The Soapbox IV: Top 10 Characters of All Time

[roller]

Um why wernt rapido, G2 Meanstreak or Thunderclash not mentioned?

Everyone over 45 even knows them

[Kyle]

Agreed mostly with 1 - 7,

[dirge]

I like my girlies pink!

BTW I agree with maybe three of the 'bots nominated. But I'll leave that alone...

[iceburn]

trying to be silly here, i think megatron should be first!! :P
hmmm STL, are you going to continue 11 - 20? haha

[1orion2many]

Well done STL, you can see a lot of thought has been put into your decisions. I may not agree with all your choices but do agree with Starscream above Soundwave. Yes a lot of the older fans remember Soundwave but ask the younger ones who he is and I think you may find them saying SoundWho. The G1 and Cybertron Soundwaves are completely different entities where as you can identify Starscream from one series to the next right up into the movie.

[Pulse]

Yes a lot of the older fans remember Soundwave but ask the younger ones who he is and I think you may find them saying SoundWho?

I've encountered that first-hand too when on numerous occasions, Non TF people have seen my G1s & they're like "I remember that guy with the cassettes coming out of him but I can't remember his name?"

Hopefully he'll be in the 2nd movie & then they'll remember Soundwave...

[Lint]

1-7 are pretty much set in stone, except maybe Devastator for me.

Aside from his many incarnations in recent cartoon series, Hotshot was a pretty central comic character too as I recall. Theres always been a hotshot/hotrod/cheetor type character in every series so try to focus on the character and not get hung up on a 'name'.

[STL]

Ah, Hot Shot.

I always knew he was going to be the most contentious one. I was actually thinking of inserting an Omega Supreme or Rodimus Prime but there was just that nagging feelin'. I hear you all on him and trust me, I didn't put him there lightly. I read up on him, watched you-tube videos, talked to some kids over the past several months who went through the Unicron Trilogy and his name came up a lot (next to Prime and Megatron). I don't like him very much to be perfectly honest but I think he merits his position.

A character like him was supposed to exist in five lines if you include Movie and Animated. If not for BB, we'd all be using a HS acronym for him these days b/c of his success in TFM. I think that the fact that, like Starscream, the writers always feel compelled to bring someone like him into the fold, is merit enough at this stage for him to sneak in.

That said, I put it to you guys, if Hot Shot should not have snuck in, who would you have put in instead? Best answer gets a spanking new Overlord courtesy of our generous Pulse.

I think the title is a bit misleading. See I thought it was a list of the top 10 characterisations, of which Devastator and Unicron wouldn't count and some of the others would be a questionable.

My bad. I guess that could always be another column. But it's always going to be hard to pick characterisations b/c there really is a lack of consistency across all lines. Of course, that won't mean I won't try.

Hot Shot was interesting in Armada growing up and rising up through the ranks to the point where he was commanding the Autobot forces. I think Hot Rod/Hot Shot are close enough in that regard to be versions of the same character.

Well, that was an assertion I made but I was given some examples of their differences so I think the characters are different enough. But not that it matters, I don't envisage Hot Shot lasting in the top 10. I might try this thread again next year after the movie.

BTW I agree with maybe three of the 'bots nominated. But I'll leave that alone...

Come on, these are supposed to flare up discussions!

(and it'd also be nice to see how someone who's more senior, as in lived thru a lot of TF history, around here thinks)

trying to be silly here, i think megatron should be first!! :P
hmmm STL, are you going to continue 11 - 20? haha

Argh! The last 4 on that list were hard enough. I think Transformers themselves lack sufficient depth to do that anyway but that's a topic for another time.

[kup]

Its ok to have a Cheetor/Hot Rod 'youthful' character in; I have no problem with that and ecourage it but the trouble is that unlike Cheetor who was well developed and 'grew' as a character steadily throughout Beast Wars and even Beast Machines (the only character with a logical progression aside from BA) while Hot Shot was just an annoying youth character who was his same annoying self from begining to almost end and was thrust into 'greatness' for some reason. Later in Energon he was just replaced by a more annoying 'youth' character (Ironhide) and thrown into the sidelines.

If Hot Shot had better characterisation or development; I would have been more open to him and his role as 'the bot who kids identify with' as I did with Cheetor but I can't do the same with Hot Shot because his character was just annoying and formulaic there just too much of 'same all' through most of Armada and only at the end did he begin to get some very forced characterisation but it wasn't enough.

[liegeprime]

hmmm agree on most except Hotshot. Oh and everytime I see the Armada version, i just cant help but think of Grimlock13's "special" Hotshot, such a retard heheheheheh Cant think of a character to put or recommend for that slot though....