80's and 90's

Chat about stuff other than Transformers.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

80's and 90's

Post by dura »

I really liked the 80's Filmation He-man and She-ra cartoons. Those were masterpieces. They don't make quality cartoons like those anymore.
User avatar
Denyer
Posts: 33033
Joined: Sun Sep 17, 2000 4:00 am
Location: Perfidious Albion
Contact:

Post by Denyer »

You'll probably appreciate James's book when it's out;

http://www.amazon.com/He-Man-She-Ra-Com ... 506700640/

On balance always preferred the mini-comics and UK comics with MOTU, but did watch MOTU/POP -- it tended to talk down to kids, though, particularly with the PSA stuff, which TFs (although equally hack writing a lot of the time) didn't. Much.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

Filmation had the best-looking and best-drawn characters.

I'm glad they added She-ra next to He-man on the cover. It was originally only He-man. She-ra was more powerful than He-man, and perhaps even stronger.

I like the PSA for "Horde Prime Takes a Holiday" where He-man and She-ra are standing in the Eternos Palace courtyard warning kids about child molesters. That was gutsy.

I hate Loreal for shutting down Filmation. I want more Filmation He-man and She-ra episodes more than anything else. He-man and She-ra still need to free Etheria, and Adora needs to go back with Adam to Eternia to serve as Princess.
User avatar
Denyer
Posts: 33033
Joined: Sun Sep 17, 2000 4:00 am
Location: Perfidious Albion
Contact:

Post by Denyer »

Yeah, they did have good moments. And POP was generally a better show in premise and tone. I'm not sure I'd trust modern writers with continuation though -- these days the tendency is to make everything more grimdark, whereas POP managed to strike a balance despite being pioneering for a show with a toyline that had comb-able hair.

Although maybe we're coming out of the grimdark with the new Voltron show.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

Why couldn't She-ra have gone on longer? Should they have just continued He-man and added She-ra? It was so good; it should not have ended.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

The 90's Spider-man The Animated was the best Spider-man cartoon ever, yet much of fandom rarely talks about it.
User avatar
Skyquake87
Protoform
Posts: 3986
Joined: Sun Jul 04, 2010 9:34 am

Post by Skyquake87 »

Possibly because its dated quite badly, unfortunately. Whilst the '90s X-Men Cartoon is pretty awesome, boiling down 30 years of moping xenophobia allegoric comics into all the good bits, Spidey (along with the Marvel Action Hour stuff) suffers a bit from an aesthetic that's dated quite badly. It's also quite Hammy and silly.

Personally, I like the cheap and cheerful Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends. But then I heart Firestar.

Still get a kick out of Batman : The Animated Series (er, or at least Seasons 1 & 2 that got released over here), which stands up remarkably well and doesn't feel old in the same way a lot of other cartoon shows. Timeless, that's the word. And it gave us Harley Quinn, so hooray for that :)

As for He-Man, it did get the New Adventures series which I remember being very good (although I haven't seen it since it was broadcast over here in the very early '90s) and the 200X series was decent, but crammed too much into its Third Series (possibly as cancellation loomed as the nostalgia boom of the early 2000s quickly died off).
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

Some fans say Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, Batman Beyond, Teen Titan, and Superman: The Animated series all eclipsed Batman: The Animated Series.
User avatar
Skyquake87
Protoform
Posts: 3986
Joined: Sun Jul 04, 2010 9:34 am

Post by Skyquake87 »

Some may, but I've not watched those because I was looking the other way.
User avatar
Denyer
Posts: 33033
Joined: Sun Sep 17, 2000 4:00 am
Location: Perfidious Albion
Contact:

Post by Denyer »

Tried watching Batman TAS after JLU and it felt like a step back (I do like ensemble cast stuff, though). Beware the Batman was decent. Teen Titans started out well and got too grim for taste.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

I like "The Secret of the Sword" better than "Transformers: The Animated Movie" because no one died in it.

I was sad at the end when She-ra flew away and He-man shed a tear.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Filmation rules!

Post by dura »

Filmation animation and special effects for He-man and She-ra were so crisp and clear:



You could see the love they put into it. You can tell they really cared about what they were doing.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

This will never be dated:



Never :).
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

They made better toys in the 80's. You had radio-controlled cars, wind-up toys, action features. Anything battery operated was hot.

Adult collectors want to keep all of that out of our Transformers. What's wrong with have an app on your phone that connects to your robots via Bluetooth so that you can transform it, make it talk, and have it roll out?
User avatar
Skyquake87
Protoform
Posts: 3986
Joined: Sun Jul 04, 2010 9:34 am

Post by Skyquake87 »

for me it sucks all the fun out of transformers - 'too fatuous to do it yourself, then just press a button!'

