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RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show

Transformers News: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show

Wednesday, May 15th, 2024 12:53PM CDT

Categories: Cartoon News, Rumors
Posted by: william-james88   Views: 53,801

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There is currently a rumour within the community based on insider information, detailing that a new animated Transformers show is currently in development. Very little info has been given but the rumour would entail that Earthspark would end after season 2. We do not know if this was always intentional or not, since it could be that the new show is more in line with the TF One film, with Earthspark existing as a show to providing content for the brand before a new era. The initial rumour also gave ratings as a possible reason, which of course can always be the case. As of now, the show ending after season two, or being replaced/cancelled is still a rumour. Our knowledge that a new show is being worked on is coming from someone who is currently working on said show.

We will keep you up to date on further developments. For now, Earthspark still has a whole season coming up for everyone to enjoy, starting June 7th.

Transformers News: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to be Cancelled/Replaced by New Transformers Animated Show

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Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180380)
Posted by Bounti76 on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:12pm CDT
If this turns out to be true, I wouldn't be surprised. While the episodes I've caught have been pretty decent, the toyline sells like.... well, nothing. It's clogged shelves since it was released.

As to the other point, while the character of Nightshade is fine, rather intolerant people have made a crisis out of a less than 30 second scene where pronouns are explained (the word gender is never mentioned). On a vaguely related note, look at people losing their brain modules over the also non-binary Morph in the X-Men 97 series. Their gender was only ever mentioned in the credits, and as far as I know, their pronouns have only been used once, by Rogue, in the next-to-last episode. The hate that trans and non-binary people face is unreal.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180381)
Posted by william-james88 on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:29pm CDT
Bounti76 wrote:If this turns out to be true, I wouldn't be surprised. While the episodes I've caught have been pretty decent, the toyline sells like.... well, nothing. It's clogged shelves since it was released.

As to the other point, while the character of Nightshade is fine, rather intolerant people have made a crisis out of a less than 30 second scene where pronouns are explained (the word gender is never mentioned). On a vaguely related note, look at people losing their brain modules over the also non-binary Morph in the X-Men 97 series. Their gender was only ever mentioned in the credits, and as far as I know, their pronouns have only been used once, by Rogue, in the next-to-last episode. The hate that trans and non-binary people face is unreal.


At least with Morph, he's from a show that is targeting all ages, as opposed to mainly younger viewers. That's what the whole controversy was about. But yeah, that deal with Morph shows you don't need much.

As for the toyline clogging up the shelves, it's not wrong, but it's not new either. Cyberverse and RID 2015 had so many older fans enraged that it's all you could find clogging up the shelves but those shows still lasted a good while.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180382)
Posted by DeathReviews on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:43pm CDT
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.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180383)
Posted by First-Aid on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:45pm CDT
To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180384)
Posted by Glyph on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:52pm CDT
william-james88 wrote:At least with Morph, he's from a show that is targeting all ages, as opposed to mainly younger viewers. That's what the whole controversy was about.
IME, that's only ever the pretext, never the actual complaint - which is basically always that the character exists at all. The age factor doesn't even make sense as a complaint unless you're conflating identity with sexuality, which is of course the standard rhetorical move precisely because it brings "but think of the children!" into play.


Aaanyway. I haven't really kept up with Earthspark despite meaning to (my 8yo godson loves it, though) - was there ever a suggestion of its intended run length? 2-3 seasons seems pretty normal, and I would expect to get something to tie in to TF:One once that's out (and that next series would have to already be in development at this point, naturally).
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180385)
Posted by Deadput on May 15th, 2024 @ 1:53pm CDT
Just because the franchise doesn't "require" humans doesn't mean that humans are a concept bringing down the franchise. About Robots that turn into vehicles that even on Cybertron are typically based on IRL vehicles.

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

There were a couple of trilogies a few years back that had no humans at all and were still absolute travesties in the writing department, although Cyberverse was actually quite decent and had no humans despite Earth being a location as well.

