And I don't mean things like, tie up the loose ends better, I mean simply what are things done in Animated that you would have liked to have seen done differently.

One of the first things that come to mind is the Dinobots. They had a solid introduction and then they seemed to exist for little more than fan service or a minor plot device from time to time. I dunno that I would have wanted them to become full fledged autobots, but it would have been nice for them to have just done more.

Something else, something I think most people would disagree with me on is..I would have liked to have had the human villains at least play some role into the third season. They actually grew on me a fair bit, and I think if there was a better balance between human villains and decepticons it could have been kinda cool.

 

Dino-Might!!

I definitly agree with you on this-the Dinobots should have been given more substance to the series and been made stronger as well as having all 5 members of the team.

 

I would have either given BA one more episode in order for her to be cured and go back to Cybertron as Elita-One, or I would have cut the "Predacon" thing off at the end of "Predacons Rising" with her and Waspinator going offline.

Slipstream would have been one of the Decepticons being paraded out of Omega Supreme. It was just careless writing to leave her on Earth unsupervised, especially when Optimus KNEW she was still around, having fought her in the previous episode.

Also, there would have been more Blurr build up prior to "A Bridge Too Close."

 

Moved Prowl's backstory into "Home is Where the Spark Is".

I really liked Prowl when all was said and done, but only when all was said and done; his backstory is fantastic and really made sense of the character beautifully, but prior to that he actually seemed a little tacked-on to me, as though they were just trying to trade on a "cool ninja" gimmick character without actually explaining why he was even there. Of course, that wasn't the case, and the way it turned out made it clear that they had his motives written from the very start, but why not tell us earlier? I can accept the need to hold the Yoketron stuff back for a dramatic moment, but for me the scene where they find him on the asteroid was the key that opened the door to actually empathising with Prowl in any real way, and it should have come much, much earlier than two minutes before the end of the penultimate episode.

Prowl was good as it was, but if they'd just changed the order of the story around a little, I really think he could have been great.

 

Agreed. The whole first season was a little eh for me because of all the stupid super-villains they had.

 

Not cancel it.

Okay, for realsies: Make the Dinobots less like bad guys. Okay YEAH they're always rebellious, but in Animated they were pretty much Decepticons (I call them Dinocons, actually) because of how stupid and primal they were.

 

Make Shockwave a bit more... Logical.

 

Maybe it's just because it's freshest in my mind, but most of the things I'd change would be in Season 3...

Season 2

- Excise the episode "Velocity" entirely and just stretch the "mystery blue car" thread out as a minor subplot through all episodes in the latter half of the season. Replace the episode with either (i) a Dinobot-centric episode that gives them something to do besides be stooges or (ii) a back-story episode focusing on Prowl and Optimus Prime to provide some of the info that ended up getting dumped in "Endgame" and slowing the action down (tweaking info as needed to avoid spoiling Season 3 stuff).

Season 3

- Adjust "Where is Thy Sting" so that the 'Wasp replaces Bumblebee' part didn't drag so long and have Shockwave's attack on Magnus shown on-screen.
- Ramjet, Sunstorm and Slipstream destroyed by Omega Supreme at the end of Season 2 and do not return, since they didn't actually do anything significant anyways. Maybe a throw-away line by Lugnut about how he and Blitzwing managed to survive, but others weren't so lucky.
- To fill Ramjet and Sunstorm's spots in "Decepticon Air", Lockdown captures Dirt Boss and Mixmaster.
- "Human Error" condensed down into one episode since, IMO, it was padded out too much. Use the extra episode to provide more detail about Sari's origin. Alternately, keep "Human Error" at two parts but, instead of padding it out with transformation sequences and such, include a strong B-plot giving more detail on Sari's origin.
- Megatron picks up Skywarp and Thundercracker off-screen between the end of "Decepticon Air" and the start of "This Is Why I Hate Machines". Explanation being that, before Lugnut got a chance to remove the errant warp-drive (which, just for the heck of it, is then implanted in Skywarp to give him his 'classic' teleportation power), Omega Supreme randomly transported near them. During the first part of "Endgame", Megatron gets wind of Prime testing his "flight mode" and sends TC and SW after him. Prime leads them to Dinobot Island and their "send-off" is a battle against the Dinobots.

