It is definitely not the best transformers show but it's pretty good and has alot of potential

 

I think it's great. But, narratively, I personally think it dropped the ball, starting with Season 2.

I remember thinking it was absolutely the best Transformers cartoon ever, after watching the Season 1 finale.

 

Stronger, Faster was fucking glorious. Regardless of how bad I think the show got, this episode will always be worth going back to.

Smokescreen's escape is pretty amazing too, and features one of the greatest gags in the franchise.

Shockwave's theme! Just listen to it!


Starscream, Ratchet, Knock Out, Fowler, Partners, most of Thirst, the visuals, the designs (mostly), the independence from the toyline, the... well, being a far less embarrassing version of the live-action movies -- there's a lot to love about the series. Which meant when it dropped the ball it really hurt.


But let me end on a happy note:
LORD SMOKESCREEN, EMPEROR OF DESTRUCTION!

 

shockwave, soundwave and megatron all had great designs and executions. especially soundwave who is my favourite version of the character

 

I think it did almost everything right.

 

I watched animated all the way through once because someone reliable on this board recommended it to me. It wasn't completely ass but it's never getting a rewatch from me. Shit was closer to Johnny Test than it was Transformers.

 

The best thing about Transformers Prime was that there was no stupid gimmick (like minicons) to ruin the show and allowed time for character development and good plots.

The bad thing was dark energon became a distraction in the show that could have ruined the whole show like a toy gimmick would.

The Dark Energon focus was really the magic Matrix or Allspark of the Transformers Prime series that I felt held the show back from being something better.

 

Outside of people who just hate it whole-cloth, a lot of the criticisms come from people who really liked the show but felt the few stumbles it makes really hurt a show that could have been a lot more. I would say I'm a pretty big fan, but I can honestly list a handful of things that would improve the series drastically. It's that same effect of getting a 99% on a test - that one question you got wrong will really bother you! But you barely passed, no one mistake you made hurts as much individually.

 

I fucking love season 3 of prime.

 

It features a unique rendition of Soundwave. He does not speak any words, and communicates via actions and displayed images. This makes him very alien and interesting. The way he defeats

Spoiler: Season 3 Spoiler

Airachnid

is so deft and effortless, I totally loved it.

They kill

Spoiler: Season 1 Spoiler

the most annoying character

in the

Spoiler: Season 1 Spoiler

first

episode.

There is some excellent voice acting talent throughout the series. Some of them are painfully and excruciatingly over-exposed actors, but you can't really get away from that anymore in the voice talent industry.

- Frank Welker with an interesting rendition of Megatron, more "inhuman", gruff, and visceral than his G1 rendition.
- Kevin Michael Richardson (Simpsons' Dr. Hibbert, Family Guy's Chris Griffin) as Bulkhead, conveys a believable "tough guy" character with his own weaknesses and vulnerabilities.
- Daran Norris as Knockout. He's participated in a large number of god-awful anime dubs, but I forgive him because he innervated Knockout with a life and flair not often found in a Transformers character, and gave a lot of dimension to what could otherwise have been a very 1-dimensional villain.
- Ernie Hudson, one of the Real Ghostbusters, as Agent William Fowler, proved that human characters in Transformers don't always have to be a sore spot or a scab waiting to be picked.
- Similarly, Clancy Brown (Spongebob's Mr. Krabs, Lex Luthor in numerous media, Warchief Blackhand in the Warcraft movie) plays as Silas, leader of the human mercenary faction MECH that attempts to

Spoiler: Spoilers

steal and repurpose Transformer techn-biology

. Honestly, Silas is just Transformers Lex Luthor in a lot of ways, but Clancy plays him well.
- Firefly fans may enjoy that Adam Baldwin and Gina Torres (Jayne and Zoe) occupy recurring villain roles in the series. I didn't find their performances to be stellar, but Gina Torres is always competent at sounding like evil deeds turn her on. Maybe that's your thing?
- Tony Todd (Dreadwing) voiced The Fallen in ROTF. I didn't find him memorable in this show but I did like the character's ideals and approach to battle.