Point is that humans don't need to stay or go, writers just need to use them well if they are in the show. It's not impossible and it has been done before.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180388)
Posted by Glyph on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:14pm CDT
Deadput wrote:Just because the franchise doesn't "require" humans doesn't mean that humans are a concept bringing down the franchise. ... You just need good writers who can make both humans and Transformers work.
Yeah, this. Paging Bob Budiansky: "What's the point of bringing your alien robots to Earth and then not having them interact with humans?"
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180389)
Posted by o.supreme on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:23pm CDT
If anything, I think it has more to do with the sale of eOne. When Hasbro announced its sale, I thought there may be no S2 of Earthspark. But in truth, probably 2 seasons were agreed upon from the beginning, so eOne is just finishing out a contractual obligation. This happens often in animation, whether a series is popular or not, if whomever is financing the project doesn't wish to order any more episodes, then that's it.

Unfortunately I've pretty much given up on TF Animation, which has been the core of my connection to the franchise for 40 years. Through all the ups and downs, I had faith that in time, something good would come along eventually. Prime was the last series I truly enjoyed, and the film that ended that series came out 11 years ago.

I understanding wanting to aim at younger audiences to try to cultivate new fans. But the stuff that has been made for old folks like me (The Machinima Prime Wars Series and Netflix WFC) are just really "off" in many ways. I actually do (in some misguided way) enjoy some parts of the Netflix series, but others just infuriate me.

Basically my feelings are this: Just ONCE I wish Hasbro would try to recreate something that would honestly look and feel like the original Sunbow animated series. Get Toei involved as well. While X-Men 97 isn't the same as the 90's show, it certainly is a worthy effort.

I know many of the Actors are sadly no longer with us. But when I hear excuses like "It would be too expensive", or "The technology doesn't exist any more". I like to paraphrase Obadiah Stane from the first Iron Man film:

Hasbro: we can't make new episodes of the original series. It's too expensive and the technology doesn't exist anymore

Obadiah Stane (the fans) : Fanatic Films did it With Scraps in a Cave!

Hasbro: with all do respect, we aren't Fanatic Films.



Now these may make zero sense continuity wise. But honestly, watching them brings me more satisfaction than any actual TF series has since Prime ended in 2013.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180390)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:31pm CDT
First-Aid wrote:To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180391)
Posted by First-Aid on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:36pm CDT
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.


Don't have that streaming service and not paying for it. If it comes out on DVD, I'll probably check it out.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180392)
Posted by o.supreme on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:42pm CDT
Sabrblade wrote:If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.


Or even better: Beast Wars. BWII was pretty great as well, although I know I'm in the minority on that ;) .
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180393)
Posted by Glyph on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:44pm CDT
o.supreme wrote:If anything, I think it has more to do with the sale of eOne. When Hasbro announced its sale, I thought there may be no S2 of Earthspark. But in truth, probably 2 seasons were agreed upon from the beginning, so eOne is just finishing out a contractual obligation. This happens often in animation, whether a series is popular or not, if whomever is financing the project doesn't wish to order any more episodes, then that's it.
Forgot about this (busy day!) but it sounds very plausible. Even with S2 being produced by Hasbro Entertainment and the Family & Brands dept being folded into Hasbro, I could certainly see cancellation at the changeover point (see also: Clone Wars getting cancelled when Disney bought LFL).
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180394)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 2:44pm CDT
First-Aid wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.


Don't have that streaming service and not paying for it. If it comes out on DVD, I'll probably check it out.
You don't have YouTube? That's where it was primarily aired.

YouTube, and the 6am deadslot on Cartoon Network.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180395)
Posted by First-Aid on May 15th, 2024 @ 3:04pm CDT
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.


Don't have that streaming service and not paying for it. If it comes out on DVD, I'll probably check it out.
You don't have YouTube? That's where it was primarily aired.

YouTube, and the 6am deadslot on Cartoon Network.


I thought it was on Netflix?

I find it interesting and hypocritical here. In the live movie threads, it's all about "LOSE THE HUMANS! WE DON"T NEED THE HUMANS! MOAR TRANSFORMERS!" THen in THIS thread, it's the opposite.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180396)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 3:10pm CDT
First-Aid wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
First-Aid wrote:To quote Bender: "Hey sexy mama...wanna kill all the humans?"

Yeah, let's just lose all the humans in the next series. I wonder if this is going to be related to Transformers One?

