WTF Primetime - 31 - Grillmada - April 22 2012

Discussion in 'WTF @ TFW Transformers Podcast' started by Vangelus, Apr 23, 2012.

  1. TrueNomadSkies

    TrueNomadSkies Well-Known Member

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    Well, about those Insecticons largely being putties in this episode, I've had a few theories, many of which it seems I wasn't alone with. In short, lets take a rundown of the 3 we've seen, those being the one on Cybertron, the one that Megatron bested, and the ones that served as cannon fodder.

    Cybertronian Insecticon: To me, a couple of rather important points for this one could have to do with it not only being in its natural habitat, but also that it was possibly left behind specifically. Granted, maybe it was also fresh outa statis or whatever, but it also had a pretty clear objective with minimal distractions.


    Airachnid's 1st Pet: This one wasn't in its natural area (it was on Earth oppose to Cybertron), but it shared the element of having a clear objective, and it could possible have even been enhanced with Airachnid's influence. Plus as Hypershock mentioned, both this & the one on Cybertron were fighting while grounded, which could also favor them.


    The swarm: These were outa their traditional habitat, being shot in the air, farther away from Airachnid, and to UltraPrimal's point, likely quite confused & mentally stretched thin in general... so even if we ignore the plotpoints, I can logicate (for the sake of this point, "logicate" will be a word) why they were dealt with so easily in this episode.




    ... moving to Grill, I'm gonna be quite disappointed if the camera battery cutting out at the end (right before the phonecall about Prime being cleared) gets completely dismissed, but other than that, I think the episode did well by me.
     
  2. Hypershock

    Hypershock Well-Known Member

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    That's an interesting theory. It could really be anything that anyone has mentioned, or a combination of them. I just hope they come along and say why the insecticons were so amateur, that might make this episode a little better retroactively
     
  3. RedAlert Rescue

    RedAlert Rescue Banned

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    Seemed pretty obvious to me, Starscream rockets that Clone in the face and then he can try to operate on himself to put the dead clones t-cog back in - and as it's a clone there should be no rejection or size fitting problems with the replacement cog. Glad screamers getting used to pain as he's going to feel some more if he has to operate on himself.

    But then there's also people who think Trees beat up Insecticons, and an Insecticon killed Breakdown - neither of which happened.

    It's easy to jump to conclusions I suppose - I thought for a long time the prototypes eye was breakdown's as it fi the facts and I couldn't think of any reason fort he prototype not to have only one eye if it as not breakdown's but then someone else pointed out that what appeared to be breakdown's eye was attached to the bomb Mech tried to blow up the Autobots with. and when that failed ratchet left with it in his hand - so I guess that makes the reason for the Prototype only having one ey less obvious than I first thought.

    And it's a lesson in not jumping to conclusions.... that said it could have been intended to have been breakdown's eye in the prototype and it's just a continuity error that it's not his eye in actuality.

    I guess the only way to find out is to ask the team at a convention why the Mech-proto only had one eye and if it was intended to be Breakdown's or not.

    ---

    My explanation (retcon) for why the Insecticons were so hopeless is one of the following ;

    1. They were babies who had been in stasis since being built and not very good fighters yet.
    2. The one that was beating up on Megatron and Arcee were a lot more experienced ones possibly guards or scouts that had more time building up their skills.
    3. They were worker drones they are of a sort who build stuff not the sort who fight so they were weaker than the previous two ones.
    4. The show is being lame

    Overall there is no excuse to allow Bumblebee to take one out with a kick to the head. that's like throwing a beer can at a Rhino and rather absurd.

    I expect Irish Mikey will be taking the mickey out of that bit for sure on another podcast in the not to distant future.
     
  4. tubbsii

    tubbsii KILL ALL HUMANS

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    whoa! three in a row!
     
  5. TedimusPrime

    TedimusPrime Full Time Toy Designer

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    Umm, the reason I thought insecticons were dealt with so easily was the fact that megatron basically had to wrestle one.

    Now everyone has guns.

    pewpew > sumo
     
  6. GogDog

    GogDog Logic's wayward son Veteran

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    One insecticon nearly killed Megatron. Megatron could have easily killed all four Autobots until Prime arrived in Orion Pax pt 3. Yet all the autobots were shown to have zero issues against SWARMS of insecticons. It's not even close to consistent.
     
  7. GogDog

    GogDog Logic's wayward son Veteran

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    And Arcee's pewpew wasn't doing her a lot of good against the one on Cybertron...
     
  8. WingedWeasel

    WingedWeasel Well-Known Member

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    Given that Optimus can go toe-to-toe physically with Megatron I am not sure it's that far-fetched to see how BB and OP could contend with a few insecticons.

    To elaborate, we see 5 insecticons break off as the "rear guard" to engage the autobots. Acree attempts to pursue Airrachnid. BB apparently guns 2 of them down but then we immediately see at least 4 on screen engaging OP and BB while Arcee speeds off after Airrachnid. Either additional were sent after the autobots or the 2 that were "killed" by BB shrugged off the shots and circled squeezing in a few more shots before taking off after Arcee.

    While the odds would be substantially in favor of the insecticons 3v2, if you can soften them up with gun/blaster shots then I can see how the autobots win. If the end scene where OP windmill slams insection #2972 onto insecticon #2973 had ended with them being exhausted/collapsing rather than just standing and semi-shrugging it would've been a lot more consistent.

