Discussing the Future of Transformers Animation

I'll be listening to all things Transformers,

till all are one. This is Stan Bush, signing

off. If you and Mike hello hello, how are you?

Kind of tired especially with having stayed up

so late messing with the new forums that I've

created So we have new forum now cafe spark is

officially closed It is closed no longer to be

used Pretty much everything that's in that old

forum, including your logins and everything else,

are still fully functional in the new forum because

I figured out how to convert it over, which is

awesome. Yes, we burnt Cafe Spark to the ground

and collected the insurance money. Yep, and out

of it came the Nexus. So it's PredaconEmpire

.com slash Nexus for the new forums. Correct

What do we want to start with well, I guess we'll

start off with the New Transformers initiative

for the Hasbro channel is called hunt for the

Decepticons Basically Hasbro's Emerged with new

information on the new well, this is for the

new television channel with Discovery. This show

will be called Hunt for the Decepticons, which

sounds kind of lame, but they've announced that

Transformers and Transformers Revenge of the

Fallen writers Roberto Orsi and Alex Kurtzman

will be working on the content for the new network.

And they didn't connect their names with the

Transformers, but most likely they'll probably

write for that as well as G .I. Joe. Well, it's

either that or they're gonna see if they're gonna

do it again, Joe Well, it's either that or they're

gonna start a Abrams verse Star Trek animated

series Which is out of all the stuff that I've

looked for about this new Supposed new and upcoming

cartoon next year The only thing I found as far

as either horsey or Kurtzman was the fact that

they're Obviously the unnamed Star Trek sequel

I have nothing about them dealing with Transformers

at all. So I'm just taking it as an unfounded

rumor at this point. Yeah, I'd treat anything

like that as rumor at this point anyhow. Yup.

I got something over here. Revenge of the Fallen,

nominated for People's Choice Awards. Oh, good

lord. Oh, man. While I'm not really comp - okay.

I am complaining, but I'm not at the same time

because at least it's not a movie that I've never

heard of. That is true. According to Cybertron

.com, member Dragons has let us know that Transformers

Revenge of the Fallen is up for a People's Choice

Award for best on -screen team. It is up against

the likes of Harry Potter and Twilight. So this

is going to be... Cast your vote by clicking

here and click on the favorite on -screen team

link near the bottom of the page. Wow. It better

win if it's only up against those two other films

because, hello, Harry Plopper and Sparkly Vampires.

Yeah, I would hope Giant Devastator Balls would

win over that. Well, the only thing I could see

stopping The movie would be as horrible as this

sounds. The Twilight movie. Because of the Frick

Fangirl fanbase. Although I would say Transformers

would do much better anyhow just because it's

been around longer and there's such a huge fanbase

in Toy Base that I could see it still beating

out Twilight no matter what. So that's the thing.

you know 25, 26 year fan base and 26 year history

compared to a movie that has fucking sparkly

vampires and only got little girls excited in

their pants when it first came out. I mean, hell,

you could almost compare the Twilight girl fan

craziness to how Female Transformers feel about

Starscream. It's the same damn thing, but you

know Against those two films if the giant robots

don't win. There's something wrong with the world

I would say so what else you got trademark application

for power core combiners. Apparently Transformers

at the Moon reports that Hasbro has applied for

a new trademark. It's categorized as toy action

figures, toy vehicles, and toy robot convertible

and other visual toy forms, which is Transformers.

