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Quantum Surge wrote:Ik people said that shows like TFP or Animated ended sooner than intended, but I can at least say they were able to make their finales not feel rushed. I have a chance Earthspark's ending will probably be more like RID15's where it's a case of "they have more adventures off-screen", but who even knows at this point.

And Prime even got the luxury of a bonus epilogue made after its final production development had wrapped up, something only one other TF cartoon has ever gotten: Cyberverse.

The only way we'll ever know what happened is if we ask, and keep asking until we get a real answer. I'm not sure if there are enough people who care to do that.

I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up. These cartoons are supposed to be ENTERTAINMENT, and an escape from the big, scary, messy world.

And Megatron becoming good all of the sudden just can't work. He committed WAR CRIMES, he can't just come out and be like, "alright guys I'm good now ". That's just insane! His transformation was pretty intimidating though, I'll give him that. And I legitimately must have been the only one to think he was faking and then would show his evilness again in the next season or so. Unfortunately, it seems like they weren't going for that. If anyone saw hints to that in the show because they watched more than me (I barely did), feel free to let me know.

Before I get burned at the stake for giving my piece of mind, I'll be honest. One thing I liked about Earthspark was the designs. (Mostly) From the pictures it seems like they pretty much just put Cyberverse, RID 2015, and G1 in a blender. And that makes me happy. Except the faces. All the faces are just And the terrans. I though they looked interesting at first, but the more I look at them, there is just something wrong, and I have no clue what it is.
 
But I can't wait to see what the new show is. What do you all think would be fun?

I think we should scrap the terrans and do transtectors. It'll make the weak humans useful and child soldiers kid appeal characters with actual powers would be refreshing. Anyone else down to bring back masterforce? If the bracelets are too cringe we can steal the cyber sleeves and reissue the blasters from the ES toyline so "You too, can use the Masterforce!", or whatever. But obviously, we can't call it the "masterforce" anymore, so...

Forgot to mention, I wish we'd gotten deluxe quality pickup truck Hashtag as an even better base for Firestar.

D-Maximal_Primal wrote:I think we are also forgetting: this show is hard to watch, from a "find the show to actually watch" way. Paramount+ is one of the lower ranked streaming services, and the Nick schedule has been far behind and very lightly advertised.

EXACTLY! Like, it didn't seem like such a bad show overall, but if you put it one a streaming platform no one has, why would I pay money to buy it just to watch one new transformers show I can get spoiled for me by others and throws in politics I find and didn't really need to be there...

snavej wrote:Studios are making massive losses on woke products right now. They're moving away from them, not because they're evil but because they're unprofitable.

Yeah, I we can all disagree about politics outside of this forum. But either way, Sound of Freedom and the Mario movie seemed to do a lot better (from what I've heard) than all the woke blunders lately. And maybe it's not the ideology, maybe the ideology attracts other problems, but either way, it's a part of it.

-Kanrabat- wrote:Earthspark had the creepiest faces in TF history...

SEE! I'm not evil, someone agrees with me!

DeathReviews wrote:Heck, even GOOD Transformers shows, like Transformers Animated, have been cancelled prematurely. It's disingenuous to blame a show's failure on a convenient boogerman like intolerance. That's just deflecting responsibility to an intangible, ideological scapegoat. Lay the ultimate responsibility where it belongs - on the show itself.
If a show is any good, people will watch - regardless of 'intolerance' or 'conservative news outlets'. As for Earthspark itself, when it was first teased I said: "Transformers is supposed to be a story about good vs. evil, depicted as a civil war between two factions of giant, alien robots. If Earthspark tries to make it about something else, if their writing gets subsumed in some weird crusade to 'redefine what it means to be a family', then the show will fail."
And it didn't help that Nickelodeon kept bouncing it around so unpredictably. You can't keep a show almost a dead secret, then ambush viewers with episodes without telling them when it's on, then act surprised when ratings are low.

ALL OF THAT! Agreed!

Deadput wrote:You just need good writers who can make both humans and Transformers work.

Masterforce?

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up.

Where've you been? Politics have been ingrained in Transformers since the very beginning. The war for energy in both the G1 cartoon and the Marvel Comics was all one big metaphor for the oil crisis of the late 1970s.