The 3D models and battles are generally very consistent and of decent quality. There is a fair (but not excessive) level of Transformer death gore in the show--nothing anywhere near approaching IDW levels or even Bayverse levels, but it happens often enough to carry some emotional weight and impact and the scenes tend to be meaningful rather than gratuitous. One gripe I have is that the firepower of the cast's weapons seems variable based on the script, as in many shows. Arcee and Bumblebee in particular seem to be firing confetti cannons most of the time, until the writers want them to kill something, then they're firing star-fury plasma cannons that melt holes through enemies.

I sort of feel that they completely expended the strongest plot in season 1. I can't elaborate on that, but it was sort of hard for them to re-build stakes after that, and Season 2 meandered until the tasteful and enjoyable recap episode where Agent Fowler tried in vain to explain the events of the past 30-something episodes to his human military superiors. After that, things pulled together again and there were a couple interesting and enjoyable plots throughout the end of Season 2 and the half-length Season 3. The show could easily have continued, though I did grow a bit bored of the recurring gimmick of introducing new characters by saying "they were lost and wandering the stars until now."

The show is definitely worth a watch or two. The younger human characters and their normie friends and family are hit-and-miss. Ratchet, Bumblebee, and Optimus Prime can get tedious at times. It's tough to swallow how much of Starscream's bullshit Megatron tolerates, but you put up with it because the show's plot would often have no way to get anywhere without him. He is an even more pathetic wretch than G1 Starscream begging for his life after getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar, and

Spoiler: Spoilers

gets maimed and mutilated

seemingly every other episode. I forget what happens to him in the end.

Give it a watch, but don't spend money on the DVD box set. I'm not sure most people would want to re-watch it more than once.  

 

That's really the size of it. Prime was almost universally praised when it started, only to drag itself out and devolve into mindless repetition and unfulfilled plots. I loved it when it started, but it was about Shadowzone that the cracks started to form, and by the end of season 1 I was starting to see the pattern. When season 2 "resolved" Decepticon Optimus by doing literally nothing with it I knew what the show was.

I mean, there definitely was. It was the artifacts. Season 2 and 3 were all about chasing various one-off macguffins.

Miko doesn't die in the first episode, though. Nor does Arcee, or Optimus, or Megatron, or Airachnid.

So did the writers I think. Honestly Starscream became so unimportant after joining back with the Decepticons I wouldn't be surprised.

 

This post baffles me, TFPrime was one of the best TF cartoons they ever made! Beast Hunters was the weakest part but even then it was enjoyable and added several great characters to the show but everything about the characters, the action, the humor, the dramatic moments, the music, hell even the human characters were excellent, and of course the toys were all fantastic. I admit the animation style took some getting used to and I initially was not thrilled with some of the characters' bayverse-inspired designs but they grew on me. I think TFP's greatest flaw was the creatives behind it refused to adhere much to the "Aligned Continuity" which was honestly frustrating and infuriating at times. It still remains one of, if not my favorite TF series to date.

 

Came back from watching Stronger, Faster, that's the good shit right there.

I'm almost done with Season 1 and so far I think TFP is super fun! Sure, a few of the episodes here and there were a little on the weak side, but I enjoy it a lot.
TFP was the first series (as in, when it was airing on TV) I ever watched and (technically; it was some TFP fan stuff I stumbled across that encouraged me to watch it and now here I am) it was the one that brought me back into loving it after all these lost years. Maybe that's why I have such a soft spot for it.

Ending this post to say:
Hoo-aah.

