I don't dislike G1, I don't dislike people who do, but I do dislike the continued focus on G1 from the aesthetic to its inspiration for TV shows, movies, games and comics. I feel that the brand has become stale and Hasbro is too buy indulging the past to be creative and drive the franchise forward. Is focusing on G1 the best thing for the brand? Time will tell, however I do miss 2000-2010 when we got so many different interpretations of the franchise: RiD 2000, Unicron Trilogy, Animated etc.

Now it's the same thing again and again. Look at the toys for example. Siege Megatron, Earthrise Megatron, WfC Megatron, aren't they basically the same figure? Combine that with Cyberverse and we have 4 Megatrons based on the same aesthetic. In the last decade in comparison we had:






Not counting the films as well. It kept the franchise fresh, it kept it interesting, and as a fan I was excited for what was happening next. We got new dynamics and new personalities for established characters, like Starscream in Armada or Ultra Ultra Magnus is RiD. For the people who grew up with G1 I'm happy that you're having a renaissance, I'll be buying a few ER figures because I've never owed G1 figures, but I can't stand the lack of variety. The next movie will have more of the G1 aesthetic, WfC will, TF Online likely will and the next TV show, comic and toyline likely will too.

For those who are enjoying the brand, are you happy that the brand has become this stagnant?

 

I assume you mean the decade before last because the newest design you've shown there is 15 years old. This is hardly a new development.

 

Those were 2 decades ago but I agree.

We're getting a lot of late G1 toys that haven't had an accurate update since the originals (Doubledealer, Snapdragon, Scorponok), a lot of characters who've never had toys (Allicon, Quintesson, Rung, Rack 'n' Ruin--Doublecrosser is clearly a pretool), original characters (Soundbarrier), a smattering of Unicron Trilogy (Galaxy Convoy) and Beast Wars (Optimal Optimus), and even classically G1 characters that homage other continuities (Ultra Magnus), but yes, by and large they're refusing to move away from the G1 aesthetic.

It's Generations, not Generation. It'd be nice to see a more even mix. If not 50/50, then anything better than the 10:1 ratio we have now.

 

The same could have been said five years ago when it was clear Hasbro really was only interested in more movie garbage, to which I did regularly ask movie fans this:

I was usually met with the same drivel about how people who prefered the old stuff needed to "accept" that the films were the next stage, even though the stagnation in the brand because of the films was evident enough.

We're stuck in G1 right now because the stagnation from the films led to the collapse that was the fallout of TLK, in which Hasbro and Paramount had gone almost all in and lost that bet. G1 always sells, hence why we are still in it once again.

I'm all for a new series, but the brand does need to re-establish itself first. And G1 is the best way to do it, for better or worse.

 

In fairness to the movies it was the big project at the time with films every 2 years, so there was a reason for movie products to be present, yet movies weren't the bases of every aspect of the brand, and during the time we also had Animated, Prime, WFC/FOC, T30 and the advent of Generations to diversify the brand.

You're right that Hasbro has fallen back on G1 because it sells, they're capitalising on the adult market hard compared to the past.

 

Problem is it’s establishing itself as something boring and emotionless. It’s so phoned in and generic and more and more fans are getting sick of it. (And the general audience doesn’t seem to be going nuts over it either) It’s arguably worse than the movies because G1 permeates throughout everything in Transformers by default. It never really went away during the movie times, so the continued tunnel-vision focus is insufferably stagnant. Transformers was always more than the Movies even whilst we were in movie years, but ever since they ended we’ve been nothing but G1. Generations is exclusively G1, Cyberverse is almost exclusively G1 (and pretty shit) and now the WFC Netflix show, being directly based on Generations, is obviously exclusively G1 again.