Look, kids aren't dumb. They don't need humans to connect to characters. If the characters are written well, they will connect and identify with them. Take a lesson from the (first) death of Optimus Prime in the 86 movie. The outflow of sorrow and tears from kids was telling...and they didn't need a human to identify with him! They just created an identifiable, kind, wise father figure that kids could look up to. The rest happened naturally. LET THE BOTS RULE.

End of tangental rant.
If you don't want humans, go watch Cyberverse.


Don't have that streaming service and not paying for it. If it comes out on DVD, I'll probably check it out.
You don't have YouTube? That's where it was primarily aired.

YouTube, and the 6am deadslot on Cartoon Network.


I thought it was on Netflix?
Only after if finished airing each season, just like every other TF cartoon that gets put on Netflix. The only ones that exclusively went to Netflix first were War For Cybertron Trilogy and BotBots.

First-Aid wrote:I find it interesting and hypocritical here. In the live movie threads, it's all about "LOSE THE HUMANS! WE DON"T NEED THE HUMANS! MOAR TRANSFORMERS!" THen in THIS thread, it's the opposite.
Because the humans in the movies are always written to be the real stars of the films (which we don't want) while the cartoons typically know how to keep the humans confined to supporting roles instead (which is fine).
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180401)
Posted by chuckdawg1999 on May 15th, 2024 @ 4:50pm CDT
I think Cyberverse is also on Tubi and Pluto, both free streaming services.

I just learned this recently with all the drama around Nickelodeon, if a show is going to go 3 or more seasons and thus hit a certain episode count, for the third season they'll change the name to avoid having to pay royalties to the actors and writers. That's why Prime became Beast Hunters and Cyberverse had all those sub-names. Perhaps Earthspark is going to become Earthspark: rise of the combiners or something like that. Another thought, they have a LOT of well-known talent on the show now, and coming in season two, maybe it was just too much money to make.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180403)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 5:50pm CDT
chuckdawg1999 wrote:I just learned this recently with all the drama around Nickelodeon, if a show is going to go 3 or more seasons and thus hit a certain episode count, for the third season they'll change the name to avoid having to pay royalties to the actors and writers. That's why Prime became Beast Hunters and Cyberverse had all those sub-names.
But, neither Prime nor Cyberverse ever aired on Nickelodeon.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180406)
Posted by Quantum Surge on May 15th, 2024 @ 6:26pm CDT
I'm not surprised by this series ending too soon if true but I'm not dancing on its grave either. I keep forgetting this series was a thing (especially since Skybound and ROTB got my interest more)
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180415)
Posted by D-Maximal_Primal on May 15th, 2024 @ 7:33pm CDT
Kinda bummed if this is true, but not surprised, given how little it has been advertised and how scattered the releases have been
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180431)
Posted by Glyph on May 15th, 2024 @ 9:59pm CDT
Sabrblade wrote:
chuckdawg1999 wrote:I just learned this recently with all the drama around Nickelodeon, if a show is going to go 3 or more seasons...
But, neither Prime nor Cyberverse ever aired on Nickelodeon.
Not just Nickelodeon - this got some discussion around the WGA/SAG-AFTRA strikes, with Netflix being particularly called out at the time IIRC. Seems it's a known tactic by the streamers to get around production crew pay scaling in the standard contracts. (Not saying it's necessarily at issue here.)
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180432)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 10:04pm CDT
Beast Hunters happened because the team at Hasbro changed. They originally wanted the Prime creators to end the show at season 2 and have Beast Hunters be a new show to replace Prime altogether. They wanted dragons and the new Optimus toy they designed, while the Prime team wanted to continue their show and see it to its proper conclusion. The third season being what it was was a compromise to make both sides happy.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180433)
Posted by Bumblebee1188 on May 15th, 2024 @ 10:05pm CDT
I am noticing in some of the comments a rather elitist and condescending light cast on people who are unhappy with nightshade.

It is fairly hypocritical to call someone a bigot for disagreeing with you. We are talking about a fictional character. I don't think it's fair to say people have a hateful opinion about an imaginary cartoon. Parents worldwide have personal values, and want those values reflected in the media their children consume. Pushing your own personal opinions into a children's show, and then becoming rude and irate when parents dont agree with your own personal opinions makes you the bigot. People have a right to watch earthspark, and people have a right to dislike it. That's just, like, your opinion man.

