Series Review: Transformers War For Cybertron (Netflix) - SPOILERS

[griffin]

found this nice review:
https://www.polygon.com/animation-cartoons/21347569/transformers-war-for-cybertron-siege-cameos-characters-easter-eggs-autobots-decepticon

Probably a decent commentary on the series too, identifying a lot of the characters and who/what they homage. The author is a main contributor of the TFwiki, who only joined that site a couple days ago, so not an existing contributor to that site... but at least it meant the article wasn't full of "facts" by someone who isn't familiar with the Brand (I remember an article years ago on one of the Transformers Movies, written by someone who tried to sound like an authority on Transformers, but got a lot of things wrong).

I did enjoy the paragraph on the leader class toy "Spoiler pack" for wave 1, noting that it was originally marketed to fans to not open it before seeing the cartoon as it would spoil something in the cartoon, but doesn't appear to have anything that spoils the cartoon... and actually contains items that aren't even in the cartoon.

[SharkyMcShark]

Ive just got through episodes 1 and 2. Honestly I find it kind of bland. It has the whiff of a fan community project.

Was Dr SMOOV Wheeljack in this?

[Autocon]

The Megatron picture hanging up, I think its megatron from the gladiator times.

[GoktimusPrime]

Gawd... I assumed that that red Bumblebee was a whole new character based on red Bumblebee (as a reference to Bumblebee having been both yellow and red in G1). But learning that it was meant to be Cliffjumper makes it really disappointing. I thought that Hasbro had learnt to move away from the "red Bumblebee = Cliffjumper" fallacy (especially given that Earthrise Cliffy is a whole new mould, or at least a different tooling from ER Bumblebee)

P.S.: Just for poos and giggles I was rewatching Episode 1 dubbed in Japanese. Aside from laughing at some of the hilariously inaccurate translations...

* They used only Anglophone names for everything. Autobots and Decepticons instead of Cybertrons and Destrons, Cybertron instead of Sabretron, Optimus Prime, Bumblebee and Jetfire instead of Convoy, Bumble and Skyfire etc. I would've thought that the dub would've used the Japanese names if they wanted to hit the 80s nostalgia thing (as G1 MPs all use Japanese names like Convoy etc.). Although they still call Wheeljack "Hoiljack," although "hoil" is Japanese for "wheel" so I guess technically it's still Anglophone (just the Japanese approximation of - MP Wheeljack's box still spells it as "Wheeljack").

* The voice acting for Convomus Prime was a lot better than on Optimus Prime, though that's not hard.

* Guh... every voice sounds like they're in a tin can. I think it's to make it consistent with the Anglophone version, but there Optimus Prime and Jetfire sound super tinny whereas other characters have varying degrees of tinnyness, with some characters being rather minimal. In the Japanese dub they've maxed up the tinnyness for the sake of consistency, but not in a good way. Gawd I'd wish both sides would just stop making everyone sound like they're speaking into a tin can! If you can't make their voices sound robotic in a good way (as the G1 cartoon did with the slight electronic warble) then just don't do it at all (as Beast Wars did (or did not)).

* On the plus side for non-English speaking Japanese fans who want a proper translation, the Japanese subtitles are a much more accurate translation. I thought they would be "dubtitles," but they're not. Given the violence in this show I'd say the dubs are more for the benefit of the visually impaired rather than for little kids who aren't old enough to read yet. Although the dubs lack audio description, so in a lot of fights all you'd hear are loud noises and shouting.

P.S.: according to tfwiki, the showrunner for this Netflix series was also the showrunner for the Machinima Prime Wars series, and one of the writers also worked on said series. :/ I must admit that I never watched past Combiner Wars, but I'm still reeling in shock at how bad the English is in this Netflix series. From an apparent lack of understanding on how some plurals work (or exist) to misunderstanding the difference between past simple and past participles. There is no way that any of these writers can be native English speakers. I outright refuse to believe it. Remember, Bumblebee is the Chose One, not the Chosen One. <shudders> Unless I am mistook (but not mistaken! )

[Seraphim Prime]

Having had somewhat low expectations for this given some of the comments I'd seen here and elsewhere I found the six episodes surprisingly enjoyable.

