Episode of the Week

[The Doctor]

Like the 'comic story of the week', this is for anyone to nominate an episode from any TF animated show they would like to discuss on a rough 'episode per week' basis. Just for fun.

I'll kick it off with 'The Transformers' episode...

HEAVY METAL WAR

-Ralph

[Deleted]

An interesting story that concluded Season 1 and also introduced the Constructicons. Not the best Constructicon story made though as it starts off a debate that still runs to this day - who built the Constructicons? Megatron claims that he built them on Earth in that episode but later episodes such as the Omega Supreme back story in Season 2 (can't remember the name of the episode) contradict this.

[kayevcee]

"The Secret of Omega Supreme", I believe. If memory serves, Five Faces of Darkness also shows the Constructicons building Megatron, changing the whole situation from a continuity flub to a full-fledged paradox.

Good times.

-Nick

[Gav]

But how important is continuity?

*runs*

[Andy Turnbull]

Ah Heavy Metal War, a terrible ending to the first season. The Autobots all lose their memories and half their I.Q. during the fight between Optimus and Megatron. Why look Megatron is using all these abilities that were previously the sole province of his soldiers. How does he do that? I don't know but surely he can't be cheating? No, why would a bad guy cheat? Twats.

Andy

[Deleted]

When I watched the episode recently I was half hoping that Megatron would use one of Ravage's abilities and cock his leg up a nearby lampost.

[The Doctor]

"Autobots, we must obey the law!"

-Ralph

[jameso]

There's a great online parody of this episode from the people behind 'Rude Awakening of Optimus Prime' where Chip is desperately trying to explain that the Decepticons are going to cheat and the Autobots can't quite grasp that a group of beings called Decepticons aren't trustworthy.

[Deleted]

That should be good. The Rude Awakening of Optimus Prime was funny so I expect this one should be as well.

[The Doctor]

The Ranomiser now throws up the pilot for Beast Wars called, um...

BEAST WARS (parts 1-2)

-Ralph

[legios]

“Beast Wars” is somewhat of a rarety amongst Transformers animated series. It marks one of the few occasions that a show has actually had a pilot rather than being pre-sold for a given batch of episodes straight from the “pitch” stage (you could count Sundows original mini-series in the same category I guess, but I am not sure how many other examples there are of Transformers shows having pilots). There are two general ways to do a pilot – one is the “and so it came to pass method”, based around taking one or more of the continuing characters and showing how they came to be in the situation that is going to be the series status quo and how things come to together initially. The other is the “day in the life” method, effectively just showing pretty much what a regular episode of the series will be like, with all the characters in place and doing there thing.
The two episodes of “Beast Wars” are very much an example of the first method. So we get the story of how a crew of heroic Maximals are detailed to apprehend a group of fleeing evil Predacons, and how both side wind up trapped on a mysterious planet and locked in an unsung war for the planets natural resources. It doesn't do too bad a job of it to be honest. Things kick off with a nice In Media Res beginning, two spacecraft locked in deadly combat is a fairly attention getting way to kick thing off. It works nicely to get the audience involved and carry them into the first act, where the exposition begins to fill in the who and why of what is going on. The exposition isn't handled too badly either – there is a certain amount of “as you know Bob” to the dialogue but a surprising amount of the expositionary dialogue sounds a lot more natural than it could have done. The first episode does do a reasonably nice job of laying out the general feel of the characters as well, we get a fair sense of which stereotype each one is going to play too and the general way in which they are going to interact. Things do creak a little under the strain of having to outline what a Transformer is and how they work, as well as establish character and demonstrate how battle scenes will look and feel in fifty minutes, and it is possible to see how it is structured so as to give a chance for the characters to do their party-piece and to give Mainframe the opportunity to show what they can deliver on a technical level. There is a certain amount of “this is what a fight in the day would look like, here you can see how we can do nighttime scenes” kind of thing going on in the storylining. But I can't really blame them for that – it is a pilot after all, and its main function is to demonstrate the shows chops to the backers and to interested networks so you are going to want to try to hit as many notes as you can . The plot is a little bit hackneyed and simplistic, and feels in places like a writing team who are till unsure of exactly what they want to do with the set-up. It is a little thin – really only enough plot for twenty-five minute, but stretched out to fifty in the interests of “settling in”. It does, however, possess a fairly good through line and hangs together consistently as an “origin story” for the series.
Technically “Beast Wars” may at first glance appear a little archaic now – technology has leapt on from where the state of the art was at the time it was made. The rendering, and some of the animation at first glance shows its age. This hardly surprising when you consider how long it has been since the show was done and the pace of technological change in the intervening years. For it's day though, “Beast Wars” was pretty close to the cutting edge, and it still holds up surprisingly well against some television level CG animation from more recent times. In part this is because of the direction. Although “Beast Wars” is a little variable on this front – episode one's battle sequence is painfully flat and static for example – there are a number of shots that are much more deftly handled. There are some nice uses of multiple axes of motion, especially in the sequence with the
bridge across the chasm that bring a bit of life to the production. It is never going to convince those who have a dislike of CG animation on principle, but as an example of the early state of the art it demonstrates admirable ambition in what it attempts and does very well in terms of its rate of suceeding at what it tries for.
This is aided by a highly competent voice cast, combined with excellent voice-direction. The fact that the voice-work was recorded “pre-lay”(prior to the animation being executed) and “whole cast” rather than having each actor working separately pays off for the production. Scenes have a bit of an energy that tends to be lacking otherwise, with the casting clearly sparking off each other and responding to each others performance. The voice-acting is very good on these two episodes. The cast seem to be putting in that extra effort to round out the characters. Stand-outs here I would say are Gary Chalk, who puts in a good shift as Optimus Primal, Ian Corlett (whose Cheetor has exactly the verve and energy that the script needs from him) and Scott McNeil – giving us two of the most aurally distinct performances in the form of a half-samurai, half-Klingon dinosaur and a petty criminal rat from the Bronx. Those are the performances that leap out at me but really the whole cast put in a good shift, creating a set of somewhat larger than life characters who shake out well as an ensemble over the course of the two episodes.