I personally think it quite silly that genderless robotic organisms who reproduce by assembling new robots would have any concept of gender, in-between, or lack thereof. It was only in the show for 30 seconds and has no bearing on the story. They don't explore or explain the phenomenon in any meaningful way which improves either the story or the characters. It's literally just a random writer's mary-sue self-insert. It's not particularly offensive in my opinion, I just see it as poor writing as a transformers fan, and sympathize with parents who don't want their children exposed to radical political agendas.

I also think it's very silly to suggest transformers earthspark is popular with children. Yes, it may be more popular with children than it is with adult fans of transformers. But to say it /is/ popular with children would be a farce. These toys sit on shelves for months and never sell. I see them every time I go hunting for short-packaged takara-tomy figures in legacy or studio series. They're alright as a toy, but their bizarre art style feels very corporate and distasteful. I like a robot's transformation and then I see the headsculpt and it just doesn't jive with me. So I put it back on the shelf and go look at Lego and Pokemon.

I think one of this series biggest shortcomings is that it tries to place itself in the G1 continuity, but has no real connection to G1. It feels haphazardly tacked on, as if the writers weren't confident to go out on a limb with their own story and universe. Tacking bad writing onto an existing series as a sequel does not improve bad writing. It just drags down the source material you are referencing.

But this is a general problem in Hollywood, so it's unfair to blame it on transformers earthspark. Paramount have a long history of ruining existing franchises with poorly written sequels. Look at Star Trek, the halo show, and God forbid AOE or TLK.

The problem is endless sequels and uncreative writing which is too afraid to experiment with weird ideas, and more concerned about self-inserting current year politics. I don't care what end of the political spectrum a writer agrees with, I don't want to be lectured by them.

Transformers prime is an excellent example of a studio wading into deeper waters and exploring new territory with novel ideas and concepts. I hope whatever animation we get next from transformers delves into those kinds of concepts. Not darkness, or edgyness. Not a specific art style. Not even humans vs no humans. Give me something self-consistent which takes itself seriously while understanding it's still a goofy cartoon about cars who stand up and fight each other on different planets.

What interests me is new ideas and exploring old ideas by flipping them on their head and following the logical consequences. I like character growth, and individual personalities with goals and aspirations. What changes a character's mind enough to compel them to switch factions, or betray a friend? Transformers has the unique position of being a well known science fiction franchise which appeals to both children and adults, while retaining the potential to be categorized as high fiction.

It's never capitalized on that potential, which constantly disappoints me, but that potential is there. And I think it's high time we got a transformers series where the writers focus on the robots, their relationship to each other, their relationship with humanity, and how their society and species "transform" over eons. These characters are essentially immortal undying demigods with multiple methods of resurrection and character development. I think that avenue is what paramount should pursue. High quality character driven fiction with a consistent and surprising plot followed to it's logical end while maintaining a surprisingly mature but still family friendly tone.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180442)
Posted by Solrac333 on May 15th, 2024 @ 11:33pm CDT
Maybe it's canceled because it was a terrible show. I haven't been excited for any animated shows since Prime. The live action films are fine but I don't get excited for those either. I'm happy if I'm entertained by them. The only thing that keeps me in the franchise is the collecting but even that has slowed because of the insane prices.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180443)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 15th, 2024 @ 11:41pm CDT
Solrac333 wrote:Maybe it's canceled because it was a terrible show.
Image
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180451)
Posted by chuckdawg1999 on May 16th, 2024 @ 2:06am CDT
Glyph wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
chuckdawg1999 wrote:I just learned this recently with all the drama around Nickelodeon, if a show is going to go 3 or more seasons...
But, neither Prime nor Cyberverse ever aired on Nickelodeon.
Not just Nickelodeon - this got some discussion around the WGA/SAG-AFTRA strikes, with Netflix being particularly called out at the time IIRC. Seems it's a known tactic by the streamers to get around production crew pay scaling in the standard contracts. (Not saying it's necessarily at issue here.)


