One of my favourites (or everybody favourites, if you lived through the 80s) of all time. It was one of my first favourite mecha shows to watch other than Macross.

Who would have thought this long-line of Japanese toys made by Takara (aka Takara Tomy as of 2006) were reused or rehashed in this cartoon version that everybody get so much craving for? Having to learned that Takara’s toylines range Diaclone and Microman series were scooped up by Americans when American toy maker Hasbro came to see Takara at the Tokyo Toy Show in 1983. They were keen to have their toylines range because they were impressed how their scale models were designed to include humanoid figures to sit/drive in them and they’re able to transform into humanoid forms. Since Hasbro bought the rights to their product lines, the company and its key people began their marketing heavily on these as one major toy line range, hence the name “Transformers” was born. So what this evolution possible?
What started was that Takara made Microman toylines that were based on one of Japanese cyborg anime series called Henshin-Cyborg 1. The series’ popularity spawned many of these 3-inch cyborg models are that tiny many kids grew to like them so Takara made one of many great commercials on these such as below.

After its success, Takara made another spin-off of Microman series (using the same toy design development) which you have miniature size vehicles that are transformable into humanoid figures. Since then, Takara had made a number of Diaclone TV commercials in the early 80s such as this (featuring Optimus Prime in its formative days).

There are a number of countless Diaclone commercials featuring other familiar Transformers characters such as Ironhide, Ratchet, Bumble Bee just to name a few. And that’s probably the reason why Hasbro made a wise decision to have them and reinvented them into a branch so people in my generations would never forget how and why it was considered as one of the great childhood cartoon stories that’s ever produced of all time.

Henceforth, Hasbro decided to give us two distinctive factions.

Autobots Logo

Decepticon Logo

The story sets in a far away distant planet called Cybertron, and the two forces are battling out for the greater control of the planet. Autobots were fighting for peace and justice whilst Decepticons sought for power, domination and control. The battle was fought for many millennia. Several millennia later, the Autobots wanted to come up with an ultimate strategy that will end the war with Decepticons. They want to start the space exploration to find raw source of energy that will help them accomplish that goal. However, little did they aware, the plans were eavesdropped by Decepticons and so Decepticons decided to ‘join’ the exploration in their own space ship as well. Soon, once both of them caught up with each other, the intense fight took up in the Autobot spaceship. Next few brief moments, their spaceships made a collision course into the Earth’s stratosphere and Autobots crash-landed onto a volcano. All of them remained lifeless.
Four million years later, they were revived again as new technologies were invented. And Autobots and Decepticons learned to adapt the Earth’s environment and began to transforming into all sort of vehicles. Later in the series, the battle between the two forces ensues and once again the war of the Transformers resumes…
They are two great leaders of the two factions.

We have Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots, seen as very honourable, compassionate, strong, pragmatic, possess strong leadership qualities and a very wise leader.

Then we have Megatron, Leader of the Decepticons, leader of the Decepticons, seen as the tyrant, vile, cunning, evil, greed for power and seeks for interplanetary domination with the final quest of eradicating all the Autobots in all galaxies, starting from our solar system.

And then you have the Autobots and Decepticons teams who follow their respective leaders, all of them share one purposeful goal of winning the Transformers war. With an impressive cast of characters, we see a large array of Autobots and Decepticons, each has a unique characteristics when they transform from robot mode into humanoid mode and vice versa.

Autobots

Dinobots

Aerialbots

Decepticons

Insecticons

Constructicons

Combaticons

Since the series ran for 98-successful episodes between 1984 and 1987, numerous toy production lines came out from the series and many new Transformers series came out such as Headmasters, Beast Wars, Machine Wars, Robots in Disguise etc etc. Transformers franchise really became a serious hit for many kids around that time and they just flocked to their toy stores like crazy buzzy bees sucking out all the last boxes of Transformers toylines to bring them home. I was like that one of them. All of the Generation Mechs were, I’m sure.