“Beast Wars” also does have one of the most entertaining cliffhangers in action-adventure animation – when Dinobot shows up insisting that he has defected from the Predacons to lead the Maximals it is one of those moments of genuinely entertainingly bonkersness. It seems like the characters are as taken aback as the audience at the sheer gall that it demonstrates. It becomes abundantly clear though that this is squarely in character for Dinobot – he has bearings of chrome steel, even if he doesn't have much in the way of common sense chips to back them up.
Actually, rewatching these two episodes now one thing that does strike me is the fact that for all the fan dislike of him, Cheetor is not the least likeable character on the show. That honor surely has to go to Rattrap – mutinous, surely and self-interest to the point of being quite content to let his comrades die rather than risk his own hide. He is the last person I would want by my side in a crisis and seems to me to be genuinely unpleasant person. Of course, as a character I think he is great – he bounces off the rest of the Maximals wonderfully and adds a distinct note to what would otherwise be a terribly clichedly heroic band. I love having him in these fifty minutes of television, I'd hate to have to work alongside him though.

Of course, "Beast Wars" does have its low points - the scene where the Maximals show off their new beast modes and adopt their new names is fairly horrible, ripe with dialogue that the voice-actors can't save(and they seem to know it). The first battle between Predacons and Maximals is, as I mentioned earlier, sadly very static and flattly directed. Optimus Primal's closing speech is also inadvertantly hilarious - "Let is be called BEAST WARS!".

Nevertheless “Beast Wars” is, by my lights, a strong start to new chapter in terms of “Transformers” animation. The CG is ambitious in terms of the budget and the available technology, and the voice-acting is some of the best to be had in “Transformers” series. Not going to be everybodies cup of tea, but I have a lot of time for it and I feel it was a strong foundation on which they could then build the actual series.

(Admittedly I may be biased, these two episodes are the pilot for the show that brought me back into the “Transformers” fold so I will always have a soft spot for them.)

Karl

Karl

[The Doctor]

A few points:

- I find the part 1 cliffhanger to be a real dud, personally. It just sort of thuds on to the screen without much surprise or wit. Otherwise the writing is quite smart for what it is.

-Yes, the CGI is now very dated but what helps it work today and adds a lot of weight to characters and scenes is the sound design, which is strong here and only gets better later on. Try watching it with the sound turned down low then again with headphones and note the difference. In particular, any scene on the Axalon. A lot of kids shows of that era (and some other TF shows) have really duff sound editing/design.

-Similarly, the voice acting/direction does a lot to lift scenes now very dated visually, ie the opening space battle.

-"LET IT BE CALLED BEEEEEEEEEEEAST WAAAAAAAAAAAARS!" is a splendid moment of camp.

-Ralph

[legios]

Aug 20, 2008 9:38:02 GMT The Doctor said:

A few points:

-Yes, the CGI is now very dated but what helps it work today and adds a lot of weight to characters and scenes is the sound design, which is strong here and only gets better later on. Try watching it with the sound turned down low then again with headphones and note the difference. In particular, any scene on the Axalon. A lot of kids shows of that era (and some other TF shows) have really duff sound editing/design.

Indeed, they went over-and-above the call of duty in terms of some of the sound work for the show. Have a listen to the transformation sounds, there is some nice layering of the hydraulic sounds. Also, the fact that just about everyones weaponary has a distinct soundscape to it (from the "plunk" of Waspinators pop-gun to the "rattle" of Rattrap's gun) is a very nice touch. A lot of shows would have given you "generic lasergun noise" and been done with it.

