[Prime] Darkness Rising, Parts 1-5

[zigzagger]

Airs December 1st (as in today/tonight).

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All 5 episodes of Darkness Rising are also up on The Hub's website:
http://www.hubworld.com/transformers/shows/prime/videos

Limited to certain regions, unfortunately.

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Just going to make some notes here.

Spolier-tags? Meh, sure, what the hell...

SPOILER! (select to read)

Bulkhead - He gets a little time in the spotlight. I haven't much to say about him other than he's the gentle, but not so gentle, giant...with a deep, sexy voice.

Fowler has some serious brass. The guy is certainly devoted to his work. I loved that little exchange with Starscream. Despite the whole police chief shtick, I just might grow to like him.

This series' Starscream continues to please me. God, he's a magnificent bastard!

Soundwave is...well, kinda creepy. Was that supposed to be Ratbat?

All that talk about worlds being seeded with energon is familiar territory. Spotlight: Shockwave naturally comes to mind (though it's certainly not unique to that story). Regardless of the inspiration, in this case I like how Prime is building on a previous concept, and I think it works well here.

More thoughts on it later.

[Cliffjumper]

Well, that's a considerate approach to spoilers. Good work!

[zigzagger]

Yeah, I think I'm going to move that to the appropriate thread.

And add some spoiler-tags while I'm at it.

[Heinrad]

Not bad. Not bad at all.

SPOILER! (select to read)

My only major problem is the kids. They were bound to pull something like this, running off with or after Bulkhead. That being said, the weak link wasn't as weak as I was afraid it would be.

[zigzagger]

Episode 5 reaction and discussion thread.

Airs December 3rd on the Hub.

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The remaining 3 episodes of Darkness Rising are also up on The Hub's website:
http://www.hubworld.com/transformers/shows/prime/videos

Limited to certain regions, unfortunately.

[zigzagger]

Episode 4 reaction and discussion thread.

Airs December 2nd (today!) on the Hub.

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All 5 episodes of Darkness Rising are also up on The Hub's website:
http://www.hubworld.com/transformers/shows/prime/videos

Limited to certain regions, unfortunately.

[Brimstone]

Did anyone recognize any of the

SPOILER! (select to read)

zombies?

I was trying to see if I could recognize any of the designs from old shows or comics. I didn't notice any, though.

[zigzagger]

For all you "honest" folks out there, you can watch the first two episodes at The Hub's website.

http://www.hubworld.com/transformers/shows/prime/videos

[zigzagger]

Must be the only person here watching this (?)

I just watched the last two episodes, so I'll bite (no worries, I'll keep comments for the 5th episode in its respective thread)

As usual, just going make a few notes:

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I guess zombies are 'in' right now. I have to admit, it does make for a rather fun fight scene.

I may not be an avid toy collector these days, but I'd so be tempted to pick up a Ratchet figure with battle blades. It's right on the cusp of being cool and being excessive, but doesn't quite cross over into the latter.

I know it's a bit of a stretch, but the dynamic between Bulkhead and Miko reminds me of that old Merrie Melodies short "Feed the Kitty".You know, the one where the bulldog adopts a homeless kitten, and spends the duration of the short trying to keep it out of trouble. It's like that.

Speaking of Miko, her lecture at the is end is surprisingly insightful, given that the character has irritated me up until now.

Optimus demonstrates his formidability this episode. I mean, wow! And for a line as simple and cliched as "You will not prevail. Not while energon still flows in my veins", it sounds fantastic when Cullen says it. It's all in the delivery...Though, Optimus climbing up a mountain while saying this probably had a part in that.

[Heinrad]

I have to say, I'm really enjoying this series.

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My only major complaint at this point is that there's only two Decepticons, Megatron and Starscream. While it means they get all kinds of development, it also means that the only advantage they've got, really, is nameless Decepticons hordes. Yes, Soundwave is there too, but for all the personality we've seen, he might as well be a drone.

[Hound]

So far I'm digging it.

I have nothing to say in special spoiler tag things though.

More Cliffjumper!

[zigzagger]

Soundwave is there too, but for all the personality we've seen, he might as well be a drone.[/spoiler]

Aww, surely creeping Starscream out is a personality trait.

No?

Other stuff:

SPOILER! (select to read)

"No point in long goodbyes. Here's the door." Ha! Have I mentioned that I like this series' Ratchet? Well I do. Sure, it takes you out of the moment, but I got a good laugh out of it.

