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TFW2005's Transformers Year in Review - 2017 - Transformers News - TFW2005

 

Titans Return was the best line ever! I have never loved any Transformers line so much.

 

Correction: The Last Knight made $130 million dollars stateside.

I thought it was a decline in quality from the previous few movies for reasons both different and similar to listed. It should have had less going on, that's for sure.

Frankly, new sequels should change the status quo - that in itself wasn't the problem, and the status quo change from Dark of the Moon to Age of Extinction was the best decision in the Movieverse in my opinion - but the new status quo should be consistent with what was previously established. The Galvatron-Megatron transition was not explained, there was no exploration of the Quintesson origins (The Creators have much more to their motivations in Age of Extinction than Quintessa does in this movie), the Knights weren't a hundred percent consistent with what Lockdown said about them, and TRF feels like a less well executed rehash of Cemetery Wind. The plot threads from the last film were a gold mine that could have resulted in a truly excellent (by Transformers standards) fifth film, but alas.

Also, am I the only one that finds it funny how people now want the same things back in the movies that they previously complained about (i.e. cringey humor)?

RiD2015 has never interested me, but I hope those that I like it were satisfied.

Power of the Primes and Titans Return are both great lines I think. I enjoy them. I just got Beachcomber and look forward to the Terrorcons. The Last Knight has some great stuff, too.

2017 wasn't my favorite Transformers year, but it still has things I like, and I look forward to Power of the Primes and the Bumblebee movie. I am open-minded as far as Cyberverse goes.

 

As for the movie lines, I never really liked them, and the fact that they were transmorgriphiformers killed it for me. I fell asleep at the end of AoE and I have yet to see TLK. The Chinese Democracy slowly shoe horned into the series was dissappointing to me as well. IMHO the first transformer movie is what is closest to the spirit of the property.

I enjoyed Titans Returned, whenever i could find something beyond wave 1.5, and could buy it at something other than an outlandish online price. Overlord is freakin awesome.

 

That was a great read thanks for the article

 

All of the films are equally close to the "spirit of the property." They all have warring, transforming alien robots and have their share of camp, cheesy dialogue, and over-the-top action and scenarios, and all of the films are heavily inspired by at least one G1 story, and they all sell toys, so they all resemble the "spirit" of their source material. Which of the films best executes the core concepts of the brand best is up to debate because fan preferences of said concepts vary wildly.

Besides, Transformers is fairly broad, so I don't know if you can describe it as having a single "spirit."

 

2017 hmmmm. The year of the $20 deluxe. Hey, isn't that the same figure I paid $15 for? Yes, but he comes in a box, has less paint, and no weapons.

Is that the same little legion guy I paid $3.99 for selling for $8.99? Yes, but he's molded in colors that approximate Barricade.

The cheapening of quality and the jacking of prices is ruining the line. Seeing figures languish on shelves for over a year and massive clearance sales says mainstream consumers are voting no to Hasbro's latest scheme.

Leader class toys kind of turned to junk, Voyagers were good, and Legends were a huge highlight.

Trypticon was a total mess and a good amount of Titans Return figures needed joint fixes out of the box. QC was horrendous in 2017.

What I truly saw in 2017 is that Chinese KO companies like Wei Jiang surpassed Hasbro in every way. Then you get others like Alien Attack putting Hasbro to shame making a fully realized Knight Optimus that makes the TLK Leader look like the cheap Chinese dollar store ripoff.

 

Things that stuck out to me last year:

• More Headmasters, loved Titans Return
• MPM04 botched release
• TLK compromised for many reasons. From the editing being all over the place to the trailers largely giving away most of the movie
• TLK toyline MSRP increase by $5 was a bad decision all around. Hasbro did the same with GI Joe Rise of Cobra and the brand suffered catastrophically as international support died after figures began to shelfwarm with domestic retail support not being too hot either. History repeated itself with a brand Hasbro thought was immune to such a thing happening
• TLK deluxe Hot Rod yet to be found at retail is not a good sign. At the very latest it should've been out before Christmas
• The writers room seemed like a waste because after TLK it was disbanded. In addition, retconning some of the previous 4 movies takes away the impact of their stories in a way(at least for me...since now that 2007 arrival wasn't really their arrival; according to TLK the Transformers have been on earth for ages)

 

Titans Return is awesome. I love the play pattern, the selection of characters. It made someone like me who grew up adoring Bayformers have more appreciation for all those G1 characters.
TLK movie was... okay. Underwhelming, yes, but I did enjoy it when it came out. Definitely could've been better.
The toyline is a mixed bag, I ended up getting all 5 new mold voyagers which I think is the definite highlight of the line. They're all excellent.

