Can anyone think of a show with as many animation errors as G1?

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Jaynz
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Post by Jaynz »

Hound wrote:I was thinking that myself. I imagine they took a look at just the sheer magnitude of errors they got in that first season and decided that the new toys reusing molds needed to have distinct character designs so as to avoid that.
Hard to say. Most of the errors like that showed up in the first batch of season two, which hadn't yet introduced the new characters for the most part. You didn't have too many examples of a lot of these characters (Red Alert and Sideswipe, Prowl and Smokescreen) being together as the show switch to the 1985 toys after that batch.

I know that HASBRO wanted the new toys to be more distinct from the old ones in order to sell them, so they might have figured out that 'Starscream toy #4' wasn't going to sell as well as 'Ramjet'. Tough call, and sadly some of the principals in those decisions are no longer with us. :(

As for GI Joe getting more love, I think it was a combination of a few factors. Hasbro was more laid back with it, and not as strongly dictating the exact toys to sell on any exact episode (look at the G1 writer's bible, it's frackin' scary how the orders came down). I suppose having the 'suits' come in an say 'introduce 12 new characters this episode - we don't care how, just sell them' would be a bit of a pisser. Also, GI Joe came first, and so Transformers was kind of taking time and effort AWAY from their existing project. Again, tough call...
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Post by Cliffjumper »

Yeh, the differing way GI Joe introduces characters (i.e. new toys) is curious. The two regular seasons start with a multi-parter that basically does nothing but shoe-horn in new toys, and bang, that's pretty much it - the new ones might have a bigger role in later episodes, they might not, but if they do, chances are that episode won't just be a laboured plot designed to hammer home their basic personality.

Transformers seemed to be less... decisive about it. Dinobot Island sort-of introduces most of the Season 2 characters, but most of them do basically nothing (it's been a little while, but IIRC Powerglide is the only one who really does anything, the rest of them get a line or two but basically take over the usual group functions of Season 1 characters), so then we get all these episodes basically introducing Red Alert or Seaspray or Beachcomber or Blaster or Tracks or the Triple-Changers or Omega Supreme, and by the time that lot's done, whoops, here come the combiners, better make the lot we just spend 20-odd episodes shilling look rubbish...

Then at the same time GI Joe seems to have been fortunate just from the timing of its' production. A lot of the guys they focus on in the first series (e.g. Lady Jaye, Flint, Shipwreck, Destro, the Baroness) were still part of the range when they made the second (not to mention that G.I. Joe started reusing characters a few years ahead of Transformers, meaning Roadblock could stay in as the same character while also promoting a new toy just by donning a different uniform), and the writers (who've gone on the record to say how they loved some of those characters) took advantage and still gave them some meaty roles.

I think if there'd been a third Sunbow series straight after the film, focusing on the likes of Falcon and Jinx against Serpentor and Cobra-La or something, with Cobra Commander and Duke written out and tiny Movie-sized roles for the by-then discontinued likes of Flint, Destro and so on, it'd probably look a lot more disjointed. GI Joe's lucky in that the disjointed bits are the first two mini-series, and then there's a run of 90-odd episodes which feel a lot like one continuous series,
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Post by Jaynz »

Cliffjumper wrote:Yeh, the differing way GI Joe introduces characters (i.e. new toys) is curious. The two regular seasons start with a multi-parter that basically does nothing but shoe-horn in new toys, and bang, that's pretty much it - the new ones might have a bigger role in later episodes, they might not, but if they do, chances are that episode won't just be a laboured plot designed to hammer home their basic personality.
I figure that they wanted to get the blatant 'commercial' out of the way, and try to make it at least LOOK epic. Seemed to work better with GI Joe. Ironically, the best time to have introduced the season two characters from Transformers flawlessly would have been in season one... "Ultimate Doom" - or at hinted at them. The fact that both sides' casts DOUBLED overnight never did sit well with me. (At least you could say the Cons arrived on the space bridge.. can't really explain away the bots as easily.)
and by the time that lot's done, whoops, here come the combiners, better make the lot we just spend 20-odd episodes shilling look rubbish...
And worse, they end up with B.O.T. before the movie toys get their season and the cycle starts all over again, finally ending up with Fort Max. You do have a point that it probably would have worked out better if some of the more popular and fun-to-write-for characters had simply gotten updates rather than replaced. (Granted, not to the ridiculous degree that the Unicron Trilogy had, but you know what I mean.)
I think if there'd been a third Sunbow series straight after the film, focusing on the likes of Falcon and Jinx against Serpentor and Cobra-La or something, with Cobra Commander and Duke written out and tiny Movie-sized roles for the by-then discontinued likes of Flint, Destro and so on, it'd probably look a lot more disjointed. GI Joe's lucky in that the disjointed bits are the first two mini-series, and then there's a run of 90-odd episodes which feel a lot like one continuous series,
The fact that Sunbow wasn't willing to repeat their mistake with Transformers is why the show went to DIC in the first place... someone at Hasbro, and I kinda wish I knew who it was, was a complete moron.
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Post by inflatable dalek »