Transformer’s popularity was its raw power of attraction that has kept people for talking about it for years and generations, even after the series ended. And now we have several websites that are dedicated to these such as Transformers.com (by Hasbro), IDW Publishing, TransformersClub.com, Botcon.com and several other unofficial fansites more to come.

We’ve seen the two latest Transformers movies that’s recently came out towards the end of first decade of 2000 since Transformers: The Movie back in 1986.

And to remind ourselves that have seen Transformers G1 and recall those four seasons of episodes, here are their intros. (If you haven’t, then sit back, relax and watch the intros and I would put a recommended suggestion you get its DVD/Blue ray release.

Season 1

Season 2

Season 3

Season 4

I remembered after the entire series ended at its fourth season, the continuity of Transformers saga went on but it was divided into a couple of streams, and one of them was produced in Japan, where they gave us The Headmasters, Super-god Masterforce, Victory and Zone. They were broadcast mostly in Japan/Asia in the later years. Looks like I have another Transformers subcategory to write into my list of mecha chronology. It’s going to be a long while.

In the meantime, let’s us rejoice the fact what is to one of the best childhood cartoon series that’s ever produced, throughout our lives. For the past, the present and the future. And it’s all thanks to this one little figurine that turn Takara’s and Hasbro’s imaginations into a reality. A reality that results in achieving incredible scale of critical success to its franchise.

Microman toylines

It’s been a little more than a week now since Transformers 2 was released in all cinema theatres around the globe. And I must say, coming from an avid fan of Transformers who’s purchased his Transformers G1 DVDs a while back (yes!!), I really enjoyed this film! It was great to watch. My friends and I went to our local cinema theatre one night, after two and half hours later we were absolutely thrilled the way how the sequel’s been delivered by Michael Bay.

Hands down, I reckon it delivered what’s expected of in reference to its title ‘Revenge of the Fallen’. And the fallen here means the evil alien robots, the Decepticons, who suffered plenty of defeat lately since in the last film, if you could recall, where Megatron was ‘disabled’ and shut down by the All Spark and USA Marine forces took and dumped him in the deepest part of Pacific Ocean. Without their leader, the rest of Decepticons where left in disarray, found no purpose of fighting for other than survival. As Optimus Prime and his loyal Autobots began to gradually defeat the remaining forces of Decepticons, a bigger threat is looming across the Earth that the Decepticons will once again rise again to invade the planet. But, more importantly, defeat the Autobots for they are always be arch-nemesis of Decepticons.

Megatron - Back for revenge

Ready for pay back?

In the nutshell, the plot delivered plenty of expectations for the fans of Hasbro toys, if not everything. The film promised people in the Tranformers-related forums there will be new alien robots to feature on both sides of the warring fence including (SPOILER WARNING!) the much talk about a combined Transformers called ‘Devastator’. Having said that, there’s plenty of action sequences these metallic behemoths sprung up against each other fighting and you get the sense of feeling that it’s a different Transformers battle sequence that we experienced in the predecessor. It’s bigger and louder. For sure. As do all sequels do, traditionally. But in Michael Bay’s world, this is his usual trademark. Explosions, weapons firing everywhere, battle scenes, US-army-forces-fighting-off-alien-invaders-from-creating-an-apocalyptic-end-to-the-Earth routine etc. No mistake about it. They got some of the amazing action sequences which were too cool to describe and you have to go and watch the film to believe it. It’s just unbelievable! The fans sure get what they’re asking for when they want plenty of robot action going on here.