Karl

[Deleted]

I haven't seen many BW episodes but the ones I have seen I have been impressed with. It is certainly an excellant series and one that walks all over the original G1 cartoon.

[Andy Turnbull]

I missed the first episode when it aired on terrestrial tv and ended up waiting years to see the first episode.

Naturally now the CGI looks dated (probably why Beast Machines opted for a more stylised approach) but it holds up well enough. The characters that do get some time on screen to speak are well rounded enough. There's not much hint of the ineptitude of Waspinator or the see-saw intellect of Scorponok just yet. Arguably the Maximals get the better hand with characterisation early on (as the heroes it's to be expected), Megatron and Dinobot shine even in this early setting.

A couple of clunky lines not withstanding the two episodes are a cracking opener to the show and as Ralph has pointed out there's a lot of attention paid to the sound design and the VA's all put in an appropriately good shift, the Connery inspired Megatron being a particular favourite of mine.

Andy

[Bogatan]

Gah must go and buy BW from somewhere I do not have enough on video. Should first pickup G1 season 3 and continue the in order thing.

Very much loved Bw and well all three of mainframe 90's shows really.

Andy

[Deleted]

The only BW episodes I have ever seen are the few ones that have been shown on Channel 5 a few years ago and the smattering of episodes released onto R2 DVD a few years ago. The DVD releases had the last two or three episodes of Season 2 and the opening four or five episodes of Season 3 plus the pilot Season 1 episode as an easter egg. I have been threatening to get the BM DVD boxsets for a while now now but have always put them off.

[grahamthomson]

This week...

'B.O.T.'

[The Doctor]

I'm trying to remember which one that is. Er, is it the one where some annoying as fuck kids build a bobot out of spare parts?

-Ralph

[grahamthomson]

That's the one.

This episode is the very epitome of 1980s misogynistic, patriarchal society: if a boy doesn't like what a girl says/does he is free to tie her up, gag her and stuff her into a potato sack.

Actually, I don't think they ever showed her being freed, so for all the viewer knew, she could have died in there.

[Deleted]

This is one of the more sillier throwaway episodes of the original cartoon and not exactly the best one to end Season 2 on. Not exactly one of my fave TF episodes.

[karla]

Swindle should have sold the kids!

[The Doctor]

For the purpose of this thread, I located a copy of B.O.T. on the youtube yesterday. But when I went to watch it today, it had been pulled. I like to think the authorities were looking out for my sanity.

-Ralph

[dyrl]

Dag...

B.O.T. is the ONLY G1 Transformers episode that I STILL haven't seen.

The only thing I "know" about it is that apparently Brawl might be in it.

Pete

[legios]

Sept 4, 2008 21:14:25 GMT dyrl said:

Dag...

B.O.T. is the ONLY G1 Transformers episode that I STILL haven't seen.
Pete

It is one of a considerable number that I haven't. (Being at the end of the second season it is beyond the point at which I decided that the Sunbow toon wasn't really my thing).

Karl

[grahamthomson]

Please; don't try to track it down to watch it if you haven't already seen it.

[legios]

Sept 5, 2008 8:45:22 GMT @grahamthomson said:

Please; don't try to track it down to watch it if you haven't already seen it.

Don't worry. I have no inclination to do so.

Karl

[The Huff]

Can I throw two of my favorite (G1) TF episodes into the mix just to get peoples opinions of them?

Traitor and The Burden Hardest To Bear

I loved these episodes when I was young. In fact, if I had to pick an episode for each series for a compilation DVD for each TF generation/series it would be these two as a starter.
May start another thread on this subject similar to the one about the comic stories.

[dyrl]

I can't really remember Traitor - which one is that?

Burden Hardest to Bear is indeed one of the better episodes.

In fact, it is one of those episode's which, to the credit of season 3, shows what appears to be a semblence of a coherent episode-to-episode plot line. Rodimus Prime's misgivings are - shock - an indication of character development - and it is fairly well executed.

Season 3 was also notable for focusing more explicitly on the Transformers rather than on them being on Earth...

In any event - I can't remember the episode well enough to make anything more than these general and passing comments - but I know I did like it. I particularly remember liking the little dialogue with Dead End towards the beginning (but then again, I like all of Deadend's lines)...

And...er...which one was Traitor?

Pete

[The Huff]

Yeah - TBHTB had the robots (Rodimus/Hot Rod in particular) acting more like real characters with emotions which was nice for the G1 series. It was good to see that Rodimus was peed off with everything and went on a rant about it.
The music used was nice in this ep. too and the words of wisdom from the sensai guy was well done.

Traitor was the one with Cliffjumper not trusting Mirage etc.