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Author Topic: Tranformers Rant
BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head:
quote:
Originally posted by Jon Boy:
quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
Like said in the first post, I get the toys. What I don't get is why 8 year old boys would sit and watch this idiotic TV show instead of getting together with friends, fighting battles with their own transformer toys and making their own exploding sound effects.

So this thread is really about how you don't understand eight-year-old boys?
Nail. Head. Hit.

Personally, I didn't have my own transformer toys, although I coveted them tremendously.

I frequently combined my transformers with my extensive GI Joe collection, and had epic battles between the two forces. Only the transformers could get GI Joe and Cobra to temporarily allign in battle. Of course Cobra would immedietly stab GI Joe in the back IF the transformers were vanquished that particular time. [Big Grin]

When my family moved to Malaysia we had our own pool and jaccuzi, I turned the massive bubble system on in the jaccuzi, grabbed my amphibious GI Joe vehicles, and it was battle on the rapids of doom time.

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erosomniac
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quote:
OK, but the basic premise is still that this race of godlike superbeings evolved in some distant time and place which are giant robots that can transform into cars and stuff. And I just find that to be the stupidest premise in any of the science fiction I've read or seen.
How are the Transformers godlike? They're more durable than people, sure: they're made of metal. But they routinely take damage, and they routinely die of it, and not just from other robots.

They do not transform into cars and stuff on Cybertron; they assume the forms of cars, trucks, etc. when they come to Earth.

Why are you so determined to hate this? It's pretty obvious that you have no rational basis for your apparent hatred of the series, given that you're ignorant of nearly all of the formative source material. How is the premise of Transformers any stupider than, say, Biker Mice from Mars? S.W.A.T. Cats? Jem & the Holograms? Gargoyles? Silverhawk? He-Man & the Masters of the Universe? Thundercats?

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suminonA
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Never had the opportunity to play with Transformers toys when I was a child. Wish I had.
Never have seen more than 5 minutes of the animated series, except for the animated movie. Didn’t like the graphic art one bit.

Seen the recent movie in a Theater, a 12 meter wide screen at least. The Visual FX were awesome! Wasn’t interested in the human characters, for the record.

A bit disappointed about the “morph” business pooka brought up earlier. But then, there was a whole cube, a few stories high, shrinking into a little one to be carried by hand. And not too much weight either. Some cool technology, I guess. [Big Grin]

And also, a few funny scenes … who needs them? [Wall Bash] /sarcasm

All in all, I’m glad they did the movie, I could feel like the infamous “8 years old boys”.

At the end of the day, there are other mythologies that can look stupid when one grows older, yet some people get offended when you point out their inconsistencies. It is always your fault that you don’t get “the context” to be able to appreciate the true value of it all.

A.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by Jon Boy:
Rabbit: It really seems like you're going on the offensive here. The implication seems to be that anyone over the age of eight who likes Transformers must be an idiot. If you don't understand the appeal, that's fine. But that doesn't mean you need to criticize those who do.

Yeah, I'll admit it. I'm cranky. I'm thousands of miles away from my husband, I haven't seen him for 23 days and won't see him for another 23. I suppose its affecting my disposition and I'm taking it out on al Hatrackers who like Tranformers.

Its not fair.

But I still maintain that the premise is just stupid.

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mr_porteiro_head
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Of course it's stupid.

That doesn't mean it's not enjoyable.

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Jon Boy
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Rabbit: And I maintain that that's just your opinion.

Edit: Actually, I like what Porter said better. A show can have a stupid premise and still be very enjoyable. And I'm sorry that you have to be away from your husband for so long. The longest I've had to be away from my wife was about three days, and I hated it.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
How is the premise of Transformers any stupider than, say, Biker Mice from Mars? S.W.A.T. Cats? Jem & the Holograms? Gargoyles? Silverhawk? He-Man & the Masters of the Universe? Thundercats?
I really can't say since I'm unfamiliar with any of them. Probably because they haven't been made into a full length movies yet.
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Epictetus
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quote:
But when 2 year olds get to be 8 year olds, they recognize how stupid Barnie is. We are never going to see someone try to make a blockbuster movie about Barnie or the Teletubbies hoping to bring in all the people who loved those shows as kids.
That's because Barney and Teletubbies patronize their audience. Once you reach a certain age, you get tired of being talked down to. It would never sell to an Audience of adults for the same reason.
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Jon Boy
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quote:
I really can't say since I'm unfamiliar with any of them. Probably because they haven't been made into a full length movies yet.
Yet.

