Autobot deaths not seen in the 1986 movie

shammus · Post by **shammus** » Fri Jul 20, 2007 10:02 pm

As many Autobot deaths as there were in the 1986 movie, it’s kind of interesting to know that many other Autobots supposedly died during that movie as well. They didn’t die on-screen and their bodies were not shown (ala Wheeljack and Windcharger) so their deaths are “implied” and simply supported by the fact that we never see those characters in Season 3 or beyond.

I read an interesting blurb on Wikipedia about the movie which states that there was a scene in the movie where a large number of Autobots were killed off all at once while running through a gauntlet of Decepticons during the seige at Autobot City. I included a link to that article below….

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Transf ... _The_Movie

Obviously, this scene didn’t make the final cutdown. My question is, I don’t suppose a version of the movie was ever released to the public that includes this scene as a deleted scene in the movie? The paragraph on Wikepedia doesn’t provide a lot of details on this scene so I was also wondering if anyone else knows anything further about it?

I’ve also read about a second scene in the movie that didn’t make it to the final cut. In this scene, Ultra Magness takes Sideswipe, Red Alert and maybe one other to go fight Devastator during the seige. This results in another death or two for the Autobots. I don’t have a link for this one but I have seen this scene mentioned in several other locations on the web.

If either of these scenes are “viewable” in some capacity, that would be terrific, however I won’t hold my breath. Am I hoping for too much in that a version of the movie was created that includes either or both of these as “deleted scenes”? Anyone else know anything further about these?

Thanks in advance…

Post by **inflatable dalek** » Fri Jul 20, 2007 10:37 pm

No deleted scenes have ever been found in a animated form (there is a slight extension to the end of the Optimus/Megatron battle in the archives where the other Autobots rush to their fallen leader, but it only lasts a few seconds).

Pure speculation on my part, but I'd assume that they'd have made sure the Movie script was in it's "final" form before animating it as putting the man hours in on a ultimately abandoned sequence would be cost prohibitive. On the other hand, it would make sense to me to have the actors record everything and anything even if you've already decided to cut it so as to save having to recall them/rebook the studio if you change your mind. So there may well be audio tracks out there somewhere with extra bits and bobs on if any have surrvived.

There are story boards for the Ultra Magnus/Red Alert sequence which are on some of the DVD releases of the Movie.

As a random fact, Gears can briefly be seen on Moonbase 1 at the very start of the film (so briefly I only noticed him when the recent McFeely DVD comentary pointed it out), whilst Beachcomber can just about be seen on the conveyor belt within Unicron. Niether is seen to escape the Chaos Bringer at the end, but it's hard to put them on the "Dead" list as-for example- Gears could have left the Moonbase before Unicron ate it whilst Beachcomber escaped his innards in a amazing unseen adventure.

Rurudyne · Post by **Rurudyne** » Sat Jul 21, 2007 12:07 am

The Five Faces of Darkness continued the thinning out too.

Skyfire bought it in the armada scene and likely brought several lawsuits to an end in the process.

Cliffjumper · Post by **Cliffjumper** » Sat Jul 21, 2007 11:30 am

Originally posted by Rurudyne
The Five Faces of Darkness continued the thinning out too.

Who died in FFoD? I remember that there Sweep, but that's about it. Someone got trodden on, and Broadside blew up (but he was in it later)...

Awestrike · Post by **Awestrike** » Sun Jul 22, 2007 1:53 am

Its kind of funny to think there were autobots who survived that just said "the heck with it, Im not fighting anymore.

In the First FFoD, you see Warpath, Beachcomber and all the new versions of old characters they killed off only to bring them back to sell in different colors. Unless you want to believe they were formatted like the Decepticons. Brawn/Outback Pipes/Huffer and so on. They could have at least shown a little more thought into the deaths of the characters that made their series popular.

I think thats why the Movie destroyed the series. All the Guys you loved were gone and never mentioned again and you were left with these terrible new guys like Blurr Wheelie and Wreck Gar that you just ended up hating because of the way they talked. For that, they should have just left us with the originals and made us see Warpath and Seaspray more often.