It could either be a new subline for 2010 or

some new gimmick that they've got for Revenge

of the Fallen or Maybe even something for the

new show who knows at this point Hopefully it's

not like a rehash of like it what it sounds like

to me is it's a rehash of all the old like power

mass Target master all that crap. Yeah Yeah,

that's what it sounds like So really repairs

yeah I'm just looking at Target online because

I'm looking at their prices for some of the Transformers

stuff. Apparently the Black Friday ads have been

released or leaked or whatever. Apparently all

Transformers at Target, the Deluxe class figures

are going to $7 .99. That's pretty cool. I don't

know if it's all brands. of Transformers, if

it's just the Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe, then

I'm not sure that's why I'm searching on target

.com, looking to see what the deal is. Yeah,

because I know that I wouldn't mind seeing some

new Transformer toys, but For the love of God,

could we get off of the Revenge of the Fallen

trip? I'm so tired of seeing Revenge of the Fallen

that it's not even funny. Well, alright, like

I said in Toycast, Episode 23 .5, which is out

now, go to geekcastradio .com. Yes, it's shameless

plug time. But as I said in that episode, the

only movie figure that I actually liked the design

of was Rabbit. and that it's the only movie figure

of movie design that I will ever own. But yeah,

you're right. We need new toys. Actually, it's

funny. I was at Rite Aid yesterday. And I was

just kind of like bombing around. My mom was

back there dropping off a prescription. So I

was just kind of like walking around looking

at stuff. And I happened to walk into their very

minuscule toy aisle. Of course, it's Rite Aid.

It's a drug store. They can have a whole fucking

aisle dedicated to liquor, but they have like

maybe a quarter of a shelf space dedicated to

toys in the toy aisle. And I just happened to

start looking and they had like three, maybe

five or six of the Revenge of the Fallen activators.

They actually had one Transformers universe tank

or and they had a Transformers universe crown

but I'm with it is is that whereas if I went

to Walmart or Target to get these universe figures

they would have been ten maybe twelve maximum

of thirteen dollars after tax here at Rite Aid

they were $17 .99 These are for deluxe class

figures. Sorry, no. It's not gonna happen. Yeah.

Yeah, no. As much as I like Transformers and

I like those figures, I really did. Now, whether

I would actually own Tankor is probably a little

questionable, even though he is a triple changer.

I would probably get proud before I got Tankor,

but at $17? new that's I paid three dollars more

for my Voyager Optimus Prime of course you know

different stores are gonna have different prices

I know that Toys R Us is notorious for sometimes

having higher prices than than other places maybe

this sale maybe this sale hasn't started yet

The only thing I'm seeing that's lower than $40

or $20 is a soundwave figure at $10. Which, you

know, all of the deluxes, when I went to find

my ravages, all of the deluxes that they had

for Revenge of the Fallen were $10. So, you know,

if they're going to cut it again to $7 .99, that's

great, but... But yeah, we need a new toy line.

We need something new. We need something fresh

You know as as I was saying on the other episode

of toy cast when I was doing that You know the

universe line That they're supposedly exposed

to is not has supposed to have died But why would

you kill a line where you can release anything

in it? It's called Transformers universe. It's

not a line It's not a theme -specific line. It's

not like Transformers animated. It's not like

Transformers Revenge of the Fallen. You can release

anything under that banner. You can put the 25th

anniversary marking thing on there and release

anything under that. Why would Hasbro take that

away? That makes no sense. Yeah, it doesn't really

make any sense whatsoever because that would

be the way to go at this point in time. Yes,

it would What else we got else we want to talk

about um I guess we can just jump right in because

this show obviously now is not It is not um Yeah,

it is it is completely discussion based now for

the most part other than when we get interviews

or There's a news topic to be talked about So

pretty much We can just jump right into it. It's

probably not going to be that big of a discussion

today, but yeah Nonetheless, we'll have one and

the reason for this reformatting of all things

transformers is because obviously Revenge of

the fallen is going to fade And I don't mean

that in a negative way, but I mean the hype and

the excitement and everything else I mean the

DVDs out people can watch it whenever they want

to You know and Honestly, the news is is is dropping

Really? There's no news outside of comic book

news and toy news While I enjoy transformers

toys a lot of the toy news is not stuff that

I want to talk about I mean it it's mostly unfounded

rumors of you know difference And I'm saying

this to me mean different. You know third -party

companies or knockoff companies that are releasing

stuff, or that are giving us updates on stuff.

And I don't mean that in a negative way at all.

