As a child of the 80's, i was completely OBSESSED with the Americanized, transforming robots from Japan.
Every single spare cent was spent on Transformers Panini stickers, books and Marvel comics.
So profound was their influence it actually molded my outlook on life.
Power does indeed flow to those who know how. Desire alone is never enough.
Enough of that. What i desired was a G1 inspired, modern take on the Transformers lore, that could quench my morphing robot addiction and cure the stench of Bay-verse.
COMBINER WARS, and TITANS RETURN, make Age of Extinction look like it was written by Neil Gaiman. Circa 1989.
What looked SUPERB as production stills has translated into Transformers:Energon-style choppy animation.
With voice acting so bad, it sounds like a group of 6yr old kids VO'ng in a studio, unsupervised, on the fly. With no editing.
And a storyline so amateur, Christian Bale would have a meltdown.
Who thought it would be a good idea to get YouTuber VO's?
Did Mark Hamill do Megatronus over the phone?
Are the new characters designed for maximum suck-age?
Do they not remember EVERY G1 transformer had DISTINCT personalities?
EVERY CHARACTER TRIES TO BE BADASS.
TRANSFORMERS were always made up of warriors, cowards, strategists, scientists, pacifists, leaders and followers.
All distinct traits, on both sides, making up sometimes dysfunctional but TOTALLY AWESOME groups of combatants.
Not a frat house of similar sounding, identical robots only differentiated by name and color.
The exception is Megatron, who seems to be an amalgam of Beast Wars and IDW. Still, not the least bit DECEPTIVE or inspiring.
Newer characters like Windblade and Mistress of Lame look decent enough, but are pure garbage.
Boring, stupid and pointless. Such a wasted opportunity, and totally reminded me of shouty, crew-cut feminists. The type with no actual important points.
With a title like TITANS RETURN you'd expect epic scale, destruction and sheer awe as Metroplex, Fort Max and Trypticon duke it out.
Hahaha NO.
The G1: Season 3 versions of Fort Max and Scorponok depicted this FAR better. And those were pretty terrible.
No damage, boring, long fights and acting so bad my inner 6 yr old died.
CUT TO THE CHASE:
Hasbro pisses over all your chips with an incoherent, boring, mindless and charisma-free attempt at a web series that features the fantastically designed robots of your youth.
Great toys, though!