F**King apps. One day, the end of the world will be brought about by someone tapping an app.
User avatar
Denyer
Posts: 33033
Joined: Sun Sep 17, 2000 4:00 am
Location: Perfidious Albion
Contact:

Post by Denyer »

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic ... uV02xOLJec
Beowoof

09/11/2004

Well! At long last I managed to perfect my temporal-displacement
machine! I'd been working on this for several months, and finally
figured out that the flux capacitor needed to be encased in old sausage
skins, thereby offsetting the porcine-Einstein equation...
Oh, listen to me, nattering on about that old stuff nobody cares about.
Unable to resist, I instantly transported myself in time to the ATT of
thirty years in the future, 2034, so I would be the first person in
THIS year to get the scoop on the latest Transformers products from
Future Hasbro! Because I am, besides being fabulously inventive, also
completely magnanimous, I copied a review from that era so you could
all read it as well. Enjoy!

. . . . .

From: Zobovor of the Five Thousand Cats (zobovor@aol.comettor)
Subject: Zob's Thoughts on TF Gigawar Deathwader
Newsgroups: alt.toys.transformers
Date: 2034-11-08 17:25:57 PST

I finally picked up Gigawar Deathwader at WalMart and raced home in my
Toyota Hovercar 2000 to open up this massive offering from Hasbro. As
many of you know, I am not interested in the Gigawar cartoon on Cartoon
Network 3D (and who would be? CN's new holo-driver totally saps the
experience that Transformers used to be about-cars that transformed
into robots! Now you can't enjoy the story when you're encased in a
totally realistic, three-dimensional environment. It's just not the
same, and the story is suffering), but I've been graciously holding off
on reviewing the toys until I could purchase one out of pocket. Now
that the kids are in college, it's not as easy to come up with $5,000
in throwaway cash as it used to be.

And before I start, remember that this is MY OPINION! I don't want to
hear anybody say anything bad about it! I'm so tired of everybody in
the fandom jumping down my throat because of every little thing I say.
So before you think about flaming me, or writing a snarky e-mail, or
even questioning what I have to say, think again. I wish I didn't hold
so much power over everybody's opinions and feelings, but I do.

First, I have to say that right off the back, I found the packaging to
be sub-par. I know that everybody was so impressed when Hasbro first
started shipping their TFs in sub-space limbo-you know, like it was
this big homage to the original series... but I have to say that I
remain unimpressed. Yes, it's nifty that all you do is open the
package and punch in the purchase code, and the toy is transported
safely to your dimension, but in the end all you have is some nifty
technology and no creativity in the packaging. Without tech specs, you
don't know anything about the character! I chalk it down to laziness
on Hasbro's part.

Now, the toy. Deathwader stands (like all the Gigawar toys) to 1:1
scale: it's approximately two stories tall and, judging from the divots
in my front lawn, weighs about 4.5 tons. It's got some nifty markings
on it and what appears to be actual carbon scoring around the front
arm-cannons that are deployed when it's out of the box. Deathwader
arrives in robot mode... you have to transform him into his PT Boat
mode. He looks, I must admit, formidable, an aesthetic that is
completely negated because some incompetent designer at Hasbro gave him
boots that resemble armored hip-waders in robot mode. This would look
ridiculous even if President Bush had NOT sold all of the country's
national parks to oil corporations in 2007. As some people pointed out
from looking at the pirated photos on e-Bay, the pilot's cabin forms
the chest, and it actually rotates on a gyro so that when you ride
inside him you are always upright... even during transformation, a
feature I didn't expect.

I'd read a lot about the manufacturing defect where the toy's
shoulder-mounted cluster rockets accidentally go off, and was amazed
when it happened to me while I was looking at the toy. QC at Hasbro
has really taken a dive since Transformers: Oil Shortage. It's one
thing to watch stuff like this happen in the holo-movies... it's
another to see nuke-nosed RPGs, black smoke trailing out behind them,
destroying your neighbor's house. A five-year old who was crossing the
street peed his pants when it happened, but that's to be expected. The
Holovid action ceased and I found it relatively easy to recover the
rockets, reset the holographic timers, and have Deathwader reload them
into his launchers.

Transformation is annoyingly simple. You either order it to transform
by voice or set it into role-play mode, where it will respond to
certain play-acting at your whim. I chose to pretend that Decepticons
were coming over the hill and that I wanted to get to safer ground, and
Deathwader responded immediately... scooping me up in his surprisingly
gentle armored claws and placing me safely inside the cockpit before
transforming.

A completely unexpected feature was the instant teleportation to the
closest large body of water. As a boat, Deathwader is, of course,
mostly effective when it's afloat, so Hasbro apparently decided I would
LIKE to take an unexpected journey without my assent. Yes, I was
instantly teleported back as soon as I expressed my displeasure, but
the fact remains that this little trip to Lake Lachrymose was akin to
kidnapping.

