Ok so I recently went back and rewatched Transformers Prime. And I still love that show. But it kinda made me look back and wish that there were more of it. When I was younger I was incredibly excited for Robots in Disguise. But when it came out and I finished the first season I found myself shocked my how much I couldn’t stand it. Gone were the overarching plots and in their place was a monster of the week formula with severely mixed results. I didn’t hate everything. I enjoyed Strongarm’s presence. I liked Optimus’ role in the series. And I liked Steeljaw as a villain. I also enjoyed the season finale a fair amount but for all that I enjoyed, there was so much I didn’t. Skunkticons? Why? The crab guy wasn’t doing anything for me either and I can hardly remember most of the cons that appeared in the end. And Sideswipe is just obnoxious and every moment of his presence is hard to watch. So I ended up just abandoning the show after the first season. But rewatching Prime has made me curious about it again. What’s the general opinion on RID15 around here? Is it worth going back and trying to watch through the whole thing?

 

The first season is the worst. But I wouldn't watch the rest. As season 2 or 3—I can't remember—really hurt Prime as a show.

 

Watch the first 5-6 episodes and if you like it continue, if you dont then dont. All 4 seasons are the same in tone and format (villian of the week), so you should be able to form an opinion on the series as a whole pretty fast.

 

Personally, I feel like it gets too much of a bad rap. It isn't a perfect show, but I honestly had much more fun with it than I had with TFP (which was torture for me).

Honestly, I feel like the fact that it doesn't overpromote itself like TFP did helps a lot. RiD2015 is a very lighthearted and sometimes goofy show, but it's aware of it and embraces it. TFP constantly wanted to make people think it was epic, dark and mature, but it was the first of the truly pretentious TF shows (followed by Prime Wars and then the Netflix series).

At least I could be invested in a show that knows how to have fun with itself rather than a bland, boring mess that calls itself mature.

I also liked a lot of the characters. Strongarm, Thunderhoof, Drift, Windblade and Starscream were some of the best characters in this show (Windblade in particular is a vast improvement over her bland IDW version and still my favorite version of the character) and most of the other characters were pretty fun.

Sideswipe... he's a mixed bag. He was fine sometimes, but other times, I just couldn't stand it (not as annoying as TFA Bumblebee, TFP Ratchet or TFP Arcee were for me, but man, he could be up there).

The show ended on a whimper (the finale with Cyclonus' team was just disappointing), but it was a fun experience. Honestly, when I get more mileage out of the shows that are supposed to be for the youngins rather than the ones supposed to be mature, you know you got people that don't understand how to make a dark show.

 

I remember really liking Windblade. But she was only in one or two episodes of the first season as I recall. I remember enjoying Jazz as well but he was in it for only a single episode as well. Drift I didn’t like much. I was down with the idea of the strict by the book character that needs to loosen up but I thought that was kinda already Stringarm’s thing. Drift is just that but as a mentor and not as a rookie.

 

She was in more episodes than that, actually. She played a pretty big role in the second season.

Jazz was cool, but I wish he was used more.

Personally, I liked Drift in this. Personality-wise, I prefer the version of the Rise of the Dark Spark game, but design and voice-wise, this is the best one. And personally, I felt he was more the stoic wiseman rather than a by-the-book guy.

 

I've had similar feelings, where I didn't like RID15 in the first season, but have thoughts about revisiting it. (I just haven't really made the time, between life stuff and there just being so many other things I'm more excited to watch.)

Here's what I remember feeling about the show at the time:

• I liked Optimus's sacrifice at the end of Prime, and wasn't happy with how RID undoes it. To be fair, if -I- was in charge of launching a new Transformers toyline/cartoon, I'd damn well want Optimus Prime in there, so I understand WHY it was done... It is what it is.
• I really liked how most of the Decepticons were new characters and designs, and their whole beast/machine (not to be confused with "Beast Machines") aesthetic. I got most of their toys even after I quit the show.
• I didn't like Strongarm's character. I liked her design, and I'm all for more fembots that aren't built like bikini models, she just annoyed me with how she was always quoting rules as a means of putting herself above the rest of her team.
• I hated Ted McGinley's character, he always came off to me like some wild-eyed asshole who cared more about his piles of junk than being a responsible dad.

Some of that stuff is very specific and based on personal experiences, but it was enough to make me drop out and not slog through something that was going to potentially make me unhappy.

 

Being better than the ROTDS version of Drift isn’t super hard though. I mean that Drift was boring beyond belief. Idk though man I just couldn’t get into Drift no matter how cool his design was. As for Windblade being in more than a couple episodes, I guess that’s reassuring. She was one of the highlights for me in the first season and I wished there was more of her.

