "Prime" until they re-discovered the language of the Primes on an archeological dig, and realized that's what the symbol engraved on his head meant.
Perhaps there were 13 Primes in all before the Fallen's betrayal. If 6 of the original 7 Primes (The Fallen being the exception perhaps) produced a descendent son, then there could have been 13 Primes eventually including The Fallen. The Fallen then may have wiped out 5 of the 6 descendent Primes (Optimus being the only survivor for whatever reason) and the other original 6 Primes went and sacrificed themselves to conceal the Matrix. I thought that might have been a reason for why they made only 7 original Primes too: to differentiate from the original 13 of the comics.
Could also be for the limited group shots for the movie. I mean, if the IMAX thing almost blew up because of the graphics it probably would have if they made the Prime 13 instead of the Prime 7. jD001
What's really interesting to me is that 6 of the First Thirteen are "known" (although one isn't confirmed as such in official canon), and a "Sentinel Prime" is alluded to in both the film and the novelization. That makes seven exactly... 1. Prima 2. Logos Prime 3. Nexus Maximus 4. Vector Prime 5. The Fallen 6. The Liege Maximo (at least according to Simon Furman) 7. Sentinel Prime (?)
People are reading too much into this, just enjoy the movie adn rmemeber this is NOT G1 OR IDW for god's sake!! It's s different continuity, and there's no need to be 13 Primes.
