Home is Where The Spark Is, Total Meltdown, and Blast From The Past

I got a vibe tells me I should be sitting in

on this scene for a while. My name is Optimus

Prime, and this episode of Transformation Animation

Podcast features Stephen C. Phillips, Mike Blanchard,

and Michael Wilson. Hello, and welcome to Episode

2 of Transformation Animation Podcast. I am your

host, TFJuan Mike, and joining me is Steve Megatron.

Hello. Goodbye. Hello. This is not AOL, thank

you very much. AOL is a dead function. You were

the weakest link. Goodbye. And peek on Court

Michael. Hey, how's it going? It's going. We

just finished an interview with a voice actor

for Transformers Animated, the one, the only,

David Kaye. Very, very cool. Even though Steve

kind of poofed in the middle. That's right, I

like poofing. Is that what the kids are calling

it these days? Something like that. Good Lord.

Yeah, probably all said and done with audio and

everything else, the interview is probably going

to run like close to an hour, but the actual

discussion is like 55, 58 minutes. So very, very

cool to talk with David about animated conventions,

toys, action figures, his Sue Blue impression.

That's awesome. Makes me want to interview Sue

Blue that much more. Yes, we have to get her

on this podcast. Yeah, definitely. I see Steve

is in voice mode tonight. Very close. Yes, I'm

in very good voice mode. So what have you been

up to, Steve, besides going insane? You act like

that's something different. Mostly, I've been

getting people emailing me about... joining up

with other transformer audio plays lately which

is good news yeah that's quite strange to me

because last i thought i was not wanted because

every time i get on a project it gets canceled

um so i'm hoping these actually you know happen

aha and michael hasn't been going into target

and stealing transformers from the back of the

store not at all actually he's actually strong

It's hard. It really is. But no, I haven't been

buying anything lately. I was really hoping to

see that final wave of classics toys, and that

just didn't happen. And since then, all the stores

have been stocking up on movie toys. And although

there are a couple of those that I'm partial

to, I've actually been saving my money. That's

good, I guess. Yeah, the only... The only one

I'm remotely interested in, which I'm actually

kind of getting out of the toy collecting game.

I don't go to the stores enough. I'm too poor

to buy Big Bad Toy Store's inflated prices. Whoa,

hey now. The good people at Big Bad Toy Store

who are sponsoring us, I think. Right. No, no,

no. I mean that with all due respect. I understand

they have to do markup, but you go into a store.

Of course, you know, that takes gas money and

all that stuff or whatever else. But you go into

a store, you find Dark of the Moon Voyager Megatron

for, say, 15, 16, 17 bucks. You go online to

Big Bang Toy Store, you find it for $25 plus

$8 and something shipping. Right. I don't have,

right now, I don't have the financial means to

be buying stuff, so I'm kind of really getting

out of the toy collecting game at this point.

I will say, as far as Dark of the Moon toys go,

the only one that I would really super want is

Shockwave. That Shockwave is amazing. God, is

that an ugly figure. No. You know what? Shockwave

should not have pinchers. you know, for a face.

I don't like it. Can't recommend it. I did get

the Power Glide. I like that one. I was very,

very tempted to buy the Starscream repaint, the

deluxe Thundercracker. Almost bought that one.

I was ready to pull it off the shelf just because

it's Thundercracker and he's blue and red and

he's perfect. But, you know, I said, you know,

I'm holding off. I'm not buying any more Transformers.

I'm not going to do it. I've got like 3 ,000

now. I think I have enough. Yeah. That's funny.

Yes, and I've just been podcasting like normal.

Actually, I'm trying to. I have, for those of

you who may not know, I know Steve knows this,

and I'm not sure if Michael knows this, but I've

been writing poetry since I was about 14. And

back in 2007, I published my first book of poetry.

Which I still have 35 copies of, so if anyone

wants a copy, $15 shipped, send an email to tfqandmygetgmail

.com. I need a new cell phone, damn it. Yeah.

It's like, yeah, we don't give a shit. So, we'll

get into the episodes next. Okay, this is definitely

not me. This party is getting out of hand. Somebody's

gotta shut down that assembly line! This looks

like a job for wheels on heels! Who needs sensitive?

Smashing stuff is fun! Thick -bolted moron. Let

me crush that smile off your face. So first up

is Home is Where the Spark Is. The Autobots continue

to defend the city while making their home in

an abandoned automobile plant. Sari set them

up in. Sari uses her key to accidentally revive

Megatron's head, who promptly learns that Starscream's

betrayal. Megatron controls a small pocket bot

to search for the AllSpark in the Autobots' base.

But when he doesn't find it, he takes control

of the machinery in the plant to kill the Autobots.

The Autobots hold their own and emerge victorious

and ponder who could have controlled the pocket

bot in the first place. Dun, dun, dun. Dun, dun.

Yeah, that pretty much covers it. Thanks. Okay.

Oh, man. When I first saw this one, when it aired

on TV. I was like, who the hell is this craptastic

character, Angry Archer? Indeed. Really? I was

like, oh, my God. The villains in this show suck.

Forsooth. But then again, you know, we come to

find out later down the line, Angry Archer was

based on Aaron Archer, one of the brand managers

at Hasbro. So I guess it's okay. It kind of looks

like him. Yeah, a little bit. Have you ever seen

a picture of Aaron Archer? Yeah, it kind of looks

like him. It looks like him in a very bad, ill

-fitting Green Arrow costume. It's really sad.

Yes, it is very, very sad. I don't think Aaron

sounds like that. No, he doesn't. He doesn't

talk like an exaggeration. He'd fit right in

at the Renaissance Fair. That's funny. He's a

rejected DC Comics character. Oh, wow. Speaking

of DC Comics characters, why is Optimus reminding

me of Batman? He has a gadget for everything.

He's got his axe, he's got his grappling hook,

and he's got his fire hose thingamabob. I don't

know. Just every time I saw him use that grappling

hook, I'm like, wow, it's Optimus Prime Batman.

Where does he get those wonderful toys? Why is

it when I heard the line that Bulkhead said,

all people want me to do is break stuff, the

first thing I thought of was Limp Bizkit's song,

Break Stuff. I'm not familiar with that one.

How's that go? Yeah, it's... Anyway. We don't

want to hear you sing. That's okay. You know,

I wasn't going to sing anyway. Okay, good. I

like how all the Autobots have different reactions

to their newfound fame. Yeah. Like B loves it.

He thinks it's awesome. And prowl hates it. Grumpy

prowl is grumpy. Yeah. Grumpy. Yeah, one of the

things that I noticed with the Autobots is you

have key characteristics. For each character,

you have a certain characteristic. Optimus, he's

a young leader who's learning as he goes. Prowl

is the zen -like bot who prefers to sit back

and watch what is around him. Ratchet, well,

he's Ratchet, dammit. His character hardly ever

changes in Transformers history. He's the cranky

old bot. Bulkhead, the bot who can't get out

of his own way and always ends up messing stuff

up. And Bumblebee, the bot who is always about

speed and being a dick. Pretty much sums it up.

Gosh. You're a little hard on the beaver there,

Wally. Wow. I'm not even going there. I'm just

not even going there. Leave it to Beaver. Oh,

man. A little rough on that. Sharon Stone, Basic

Instinct. Yeah, yeah. Let's go. Oh, that was

the gratuitous. And a lot of people, I don't

know, but I know some people didn't really agree

with Prowl's characterization because he has

a way different character base in this series.