To expand on that a little, I'd have dropped some more hints about the Prowl-Lockdown connection in both "Thrill of the Hunt" and "Fistful of Energon" so the whole idea of Lockdown being a rogue cyber-ninja and killing Yoketron didn't basically come out of nowhere in "Five Servos of Doom".

 

There's not really a lot from the first two seasons... I think they did a great job with it. With season three though...

- More Thundercracker and Skywarp, hated how they just disappeared
- Wreck-Gar made a more permenant member of the cast, and actually develop
- More development for Sentinel Prime and Jazz
- At least one more Dinobot-centered episode
- DEVASTATOR!
- Blackarachnia either going back to the Autobots or going offline

 

The whole 'Lockdown as rogue cyber-ninja' thing didn't work in my eyes. I'd have used Oil Slick for the role instead (this would nicely fit his toy bio), or even an Animated Bludgeon.

 

First & foremost, I would have wiped out at least 6-7 of the filler episodes from Season 1 & 2 (ie: anything involving silly human villains, all the 'adventures of BB & Bulkhead' time wasters, anything with Blackarachnia, etc.), moved the "Megatron Rising" episode to 1/2 or 3/4 of the way through Season 1, and then promptly got the action and real story lines going in full force. And of course do a lot more character development for guys like the Dinobots, a few Screamer clones, Jazz, maybe Lockdown, and even Megatron. Probably would have dropped the whole Porter thing too, as well as replaced the 8 year old little girl schtick with something more akin to G1 with a teenage guy. Also would make sure not to introduce characters like Dinobots, Constructicons or Swindle without a set plan to include the rest of their respective group/team members.

Just for starters  

 

They had a set plan for the constructicons, but it was kinda hampered by the whole, you know, series cancellation.

But you're Incepticon, you already know all this.

 

I would have made Optimus a little more confident in his abilities and leadership skills. By the last episode, he still doubted whether or not he could be effective against Megatron. I like the hero's quest and all, but there wasn't much payoff to Prime's personal story. All it really would have taken was him putting Sentinel Prime in his place but instead, I can still see Sentinel giving him grief after Optimus returned to Cybertron, even with Megatron and the rest of the Decepticons in custody.

 

See, I didn't think they actually had a set plan as much as a general hope to maybe, eventually introduce new Constructicons along the way. I must have missed the news/update/post/whatever where it was confirmed that more Constructicons were definitely coming.

But for the record, the changes I'd make are just minor nitpicks. Overall I think the writers did an amazing job with this show.

 

Swindle works better as a free agent. I'm glad they finally ditched the Combaticons to focus on the only member who was actually worth a damn.

 

What everybody else said

 

I actually didn't mind there being human villains, that helped make the Decepticons seem like much more real threats as each of their appearances they definitely did a large amount of damage. I just think there should of been better human villains, the Professor Princess, Slo-Mo, Nanosec, The HEADMASTER Angry Archer and Master Disaster characters should of been replaced with more serious and evil villains who were real threats to the Autobots and had serious agendas.

I also wish we had an extra one or two members join the earth autobots, i wish jazz joined sooner and was Prime's second in command. And Rodimus and his team should of been sent to earth by sentinal when he was acting magnus to capture the decepticons since sentinal wanted it dealt with immediately.

 

I also liked Swindle as a free agent but I think the Combaticons would have kicked ass if they were formed later as an evil version of the A-team

 

The show frequently did an OUTSTANDING job balancing light humor with serious situations. Unfortunately, it seemed like about once an episode there would be some utterly stupid slapstick moment... For me, it really sapped at my appreciation for the show.

I started hating the over-the-top characters (Bulkhead, Bumblebee, Wreckgar, Lugnut, Constructicons) because they undermined the more serious, introspective, and deeper characters (Prowl, Megatron, Ratchet, Shockwave) and situations (Omega & Arcee's stories). I mean, this was probably the best Megatron since Beast Wars, but instead of focusing a bit more on him OMG WE'VE GOT TO CUT AWAY BECAUSE BULKHEAD FELL DOWN AND BUMBLEBEE HAS TO TRY OUT HIS NEW ROCKETZ!!!!!!! VVRROOOOMMMM! TO-TAL OWNAGE!

So while my appreciation for the show has grown significantly, there are still a lot of cringe-worthy moments in there for me. Ramp down the silly factor by 25% and I'd probably love it as much as anyone else.