Transformers Armada

Well today was the day. I only saw the second half of it, but I have a good understanding of what happened in the first half. I can honestly say its off to a good start, but that it could go either way. I wish they would shy away from the token humans in the show, but fuck it, I'll deal with it. My only real disappoint is that they seem to have gone with the RiD method of cheap animation: Lots of still frames, and what almost seems like missing animation frames during fights. I'll be watching to see how it fares.

Yeah, I'm pretty much in agreement with you. I'm very happy to see Starscream. I noticed that the dialogue for the kids was really annoying. I was about to change the channel by the third time I heard "WOAH WICKED COOL MAN! THAT IS SO SWEET!"

I only saw the first half (second half is on tape) but so far it seems OK. I do wish Megatron would step on the flesh-creatures, and the lack of animation at some points REALLY bothers me.

Anyone else notice pixelazation when they did close ups of the Autobot symbol? Whatsupwitdat?

I saw the whole show, and I must say it opens the series very well, the music wasen't 80s style, but still had the same effect as the original series. the animation was anime style, I didn't like kids at all. the Mini-cons were exactly as what they are, power-up tools. It was nice to add that the Autobots see them as friends and the Decepticons see them as slaves. The Transformering was the best part of show and the artwork of the transformers was even better.

I give the new show: 8/10

Y'know, growing up sucks. One reason is the responsibility (job, bills, etc.).

The other is, nothing ever seems as good as you remember it being when you were a kid.

In this case, Transformers Armada not only fits the bill, it usurps it.

Like most, after seeing the trailers on Cartoon Network, I thought the true glory would return to the Generation 1 Transformers, much like the Beast Wars series did (Beast Machines does not exist in my mind. As far as I'm concerned, those events never happened). But what we got was a cleverly disguised Robots In Disguise, coupled with today's "collect-a-mania".

It starts out with a half decent storyline; Autobots and Decepticons waged war on Cybertron, using ability-enhancing "Mini-cons" to shift the tides of battle. Finally, both sides realize that the war will never end and the casualties will continue to multiply if they don't get rid of the Mini-cons, so the Autobots and Decepticons band together for the endeavor of building a big ship, putting all the Mini-cons aboard, and sending them out into the endless void of space.

Now here's where the story fell apart. Why would the Decepticons, known for their cheating and crafty ways, WILLINGLY depart with their only means of gaining the upper hand in the war? Especially if the Autobots already agreed to get rid of theirs? Furthermore, how is sending the Mini-cons into space going to end the war? Apparently it didn't, since Megatron tracked them down and brought the battle to Earth.

Up to this point, the animation consists of sliding still ships, space mines, and generic explosions. In other words, very little actual animation. More like moving a cut-out across a screen. Oh, but there's the "ooh, aahh" stretching/warping effect used to depict the Mini-con ship heading toward it's destination of.. nowhere in particular.

The story takes another blow when we're introduced to Red, Carlos and Alexis, three 7th graders with the ability to ride normal bikes, skateboards and scooters up mountainsides. We're also introduced to Bulk and Skull.., oh wait, wrong show, but two very similar characters, except Bulk is an annoying snot-whiner.

When Red and Carlos investigate a cave they found in a mountain, Bulk and Skull follow. The kids get separated. Red and Carlos stumble upon the crashed remains of the Mini-con ship, sending out a beacon (why was this installed? You don't put a tracking device on something you want to LOSE..). They also manage to activate one of the Mini-cons. Good thing the ship's computers and text are written in English, even though the ship crashed to Earth MILLIONS of years before the English language was born. How considerate of those Cybertronians to foresee this eventuality.

Also, Red is gifted, or a crime scene investigator, because he's able to figure out exactly what purpose the Mini-cons served seconds after meeting one. He and Alexis are also invariably able to understand the Mini-con, although it only speaks in computer noise-garble. You would think that if the ship's computers are in English (remember, Red was reading them), there oughtta be someone on board who can actually read and SPEAK the language. Guess that's why the Mini-cons were drifting so long.. they never figured out what their terminals said.

Megatron appears, looking like a revamped Devastator, to claim the Mini-con, who decides to side with the children.

Let me take a minute to comment on the voice acting. First of all, Bulk's VA has to go. I tell you the truth when I say he is SO annoying, I had to fast forward my tape whenever he was on screen. Bulk will make the front of your brain wrinkle.

