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Post by grahamthomson on Aug 23, 2010 9:43:53 GMT
I had a real trip down Memory Lane at the weekend. I came across a few of my old Ladybird Transformers books. I cherished these as a kid. I remember getting the first three, along with the cassettes, in a gift set for Christmas. I played and re-played them relentlessly in my Walkman. A quick Google search for the audio from the cassettes yielded this thread on the Allspark forums; www.allspark.com/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t56863.htmlMost all of the stories are there! Yay! Because I never watched the Transformers cartoon as a child, the audio cassettes were quite definitive in forming my love for the Transformers storyline. They also seemed to fit in quite well with the Marvel comic. (The early ones, leastways.) The Autobots and Decepticons were always portrayed as very alien, usually at a loss to explain much of what they encountered on Earth. And the Decepticons always came across as very sinister, especially with Megatron sounding so... old. In short, I loved the Ladybird Books. Have a look at the MP3 files that are linked to from the Allspark and see if they spark any memories! |
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 23, 2010 10:10:33 GMT
Autobot Hostage did have a tape for I picked it up a few AA's ago from Nigel's stall. Alas, I can't find it online. The link for Decepticons at the Pole part 1 alas is fried.
My love for the Ladybird books and tapes knows no bounds! They are the one true continuity!
When I saw the Transformers movie at the cinema I thought the voices and transformation sounds were wrong because they were different from the tapes. And the theme tune was the theme for Transformers (I did not see the show until Uni many years later)
-Ralph
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Post by Bogatan on Aug 23, 2010 10:16:17 GMT
I had most of the books and some cassettes though I know some (maybe all) were American tapes of ....... non... ladybird origin!
Andy
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 23, 2010 10:23:15 GMT
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Post by grahamthomson on Aug 23, 2010 12:20:46 GMT
When I saw the Transformers movie at the cinema I thought the voices and transformation sounds were wrong because they were different from the tapes. And the theme tune was the theme for Transformers (I did not see the show until Uni many years later) The Ladybird theme was the only one I'd ever heard until I saw The Movie at the pictures! |
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 23, 2010 13:22:17 GMT
Same here!
-Ralph
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Post by legios on Aug 23, 2010 20:26:27 GMT
I didn't actually hear many of the Ladybird tapes until recent years. Someone I knew got one for his birthday (from me) but I never owned any myself so they weren't so much a feature of my childhood. In fact, they fell into the same category as the cartoon - something that I knew was out there but didn't see to matter because the comic existed.
Indeed, there are still Ladybird tapes I haven't heard to this very day.
Karl
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kayevcee
Fusilateral Quintro Combiner
The Weather Wizard
Posts: 5,527
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Post by kayevcee on Aug 23, 2010 20:50:56 GMT
I had tapes for the Ladybird version of the Movie, Autobots Fight Back and Laserbeak's Fury. I may have had others but I cannot recall. The only later one I picked up was Decepticons Underground, set on a very alien Nebulos and starring the junior Targetmasters and Quickswitch. It was awesome.
I still have two or three of the tapes at the back of the drawer in my room, but I suspect time has not been kind to them.
-Nick
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Post by Dark Stranger on Aug 24, 2010 12:19:07 GMT
Graham & Ralph - we're all of a similar age, how on earth did you guys not manage to watch Wackaday and the Transformers cartoon?
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 24, 2010 12:36:23 GMT
I wasn't allowed to watch TV in the mornings. This rule was only relaxed on special occassions, such as the Peter Cushing Dalek movies!
Didn't have a video player so never saw the VHS tapes either of the show.
-Ralph
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Post by jonathan85 on Aug 24, 2010 12:43:17 GMT
Ah, this takes me back.... I got loads of the Ladybird books when younger, the only one missing was Decepticons Underground. Eventually won it on eBay several years ago, after I started to doubt it even existed! Can now boast a complete collection, of the books anyway, plus a few cassettes. Read some of them so many times when younger, the Northern Lights one was a particular favourite, as I recall... :-)
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Post by blueshift on Aug 24, 2010 12:51:13 GMT
Decepticons Underground, if taken at face value, is the only officially produced tale of the ending of the Great War! The Autobot victory came when Quickswitch and the Autobot Double Targetmasters found all the Decepticons living in a cave, and so poured cement down, entombing them alive  |
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Post by grahamthomson on Aug 24, 2010 12:56:11 GMT
Graham & Ralph - we're all of a similar age, how on earth did you guys not manage to watch Wackaday and the Transformers cartoon? I was born and raised in a military base in Germany, so while we had the BFBS* channel, most of the channels were in german or dutch. Thus the television was never on when I was growing up, so I didn't really watch it. I was always more of a bookworm anyway, and was relentlessly picked on at school by the time we moved to the UK for not knowing what was on telly the previous night. *British Forces Broadcasting Service... which broadcast the 5.45 ITN news at 6.45 local time and confused the heck out of me. So, yes. Ladybird books FTW! |
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Post by grahamthomson on Aug 24, 2010 12:57:55 GMT
Decepticons Underground, if taken at face value, is the only officially produced tale of the ending of the Great War! The Autobot victory came when Quickswitch and the Autobot Double Targetmasters found all the Decepticons living in a cave, and so poured cement down, entombing them alive Take that, naughty Decepticons!!! |
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 24, 2010 16:12:16 GMT
Just more proof that Ladybird TF is the one true TF continuity.
