So I watched Earthrise. I enjoyed it/paid for attention than Siege, but it's still on the turgid side. I feel that Scorponok and Sky Lynx were squandered. I did enjoy the bits with Galvatron, and the last scene did make me smile. Raise the bar with Kingdom, please?

Cybertron Seven refresh. I thought I was fine with TR Perceptor, but even he's feeling a bit dated to my eye. Cosmos and Powerglide could definitely benefit from new takes, though that seems unlikely from what we've been told. And Blaster. Fucking Blaster. I mean, come on.

 

Annoyingly I can’t do that on my (apparently not-so) Smart TV or the Xbox app; is it a browser thing only?

I watched the last one in Japanese, that options not there this time...

 

Then don't watch Earthrise. Or Siege for that matter. The show just SMACKS of cheapness with its imported CAD models, lack of expression, poor presentation and sluggish pace. I gave up on Siege after two episodes and I have zero interest in Earthrise. Please, Hasbro, give the license to a studio with some actual TALENT!

 

just started watching mandalorian season 2.

I must admit I love it.

I am the same as you, just a simple fan now. loved how you phrased that, very much trying to find our way through the galaxy!

 

Three episodes in, I have come to this conclusion: with some more pep and sizzle to the writing and better voice direction, this one might be good. The story is actually batshit crazy and needs that corresponding energy.

Everyone, still, loves.. punctuating, their, lines.

 

Watching at x 1.25, I am convinced that the.........usual..............WFC............Delivery........is only a "creative" decision in the sense that someone's gotten creative on how to pad out the episodes to reach the set episode running time for cheaper, even at that Prime.....and....Megatron are still ponderous pontificators but the action and character models just look way more alive and smoothly "naturalistic" (for space robots) when bumped up. I was expecting it might get a bit Benny Hill but, nope, it's a massive improvement. It's a scam, Lads, I'm convinced. x 1.25 is actually the real pace, they've just stretched it out on the cheap!
As usual it seems the better ideas that crop up have been lifted wholesale from elsewhere (a couple in particular strike me as swiped direct from SW canon old & new)!

Dunno about the browser Vs. Smart telly on the speed front, could be the telly doesn't have the processing power of a dedicated actual computer?
To watch Japanese last time I had to create an Alt. account and set Japanese as the default which opened up the language options, managed to snag my old post with the link to how to do Japanese setup from the last time around:

 

Hadn't been into town in nearly 6 months so was pleasantly surprised to find all these in FP !

 

hey dude

some Kallax inspiration

and some shelf inspiration

 

Heavy lump isn't he?

Of course you are expected. Under pain of death! By beetles.

Definitely agree power glide could use another go. FOC blaster still does things to me.

 

To me it still feels like a bunch of fans have bunched together to make something cool and I'd probably like it a lot more if it was. But for something that is supposed to be a professional product from the twin juggernauts of Hasbro and Netflix, it just feels like amateur hour to me.

That's not to say others can't enjoy it. Anything can and will be someone's favourite.

 

I'm on Episode 5 now and it's gone right fucking downhill from the promising developments I hoped might drive the story  

Yep, it reeks of what fans think fans want. If that's the case, fans want a fucking slap.

This whole thing will probably improve with a bottle of whisky.

 

"Forward my friends! This is a look that shall never become dated! Now let us destroy the forces of... *checks notes* Fat Willy's Surf Shack!"

(fun fact: I normally pick a background colour to contrast with the toys, but realised that they were all so bright and clashing anyway that someone was always going to get lost. Farewell Dead End, you are background now)

Well, Cyberverse was alright enough. Prime was good but hamstrung by budget restricting the number of characters. RID was a hopelessly unimaginative 'monster of the week' that managed to piss away most of the good will from Prime along with any opportunity presented by the evolving art style.

Let's go live on the scene and check in with what's happening...

I think Blaster always wore that mould better than Soundwave. But I wouldn't be at all surprised if the Netflix Soundy got buffed up in red and grey...

As for Powerglide, I never got one but I always felt he looked pretty perf? What more could be done there?

 

The worst thing I ever did as a Star Wars fan was get invested in all those awful books they put out when I was a teenager. Seems the whole spirit of the old 'Expanded Universe' was to drive out every shred of fun from Star Wars and replace it with bad, thin sci-fi. It honestly turned me off the whole thing. It also bred one of the most repulsive online fandoms possible.

Disney dumping all of that (while cherry picking the few choice ideas from it) was the best thing for the franchise, and finally finding their feet with Mando (though I'd argue Rebels was great and hopefully more people take the time to revisit it with how it sets up so much of the upcoming content).

It's good to enjoy SW again though. Not taking it to seriously, having fun with it... genuinely makes me feel like a kid again. Wasn't that always the point?

You're watching it sober?

You goddamn maniac.

I'm waiting until I'm well oiled before chancing that show.

 

Thems drinking words!

 

Went to check on the ferrets yesterday evening and discovered Oreo had been sick so two levels of Ferret HQ needed a damn good clean.