The G1 cartoon pilot mini-series even ended with Spike making a very obvious jab at the then-contemporary Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union when he noted "Because the Autobots stopped the Decepticons from stealing Earth's resources, the governments of the world have agreed to give Optimus Prime the energy he needs to revitalize Cybertron. It's probably the first time all the governments ever agreed on anything."

That last bit was completely unnecessary from a narrative perspective, yet it was put in to give meta emphasis to Spike's statement, as if to say that it shouldn't have to take a global invasion by giant alien conquerors in order for the world's governments to finally put aside their differences and get along with each other in peaceful cooperation. Yet, because it took such an invasion for that to happen in this fictional universe, Spike's words were used to say how unfortunate it is that a similar crisis would probably be required to make the world's governments get along in the real world, too.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:And Megatron becoming good all of the sudden just can't work. He committed WAR CRIMES, he can't just come out and be like, "alright guys I'm good now ". That's just insane!

It didn't happen "suddenly", it happened over the course of several years. The show just begins after all those years have already passed. And even at that point, Megatron still felt like he had much more atoning and forgiveness to work towards, and was still making efforts to reach that atonement. From his perspective, he wasn't yet fully absolved, but was on the path of redemption (and had been on it for a long time). Heck, because of his past transgressions, he may never feel fully redeemed, and will continue to spend the rest of his life trying to make right his sins of the past.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:(I barely did)

Well, there's your problem. You can't really make an educated critique of something you only have a passing familiarity with.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I think we should scrap the terrans and do transtectors. It'll make the weak humans useful and child soldiers kid appeal characters with actual powers would be refreshing. Anyone else down to bring back masterforce? If the bracelets are too cringe we can steal the cyber sleeves and reissue the blasters from the ES toyline so "You too, can use the Masterforce!", or whatever. But obviously, we can't call it the "masterforce" anymore, so...

They kinda already are going that route for EarthSpark season 2. Robby and Mo have suits of battle armor around their bodies, and may even be able to combine with the Autobots or Terrans with mech armor if the Cyber Combiner toys are anything to go by.

Good.

The industry is going through a massive contraction, and what with the endless parade of dumpster fire projects (Rings of Power, Velma, She-Hulk, Echo, Ahsoka, Obi-Wan, etc.), vanity projects like this that are more about the production team and less about the franchise (never mind the fact the premise doesn't even make sense), and the fallout from the strikes, many projects which don't belong need to be culled. They've been burning and gaslighting the existing audience in order to attract an audience that doesn't exist. You service your customers, your customers don't service you. Give them what they're looking for or get canceled and lose your job.

It's indicative of how much of a filler line it is that it's reusing molds from an earlier filler line (Cyberverse), which itself reused molds from an earlier line (RID2015).

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up.

Where've you been? Politics have been ingrained in Transformers since the very beginning. The war for energy in both the G1 cartoon and the Marvel Comics was all one big metaphor for the oil crisis of the late 1970s.

That's generic politics I meant political agendas. And an event that literally happened is not the same as some highly debatable idea.

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:(I barely did)

Well, there's your problem. You can't really make an educated critique of something you only have a passing familiarity with.

I wasn't even claiming to make an educated critique, I was just judging what little I know. That's why, when talking about Megatron, I said, "If anyone saw hints to that in the show because they watched more than me (I barely did), feel free to let me know".

And please, I know I'm apparently fun to argue with, but you don't have to pick out only the comments I made that you disagree with to make me look evil. I made sure to say at least on nice thing about earthspark.

Here are some more:
I don't like shockwave as a spider tank but his design in the show was an interesting reference to the original toy and it's proportions.
It's interesting to see the battle trailer actually show up in the show in station mode
It's interesting to work Elita One into the Earth Autobot team and make here a main character
It's interesting to upgrade Bee into a more G1 look for season two (I think it was)
I was glad to see a more obscure hardtop thrown in to get killed off, I would do the same
I think Twitch would make an awesome base for a fully robot Sari Sumdac Custom
It was cool to see the emberstone in a cartoon
It was cool to see Bombshell
It was cool to see Megatron transform for the first time

That's like 9 things I liked about Earthspark just off the top of my head, and I barely watched any of it.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:It's interesting to upgrade Bee into a more G1 look for season two (I think it was)

That didn't happen.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I was glad to see a more obscure hardtop thrown in to get killed off, I would do the same

He's not dead.

