Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Series

No noses? No problem! Zombiebots? Sure, why not. A confusing new canon that allows loose and contradictory material? And now a new sequel show with an entirely different art style that takes place way in the future!
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andersonh1
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by andersonh1 »

I love the CGI cartoons, though admittedly I'd prefer a larger cast, and I guess the two have been mutually exclusive up until now. We didn't exactly get a large cast with Animated though, so traditional animation goesn't guarantee every figure making it onto the show.
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

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Tigermegatron wrote:CGI,No matter how beautiful it looks,Is a bad/Negative thing to use on Transformers cartoons. Because Hasbro has always used the TF cartoons as 22 minute commericials to help advertise/sell the toys in stores. limiting the cast & not having all the toys featured in the cartoons means these non-show toys don't sell as well in stores compared to the show-toys.
I wouldn't say CGI it's a bad or negative thing at all. Given enough time, or quality of the CGI, it can have large casts as well. Energon and Cybertron both used CGI for the Transformers, they had rather large casts. And as andersonh1 points out, some traditional animation shows have kept the cast small. And even if one of the purposes of the show is to sell toys, Hasbro usually comes up with some figures they don't intend on having in the show. Oil Slick from Animated for example, Hasbro didn't tell the shows creators about, but was an early enough release that the show's creators eventually worked him into an episode anyway.
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Shockwave »

I can kind of see Deathy's point though. To a point. I won't go so far as to say that it's a bad/negative thing, in fact, I think if any franchise would lend itself to cgi it would be TF. But I did kind of feel like the epicness of BW was a little bit hindered by the lack of cast. I think if both BW and BM had bigger casts it could have felt more epic (we could have had more aquatic based episodes if characters like Cybershark or Airhammer had been included for example). Of course, the reverse side of this is that with a smaller cast you get a lot more focus on character development and generally makes for a better series.
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Sparky Prime »

Shockwave wrote:But I did kind of feel like the epicness of BW was a little bit hindered by the lack of cast. I think if both BW and BM had bigger casts it could have felt more epic (we could have had more aquatic based episodes if characters like Cybershark or Airhammer had been included for example).
I don't think it takes a large cast to make a story feel epic personally. I mean, I wouldn't say Beast Wars felt less epic having been hindered by a small cast at all. If anything that added to it, given how few troops and resources they had to work with. Same thing with Beast Machines, with just a small group of Maximals fighting against nearly impossible odds with essentially an entire planet worth of Vehicon drones against them. How would a larger cast make that more epic?
Of course, the reverse side of this is that with a smaller cast you get a lot more focus on character development and generally makes for a better series.
I think that's the main reason Hasbro has decided to keep the cast small with the past couple shows.
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by BWprowl »

I'm not sure that 'epicness' is something a TF series needs to have to be good, anyhow. A series should just focus on telling a decent story with whatever cast-size works for that, and whether it needs an epic-level story/setting/cast or whatever comes about as a by-product of that. Bigger isn't always better, and I'd certainly rather have better.

All I'm saying is, Armada, Energon, and Cybertron went for 'epic', universe-spanning stories with a cast of hundreds and...well I liked Energon, but that's kind of the opposite of validation for a show, isn't it?
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Shockwave »

Epic was obviously the wrong word to go with. TF doesn't NEED epic to be good, that's not what I was saying, I guess what I really meant was that we could have had more variety in the stories with more characters? Y'know so the end of BW wouldn't have had to have every water battle boiling down to just another "Rampage fighting Depth Charge"... there could have been something different. Like.. maybe Cybershark has to do a mission on land that involves him not getting caught but then he does, by Airhammer and Airrazor and he starts running towards the ocean nearby because his alt mode is useless on land. So then he makes it, but guess what? He's not out of the woods yet because, oh yeah, Airhammer is a shark too and can still chase after him. I dunno, I guess I just see so much wasted potential for good stories that we could have gotten if the cast weren't so limited. That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy BW for what it was or that I don't like it now or anything like that, I just think there could have been more.

Plus, with a larger cast in a setting where you have factions at war, it's sometimes good to actually see the war element portrayed. Like we'd never have seen in BW the kind of scene near the end of the G1 two parter where the Decepticons banish the Autobots from Earth and take over but then they come back and it's just an all out battle scene with like 40 Autobots vs. like 30some-odd Decepticons. No one's talking, it's just all fight and you don't get the "war/battle" feel with BW.

TL: DR: I guess what I'm saying is that I can see the potential for more good stories with a larger cast.
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Mako Crab »

Shockwave wrote: I think if both BW and BM had bigger casts it could have felt more epic (we could have had more aquatic based episodes if characters like Cybershark or Airhammer had been included for example).
Sorry, this just made me chuckle. I remember on some of the BW extras on the Rhino release, that someone said the animators cried whenever they saw that an episode was in or near water. 1990s cgi was a bitch when it came to rendering water. Especially on a small TV show budget. :P
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Onslaught Six »

BW's story didn't call for that kind of thing, though. They had limitations and they used them to craft a story about explorers and couriers getting crashed on a planet with a terrorist with illusions of grandeur. (Who, of course, actually achieved that on some level, but whatever.) It ain't Saving Private Ryan, it's Die Hard.

It's exactly your kind of description, though, that makes me yearn for a BW reboot or reimagining or something that isn't set in the God damn same universe. Even the shitty "Shattered Glass" Beast Wars shit is doing that! They had an opportunity to do something that would literally be completely different from Beast Wars, and they made it the fucking same! Argh!
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Re: Roberto Orci Talks About Next Transformers Animated Seri

Post by Tigermegatron »

Onslaught Six wrote:BW's story didn't call for that kind of thing, though. They had limitations and they used them to craft a story about explorers and couriers getting crashed on a planet with a terrorist with illusions of grandeur. (Who, of course, actually achieved that on some level, but whatever.) It ain't Saving Private Ryan, it's Die Hard.

It's exactly your kind of description, though, that makes me yearn for a BW reboot or reimagining or something that isn't set in the God damn same universe. Even the shitty "Shattered Glass" Beast Wars shit is doing that! They had an opportunity to do something that would literally be completely different from Beast Wars, and they made it the fucking same! Argh!
I thought the BW Second writers did a decent different BW story.
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