Yes, I'm sorry, many networks have pulled stuff like I mentioned, Disney springs to mind.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180457)
Posted by snavej on May 16th, 2024 @ 7:29am CDT
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.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180460)
Posted by Glyph on May 16th, 2024 @ 8:13am CDT
>:oP
Yes, that is definitely what is happening, A+ take, excellent commentary.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180461)
Posted by D-Maximal_Primal on May 16th, 2024 @ 8:16am CDT
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.

As for the toys... most of them are Cyberverse repaints, Hasbro has not put a lot of effort into the toyline either. I think that low effort in toyline production shows.

It is a good show, a good quality show with great animation and a good voice cast. It just feels like it was always meant to be lowly advertised and just run its course
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180464)
Posted by First-Aid on May 16th, 2024 @ 8:50am CDT
D-Maximal_Primal wrote: It just feels like it was always meant to be lowly advertised and just run its course


This is it, exactly. The show is disposable and, in the end, will contribute absolutely nothing to the mythos of Transformers. The only reason it is there is to sell Optimus and Bumblebee toys and it's even failing at that. The success of the first decade of Marvel movies was that they built towards an inevitable climax (the "Portals" scene...I still get chills when I watch it). This is piecemeal, and eminently ignorable. There is no build. There is nothing going forward, they aren't writing towards some long term climax. It's just...there. If the goal is to build brand recognition, then I'm not even sure they are doing that because of the lack of availability to watch.

If you want success evaluation, TelevisionStats.com has it listed 800 spots below Golden Girls reruns, the original Law and Order reruns, and 750 spots below Family Matters reruns. The show's engagement score is 0.59. By contrast, the number 1 show right now, X-Men 97, has an engagement score of 57.2 If there were still only the normal number of cable networks, this show wouldn't have have even MADE it to season 2, let alone season 3. In order to make the top 200, you need a score of 2.93. It barely makes the top 1000, let alone the top 200 and has NEVER peaked into the top 500. That's failure.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180466)
Posted by Sculyblast on May 16th, 2024 @ 8:57am CDT
I do think we need a better strategy for reaching new young audiences.

My nephews don't watch regular cabel, they only watch streaming services.
The only reason they know about transformers is because I showed them episodes of Beast Wars and Transformers Prime.

(I did run into the problem that most of the figures that I actually buy are too complex for 7 year olds.
I had to buy a couple of deluxes that intuitively transform in less than 4 steps.)

A lot of the old stuff is already on youtube, but I don't know the customer Journey that brings a 7 year old to episodes of transformers animated on youtube.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180468)
Posted by D-Maximal_Primal on May 16th, 2024 @ 9:13am CDT
First-Aid wrote:
D-Maximal_Primal wrote: It just feels like it was always meant to be lowly advertised and just run its course


This is it, exactly. The show is disposable and, in the end, will contribute absolutely nothing to the mythos of Transformers. The only reason it is there is to sell Optimus and Bumblebee toys and it's even failing at that. The success of the first decade of Marvel movies was that they built towards an inevitable climax (the "Portals" scene...I still get chills when I watch it). This is piecemeal, and eminently ignorable. There is no build. There is nothing going forward, they aren't writing towards some long term climax. It's just...there. If the goal is to build brand recognition, then I'm not even sure they are doing that because of the lack of availability to watch.

If you want success evaluation, TelevisionStats.com has it listed 800 spots below Golden Girls reruns, the original Law and Order reruns, and 750 spots below Family Matters reruns. The show's engagement score is 0.59. By contrast, the number 1 show right now, X-Men 97, has an engagement score of 57.2 If there were still only the normal number of cable networks, this show wouldn't have have even MADE it to season 2, let alone season 3. In order to make the top 200, you need a score of 2.93. It barely makes the top 1000, let alone the top 200 and has NEVER peaked into the top 500. That's failure.

Part of that too is that X-men 97 was a damn good show that also ran on probably the #1 streaming service. Earthspark is good, but not damn good, if you will.