 

The Last Knight was a laughable line with only handful of new molds and only the voyagers really being impressive. The worst part about the line though was how wave one clogged the shelves far after the movie came and went. This year was actually a new low for buying figures from retail shelves- both the Last Knight and Titans Return had old waves just clogging shelves.

Titans Return was a great line though.

 

Not really.  It certainly lived up to being a cartoon accurate, transforming TF figure, but due to the paint scraping, complexity of transformation, the silencer getting stuck on the gun barrel, the lack of non-cartoon paint/face/insignia options and the fact that there are 3P and KO equivalents that don\'t have these problems means that the Takara Tomy version falls short of being a true Masterpiece.

Also, I thought the negative/controversial sections of the article should have included:

- Controversy surrounding \"Sikomofo\" style content in the Legends toys comics and/or the direction of selling TFs in Japan to 15+ consumers instead of the usual child demographic 

- The new, \"anime only\" direction for the MP line.

- The lack of original designs, story, etc for MASK and Visionaries (and/or the issues with the \"expanded TF universe) at IDW.

- The high prices for upcoming MP lines.

 

Awesome review - when do the \"best toys of 201X\" typically get posted? I always enjoy reading those as well

 

This this this!  

Especially the part of Hasbro toy quality going down (bad QC!!!) and KO quality going up!   The difficulty in picking these toys up locally is a giant nail in the coffin - if I have to mail-order my Hasbro toys, why wouldn't I invest in a 3P with better quality (and reviews that confirm it before I even purchase)?

I was looking forward to just ONE TLK toy: Deluxe Cogman. And he never appeared. Now what? Pay scalper prices? Even Hasbro's own HTS failed to list the toy!   It's a complete botch. I couldn't be forced to see TLK in theaters, but from what Sol Fury said, Cogman stole the movie. Really? And the idea is to delay his release because....? To me, Deluxe Cogman encapsulates the entire distribution problem, as one of the more obvious (and perhaps most significant) failures.

I'm seriously angry at Hasbro for doing such a poor job with the Generations line distribution/shipping, when the kiddy junk made it to shelves in record time!  

And the tragedy here is how we're seeing some of the best toys Hasbro has done in years... on our computer screens. Not in stores, or anywhere directly accessible for actual purchase. Great job, Hasbro sales and manufacturing/shipping!  

 

I agree with your point, in theory... but I think the reality is that the target audience did not actually buy toys because... the movie was REALLY bad. So bad that even if you had a friend who was gung-ho about it (and caught the premier), he likely did not recommend you spend your money to see it!   The biggest problem with the movie toy line sales? The Bay movie looked like more of the same from Bay, and most people get bored with recycled explosions and cinema styles. The least they could have done was mix things up a little... but the movie looked like the same junk you already saw... FOUR TIMES.

So I think a lot of people skipped it. And they had little desire to buy toys for something they didn't bother seeing. Just my  

 

Same here - cogman was the only figure from the line I was interested in - guess it's not going to happen

 

Wasn't he just officially released, or did I miss something and now he's cancelled?

 

Wow, that paragraph was way too dang easy on Machinima's Titans Return.

TLK's toyline... ugh. Your new kid-appeal character? Doesn't come out 'til five or six MONTHS after the movie came out, kids already probably forgetting about him, the breakout character still hasn't seen a release yet, and then you've got Hot Rod who was a Wal Mart exclusive... that never came out as far as I can tell. It's the one time I'm probably gonna have to rely on Takara because they're actually selling the doggone things.

The Titans Return toy line was a continued dose of fun, definitely the line I've bought the most from period. Power of the Primes is probably going to be in between it and Combiner Wars, though it still feels pretty fun.

The highlight for me was definitely MPM Bumblebee. Now I get the true Masterpiece appeal, here. Sign me up for Barricade.

 

I think he was technically released, but a lot of people (myself included) have never seen it at a store.

 

This. I don't know of any of the usual online retailers that got him either. Just a couple of sites scalping them for ~$50 each

 

Cripes. I've been wanting him bad, too. Who knows, maybe if I'm patient there might be a silver painted edition somewhere down the line.