Random Rants: Transformers Crack

[sapphirebreeze]

You know, I have, of late, heard a lot of commentary on how "cracky" the G1 Transformers cartoon was compared with, say, RiD or Armada. And you know, between episodes where the Transformers were toy sized compared with the locals, to mermaids, to random time travel devices sitting out in the open in the middle of Europe, yeah, G1 gets pretty cracky

Comments

[lunatron]

Sky-Byte and Koji

Starscream and Alexis

et cetera

[someidiot]

Daniel got with Sixshot, Arcee AND Wheelie. What a slut.

[sapphirebreeze]

See, to my mind, that's not G1. Why? Because the Headmasters series as shown in the United States is a completely different storyline than the one shown in Japan, and any and all later shows were made for and shown only in Japan.

In fact, one thing every "cute kid converts evil Decepticon" story has in common is that they were all made with a primarily Japanese audience in mind.

Of course, other people may still count that as G1, but since I'm talking about my crack, I'll also talk about my G1. ;)

[seryan]

The show didn't NEED to show us that.

That's what fanbrats are for.

[sapphirebreeze]

The other shows apparently felt they needed to show us that!

[seryan]

I...try not to think of the other shows.

[dragoness_e]

*Thinks about anything that resembled side-switching or even cooperation in G1*

Skyfire - you covered that. Like Silverbolt in BW, a good guy who got signed up with the wrong side initially because he hadn't read the background material and "Hey, that's my old friend/partner/*ahem*censored*! He wouldn't steer me wrong!" Once he figured out his mistake, he went to the Autobots.

Starscream - made the occasional alliance-of-convenience with an Autobot to take out one of his enemies--like Megatron or Galvatron. Never turned 'nice

[sapphirebreeze]

There's also:

* Autobot Spike, who wasn't in his right mind at the moment

* The Dinobots, who were manipulated when they were pretty much too ignorant to know "We shouldn't trust these guys!

* The Constructicons in the Secret of Omega Supreme. They were reprogrammed!

* The Constructicons in the Core. They were remote controlled!

* Blitzwing. Disobeyed orders against a mutual threat. Helped the 'Bots. Got thrown out of the Decepticons for it. Was offered a place in the 'Bots and turned it down because he considered himself a Decepticon first and foremost, exile or no.

* Octane. Got exiled and went to the Autobots for asylum, and was granted it. Was not offered a place in their ranks.

You still don't have any of the serial flip-floppers and wobblers you see in other stories, though. Like the warning we gave when we got a Sky-Byte app, "G1-ers don't play that game."

[dragoness_e]

Now why would I forget Octane? *facepalm*

Does not change his symbol, just 'hangs out' with friend Sandstorm. I get the impression that cartoon Roddy Prime doesn't care what symbol you wear as long as you're not shooting at his guys.

Oh, the Aerialbots thought about joining the Decepticons because Starscream was cool and the Autobots weren't, but Starscream decided to be an ass about it. Sent them back in time to find out what the Cons were really like. Guess he didn't want any more Skyfires. *winks*

I'm not familiar with Sky-Byte, though.

[sapphirebreeze]

Sky-Byte's RiD, so I only know what I'm told about him. He starts out a Pred, and I'm told he meanders back and forth a fair amount before he finally decides to be good.

Thanks to a random human kid, of course.

[ravenclaw_devi]

Well, you know I'm a Starscream/Alexis 'shipper... *shifty eyes* But then, I don't go on about how "logical" that pairing is nor am I in denial of the fact that 99.99999% of what gets written for said pairing is badfic.

[earthscorch]

All the wonky stuff stems from it being made by Marvel, I expect. It is very comic-bookish in its content. Did they ever go to an alternate universe/future where the bad guys won or the good guys are all evil or whatnot? They didn't hit ALL the cliches. :)

[koilungfish]

Actually, no. The Marvel comics were rather more sane in those terms. All this aforementioned wonky and weird is from the Sunbow cartoon [so we can blame Sunbow instead].

The only side-swapping I recall in the Marvelverse, offhand, was Carnivac and Catilla turning Autobot because they were impressed by the Wreckers fighting abilities [not to mention they were kinda at risk of ending up dead if they went home].

[sapphirebreeze]

The Marvel cartoon had a bunch of time travel weirdness. I tend to consider time travel weirdness as "crack."

It also had Spider-Man battling Megatron.

And robots evolving from "naturally occurring gears and levers." Even if they retconned that out later.

And Optimus Prime's brain being saved to a single floppy disk.

And Circuit Breaker.

And budding.

And that's just what someone who hasn't read the whole series, or even most of it, can come up with off the top of my head without thinking too hard. You can't tell me the Marvel G1 comics was without crack!

[seryan]

And robots evolving from "naturally occurring gears and levers." Even if they retconned that out later.

And Optimus Prime's brain being saved to a single floppy disk.

I remember laughing SO HARD the first time I read those, I scared the cat. Seriously, there was some good crack in those comics. I really should re-read them.