Optimus Prime

Bumble Bee

Aside the action sequences, the story-telling side of things are, how should I say, adequate enough to make the point why the Fallen wanted to take revenge on the Autobots and pursued the invasion of the Earth, relentlessly, and how our main star-lets Shia Lebouff and Megan Fox are caught behind all of this in what appears to be an intergalactic warfare. I highlighted the word ‘adequate’ in italics because I do not suggest that the film was not good enough to tell us a great storyline. Rather, I’m saying it could have been better. If only they could ‘trim’ certain bits of the film that are not necessary to aid the storyline any less conceivable. As I know Michael Bay after seeing some of his movies like Pearl Harbor and Armagedon, I realised he’s managed to incorporate some elements from his previous movies in this one and I felt they serve no purpose other than weakening the plot along the way especially during the climax of the film and you’re starting to wonder if things are getting bit too predictable from one scene to another. I won’t go to specifics what they are, as I don’t want to risk spoiling it for everyone who’s yet to see the film. So I’ll stop here. However, if you know where I’m coming, you know pretty well what I mean.

Actors are good as they should be as we have Shia and Megan return to the big screen along with the original acting crew from Transformers set. They’ve played their individual role well so nothing short of expectations. My only other comment is that Megan Fox’s character was ‘downer’. To me, anyways. It would harsh for me to say this but having Megan appearing as a someone who’s got all the curvaceous grooves that certainly draw plenty appeal for, not just the teenage guys, but guys of all ages. As if we need that when this film is already considered as a big-boys-toys-psyched up film anyway. In other words, she’s all over the show and I felt it didn’t have any valid reason why a hot actress would bear that much importance to the whole story as much as our metallic gasoline-powered heroes who are supposed to be the stars of the night. A little overated with her screen time, I would say.

Overall, if you ask me what my overall rating for the entire film is, I would give a 4/5. Just!

I say ‘just’ because it’s totally a great film for guys (and girls as well) who have things for cars and vehicles of all sizes and check out their favourite Transformers morphed into new hot vehicles that General Motors were trying really hard to promote despite their pending bankruptcy proceedings as of late. So if you’re looking for exciting film that has plenty of action, good humor (which is nice I must say) and lots of thrills vehicle transformation, I recommend this one highly. It’s worth it!

“Autobots, Rollout!”

For a couple of months now, American rock band Linkin Park(inset) was asked by the Transformers 2 movie producer to produce another great music score since their last one back in 2007 summer blockbuster hit Transformers.  Their song “What I’ve Done” was “acclaimed by listeners, becoming the top-ranked song on the Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks and Mainstream Rock Tracks charts”¹.  It turned out favourably to be considered and recognized as the music score for Transformers.

Thanks to the great success of Transformers with such overwhelming positive response worldwide, it is an obvious fact that Linkin Park, without a doubt, be given another nod to produce another great music score for Transformers 2. The new music video entitled “New Divide” would be main music theme for the film.  After “New Divide” was composed, it was readily for purchase via downloads on iTunes 3 weeks ago.  I decided to check this out on Youtube and listened to it.  It was great!  Simply sharp.  Definitely captures a lot of things that more or less reflect the mood of the film. Here’s official soundtrack of what’s soon-to-be-the-greatest-summer-blockbuster hit. (Well… actually it’ll be winter for me, I’m living on the southern hemisphere on this side of the planet.  We could really use the heat once a while).  Enjoy!

Whilst everybody in the world (well hopefully almost everybody, if they’re into robots genre like me) are all getting hyped and excited with the upcoming Michael Bay’s/Steven Spielberg’s Transformers 2 the movie within less than 3 weeks time from now, I decidedly got onto the net, finding any interesting articles, facts people shared about our ‘friendly robots in diguise’.  And towards the middle of the night, as I was about to stop browsing after failing to find  anything within 2 hours, I stumbled upon a link that really got my eyebrows raised up a notch.

A writer by the name of Shahendra Ohneswere published his post on the ten most ridiculous things about Transformers G1 we never knew about, even for old school fans like me.  He made a number of very highly critical  yet insightful comments on how certain robot characters were introduced to the TV audience and their backgrounds were vague and less convincing when it comes to any ‘realism’.  His arguments are when Tranformers were to perform any heroic activities during the series or the way their transformation sequence goes, we never asked ourselves why on earth Transformers were to do such things in the series and they simply do not make logical sense to the ordinary viewers who would know Transformers can’t possibly do that (eg 9-foot Giant Megatron transforms into a puny 12-inch handgun???), if their intellect serves them best.