I would be curious on Televisionstats, if there is any correlation to streaming services and scores. Even if Earthspark was on Netflix, I think there would be more traction
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180470)
Posted by First-Aid on May 16th, 2024 @ 9:44am CDT
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:
First-Aid wrote:
D-Maximal_Primal wrote: It just feels like it was always meant to be lowly advertised and just run its course


This is it, exactly. The show is disposable and, in the end, will contribute absolutely nothing to the mythos of Transformers. The only reason it is there is to sell Optimus and Bumblebee toys and it's even failing at that. The success of the first decade of Marvel movies was that they built towards an inevitable climax (the "Portals" scene...I still get chills when I watch it). This is piecemeal, and eminently ignorable. There is no build. There is nothing going forward, they aren't writing towards some long term climax. It's just...there. If the goal is to build brand recognition, then I'm not even sure they are doing that because of the lack of availability to watch.

If you want success evaluation, TelevisionStats.com has it listed 800 spots below Golden Girls reruns, the original Law and Order reruns, and 750 spots below Family Matters reruns. The show's engagement score is 0.59. By contrast, the number 1 show right now, X-Men 97, has an engagement score of 57.2 If there were still only the normal number of cable networks, this show wouldn't have have even MADE it to season 2, let alone season 3. In order to make the top 200, you need a score of 2.93. It barely makes the top 1000, let alone the top 200 and has NEVER peaked into the top 500. That's failure.

Part of that too is that X-men 97 was a damn good show that also ran on probably the #1 streaming service. Earthspark is good, but not damn good, if you will.

I would be curious on Televisionstats, if there is any correlation to streaming services and scores. Even if Earthspark was on Netflix, I think there would be more traction


Paramount+ is a surprisingly highly rated streaming service. Number 1 is Netflix followed by Prime. Paramount is 13th. So, even being a top 15 streaming service doesn't appear to be helping the show. Incidentally, YouTube is 35th on the list. Being on Netflix might help, but honestly, if you are getting beat out by 40 year old Golden Girls and Family Matters reruns that's NOT a good sign for the quality and popularity of your show. Fun fact...ROTB is just a tad out of the top 200. So even THAT beats Earthspark handily. The original TF:TM peaked at 232 in April.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180473)
Posted by o.supreme on May 16th, 2024 @ 10:49am CDT
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:I would be curious on Televisionstats, if there is any correlation to streaming services and scores. Even if Earthspark was on Netflix, I think there would be more traction


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Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180477)
Posted by D-Maximal_Primal on May 16th, 2024 @ 10:56am CDT
o.supreme wrote:
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:I would be curious on Televisionstats, if there is any correlation to streaming services and scores. Even if Earthspark was on Netflix, I think there would be more traction


Image
Image

It's interesting that it peaked in May 2023, the middle part of season 1 released in March, and the last part in late July, and funny thing is, Nickelodeon aired the season 1 finale 9 months after paramount.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180480)
Posted by o.supreme on May 16th, 2024 @ 11:24am CDT
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:It's interesting that it peaked in May 2023, the middle part of season 1 released in March, and the last part in late July, and funny thing is, Nickelodeon aired the season 1 finale 9 months after paramount.


Yeah, Nick aired the last batch of episodes even AFTER they were released on DVD in North America:

transformers-earthspark-show-discussion-thread-t116145s775.php

The spike last May unfortunately was related to the controversy that has been referenced previously. I mean, I am admittedly not a fan of the show. But like all things. I respect that others are allowed to enjoy it, just as I am permitted not to. I don't wish the show ill will (I haven't wished any TF show to actively go away, no matter my level of interest), just reporting objectively what's going on.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180483)
Posted by AllNewSuperRobot on May 16th, 2024 @ 1:58pm CDT
I've largely avoided discussion on Earthspark. Largely because I only watched the pilot on YouTube and have no real interest in buying further into the streaming service model. Yet reading this thread has been fascinating.

First point to make, I believe Rescue Bots is the longest running Transformers series. Supplanting Beast Wars' prior top spot. The shortest was Car Robots, at one season. Somewhere between RB and CR is the standard every other show achieves.