Worse, the brand has not simply re-adopted G1’s aesthetic and characters, but apparently it’s quality and mentality. The very, very dated mentality. Cyberverse is absolutely terrible, featuring terrible writing, acting, and story. WFC is like something from 15 years ago, embarrassingly dark and edgy and up-it’s-own-ass serious. The comics are bland, emotionless slogs that lack that growing presence and fan base they used to be able to gather, and the movies are MIA with ridiculous aspirations of a Beast Wars movie of all things (yeah, cuz Hasbro’s gonna approve that) and a sequel to Bumblebee, a movie that really shouldn’t have a direct sequel, and thus will likely be just another G1 rehash... if it ever materializes either. And even if it does come to fruition, and does bring something new to the table, that’s pretty fucking far away.

I agree with Sizuka, this synergized wasteland of tail-chasing Transformers has become is not what built the brand, and not what gathered the success it enjoyed before the movies. The movies got Hasbro into a dangerous mindset of taking one thing that worked and riding it. Problem is that only just worked for the movies, and started having diminishing returns almost immediately. But they’re doing it again, this time with G1, for the exact same reason you gave: G1 sells... for now. But what happens when it doesn’t? What happens when the brand begins to stagnate in this state and, unlike the movies, can’t default to G1 to save itself, because G1 is what’s hurting it? Pick another random series, like Beast Wars, and hope that fans of it still exist among collectors and modern audiences enough to cash in that nostalgia check?

G1 was a safety net following TLK, I agree completely. Problem is it’s not suited for being the new meal ticket. What happens when that safety net breaks? What more base, marketable series can they cushion their fall with if (or when) the G1 gravy train runs out? They should’ve used this as a wake up call to put Transformers into a healthy cycle of reinvention and evolution, not make the exact same mistake again.

I think it says a lot that we’ve been in a slog of the same mediocrity for so long that we can’t even remember exactly when the last time Transformers wasn’t just the same old shit year after year. That or they meant “in one decade” not “in the last decade.”

Like, it’s mind-boggling comparing the mentalities of the pre-2010’s to how we view Transformers today. Over three years we’d see three distinct versions of Transformers, each with an almost entirely new cast of characters in entirely new designs with an entirely new story. (Whether intended to be or not, in the case of Armada/Energon. Oof) Like Sizuka compares with Megatron, across four series he changed appearances, goal and personality so much he wasn’t even actually the same person in Japan. (Gigatron in RID, Megatron in Armada, reborn as Galvatron in Energon, and Master Megatron who is apparently his own thing and is more of a dark sorcerer than a simple megalomaniac) We’d have entire rotations of everyone and everything, with at best three or four names surviving onto new characters... and people found that to be boring. People thought Hot Shot, an entirely new character sporting an old name in a brand new body, was getting redundant come Cybertron.

Now we have an Optimus Prime who barely changes between series, always the same, stoic flatline of a character based directly on the G1 version. (Or if you’re really lucky, the Powermaster or G2 character) The narrative is the same too, and I think that hurts things more. People complain about the Transformers stories being basic fetch quests, but at least they were good catalysts for new stories and characters. We have seen the fall and subsequent Exodus from Cyberton told three times now across video games, movies and TV shows, all without hardly any change to the narrative.

It’s the same old shit, just new packaging, verses the years of RID-TFA which was new shit in old packaging. New characters and stories dressed up to harken back to the originals, but fundamentally unique in their portrayal. Now we have the illusion of difference, different aesthetics and different designs (sort of) but it’s all the same characters filling the exact same roles in nearly the same narrative.

Transformers’ future is incredibly bleak for me because I don’t see it going anywhere but down. I know the next Generations line will be G1, I know the next cartoon will be G1-based, I know the next movie will most certainly be more G1. G1’s not even bad, I’m just sick of it, and nowhere on the horizon is that same sense of “man, what could they possibly do next?” Because it won’t be another TFA, it won’t even be another Prime. It won’t be another TF07 or even Unicron Trilogy. It’ll just be more of the same we’ve been getting for the last... what is it now, four, five years? It really started with Combiner Wars but I feel like even Thrilling 30 lacked a real embracing of its various Generations, morphing everything it referenced and reinvented into some twisted amalgamation with G1 at its core, with none of the legacy characters outside G1 being major entities.

 

Wow can we get this thread renamed the whiney thread?