And we'll find out why that is later, not to

spoil it for anybody. But to the first -time

viewer, the whole Zen thing could be really off

-putting. I don't think so. I mean, we can't

assume that this is the G1 character. True. Considering

that Optimus Prime is a captain of the ship and

that leader of everybody, that alone throws all

of the characterizations from G1 out the window.

That's true. So with this particular character,

you have to take it with a grain of salt. He's

the loner type. He's not used to working in a

team. We find out straight from the get -go that

he's the first to jump in and try to do everything

himself. So of course he's going to want to spend

more time alone and just enjoying his own surroundings.

Yeah. And yeah. No matter how many – and when

I wrote that note about Prowl being Zen, it was

the scene where he and Optimus are talking and

Prowl is talking about being one with nature

and watching the cat stalk the bird or whatever

else. And of course Bumblebee pops up in the

middle. Yeah, what are we talking about, guys?

Yeah, he's still a dick. That's just a terrible

way to put it. He just is. No, I think he's just

very energetic. At a certain point, maybe you

could consider him to be obnoxious. But I think

that he's just wanting to be in the middle of

things. He wants that attention. He goes pretty

far to get the attention later on. Like I said

in the first episode, last episode, last week's

episode, It's going to take me a while to actually

get to like Bumblebee because I cannot stand

him at this point. So we switch gears and we

have Megatron awakening. What? Who? Where? Where

am I? What am I looked up to? How did I get here?

Why are the Autobots still online? Starscream!

Yeah, that would suck. It's like, am I dead?

I don't think I'm dead. Oh, look, there's Starscream.

He's ratting himself out because he's a dumbass.

Yes, okay. He just gets busted right off the

bat. He's thinking, you know, if I had my pimp

hand... Oh, there it is. It's somebody's freaking

chair. Wonderful. Okay. My pimp hand's strong.

My pimp hand is strong and it's Sumdak's ass

warmer. Wonderful. Get off my hat! flesh creature.

I'm using it as my commode. Stop it. Stop it.

I wasn't really happy with the way that Sari's

ki wakes up Megatron. It's like as if this isn't

an overused plot device already. Well, I mean,

we can all agree. Even Kevin doesn't like it,

but we can all agree from the get -go. I mean,

this isn't like, you know, go -to seasons. have

a movie, introduce this huge plot device in the

Matrix of Leadership, and then use it throughout

Season 3 and Rebirth. This isn't like that. They

have this feature movie, they introduce it because

she gets it in the movie, and by the time the

end of the movie, she's already used it twice,

once on Prowl, once on Prime, and it's just the

biggest plot device in this entire show, and

it's just getting old and annoying already. Yeah.

Anyway. So Megatron uses the pocket bots, and,

you know, some decks' response to this is, ooh,

wow, I didn't think I fixed these pocket bots.

You would think that pocket bots would be commonplace.

You know, giant robots, not giant robots, but

let's say regular -sized garbage can robots are

commonplace. Police bots are commonplace. But

little tiny, you know, let's say insecticons,

for lack of a better term, those aren't... normal

household fixtures by now? I guess not. Eh, surprising,

considering that in the intro they were working

on nanobots. Right, but the other thing is, like,

in the beginning of the episode when Sari first

goes to his lab and first breaks in with her

key, which, again, ugh. But she first breaks

in and... She stands in the doorway and then

he comes up and he's like, not even you are allowed

in my private lab, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And he's like yawning like he's been sleeping

for days or he hasn't had any sleep in days or

anything. He's been up working for a week straight

and hasn't slept. And he sits there and he drinks

the tea. I got to tell you, that is the worst.

Oh, I'm sorry. I like Derek J. Wyatt's designs,

but I'm sorry. I kind of almost agree with Kevin

when he says his humans are kind of bad. When

some deck is gulping the tea, you can see the

old man crease line in his neck. I was like,

oh, my God, he's going to pop a fucking vein.

But the guy hasn't slept in, like, days. He hasn't

slept in days, I know. So he's like, oh, did

I create these at some point? I don't remember.

I'm not even thirsty. I'd like another one of

those, please. I'm not even hungry. I think I'd

like a horse. If I could bring me a cow, and

I'll cut off the pieces I want and send the rest

home. Yeah, I did not like Sumedag. He's funny.

I mean, I can see why he's there, but yeah, he's

kind of a useless plot device. I like him. He

becomes more important later. Yeah, he's okay,

but just in this specific episode, it's like,

really? I like him. I think he's an interesting

character. Well, poor Prowl. Prowl just can't

get a break. No, he can't. No peace and quiet.

He can't watch his nature documentaries. He can't

sleep in a tree. No one's giving him a break

here. I kind of feel bad for him. Yeah, he just,

man. I can see why he's frustrated. And of course,

half the time his frustration comes from, oh,

guess who? The dick of the show, Bumblebee. Still

being rough on the bee. I'll admit, I don't care

for him all that much in the show, but he does

become more likable the more he progresses. I

agree that he does become more likable, but as

of right now, he is the biggest douchebag in

Transformers history. I mean, Bumblebee is second

only to Kicker at this point in my mind. Oh,

God. It's so rough. I don't know. In this episode,

Not to get too far ahead of ourselves here, but

he has a learning experience. And in the next

episode, he has a learning experience. And, you

know, he grows as a character continuously. Now,

granted, three or four episodes down the road,

he's going to relapse and be an idiot again.

But he's progressing. Bumblebee is the... He's...

He's kind of like Spider -Man. Spider -Man is

not as bad as Bumblebee in the dick area, but

it's one of those things where Spider -Man has

all this growth, and then something, just some

big thing will set him back and just take all

that care. Oh, God. No, it's a better reference

if I do it this way. Bumblebee is the animated

version of Shia LaBitch. Ah, they sigh. You go

a little too far on that one. I know. My final

And that's at the beginning scene when Sarai

first does the slumber party. I did like how

Bulkhead tried to get into her sleeping bag.

It barely fit over his toe. No, it didn't even

fit over his toe. Oh, my God. Steve, what do

you have for this one? I have, well, I like Megatron

and his big, glowy, like, purple and blue electrical

self when he comes back online, and he looks

fucked up. Oh, yeah. But it almost, in a sense,

kind of reminds me of Beast Machines. Not necessarily

the fact that he's kind of fucked up, but the

sense that... I mean, he kind of has a G1 -esque

look to him, which, I mean, that's pretty much

typical of all Megatrons. But he has more of

a Beast Machines tie, just because when he comes

online, he ends up connecting to a bunch of networks

of machines. and causing problems for the Autobots.

Right. Oh, yeah. I can see that. Because he's

plugged into a computer, and that's the only

way he can... Good call. Where's my body? What

antiquated system am I hooked into? I like one

of his jokes. He had, You Autobot fools are the

keepers of the AllSpark? This must be some cosmic

joke. Angry Archer, like I said, rejected DC

Comics character. Don't care for him at all.

That gets thrown into the lot of all the rest

of the human villains, which I could care less

if they were in the show. In retrospect, I kind

of like how they throw in a couple human villains

for the group to kind of whet their appetite

for. get their feet wet with. Because they're

not heroes, right? They're stepping into this,

you know, not really, you know, they're a janitorial

crew in space. So these human villains kind of

give them a little bit of a taste of what it's

like to be heroes before the Decepticons show

up and trounce their asses. Yeah. I mean, the

human villains... by themselves i think the only

one so far and and we'll get to this eventually

princess that's the only one i cannot stand out

of all the human villains that's the only one

i cannot stand might be my favorite oh god only

because mike doesn't like it i have to take the

opposite stance of blanchard yes no i Whereas

Transformers Prime did the human element right,

I don't think this exactly hit it. I understand

they were going for a kid point of view, but

I still don't like it. I like Megatron's coming

back online. I am Megatron! Kind of like the

movie. Yeah, he's kind of like... But in this,

it's almost better than the first movie where

he immediately says it. Hugo Weaving immediately

says it. But in this, Corey Burton's version,

he's like, I am mega, mega. It's kind of like

he's stuttering. And I like that a lot. That

was cool. Well, he's damaged. He's coming to

terms with the fact he's not in front of Prime

anymore. Yeah. Sorry. No, go ahead. I think I'm

messing up my judicious use of mute. I'm sorry.