 

RID15 isn't completely terrible. At the very least, season 1 was a decent monster of the week show, and later on, it was fun to see returning characters from TFP pop up here and there. But as the series continued, it began to feel like the really interesting things were happening elsewhere. In the penultimate episode, Optimus delivers a series' worth of content in a brief exposition dump, all of which was far more engaging than most of the episodes of this show. If the whole series was about Cyclonus' conspiracy, the blacklisting of the Autobots, and all that, I probably would have enjoyed it more.

 

My opinion on RID2015 seems somewhat unpopular...

I really like it...probably more than Prime.

I think RID2015 is a fantastic sequel to Prime that actually improves on it in almost every way. It has a more interesting premise (the crashed Decepticon prison ship). It has more visual diversity in the designs (not everyone is a car or jet with the same transformation scheme). It has a funner tone. It has a more streamlined human cast (including Denny Clay, who's a really unique human character). It has threats that aren't just Megatron and his usual crew. It delves deeper into Transformers lore with stuff like Optimus training in the spirit realm, and the council of Cybertron. The only aspect I'd argue is worse is the animation. But only from a realism standpoint. RID2015's less-realistic animation allowed for a larger cast and more creative designs, so I actually prefer RID2015's animation.

Although I mostly like the first season. I thought Season 2 got a bit boring, with the Mini-con hunts and Starscream eventually being the main villain. And I thought Season 3 was kind of forgettable, aside from the finale. I do think the latter seasons of Prime were better than the latter seasons of RID2015, just because they were more memorable to me. But RID2015 season 1 is probably my favorite thing in Aligned, outside the Cybertron games.

 

The first season is quite good but most of s2 and s3 are pretty mediocre at best and terrible at worst.

so here’s my recommendation on how you should watch it:

Season 1:
All of it.

Season 2:
Portals
The decepticon island part 1&2
The starscream arc or basically s2.5

Season 3:
The series finale

 

Well you all are providing some interesting opinions. I gather that maybe there’s something that I missed back in 2015. I might have to go back and rewatch it after all. Probably gonna finish up the Beast era first though.

 

Again, you read me wrong. I like the ROTDS version. Personality-wise, I feel it's the best Drift we've gotten so far (I like the amount of regret he has over his past actions). I prefer the design and voice of RiD2015, but depiction and personality-wise, I prefer the ROTDS version.

The Drift from RiD2015 IMO is basically Master Splinter if he was an Autobot. He did get quite a few fun moments at times so he wasn't a dull character, and I still prefer him over the non-character he was in AOE and TLK and the meh IDW version.

 

Not my favorite series. Each episode are carbon copies of themselves and the Decepticons look ridiculous.

 

I think it's an underrated show and I liked it a lot more than Prime. It's got a fun cast and a unique premise. Steeljaw was an enjoyable antagonist and it was nice to see a leader other than Optimus. Plus, it gave us some pretty cool designs. @TheSoundwave pretty much summed up my thoughts on it.

 

I say watch. But don't go in expecting a sequel to Prime, because that's not what it is. It's not like Beast Machines to Beast Wars. I've come to look at it as more of a spin off of Prime. If you go in treating it like a new show, it can be entertaining. I don't like it as much as I love Prime, but I do find it entertaining.

 

It's better than the Netflix War for Cybertron series I'll give it that much.

 

I really liked Drift in ROTDS the first time I played it but I just find him bland now. I think that the voice performance might have had something to do with it. I liked the idea of the character but he definitely doesn’t peak my interest with how he sounds. I appreciate the move to write Drift in that game to be much more like his original IDW counterpart which I personally enjoyed. And less like the wannabe zen master psycho from the movies though.

 

Yeah, IMO, if you combined the Rise of the Dark Spark personality and writing with the design and voice of the RiD2015 one, I feel you would get a Drift that would be close to perfect

 

I consider it somewhere between a spin-off and a loose sequel to Prime. Which is personally something I like in sequels...I don't go into sequels wanting to see more of the same thing, I like it when sequels change things up and take a different approach. I get why people who wanted or expected a more direct sequel were disappointed, but I like that they did something different. We had three seasons and a movie about Prime, some "gang back together" show would have been a bit boring to me.

And I do think RID2015 functions as a good sequel to Prime. They follow up several major aspects of Prime, like Bumblebee's road to becoming a leader, Cybertron being restored, Optimus' sacrifice, the Autobots becoming the dominant faction, and the future of some of the unresolved Prime cast members like Ratchet and Soundwave and Starscream. There are a few things I wished were addressed...like, I could have used an episode devoted to an adult Raf, or even Megatron making one last appearance (maybe as a reluctant anti-hero in exile, just to add some closure to his character). There was definitely some missed potential. But overall I still feel like it's a fine sequel.