I haven't followed the Japanese series very much. I watched some of Headmasters, but beyond that (Masterforce, Victory, Zone) are weird.

It just seems like the later-year Japanese Transformers got more and more "Power Rangers"-ish, like all garnered in gold and combining in really weird ways (like Star Saber combining with...a lion?)

I know a lot of folks out there really covet the Japanese TFs, and that's cool and all, it's just that...I just think they're generally strange (the show, the way the characters look, the storyline, etc.)

Who else finds the Japanese Transformers - the characters or the TV show - to be strange and otherwise not-so-interesting?

 

I guess the Japanese series are just a little too...Japanese for you? These things were fairly common in giant robot anime at the time, and with Americans no longer involved in the writing of the series, I guess they were able to go that route for Headmasters, Masterforce, and so on.

 

I am getting though the Takara box ..but MAsterforce have a few very cool stuff like Overlord and such.

 

I'm not unilaterally dissing all of the Japanese TF merchandise - yeah, Overlord is neat and I think the evolution of Convoy's crazy-ass trailer is pretty neat - but the parts I listed above are, yeah, probably a bit too Supah Sentai for me.

 

There are some Japanese fans who refuse to consider Masterforce as a Transformers show, too. Exactly the same reason as you listed.

I can't speak for myself as I am not familiar with those shows, though  

 

but Masterforce has Liokaiser.  

 

No, Victory does. Masterforce does have Overlord though which is still the best cartoon Decepticon leader ever in my book.

 

Yeah, I bought the Metrodome releases and they did nothing for me.

Some of it was the stuff you mentioned, but with Masterforce, it was especially the human element. Blech.

Never got around to watching Victory though, on account of the asshole in my sig. I'll catch it one of these days.

LOVE most Japanese releases, though. Not sure if they kick ass or just 'cause they have the appeal of the hard-to-get. Either way, I can't wait to get a Liokaiser.

 

I love the toys, but most of the cartoons do make my head hurt rather badly.
Squirrelcar: who's the asshole, and why?

 

It's kinda ironic that of the three Japanese G1 shows, the best one is the least "Transformer-y". Humans becoming Transformers is fine with me, it's the whole mythical aspect, lack of "classic" transformers and the almost complete disconnection to the previous show that makes it feel so...unnatural. Victory had tons of potential but they managed to made it complete and utter bollocks.

However, I definitely prefer some of the Japanese concepts to their American counterparts. The Japanese Headmasters with Micromaster-sized robots turning into the heads of bigger, lifeless robot bodies made a heckuva lot more sense than the western one (how exactly is that supposed to work, anyway?) for example, and Pretenders was another good one.

 

From what I've seen of them, it seems like the Japanese shows really fell into using a lot of anime cliches. That's what makes them seem so bizarre compared to the US series.

 

I only found them to be weird when they had cars with penis tongues chasing young looking girls. Could've done without that.

 

I accepted Braves with Super Sentai elements so I accepted Transformers with Super Sentai elements... And I actually found it watchable...

 

I'm in agreement with Draven on this. The Japanese have a lot of cool TF toys that we don't, but the anime TF is just painful at times.

 

I simply love Japanese shows. They may look repetitive and simple, but that's the way I like anime too. All the Japanese sagas have got awesome final episodes that make you forget the goofy ones.

I don't consider the lack of calssics TF's as a complain about these series. I never liked the idea of repeating the same characters over and over and over... Jap-TF's introduced most of the best designs ever.

TORANSFORMA!

 

That's so true! About the final eps of all the Japanese TFs series being awesome. And we're left wondering why the whole series previous to the final eps couldn't have been as well executed and animated...Tho' mind you, the only final ep that didn't fare well with me was the Car Robots one, but that was mostly because my Black Convoy sama had been reprogrammed into a mindless drone.*sniffles* Oh the pain of watching that! *Strokes Black Convoy toy for comfort.* Plus i absolutely loved the ending for BW Neo, but a personal minor complaint would be how LioConvoy stole part of Big Convoy's spotlight in the end. Big Convoy was the star of BW Neo, but they just had to throw LioConvoy into the mix didnt they!

Cho sematai Tu-ran-su-fo-mah! Indeed!

I think it's hilarious how young Japanese characters throw insults at one another and curse sometimes. He! He!

 

I generally find all Japanese TF series/lines good, except for one very disturbing exception:

Kissplayers.

 

I don't find them weird. Just a completely different take on them.

A lot of the shows mostly dealt with Japanese Philosophies and their culture.

As for Kiss Players. I'll pass on that.

 

Recently I've been getting into the Japanese side of G1 a bit, watched half of headmasters and most of Masterforce so far.

I like the cartoons, well, Masterforce anyway. It's a bit goofy and doesn't always make a great deal of sense, but it is responsible for me getting into the habit of shouting YATSURA at my friends when very drunk, and for that I applaud it.

The Japanese toys are awesome in my eyes, probably because I think the packaging looks great, and my collecting habits have now skewed towards buying MIB Japanese figures from the later years. Obviously that means I barely buy anything these days, because all that stuff is generally super-expensive.

 

I've watched Headmasters, Masterforce, and Victory. IMHO, I wasn't impressed by any of them and found them painful to watch as well. Final battles and all. Out of all of them, I liked Masterforce the best but even that was painful to watch at times with the utter wankfest that was God Ginrai. I will agree that Overlord is the best cartoon Decepticon leader the 'cons ever had though.

As for the toys, only one I ever really gave a damn about getting was Browning, which thanks to hotspot17, I now have. Yay! I also have a reissue Soundblaster (wanted the Laserbeak and Ravage) but he's nothing really all that special, just Soundwave with a different color and a boob job. I've seen Star Saber, Overlord, Victory Leo, Grandus, Road Caesar, Liokaiser, and Sky Garry really up close and in-person. I had a Star Convoy reissue and I have to admit, I wasn't impressed by them. I thought they felt and looked rather cheap and sometimes garrish. I'm still trying to understand what the appeal is with the majority of them.