Hope I put this in the right place. Since I've been laid off I made a website. Part of it is just a blog of stuff. Click the My Blog link below to see it .

I added a blog about a weird line in the 1986 transformers movie.
After coming down with a weird allergy reaction, I was forced to take Benadryl for allergies and was high as a kite.

Being stuck in bed because of this I decided to put in a dvd movie and just rest up. Because of the new Transformers movie coming out in june, I threw in the original cartoon and was whisked away to my childhood.

I don’t know if it was the mediation kicking in but the scene where Starscream is killed by Galvatron (Megatrons new identity) he is quoted as asking: (at 1:15 seconds on the youtube clip below).

“ Will anyone else attempt to fill his shoes.”

That line always made sense before. But it got me thinking...... Do transformers really wear shoes?

Do you know of any other movie lines that make no sense..... let me know. Now back to bed I go.

 

Its a METAPHOR.

 

It's an expression; to "fill someone's shoes" is to try to live up to them. Galvatron was basically asking the other Decepticons if any of them fancied the same fate.

 

I no it's a expression, but thought it was weird...... I think it was the medication that made it funny to me at the time.

 

It carried more gravitas than "So, who's next?"

 

When I heard the line, I had a image of Starscream buying shoes at Footlocker and asking for a 72 inch shoe or something...like i said it was the medication. Good stuff though.

 

I do see your point, as it goes; it does seem like an odd thing for a robot to say, since they don't have a need for shoes. However, it's better than some of the other expressions they messed around with in G1 to make them sound more robot-like whilst still meaning the same thing - "cast iron manifolds", for example. That even sounded silly when I was a kid. I'd have preferred "guts", whether they have them, or not.

 

well they could refer to their feet as shoes, since horses use horseshoes attacked to their feet are called shoes so maybe robot feet are called shoes

 

Dude, your fucking kidding me, you get fucking high off of benadryl??? I dont feel shit?

 

I think I may take some Benadryl myself.....

 

I actually know exactly what you're talking about. Transformers use all sorts of idiomatic expressions that are specific to Earth culture, and sometimes they just sound really odd coming from robots.

No, I'm not high... but I notice it a lot, and on some deeply recessed, anally retentive level, it sort of bugs me.

I mean, what do TFs know about shoes? Do they even understand the expressions they are using? I wish I could think of some other examples off the top of my head... I guess all I'd have to do is start thumbing through some of my TF comics to find some more... Furman does it all the time.

As a reader of light sci-fi, I admit I'd rather hear some applicable Cybertronian equivalent turn-of-phrase, some kind of play on a mechanical/electronic theme. Occasionally you see it done... Ratchet's "I have a diagnostic that will delete that feeling like a bad line of code..." was the first indication for me that TF Animated was going to be a clever show. But normally it takes a sharp writer to pull that kind of dialogue off and still have it sound credible and interesting.

On the other, equally nerdy side of things, there's also an explanation for why TFs use expressions like that. Now obviously, TF's don't come from Cybertron already speaking English. I always figured that at some point, they must have the ability to speak english downloaded into them, or installed in their brains like a codec.

The actual linguistic samplings are probably compiled by Teletran 1 from the thousands of media signals that are constantly being broadcast around the planet, and when this "dictionary" of language is enabled in a Transformer's mind, based on that particular bot's own personal preferences and predilections, they come out with slight variations. This also why certain TF's speak with accents that carry Earth cultural connotations, like Jazz's "street" speak, and Ironhide's Southern drawl. They're just drawing from samples of human language from their media sources, that seem to best fit their personalities.

Likewise, this provides a huge database of human euphemisms and idiomatic expressions. Some bots might use terms like these without even knowing what they "literally" mean in human language. This is why some TF's are confused about some basic elements of human culture, while others who are more savvy, pick it up easily.

zmog

 

I always thought it was a wierd phrase for him to use too.

I mean,I get the expression but it's still funny when you think about it.

 

Never had a problem with it. The Transformers had been on Earth for about 20 years by that point. It would be pretty weird if they HADN'T picked up some human expressions.

 

"Balls" is what comes to mind when I here this one, I know, I have problems.

 

Brakes on cars have "shoes" too.

 

I like to think that he somehow picked that phrase up after being on Earth for 20 years lol.

 

I mean, sure... in the 1986 movie, they've been on Earth for a long time already... but that doesn't account for all the times TF's have used expressions like that even after only limited exposure to Earth.

Also, would Megatron really have been spending all that much time talking with earthlings and picking up their vernacular? Somehow I doubt it.  

zmog