Civ · Post by **Civ** » Sun Jul 22, 2007 2:34 am

Originally posted by Awestrike
I think thats why the Movie destroyed the series. All the Guys you loved were gone and never mentioned again...

Some of the ones who died were mentioned in Dark Awakening and Optimus Prime did return. Optimus was mentioned a few other times as well when Rodimus Prime was trying to get adjusted to the leadership role.

For that, they should have just left us with the originals and made us see Warpath and Seaspray more often.

I can agree with more character development (or in quite a few cases, any character development) for the original characters but for those two, they really need to change their speech patterns; otherwise, people may change the channel just to shut 'em up.

Here is a whole slew of storyboards that never made it to the final cut: the apparent death of Mirage, Trailbreaker dead, Red Alert eating it, and other scenes.

http://www.wombatking.com/coppermine/th ... hp?album=4

Ballplayer · Post by **Ballplayer** » Sun Jul 22, 2007 7:23 pm

It was just a dumb marketing decision of Hasbro, which killed off G1...

I noticed they had learned their lesson with Beast Wars, which instead upgraded the main characters to sell more toys...

Awestrike · Post by **Awestrike** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 4:35 am

Yeah, the Dark awakening episode did mention some, but i was the ones that everyone already knew were dead( Except Huffer, still don't understand that one.) And don't get me wrong, I still like the franchise, I just think the show would have ran a little longer in the U.S had they not just wiped out everyone you cared about,( I was a huge Wheeljack and Sideswipe fan) even minor characters. Show Beachcomber once more, or Inferno, even if it was as background characters.

My final question to all is, Whatever happened to Sparkplug?

optimum · Post by **optimum** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 6:46 am

Originally posted by Civ

Here is a whole slew of storyboards that never made it to the final cut: the apparent death of Mirage, Trailbreaker dead, Red Alert eating it, and other scenes.

http://www.wombatking.com/coppermine/th ... hp?album=4 [/B]

Nice find, those storyboards kind of do fill in the gaps not seen in the movie. But some of the boards make no sense at all.

Cliffjumper · Post by **Cliffjumper** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 3:14 pm

Originally posted by Awestrike
My final question to all is, Whatever happened to Sparkplug?

Let's say he died off-screen of a heart problem (he put the fat into "fat American mechanic") in 1993... Twelve years later, people aren't going to be mentioning it every 12 seconds (especially with Daniel around)... Thing you've got to think about is that in TF:TM Ironhide (Prime's right-hand man at one point), Ratchet (the Autobots' chief medic), Wheeljack (the comedy scientist), Prowl (who was... there. Sometimes. And did have that single badass moment picking on those cowboys), Windcharger (their chief magnet guy, whenever he remembered to bother) and Brawn (who, admittedly, none of them liked) all die, and mention is amde of just three of them (and then in an episode which was good precisely because it went against the feel of everything else in the whole show). So you've got to maybe assume that TFs get over death pretty quickly - they don't mention some key characters who died a year ago, so if Sunstreaker got slotted in 1994, it's unlikely anyone would mention it in 2006.

That and the writers for the TF cartoon were a bunch of pig-ignorant hacks

martyboy70 · Post by **martyboy70** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 3:38 pm

I see you're still lovin Mr Gluts work;)

Awestrike · Post by **Awestrike** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 4:01 pm

Agreed, they wouldn't still talk about it. However, are we left to assume that all the characters from the past(and probably the best) three seasons all died and these new guys who were still afraid of the decepticons even without energy or Galvatron? Someone had to live ala Omega Supreme who I was stunned when they showed him and Cosmos again. I just think they could have eased in the new characters and kept a better show running longer. Who wouldn't like to see Rodimus Prime getting advice or even talk to guys who had been Optimus' underlings for millions of years.

shammus · Post by **shammus** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 4:56 pm

One thing the writers could have done is, instead of wiping out the old characters to make room for new ones, they could have simply modified the existing characters while bringing in a few new guys to mesh with them. In many cases, the deaths of some of these characters was truly pointless. The silliest example of this that I can think of is when they killed of seldom used characters such as Huffer and Windcharger just so they could introduce more seldom used characters (Pipes..etc..) that are identical to the originals except for the paint job. Why not just give all the characters a make over so you can still have a new toy to market and audiences don't lose the characters they've grown attached to? Bumblebee/Goldbug received this treatment yet most others didn't unfortunately.