As I'd ran out of their cage disinfectant I got a bucket of warm, soapy water and did it that way and nipped to Pets At Home this morning for a new bottle of disinfectant.

Oreo's fine, I think he just overdid it with the snacking and maybe got a hairball as well, it happens.

Newage Soundwave should be here within the hour and I got another package this morning which turned out to be the custom 3.75" scale Blurrg I bought about 7 weeks ago that I'd been starting to get a tad concerned about but it's got here in one piece and is f'ing AMAZING! There's even a proper box for it with vintage style artwork on it and the instruction sheet for the saddle is also done like the original Kenner figures so there's some nice nostalgia to go with the awesomeness of having a creature from The Mandalorian.....the same guy also does a Mudhorn with 2 versions of The Egg that I'm VERY tempted by.

Blurrg by Brendan Mitchell, on Flickr

2020 has seen my Star Wars fandom go from being near dormant, to buying figures in 4 scales (3.75", 6", 1/6 and 1/4), a bloody big ship and a custom creature.

Well played Disney or to be more accurate Favreau and Filoni.

 

Finally, it is over but it never ends! (Until Kingdom drops) Got thru 6 and, welp, it's Rooster Teeth all over squandering potential left & right, an improvement on Siege to be sure but they still don't earn their payoffs at all, very much storytelling stuff happening "just because" to get to the next plot point.

Spoiler

As expected minimal transformations in a Transformers show but kudos for an actually-transforming Scorponok!
Megs talking to Mags battered head was a total Kylo Ren ripoff though, right?
What was that mystery planet on the other side of the Spacebridge?
If Scorponok was the last of the natives, why/how the fuck was he a giant robot?
As @barry said Scorps & Sky Lynx were wasted. There's a point for Doubledealer being too, after what was a neat (but unearned as usual) "Han Solo" moment prior, I see what they were swinging for there with Prime demonstrating true heroics winning him over but, boy, there were quite a few steps missing on the ladder to get there.
Having him reduced to an actual puppet explains why he only got an off the shelf existing model face.
Also that Quintesson was f*****-up, in the most edgelord fashion possible.
WTF would anyone name the Green Lantern MacGuffin dimension "The Dead Universe"?
If Prime needs the Matrix to harness it's power, how come Megs can just do it with pure spite?
WTF was going on with Cog's weird sucked out into space/unsung hero bit? A neat idea I thought, or rather half an idea the way it was executed
Shockwave and Co.'s "Stealth Tech" final battle seemed very much an exercise in the old John Byrne Snowbird fighting a Wendigo in a blizzard bit(without the excuse of illustrating three other comic titles at the same time).
Did Shockwave just not noticed all the bright green bombs being scattered about as he sprung his trap?
On Cybertron EVERYONE EXPLODES! Who will survive?
Er, whoever the plot of Kingdom needs to judging by Chromia's, uh, just getting the f*** back up after being shot in the chest?!
Cheap & Lazy.
I wonder how much of the budget goes to DeSantos' Showrunner's wage?

 

Halle-Bleedin-lujah!

10 days in purgatory but well worth the wait.

Now, give me a Toy-Coloured Select please.

 

Absolutely right, it has the roosterteeth "cheapness" to it, such a waste of potential, could have been an awesome trilogy, and all the voices are so generic, a lot of times you can't tell who is talking

 

Done now.

It did start well.

Spoiler

Desperate times on Cybertron. Was enjoying Megatron‘s conflict and mental state and there was a genuine despair to what was being done in the Decepticon ranks. Cheesy, but liked him talking to the head of Magnus. Quintesson angle was familiar but the psychological aspect of their internal battle was darkly entertaining. So far, so good. Comparatively speaking.

Come Scorponok's arrival, I was back to watching it through my fingers, as I did Siege. I don't mind batshit crazy but you need your creative team to be on top form in order to deliver it. More pep and sizzle to the writing and better voice direction was my hope, but it still isn't happening. Its space opera lunacy is played so awkwardly po faced it became difficult to watch and I found myself not enjoying the good bits anymore.

Episode 5 felt like it was supposed to be an epic game changer for Prime and Megs. It was simply an exercise in exposition, and a waste of both Galvatron and Sky Lynx.

Taking a step back, a hell of a lot happened this season at breakneck speed, yet nothing seemed to register emotionally for me. Big fan of elements the show incorporates and I'll happily take a remixed G1 Greatest Hits album presented well, but a failure in drawing any kind of attachment from me to the principle characters took me right out of the game.

I tried here. I really did. And it started out quite promising. But in the end, like its predecessor, it still felt like the cold and cynical edge lord nonsense those soulless G1 Facebook groups are convinced they wanna fap themselves silly over.

Unfortunately for them, we're in Beast Wars country now.

It did not end well.

 

Cyclonus on the way from Kapow. Warpath and Blackarachnia on their way from Star Action Figures. Meanwhile Paleotrex from Comics & Cocktails won't ship until next week.

I mean fairplay they do warn you on their site but I ordered him before the stuff from SFA so...

Yeah if you wanted entitlement summed up in three sentences there you go.