After reading his post halfway, despite they indeed bring out the important points of logic and human common sense we all normally possess, the fact is true that when Transformers G1 first came out 20+ years ago, our generation were very young and naive (come on, this is 1985 we’re talking about here!). So as a kid, we always believe everything we saw on TV.  We’re ‘entitled’ to it so rationale and lateral thinking is not expected.  In fact, we don’t even care. So why bother? Maybe now you do, as you look back and you’re thinking “Right… That was a dumb thing they do.  But nevertheless it was all the while fun :)”.

Anyway here’s the link below.  I’m sure you’ll find them enlightening to read as much as I do, especially the comment on Autobot’s Blaster was once portrayed as the African-American stereotypes in the 1980s!

http://www.streetlevel.com/2009/06/04/the-top-10-most-ridiculous-transformers-ever

Also when you get to the bottom of his post, be sure to read out a cool Transformer Ravage USB memory stick or Blaster Netbook USB Port!  They’re great!!!

Whilst we’re still waiting for the upcoming and greatly-anticipated Transformers 2 film in a few weeks time,  I bumped across a Transformers fan site that just announced, not long ago, that company Shout! Factory’s going to release Transformers DVD collection set, that comes with 16 DVDs (say that again? 16 DVDS????) of every ‘G1′ Transfomers animated series in the 80s.  Not only that, it also comes with several other impressive items to add to every Transformers’ fan collectors item such as concept artworks, photo gallery, interview scripts etc.

Whilst I was reading the article from TVShowsOnDVD.com page, they said the collection set (entitled “The Transformers – 25th Anniversary Matrix of Leadership Edition: Collectors’ Set”), is available for buy at San Diego Comic-Con, running between July 23-26, this year.  (Check this link for find out more).  And if you’re anything like me, living several thousand miles away from the world’s craziest comic book convention centre and having a decent flight ticket is not ideal approach to getting there (especially in the economic climate everybody’s in), then you can also order it online via TransformersCollectorSet.com.   The starting price is at USD $140.00, which includes free shipping and handling of shipping within USA borders, and the delivery time takes up to 5 days after placing orders  (not sure whether this is theoretically true for international orders as it could take 7-10 days to deliver from my Amazon shopping experience).

Nevertheless, it’s there for everybody to order online anytime before beginning of July.  I would like to make a go for this, but I couldn’t because I’m not sure I really need the other special features it comes with.  Some people may like them.  But I’m not.  So it’s a matter of personal preferences for some people, I guess.  Would be interesting to find out whether there’s a majority of people out there really thought this a great steal of bargain for Transformers hard-core fans…

Recently, there’s been a huge hype with the greatly-anticipated film this year. Transformers 2 is coming out officially on 26th June 2009 in the USA (I still need to check with my film schedule in NZ cinemas as we don’t have any major announcements over the bottom side of the hemisphere!)

Anyway, Transformers the sequel is out after just 2 years since the first film came out, back in May 2007. The excitement with the fast cars, cool robot transformation (not too mention with a few great surprises from film fans favourite BumbleBee from its junkie Cheetah model to god-send hot rod Chevrolet). What great fun.

And looks like we gonna have another crazy fun ride again, with all new villians and robots to unveil, so I heard.

There’s plenty of people making such dubious comments on its very own Facebook pages.  Here’s the link.  After reading these comments, watching this trailer, who wouldn’t want to head out and watch this excellent film?

Sam Witwicky(Shia) and Mikaela Banes (Megan) ready for another 'transforming' ride in the second chapter of Transformers

Bumblebee ready to charge and fight!

A Meteorite crashing on the clock tower in "Transformers 2"

Transformers 2 - Pyramid attack by Decepticon planes

Also I was browsing a couple of online Transformers 2 (T2) forums and stumbled on a couple of wall posters produced by Paramount Pictures, thought it would be cool to share these.