I was greeted, upon my return back home, by one of the neighborhood
kid's Gigawar Megatron, which immediately engaged my Deathwader in
battle on my front lawn. Deathwader, even though at a lower price
point, held its own quite well, I must say. I was a little put out
when Megatron decimated him completely with his Fusion Gigacannon in
one fell swoop (are you telling me the Autobots don't have force
fields?), but I suppose a bit player like 'wader, realistically
wouldn't hold his own. After this performance, the toys restored
themselves and exchanged consumer information and e-mail addresses so I
could, if I wished, chat with this kid online about our mutual love of
Transformers, the kid and I shook hands, and then he left. I was
amused to see that Deathwader actually seemed despondent at the loss.

The toy is, obviously, a miserable failure. First of all, nothing
about this toy to me says "Transformers." I mean, you can slap a
sticker on a pig that says "chicken" and you still don't have poultry.
Besides an utterly ridiculous name that sounds a little bit like
"dumbwaiter," Deathwader in no way resembles the Generation One toys of
my youth. There just isn't the same design, or love of the toy, that
these figures used to have. Yes, it's a working, life-sized robot that
transforms into a PT Boat... big deal. The more that Hasbro insists on
being "creative," the more they stray from what Transformers is all
about! Where are the characters that made the show terrific? Remember
when everybody always talked about Optimus Prime and Megatron in grade
school, and the story lines were so involved and you really cared about
the characters? I don't care anything at all about Deathwader, no
matter how often he washes my hovercar or takes out the garbage.

I just don't understand why Hasbro can't seem to get it together.
They've been trying my patience with this sort of crap for twenty-five
years, it seems, and still they can't get it right. Don't even get me
started on this year's fiftieth anniversary Optimus Prime. They put
all that time and effort into designing a 1:1 scale Optimus Prime that
interacts with you and is actually approved by the Federal Highway
Commission for travel... and they design it as an EXTENDED cab! It's
like they don't even care.

Clearly I won't be watching any Gigawar episodes. I am going to TRY
and make the most of things by repainting Deathwader in Seaspray
colors, even though he doesn't look anything like a hovercraft. I'd
actually be done already, but he keeps wiping the paint off as I go and
giving me stern lectures about the positive benefits of change.

Imbecile.

. . . . .

Wow! Pretty amazing, huh? Well, I'm off to the year 2045 to see if
my Sentinel Maximus has been put in the mail yet!

Cheers!

'Woof.
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

What made the 80's toys so successful.......wait for it.......action features, electronic gimmicks, motorized effects........blinking lights.......sound effects........the things that kids love. Let's inspire the scientists and engineers of the future.

Or, we could be content with getting a space shuttle mock-up and pretend to go to Mars........inspire the fiction writers of the future. I understand that this may be some people's preference.

Personally, I prefer the former.

Different strokes for different folks.
User avatar
Sades
Posts: 9483
Joined: Tue Jan 02, 2001 5:00 am
Location: I APOLOGISE IN ADVANCE

Post by Sades »

I personally would like a little less of the planned obsolescence influence. ... And to possess the ability to beat a pickpocket into submission/retreat with an Optimus Primal (for example) without it falling apart. Is that too much to ask?
This is my signature. My wasted space. My little corner. You can't have it. It's mine. I can write whatever I want. And I have!
User avatar
dura
Protoform
Posts: 139
Joined: Sat May 07, 2016 3:42 am

Post by dura »

Technology moves at the speed of light. There's no time to plan for obsolescence. If Hasbro does not get on board and go with the flow and be the first to market they will be left in the dust.

They need to get with the digital age and attract the millenials by replace mechanical parts with electronic. Reformat the g1 Transformers, like Megatron was reformatted into Galvatron.

Hasbro needs to innovate and go visionary like Steve Jobs style. Bring these G1 characters into the 21st century.

I feel that the G1 franchise is being held back by the adult collectors.
User avatar
Skyquake87
Protoform
Posts: 3986
Joined: Sun Jul 04, 2010 9:34 am

Post by Skyquake87 »

Hasbro have dabbled with moving TFs into multi-platform areas. The recent RID toyline features scannable faction symbols that unlocks stuff on the gaming app they made to support the TV show and toyline. Whilst its no Skylanders or Disney Infinity, its a start. Personally, I think I can see them moving towards this - Legends sized characters that plug into an online world would pretty awesome for Transformers.

I don't know that old-school electronics really cut the mustard these days and eat into a lot of the budget for toy development (hence the stuff in the Armada/Energon/Cybertron era being a bit basic in comparrison to the Beast era and the original RiD).

As for dragging the G1 characters into the twenty-first century, they kind have already have. Since 2001, we've had the same key character archetypes re-imagined for each successive line of Transformers, to keep the line fresh and relevant to children. Plus, there's the live action films which have cemented Transformers as a franchise with similar legs to things like Star Wars in the eyes of the public.

Adult collectors don't really hold the line back. This has been discussed before, and folks like us make up a tiny percentage of the overall sales of TF toys and so on. We're more vocal, and Hasbro and TakaraTomy through us a bone with lines like Generations and Masterpiece, but we're not the be all and end all as far as any influence over the brand and its longevity goes.
Locked