I was clearing my throat there and then it occurred

to me I might be live. Sorry. Well, it's better

than being dead. Feel free to edit that out.

But it's better than being dead. Yeah, sorry.

Yeah, that's happened to me before, actually.

Didn't like it. I like the computer references

that they have in this. Looks like somebody forgot

to defrag his hard drive. Yeah. Even though it's

antiquated, it's just still cool to see in there.

I don't like the Twister thing. I'll just be

honest on that. I think it's... I mean, again,

this is more so catered towards children, so

I can kind of see where some of these little

stupid things come up. Well, and the other thing

is, Sari is in her own way. Well, yeah, but that's

not what I was going to say. What I was going

to say was Sari, in her own way, is trying to

teach them about human life and human interaction,

but it's coming from an eight -year -old little

girl. So you have to think, at the time, what

would an eight -year -old little girl be into

and whatever else? You know, this isn't G1. This

isn't... No, and I know everybody knows that

this isn't G1, but... This isn't G1. This isn't

Spike, the 16 -year -old boy who is into giant

robots and wants to help them and teams up with

Wheeljack to create the dino. But this isn't

that. So, I mean, this has its own flavor. I

see where the kid angles come in. But, yeah,

Transformers, especially Bulkhead. Bulkhead should

not play Twister. He can barely walk straight,

let alone play Twister. Yeah. He's like a walking,

foldable, Cosmos, bowling ball figure. Yeah.

I like how Prowl wins at the end. Well, that's

because Prowl is the most agile. He's the ninja.

Yeah, he jumps down and, whoo, I win, and then

jumps away real quick. He's just a little too

bit flexible. Yeah. Where's Alita 1 when you

really need her? Oh, wait, we'll get to that.

Never mind. We'll get to that later. Yeah, we'll

get to that much later. Never mind. What else

did you have, Steve? Well, besides those, I'm

trying to see. Edit point. Don't fuck yourself.

Yes. I like how Megatron eventually reveals himself

to Soomdak and... That doesn't come until later.

Shut your face! I don't care. Now, child, I will

show you true fear. I like that quote. I just

thought that was funny. Yeah, that doesn't happen

until two episodes from now, though. But he reveals

more Cybertronian technology to Soomdak in order

to get a new body. So that Soomdak can learn.

If I teach you, will you learn? Yeah, that's

all I got, though. Thank you, Yoda. I like the

fact that they live in an abandoned auto manufacturing

plant in Detroit. Because that's what Detroit

is known for. And that's pretty much all they're

known for. And it just kind of leads into some

time in the future. their auto manufacturing

just takes a total dive. And, you know, if it

wasn't for, uh, if it wasn't for the, the, uh,

some Dak robotics industry, then the whole city

would just fall into the, into the lake there.

It's very true. I thought it was funny. I thought

it was ironic. Let's say, you know, it's, it's

an abandoned auto manufacturing plant and now

they live in it. Yeah. What I thought was really

strange. I didn't, place this as you know like

a uh an industrial facility i just thought it

was like a big warehouse and it wasn't until

they show all of the mechanical arms and all

the stuff and uh going on and that uh it occurred

to me wait a minute they built cars here so yeah

that was kind of like a duh moment later on but

you know once i figured that out it was like

oh man they're you know, car robots that live

in a building where they used to make cars. Silly.

Yeah. But what's really funny, though, is that

Bulkhead finds himself in a Saw movie. Bulkhead,

I would like to play a game. You know, they tie

him down to a conveyor belt and move him slowly

to a machine that's going to crush his head.

I just thought that was funny. I expected to

see the puppet toddling around on a tricycle.

We really ought to do that. We've got to mash

those two together somehow. I think that would

be funny. But Bumblebee finds out that speed

doesn't always work. He's not going to be able

to just motor his way through everything as quickly

as possible. He has to master the... Prowl's

technique? Stillness. And then strike. Which

I think he did once successfully, and you could

see the beads of sweat coming off his face as

he tried to stay still. He just couldn't do it.

Yeah, and then once he does do it, then that's

the only time he has to do it. I thought it would

have been cool if he would have been like Prowl

did, like four or five times in a row, if he

would just jump and then stop, and then jump

and then stop. but he did it once. And I was

like, all right, he's learning, but it looked

like he was about to drop a spleen. Right. But,

you know, he learns and he disables the assembly

line. So, you know, good for him. But I think,

you know, the key moment that comes from this

is at the end where Bumblebee is starting to

learn from Prowl. Not so much, oh, what a good

lesson, but he's actually learning, he's actually

training under Prowl. At the end. Oh, yeah. I

agree. He's still, his character is not developed

enough for me. I mean, Bumblebee. Oh, well. He

gets there towards the middle of this episode,

but just those. few beginning scenes is just

like, well, his dickery have no end. It doesn't

end anytime soon. Find out next week on Transformers

Animated. Do we have anything else for Homers

where the spark is? Uh, no. Oh, you know, I thought

the, uh, uh, bulkhead quote was funny where he

said, this earth stuff is hard. It's like, oh,

you have no idea. All right, we're going to move

on. Guess you didn't get the memo about the acid

that melts through anything? Fools! Nothing can

hold me! Suggestions on how to stop him? Hey,

how about using the one thing that stopped us?

Hurry! The auto -defense field! Gotcha! You can't

melt what you can't touch! Let him stew in his

own juices. Big help you were, Bulkhead. Why

don't you just draw a big bullseye over that

oversized chestplate of yours? Gotta admit, kid,

for a little bot, you got a great big spark.

You showed a lot of courage taking that hit for

Bulkhead. Sorry about yanking your crankcase.

I was just having a little fun. Little? Did you

say little? No! I mean... Yeah, no, but I didn't

mean... I may be small, but I'm scrappy. And

I can run in circles around your big old rusty

chassis. You know, I got major skills. It's gonna

be impossible to live with now, isn't it? Oh

yeah, big time. I go like this. And then I be

all like this. So up next is Total Meltdown.

After having his funding cut by Porter C. Powell,

Cyrus the Colossus Rhodes goes berserk during

a demonstration. Prometheus Black experiments

with the fluid leaked by Bumblebee, which results

in Prometheus becoming Meltdown. With his new

melting powers, he vows to eliminate Isaac Sumdack,

but the Autobots prevent him to carry out his

ominous plan. The first thing I thought of was

a Roid Rage episode? Really? You know, I'm getting

ahead of myself here in this one, but Cyrus reminds

me of Bane on Batman. Yeah, and that's really

where my Roid Rage line comes in. It's basically

Transformers version of Bane, but it's less awesome.

He's got the huge drug pumpers on his back. I

mean, he's clearly on Venom. Oh yeah, something

like that, yeah. Well, at least Bumblebee finally

got all the punches I've been wanting to give

him because he got pummeled by Cyrus. Yeah, by

Cyrus Colossus. Yeah, I just did fist bumps in

the air like, yes, yes, yes. Well, what kills

me, though, is we talked about how Bumblebee

loves attention. And he loves the spotlight so

much that he turns to professional wrestling.

