What A Cartoon Movie! - The Transformers: The Movie
Added 2022-10-31 04:00:06 +0000 UTCAnimated kids films were different 40 years ago: Some of the top animators in Japan are hired to make toy commercials for American children where they can watch all their favorite characters get shot to death onscreen! Yes, we're digging deep into the 1986 Transformers film that was meant to start a new era of the toy franchise but instead traumatized a generation of youngsters--all with a rocking '80s soundtrack and stars like Leonard Nimoy and Orson Welles. Learn all about how this film has The Touch in this month's big What A Cartoon Movie podcast!
Comments
Rats, I thought I'd finally deprogrammed myself from saying it the wrong way. I'll try harder next time. - Henry
Talking Simpsons
2022-11-07 23:33:49 +0000 UTCThe very first CD I bought over the internet was the TF soundtrack (by the mid-90s, it was back in print and easy to find new for $10 plus $5 shipping.)
Dave Dalrymple
2022-11-07 15:47:07 +0000 UTCYeah. Henry's narrow definition of "G1" as meaning characters that debuted in the first two seasons of the show is out of line with the consensus in fandom, as well as Hasbro and Takara's official uses of the term. The consensus is that "G1" means "toys that came out from 1984 to 1993 and don't have the word 'generation 2' on the package." [Or, more broadly, it refers to characters that appeared as toys or in media in that timeframe.] In the US, this means that G1 ended with the 1990 toys (which was made up of Action Masters and Micromasters) but the line did continue until 1992 in Japan, and 1993 in Europe. It's not like Pokemon generations where every new wave of characters gets a numbered generation. Something belongs to "Generation 2" or "G-2" if it is labelled as such. Something is "Generation One" or "G1" if it is older than G2. And there's no such thing as "Generation Three".
Dave Dalrymple
2022-11-07 15:37:55 +0000 UTCI've bothered you about this before but Henry: it's "sakuga booru", not "buuro." It's literally the word "ball" pronounced in Japanese: boh-roo. You can even just say ball-u
nina matsumoto
2022-11-06 22:50:22 +0000 UTCThis was excellent and makes me wish y'all would talk about the GI Joe movie, which is maybe exactly as good as this movie. What a sell, huh?
Aaron Alcott
2022-11-04 13:45:11 +0000 UTCnever caught it in the theater as a kid but had it on a (bootleg) tape....it wasn't until the recentish anniversary theatrical screening I got to finally see it on the big screen. it obviously wouldn't hit the same as if I were a kid in the 80's...but I think it was cool seeing people my age bring their kids in to watch it....it was like when I went to see Willy Wonka's anniversary screening last year...theater was full of 60+ year olds...a few people my age (30's)
Frank Grimes
2022-11-03 09:29:24 +0000 UTCHenry, I gotta be the person telling you you've mispronounced something: Regina, Saskatchewan is, as the old joke goes, "the city that rhymes with fun". Great episode guys, I was born 96 so this goofy commercial feels like another world. I guess my generation's best equivalent is the Bionicle movies, which also have a fervently devoted fanbase to their goofy lore.
Jon
2022-11-02 19:25:46 +0000 UTCWell it was everything I hoped for. I have been waiting for this movie since you guys started what a cartoon - you guys even cracked a few zingers I had not heard before
Ric Mahurin
2022-11-02 16:02:05 +0000 UTCTransformers: The Movie is also the catalyst for something that literally changed my life. When Generation 2 hit, my nostalgia for the original series began to swell. I was desperate to find a copy of the movie's soundtrack. The 1993 Marvel comic book tie in was currently running, so wrote into their letters page to ask if they knew where to find it. They printed my letter in Issue 11, including my FULL HOME ADDRESS--which seems irresponsible of Marvel since I was only 16 (a minor). I was soon contacted by other fans all over the globe; some of which I'm still friends with to this day. I got into the world of anime tape trading for Japanese Transformers shows and even took part in a fanzine. One person straight up sent me a cassette of the soundtrack, which I cherished until someone helped me find the CD.
Sean Ryan
2022-11-02 01:43:01 +0000 UTCI've been a huge Transformers fan ever since I was a kid and even saw this movie in the theater at the tender age of 7. Yes, it traumatized me as it did us all at the time. In the early days of the internet, I learned that the "shit" version of the movie was released on VHS in the mid-90s (brace for lack of surprise, Bob)...in Canada. I was quick to import it in its lovely clamshell case. As for when Gen 1 ended, in the US I'd say it was the Action Masters. That's when Hasbro just kinda gave up and just threw out Transformers that, wow, DIDN'T transform. Then Gen 2 begins with the toyline of the same name a few years later.
Sean Ryan
2022-11-02 01:30:01 +0000 UTCI enjoy this movie, but I also paid money to see Manos: The Hands Of Fate and The Room in a theater so what can I say?
