Well That's Just Prime
Transformers: Prime is nearly upon us. Well, me, as I’m waiting for the torrents to be uploaded. So I thought I’d write down my thoughts before watching the first two episodes.
I have mixed feelings about Prime. It’s great that Hasbro are aiming to make a more unified continuity, rather than constantly reboot it with every new series. I also like that they’re trying to make a series that’s essentially everything good about every previous Transformers series. Prime will apparently be exploring ‘what it means to be a Prime’. While I think Animated did a pretty good job of that, I’m interested to see whether Prime will do a different take on that idea.
Design-wise, though, I don’t have any major reactions. I don’t hate or love the new designs, I’m more disappointed, somewhat. It doesn’t seem like they’re really trying to make their own visual style. The designs of the Transformers are really like hybrids of the movie and Animated styles, but it’s not a hybrid that creates a new beast, so to speak. They very much look like all the fanart you see on deviantart of characters from one series in the style of another. It’s not bad, it’s just really derivative looking. Although Soundwave looks very cool. He’s not too much like G1 Soundwave, as people apparently want, but he’s supposed to be a sneaky spy. Being a big chunky robot does not facilitate spy activities very well, as does transforming into a tape deck which hasn’t been common for the past 20 years. However, being a sleek robot with a flying drone alt mode is very fitting for him in this role.
The other thing is that it’s still Optimus Prime and Megatron. I don’t dislike them, but ever since Robots in Disguise it’s been Prime and Megatron, Prime and Megatron, Prime and Megatron, over and over again. At least Japanese continuity tried to shake things up with guys like Star Sabre and Deathsaurus who, if not completely different, were at least new faces. The only vaguely comparable thing in Western Transformers fiction is Animated, where being a Prime wasn’t the highest rank in the Autobot power structure. Once again, though, we’re back to the familiar pair. I think this whole thing stems from two factors. The first is the fan reaction to the death of Optimus in the original 1986 film. To put it simply, kids went insane, Hasbro was inundated with letters about it, and then Optimus came back from the dead at the end of Season 3, ending the most experimental phase of the G1 cartoon. The second factor is keeping today’s kids into Transformers. As there are so many different incarnations of the franchise now, with the movies as the most prominent part, I suppose keeping roughly the same cast provides a chance of attracting kids to the different series. In any case, I’d like to see a shakeup. Maybe have the Autobot and Decepticon leaders be sub-commanders in some distant section of the galaxy, where Optimus Prime and Megatron are legends who no-one has seen. Exploring the whole ‘what it means to be a Prime’ thing would be more interesting when the Prime is not Optimus. Similarly, do the same for the Decepticon leader, who wants to be like Megatron but has trouble doing so.
I’m not saying that Prime is going to be terrible-I’m still going to watch it, even more so if certain characters appear in it. It’s just that, for the reasons above, I’m not terribly excited for it.
I have mixed feelings about Prime. It’s great that Hasbro are aiming to make a more unified continuity, rather than constantly reboot it with every new series. I also like that they’re trying to make a series that’s essentially everything good about every previous Transformers series. Prime will apparently be exploring ‘what it means to be a Prime’. While I think Animated did a pretty good job of that, I’m interested to see whether Prime will do a different take on that idea.
Design-wise, though, I don’t have any major reactions. I don’t hate or love the new designs, I’m more disappointed, somewhat. It doesn’t seem like they’re really trying to make their own visual style. The designs of the Transformers are really like hybrids of the movie and Animated styles, but it’s not a hybrid that creates a new beast, so to speak. They very much look like all the fanart you see on deviantart of characters from one series in the style of another. It’s not bad, it’s just really derivative looking. Although Soundwave looks very cool. He’s not too much like G1 Soundwave, as people apparently want, but he’s supposed to be a sneaky spy. Being a big chunky robot does not facilitate spy activities very well, as does transforming into a tape deck which hasn’t been common for the past 20 years. However, being a sleek robot with a flying drone alt mode is very fitting for him in this role.
The other thing is that it’s still Optimus Prime and Megatron. I don’t dislike them, but ever since Robots in Disguise it’s been Prime and Megatron, Prime and Megatron, Prime and Megatron, over and over again. At least Japanese continuity tried to shake things up with guys like Star Sabre and Deathsaurus who, if not completely different, were at least new faces. The only vaguely comparable thing in Western Transformers fiction is Animated, where being a Prime wasn’t the highest rank in the Autobot power structure. Once again, though, we’re back to the familiar pair. I think this whole thing stems from two factors. The first is the fan reaction to the death of Optimus in the original 1986 film. To put it simply, kids went insane, Hasbro was inundated with letters about it, and then Optimus came back from the dead at the end of Season 3, ending the most experimental phase of the G1 cartoon. The second factor is keeping today’s kids into Transformers. As there are so many different incarnations of the franchise now, with the movies as the most prominent part, I suppose keeping roughly the same cast provides a chance of attracting kids to the different series. In any case, I’d like to see a shakeup. Maybe have the Autobot and Decepticon leaders be sub-commanders in some distant section of the galaxy, where Optimus Prime and Megatron are legends who no-one has seen. Exploring the whole ‘what it means to be a Prime’ thing would be more interesting when the Prime is not Optimus. Similarly, do the same for the Decepticon leader, who wants to be like Megatron but has trouble doing so.
I’m not saying that Prime is going to be terrible-I’m still going to watch it, even more so if certain characters appear in it. It’s just that, for the reasons above, I’m not terribly excited for it.