I was like, man, how much attention do you really

need? It just seems pretty ridiculous, you know.

But he gets in there and just gets a snot beat

out of him, which was kind of cool. It's like,

who do you call a little guy as he pounds him

in the dirt? But, you know, Sari uses her ki

to heal him halfway through the fight. And, you

know, as if we haven't used the ki enough already.

Would this be considered cheating? Yeah, pretty

much. But then again, I mean, really, then again,

Sarah using her key on Bumblebee is no more cheating

than Colossus Rhodes is doing with his steroids.

So, I mean, it's kind of like an even playing

field here. I suppose, but I mean, you know,

the steroids are built into him. It's part of

him. It's kind of like Bumblebee and the Stingers,

which he really underutilizes here. Yeah. Yeah,

but, you know, the key is completely external

to him. So by him getting a second wind is not

really fair. Not that it helps him any, because

he gets trounced again anyway. See, that's the

thing. That's why I don't consider her using

the key on him during the match cheating, because

as you just said, it didn't really help. He still

got beaten the shit out of. So pounce on him.

But I like how he's... bleeding. Actually, he's

on the ground and he's bleeding from wounds.

Yep. Which I thought was cool. I mean, it comes

back later. You know, he's supposed to bleed.

It's part of the plot, right? But that was funny.

It reminded me of Predator. If it bleeds, we

can kill it. I think Steve probably does a better

one of that. One of the whole A points of this

episode is that it's Prometheus versus Sumdak

and trying to get the city contract for who's

going to patrol the city, whether it's Sumdak's

policed robots or whether it's Prometheus's roid

-raging people. And this is where the reference

I mentioned last episode comes in. So we don't

have a repeat of that unfortunate incident with

the captain's wife. They don't really go into

that. Right, no. But they don't really go into

it. But after Sundax says it, they cut to fan

zone and he just kind of grimaces. And then the

conference is over. And Sundax is like, we'll

talk soon, Captain. My regards to your wife.

I thought that was funny that in Detroit, you've

got a giant robot police officer that looks vaguely

like the ED -209. So you've got the SumDeck Systems

ED -209, and he says, well, he doesn't say it,

but I was thinking, you have 10 seconds to comply.

Like the ED -209, it gets blown up, but I was

kind of wishing that they had pushed that. you

know, the analogy a little bit closer. Yeah.

Let's see here. Okay. I get they have to show

all the Autobots transforming, and eventually

when we get to meet the Decepticons, they'll

have to show them transforming. I'm already sick

of the stock animation of the transform scene.

I already know how they transform. I don't need

to see it again. I was going to say, there's

an episode coming up where they start doing the

tornado transformation. It's not as vexing as

I thought it was going to be. But it's still

like, what are they doing? I'd rather watch the

stock footage than watch them spin around in

a little tornado. I forget what episode it is

when they first start doing it. I'm not seeing

it in my notes right away. So it must be like

7, 8, or 9 or something like that. Yeah, a few

episodes down the line. Yeah, yeah. Once they

start doing it, it's like, ah, what is that?

Yeah. My final note, and the only real smile

I got out of watching Bumblebee was, hey, watch

the paint job, which is a nice G1 Sunstreaker

reference. Oh, yeah. It's when he got hit by,

when Bumblebee got hit by the acid. What else

do we get? What do you got for this one, Steve?

Well, I don't really care for this episode particularly.

I think it's more so, again, another human villain.

Yeah. I just, yeah. This is a cool human villain,

though. Granted, I will give you that. It makes

me think about Blight from Batman Beyond. In

a sense. Oh yeah. He's Powers in Batman Beyond.

Okay. You'd have to see the show to actually

know. Derek Powers in Batman Beyond got toxic

chemicals spilled all over him and he ended up

this radiation entity slash skeleton that was

basically take DC Comics atomic skull. Yeah,

I know. I like that guy. Yeah, this is kind of

like... I see the resemblance now that Steve

pointed it out. That's the first thing that I

thought about when I saw this, and I was like,

yeah, this is pretty much... But it's a cool

take on it. But I still think Batman did it better.

Not a bad villain, though. I would say that if

they had to have any of these human villains

in here, this would be the only one I would accept.

Well, I mean, this is the only one that's really

powerful enough to defeat an Autobot. True. The

other ones are like, you know, talking to him

and they're like, get off my lawn. Well, you

know, it's like, I have a bow and arrow. Or,

you know, just something lame. And this guy's

like, I can melt your face. What's your power?

I can shoot acid at you. I was like, oh, that's

pretty scary, actually. I mean, all he needs

is like a second pair of jaws to come out and

bust through your skull and he'd be an alien.

Wow. Dun, dun, dun. I might be stretching it

with the analogy there a little bit, but no,

I do like this bad guy. Yeah, he is very cool.

And this won't be the only time that we see him,

so very, very cool. Yeah, well, what's cool is

that he comes back with something that's actually

relevant to G1. Yeah, we'll get to that. We'll

get to that later, yeah. Yeah, we'll get to that

much later. But I like how they mix them in.

I mean, this is your classic mad scientist gone

bad. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he's working with the super

steroids and stuff that, you know, he really

shouldn't be toying with. He's toying with God's

domain. You know, and it turns around and it

bites him. They don't actually show him getting

splashed or infected or whatever it is, but it's

like one second he's like, and the next second

he's crying acid from his sunglasses, which is

just messed up. My eyes! It would have been cool

if they would have shown it, but maybe they thought

that it was a little much for little kids or

something. Well, it isn't Batman after all. They

can't show somebody getting killed. I don't know.

They showed... Well, that's later. I'll save

that for later. What else, Steve? Well... I don't

know. I just don't like this episode other than

that. Other than the character, I don't really

care for the episode. And there's yet another

AllSparkKey usage. We should start a count of

how many damn times this key has been used. At

this point, it's... Too many to count. It would

be on three hands. I'll have Kevin go back, and

I'll make him do it, or I'll ask him to do it.

And then we'll keep track from here on out. No,

I'll ask him to do it from here to the end of

the show. Because he always likes pointing out,

oh my god, they're using the fucking key again.

Since Kevin likes to point it out all the time.

Yeah, so we'll have a special sound effect maybe

that plays. It says, all spark key, plot device.

Hello. Plot device goes here. You hear a ching

every time it happens. What do you have for Total

Meltdown, Michael? Well, first of all, you know,

Captain Fanzone is a crooked cop. How do you

figure? Well, it's like at the beginning, he's

got, you know, the skybox seats with Prometheus

Black and he's watching the wrestling match.

And he's like, yeah, thanks for all the gifts

and the blah, blah, blah. And, you know, you're

not trying to, you know, sway the police department,

are you? And he's like, oh, no. Yes, he is. Yes,

he is. And you took every freaking bribe. That's

why you're up there in the skybox. I can kind

of argue that because that was the way that Prometheus

was presenting his method of protecting the city.

Granted, it's more on Prometheus. Yes, Fanzone

is in the wrong for taking this stuff, but it's

more on Prometheus trying to bribe him rather

than Fanzone is an out -and -out dirty cop. Fanzone

is nowhere near. Mr. Training Day over there,

Denzel Washington, thank God. But anyway, continue.

On the one hand, I kind of like that because

he's not the one trick pony. He's not, oh, I

hate machines, and that's his one line. Here

he's actually interacting with other characters

in the show that doesn't involve him hating machines.

So it's like, well, okay, I'll kind of buy that.