TFVanguard wrote: There are a couple of things which makes G1 a bit more of a victim. One, the Franchise has been going nearly non-stop (with only a year-long break in 1991) for nearly thirty years. I can't actually think of a toyline, much less a toyline with cartoon tie-ins, which go back nearly that far so largely uninterrupted. That means that G1 is going to get a lot more 'watch' time than, say, Silverhawks or even Thundercats. A lot of people, a lot of time, that means a lot more errors get spotted and reported.
On the other hand though, it's not the full 25+ years of stuff that gets easily picked apart, it's the three years and three episodes of G1 and the Unicron stuff, which is what, five years? No one, as far as I know, finds the Beast shows or Animated hugely error ridden (the former has a couple of noticeable mistakes and no doubt the later does as well, but nothing in the same league as the others).

If anything the Beast shows would actually have more of an excuse for it, they were basically, along with Reboot, breaking new ground that hadn't been done before on TV. There's huge mileage in that to get things wrong but they generally knew the limitations of the technology and worked within them, whilst having a careful eye for detail that means the wrong CGI model being used for Rattrap in Code of Hero is probably the only "Big" error, and he's so small on screen at the time only a dedicated fan would likely spot it.

To go off on a tangent slightly, I've noticed in the last couple of years that non fan friends can't really take the animation in Beast Wars seriously. Which is annoying, I think the problem is because TV CGI has never really taken off (in the success category you've got the Beast Shows and Reboot, then you've got a handful of shows that are either completely forgotten like that Prince Valiant thing or were considered utter crap like Dan "Written by Simon Furman" Dare) there's no real frame of reference for people to make comparisons with except for big budget movies. Which is unfair on the Beast shows...

As far as GI Joe getting more of the love from the people making the shows, it's worth remembering that Joe already had been around for years. The young guns working on RAH probably had the original toy as kids and had some nostalgic fondness for it, whilst Transformers was just new kids stuff. Hardly surprising which got more attention, though Transformers tends to get the same nowadays, especially on Animated.
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Post by Jaynz »

inflatable dalek wrote:On the other hand though, it's not the full 25+ years of stuff that gets easily picked apart, it's the three years and three episodes of G1 and the Unicron stuff, which is what, five years? No one, as far as I know, finds the Beast shows or Animated hugely error ridden (the former has a couple of noticeable mistakes and no doubt the later does as well, but nothing in the same league as the others).
Keep in mind, G1 is the source of the Franchise as a whole. That means everyone refers back to it. They don't do that to the Unicron Trilogy, Beast Wars, or even the Micheal Bay movies. It's a lot like how Star Trek (the original) is nit-picked while Deep Space Nine and Voyager are largely forgotten. Everything is ALWAYS compared to the original, if it makes sense to do that or not.

Unicron Trilogy was just the big recent 'block' of the franchise and just outright sucked. But I doubt that, in three or four years, anyone's really talking about it much.
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Post by Thunderwave »

Looking back, Transformers G1 did have a large amount of errors for the time. I know I watched a lot of cartoons growing up, and I've been rewatching some of them recently with my son. I've noticed no where as many errors in Thundercats, M.A.S.K., He-Man and the like then in Transformers. Like someone said before, though, the show was pretty rushed when the toys started to really sell, so that may have something to do with it.
TFVanguard wrote:It's a lot like how Star Trek (the original) is nit-picked while Enterprise and Voyager are largely forgotten.
Some things are best left forgotten.