Aaron Alcott
2022-11-01 23:45:46 +0000 UTCI liked this episode, as it had a much different dynamic than most Talking Simpson/What a Cartoon. Normally you guys are pretty much in sync, either both liking something (due to a shared nostalgia or reappreciating something you didn't like in your teenage/young adult days) or hate (Cool World). However this episode was from the perspective of both you first viewings (7 year old Henry and 40 year old Bob) and it made it a really interesting listen. I'm on Bob's side for this one. My childhood cartoon obsessions went He-Man > ThunderCats > Ghostbusters > TMHT, so Transformers just seemed to miss me, although I knew it existed and got a few toys as gifts (from relatives who didn't really know me). I remember watching this first when I was 17 with friends who had nostalgia but I didn't and thought it was the most complex basic movie I'd seen and I still feel that way after re-watching in anticipation for this podcast. Great soundtrack though.
David Thomson
2022-11-01 20:27:55 +0000 UTCIf Bob had to watch this, then I felt I owed it to him to go on a 4+ hour ride via the podcast. I don't think I ever sat through this movie from start to finish as a kid. Transformers weren't a thing I gravitated towards, I wasn't big on cars or robots, so I had maybe 1 or 2 G1 toys. I did get into G2 a little when that came out, and even spent 30 of my own 1992 dollars on the Optimus reissue from that which is pretty shocking to me looking back on it. I tried to engage with the film when it got released on DVD in 2006 or 7 and wow, did I hate it. Yes, the animation is good, but most of the film is just so boring and ridiculous. Anytime I refresh my memory on the actual running time for this one I'm shocked it isn't longer because it feels like a 2 hour movie. I get it though, I have nostalgia goggles for many things, though few of those things are movies, now that I think about it. The Real Ghostbusters, TMNT, the X-Men cartoon - I can be carried through an episode or two by nostalgia, but definitely not 90 minutes. As a modern toy collector, I have to say Hasbro is still up to the same bullshit as they were back in the 80s, with just less death and carnage since they don't want to spend money producing films. They just tried another one of their Kickstarter styled campaigns which crashed and burned yesterday. It was for Ghost Rider, but for his car. I'm not big into comics so I had no idea Ghost Rider even had a car these days. They wanted $350 bucks for it, and to get people onboard they tossed in an X-Men character and a figure for their character Mephisto under the guise that they'll never make these characters available again because they're too evil for retail. If some X-Men fan wants a figure of the Goblin Queen they have to spend 350 bucks on a car for a character they don't value and hope nearly 10,000 other people are willing to do so (they had to sell 12k to get Mephisto). It's no surprise it failed as it barely hit 50% of the backers needed. The only good thing is that Hasbro is basically just trying to fleece people my age instead of little kids now since so few kids are buying action figures these days. Transformers are still going strong though, they have a crowd funding campaign up right now for someone I don't know and I think a Christmas themed Optimus Prime goes onsale today too. I may not be big on Transformers, but I am a mark for Christmas themed toys so I might have to give that one a look. And Hasbro even licenses out Transformers to other toy companies too! Super7 makes figures of them, but they're not allowed to transform, and even have one of the shark robots from this movie on the way. It would seem it's a pretty good time to be alive if you're into Transformers.
Joe Hodgson
2022-11-01 16:04:00 +0000 UTCAnd in Japan, they killed him AGAIN, just a few episodes into the fourth season. So, in Japan, the toy that was known as "Powermaster Optimus Prime" in the US ended up being a completely different character called Ginrai. The resemblance between Ginrai and Prime was only acknowledged in the final clip show of the fifth season.
Dave Dalrymple
2022-11-01 12:12:17 +0000 UTCLoved the episode, guys. Transformers was one of the first things I ever remember being a fan of as a kid, second to maybe only The Muppets. Regarding Henry mentioning how Optimus Prime was brought back, he was actually brought back twice! As crazy as it sounds, the first time he came back was probably even more traumatizing to young children than his death. In the third season episode "Dark Awakening", ( https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Dark_Awakening_(episode) ) a group of Autobots are pursued by the Deceptions and take refuge in the Autobots' flying space mausoleum. While there, they encounter what can best be described as a zombie Optimus Prime. Imagine being 8 or 9 years old, and this is the first time you see Optimus since his death in the movie: https://imgur.com/a/qnU4i9K For "just" being a robot, that's some pretty horrific body horror! As a kid, that episode freaked me out and upset me more than the movie. Especially since Optimus is acting "off" the whole time, and we find out it's because the Quintisons revived him and re-programmed him to be "evil" and lure the remaining Autobots into a trap, though eventually as you'd expect, he was able to overcome his new programming and instead (seemingly ) sacrificed himself to save the rest of the autobots. But then several episodes later, in the two parter " The Return of Optimus Prime" , he was resurrected AGAIN and came back for good... "For good" meaning for the three remaining episodes of the G1 cartoon run.
Andrew Bouvier
2022-11-01 02:57:43 +0000 UTC