Secondly, animation is expensive. CG animation is expensive. Shows like Young Justice should have demonstrated that toys aren't a practical metric for gauging a show's engagement in modern times. Toys aren't the most widespread form of entertainment for kids anymore. But sadly, that lesson still falls on deaf ears.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180486)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 16th, 2024 @ 2:21pm CDT
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:First point to make, I believe Rescue Bots is the longest running Transformers series. Supplanting Beast Wars' prior top spot.
Beast Wars only had 52 episodes, the same number as Armada, Energon, and Cybertron. G1 was the longest series at 98 episodes before both Rescue Bots and Rescue Bots Acadmay overtook it with 104 episodes each. And even then, Prime, RID 2015, and Cyberverse all had more episodes than Beast Wars, being 68, 71, and 70, respectively.

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:The shortest was Car Robots, at one season.
The shortest was Zone, being a single episode. And even then, several one-season shows have had fewer episodes that Car Robots's 39:
  • The Headmasters: 38
  • Beast Wars Neo: 35
  • Go-Bots: 4
  • RobotMasters: 2
  • Cyber Missions: 13
  • Go!: 10
  • Portal: 13
  • BotBots: 10 (20 individual segments)
And even some multi-season shows were shorter:
  • Beast Machines: 2 seasons, 26 episodes
  • Q-Transforers: 2 seasons, 26 episodes
  • Prime Wars Trilogy: 3 seasons, 28 episodes
  • War For Cybertron Trilogy: 3 seasons, 18 episodes
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180487)
Posted by o.supreme on May 16th, 2024 @ 2:31pm CDT
darn, Sabre beat me with the stats.... ;)


AllNewSuperRobot wrote:Secondly, animation is expensive. CG animation is expensive. Shows like Young Justice should have demonstrated that toys aren't a practical metric for gauging a show's engagement in modern times. Toys aren't the most widespread form of entertainment for kids anymore. But sadly, that lesson still falls on deaf ears.


But anyway, while I agree toy sales (or lack thereof), should not be the metric to determine the success/fate of a TV show. I don't think that's the case here. This isn't 2002-2012 CN that was killing good shows Left and Right. While I don't think the toys are selling especially well, I'm pretty sure the decision to cancel and move on (if in fact that is what's happening), has mostly to do with the sale of eOne, and the desire not to make any further episodes after what was contracted from the beginning.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180488)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 16th, 2024 @ 2:36pm CDT
Yeah, the Entertainment One sale has been no one any favors.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180494)
Posted by -Kanrabat- on May 16th, 2024 @ 4:23pm CDT
Earthspark had the creepiest faces in TF history. Plus the californianisation of the whole thing was cringe. So maybe these contributed to the low viewership of that series. And if this resulted in lower than expected toy sales, this will be the final nail in that coffin.

My expectations are very low for the next show, but I have a sneaky suspicion that TF1 will continue as a TV series. :-?
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180496)
Posted by AllNewSuperRobot on May 16th, 2024 @ 5:30pm CDT
o.supreme wrote:darn, Sabre beat me with the stats.... ;)


Image

I knew I should have chosen my words better, in hindsight. Before the pedantry started. Beast Era, not just denoting it all as Beast Wars.

o.supreme wrote:
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:Secondly, animation is expensive. CG animation is expensive. Shows like Young Justice should have demonstrated that toys aren't a practical metric for gauging a show's engagement in modern times. Toys aren't the most widespread form of entertainment for kids anymore. But sadly, that lesson still falls on deaf ears.


But anyway, while I agree toy sales (or lack thereof), should not be the metric to determine the success/fate of a TV show. I don't think that's the case here. This isn't 2002-2012 CN that was killing good shows Left and Right. While I don't think the toys are selling especially well, I'm pretty sure the decision to cancel and move on (if in fact that is what's happening), has mostly to do with the sale of eOne, and the desire not to make any further episodes after what was contracted from the beginning.


It's a moot point. But if this was aired on a network and not a superfluous streaming service. What kinds of figures it might have garnered.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180505)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 16th, 2024 @ 11:39pm CDT
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I knew I should have chosen my words better, in hindsight. Before the pedantry started. Beast Era, not just denoting it all as Beast Wars.
By that same logic the Unicron Trilogy still has more with its combined episode total being 156, compared to Beast Wars and Beast Machines totaling out to 78, which is also still twenty episodes less than the G1 cartoon on its own.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180507)
Posted by snavej on May 17th, 2024 @ 5:29am CDT
Glyph wrote:>:oP
Yes, that is definitely what is happening, A+ take, excellent commentary.


