posted
Ultra Magnus, I'm sure that "decrease mass" was meant instead of "decrease weight." In any case, Astrotrain was a triple-changer. He had his robot mode and two vehicle modes. Those two vehicle modes were a locomotive and a space shuttle. He's similar to Springer, who could transform into a helicopter and a car.
-------------------- The philosopher's stone. Those who possess it are no longer bound by the laws of equivalent exchange in alchemy. They gain without sacrifice and create without equal exchange. We searched for it, and we found it.
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posted
There's a lot of animation errors like the characters showing up after dying.
Two examples:
When the Battle of Autobot City is raging on they show perceptor in the distance firing and then a Transformer runs by close to the screen, you can just see the legs but they are the Pterodactyl feet at the knees from Swoop, the Dinobot. The Dinobots and Prime arrive on Earth the folloing morning.
Sunstreaker is seen helping Kup erect the warning sign near the beginning and 'arrives' with Prime after the city battle.
OK, three examples:
When Galvatron attacks the city, watch briefly for the only Dinobot not used in the film to make a cameo: Snarl, the Stegosaurus. Not seen before that point in the film, not seen afterwards. (but shows up in the third season.)
posted
Regarding the mass issue, the most common explanation is that each TF has a subspace pocket keyed to their specific use. We frequently see their sidearms appearing in a flash of coloured light in their hands from out of nowhere throughout the series. That's where Prime's trailer goes, where Soundwave (and Blaster) stashes his cassettes, where Soundwave and Megatron dump their excess mass when they transform to their much smaller alternate modes...
--Jonah
P.S. Meggie was a Walther P.38 -- with add-ons -- not a Ruger.
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
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posted
This is also a convenient excuse for the changes some of the transformers go through. Hot Rod to Rodimus Prime, for example, or the brief conversion to neutron energy. And if you accept the Beast Wars continuity as part of the main TF universe (I do), many trasformers are basically compased of a mass of nano-sized machines that can be reconfigured under the correct curcumstances, explaining some of the impossibilities some of them go through when they transform between modes or incarnations.
posted
Insecticons also create clones, so it's possible that the clones were the ones thrown out into space. Except they talked, and the clones couldn't talk. Except that they couldn't talk in 1986, but they might have learnt to in 2005.
Strage though that Galvatron is fully aware of having been Megatron, and keeps much of his personality and mannerisms (or at least until he goes stark raving mad), but Scourge and Cyclonus don't.
For Astrotrain and the "jettoson some weight" line, it's possible that it wasn't a straight line to Cybertron. If he had to turn to get around a black hole (say), or fly through an asteroid belt, then the weight comment might make some sense.
It's also not mentioned (even in TF fan groups, AFAIK), but Astrotrain can apparently travel FTL. Unless we are to assume that Cybertron is right on top of Earth.
I can't make up my mind if the Quintesson-creaation story was stupid or brilliant. I do prefer the comics version though. And the comic Galvatron too, but that's because he killed lots and lots and lots of people, whereas cartoon Galvatron managed...one. Which is a lot more than most of the Transformers engaged in this bitter war, to be fair.
Armada causes pain. PAIN!
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posted
My preferred TF origin story is a melding of the two. Primus and Unicron are two ancient entities that came from the previous universe/an alternate universe. They are opposing archetypes, chaos and order, creation and destruction, etc. Primus sees their fight won't end through main force, and dives into a metallic planetoid, imprisoning himself. Unicron thinks he's up to something and follows suit. Thus Primus succeeds in trapping the Chaos-Bringer.
Over the millennia, both learn to exert their wills/auras/whatever to manipulate their prisons. Primus is content to stimulate the origin of mechanical life that will one day lead to the TFs we know, and that will be more potent against Unicron that Primus himself, and then puts himself to sleep so Unicron won't find him. Unicron, meanwhile, is reshaping his prison into a new body for himself.
Then, millions of years later, now that Primus' prison has evolved into a thriving ecosystem and civilization -- the Quintessons come along and f*** everything up. They conquer the planet, enslave the inhabitants, and re-educate them over the following centuries to come to believe the Quints created them, and that their lot is to be servants. The genders are segregated, so they won't learn they don't need the Quints to reproduce. The females are marketed as domestics (being more aesthetically pleasing), while the males are good manual labourers. Many non- or semi-sentient drone vehicles are made during this time, too, to ferry potential customers, goods, and so on, and much of the wildlife becomes uncommon, if not extinct.
There is of course unrest, but nothing ever comes of it. But then, at some point under Quintesson rule, one of the labourers tries to get away, and hides from the Quints' enforcers down one of the tunnels the Quints cut to explore the subterranean (or whatever term is appropriate) environment. This cutting is the eighteenth approach they made to the core, and so they designated it "Vector Sigma". At the planet's core, the Quints found a glittering sphere that contained great power, but they weren't able to activate it, so they stationed guardian drones to make sure no one else found it. Well, our wayward slave manages to evade the guards, and finds himself in the presence of "Vector Sigma" -- who wakes from his slumber long enough to say somethign along the lines of "I am Primus. I created Cybertron, and all life on it. You are the first of my creations to find me. To you I impart this portion of myself, a matrix of my very essence. Use it to lead your people. Use it to create new life, as I did. And guard it well, for one day one will rise from your ranks and use the power of the matrix to light your darkest hour."