Oh, except for He-Man, which was made into a fantastically stupid movie in the '80s.

<—hypocrite

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erosomniac
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:
How is the premise of Transformers any stupider than, say, Biker Mice from Mars? S.W.A.T. Cats? Jem & the Holograms? Gargoyles? Silverhawk? He-Man & the Masters of the Universe? Thundercats?
I really can't say since I'm unfamiliar with any of them. Probably because they haven't been made into a full length movies yet.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.

There's also a Thundercats movie in the works.

Edit: sorry, missed the "full-length" part there, corrected to the live action He-Man movie.

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pooka
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quote:
But when 2 year olds get to be 8 year olds, they recognize how stupid Barnie is. We are never going to see someone try to make a blockbuster movie about Barnie or the Teletubbies hoping to bring in all the people who loved those shows as kids.

Actually, there was a Barney Movie. I have grown to kind of like Barney. I guess you could call it Stockholm Syndrome. I know some people disagree with me on this board, but I really don't think there is anything insidious about Barney.
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brojack17
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quote:
Originally posted by Christine:
quote:
Originally posted by Zalmoxis:
Clearly, you were never an 8 year old boy.

As it happens, I JUST watched this movie for the first time this past weekend and while I was also definitely not an 8-year-old boy, my husband was and he even loved the Transformers cartoon and the original cartoon movie.

And actually, I liked the old stuff, even if I didn't love it like a little boy.

Both my husband and I agreed the recent movie was crap. What makes it worse is its absolutely unbelievable popularity. Even people who had never seen transformers as a child, girlfriends of mine, said it was a good movie.

The action sequences were difficult to follow and the plot was beyond stupid. I'm sorry, but I think the moment that clinched it for me was when the British blond chick who was working for the U.S. government made some EXTRAORDINARY leap in logic and claimed that because computers were getting hacked quickly there must be Transformers out there. (She said it differently, but that's basically the gist of what she said.) I mean, her mouth was moving and words were coming out...I can only assume that we were supposed to be too preoccupied with her cute blondeness to notice what those words actually were!

I'll stop now.

She talked? I guess I didn't catch that. [Big Grin]
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MrSquicky
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quote:
And I just find that to be the stupidest premise in any of the science fiction I've read or seen.
And, as I've said twice before, looking at it as science fiction is the wrong way to look at it. It's like looking at Batman as noir mystery. Or science fiction as literary fiction.
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brojack17
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I liked it, but I wasn't really into them as a kid. I couldn't afford the toys, so I never really got into the cartoons.

Visually it was appealing. The CGI was great. It was a good way to waste a couple of hours.

It doesn't have to be believable for me to enjoy it.

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The Rabbit
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Christine did a much better job of articulating what I mean when I've said the premise behind Transformers was just stupid.

All speculative fiction has aspects that are improbable and stretch the limits of belief. But good science fiction gives you a reason to suspend your disbelief. The example Christine gives of X-men illustrates the point. X-men isn't just about really awesome super powers and great special effects. The fantastical parts of the story become a vehicle for telling a story about real human problems of outcasts, fear and intolerance.

At the very least, a good fantasy should get inside my head. It should make me dream about what it would be like to live in a hobbit hole, feel the force, travel through time or explore the galaxy.

Frankly, the Transformers just doesn't succeed on any of those levels for me. It seems like the fantastical elements of the movie "robots transforming in to car, truck, planes etc" exist solely for awesome special effects.

Do people who like this story get into the fantasy of owning a car that could transform into a superpowerful robot? Do they relate to the robots?

What is there about this story that makes it any more than another Monster truck rally?

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MrSquicky
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Christine,
I didn't even see the recent movie because of what was in it. I wasn't taking issue with you criticizes it as poorly shot and/or written or just all around not good. I was just talking about the criticism that it wasn't good because the premise of robots that transform into things was implausible.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by pooka:
quote:
But when 2 year olds get to be 8 year olds, they recognize how stupid Barnie is. We are never going to see someone try to make a blockbuster movie about Barnie or the Teletubbies hoping to bring in all the people who loved those shows as kids.

