Rodimus Prime wrote:I wasn't trying to say they shouldn't be in the movies at all. Maybe I phrased it wrong. I meant to say that the main story should be about the Transformers themselves, with humans as peripheral characters, or perhaps as villains, like it was in AoE with Cemetery Wind, and even Dylan Gould in DoTM. I liked those characters. I understand about the general audience needing characters to relate to that aren't giant robots, but I always had a little problem with that: the title of the movie is TRANSFORMERS. The brand had been around for 23 years when the 1st film came out, so people knew of it. So even if there weren't main human characters to relate to, the movie would have done well. Maybe not $800 million well, but well. And I guess that's what everything comes down to. $$$
The thing is, this situation is like that video that was posted roughly around the same time the first film came out, "They Were Always Real To Me" is what it's called, the title fits our situation. Transformers were always a big deal to us, but then they weren't. A quick history lesson, for everyone, including myself:
Action Masters have their spot in a few collections here and there, but technically the last fully transformable line of figure was the end of Transformers for most people. Then it just died. Comics, show, toys, all of it gone. So if it was gone for us, imagine how much of it escaped the mind of the average American (or anyone worldwide, really).
G2 tried to revive it, show, comics, toys, all of it. It barely registered, really. Fans snapped them up as fast as they could, as garish as the colors were, it was G1 dang it, and we were going to have it! The "remastered" show caught a few people's attention, along the lines of "I remember that show. WTF did they do to it? I don't remember that cube thing. This is stupid." Not a good start. The comics only lasted a year and we didn't get a single figure of the new characters. It took 20+ years to get a Jhiaxus figure and he's not even the right color, or size.
It wasn't until Jurassic Park that Hasbro had the bright idea of Transformers + animals and bugs = big seller! come to mind. Now, that started to bring TFs back to the forefront, but it wasn't in the public's consciousness, not much, at least. It would be another decade before the general public took notice.
News stations around the country (I was, in fact, the first person to report on it. I saw a snippet about it on WEWS out of Cleveland and reported it to The ALLSpark back when I was a member there.) "Paramount pictures says they're bringing the 1980's cartoon and toyline Transformers to life on the big screen. The live action film will be the first of it's kind for the series. They're hoping to release the movie sometime in 2006, according to sources."
And then nothing for months, some of the fandom even forgot we were getting a movie, for a little while. Then out of the blue, leaked script and it divided the fandom. The film was never going to be ready for '06, so Summer '07, here we come. Trailers started popping up, the reaction wasn't a positive one. "That looks like a skeletal Cliffjumper! Why is he attacking the Mars rover?! WHO WRITES THIS?!"
People saw the name Michael Bay attached and thought "Oh no! It's going to be Bad Boys with Transformers in it! Noooooo!" Then it came out, people saw it and it turned into a sleeper hit. Made a good chunk of change here, and surprised everyone worldwide with a 700+ million dollar take. Couldn't keep the toys in stock, Transformers finally made it back to the mainstream and into the public consciousness.
It worked because it had never been done before. It worked because the juvenile humor registered with everyone.
Then another lull, so Animated could come along, we quickly saw how fast the general audience's attention span shrinks. Then comes 2009's ROTF. "They're making another one? Cool! I'll go see it!" and we saw what happened there. Critics hated it. Fans hated it. Audiences hated it. Yet it made 800+ million and beat the first film by quite a bit.
Another lull, another waiting period for the next film. In the meantime, the only publicity was bad publicity. Shia LeBeouf couldn't keep his head out of his ass for 10 seconds and caused a bunch of trouble. Bar fights, getting arrested at Walgreens, public intoxication, running his mouth, etc.
Then DOTM comes along in 2011 and this time it's in 3D and people said "Well, because it's 3D, I'll give it a shot, I guess." and they sure did. First of the series to break through the billion dollar threshold and then some. People just could not stop watching this movie because the visuals and the 3D just blew 'em away. But critics and fans were harsh and said it was overblown and they pretty much hated it.
THREE year hiatus. The general public moves onto other films and see things like Star Trek Into Darkness, read up on Star Wars coming back after 30 years, Ridley Scott's attempt to go into the history of Aliens, etc. Then...out of nowhere (for them, not us) Bay brings us Age Of Extinction.
"Aw, not another one of these..." But wait...there's Kelsey Grammer! Stanley Tucci?! JOHN FRIGGIN' GOODMAN?! Oh and uh...Marky Mark? Really? Eh, okay. Final verdict? "3D wasn't that good, the visuals are their best yet, the cast is somewhat likable but tries too hard and makes me miss Shia! Oh and it's too loud and way too long." Still ends up beating DOTM at the box office and surpasses it's billion dollar take.
Now we're in another hiatus and news places are reporting Robert The Walking Dead Kirkman among other very talented creators sitting in a room working on the next script and we hear that Paramount's plan is to create a MCU type of deal but for Transformers. General consensus? "Reboot the whole thing! Or better yet, let it die!"
So, if it's in the public, it's a negative image at the moment. As the next 2 of 3 years burn away until the next film, they'll forget more and more. They'll cringe at the thought of another 2.75 hour flick that seemingly does nothing but have explosions and weird looking robots beating the crap out of each other. Not to mention "Oh, great. This one contradicts the other films even more than the other ones did! Now none of it makes sense! Who writes this crap?!"
Heck, even the toys suffered a bit. Fatigue set in and a lot of stores just don't stock 'em like they used to. People don't buy them like they used to. People come to laugh at Shia, John Tuturro, John Goodman and Mark Wahlberg, they happen to look at the CGI eye candy too, but they could do without 'em for the most part, probably.
With the writing being handled as it has been, with the films being a whole bunch of explosives, with the general audience having the attention span of a gnat with ADD, having a Transformers-centric film won't work and certainly won't make enough money to recover the investment. Look at Disney, for example. Big name stars, big pricetags, HUGE failures. They're still recovering from John Carter, and it'll be a while before the sting of The Lone Ranger goes away.
The problem is partially the audience, it's partially the filmmakers, but whatever it is, the world just isn't ready for a Transformers only film. It's just not going to work, no matter how much we wish it would. And right now, what is everyone talking about? The massive success that is Jurassic World and it's well deserved, too. A fun romp from beginning to end and made everyone feel like a kid again, like we were back in 1993, just with prettier people doing the running and screaming thing. Star Wars is coming at Christmas, everyone's losing their minds. Transformers? No one's talking about it. Heck, half the time, the movies are only mentioned so people can say "Oh, I saw that pile of $#!7, it sucked!"
Sad, but true. People aren't enlightened and Transformers aren't enlightening. Nothing you can do, really.
Sabrblade wrote:Rodimus Prime wrote:Predacons Rising was fine for what it was, the ending to a TV series.
"Deadlock" was the show's ending. Preds Rising was an epilogue made after the fact.
I also feel Deadlock was the defacto finale. I feel like Rising was tacked on just because. It wasn't the best writing and it felt hollow and boring to me. Optimus and Wheeljack floating around in space, Starscream beating on Predacons because he could and Autobots fighting...what? I mean, there was nothing particularly special about it and it was ridiculously short. Not even worth my time or effort, really. (And I'm not the only fan who feels that way.)
Transformers Prime was excellent. Prime Beast Hunters was Prime dying a not so great death. Predacons Rising was taking a dump on a once great show's grave.
NOTE: Realize that I am not a perfect Christian, nor do I profess to be. I apologize if anyone's ever offended by me, I'm not perfect. Don't hold my posts and opinions against other Christians.