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Post by Devastator_2000 on Sept 25, 2004 13:28:08 GMT -5
It seams that our board has had a lack of good conversation for some time now. So I am going to ask a question that hopefully will make for good conversation.
As we all know, Cybertron is going to be the follow up show to Energon. But very little if anything is known about the show.
So what would you as long time fans like to see done to both the show and the toys to make them interesting?
As I am still thinking about the subject myself, I will post my thought a little later.
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Post by CkRtech on Sept 25, 2004 14:19:45 GMT -5
They have GOT to pull the plug on this Japan/USA co-development plan they are working on. It is obvious that the transformers shows have gone a route of pure toy commercial alone instead of including decent writing and characters in the mix.
Funny - Mattel manages to have the good cartoons and toy distribution that sucks while Hasbro has sorry cartoons and quite a big product line of toys with fair distribution.
I really think they should consider doing "out of season" development of the cartoon & develop it for one country. The translation can be done as more of a post production type thing for the secondary country.
Personally, I think Japan needs to keep their hands off of it. Ever since the cartoon style turned to kiddie anime, the whole thing has gone down hill. The animation isn't good, the writing isn't good & the dialogue is horrible.
The earlier years worked better in terms of mixing animation studios, writing, voice acting, etc. The CGI of Beast Wars wasn't too bad. It is possible that this could be utilized again, but I would hope that the scenes would be a little more complex animation-wise.
I don't really have a call on the toys as I do not collect Energon.
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Post by Devastator_2000 on Sept 25, 2004 16:26:31 GMT -5
As for the toys, I think that for the most part Hasbro is doing a good job. There are a couple here and there that make me scratch my head and ask what they were thinking, but nobody is perfect.
As for the toon, I fully agree with you CK. They have got to make a cartoon from the ground up for the US market, not recycling a Japanese toon. I can live with the so-so animation, it is after all a kids cartoon. But the dialoge sucks!
I have tried to watch Energon, but I just cant stand Kicker. I really hate it when he does the dumb flashback to when he was a little kid. So to me I think having good solid writting/stories as well as normal American dialoge is a must. It should not be hard for them to do this either, after all they have a good model.......Beast Wars.
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Post by Gunman_sr5 on Sept 25, 2004 18:04:09 GMT -5
It is know that a new studio is handleing Cybertron. This time it is a US company if I am correct. I would like to see the current voice actors stick around as well. Once Cybertron is all said and done. The Armada continuity should be cut off to start from scratch. As for the toys. They are greatly improveing.
As far as US vs. Japan cartoons. We are getting the movie. Depending on how it turns out a spin off cartoon from it being solely US in the begining would be Hasbros best bet.
Armada/Energon was created jointly between Hasbro and Takara was a last ditch effort to save Takara from banckrutcy.
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Post by Jo'Roq on Sept 25, 2004 18:07:17 GMT -5
The problem with the co-development is that the dialogue is usually written so that mouth movements match what is being said - which means they animate primarily for the Japanese dialog which has many more syllables for the same meanings. Also, the different countries have different broadcast restrictions, which usually are detrimental on the US side - my best example is the travesty of Fox Kids airing "Vision of Escaflowne", one of the best anime out there and never intended for the market it was imported for (they had to completely REWRITE several characters and plot points to get it on the air).
I have long been against the current trend of importing Japanese shows for the standard "kiddie block" programming slots. The intent of the dialogue gets lost, and serious moments are turned into gags - especially when the scene was a silent contemplative moment (apparently US kids can't be allowed to see characters be serious when its not high action drama). Also, the culture references in scripts and animation are the hardest parts to translate, and are usually the first things switched to jokes.
TF was at its best when made for the American (and then American/Canadian) market first. Its our show, our culture, and it should stay that way.
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Post by scrapperboy on Sept 25, 2004 18:16:16 GMT -5
The most important thing to do is of course having little to no human characters. By this I also mean how big of a role there is for a human character. It worked fine in G1, and Beast Wars, shows that fans put on the top of the list. The audience has to identify with the personality of the bots, not with one single human character (Kicker).
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Post by Jo'Roq on Sept 26, 2004 0:21:57 GMT -5
Right on, Scrapper.
The appeal of Spike (and Sparkplug) was that Spike complemented the Autobots by providing knowledge of Earth where they hadn't done any research yet. He was also part of the formula buddy pair with Bumblebee, but except for a few episodes he was just a secondary character who usually kept out of the fighting.
That's why Daniel was less well received by the original fans - he was too involved and never really added anything to the story, until "Rebirth".
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Post by CkRtech on Sept 27, 2004 0:15:41 GMT -5
GOSH I wish Rebirth had continued! ....I'd watch it right now...except I have to go to sleep.
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Post by StrykerX2K on Oct 1, 2004 8:15:05 GMT -5
I liked the Transformers toons, just because it was TF's but splitting them from Japan would be the absolute best thing. Instead of the cartoons being made for us and imported to Japan it is the other way around and there seems to be somethign lost in the translation....we definitely get the raw end of the deal...
I would love to see them pick up from Rebirth, as well. If we are going to be doing a Cybertron series, I am hoping that means entirely new and futuristic alt modes....
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Post by Devastator_2000 on Oct 1, 2004 12:01:07 GMT -5
If I am not mistaken, Cybertron follows Energon the way that Energon followed Armada. So it is most likely that we will still have the same type of toon to deal with.
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