And then the whole Fanzone's wife debacle. It's

kind of adding to his character. So that was

welcome for me. The other big part of this episode

was quote -unquote, Bumblebee is little. We get

it. He's short. And the whole time it was puns

or it's like, oh, he comes up a little short.

Even prowl gets in on it and he i forget exactly

what he said but it was it was something funny

uh and ball kid's like oh the ninja bot gets

in a good one you know everybody's in on it and

bumblebee is just so uh overly sensitive about

it yeah you know he's just like what do you mean

little you know it's like oh sorry little guy

oh didn't call you little you know It keeps up

for like 10 minutes. Yeah, it gets old. Yeah,

I don't know what to say. It's adding, again,

to his character. He's the littlest one. I get

it. We sat through three or four episodes of

that in Beast Machines up until Rattrap finally

got the giant ED -209 body from Megatron. Partially,

it makes me wonder... At what point is Bumblebee

going to get a giant ED -209 body? Well, we already

had the ED -209 reference in the police robot,

so... Yeah, but I mean, this isn't helping Bumblebee.

I mean, at a certain point, he gets his booster

rockets. That doesn't help him either, though.

It doesn't really help, no. It doesn't make him

any taller. No, not at all. I'm expecting, you

know, like, Ultra Magnus power armor for him

so he'll be taller than Prime and be like, you

know, that type of thing. This is not Armada,

thank God. That's right. We can't defeat Megatron.

Power up, you know. But again, I did like Meltdown.

The name is Meltdown, you know. I mean, you know

you're a supervillain when you take an Ultra

Ego name, right? And he shoots acid, which is

awesome. I really like that. And he's chasing

Sumdak around. And what I didn't understand is,

why wouldn't Megatron step in and help Sumdak?

You know, considering, from Megatron's point

of view, Sumdak is the only person that knows

he's alive, right? He's the only person that

can help him get his body back. And yet there's

this crazy guy running around shooting acid at

him. Well... As I said before, Megatron hasn't

revealed himself. Megatron's still trying to

figure out what the fuck's going on. I don't

know. I mean, in the last episode, we've seen

that he can take control of machinery. Right.

There's an awful lot of robots running around

in Sumdack's lab. Yeah. Well, that's robots.

This is a guy that spits acid. There's a big

difference. Yeah, I was expecting Megatron, like,

hey, that's my meal ticket. Keep off of him,

or you're going to have to talk to me. But again,

because Megatron has this whole thing, and we'll

get to this next episode, Megatron hasn't revealed

himself to even some deck yet. Yes, Megatron

has interest in some deck, but as I said before,

Megatron's still trying to figure out what the

fuck's going on. That's OK. You're right. Yeah.

He doesn't reveal himself to some deck until

the next episode. Right. So Megatron just wakes

up and sees the Starscream thing and then he

sees the Autobots. His first thought is I got

to go destroy the Autobots or I got to have these

little nanobots go destroy the Autobots. And

I believe it's I believe it's in the end of this

episode or it might be in the beginning of the

next episode where he says to himself, he says,

well, maybe I need to. reveal more of my Cybertronian

stuff to some Dax so he can do whatever. But

it's not until the next episode that we'll be

talking about today that he actually truly reveals

himself. So Megatron going after Meltdown would

have totally fucked the entire story. Right.

Yeah, I'll buy that, sure. Another comic book

tie -in. This is really stretching it. The first

comic book tie -in, you've got Cyrus as Bane

on Batman. The whole thing on Bane is he gets

huge by using a steroid called Venom. Speaking

of Venom, this is where we stretch. Cyrus doesn't

like high -frequency sounds. Just like Venom

on Spider -Man. Yep, the symbiote suit. No, that's

not a stretch at all. Okay, yeah. And that's

like ink on Batman Beyond. Yep. Well, it all

ties back to Batman Beyond. Yep. But no, I'm

putting two and two together in my head, and

I'm like, wow, I wonder. And I'm thinking, you

know, this passed through their minds when they

wrote this. I mean, it had to have. I like Ratchet's

line of... When Optimus tries putting the bell

over Meltdown, and Gratch is like, didn't you

get the memo of the guy who can melt through

anything? That was my first thought was, what

is that bell going to do? Is he going to ring

the bell while it's over his head? I mean, that

would suck, sure, but the guy doesn't have ears.

I don't think it's going to do any good. But

again, Bumblebee learns, and he's progressing

as a character to the point where... He takes

one for the team at the end. I'll give him that.

I'll give him that. He didn't die. The first

20 minutes is like... I'll give him the last

8 minutes of the episode. The first 20? Nah.

He's shown himself to be very brave. At the end

of the movie in the beginning where he throws

himself off the parking garage into the giant

worm thing. Yeah. Yeah, you're going down, you

know. I mean, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, and

here he jumps out in front of the acid shot that

was, you know, meant for somebody else. You know,

as annoying as he can be, he has a heroic streak

in him. He's a brave little guy. I will agree

he has his moments. Unfortunately, his dickish

moments outweigh his good moments at this point

in time. All right, well, just wait. You know,

eventually he's going to be in the elite guard.

Not in the series. He's not only in toy form.

Season four. Right. That's funny. We have anything

else for a total meltdown? Nope. All right. We

are moving on. I can't thank you enough. And

again, my apologies for the glitch in their programming.

You call breathing fire a glitch? I suppose I

was overly inspired by you Autobots and your

powers. I should be more careful when I try to

reverse -engineer alien technology. So what will

you do with them? Keep them in the energy cage

for now, then melt them down first thing in the

morning. Melt them? After all, they are still

just mindless machines. But I... I sense something.

A life force. A spark. What if they are more

than just mindless machines? That's an awfully

big what -if prowl. But I think Professor Sumdack

is right. These things are far too dangerous.

Come on Autobots, let's roll! They do look kind

of happy. Thanks again for your help getting

them here. And thanks for keeping it a secret

from the others. The Dino Box won't cause any

harm here. And with a little holographic trickery,

no one will even know they're here. Do you really

think it's the right thing to do? Just because

something is big and lumbering and destructive...

Doesn't mean you give up on it. Cars and trucks,

bad! Nature, good! Stupid nature! Come back and

fight like Dinobot! And finally up today is Blast

from the Past. Megatron has just made himself

known to Isaac Sumdack and tricks the inventor

into thinking that he is an Autobot. He then

helps him in reprogramming some robotic dinosaurs

after Bulkhead accidentally destroys them at

a robotic theme park. While Sumdack tries to

rebuild them, Prowl teaches Bulkhead how to think

and move, which doesn't work. Behind Isaac's

back, Megatron upgrades these Dinobots, Grimlock,

Snarl, and Sloop. And yes, the Snarl is the Triceratops,

and yes, Slag is now a curse word in Transformers

lore, so... I was going to name him Slag, but

I thought it would hurt his feelings. Exactly.

These are to become his new attack drones, but

during their rampage, both Ratchet and Bumblebee

try to use an EMP attack to disable them. However,

Sari's ki gets pulled into the mix again, which

gives the Autobots a small semblance of spark.

Megatron tricks them into attacking the Autobots

because all the cars are bad. Our robot's bad.

This forces the Cybertronians... to battle them.