So the slaves rebel. They drive the Quints off Cybertron. Their brand becomes a badge of remembrance. The Brotherhood of Decepticons forms of like-minded individuals who believe Cybertronians should expand and conquer -- a perfectly understandable reaction for a recently-liberated people. Thus ends the Golden Age, and thus begins the Civil War. At some point, Autobot scientists crete the secret weapon of transforming, allowing them to slip about without being noticed by the Decepticons. The Decepticons eventually catch on and adapt themselves similarly, and later one-up the Autobots by creating Triplechangers, and eventually the first Gestalt, Devastator.
About this time, Cybertron's energy reserves are dwindling. The Decepticons send out probes to find more sources of energy. These home in on likely planets, scan the dominant life-forms, create five or six new Decepticons from the nascent personality chips included with the probe. These 'Cons set up an energon-collection station, harvest energy, and await retrieval. And if anything threatens the station, they can combine into a big nasty to defend it. This is how I explain the Predacons, Seacons, Terrorcons, and even Insecticons (the probe was damaged in the landing and could only activate three).
The Autobots' answer was to form an expedition to find a new source of energy, but the Decepticons intercepted the ship and they all crashed on Earth four million years ago. Etc.
That about cover all the bases?
--Jonah
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
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quote:Originally posted by PsyLiam: And the comic Galvatron too, but that's because he killed lots and lots and lots of people, whereas cartoon Galvatron managed...one.
You're talking about the UK comic, eh? The issues where the future Transformers (Galvatron and the like) were responsible for causing a rift in time/space was pretty full on. I remember Galvatron going absolutely psycho, and didn't he somehow lose his face? There was some crazy stuff there.
Both the UK and US comics series were generally better than the cartoon IMO.
posted
My own interpretation loses the comics' Primus and Unicron, but keeps most of the stuff introduced in the latter TF and Beast Wars cartoons.
This time around, the Quintessons DO create the Transformers, in the two main classifications - military hardware, and consumer goods. In imbuing their machines with AI, they uniwttingly created receptacles for the fragments of the matrix (Primus), an extra-dimentional being that subdivides bits of itself into each machine via portals/computers like Vector Sigma and the Matrix of Leadership.
The fragments of the Matrix, called sparks in BW mythos, spend their existence as separate lifeforms, accumulating knowledge and wisdom. When they die, the sparks return to the Matrix and enrich it, and the cycles continue. In short, the Quints unknowingly created shells for all this to happen. The ultimate rebellion wan precipitated by what they thought was making their product TOO well, when it fact it wasn't their doing at all.
I am an unashamed Beast Wars and Beast Machines fan! There, I said it!
posted
I rather like the cartoon continuity that an ancient being called Primacron built robotic creations culminating in the monstrous Unicron. Primacron then built the Matrix to destroy Unicron, but it was lost to deep space when Unicron attacked Primacron's lab, nearly killing him.
The Matrix I guess floated through space and ended up in the hands of the 'consumer goods'. Unicron began a quest to find this small piece of technology that was the only thing he knew that was capable of destroying him.
posted
Uh...."Primacron"? Is that from Beast Machines?
Stuff I've seen that looks right: (not including any BW or BM stories)
Quintisons either create or are created by what will become Unicron.
Quintisons are either cybernetic/biological organisms or develop the use of added organics to upgrade their systems.
Quintisons need rescourses and develop the planetthat will become Cybertron by building primitave robots as laborers. Quintisons create a sentient personality to program each robot: Vector Sigma. Vector Sigma considers his new creations his offspring and wants them to be free. Vector sigma begins making his robots more independant.
Quintison culture begins to decline: much of their past science and history is lost as they depend more of teir robotic creations for everyday functions. Vector Sigma begins adding the need for freedom to his creations.
Eventually Quints set up comerce with other races by selling their robots in exchange for technology (withch in turn improves their robots). Quints begin making smarter robots with specializations in combat or slave labor.
Robots overthrow Quintisons.
Combat oriented robots become the first Decepticons and set up a facist rule of Cybertron based on their strength. Civil war ensues.
Servile robots in other cultures either outlive or overthrow their masters.
Vector Sigma realizes the newly-banded together Autobots will fall to the Decepticons and creates the Matrix of Leadership to allow knowledge and abilities from previous Autobots to be passed to new generations of robots. Autobot forces increase in both strength and skill over time due to knowledge passed down via the Matrix. Autobot and Decepticon forces stalemate in endless conflict.
Unicron realizes that the Matrix is a threat to him and seeks it's destruction.
Prime and all the G1 transformers are lost on Earth for millions of years. Cybertron is mostly abandonded by it's non-combative inhabitants: machine world colonies are formed in several systems.
Events of the first cartoon.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
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posted
On a side note: Anybody remember the episode in space with the Autobot Bounty Hunter? All I recall is that is was cool and I really wanted a toy of him (witch was never made).
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
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What I related above is from the original cartoon, Season 3 episode called "Call of the Primitives". Primacron is established as the creator of both Unicron and the Matrix.
It was the Season 2 episode "The Gambler" that introduced Defcon, the bounty hunter!
posted
Huh. I sure missed that one. So Primcron is a kind of machine god? Cool: much better than the hackend old "robots turn on their creators" bit.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
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