TF Views

So I started re-watching Animated last night (because lord knows I gotta watch good TF cartoons somewhere) and they mention Sparks a few times here and there, and it got me thinking: when was the last time TF, as a franchise, in-media, actually explained what the fuck a Spark was? I mean, the concept has become so ubiquitous to us longtime fans that we don't even think about it anymore, but between stuff like the movies and the video games, there's a lot of newcomers that might hear the term and wonder what exactly they're referring to. That new game, "Rise of the Dark Spark", which crosses over those two newcomer-friendly universes, has "Spark" right there in the dang title, but it's entirely possible a lot of people picking it up won't realize that it refers to a specific thing, a Transformer's soul/being/whatever, and think it's just some goofy macguffiny nametitle.

Really, I honestly don't think TF has defined Sparks since they first did it way back in BW, then expanded on it in Beast Machines. Given the scope and breadth of TF media these days, it's entirely possible fans, not even newer ones, like guys who have been in since early-mid 2000's, might not have watched those shows and might not be fully aware of what they're referring to when they say 'Spark' in the more recent media.

What's everyone else's thoughts on this subject? Anyone seen any fans anywhere else asking what the hell a Spark is, or anything like that? I dunno, the ubiquity of the concept in the fandom contrasted with the lack of explanation of it in more recent media just, aheh

sparked

my interest.

AoE has a short convo between Marky Mark and Robo Jesus that a spark is basically a transformer soul, which is pretty much the long and short of it.

Almighty Unicron wrote:AoE has a short convo between Marky Mark and Robo Jesus that a spark is basically a transformer soul, which is pretty much the long and short of it.

Answers that question! Short thread, good job guys, we can all go home.

I remember in Armada it was explained as the equivalent of the human heart when they were trying to save Smokescreen's life. In Beast Wars and especially Beast Machines it was clearly the soul of the Transformer, where their conciousness and being resided.

Prime briefly explained sparks in the first TF film but that was it (I haven't seen AoE). I also didn't watch Prime, so!

Well to answer the sub question: I haven't seen any fans wondering about the term, at least not on TFW which is where I would be likely to see such questions. Maybe most new fans have been able to assume definition based on context.