It is during this fight that Bulkhead proves

to be exactly what the Autobots need him to be

to stop the Dinobots. His muscle more than a

match for... Oh, God. You suck at this. Shut

up, I know. His muscle is more than a match for

the Dinobots' muscle. SomeDak thinks it would

be better to dismantle the Dinobots, and Prime

agrees. But Prowl, who senses a life force inside

them, going back to his... He is the mystic rhino

of this series. He and Bulkhead, without Prime's

knowledge, take the Dinobots to an island! So

we have Dinobot Island reference. Okay, that

about covers it. Thanks. Yeah, if some of these

synopsises weren't so long, I wouldn't suck at

them. But Wikipedia has varying lengths of each

one. So it's not like I'm reading from the books

anymore because there were no books with the

DVDs. I thought we weren't going to do synopsises

for these. How else are we going to get the thing

out? Anyway, seriously, Bulkhead destroys every

car while driving. he's not that big of an SUV.

I mean, he's not that big of an APC. He's an

armored personnel carrier. He's huge. He's not

that, like, APCs are big, but they're not that

big where they take up the entire street and

destroy every single car. He's clumsy. Oh, God.

Take a break. You know, and again, like the last

episode, it's like, they beat you over the head

with it. Bumblebee's small, he's little, you

know? And in this one, they beat you over the

head with it. Wulkhead's big, he's really big,

and he bumps into things, and he's klutzy, and

you know, they try to work on it. Prowl is trying

to train him to not be clumsy, I guess. Which

fails. Which fails, right. But, you know, at

the end, getting ahead of myself here. It turns

out... No, I know. It's, you know, they need

his brute strength. And it's like... Ugh. Life

lessons. So, Megatron, this is where Megatron

reveals himself. But, let's keep my existence

a secret. And again, I don't want to beat this...

What? That doesn't work. obviously not later

on. It doesn't, it does for now. Well, you know,

like if you have like two girlfriends and you

tell the one girlfriend, you know, there's a

secret from the, I can't believe you're equating

Megatron secret existence to having two girlfriends.

Oh God. Okay. So between us, if you will, you

know, it never works. Cause they all, I always

find out, you know, eventually your, your body

gets replaced and you, you know, jump out of

a mountain or something. It's one of those things

where with Bulkhead, they're trying to change

him. Just let him be what he is. I mean, yeah,

the guy is clumsy, but to the point where he's

so clumsy and large, he's too big to be gentle.

He just is. It's just not his style. And it's

kind of like somebody, oh, actually, this kind

of goes back to Transmutate. Oh, I want you to

be this. No, I want you to be this. Why don't

you just let them be what they are? So what you're

saying there is you like Bulkhead, so it's bad

to change him. But you hate Bumblebee, so it's

perfectly okay to change him. There's a difference

between a regular character flaw of being super

clumsy and just being an outright dick to people.

I don't think he does it on purpose. He's just

a little on the naturally obnoxious side. Megatron

creates the Dinobots, yay. And then, of course,

he tricks them. They feed on your bones. I so

didn't really care for the whole thing of tying

the fossils and the fossil fuel into car robots.

Bad. Yeah. You'd think this far in the future

everything would be solar -powered or something.

Exactly. At the time this is, you know, in G1,

Wheeljack creates the Dinobots. Right. And in

Animated, Megatron's head creates the Dinobots.

Right. Yeah, that's as far as it goes. I just

couldn't think of anything past that. It blew

my mind! Wasn't the Japanese series called Car

Robots? And, of course, the Dinobots must destroy

Car Robots! Yes. That was the Japanese name for

Robots in Disguise. Yes. Although Derek J. Wyatt

claims it's not the reason why that was in there.

Oh, really? Okay. That's fine. I mean, we're

just alluding. We're finding connections that

probably aren't there, and as podcasters, that's

what we do. Stupid nature, come back and fight.

Grimlock transforms, me Grimlock alike. After

he gets pooped on. After he gets pooped on. I

really like the fact that they gave him a robot

mode. He comes back, all the Dinobots come back,

and they play pretty substantial roles later.

But I was really expecting these guys to... you

know, just be throw away. Oh, they're not real.

They're just robots. And then we're going to

put them on an Island where they can graze and

shoot flames at birds. Uh, and then at the end

he transforms and it's like, Ooh, and you know,

the other two transform, but they don't show.

Yeah. The other two transform as well. Yeah.

I mean, I just thought it was cool, but when,

uh, again, jumping right into the middle of the

story here, when we've already talked about the

end, but, Megatron adds, I forget the term he

used, but, you know, modifications into their

design. And he tells them, I designed you. I

created you. You know, I'm your leader. And,

you know, Grimlock gives him the finger. So it's

not all. But Megatron says, well, I added modifications

like flame breath. You know, and some deck gives

them the third degree. It's like, Why would you

add flame breath? He says, well, I'm sorry. I

wanted to build a new body for myself, and I

thought I'd try some stuff out on these. Which

should have raised huge red flags for some deck

to begin with. Yeah, it's like, okay, so you're

a psychopath, and you are controlling my robotic

empire at this point. Yeah, but it didn't say

anything about... the ability to transform. Well,

Megatron said he added modifications, and Sundak

is like, modifications, as in plural? And he

goes, yes. But yeah, you're right. He didn't

actually say what the second mod was. Well, and

that's what makes me wonder now. Sari's ki affected

all of them. And what makes me wonder is, is

that how they ended up with Sparks? Probably.

They're not just machines anymore. They have

been granted life by the AllSpark. Right. Or

at least, sorry is key. They don't come out and

say that. But, you know, Prowl is like, I think

I sense something within them. And the question

becomes now, did the AllSpark also give them

robot modes? Or the ability to transform? It

probably did. Technically, you've got random

cars and garbage trucks that can suddenly transform

from the use of the all -spark fragments. Yeah.

But here, it's like, well, so they get a spark

and a robot mode from Starry's Key? I mean, that's

huge. Steve? I was going to say, technically,

it probably does, but it doesn't. Maybe it's

something that... essentially got and I'm saying

this with a grain of salt because Megatron could

have programmed it specifically into Grimlock

being that he's the only Dinobot that transforms

yet all three of them are alive. Okay. Whereas

future robots get all spark fragments, which

is what ultimately gives them life. I mean, with

Grimlock, it could be a combination of the two,

like Steve said. Megatron could have programmed

an alt mode, but Megatron is not an all -giving

life source. So maybe when Sari boosted the EMP

with her ki... maybe giving them life allowed

them to access the alt mode. Maybe it was there

in the, it's kind of like when you have, um,

an app, like say you have a game on your computer

running it, but you have other stuff running

in the background, you know, it could be something

like that. Okay. It was the only analogy I could

think of. Yeah. So this is another one of those

where, you know, we asked Derek Wyatt and he's

going to be like, You're thinking too much into

this. Just don't overanalyze. But that's the

point of reviewing the show is to overanalyze.

Did he get their robot mode from Megatron or

did he get it from Sari? Yeah. Or from G1 Wheeljack,

which is, you know, my preferred. I'll totally

buy that. Yeah. Steve, what do you have for a

blast from the past? First of all, I like the

introduction of the Dinobots. Granted, in their

archaic form to begin with, it was kind of interesting

to see how they eventually fixed them, or quote

-unquote fixed them, to be more realistic in

which they were brought to life. I like how Megatron

revealed himself just kind of talking out of

nowhere. Just, you know, ZoomDax talking to the

TutorBot, and then... Megatron just is like,

yeah, I never knew that either. And then he's

like, what? You know, it's just, I don't know.

It's just crazy. Yeah. He's like, you talk. I've

been pulling parts off of your face for decades.

Um, I thought maybe you should go with the chicken

sandwich today. He's like, could I borrow the

all sparky? Yeah. But yeah, I like that. I like

how Megatron finally comes back and then basically

talks a bunch of shit that gets Soomdak to believe

that he's on his side. Yes, I'm an Autobot, but

don't tell anybody. Don't tell anybody I'm here.

