Bumble Bee, Wheeljack and some seekers had nice Cyberton alt modes, if you can deal with the fact that the robot modes were earth modes.

Also, something I do alot, never spelling out words I can understand why we do it but sometimes I just don't know what people are talking about example SG Rodimus = Shattered Glass.

 

Oh yeah the triangle jets were cool.

Bee and Wheeljack's alt modes looked like shit though. Wheeljack's in special looked like a floating box.

 

I kinda liked bumblebee's, I agree with you that Wheeljack's looked terrible.

 

It tends to some down to a simple fact, people care about things that are like them. If you made them truly alien ou end up with something so different from us or our experience that not only is coming up with it borderline impossible (How does an alien robot think? Seriously their entire thought process would be radically different that it becomes the sort of thing we can only imagine imagining. ) But also completely un-relatable. At that point your only real option is to make TF side characters so we don't have to guess as to how they think or relate to them.

 

Really? Episode 23 when Bumblebee wants to go warface on Megatron, I think they communicated that perfectly! Great moment from a mute character.

 

Constant reboots
Transformers: Energon
Transformers: Animated's premature cancellation
The Maximal designs in Beast Machines
Pat Lee
Bumblebee being mute
Megatron turning into a space jet (give me tank Megatron anyday. Or Megatron being a gunship or bomber at least)
Michael Bay
The Bayverse character designs (most of them, anyway)
Optimus Prime dying in every continuity (sure, it was sad in Transformers: The Movie, but it got old)
TRUKK NOT MUNKY
Hasbro's and Takara's lack of love for Beast Wars

 

Another thing that I personally find annoying is the people who complaining bout baddas transformers. Kinda like in Prime where people complain that Wheeljack has become too much badass.

Well, if a species has waged war for the time the Transformers race has, it´s natural that the survivors are the badass ones. Those who sucked at fighting died out ages ago, leaving the stronger and better elements alive. Transformers like G1 Bumblebee would not last very long unless they learned out to fight (that´s why characters like him annoy me, they make no sense).

 

I'm kinda getting tired of '86 movie quotes.

I mean, they were cute awhile ago, but ...

Oh, and roboswears. Fuck, man. Swear or don't. "Scrap" is getting very, very old. Even worse when the fandom uses them...

 

Again, this is assuming the only alternative is an extreme degree of difference that totally alienates the viewer, which is not what I'm saying at all. The real energy is to be found in the clash of these two elements of familiarity and the abstract.

For these reasons, learning about Cybertronian culture becomes interesting because it is different, new, or metaphorically clever, rather than "oh, it's just like modern Earth, except they're made of boxes and eat "energon" sandwiches instead of salami".

In other words, the fact that often TF's and Old Cybertron are shown in ways that make them EXACTLY like us (sometimes to the point of stupidity) actually makes them LESS interesting. If you remove too many of these elements, the whole allure of them being "alien robots" in the first place is totally lost.

As an aside, I often suspect that this division also aligns with the distinction between fans who like sci-fi stories that explore possibilities, and fans who want empowerment fantasies. Those who want to live vicariously through their TF heroes, who want to BE Transformers, are the ones who are most likely to over-humanize them. That's a theory anyway.  

No, I disagree with this. The reason they've survived this long is because they practice a division of labour. Not everyone can be good at everything. If the only people left in your society are badass warriors, your culture is effectively dead. In fact, this is precisely what Megatron's ambition seems to be, and what the Autobots fundamentally oppose... that TF's become a warlike master race, whose only real purpose is to fight and conquer others. If all you have left are warriors, what kind of civilization are you going to be after the fighting is done?

I think badass characters definitely have a place. I like badasses, but at the same time, too many badasses just plain sucks. It becomes boring. When Perceptor is a badass, you've taken a wrong turn. It's much more interesting to see how someone like Bumblebee is so damn good at his job, that he doesn't HAVE to be a badass.

Another aspect of this is the simple point that Transformers probably don't evolve very much. They live nearly forever, and yet often seem to remain fixed in their ways (this is a theme that has been often explored). For a civilian TF to become a warrior might require a massive paradigm shift. It might just simply not be in his programming. But that's okay, because somebody has to put others back together, and come up with the plans, and do the surveillance, etc...

zmog

 

The problems is that the war lasted for millions, that being that the average cybertronian had to adapt or or die. Kinda like our armies. The US got it´s ass handed to them by the germans in Africa, but it learned the hard way. Same of the civilians that joined the Autobots. They had to learn how to become badasses or serve as the proverbial meatshields. Those who could not..well their heads probably serve as the decoration on some Decepticon room.