My edit is in bold.

inflatable dalek wrote: To go off on a tangent slightly, I've noticed in the last couple of years that non fan friends can't really take the animation in Beast Wars seriously. Which is annoying, I think the problem is because TV CGI has never really taken off (in the success category you've got the Beast Shows and Reboot, then you've got a handful of shows that are either completely forgotten like that Prince Valiant thing or were considered utter crap like Dan "Written by Simon Furman" Dare) there's no real frame of reference for people to make comparisons with except for big budget movies. Which is unfair on the Beast shows...
In response to this tangent, I suggest having them look at Babylon 5. While most of the show is live action, the exterior action (and there is a good bit of that) is mostly, if not all CGI and is from the same time period. The early episodes looked, honestly, like a current Sci-Fi Channel movie, but by the end it was slick looking and they did some great things with CGI while staying on TV. Or hell, just watch it again just because it's B5 and is a damn good show. ;)
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Post by Cliffjumper »

Mmm, I agree with Beast Wars - in technical terms it's probably aged worse than any of the other shows. There's a sort of... timelessness to cel animation, plus really good, well-drawn animation is always going to be good, well-drawn animation in the way that, say, a well-drawn comic always will be (even digital colouring can't make something look like, say, Frank Miller in his pomp).

Something like Akira, that's well drawn and animated in the first place, isn't really going to age because it's not dependant on technology (or at least, it used technology that can't really be improved on in that field), whereas CGI is a technology that's improved massively over the past decade or so.

The cel stuff probably also gets off a bit by the relatively even comparisons - a well-animated episode of G1 (to go for the jugular, let's say "Call of the Primitives") looks about as good as most more up-to-date TF cartoons. Whereas BW has the more obvious comparison of the decade-later massively-budgeted films.

Obviously, though, BW has a lot of other things going for it, but I could see why the animation could be... distracting for anyone who didn't get used to it before CGI really started coming on.
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Post by inflatable dalek »

TFVanguard wrote:Keep in mind, G1 is the source of the Franchise as a whole. That means everyone refers back to it. They don't do that to the Unicron Trilogy, Beast Wars, or even the Micheal Bay movies. It's a lot like how Star Trek (the original) is nit-picked while Deep Space Nine and Voyager are largely forgotten. Everything is ALWAYS compared to the original, if it makes sense to do that or not.

Though by every term in which these things get measured The Next Generarion is by far the most successful Trek TV show. The highest first run viewing figures, the most episodes, the most contemporary awards. Kirk and company have the films sown up but as far as TV goes TNG is the baseline for all Trek.

As far as Transformers goes, God knows what the overall most successful and iconic version of the franchise is (possibly the films, at least in terms of size of audience and demographic reached, I have friends and family who were old when G1 began who enjoy the films almost inspite of themselves: "What, it's a movie based on those crap toys we had to buy you as Birthday/Christmas presents when you were a kid? Well this won't be good... Ohhhh big screen action!"). But I don't think it's a case of the Unicron stuff only getting it in the neck from fans because it's recent, I've never heard a bad word against the Animated Show in terms of quality of animation, various people don't like the ides and format but no one faults the look.

Equally, even at the time I don't recall people ripping apart actual errors in Beast Wars just because it was current. Some fans didn't like the style, nor the characters or stories, and may didn't like the use of CGI at all, but legitimate complaints about errors in the animation? I can' t recall that many.
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Post by inflatable dalek »

Today myself and a friend watched the Arise Serpentor Arise mini series as he was interested in some nostalgia. Now, I don't know if it the affect of watching it with a more cynical non fan ("I can cope with the different name but where's the proper theme music?") or it not standing up to my big HD TV, but compared to my first watch of it the whole thing seemed hideously animated and full of errors.

You had uniforms changing between shots, Iceberg not being able to decide if he was black or white between camera angle changes in the same scene, a character planting a bomb and leaving a hand shaped hole on it when they let go and the edge of an animation cell being so in one scene it looked like bad split screen. And that's just what really stood out. Certainly I'd say it's on a level with the mid-quality range G1 episodes.
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Post by DaneClark »

Sorry to bump such an old thread, but I can name a show that had just as many mistakes as Transformers - the first two Mario cartoons were very obviously rushed out the door in a half-finished state. The Super Show had "character talking with another characters voice" errors that need to be seen to be believed, while SMB3 had so many blatant coloring goofs that it's like they just didn't care. And they didn't have the same excuses that Transformers had for these kinds of things - the drawings were much less complex, there was a much smaller cast that should have been alot easier to keep track of, and I've never seen any show that had as many "props and background characters changing colors between shots" errors as SMB3 had.
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