Don't tell Optimus. Let's keep it a secret from

all my other girlfriends. Yes, I just thought

that was kind of interesting that he just pulled

that one. All the while he's, you know, I like

the fact that he tested ideas out on Grimlock

that he never actually used. Yeah. Which helped

fill the plot void of trying to create the actual

classic Grimlock in a sense. Oh, yeah. And I

love how at the end he just all of a sudden goes

and transforms and pulls out the Energo sword.

With flames on it. Yes, I love that. That's awesome.

And the flaming sword was cool. Yes, definitely

cool. And it's funny how Megatron comes up with

his name. For Grimlock. Yeah, I'm locked in this

Grim situation or whatever it was. My prospects

are Grimlocked in this prison of a lab. Yeah.

Grimlock. Grimlock. That is some awesome writing

right there. Mm -hmm. This is where you start

actually getting into some good stuff. Yeah,

yeah. Yeah, I like this episode. I actually found

myself thinking more of Jurassic Park in the

beginning. You can't help but think of Jurassic

Park. Well, when they first go to the dinosaur

exhibit, I mean, yeah, you're right. You can't

help. But think about Jurassic Park. Right. It's

called Dino Drive, and as soon as you drive up,

they, I don't want to say cue the Jurassic Park

theme music, but it's very similar to the Jurassic

Park theme music. Yeah. And then later on, when

Sumdack reintroduces them, he's like, I give

you the Dinobots, and then cue the Jurassic Park

theme music again. It's cool. I mean, I really

like Jurassic Park. It's a classic, right? But

I think they were pushing this a little heavily.

Yeah. Yeah, they kind of were. But it only happens

for one episode. So, I mean, it's not like, you

know, it's not a total plot device like other

things are. To take it a step further, later

on when you hear Grimlock roar, his roar is just

straight Jurassic Park T -Rex. It's not as long

or as trumpeting, but it's almost like they took

a sound clip from it. Yeah. I'm sure that's possible.

No, they're really pushing the analogy. And I

like it, again, because I really like Jurassic

Park. But, you know, at some point it goes from

homage to... Oh, shit. Yeah, homage to oh, shit.

Yeah, that is kind of funny. Anything else, Michael

or Steve? Do you guys have anything else on Blast

from the Past or anything else we have to cover

for it? I don't think so. I have a couple ideas

here. I like the teamwork between Bumblebee and

Ratchet. This is the first time that Bumblebee

uses electricity and Ratchet uses the magnetism

together to create an electromagnetic pulse.

Or it's like a super laser of some sort. But,

you know, they're using it against the Dinobots,

and things seem to be working out pretty well.

But then Sari jumps in and plugs her ki in. Now,

plugs her ki into a bumblebee while they're doing

it. Now, this is probably the point where all

of them are granted sparks. But at the same time,

the super laser they're using... against the

the dinobots melts off their skin yeah isn't

that a little traumatizing i mean well they were

going to be in beast wars but now they're in

animated i know well it's it's kind of cool because

it's like well you know they were dinosaurs but

now they're straight g1 homages right i mean

it looks like grimlock it looks like swoop it

looks like slag or snarl Snarl. Snarl. I'll show

you a slag. That's a big pile of slag. Oh, sorry,

my name's Snarl. Snarl, Snarl, Snarl. But, yeah,

I just thought that was funny. It just melts

off their skin. And I'm thinking, this is pretty

traumatic here. I mean, if I was a little kid,

I'd be like, fuck, man. I mean, I don't know.

I know that the three of them are obviously G1

homages, and I know that slag has become a curse

word in the Transformers, you know, lore now.

Big, steamy pile of slag. Slaggity, slag, slag,

slag. Slag it. Like, I know that's become a Transformers

curse word now and all that stuff. I understand

why. Like, I get that they... There's two levels

here. I get why they used the T -Rex, the Triceratops,

and the Pteranodon, because that's what the original

three Dinobots were. Well, no. There were five.

No, yeah. It was what three of the original five

were, because Snarl and Swoop didn't come to

later. My question here is, instead of using

the Triceratops, why not use the Stegosaurus

and call the damn thing Snarl? Because that's

what Snarl was in G1. That's a good question.

That's a really good question. The original three,

now that I'm actually using my brain and thinking

about it, the original three was the T -Rex,

the Triceratops, which was Slag, and the Brontosaurus,

which was Sludge. Sludge. Technically, there's

no such thing as a Brontosaurus. He's a Brachiosaurus.

Whatever he is. Had to throw that in there. But,

you know, Sludge does make an appearance later.

Right, but what I'm saying is because of the

whole name change, why not instead of using the

Triceratops and calling the damn thing Snarl,

which was a character's completely different...

Why not use the Stegosaurus instead of the Triceratops

and just call that Snarl instead of using Slag's

form? That was just the first thing that popped

into my head when I really started thinking about

it. Personally, I prefer the Stegosaurus over

the Triceratops. When I was little, the one Dinobot

that I actually owned was Snarl. And his tail

fell off. But that's neither here nor there.

Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. No, it's all right. Wee, Grimlock.

So I think we're going to head to Samad. What?

Yeah, other stuff. Sorry. No, no, it's fine.

Just one more thing. At the end, the whole moral

of the story here, or the whole moral of the

B -side of the story, is that Bulkhead wins out

not by following Prowl's advice, kind of like

Bumblebee did, but just by being himself. And,

you know, I mean, he's good at breaking stuff.

And at the end, they're just like, dude, just

break stuff. And he goes all... bulkhead smash

you know just he runs through and just beats

the snot out of all the the dinobots he just

out of brute force and you know all of the uh

bulkhead isms that come along with it where he's

like sorry my bad but i like that at the end

you know he just he wins out just by being himself

which yeah you know it's it's uh if you can't

grow up and be a ninja then you should at least

try to be yourself exactly So anything else?

Nope. All right, so we're going to move on to

some ads, and then we're going to head to Cybertron,

where we have Stranded Kevin, Optimus Solo, and

we'll be back with the outro. Here is quote number

one. All people want me to do is break stuff.

Transformation Animation Podcast will be back

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Interference. I am TFG1 Mike, and you should

be listening to my very first podcast, the TFG1

Podcast. 24 episodes covering the entire US run

of the 1984 Transformers cartoon. I also have

a few supplemental episodes and an interview

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be full -time co -hosts in Steve Megatron and

fan of the show now co -host P. Concord Michael.

So check out the TFG1 Podcast. You can find it

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Transform and roll out! Ah, welcome to my throne

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is over, not gone. You can hear more of this

great podcast Discussing all the episodes of

Beast Wars and Beast Machines on geekcastradio

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Head on over to iTunes or the net, or else I

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Tune in. Now back to Transformation Animation

Podcast. Hey guys, it's Optimus Solo reporting

live from Cybertron. First, I'm giving you my

thoughts on Episode 4, Home is Where the Spark

Is, written by Michael Ryan. I don't understand

the purpose of the opening scene with the Archer

character. Maybe we'll see that character again,

but as far as a first -time viewer of this episode,

I have no idea why that scene was part of the

episode. Then we get to the actual Transformers.

Once again, every time I hear David Kaye's Optimus

Prime voice, I cringe. But I do like that Prime

has bolas all of a sudden. I like the weapons

in this series so far, so I'll give him that.

My main problem with this episode, even though

it does... developed the character of Prowl,

it turned Prowl, which is one of my favorite

G1 characters, into one of my least favorite

Transformers characters of all time. Apparently

he's an emo bot that likes meditating and he

likes nature. Why couldn't we have just named

Prowl Hound? So at least we were somewhat accurate

with a character that likes nature. Whatever.