$160 billion for Disney alone over the last three years. They can't take the punishment much longer.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180509)
Posted by First-Aid on May 17th, 2024 @ 8:06am CDT
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:
o.supreme wrote:
D-Maximal_Primal wrote:I would be curious on Televisionstats, if there is any correlation to streaming services and scores. Even if Earthspark was on Netflix, I think there would be more traction


Image
Image

It's interesting that it peaked in May 2023, the middle part of season 1 released in March, and the last part in late July, and funny thing is, Nickelodeon aired the season 1 finale 9 months after paramount.


I noticed that too. The only thing I can think of is that there must have been some news stories focused on it that the news lemmings followed to the show.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180511)
Posted by ShawnBailey1 on May 17th, 2024 @ 12:20pm CDT
Rumor has it that "Transformers: Earthspark" may be canceled and replaced by a new animated show, leaving fans as puzzled as choosing between Starbucks cup sizes.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180529)
Posted by noctorro on May 18th, 2024 @ 4:32am CDT
Sorry but I'm kind of happy it's over. I didn't like the designs, the show isn't for me (I laughed my ass of with Cyberverse and loved it). And I didn't like that nickelodeon charm (look up all the grooming etc.)

I hope they do better with the next cartoon.

Also don't go in the Netflix/Machinema direction, that show was written by an AI run on a PS2 with it's humor chip removed. My god it was aweful yet the animation (models/textures and movement) was awesome.

But first, Transformers One!
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180538)
Posted by Burn on May 18th, 2024 @ 4:20pm CDT
I'm not bothered by this. The show, the line, feels like a blip.

In a world where streamers drop shows the same time worldwide, P+ delayed it by weeks in Australia. Australia only got the first B.A.F. wave and not much else.
-edit- Apparently other waves were just released, picked up all but Shockwave.

Bit hard to miss something that was barely there.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180540)
Posted by Sabrblade on May 18th, 2024 @ 4:38pm CDT
Isn't this also pretty much par for the course at this point? That we know going in which season of which TF cartoon is going to be its last one?

We knew ahead of time that Season 3 would be the final season of Animated.

We knew ahead of time that Season 3 would be the final season of Prime (Predacons Rising as an epilogue was a nice surprise, but it wasn't a full new season)

We knew ahead of time that Season 4 would be the final season of Rescue Bots.

We knew ahead of time that Season 3 would be the final season of Robots in Disguise 2015.

We knew ahead of time that Season 3 would be the final full season of Cyberverse (Season 4 came as a nice surprise, but was only two epilogue specials rather than another full season).

We knew that each part of the Prime Wars Trilogy and War For Cybertron Trilogy would be getting one season of their own, so we knew each would end with Power of the Primes and Kingdom, respectively.

Going even further back, we kinda knew Armada, Energon, and Cybertron would each be one season, since Hasbro kept announcing the following year's next toyline franchise with a new name.

Car Robots had already ended in Japan by the time Robots in Disguise 2001 started airing, so it was known to only have one season, too.

And even farther back, online sources made it known in advance that season 3 would be the final season of Beast Wars, and Season 2 would be the final season of Beast Machines.

I think the only western TF cartoons that we didn't already know were going to end when they did were:
  • the G1 cartoon (the Internet didn't exist at the time, so that kind of online correspondence between creatives and fandoms didn't exist yet)
  • Rescue Bots Academy (it was still up in the air, even to the creatives, as to whether or not it would be renewed for another season after its second season)
  • BotBots (same situation as RBA, it wasn't yet known to the creatives if the show would be renewed for another season after its first one)
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180545)
Posted by chuckdawg1999 on May 18th, 2024 @ 7:07pm CDT
I think a few have mentioned Paramount+ but do we remember that at first Earthspark was supposed to stream there exclusively? I didn't hear a word about Nickelodeon until much later, probably when I saw the episodes up on demand. I knew it would have an uphill climb since not a lot of people use the plus.
Re: RUMOUR: Transformers Earthspark to End After Season 2, Replaced with a New Show (2180566)
Posted by Quantum Surge on May 20th, 2024 @ 12:47am CDT
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.

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