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I think we should scrap the terrans and do transtectors. It'll make the weak humans useful and child soldiers kid appeal characters with actual powers would be refreshing. Anyone else down to bring back masterforce? If the bracelets are too cringe we can steal the cyber sleeves and reissue the blasters from the ES toyline so "You too, can use the Masterforce!", or whatever. But obviously, we can't call it the "masterforce" anymore, so...

They kinda already are going that route for EarthSpark season 2. Robby and Mo have suits of battle armor around their bodies, and may even be able to combine with the Autobots or Terrans with mech armor if the Cyber Combiner toys are anything to go by.

Hey thanks, I didn't know that! I think I remember seeing these and I thought they were just armor-less terrans, I guess I didn't look at it long enough. Do they transform?

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:It's interesting to upgrade Bee into a more G1 look for season two (I think it was)

That didn't happen.

Then what is this? if you say that isn't really like G1 you just proved I'm not a geewuner.

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I was glad to see a more obscure hardtop thrown in to get killed off, I would do the same

He's not dead.

Utilizing an obscure-ish character and going as far as to resurrect him? Awesome, even better!

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:It's interesting to upgrade Bee into a more G1 look for season two (I think it was)

That didn't happen.

Then what is this?

Screenshots from a flashback to the Great War circa 2006. His original Earth body before he changed to his current one in order to go on the run and hide from G.H.O.S.T.

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:It's interesting to upgrade Bee into a more G1 look for season two (I think it was)

That didn't happen.

Then what is this?

Screenshots from a flashback to the Great War circa 2006. His original Earth body before he changed to his current one in order to go on the run and hide from G.H.O.S.T.

Oh, ok. I was only backwards. It existed, I just screwed up the order. I still think it's neat.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up.

Where've you been? Politics have been ingrained in Transformers since the very beginning.

That's generic politics I meant political agendas.

Ah, right. "Any politics I disagree with," got it.

Glyph wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up.

Where've you been? Politics have been ingrained in Transformers since the very beginning.

That's generic politics I meant political agendas.

Ah, right. "Any politics I disagree with," got it.

Any politics. ANY politics. PERIOD. We have to deal with that crap enough in the real world. We shouldn't force the kids to have to deal with our crap. Let them be kids first, THEN they can deal with politics. Your legs must be pretty strong from all that jumping to conclusions...

First-Aid wrote:Any politics. ANY politics. PERIOD. We have to deal with that crap enough in the real world. We shouldn't force the kids to have to deal with our crap. Let them be kids first, THEN they can deal with politics. Your legs must be pretty strong from all that jumping to conclusions...

Nah bud, I just read the posts I quoted.

There's no such thing as a perfectly non-political story, and Transformers has certainly never been an exception.
Geopolitics! Carbombya! Authoritarianism! Just war! Colonialism! LGBT representation! Functionalism!
Or are you suggesting that some of those count as "politics", and others don't?

Glyph wrote:

First-Aid wrote:Any politics. ANY politics. PERIOD. We have to deal with that crap enough in the real world. We shouldn't force the kids to have to deal with our crap. Let them be kids first, THEN they can deal with politics. Your legs must be pretty strong from all that jumping to conclusions...

Nah bud, I just read the posts I quoted.

There's no such thing as a perfectly non-political story, and Transformers has certainly never been an exception.
Geopolitics! Carbombya! Authoritarianism! Just war! Colonialism! LGBT representation! Functionalism!
Or are you suggesting that some of those count as "politics", and others don't?