-Ralph
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Post by Dark Stranger on Aug 24, 2010 17:13:27 GMT
Cheers lads! I always assumed people got into TFs through the cartoon.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2010 19:34:00 GMT
I rarely got to watch Wacaday as a kid. It was on at 9.25am weekday mornings and half of the time it was on I had to go to school! There was the odd occasion when it was on during the school holidays and I watched the joys of Transformers and Mallet's Mallet before switching over to Channel 4 to watch the schools programmes (don't ask me why!).
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 24, 2010 19:37:34 GMT
Cheers lads! I always assumed people got into TFs through the cartoon. Twas the weekly comic that pulled me in and as I loved reading, the Ladybird books and tapes were also very important in hooking me on the Transformers. -Ralph |
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Post by legios on Aug 24, 2010 20:21:00 GMT
The cartoon was something that I saw a couple of minutes of in the morning before I had to go out the door to school, and Arrival from Cybertron which I saw a couple of times because someone who babysat for my sister and I rented it, so there wasn't really much opportunity for me to be exposed to it. I wasn't even aware that it had been on at Saturday mornings when I was younger. (Not that it would have mattered - Saturday mornings were all about voyaging into town to return one pile of library books and borrow another).
Whereas the comic was much more available, being weekly chunks of story that could be easily obtained on my way into school. As a result, for me the core, foundational, Transformers media has always been the UK comic.
Karl
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primenova
Fusilateral Quintro Combiner
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Post by primenova on Sept 11, 2015 9:02:50 GMT
tfwiki.net/wiki/Satellite_of_DoomNot ladybird book a story book. I read it & the other one with it last night. Could a diamond be used for a power source with redirecting the sunlight? instead of melting mountains.
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The Huff
Thunderjet
Hufferlover
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Post by The Huff on Sept 11, 2015 9:17:20 GMT
I still have fond memories for the ladybird books and (along with the comic) were the original fiction for me. Loved the way the Tansformers were treated like they were alien robots from another planet or something and not just big metal people. Loved the voices too - Megatron really sounded like an old Dalek. Also Huffer and Gears were a lot better portrayed in these then he was in the cartoons or comics.
Does anyone remember the four stories on two tapes with one guy reading and doing al the voices? I have them somewhere and remember one was called 'Bumblebee to the rescue'. They are very similar to the early ladybird stories. Will see if I can dig them out.
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Post by Andy Turnbull on Sept 11, 2015 10:08:07 GMT
Yes, I do The Battle For Planet Earth.
It has random humans helping the Autobots rather than Spike and Sparkplug, but it's still Peter Marinker and co. doing the audio as well. Pretty sure it was released by Pickwick.
Andy
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Post by Philip Ayres on Sept 11, 2015 10:14:43 GMT
While in the Loft at My Mum's last week I discovered a number of Ladybird TF & Action Force books propping up a shelving unit!
I need to figure some way to safely remove them!
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Post by Grand Moff Muffin on Sept 11, 2015 16:00:56 GMT
Yes, I do The Battle For Planet Earth. It has random humans helping the Autobots rather than Spike and Sparkplug, but it's still Peter Marinker and co. doing the audio as well. Pretty sure it was released by Pickwick. Andy It's on YouTube. I found those stories more satisfying than the Ladybird ones. Perhaps in part because they have continuity, each of the four stories following on from the previous one. Perhaps in part because the pictures they create in my head are better than those I saw in the Ladybird books. Martin |
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 11, 2015 20:46:51 GMT
They're very curious those ones. I've always wanted to know what the relationship is between them and the Ladybird ones. They share the narrator and theme music of the first Ladybird releases, but don't have the sound effects or the additional voices. It's liked they're unused Ladybird stories that Pickwick picked up. I've still got all those, they're almost as important to me as the comics.
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Post by The Doctor on Sept 12, 2015 9:35:14 GMT
Yes, I do The Battle For Planet Earth. It has random humans helping the Autobots rather than Spike and Sparkplug, but it's still Peter Marinker and co. doing the audio as well. Pretty sure it was released by Pickwick. Andy Tim and Alan! I am shocked you forgot their names. Shocked! -Ralph |
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 12, 2015 10:18:34 GMT
I just had a look at the Pickwick cassettes. There's no writing credit on the inlays. I'd love to know if they were John Grant ones too. There may have been a cardboard box or sleeve those tapes were originally in which I no longer have, but the tapes and boxes are about as anonymous as they can be.
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Post by The Doctor on Sept 12, 2015 11:33:09 GMT
Back in the day the tapes came in a cardboard box which just looke like the tape cover.
-Ralph
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 12, 2015 12:09:45 GMT
I thought they did. I wonder where that went.
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Post by The Doctor on Sept 12, 2015 17:49:08 GMT
Many years ago I wrote a Ladybird Books era fanfic. Long since lost a few hard drives ago though. I know it was in a fanzine but I forget which one.
-Ralph
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