I think Vance Project has done an awesome job

with the stuff that they've done. I want that

Shadow Commander armor, tin -tin, if anybody

wants to get it for me for Christmas. But anyway,

I'm actually losing my voice here. Wow. First

time in almost over a year of podcasting that

I've almost lost my voice. That's crazy. So what

do you want to discuss? What do you want the

discussion about to be? Well, I was thinking

we could discuss our ideas and thoughts for the

new Transformers cartoon and who we think they

should have come as writers, voice actors. whether

they should drop the mold of certain characters

and just start over? I think, well, my main idea

stands true, I think. Of course I know it'll

never happen, unfortunately, but I want a shattered

glass animated show. Because I want to see the

animated characters in the shattered glass colors.

Hell even just a shatter. It doesn't even have

to be the animated design type just a just take

from the comic and Even if they don't make a

cartoon series out of it if they made a movie

out of it You know just like a you know 70 minute

animated film That features the characters from

the BotCon 2008 comic book I would love to have

that I think that as far as voice actors for

that idea, Peter Cullen could pull off a very

dark Optimus Prime because he did a very, very

dark voice for Carr in the 2008 Knight Rider

TV show. You know, I would really enjoy that.

You know, that's one of my, I haven't read a

lot of comics lately or really ever in my entire

life. I'm not, you know, not that I don't like

comics. I was more into action figures and movies

and stuff like that than I was into comics, but

the BotCon 2008 Shattered Glass comic is probably

my favorite comic ever, as of this point right

now. And I would like to see that translated

to another medium, whether it's animation, whether

it's a stop, hell, if somebody wants to make

a stop motion thing with their toys, I'd love

to see that. That would be kind of cool. but

i would like to see a shattered glass animated

something whether it's like i said a movie or

tv series whatever unfortunately i know that's

not going to happen because hasbro would be like

well that's technically confusing kids saying

that is bad and good is good or you know you're

basically taking optimus prime who has been good

you know you know hero for twenty five years

and basically saying oh he's a villain now But

I still think it would be a good contrast and

something way different than they've done before.

Yeah, I would like to see them do something completely

different and not just keep going back to the

same old mold of what they seem to keep falling

into. It just seems like they keep rehashing

the same thing over and over. They need to just

do something new. Have either a new writing team

come in or one that's experienced with the Transformers

franchise. Yeah. I mean, shit, you even saw when

they brought in Bob Ford and Larry DiTillio for

animated. It actually got better. Oh, yeah. I

mean, I will. Probably gonna have to write something

up kind of Not really apologizing but kind of

going back on my original write -up of animated

because Looking back on it now after we've gotten

season 3 That is just outside of g1 beast wars

and beast machines. That's my favorite transformer

show I Mean that show is just so awesome and

it's a damn shame that it only lasted For three

years or three seasons and of course, you know,

it's fucking Cartoon Networks fault because they

want to go CN real Yeah, don't even get me started

on the CN real bullshit. Yeah, we're not gonna

go there That's it. That's an entirely different

topic right there Yeah It's just I don't know.

I don't know what else they could do because

if they're wanting to keep it like cars You know,

vehicles that turn into robots. It's probably

going to be another series. They could do a whole

other fiction. Kind of like what Beast Wars did.

Originally, I've read, originally they wanted

Beast Wars to be completely different from G1.

They originally had no intentions of tying Beast

Wars and Beast Machines into Generation 1 whatsoever.

And then, I guess, at that time, Fan Outcry said,

no, we want this, we want that. And that's how

we got the story of the end of Season 2, beginning

of Season 3, Beast Wars, where they came in,

and then optimal situation, and all that. Looking

at some of the stuff on YouTube recently. So

yes That's another thing somebody wants to get

me for Christmas the three seasons of Beast Wars

on DVD. That'd be great, too Yes, because then

we could review them. Yes, then we can actually

start the the much -anticipated Beats Unleashed

podcast which was supposed to start this year

in it Yeah, that's that's due to other reasons.