Apparently one of the side effects of dark energon is that it causes Welker's new, slightly subdued in tone Megatron sound more like G1 Megatron. All nostalgia aside for a moment - and I'm sure to offend some purists out there - it seems a little misplaced with the rest (or at least most) of the voice cast. I can't quite place what I found off about it. Too cartoony, maybe?

[Blackjack]

I like this. Keeps getting better and better, and Starscream is perfectly done.

SPOILER! (select to read)

Evidently he has his own agenda, but he keeps it hidden and actually sounds concerned when Megatron injects that Dark Energon into his body. Screamer is proving to be my favourite incarnation of the character so far.

Poor Soundwave is still devoid of personality. What, he can't have any personality outside the comic medium? He did get that kickass Breastforce drone thing, though. (Pity. I had hoped that it would be Laserbeak or Ratbat, but...)

I adore Megatron's new design, a hybrid of his G1 and Movieverse.

Ratchet is also a nice foil for the other more enthusiastic Autobots, and he's like Prime's trusted advisor or something.

Bulkhead... well, I like the fact that he's still a gentle giant, but not a village idiot like in Animated. I mean, I like Animated Bulkhead, don't get me wrong... but I like this Bulkhead better.

Arcee as the main human-friendly (or not so friendly) partner... I didn't see that coming.

Bumblebee is charmingly cute!

Still not sold on the humans. Jack is harmless enough, seeing that he's Sam Witwicky in another name. Rafael is also quite funny, although hardly necessary. The girl irritates, however.

[wolfbolt86]

Not a bad ending to the mini series. Too bad,the sereis does not start back up to Feb.

SPOILER! (select to read)

Hard to tell if Starscream betrayed Megatron. Looks like the kids have a hit on them now. So is Megatron gone for good like Cliffjumper?

[Heinrad]

SPOILER! (select to read)

They'll bring Megs back. Maybe not right away, but he'll come back.

He's like a bad penny.

On the up side, if they ever do get a space bridge built and can return to Cybertron, the odds are good that there won't be much in the way of zombies left, I think.

As for Screamer's betrayal, or lack thereof, it's all down to interpretation. Starscream saw what was happening and informed Megatron after moving the ship to a safe distance. Could Screamer have tried harder? Possibly, but at that point it was choose between all of them dying when the bridge went up trying to save Megatron, or let Megatron get out of there on his own, something that he was perfectly capable of. Given everything Screamer's been through over the last 5 episodes, He's probably not going to mourn for very long. In fact, he's been running everything for so long, Megatron's return was probably more inconvience than anything.

[Rurudyne]

I enjoyed the show ... though the common heavy black eyebrows tended to make me think of the Amarao character from the FLCL anime (link).

Look forward to the rest.

[Warcry]

I still can't get used to Ratchet sounding like Weyoun. That's going to take a while.

SPOILER! (select to read)

I won't delude myself into thinking Megatron is gone forever, because that would be too big a risk for a Transformers cartoon. I will say that I hope he doesn't come back right away though, like he did in the G1 cartoon after he disappeared in a Space Bridge accident. It would be really nice to see this Starscream lead for a while, just to see what he's made of.

But if Megatron doesn't come back right away they're going to need some more Decepticons. Soundwave doesn't seem all that chatty (if he can even talk at all) and neither do the generic Decepticons. Even though I like this Starscream a lot more than usual things will get boring very quickly if he's constantly monologuing to his legions of silent minions every episode.

Apparently Adam Baldwin is supposed to show up as Breakdown at some point? I hope he'll stay around longer than the Rock did.

I thought that the design choices were oddly incongruent. Prime and Bumblebee look like they walked right off the Movie set, but Bulkhead isn't very different from his Animated look, Soundwave and Starscream are these weird reedy things and Megatron is all spikes and teeth. Ratchet, Arcee and Cliffjumper had the nicest designs, but don't really fit in with anyone else. And yet it all seems to work, and I'm not sure why.

SPOILER! (select to read)

A shame we're not likely to see anymore of Cliff...

[Cliffjumper]

General thoughts on 3-5, which I throughly enjoyed.