Some aren't. Some are clearly satire and humor (Carbombya, a joke I didn't realize until I was a grown up) as well as avoiding copyright infringement. I also question the intent of the writers back then. You have good guys and bad guys so there's going to be conflict...it didn't have to symbolize anything- especially in a cartoon. Comics, not so much...there's always been politics and such in comics as far as symbolism goes (The X-Men, for example). But once you decide to focus on good guys and bad guys, you have to have a war or battles- and it wasn't always about energon; that was the start of the show. For the 'Cons, it was conquest, always. For the 'Bots, it was protecting. How many times did we hear Megatron say the phrase "rule the universe"? Seriously. Go on a G1 binge and do a drinking game. Take a shot whenever Megatron says the words "Rule", "conquer", and "destroy". You'll need an ambulance and a liver transplant. But as a kid, do you need more than good guys vs bad guys? It was pretty cut and dry, and pretty apolitical- pure entertainment to sell toys. Nowadays, they are intentionally weaving political themes into EVERYTHING and it's fueling a burnout of the population and driving down viewership. Look at the Jodie Whitaker run on Doctor Who, for example. The good Doctor has always had some politics worked into it, but it became blatant...it became the story rather than simply an aspect of the story. Because of that, the show started to get beat out in viewership by reruns of Oprah Winfrey (true fact!) and is desperately trying to re-energize its fanbase- a group that is turning BACKWARDS for entertainment to older episodes (and for Doctor Who, there are a LOT to entertain without bothering with the current iterations), much in the way that vast majority of us here prefer the older, more purely entertaining versions of Transformers. It's overkill nowadays, and more and more people are turning away from it and taking their kids with them. IT needs to get back to pure fun and entertainment.

Oh my goodness, are you really using DOCTOR WHO - a show whose very second story was about space fascists and nuclear war and the limits of pacifism, made by people who remembered WW2 - as your example of something that never used to be political? A show that, over its history, has repeatedly gone out of its way to discuss social inequality, environmentalism, racism, sexism, various facets of (British) politics?

You're quite right that, as a kid, you may well not realise that those themes are there. Doesn't mean they aren't, whether deliberately (writers put them in to make a point) or not (writers unconsciously projected their beliefs into the story). And doesn't mean that because you only started seeing them as an adult, they only started existing recently.

To borrow the old adage, "all media is political" - there's just the politics you don't notice because it aligns with the way you see the world, and the politics you do, because it doesn't. (Carbombya may be "just a joke" to one person; it was also blatantly, offensively stereotyped and famously a red line for Casey Kasem.) And just to note, leaving stuff out of your story is as much a political choice as what you put in.


Personally, I think it's sad that if people know only one thing about Earthspark, it's probably that the show "drew controversy" by including an explicitly non-binary character - that is, by acknowledging something that exists in the real world, that kids would likely encounter for themselves, and then moving on with the story. Like the other examples, kids wouldn't see it as "political" except for adults around them making an issue of it. I think it's telling that it's been brought up twice in this thread, in the context of "shoving politics into kids' media", when people were otherwise talking about character designs, toyline support and network viewership stats.

Glyph wrote:Personally, I think it's sad that if people know only one thing about Earthspark, it's probably that the show "drew controversy" by including an explicitly non-binary character - that is, by acknowledging something that exists in the real world, that kids would likely encounter for themselves, and then moving on with the story.

I know only two things for certain about the show. One, its ratings are and always have been abyssmal (see above posts; seriously, it's being outwatched by 40 year old reruns of Golden Girls). Two, it is exceedingly difficult to watch, both in the aspect of trying to find it without having to subscribe to another freaking streaming service and in the aspect of getting through an episode without getting bored, distracted, and switching it off. I have less trouble rewatching old TF: Energon episodes than watching that show.

I think I was trying (badly) to explain the point of view. I wonder. If all media is politics, is that why sporting events are so popular and people are getting upset that politics are working its way into that? Sports have always been just competition, games. Politics is just so all-permeating anymore. It's the new religion to fight over, figuratively and literally. Not a true religion, but people seem to treat it as such (don't touch my Golden Calf!). Frankly it's severely depressing. Maybe I'm just hoping...HOPING for something to be free of it. For myself, dealing with lifelong severe depression, seeing something without it would help me escape the daily grind. Otherwise...well, I will say that I've been in some really...dark places. Between the mishandling of Covid, the lockdowns and resultant parade of death I've seen, and the dramatic increase in politics permeating pretty much everything anymore...the mental health climate is not good, for anyone. And the lack of a clean escape from it is dimming the lights.