Well, not only that. I mean it's mainly due to

the fact that I don't have the DVDs and But but

I mean it is you know you are right that there

are other factors, but yeah that show won't premiere

until next year So yeah, I mean I honestly don't

know what kind of original thing they could do

For 2010 yeah, I don't know either I just would

like to see them do something out of the ordinary.

It just, I don't know, keeps getting rehashed.

It's kind of like beating a dead horse. Just

kind of so. But for like voice actors though,

I'd like to see them bring back like... some

of the old G -Won -ers, like Peter Collin and

even Welker, even if they don't want him to reprise

his role. I don't know how, I'm not sure, like

I know he reprised, obviously, Soundwave and

the Dr. Claw voice for Revenge of the Fallen,

but I'm not exactly sure. Don't know what he's

been doing lately as far as animation because

I haven't really seen his name on a lot of stuff

recently Yeah, he hasn't really been showing

up in the whole hell of a lot I know he's been

doing I mean obviously still doing like scooby

-doo But that's to be you know Obviously that's

something he's gonna end up doing but uh Yeah,

but I mean, yeah, I'd like to see him. I'd like

to see possibly, damn, I can't remember his name.

The guy that did the voice of Rat Trap and Dinobot.

Oh, Scott McNeil. Yeah, I'd like to see them

bring him in. Just bring in a great voice cast

of past and present, creating this new franchise.

Yeah, that would be kind of cool. I don't know.

I mean, even if you couldn't get, excuse me,

even if you couldn't get Colonist Prime, I mean,

still, David Kay did a great Optimist Prime.

Oh, yeah. David Kay to do it. Just as long as

it's not fucking Neil Kaplan, I would be happy.

Yeah. Yeah, I definitely like David Kaye's rendition

of Prime compared to the latter. Hell, you could

even bring Gary Chalk in. Because he did a pretty

good job of prime in the Unicron series. I mean,

yeah, there is Beast Wars, but if you're talking

the original type Optimus Prime where he's the

truck and not the monkey, Gary Chalk did do a

good job of that, I thought. Oh yeah, no doubt.

He made a good Optimus Prime next to the original,

you know of Peter Cullen it it was kind of a

a close tie considering the fact that Cullen

had did the original but these guys are like

David Kay and Gary did the the newer versions

and They actually did them a lot longer as well.

Yeah, they did. Because Gary Chock went all the

way up until 2006, I think. As did David Kaye

as Megatron. Well, yeah, but I meant just as...

Transformers, yeah. No, not even that. I mean,

just as far as just being Prime. Because Chock

was obviously Optimus Primal. and all the other

incarnations of Optimus Primal that you had,

Optimal Optimus and all that other stuff. And

then he was Optimus Prime in the Unicron trilogy,

which again, so did David Kay. I believe they

brought him back for the Megatron role for that

series as well, those three series. So I mean,

if you wanted to shape a series around them being

the voices, I could see that, because... If you

think about it, Gary Chowk and David Kay, as

far as being any version of Optimus and Megatron,

they are the 90s version as to what Colin and

Welker were for us in the 80s. It's just the

way they are. Yeah, and pretty much I just want

to see a series that isn't kid -based, doesn't

focus primarily on freaking humans I mean granted

I know you have to have them for the show just

because kids are what they consider to be the

primary demographic but in the end it's you know

usually us that keeps it afloat oh yeah so I'd

like to see them actually you know eliminate

most of the human bullshit Go back to like I

mean shit Beast Wars in itself It had those early

it didn't have Yeah, I mean it had them but they

they don't really count. No, I know I know they

don't count You know if you just go back Go back

as far as g1, you know, you can have like like

one -shot human characters Like the generic construction

worker, white shirt jean and yellow boots. You

know, that's fine if you want to do that. But

as far as directly dealing with the Autobots,

or the Decepticons, have like a spike and a spark

plug, or just, you know, a few main characters.

While I enjoyed animated, there were too many

humans. You got Sorry, Fanzone, what's -his -name,

Sumdac, that dumbass Powell, Masterson, all that

crap. Yeah, Masterson was completely unneeded.