SPOILER! (select to read)

- The action scenes, my Christ. I don't think I've ever seen a TV show that did action this well. The corridor fight in part 3 shot from low angles, the POV shot of a forest-level pissed off Prime ripping through zombies to Ratchet. This thing thinks it's a film - and more power to it. The visuals just keep coming off.
- And was it just me, or was there just a tiny frisson of "Will they...?" when the zombies started really pulling at Ratchet.
- Agent Fowler = ****ing awesome, and believably so. I was really worried he was going to be a straight port of Captain Funnyname from Animated, but it looks like he's not just a single tired, shitty joke.
- Miko might be a problem. Jack and Raf are coming off better than they have any right to, but she's pretty ****ing annoying. Plus side is that she's just one regular. I know the point is that she's a bit of an annoying cow, but if they could just crank it back a bit...
- How completely ****ing pissed off is Prime the whole time? Cullen's on fire here, I was a bit worried he'd autopilot the series, but he's been as good as he's been in the film. Speech at the end was epic.
- Generally the human involvement is still handled really well. It was probably a bit inevitable they'd tag along, but at least we're shown this is really really ****ing dangerous.
- The tight cast is working nicely. Is that Sarracini Armada Starscream in there? Pretty much all the Transformers are working nicely, though I'm not sure how well the Bumblebee not speaking thing is going to work long-term and without the expressive film model and Shia to fill in the gaps.
- The score - my god, it's fantastic.

With my mod hat on... Can we not do a spoiler warning sticky and dispense with spoiler tags in individual episode titles? People are free to ask questions in other topics, and TBH now the initial few are out there surely there's no reason anyone would go into individual episode titles without having seen said episode?

[Osku]

Eh, the promise of a new cartooon interested me enough to check it out. Will be spending evening catching up.

Not bothering to read other comments before typing.

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So far the first two episodes haven't really impressed. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot to like, but the writers also managed to make cringe more times than I would have liked.

SPOILER! (select to read)

-generic "I break the rules" introduction of Cliffjumper
-anyone else got Infiltration car chase flashback?
-Bumblebee is a (cartoon version) Minicon?
-Prime's (supposedly) dramatic remembrance speech for a character I didn't know or care about. Points for killing off a character, minus points for it being a glorified red-shirt.
-A little variation on autobot cast too much to ask? Almost same as in Animated.
-Drones -> Aaargh!
-Zombie equivalents -> double Aaargh!
-Red glowing eyes -> triple Aaargh!
-"Blood of Unicron", "Dark Energon" -> quadruble Aaargh!

-Arcee's "farewell partner" bit, please no fembot characterization. Would love to be wrong.
-Autobots once again being only land vehicles.
-They're really trying to make Megatron an idiot in the cliffhangers? Yelling "Decepticons I have returned!" in an empty space, stabbing one's spark/heart/essence/ with a corruptive material?

Liking so far.
-Overall setting.
-Animation much better than I expected (got in without seeeing trailers etc.). Huge difference with the quality of character and backgrounds unfortunately.
-Most of the character designs. Especially liked different take on Starscream and "cylon" drones. Was really disappointed thew "twins" turned out to be drones. Do they have a group name?
-Ratchet, seemingly competent Starscream (reminded me more of Tarantulas than earlier versions of Starscream though), bigisntnecessarilydumbandclumsy Bulkhead,

Undecided: humans, Arcee, Soundwave.

Off to read other people's comments and watch part three.

[Cliffjumper]

I felt Cliffjumper worked pretty well in the context. Good VA meant he made a solid, if unspectacular, impression, and it threw down the gauntlet nicely - I, for one, didn't really expect that to be that quite so early. It showed us the Decepticons are ruthless and have moved a little bit from the generic 1980s "lock him up" bad guys. I felt they walked the tightrope of investing screentime in a "hi-then-die" character versus actually making anyone give a crap quite nicely, through the trusty Autobot shorthand (he's brave, he's a bit cocky, he's quite cheerful). It's not the first time a Transformer's been killed off when we don't know a huge amount about him either.

It'll depend whether we get any other casualties, though. If the show runs three seasons and he's it for named deaths, it'll suck a bit. If we're going to get the odd rank-and-file death in regular episodes, it'll work.

Really didn't mind the drones. It's not the best answer, but it nicely rations the main Decepticons, leaves more space for characterisation and packs out the fight scenes well enough, while it'll also help the budget. It also avoids the old Decepticon problem of them all being self-interested wannabe leaders, which begs the question of how they get anything done.

If the choice is them or CN reject human villains, I know where my vote goes.