If you think back to some of the other cartoons from the 80s, having characters die was a very rare occurance if it occured at all. Rather, they just modified some of the more prevailant characters while phasing some of the lesser used ones out. GIJoe and TMNT both did this for example. They released a new version of Cobra Commander in almost every series. Older, lesser used GIJoes were repackaged into new "subgroups" (ie...Slaughter's Mauraders) and reinserted back into the lineup. It seems as though there were plenty of ideas for the Transformers, yet the writers just insisted on needlessly using entirely new characters to carry them out. I don't really see why Ironhide couldn't have been a "Targetmaster". By the time they did start using some of these new ideas on the old characters (Powermaster Optimus Prime.... "Actionmasters" ..."Pretenders"...etc...) it was too late.

Sociopathic Autobot · Post by **Sociopathic Autobot** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 6:10 pm

You're all idiots. All of us with brains know Brawn didn't die.

Edit- Especially Cliffjumper, you should know by now. Don't be surprised if you get banned.

Halfshell · Post by **Halfshell** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 6:18 pm

Originally posted by Sociopathic Autobot
You're all idiots. All of us with brains know Brawn didn't die.

Only because he's not real.

Awestrike · Post by **Awestrike** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 7:14 pm

Its agreed that the old characters really didn't need to be taken out to sell new toys. If fact if you mixed them together, they probably would have sold a lot more of the new guys. But characters like Ironhide and Wheeljack for example, would have made the new episodes easier to watch and would have resulted in a longer run on TV. Sure I was glad they brought Optimus back but it was too late and he wasn't enough. The Galvatron character alone was a waste. The decepticons were no longer the threat they were since the Movie when Megatron was finally doing what he said he was going to do. They waited until he finally became a badass to replace him with a maniac who brought the memory of Megatron to a sad conclusion. Rodimus Ultra Magnus Sky Lynx etc were a total bore to me. Either too Pompous, too whiny or they made too much of them. Like Ultra Magnus, they were always stating how great he was but it was never written why. The Older Autobots already had a track record. The only new autobot that I enjoyed was Kup because he was written old school. I even ended up not liking Spike(A G1 staple) because of the addition of Daniel who sucked the desire to watch whatever episode he was in. I wish they would try there hand at writing a new series that continued how the show should have been going into the 86 movie instead of say Armada or RID or Cybertron, all those shows were destined to fail. A retcon show would bring back original viewers and new ones who could watch the series and get hooked.

by the way, did anyone notice on the shuttle after the crew got wiped out, that when the decepticons took the controls, all the supposed dead autobots had moved positions and even flipped over?

chiasaur11 · Post by **chiasaur11** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 11:28 pm

Originally posted by Sociopathic Autobot
You're all idiots. All of us with brains know Brawn didn't die.

Edit- Especially Cliffjumper, you should know by now. Don't be surprised if you get banned.

It's not Cliffjumper's fault Brawn wants to lay low for a while.
I understand him, I mean what's the good of faking your death if everyone constantly brings up that you're alive?

Grandmaster Shockwaeve · Wed Jul 25, 2007 4:39 am

Don Glut said:

None of the writing on this series, in my opinion, was good or passionate or, sometimes even adequate.

These shows were, after all, half-hour commercials for the toys and little else, when you come right down to it.

I didn’t even remember writing this episode or the title until this interview.

I was never a fan of any of the characters.

I really don’t think any of my “Transformers” episodes was particularly good

Rabid cartoon fanatics don't come along as often as they used to, but this collection of quotes should be kept on hand just in case.

Prons · Post by **Prons** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 5:09 am

Apparently there was an unanimated scene where Unicron destroys Shockwave, or so I read on the Wikipedia. I suppose we're meant to assume he died off screen in the movie.

Ballplayer · Post by **Ballplayer** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 6:35 am

That Glut is a real a-hole :P