 

This really contributes to the discussion.

 

...

That's incredibly rude to the people who are just voicing their opinions and concerns about something that they like enough to join this forum stagnating and dying out.

Yeah. I agree with all of you (besides Terradives, of course). What I think would be really nice and what I would want is for part 3 of the WfC trilogy to be a Unicron Trilogy or Beast Wars line. That would really be nice.

But impossible, of course.

The name "Generations" is proof that companies can lie to us. So far, Generations has been solely G1. I mean, I'm pretty sure Studio Series isn't counted under the Generations banner, right?

That's what I buy now. Studio Series has great figs reliable challenge to transform them. I may get Earthrise figs, but they'd have to impress me.

 

Would sending you a bouquet of roses be awkward after that pessimistic yet enthralling speech?

 

I for one am happy that there is a consistency in the brand regarding character designs and personalities. I never want to get to a point again where we have a dude who looks like Wheeljack, is not actually named Wheeljack, and sure as hell doesn't act like him. I never want an Ironhide like Energon Ironhide ever again.

Optimus and Megatron get a slight pass in this regard, as both G1 and G2 established that their core designs were more mutable in a way that keeps them recognizable but makes them fresh, and I wouldn't mind seeing some experimentation on that end, but for the most part, if we were to get a new TF series that was a bold new direction for the franchise, I'd rather it be with brand new characters that aren't just named to hold onto a trademark, but are instead completely unique. Unfortunately, the show that was the closest to attaining this was Rescue Bots.

Hell, bring Gigatron back, but actually call him Gigatron! That would kick ass.

 

I do agree that G1 as it stands now works as a safety net, but as a long term projection for growth it really isn't going to work.

However, I personally don't think it's going to change until we get a serious shakeup in Hasbro management at this point. That's just the end point of the culture that developed there, as they banked so hard on the films continuing their billion dollar streak that TLK somehow came as a massive kick to the nads. Between that and the absolute failure that was Prime behind the scenes where Hasbro lost all control somehow over their own franchise, the guys who stand to make decisions simply don't want to make risky decisions anymore.

THIS is why DOTM should have been the last film, because by breaking the reset cycle that had been well established, the whole franchise had plateaued because currently, risk is seen as something they need to avoid at all costs.

What we need is something that radically shakes up the premise and has the writing chops to pull it off.

What we need is another Animated. I'm not talking a sequel to Animated, but something that comfortably breaks from the norm like Animated did by immediately making Prime an inexperienced washout in charge of the space janitors instead of the top dog from the word "go".

Personally, I think a show similar to how Rescue Bots worked by focusing almost entirely on a group of Autobots not under Prime's direct command. This is supposed to be a galaxy spanning civil war, Prime can't be at the forefront of every single theater of battle.

 

I hear you. There was a reason I stopped collecting in 2011. The movie line was turning me off, and I was tired of basically getting the same figures again and again. But it was WFC that brought me back, so doubt because of the combination of G1 homages with new transformation schemes and detailed sculpts. I always kept my eye on the line, and frequently checked the releases here, but none of the mainstream lines since Animated really appealed to me.

That said, Megs is an outlier. I'm not sure why they'd do 4 very similar decos of the same mold, which is excessive, but that's atypical. Redecos have been a thing from the start, and usually we've gotten them as new characters (Prowl into Smokescreen and Bluestreak, e.g.). If you're not enjoying it anymore, step back from collecting. Certainly no need to buy every deco of every mold.

It is interesting to look back and remember how when I first got into collecting (around '99) fans felt rebuffed, and were happy to see an occasional homage, like Powerlinx Armada Hot Shot. Now it seems nostalgia rules the roost, at least with WFC. There look to be a lot of new characters in the Cyberverse line. Anyway, looking at the timeline, we're almost 20 years from Armada. It will be interesting to see how those kids-now-adults change the collecting market, if at all.

 

I'm not that bothered by the G1 focus (though I must admit that it is getting a bit much), what bothers me more about all the recent stuff is the excess of Optimus and Megatron. I've just grown tired and pretty annoyed of them.