 

I had not seen ANYTHING transformers in years. I accidently stumbled on the 5 episode pilot. Mind you I was in my 30s. but it got me back in the franchise. I loved everything about it. i even watched it and read the episode threads even commenting on occasion. Getting new Autobots or Decepticons while didnt happen often felt like a early Christmas gift. Hearing Peter Cullan and Frank Welker voice the 2 biggest characters from my childhood was absolutely delightful. And the new ones i hadnt seen before i genuinely liked. both Autobot and Decepticon. Every show has episodes that are just filler or not top 10 contenders. I do believe the show gets better each season. I dont think ive spoiled any thing yet to come. I would Highly recommend watching the entire series. ohh and RIP Jacks mom (Marky Post) Everytime i heard her talk I thought of Christeen Sulivan from Night Court. I was Saddened to hear of her pasing last month.

 

I watched through the One Shall Fall/Rise arc today, and with that I finished season one of TFP too.
Such a good wrapup for the first season. I thought Part 1 was alright and I actually felt myself getting a little bored with Part 2, but Part 3 more than made up for it all. I can't wait to start off season 2 and watch the Orion Pax arc!
Why the fuck does Unicron sound like that though

EDIT: As you can see the last post on this thread was after I watched Stronger, Faster. In hindsight I should've waited until I finished season 1 but I got super excited for some reason

 

Also new personalities for old favorites like ratchet and smoke screen, while not all new personality's were and improvement lol looking at Arcee. still to this day best Transformers show.

 

I liked skylynk and darksteel. if they haven't killed the characters off, maybe they could have become more nuanced.

 

I liked their iterations of Ratchet, Shockwave. Soundwave and Starscream.


jD001

 

There were a number of good things about Prime:

• The voice acting was generally high-quality (which I really appreciate after the trainwreck that was the WFC Trilogy), even if I wish they'd gotten a less expensive VA for Breakdown.
• Soundwave had an interesting design and was very cool in the fight scenes he got (Why wasn't he Decepticon leader, anyhow? He would've been a lot better at the job than repeatedly-undercut-by-the-writers Starscream or high-on-Dark-Energon Megatron.)
• Frank Welker got to voice Megatron again, hurrah!
• Dreadwing and Breakdown had the potential to be really interesting characters. So did Predaking.
• Agent Fowler is awesome. I liked June Darby, too.
• As a standalone episode, I found "Thirst" to be absolutely hilarious; the Knock Out/Starscream dynamic was fantastic.
• The animation was generally high-quality; the fights scenes usually looked cool.
• Unicron being the Earth's core was at least an interesting change of pace.
• Knock Out is great. I love Knock Out.
• Bulkhead and Ratchet were enjoyable.
• MECH and Silas were really good villains (at least before "Nemesis").
• Peter Cullen was back voicing Prime (it's not his fault that the writers gave Prime the emotional range of cardboard).
• I have to admit, I actually really enjoyed the "All Hail Starscream!" dance sequence as a standalone thing.
• No character was as annoying as Headmasters Chromedome or WFC/Earthrise Optimus Prime.
• That scene where Megatron chucked a couple of Vehicons off of the Nemesis without seeing if they could fly or not first was great.
• Have I mentioned Knock Out yet?

You know, I think these two thoughts generally sum up how I felt about Prime as a whole. There's a lot of individual scenes, episodes, and characters I enjoy a lot, but strangely, the overall plot isn't very memorable.
Usually, I have to really hate a show to not care about its ending (e.g., Headmasters, Beast Wars II, etc). Prime is the only show that I actually enjoyed where I didn't particularly care about the ending. Two of its biggest impactful moments (the deaths of Bumblebee and Megatron) ended up being meaningless, and the third (Cybertron being restored) felt a bit like a cheat after the events of Season 2. The overarching narrative felt poorly structured and disjointed, like the writers weren't really sure where to go from one story to the next. This, in turn, likely played into the problems with character development that we saw frequently. I almost feel like Prime would've made for a better story if it had been less serialized.

 

*looks at TFP Ratchet and Arcee* As much as I hate Headmasters Chromedome, those two are worse IMO.

The problem I always had with the show is that it's good parts feel out of place and deserving of a much better show. Knock Out was one of them. He deserved better.