Actually, there was a Barney Movie. I have grown to kind of like Barney. I guess you could call it Stockholm Syndrome. I know some people disagree with me on this board, but I really don't think there is anything insidious about Barney.
Was it a Barney movie made for 2 year olds, or a Barnie movie made for adults?
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mr_porteiro_head
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quote:
All speculative fiction has aspects that are improbable and stretch the limits of belief. But good science fiction gives you a reason to suspend your disbelief.
I don't think anybody would claim that Transformers is good science fiction.

They just claim that it's fun. Or awesome.

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MrSquicky
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And the recent Transformers movie is not a good representation of Transformers as a whole. That was more like generic action movie #39 guest starring some Transformers.
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Christine
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
Christine,
I didn't even see the recent movie because of what was in it. I wasn't taking issue with you criticizes it as poorly shot and/or written or just all around not good. I was just talking about the criticism that it wasn't good because the premise of robots that transform into things was implausible.

Actually, I don't recall saying that robots transforming into things was implausible. I can suspend disbelief enough to buy that part. It's the ways the humans interacted with and grew to understand these new creatures in their midsts that I found implausible. It's hard to explain if you haven't seen the movie.
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erosomniac
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quote:
Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head:
I don't think anybody would claim that Transformers is good science fiction.

quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
And the recent Transformers movie is not a good representation of Transformers as a whole. That was more like generic action movie #39 guest starring some Transformers.

QFT
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brojack17
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
Do people who like this story get into the fantasy of owning a car that could transform into a superpowerful robot?

Yes. I would also love it if my old jalopie would change into a new camero.

quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
Do they relate to the robots?

Yes, I want a Roomba in the hopes it will become self aware and then we can fight!


quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
What is there about this story that makes it any more than another Monster truck rally?

Nothing. That's the beauty of it. (to steal another line)
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The Rabbit
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quote:
I I was just talking about the criticism that it wasn't good because the premise of robots that transform into things was implausible.
I never said it was bad because it was implausible. I said it was a stupid premise. I recognize that was a highly non-specific criticism. Science fiction is virtually by definition "implausible". Implausibility alone doesn't make a science fiction premise stupid. What constitutes a stupid idea in science fiction, at least by in my mind, is not just one that is implausible but one that serves no purpose beyond awesome special effects.
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MrSquicky
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Rabbit,
It's not meant to be treated as science fiction.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Rabbit,
It's not meant to be treated as science fiction.

Then substitute the word "speculative" for "science".
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MattP
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quote:
They do not transform into cars and stuff on Cybertron; they assume the forms of cars, trucks, etc. when they come to Earth.
Actually, this is incorrect. Even the very first Transformers cartoon episode featured Autobots transforming into cars on Cybertron. They looks sort of like the concept cars from 70's-80's auto shows, but they were clearly cars with windshields and doors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ16d-qpBEE

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MrSquicky
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quote:
Then substitute the word "speculative" for "science".
It's not meant to be treated as speculative fiction. I refer to you every post I've made in this thread, especially the first one.
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erosomniac
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quote:
Originally posted by MattP:
quote:
They do not transform into cars and stuff on Cybertron; they assume the forms of cars, trucks, etc. when they come to Earth.
Actually, this is incorrect. Even the very first Transformers cartoon episode featured Autobots transforming into cars on Cybertron. They looks sort of like the concept cars from 70's-80's auto shows, but they were clearly cars with windshields and doors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ16d-qpBEE

They're passenger vehicles, yes, but I was assuming Rabbit's objection was to them transforming into Earth-originated objects.
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MattP
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quote:
They're passenger vehicles, yes, but I was assuming Rabbit's objection was to them transforming into Earth-originated objects.
I thought so too, but I already pointed out that they didn't do that until they came to earth, as I think other did too.
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adfectio
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To me, at least, Transformers was about the battle between good and evil. Sure, that may seem shallow, and the fact that it's between giant robots that transform into cars and trucks and the like is a little implausible. But it was still a good story to me. I'm working more off the cartoon, which is a lot different than the movie, but it still had a story. The new movie had some really bad acting, granted. I said from the beginning that Shia was not the right character. He did a good job, but I think they could have found somebody else to do it.

quote:
I kept asking my husband what was going on and he said he wasn't sure either.
Are you sure this isn't just so he could watch the movie? More often than not that's how I respond when someone asks me a question in the middle of a movie, just because I hate talking during them.

quote:
Biker Mice from Mars? S.W.A.T. Cats? Jem & the Holograms? Gargoyles? Silverhawk? He-Man & the Masters of the Universe? Thundercats?
I Had completely forgotten about the Biker Mice from mars! That was great! I've got the first volume of the Thundercats series, and really want to buy some He-Man volumes.