There's enough lore and backstory not to get too in the way. Every character felt like they had a purpose in the storytelling, which only a little bit of interchangeability (Prowl, Ironhide, Spinister and Skytread drew the short straws sadly). I wish there was a bit more to Jetfire's change of heart than being onboard with the Decepticons and then making a change to the Autobots. There could have been a bit more nuance in the early episodes. I wish we'd had a bit more interaction between Optimus, Megatron and Magnus outlining their shared history but understand the difficulties there would have been in doing so.

The set up of a dominant Decepticon force and guerrilla Autobots, with unaligned characters and the Mercenary collective mixed in was a familiar yet pleasingly different approach than what we've had before. But the idea of the Autobots and Decepticons being different races fell flat to me

The animation was pretty fluid and didn't jar in my viewing which was a big plus, compared to the previous Machinima work. A lot more effort was put into character models and filters to make the series seem real and lived in.

[SharkyMcShark]

I finished this last night.

Even within the remit of it being a 6 episode long thing, I didn't think it was great.

PROS
- Some of the art looks gorgeous when still.
- I felt that the story got more interesting as it went along. It started generic but built from there.


CONS
- The amount of recolour background characters was really really distracting, and kind of unnecessary. If the studio wasn't in a position to make more character models, then I'd have preferred a tale with a smaller focus (think Beast Wars or Animated) as opposed to cramming blue/green/purple Sideswipe into the background of scenes. That would also have given the creators scope to give a bit more time to characters that didn't really get it, like Prowl, Ironhide, Sideswipe and Cog.
- That Optimus Prime is a bit of a loser, isn't he?
- Dialogue was at times tortuous

[Lint]

Didn't really find this much of a step above the Machinima stuff, but with only six 25 minute episodes you can't really expect too much. It really did feel like it belonged on Youtube.

The amount of recolour background characters was really really distracting, and kind of unnecessary. If the studio wasn't in a position to make more character models, then I'd have preferred a tale with a smaller focus (think Beast Wars or Animated) as opposed to cramming blue/green/purple Sideswipe into the background of scenes. That would also have given the creators scope to give a bit more time to characters that didn't really get it, like Prowl, Ironhide, Sideswipe and Cog.

Yeah this was extremely distracting. They would have been better off with the Cyberverse approach having genericu mook Autobots and Decepticons.

[Tha_Phantom]

I enjoyed it. My biggest issue with it is the lack of transforming going on and Soundwave's voice which you could barely understand. Enjoyed the dark tone and treatment they gave characters such as Bumblebee, Jetfire and Soundblaster. It was cool to see Jetfire start off as leader of the seekers and his transition toward joining the Autobots was done better than the G1 cartoon. Also liked seeing Starscream going after Jetfire's job rather than Megatron's and becoming leader of the seekers by the end of it. Animation was pretty spectacular aside from the stretchy torsos when they walk. I already had bought many of the Siege toys, but seeing the show made me want to take them off the shelf and mess with them again. I'm especially loving the tetrajet mould more than ever and I'll be displaying Jetfire with his Decepticon logo for a while, so IMO the show did its job. Looking forward to Earthrise and Kingdom.

[Tetsuwan Convoy]

* They used only Anglophone names for everything. Autobots and Decepticons instead of Cybertrons and Destrons, Cybertron instead of Sabretron, Optimus Prime, Bumblebee and Jetfire instead of Convoy, Bumble and Skyfire etc. I would've thought that the dub would've used the Japanese names if they wanted to hit the 80s nostalgia thing (as G1 MPs all use Japanese names like Convoy etc.). Although they still call Wheeljack "Hoiljack," although "hoil" is Japanese for "wheel" so I guess technically it's still Anglophone (just the Japanese approximation of - MP Wheeljack's box still spells it as "Wheeljack").

The toys use the Anglophone names as well, so their Japanese names ARE Oppuchimasu Puraimu, Bannburubee and Jettofaiya.
I have a guilty pleasure of saying words in katakana even when I don't needo tsu!
After seeing the show, I kind of want a Jetfire to lead my seekers (which is only Starscream at the moment, in his Earth mode)

[Trent]

Pros:
-Megatron’s lips
-Score - very Tron Legacy inspired
-Megatron’s lips
-Jetfire vs Starscream
-Did I mention Megatron’s lips?

Cons:
-Everything else with a special mention to the incel that animated Elita-1’s walk.