The Transformers

STAR RATING:*****Unmissable****Very Good***Okay**You Could Go Out For A Meal Instead*Avoid At All Costs

Golly gosh,is Transformers really nearly 20 years old?This timeless celebration of colourful good machines versus bad machines is a piece of genius.I was channelsurfing today,and saw this on one of the channels.It was an episode I remember called The Revenge Of Bruticus.That holds your attention as well now as it did when you were a young kid.In fact,strangely enough,it almost seems better caught up in the pretentiousness of adult life.I would be very happy if they made a big hollywood blockbuster movie adaptation of the series,even though this would contradict my movie laws no end.Maybe the heartless marketing moguls at hollywood should leave this old classic alone,and let it stand the test of time in it's current posistion.*****

One of the best cartoons to come out in the 80's along with G.I. Joe and Visionaries.

This story is about two waring Robot factions, The Autobots (the good guys) lead by Optimus Prime, and The Decepticons (the evil nasty pieces of work) lead by the maniacal Megatron.

The show starts off with the Autobots leaving their home planet of Cybertron to find a new source of energy to win the war, having depleted their own planet of energy they set off in their space craft (known in the comics and the Beast Wars TV Series as The Ark) to find new sources of energy to help win the war and replenish there own planets energy supplies, but unknown to them The Decepticons already new about their plan and set off to follow them in their own space craft, The Decepticons ambush The Autobots in space and board there ship but the ship is caught in the magnetic pull of earths atmosphere and the ark crashes into a volcano and lies dormant for 4 million years, before an eruption re-activates the ships computer (teletraan I) which rebuilds and reactivates The Transformers giving them Human vehicles designs and the war starts all over again.

Cartoons like Voltron and Thundercats are good by their standards, but Transformers blows them all away. Like it's follow ups, Beast Wars & Beast Machines, this show was designed to sell toys. But Transformers and the future series are much better them some people say. The reason the show ended in the first place is because sales for the toys dropped a lot, so the show was cancelled along with the comics. It's the classic good versus evil show. All the characters are great, especially Optimus Prime. Transformers is a number 1 show.

Ah, what a gem this was and still is! Sixteen years later, this series still has not lost its sparkle. This is due to the obvious care that was put into this production. Kudos to the animators for successfully animating a slew of WAY cool transforming robots (which, I am sure, is not very easy to do). Kudos to one of the best voice casts ever assembled for a production for bringing the characters wonderfully to life. (The cast list reads like a miniature "Who's Who" among voice artists.) Special thanks must go to Frank Welker, who brought Megatron (among other characters) wonderfully to life. And then, of course, there was the Autobot leader who became so beloved by kids everywhere that he rose to the status of genuine icon for many a child: OPTIMUS PRIME. Now, I liked "Beast Wars" and thought that Gary Chalk was good as Optimus Primal, but the one TRUE voice of the REAL Optimus Prime will ALWAYS belong to Peter Cullen. They could not have gotten (nor will ever get) a person so perfect for the role as him. He brought both gentle warmth and fearless commanding to Prime, and those traits are what made him last, in my opinion. Here's hoping the series will continue to do the same.

Transformers, for me were the coolest toys as you could actually do something with them, hey they transformed. The cartoon was a very good compliment to said toys. It followed the story of the Autobots who were good and the Decepticons who were well not good. They raged most of their battles on earth and the show was at its best during the first season and parts of the second season. The ones that occurred after the movie were pretty good, but then I thought the headmaster and target master miniseries that would mark the end of the Transformers generation one was very weak as it was nothing but one big toy commercial and featured many Transformers that were never introduced before playing a rather large role. My favorite episodes usually involved the Decepticons called Constructicons. Six robots that formed the super robot Devastater. They were my favorite toys as a kid and I actually still have them. The show was not without other problems than just the weak ending. A lot of problems stem from problems with the plot and origins of some of the robots. Apparently, they didn't think a kid could remember how a robot was introduced so they created a new origin. Such as Devastator. Clearly introduced in season one as being created on earth they would in a later episode show them having been on Cybertron and they were good guys no less. Also, it was clearly shown you could make a new transformer on earth, but in later episodes it was shown you had to use a special device to infuse them with personality. Still, the problems were not enough to steer me away from this cool cartoon.