Oh wow how I miss the cartoons from my Childhood.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Second, it's not really science fiction. It's mythology of a sort. Mythology of this sort generally isn't all that plausible, but that's not the point. You need to accept some basic premises, outrageous as they may actually be, to get it.
I assume that this is the "first post" you were referring to Mr. Squicky.

The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars could also be better described as Mythology than as science fiction. Those stories give me a reason besides awesome special effects to accept some of the outrageous premises withing the story.

I understand the appeal of a story about the battle between good and evil. What I don't get is what robots that transform into other things adds to this story besides special effects.

It just seems to me that someone came up with these cool toys that could transform from being robots to being cars, planes and insects and other cool and then built this story to go around them as a marketing tool. No matter how you twist it, the story seems contrived because it is contrived. The fact that the characters can transform from cars into robots just doesn't add anything to the underlying story.

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Noemon
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This discussion made me think of the article I was reading in New Scientist about groups of robots functioning as shapeshifting colonial organisms.
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mr_porteiro_head
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quote:
It just seems to me that someone came up with these cool toys that could transform from being robots to being cars, planes and insects and other cool and then built this story to go around them as a marketing tool.
Um, that's exactly what happened. If you don't want to see a movie with that lineage, don't go see Transformers. I didn't.

It's like complaining about the Bratz movie because it's a contrived story designed to sell toys which focuses on the unimportant concerns of shallow, beautiful teenage girls.

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suminonA
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
[…] The fact that the characters can transform from cars into robots just doesn't add anything to the underlying story.

If they were (flesh and blood) dinosaurs, it would explain their war and their ongoing search for energy a lot better.

A.

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Mucus
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Seriously, Captain Planet fights against pollution.
Captain Power had toys that could let you shoot at the TV during the shows, presumably aiding the characters therein.

I think contrived goes with the territory.

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Lyrhawn
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Damn Rabbit. What do you have against my inner 8 year old?

I LOVED Transformers as a kid. I had tons of the toys, I even loved the little McDonalds toys that transformed, especially the hotcakes that transformed into a pteradactyl. The show was good for an 8 year old I guess, but I loved and still love, the cartoon movie. It was a bit before my time, the movie I think came out the year I was born, but when I loved it, and the GI Joe movie, when I first saw them, and I continue to enjoy them today. I think the cartoon movie had a better plot than the live action movie, but there's always hope for the sequel!

I don't see how it's any less plausible than and other sci fi shows that are utterly ridiculous in their premise but we still accept because it's that genre, the genre where believability in OUR universe matters far less than believability in THEIR universe.

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Jon Boy
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
It just seems to me that someone came up with these cool toys that could transform from being robots to being cars, planes and insects and other cool and then built this story to go around them as a marketing tool. No matter how you twist it, the story seems contrived because it is contrived. The fact that the characters can transform from cars into robots just doesn't add anything to the underlying story.

And?

I'm reminded of those stupid Apple Jacks commercials where the grown-up says, "But they don't taste like apples!" and the kids respond with something like "We don't care! We eat what we like."

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Zalmoxis
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I have not seen the movie.

Of course the story is a marketing tool -- most kids-oriented animated shows since the '80s have been.

And it's been a long time since I've seen any episodes so I have no doubt that the execution probably wasn't that great.

But here's what it is with the basic concept/storyline:

A. As has been mentioned what we have here is an epic struggle between good and evil. And the participants happen to be robots that transform into other forms as a way of camouflage and also a means of accomplishing something else (being able to travel quickly). And they are very powerful. The participants in this struggle then tend to face off in more gladiator style battle. For a young boy such an individualistic approach (yet they're still part of a team) is appealing.

B. It's a galactic struggle that then moves to earth -- that ties our mundane existence to something grander (and scarier).

C. Although the toys later strayed from this, as I recall, in the beginning most of the major characters looked like native products. This leads to an element of suspense for the humans who are drawn into the conflict (as well as the transformers). In fact, I'd say that the idea that everyday items of technology could be sentient robots in disguise is a fairly powerful conceit for an age in which the personal computer was just beginning to gain traction. The real acceleration of the digital age.