The kids.. Every other word is "Wicked!", "Cool!", "YEAH!". And, I guess riding bikes and skateboards along mountains really tires you out. In one scene, Red is bending down to pick up a module before Megatron gets it and all you hear is "Uuughh! Oooh! HHmggghh".. EXTREME grunting just to bend down! This series is OVERCAST when it comes to voice-overs. There are some scenes where no voiceover is necessary, but Armada has failed to realize this. So has Digimon, but I digress. Megatron's voice didn't bother me much at first, but it began to grate on me the more I heard it. He sounds like he's trying to mimic BW Megatron, but trying not to sound as "smooth" as BW Megatron. Bad move. BW Megatron was the best American VA I've EVER heard. Optimus sounds like his RiD rendition, which I really don't have a problem with.

Back to the story, Megatron appears, chases the kids and the Mini-con, but Optimus appears. Megatron and Optimus have a skip-frame, still-slides battle, and then reinforcements arrive overpowering Megatron and his troops, who depart back to Cybertron and we're left with the mediocrity that encompasses the final half-hour of the show.

Getting back to what I was saying about growing up, I'm willing to bet the 20-30somethings of the early to mid-80s probably spewed as much venom towards the shows we loved at kids. After all, that's when the "moral-of-the-day" was inserted into every damned toon, when kids who grew up thought our shows weren't as good as when they were kids. Either that, or we weren't as smart as they, or something.. Why else would they censor Looney Toons, Tom & Jerry and other classics like Droopy, Barney Bear and damn near all Tex Avery toons?

Anyway, my point is, I'll bet today's kids are loving the hell out of Robots in Disguise, Digimon, and now Armada. Think about, the same core concepts of giant transforming robots, or powerful mythical creatures is just as cool now as it was then. The kids don't see all the problems with these shows like we do, they don't discriminate. They see something cool, and they love it and have to have it. Questions about possible plotholes or continuity are forgotten almost as soon as they're asked. It's that simple. And when they get older, all of the 3-D, holographic and virtual cartoons of the future will be ripped apart by the now-older children, longing for a return of the shows that they liked as children, just like we're doing.

The circle of life, my friends.

My 30something review: Damn, this show sucks.

My "me as a 10-year old" review: "COOL!" "WICKED" "YEAH!!"

I really have mixed feelings about this show. When I first looked at the art concepts for it I didn't like it because there was so much extra stuff. The characters didn't look like super refined war machines, they had all this extra stuff that would stick out in combat and be in the way. In the original TF most all of the bots were streamline to some extent. Soon into the show though, I got used to it and liked the robot designs. Soon other things replaced it. Over all my biggest gripe is the show overwhelmingly comes off as a big toy commercial. A commercial to sale to the largest common denominator. Everything from putting way to much slang in it so kids can identify with the characters to using very low grade style anime like other popular cartoons. The minicon storey comes off more as a digimon/medabots rip off than anything else. "Hey kids like little robots as buddies to play with, lets stick some of those things in here, we can also use them to make the big robots more powerful sort of like digimon".
So far the dialog has ben bad for everyone. The plot flows poorly and they really arn?t doing much with any of the characters other than make them annoying. Sure, maybe im being a little to harsh because we only got transformers when we were little was to sale japanese toys to the US. But we also got a moral, good dialog and a flowing plot line in each storey. And the art look like someone who cared worked on it to. Surely if they can give detail like that in the 80s it can be done now for cheaper. A bad original TF ep was written better than this was.

The He-Man cartoon was better. :)

I'm gonna have to ask the producers to cut down on the kids and put more emphasis on the robots. The kids are really annoying and there's not enough autobots yet, so I hope they'll be more soon. I thought I saw the Aerialbots in the beginning but they never made it to Earth. Cyclonus sounds like a bumbling idiot (as opposed to the cool, calculating Cyclonus from the original series). Starscream sounds alright but nothing too memorable. Megatron looks like Devastator for some reason... Optimus's voice sounds good, but his second form makes him look like a merman.

One part that I really liked from the show was when Optimus rammed into Megatron, blasted Cyclonus in the face and ran him over. That was pretty much it. I hope this show gets much better...

Well, the scenes on Cybertron looked cool :/

I missed it. When and what channel is it on?

I must say that I was looking forward to Transformers Armada and came away very disappointed. After witnessing such a strong come back from the MOTU cartoon, I was hyped to see how good the new Transformers cartoon would be. After taping the cartoon for a good 45 minutes, I hit the stop button and rewound the tape. This crap is not worth watching once much less having on tape.

The show was'nt even about the Transformers, it was about 3 little kids, and how they discover the mini-cons. The animation which looked so cool in the trailers, was just barely better than Robots In Disguise. And what's up with Laserbeak being an Autobot?! To add insult to injury, they kept playing a remix of the old theme on certain parts of the cartoon and the original voice of Optimus Prime was hosting the commercial breaks.

Crap like this is going to kill the Transformer franchise.