I'm sure there are a few people... As was Powell.

I'm sure there are a few people right now screaming

at their iPods, no he was the best, it was the

headmaster and all that stuff. I know a few people

that I talk to are fans of Masterson. Yeah well,

that's Satan's incarnate. They were both like

in the angry archer. I mean yeah I know they

were doing like nods to like people in the franchise

but that was just, I'm sorry, that was just totally

stupid. If it weren't for the fact that I'm a

die -hired transformers fan. I would have said

This series and just went the other way well

again. I have to say since I have the the transforming

rollout DVD and then the season one season two

sets you actually have to go But if you go back

and you watch it from the beginning like I said

like I've said in the past my main problem with

animated the cartoon was That I can never catch

it to be caught up and and to get into it because

it was at first it was only it was already it

was on at 1030 in the morning on Saturdays I'm

asleep or just waking up or I've slept past that

time you know so but you know you should get

the DVDs and and and watch it from the beginning

because it is a very intricate story I wouldn't

know it I mean it is good Don't get me wrong,

but I just... Some bad parts in it. There's a

lot of bad parts in it until season three. I

think the one villain that I cannot really stand

the most is probably Professor Princess. That

was the one that kind of just... That was when,

for me, that's when animated jumped the shark,

supposedly. And I think when they got to end

of season two with the whole... Megatron or rise

of Megatron or make I I don't know it was something

It was that Megatron two -parter. I can't remember

it off top my head now And again, I know people

are screaming at their iPods or iPhones or iTunes

or computers saying oh is this what was this

I? You know the whole when they really introduced

the the space bridge stuff at the end of season

two going into three You know that's when I actually

started getting into it. You know, if I go back

and I watch the beginning, I'll have to see.

There may be, now I'm just teasing this out,

I'm not saying this is going to happen, there

may be an animated review coming that just depends

on whenever season 3 is released on DVD. I did

ask Dave and Gort, Dave Lambert and Gort Lacey

over at tvshowsondvd .com on their Facebook wall.

I asked them, I said, has there been any news

or is there anything indicating that season three

DVDs are coming soon? And they replied to not

at this time, seeing as how season four never

happened and we're not really sure how they could

tie it into Revenge of the Fallen being out.

Maybe when the next cartoon series comes out

they'll release the season 3 DVDs You would think

that they would just release them anyway since

it's already been what six six to eight months

of showing them Yeah, but you know I understand

it takes you know it takes that time six to eight

months to get get them off the Masters and get

them on the DVD and if they're gonna have Derek

J Wyatt or David Kay or whoever come in for maybe

commentaries or interviews or whatever. I understand

all that takes time, but you know me, must have

instant gratification now. It's just like this

Mighty Mugs shockwave thing. Proto Man basically

shattered my dreams of actually hoping to get

that Mighty Mugs shockwave this month, because

BBTS says that their pre -orders are in. You

can pre -order it. And it's estimated to arrive

this month, November 2009. Proto Man told me

that usually means you're not gonna get it until

January. Which sucks. But, you know, I understand

it takes time to make these things. I was actually,

I had pulled up Gary Chock's IMDB page. And it's

very funny, he and Scott McNeil both did an ATV

show called Angel and the Bad Man. which was

a TV show this year. I've never heard of this

show. Gary Chock also starred in a episode of

Supernatural. Yes, he did. No, it's not. It's

not, unfortunately. Yes, unfortunately. No, not

unfortunately. Spawn of Satan. Yes, that's what

Smallville is. I don't know, that's what Supernatural...

You had it right the first time? Yeah, no, no,

no, shut up. Anyways, um... The only upcoming

thing I see for Chalk is the Saints of Mount

Christopher on Falls, whatever that is. So, yes.

Apparently, Smallville, you know, I know this

is a tangent, but apparently it's getting good.

I don't know. I'll just wait until the season

9 DVDs come out, because, you know, whatever.

Yeah, I don't watch that show. Apparently...

