August 14, 2008

Transformers are a house hold name these days. Ever since their creation in 1984 to the recent box office hit, generations of fans have fallen in love or back in love with them. Personally I grew up with the Transformers and they still remain one of my favorite cartoons of all time.

Transformers as a whole are now in their 6th Generation (give or take a generation) with the recent release of Transformers: Animated in December of last year which not long too ago I had the opportunity to review the pilot movie for the show. Now almost 2 months later, I return to give you the skinny on Transformers Animated: Season One on DVD.

This 2 Disc DVD of Transformers Animated picks up right after the events of the “Transform and Roll Out” pilot movie. This answers my question about whether or not it would be included with the season set or not. So for those of you wanting to see the series from the beginning you’ll want to pick up the 68 minute DVD and Season One at the same time.

With the Transformers now established as heroes on Earth, Season One kicks off with some action as Optimus stops the Angry Archer after he attempts to rob and armored truck with Robotic arrows. Before I go on, I will say that every supervillain in this show uses some form of technology to get what they want.

As I mentioned in my previous article, there were several things that bugged me about this show, namely the look of the Transformers. I still don’t particularly like the look of them with the exception of Blackarachnia. Since she is half organic, her look fits the part. The other thing I disliked was the voice of Optimus, which I’ve kind of grown to like after watching the entire season.

A few of my favorite episodes include “Thrill of the Hunt” and “Along Came A Spider.” Both of these episodes in particular herald back to past generations of the Transformers. In “Thrill of the Hunt” we get to see Arcee as Ratchet tries to save her on the battle torn planet of Cybertron. Both are captured by the rogue Transformer known as Lockdown.

Lockdown, who treasures trophies taken from his captives, attempts to turn access codes over to Megatron. He takes a souvenir in the form of Ratchet’s EMP device and proceeds to relinquish Arcee of her information, but not before a struggle wipes Arcee’s memory clean. Both escape but Ratchet is left with scars and reminders of that day. He finally gets his revenge in this episode and takes back what is rightfully his.

“Along Came A Spider” takes place during Halloween and features the Decepticon Blackarachnia. Now anyone one that watched the Beast Wars series will remember Blackarachnia, the Predacon turned Maximal. This episode goes into her past a bit farther than before and reveals that she was once an AutoBot named Elita-1(from the Gen 1 days). Upon getting her infected with organic material she became the creature she is today, although she would do anything to rid herself of her “curse” as she puts it. She blames Optimus for her current condition and for abandoning her.

While all of the characters themselves are cool, it wouldn’t be a Transformers show without the threat of Megatron at every corner. Well his minions anyways. Lugnut, Blitzwing and the reluctant StarScream all are in search of the Allspark that the AutoBots are hiding. It isn’t until later that the Decepticons realize that Megatron is still alive, although in pieces.

With the help of Dr. Isaac Sumdac, who is tricked by Megatron to rebuild his body Megatron returns and all hell breaks loose as the AutoBots face their greatest enemy. Do the AutoBots have what it takes to defeat him? The only ways to find out is to watch Transformers Animated: Season One as I ‘m not telling.

Filmmaking: 8
The filmmaking of Transformers Animated is fairly good to be honest. While there are too many directors to name as this is an animated TV show they pull of a fairly good show and bring a diversity of different Transformers lore together. The inclusion of characters like Blackarachnia, Arcee, Ratchet, Blitzwing, Prowl and even the Dinobots will surely make any fan of the Transformers appreciate the details that the people are committing to create a show worthy of continuing the Transformers Saga.

Graphics: 7
As I mentioned above, I am still not a big fan on the “brand new look” that Derrick Wyatt created. For me it largely because I have been following the Transformers for pretty much my entire life and I just can’t picture the Transformers looking as they do now. When I picture a Transformer I envision a huge metallic sentient that fires lasers. Instead I look upon Transformers that look like more human on occasions than what I am used to.

While I may not agree with the choice of what the Transformers look like, I do like the general look of the Transformers: Animated series so far. Part of this probably has to do with the fact that Derrick Wyatt who did work on Teen Titans (my favorite cartoon) worked as Art Director on this project. I also must say that I have taking a liking to Sari’s character as well. She kind of reminds me of Juniper Lee’s annoying little brother Roger, from The Life and Times of Juniper Lee, only much cooler.

I will mention that all of the different villains Cybertronian or not are pretty cool and definitely worth a mention. Their inclusion into this show brings an entirely different criminal element to the Transformers series and I kind of like it. All of their designs are much cooler than their AutoBot pursuers.

Sound: 8
Transformers Animated: Season One is presented in Dolby Digital so it sounds fairly decent. Every explosion and metal clashing fight sound is pretty good in my opinion. While the overall sound of any show is important voice acting is even more important if not crucial. I must say that this Transformers: Animated doesn’t skimp in this department.

Actually one of the reasons I kept watching this pilot was due to the voice behind Sari Sumdac. Tara Strong provides Sari’s voice and coincidentally does the voice of Roger on Juniper Lee and the voice of my favorite Teen Titan, Raven.

David Kaye, known for doing the voice of Megatron in the Beast Era and Unicron Trilogy returns this time to do the voice of Optimus Prime. This is perhaps why I don’t like Optimus’ voice as much as he is younger in this series then all of the previous series.

Corey Burton performs the role of Megatron for the short while we actually see him before he is blown to pieces. Corey is known for various roles including doing several voices in the original Transformers show back in the 80’s. Even Susan Blu returns to reprise her role as the voice of Arcee.

Value: 6
Transformers Animated: Transform and Roll Out retails for about $20 dollars which isn’t bad for the 13 episodes that are in this 2 disc set. The first disc also features a sneak peak at season two with a photo gallery showing off some of the characters from the new season.

Overall: 7.5
While there are still elements that I still don’t like about the show, there are many more positives that outweigh them. Showing the Transformers facing foes that are not always towering robots is a definite change and somewhat unexpected but welcome. Sari’s character still keeps me drawn to the show as she is what ties everything together, much like the humans seen in Transformers: Cybertron. If you are a Transformers fan then you may like this show. If you are new to the Transformers experience then this is a good start as well.