I don't mind what direction they're going with in terms of focus, just don't put Optimus and Megatron in every single friggin' thing in the media. That's the reason why I stopped watching Transformers TV shows a while ago, I basically lost hope.

 

Sadly, I'm kind of feeling the same way. I love G1, and I don't mind Hasbro focusing on it. What I do mind is how little creativity is going into a lot of the recent media, especially in terms of designs. The new Siege trailer makes me feel kind of sad. The first ever Netflix Transformers show, and they chose to just 3D model the toyline. Prime Wars basically did the same thing. The comics use Generations designs. Cyberverse uses Evergreen designs. Everything is just Evergreen and Generations.

I get why they want to lean into G1. I just think there's a happy medium. Allow artists to put their own creative spin on these characters. IDW had a variety of great designs before they rebooted, and they all felt like they fit in with G1. For the past couple years, everything has looked too uniform. I guess it's part of Hasbro's whole "brand unification" thing. I just find it super boring. I need more creativity and unique takes. That's part of why I'm a fan. There used to be so much variety and creativity. A little something for everyone, be it G1 or non-G1. Now everything is trying to be "the definitive Transformers". It's just so stale and cookie cutter.

The only aspect of the brand that really interests me right now are the movies. If they continue the style of Bumblebee, it seems like the movies will be G1 inspired, but still be artists unique takes on the brand. I love that. If Hasbro forces the movies to take the same approach as other recent media (Evergreen/Generations/overly toy-accurate designs and whatnot), Transformers might leave me behind for a while.

 

I agree. I would love to see risks taken.

 

Cyberverse is where Hasbro should be taking risks. But they just aren't.
The third season of the show is, but the toylines seems to repeat the same 4-6 characters every six months.
I swear, every toy fair or Sdcc for the last 2 years has announced a new gimmick line for Cyberverse, and the first wave is always Optimus, bee, Megatron with either Starscream or shockwave filling in the fourth slot. And they barely expand past that.
the cast of the show is enormous. But barely any of them have toys.

Also, Rid 2015 started.iut well enough, we we getting some creative new decepticon designs with Steeljaw and Thunderhoof. But then the end of the line came and stuffed Geewun ass Starscream, Soundwave, Stunticons, Bludgeon, and so on down our gullets. And so many of those delightful weirdoes got left in the cold.

The constant 1984 rehashing of Generations is what frustrates me the most. We just got a Grey tank megatron and Datsuns trio in Siege, now we get them Again in Earthrise.
I adore the Micromaster love we're getting and the Quintessons look cool. But I can't help but feel like Megatron and Smokescreen are wasted slots that could have gone towards characters that haven't had a toy since 1987 like Quickmix or Flamefeather.

I'm mostly happy with Studio series. It's a celebration of ten plus years of Bayformers making Hasbro all of the money. And.it has an end point. Once the onscreen cast of all six movies are done, Hasbro can move on. Unless more films add to the list of dudes what need making.

 

You're right, in my fatigue mathematics failed me.

If you can't have a mature discussion built upon delivering an opinion in an constructive manner, then please leave.

 

But of course it's ruined forever since the '84.

 

Yeah, I agree with this. Again, I don't mind the G1 focus, but when you have the 1984 characters as the be all and end all of most of the TF stuff, it just annoys me (Optimus and Megatron are just everywhere, and they just keep boring me to death). We have other characters around that could use some love, like the Triggerbots and Triggercons, the Sparkabots and Firecons and perhaps G2 characters like the Color Changers (yes, I'm desperate for a new G2 Deluge figure, but none of that store or convention exclusive crap, 'cause I already had a hard time finding a Nautica where I live in thanks to its status as an exclusive toy).

So yeah, I would really be up for rarer characters like the latter G1/G1 Japan characters (once there is a Minerva toy that isn't a hard to find and expensive convention exclusive or an even more expensive Japanese exclusive, I'll be a very happy guy) or G2, Beast Machines and 2001 RiD characters (seriously, those Spychangers and the Predacon trio need some love).