And sorry, your key is not wicked cool. I'm sorry.

Oh, I did it again. Other than that, I mean,

it was a pretty basic episode. I like Megatron's

line of, I have no hands. That was kind of humorous.

I'm not 100 % sure why Megatron can see everything

that's going on. They didn't do a real good job

of explaining why he can see what the little

robot thing is doing. But I can look past that.

This episode did do a good job of setting up

Megatron's character. It was all a character

development episode for me, Prowl and Megatron,

so the action that was taking place in the episode

is kind of not even important. But the animation

is awful. Bumblebee's squirming when he gets

picked up by that little hook grapple thing.

These Transformers are made of metal, and I wish

they would have told the animators that. They're

not elastic. Overall, not a great episode, not

a horrible episode. I'll give this one a 4 out

of 10. Let's move on to the next episode, which

is Total Meltdown, written by Rich Fogle. Oh,

my great God, this episode is terrible. What's

Bulkhead drinking in the beginning? That's just

a question. It has nothing to do with why this

episode is terrible. The episode goes a horrible

down, horrible path right from the beginning

when we find Bumblebee in a wrestling arena.

What the fuck? Of course, we get a couple more

key uses from Sari and the Great Key. I'm glad

that's a part of this series. I'll eventually

stop mentioning it and you'll just have to assume

that it's terrible and it's used in every episode.

Praise the dialogue in this series up to this

point. The dialogue in this episode is fucking

terrible. Way to cut him down to size. Came up

a little short. Let's have some more small jokes.

laced throughout the entire episode. The dialogue's

terrible in this episode. Prometheus Black is

a decent character. I like him, even though I

have no idea what type of accent he's using.

First of all, it changes off and on throughout

the entire episode, and then second of all, it

matches no accent that I can think of. But the

character itself, I like. As far as the Meltdown

character being able to go through, they call

it Autobot Alloy. So was that something that

the writers couldn't come up with what Autobots

were made out of, so they had to say Autobot

Alloy? and should we then assume that Meltdown

only affects Autobots and because Decepticons

must be made out of a different alloy altogether?

Just a little picky part. But why is Optimus

even in this episode? Sari's giving the orders.

Optimus is just in the background doing nothing.

I don't even know why he is in this episode.

And why when Bulkhead is getting meltdown by

meltdown, why doesn't he let go? He just keeps

the hand holding it as he's melting down. Let

go, that would be your first reaction. This episode

is two different halves. The first half of this

episode is absolutely batshit stupid. It does

get a little better in the second half, but overall,

I'm sorry. This episode gets a 2 out of 10. This

is... Maybe one of the worst. It was going to

be the worst Transformers episode in the entire

Transformers franchise that I've ever seen. The

second half of the episode saved it. I'm still

giving it a 2 out of 10. Now let's go to Blast

from the Past, written by Kevin Hopps. So we're

getting different writers here all the way along.

Hopefully Rich Fogle doesn't do too much more.

Blast from the Past, I actually like this episode.

I'm going to look past that we're... The teacher

in me that goes crazy because we're teaching

kids incorrect information, he mentions in the

first part that we're talking about the Jurassic

period, and then they show a bunch of dinosaurs

that are not from the Jurassic period at all.

So I have a little bit of a problem with that.

Bulkhead did turn retarded at a part of this

episode, but he gets better at the end. It's

a great storyline, though. At first, I thought

they were going to go this storyline, which is

how Megatron became a dinosaur -type figure in

Beast Wars. I haven't seen the series, so obviously

I don't know what Megatron's form eventually

is. But I like the idea of this is how the Dinobots

came about. It's a good storyline. I'm not sure

why the key changed the type of material the

dinosaurs were made out of and turned them into

these Cybertronian characters, but that's the

fucking key, so we'll ignore that. The Grimlocked

line, it looks grim, me being locked in this

lab, and then Grimlock using the name, that's

great. With the whole dinosaur angle and the

whole Dinobots and Grimlock and all that, until

they do the whole cars and trucks feeding on

fossil fuels nonsense, that's too big of a leap,

guys. You're stretching a little bit too far

with that. I was with you with the whole angle.

The car's truck is bad because they eat fossil

fuels. That's kind of lame. Another kind of cool

line there when they call the equipment prehistoric.

I really like the Soondak and the Megatron angle

and how they're interacting and the dynamics

there. That's one reason why I like this episode.

And Prowl and Bulkhead end up not being so bad

in this episode, not quite as annoying as I was

finding them earlier. I do have a question, though.

Why is Grimlock the only one that can talk? They

don't really touch on that at all. Maybe they'll

touch on that later, but Grimlock's the only

one that talks, and then all of a sudden he turns

into this kick -ass robot mode at the end. I

just dig this episode so far. I mean, it's not

my favorite Transformers episode of all time,

but so far in this series, this is the best we've

seen. I'm giving this one a 6 out of 10, and

now I'll spin it back to the rest of the guys.

So we are back, and we'd like to thank our Cybertronian

correspondent. I only have two notes out of what

he was talking about. As far as Megatron being

able to see what the Pocketbot was doing, Megatron

is hooked into Sumdak's system. He can control

the robots. So that's how he was able to see

what was going on when the Pocketbot was in the

Autobot base. As far as the key, we all agree,

all four of us agree, The key is the biggest

fucking plot device ever. The thing with the

key about giving the Dinobots life and changing

the way they look and all that is because the

key has the AllSpark in it. It has energy from

the AllSpark in it. So the key gives the Dinobots

life, I guess. Michael, do you have anything

you want to add or respond to Kevin about his

pretty bad. Um, and just basically saying that

the writing was, was not as good because, uh,

uh, of all of the, you know, quote unquote short,

uh, puns that are directed toward Bumblebee.

And I mean, honestly, from a writing point of

view, it's not easy to come up with that many

puns. So I think, I think, I think the writers

need a little more credit. Uh, and then from

blessed from the past, uh, yeah, I, I'm not sure

if I liked that episode as much as he did. I

mean, if you're a total Grimlock fanboy, then

yeah, you're going to love this one. But I'm

not as much. I really like the Dinobots, but

I think after reading enough Simon Furman stuff,

I'm kind of sick of him. Or sick of Grimlock

at this point, because Simon Furman just uses

him way too much. I will say, as far as Grimlock

being the only one to talk, I believe, and I'm

not trying to spoil this for you, Kevin, but

I believe that Grimlock is the only one that

talks throughout the entire series, probably

because they had everybody on the cast doing

multiple voices at the time, and they maybe couldn't

have hired other actors. I don't know. So there's

that. What about you, Steve? Anything to reply

to Kevin on? I kind of agreed with some of the

things he said. I still think Optimus, he still

needs to give him a chance. Yes, he does. Optimus

is not ass. He's actually one of the better ones.

It's just because he's so young and that's not

what everybody expects. Get out of the G1. Yes.

So with that, thank you for joining us here on

Transformation Animation Podcast. There's several

ways to get in contact with us or leave feedback

for the show. Visit the website, www .geekcastradio

.com. The show is on iTunes now. You can leave

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Mine is TFG and Mike. Michael, what is your Twitter?

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for and your name, 502 -526 -5821. We hope you

enjoyed this episode of Transformation Animation

Podcast and wish you'll join us next time. We'll

be reviewing three more episodes from Transformers

Animated Season 1, those being The Thrill of

the Hunt, Nanosek, and Along Came a Spider. For

now, I am TFG1 Mike with... Michael Wilson. And

Steve Megatron Phillips. We'll tap you again

next week.