C-2: The transformer aspect also leads to some moments of the uncanny.

D. Like most television shows, what it really is is an ongoing soap opera that focuses on relationships and personalities. And although not painted in depth, the individual transformers did have personalities. For those of us who came of age, Optimus Prime is an example of a noble, self-sacrificing leader. A real hero.

The only Transformer I owned was Prowl. And I very much related to his personality.

I could probably come up with more if I rewatched the series. I'm sure I could also come up with a lot of criticism of the franchise (and again, all the above applies only to the original generation of toys and the first series). I'm not claiming that it's a major achievement in either science fiction or storytelling. But if I remember correctly, in my mind it was the third best-executed series (behind Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the Voltron that featured the 5 lions).

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mr_porteiro_head
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quote:
The fact that the characters can transform from cars into robots just doesn't add anything to the underlying story.
The characters transforming into cars, etc. is the underlying story.
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pooka
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Re: Barney

I think they took into consideration that not many two year olds would get into a movie theater without a parent, so I think they put some effort into giving it something resembling a plot. But it was not rated PG-13 (which the Transformers movie was). So all in all, I'd say it was not meant for adults.

I see your point there. Everyone's taking you to task for not understanding 8 year old boys, but the movie was produced and marketed to an adult audience.

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Lyrhawn
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She's not just talking about the live action movie though.

And I'd argue that it was marketed to everyone's inner 8 year old, if not actual 8 year olds.

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Jon Boy
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I thought she was talking about the concept as a whole, not simply Transformers the movie.
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Juxtapose
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quote:
Biker Mice from Mars? S.W.A.T. Cats? Jem & the Holograms? Gargoyles? Silverhawk? He-Man & the Masters of the Universe? Thundercats?
Voltron? Samurai Pizza Cats? Dino-Riders? TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES!?

Sorry, couldn't keep those to myself. Carry on.

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Itsame
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quote:
Originally posted by pooka:
I got the "bigger than Jesus" joke.

eros loses the thread.

Same, I expected someone to say immediately "Well, they kind are bigger than Jesus, have you seen Jesus carry passengers?"
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Sterling
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
I admit, my familiarity with the transformers story line is limited to what I saw in the movie. I've never been able to watch more than about a minute of the cartoon. As best I can tell, the story line in the cartoon is basically irrelevant. Whats important is lots of robots, cars, planes, explosions, fighting and such.

Well, you see, that's the movie. If you watch the earlier cartoons and read the earlier comics, you come to understand the deep, underlying universal themes and recognize the Jungian archetypes typified by the [ROFL]

Okay, I knew I couldn't keep that up with a straight face.

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Icarus
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quote:
Originally posted by Zalmoxis:
Clearly, you were never an 8 year old boy.

I'm pretty sure I was, once, and I never got the appeal either.

Oh, and [Roll Eyes] [Roll Eyes] [Roll Eyes] [Roll Eyes] at anybody trying to use this as a platform to slam religion. Seriously.

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suminonA
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Do you believe that religious ideas are rationally distinguishable from the human made fiction?

A.

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Eaquae Legit
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Can we keep the religious heckling out of the big smashy robots thread, please?

I enjoyed the movie, and I didn't expect much more than big smashy robots. There were some humans involved, but they did more to get in the way, IMO. Most of the fantastically stupid decisions were made by humans in power. (Although, the robot peeing oil on the one human was pretty dumb.)

It was awesome the same way Indiana Jones is awesome. Indy's got some far-fetched plots, and no one gives him any guff, so why should we care so much about Transformers?

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Juxtapose
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I read this
quote:
A mysterious superbeing created everything and no one really knows for sure he exists because no one has ever seen him and he routinely threatens his creations with eternal suffering?
more as a tongue-in-cheek way of saying that any story can sound stupid if you choose to express it in the stupidest way possible. In fact, I believe we had a thread in the not too distant past that turned this concept into a game, thusly:

Smartass kid plays video-games, destroys planet.

(I assume the quoted text is what you were referring to. If it wasn't, I hope you'll correct me.)

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TL
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Let's play a game where we try to think of recent movies that are worse than Transformers, a Michael Bayfilm film.

I'll start.

... ... ... ...
...

Bratz?

Where's the helpless shrug emoticon?

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