The Cybertronian culture is already dead since the war pretty much destroyed anything they had. A cybertronian has probably seen more war in one equivalent to their version of a year than the entire combined armies of Earth (exaggeration, but it gets the point across). Basically, the war lasted a lot of time and the weaker elements were killed or adapted, it´s natural selection in a way.

And Bumblee has never been good at anything expect being there to be kid friendly. If you say he´s a spy, well, even WWII or modern spies were skilled and often ruthless in their goals, none of wich is Bumblebee´s character.

Basically it would be like you and me being drafted into a war. I´m not a soldier, but either I would have to adapt and become one to survive or be on the receiving end of a bullet.

You want a RL example? During the Ardennes offensive, the US was forced to defend some sectors with cooks and mechanics because they lacked personal in some areas and that was temporary. Now imagine that on Cybertron with the Autobots lacking proper soldiers, they would have to draft anyone who can learn to use a gun. Even a cybertronian scientist has probably passed more time in a trench and knows more about war then the average human soldier.

 

- Out-of-universe explanation - Same reason that the eagles didn't just fly the Ring into Mordor or Voldemort doesn't just buy an AK-47 and shoot Harry Potter: Because then there'd be no story.

- (Possible) In-universe explanation - It's been established in at least a few continuities that the Autobots and Decepticons have one or more treaties, some of which restrict the use of various weapons. Sort of like the Geneva Protocol adopted after WWI, which prohibits the use of certain chemical weapons. It's entirely possible that nuclear weapons are forbidden under one Cybertronian treaty or another.

And then the Autobots develop their own nuclear weapons, which results in the same situation we had during the Cold War: Mutually-assured destruction, which effectively prevents either side from using their nuclear weapons, but doesn't necessarily stop the fighting.

 

^this.

RID SCOURGE IS BADASS  

How people seem to hate the kid appeal charecters like Bumblebee, Hot Rod, Cheetor and Hot Shot because their the young blood that can be irreposonsible. They all had good moments.

How when need both Thundercracker and Skywarp. I'm fine with one being used instead of another in future series.

 

Unless its a G1 continuity, we rarely see both anyway. Besides, even with G1 toys one tends to be an exclusive of some kind.

And which would you give up? Its like having to abandon one of your favorite children in favor of the other.

 

biggest pet peeve?

-the movies...the whole things...annoying as hell

-human CHILDREN teaming up with giant robots...thats just, just totally stupid...no parent would let this happen...let alone the Autobots that claim to care about humans...no one would let them be around, having their lives CONSTANTLY endangered...i hate haaaaaaaaate how they get used as plot devises and always get in the way, yet somehow never get squashed...oh how i wish they would get squashed soooooooo badly...

this one is a pet peeve that applies to almost all toons...

-all the characters have become anorexic teens...in TF , WTF happened to Prime and Starscream?...they need serious nourishment!

 

Here's an old-school one.... I hate, really HATE how in G1 it was put forth that everything in the Transformers universe takes place over millions of years. MILLIONS. Do you realize how long a million years is?! I know these guys are robots and all, but that is stretching credulity. The Ark crew lay dormant for millions of years, Shockwave serves as Cybertronian janitor for millions of years, etc. I would so much prefer if the timeframe dealt in thousands of years. Prime is 6000 years old, cool, I can dig that. Prime is six MILLION years old.... bleah. Seems like hyperbole.

But, now we're stuck with it, just like terrible legacy names like "Rodimus Prime" and "Kup." Oh well.

 

But the names Rodimus Prime and Kup have only been used for new toys of those characters.

We haven't seen unrelated characters in other continuities with those names yet, although we have seen other characters named Rodimus.

 

I agree entirely. Along with other "staples" that I'm not on board with like mass shifting, mystical crap like the Matrix, etc., the idea of these characters being millions upon millions of years old is just too much. In my own made-up continuity, millions have been replaced with thousands.

 

My pet peeve for Transformers in general, is Animated when they made Optimus a low rank or him not being a full Prime.

 

mass shifting, it's a pathetic excuse for not to scale

 

Well, the likes of Megatron and Soundwave's toys predated Transformers so we would either get a tiny Megatron and Soundwave in fiction which didn't grow in size when transforming to robot mode or mass shifting how we have it now.

But I do agree though. Jets and cars shouldn't be able to fight each other on equal terms. I don't want tiny jets and I don't want oversized cars. If that means there have to be more Autobot jets and more Decepticon cars just to provide an appropriately sized enemy then so be it.