Oh, it's a movie. Okay, never mind. I was looking

at, because you know how these websites have

ads on different pages and stuff? Yes. There's

an ad for The Prisoner, which is a movie on AMC

this Sunday, and at first I saw the ad and it

says Jim Caviezel, which he was obviously, he

played Christ in Passion for the Christ, and

he played, he was in Frequency. Yes, which was

a great movie. Yeah, I love that film. I gotta

get that on DVD. So yeah, do you have anything

else you want to discuss? I haven't even looked

at the timer on it to see how long. No. Yeah,

I'm pretty much done with it, I would say, because

we've kind of got not much to talk about on it.

But there's a lot I'd like to see them do with

the new series. It's just a matter of them, you

know, showing us more information to make more

of an opinion on it. Yeah, because I mean, right

now there really is none. I mean, you know, there

are unfounded rumors of Orsi and Kirkman joining

up and writing for the Hasbro channel. I think

until the actual channel launches, we're not

going to hear too much. I mean, if we do, that's

great, but I seriously doubt that we're going

to hear much about it. Now, obviously, Revenge

of the Fallen is still hot. But obviously, I'm

telling you, by the end of January, beginning

of February, everybody's going to be so burnt

out on ROTF. And it's basically going to be done.

So they're going to have to do something between

February and next fall. Yeah, it's going to definitely

fizzle out. It's just a matter of when. I would

like to let everybody know with this reformatting

of all things Transformers, at some point in

the next few episodes, probably around episode

40 or 41, we are going to be doing three different

commentaries for three episodes of the podcast.

One will be for TF, or Transformers the movie,

the 1986 animated film, and the other two will

be the live action films. The reason why we're

doing them here, is because if I tried to work

them into the MWIRE schedule the nearest time

that we could review them would be sometime May

of 2013 and Transformers 7 would have been out

by then so yeah they will be an ATTF exclusive

commentary not really doing the MWIRE thing but

we're actually going to give you all a DVD commentary

that you can listen to while you're watching

The film, kind of like what This Weekend Geek

is done with hackers, ghostbusters, and stuff

like that. So look forward to that. Probably

around episode 40 or so of the podcast here.

I know you said you wanted to do some more discussion

stuff between this episode and 39 or 40 or whatever,

so. Yes. You can email or call us and leave us

if you'd like us to. If you guys have any suggestions

for topics, we're more than open to talk about

stuff. So you can email us where? You can email

us at podcast at printaconempire .com. And you

can call the voicemail line, 502 -526 -5821.

Yes, and also I need to be updating the Twitter

account for this site, which I'm just going to

use the Predacon Empire one for it, for ATTF.

Oh, fine. It's at Predacon Empire on Twitter.

Yeah, there's not very much updates besides,

yay, have a Twitter and Big Bad Toy Store sponsor.

So yeah, pretty much that's all that's on there

at this point. Yeah, I try to update the. DCR

one and the MYR one and the Tunecast one regularly

but because I no longer have iPhone and I have

yet to get an iPod touch and I don't have my

favorite raw mobile Twitter application which

is terrific I haven't updated a lot lately I

need to start doing that again but I don't know

I just honestly I think and in this topic for

another time and another show or a different

podcast but for me Twitter is kind of like waning

in interest more on Facebook now than I am on

Twitter. I still enjoy Twitter. I love the friends

that I have on there. It's a great communication

tool between friends, but because I don't have

instant access all the time via the iPhone anymore,

it's just like, oh, yeah, I better go on there

and do some posts. Yeah, I don't have much of

anything on there. at this point. I mean, I spend

most of my time on Facebook as well. I mean,

Twitter's kind of dying for me. I mean, it isn't

for me, but I mean, like I said, if I had an

iPod Touch or an iPhone, if I had that Twitterific

app, I would be constantly like I was when I

had my iPhone original. But yeah, I don't know

So anyway, um, I guess we will close this one

else Yes, and be sure to leave feedback on the

forums as well as on the email and voicemail

line So as for now, this is Steve Megatron signing

off