    Stretching it? Probably, more likely it's snapping it as a result of stretching. The most likely answer (yay occam's razor) is what was mentioned in the podcast that the writer was misinformed or a similar answer.

    ninja edit: As to Arcee's blasters, have they ever been shown to do substantial damage to anything? (serious question, I can't recall)
     
  9. GogDog

    GogDog Logic's wayward son Veteran

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    Meh. These things have been portrayed as forces of nature. So much that they can take on Megatron himself and when the autobots learn they are on Earth they rush to the scene to stop a single one. This episode flushed all that down the toilet and made them out to be little more than larger Vehicons, and they were dispatched just as easily. The Autobots literally just stood in a circle and shot in all directions just like they were fighting Vehicons. It was lame. That's all there is to it.
     
  10. Bountyan

    Bountyan Well-Known Member

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    The Insecticon nerf annoyed me too. I don't even want to bother justifying it or making up an explanation for it. Unless a reason was stated in the show, it was just blatant cheating.
     
  11. Hypershock

    Hypershock Well-Known Member

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    But they were all in insect mode!! they cant use that brute strength when theyre flying around in the air!! they were never shown to be equally as effective in insect mode. Dont get me wrong, i wish they had been more force-of-naturey as well, but for the majority of the episode, the insecticons were in bug mode!! if they all had been in robot mode, i have no doubt that it would have been no contest. They would have taken megatron apart had they not converted at the last second
     
  12. SearchmanDS

    SearchmanDS Well-Known Member

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    Personally I just took the Insecticons falling into the Conservation of Ninjutsu as Airachnid was overextending her control method, especially when trying to run for her life. I'll be disappointed if they don't make a return to their badass status. Oh, and as for the supposed tree incident, anyone else had the showdown between lawmower and a bush stump? The vegitation wins the battle. Can't tell you how many times I've bent the blade by accident or broken the drive shaft by accident that way.
     
  13. updatedude

    updatedude Well-Known Member

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    Considering Grill foreshadowed Airachnid's defeat and having watched YEARS of cartoons and live actions, I was not at all bothered by the nerfing. Probably 'cause I was expecting it and had already reconciled it with myself.

    Law of Inverse Ninja or Conservation of Ninjutsu is a way of fictional life. I'm surprised you guys seemed surprised it happened (wham! "I'm surprised..." integrated). Woulda thought it was seen a mile away.

    Also, with both Breakdown and Airachnid out of the picture, I guess we're left with less celebrity voices.
     
  14. tubbsii

    tubbsii KILL ALL HUMANS

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    i'd have to say this is my least favorite episode of primetime no fault of your own just because the the episodes weren't exactly up to par (armada)
     
  15. zandergb

    zandergb Well-Known Member

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    The Nemesis was namedropped in Shadowzone.
     
  16. RedAlert Rescue

    RedAlert Rescue Banned

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    I suppose any time we see an Insecticon shot and knocked back and it does not fall over or blow up then you can say it might shake it off like a wet dog get up again afterwards.

    I'd be very surprised if the show ever addresses that the hive has plenty of Insecticons still in stasis - I bet it just forgets them.
     
  17. Thinktank

    Thinktank Well-Known Member

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    It's pretty obvious to me after watching a second time.

    Point 1: Gat over Wrasslin'.
    Megatron's cannon equals 1 shot TDK to a Starscream clone.
    Mind you these clones are physically SS's exact duplicate.
    The Insecticons he shot once took damage and generally started
    acting like they had taken a critical systems hit. Not "Kaboom!"
    More like "Houston! we have a problem!" kind of damage.

    Point 2: In yo' FACE!
    The Insecticon Megatron faced in Crossfire he had to fight in close
    combat due to Airachnid webbing his main gun. She did this for an
    obvious reason. Because Megatron would have walked through the
    lone insecticon like a shower curtain if his gun were online. Also that
    insecticon kind of had him stuck on "Wait, WHAT?" in round one.

    Point 3: Size matters, sometimes...
    I am pretty decent sized guy with some padding. I can take and
    serve up some serious "rough love" in hand to hand. Somebody pulls
    out even a small gun on me, it's over. I cannot soak enough (if any)
    ballistic damage. Humans are just not made for that. I would imagine
    cybertronians carry armament of the same magnitude in comparrisson
    to their scale and composition. If not, why do they have them?

    Point 4: Something something...
    I can see insecticons taking an EOD hit and having a "Mayday!" situation.
    Whereas Starscream's clones take the same damage and are RIP. An
    insecticon is easily 3-4 times as ornery physically as the copies of
    everyone's rogue Air Commander.

    On an aside:
    Some other stuff I noticed was tha the insecticons in bug-mode have
    cannons that look very much like the Vehicon gun barrel. They in some
    way have to be related somewhere way back. The grocery list of
    similarities is getting longer and longer.
     
  18. TedimusPrime

    TedimusPrime Full Time Toy Designer

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    Megatron didn't have his blade or gun until the end of the fight, at that point it was easy for him.

    Buuut, Arcee also went after airachnid. She wasn't shooting at insecticons.
     
  19. ToasterPrime

    ToasterPrime Toast maker

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    Bulkhead's got claw scars on his friggin' chest plate.

    bad. ass.
     
  20. Kaymac

    Kaymac I'M REALLY FEELIN' IT!

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    I think introducing Barricade or Lockdown as the "Alpha Vehicon" would be really freaking cool.