First-Aid wrote:Sports have always been just competition, games. Politics is just so all-permeating anymore. It's the new religion to fight over, figuratively and literally.

Which is funny, because "it's the new religion" has pretty much always been my opinion of professional sports, and in fact I think the problem is in the other direction - modern politics being treated like a sports competition, where there's My Team and there's Your Team and only one of us can win, and I'll wrap my identity up in supporting My Team and opposing Your Team.

I repeat the previous point: whether you see representation as "injecting politics" or "being realistic" largely depends on your worldview, not on the act itself. And media ginning up culture-war ragebait out of every little thing gets clicks and sells TV ads, after all.



Anyway, I think we were discussing Earthspark...?

Glyph wrote:
Anyway, I think we were discussing Earthspark...?

SQUIRREL!


Hey...why don't we have any squirrel Transformers?

Put her in your next series, Hasbro!


Or that Frostbutt custom that's floating around online. Or Heinrad. I'd take Heinrad, in absence of any official squirrels. But maybe without the balls this time.

First-Aid wrote:How many times did we hear Megatron say the phrase "rule the universe"? Seriously. Go on a G1 binge and do a drinking game. Take a shot whenever Megatron says the words "Rule", "conquer", and "destroy". You'll need an ambulance and a liver transplant.

Yeah, and there's a political term for all that ruling and conquering Megatron spoke of: "Imperialism". You can't tell me G1 Megatron wasn't an imperialist, because based on all his words and actions he very much was.

The very concept of someone wanting to conquer and dominate another people or nation (even if it expands across the whole universe) is political in and of itself. The G1 cartoon just heavily simplified the concept so it could sell plastic-and-metal playthings to young minds.

(Also, and keeping on track, I'm rewatching & catching up with the back half of S1, and honestly about the only bit of design I actively dislike so far is Optimus' face. Just took a few episodes to find its feet - wish I'd kept up with the series on release.)

Sabrblade wrote:

First-Aid wrote:How many times did we hear Megatron say the phrase "rule the universe"? Seriously. Go on a G1 binge and do a drinking game. Take a shot whenever Megatron says the words "Rule", "conquer", and "destroy". You'll need an ambulance and a liver transplant.

Yeah, and there's a political term for all that ruling and conquering Megatron spoke of: "Imperialism". You can't tell me G1 Megatron wasn't an imperialist, because based on all his words and actions he very much was.

The very concept of someone wanting to conquer and dominate another people or nation (even if it expands across the whole universe) is political in and of itself. The G1 cartoon just heavily simplified the concept so it could sell plastic-and-metal playthings to young minds.

Glyph wrote:I repeat the previous point: whether you see representation as "injecting politics" or "being realistic" largely depends on your worldview, not on the act itself. And media ginning up culture-war ragebait out of every little thing gets clicks and sells TV ads, after all.

There's a difference between broad political factions and specific ideas that we don't agree on right now. I still don't understand why that is so hard for you to see.

First-Aid wrote:

Glyph wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:I mean, putting any politics in a kids show is kinda screwed up.

Where've you been? Politics have been ingrained in Transformers since the very beginning.

That's generic politics I meant political agendas.

Ah, right. "Any politics I disagree with," got it.

Any politics. ANY politics. PERIOD. We have to deal with that crap enough in the real world. We shouldn't force the kids to have to deal with our crap. Let them be kids first, THEN they can deal with politics. Your legs must be pretty strong from all that jumping to conclusions...

THIS


I don't want to get off topic now but that squirrel reminds me of all the cool beast wars customs out there. I feel like most of them are made buy Unicron9, those are always very high quality. Could scroll through them for hours...

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:There's a difference between broad political factions and specific ideas that we don't agree on right now. I still don't understand why that is so hard for you to see.

RodimusPrimeUkraine1 wrote:

First-Aid wrote:Any politics. ANY politics. PERIOD.

THIS

Can't have it both ways. Maybe decide which one you're trying to argue before saying I don't get it.


Anyway, updating my last post: I was NOT expecting Tarantulas to sound like a chirpy-chappy British Minecraft Youtuber.