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[ANI][TV] "Transwarped" (3-part s3 premiere)

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Phillip Thorne

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Mar 15, 2009, 3:31:50 PM3/15/09
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The three-part premiere of season 3 of "Transformers Animated" aired
on Cartoon Network on Saturday 14 March 2009 at 8:00 am ET.

*
**
***
****
*****

SPOILERS

*****
****
***
**
*

WITH APPEARANCE BY these named and unnamed characters, easter eggs and
allusions:

Alpha Trion, Arcee, "Blackout" [not-a-helo gunship], Cliffjumper, ARM
Hot Shot, Ironhide, Jazz Prime, Metroplex, Oil Slick [with "cosmic
rust" grenade], Perceptor [using a 1980s voice synth -- bad bad BAD
decision], "Rodimus," Sentinel Prime, "Spittor" [as a bulky purple
frog-tank with multiple tongue-tentacles] "Strika," Ultra Magnus,
Wheeljack, unnamed female Autobot medic.

NOT SEEN:

Blackarachnia, Blitzwing, the Dinobots, Lockdown, Lugnut, Quickmix &
co., Soundwave, Wasp

STATE OF PLAY BY THE END:

Sari has upgraded herself to teenager-size, and has battle-upgrades.
Her Key is no longer operative. The Autobots and Sumdac are no longer
keeping secrets from each other. Sumdac is back in control of Sumdac
Systems. Masterson is in jail.

The Autobots now longer have a ship, and are cut off from Cybertron,
at least until the Elite Guard visits.

Megatron and Starscream's head are aboard Omega Supreme, but warping
randomly through space.

Blurr is dead(ish), Shockwave is still undercover as Longarm, and the
scattered Decepticon forces are waiting for their next order. The
Autobot-controlled spacebridge network has been deactivated because
they're at the gates.

PLOT SUMMARY:

Sari is mightily ticked at Prof.Sumdac (whom she refuses to call
"father") for concealing her mechanical nature. Sumdac explains that
a pod containing a small liquid-metal body had mysteriously appeared
in his lab one day, and when he touched it, it assumed human form.
Prowl identifies this as a protoform, "the basis for all life on
Cybertron," but they're distracted from discussing it futher.

In a fit of pique, energy-projectors appear in her palms
(Ironman-style). When Optimus insists she not join them in battle,
she uses her Key to upgrade herself, gaining a teenager-sized body,
armor elements, and "upgrades" -- energy-skates and tonfa-like energy
blades. But she can't control her own powers, and Ratchet is forced
to EMP her.

They arrive at Sumdac tower and kick out the interim bosses, Powell
and Masterson. Masterson retrieves his Headmaster unit from the ruins
of the Decepticon mine-base, finds Starscream's body, and goes on a
revenge-run in Detroit. Optimus tricks him into transforming the
body, which squeeze-pops the HM unit off. Masterson is taken into
custody by Capt.Fanzone.

Ratchet has repeated flashbacks to the Great War and a crisis of
confidence in his own medical skills (re: Bulkhead and Bumblebee),
given the ease with which Sari's Key repairs things. But then it's
taken out of the picture.

Turns out: Arcee had been carrying the activation codes for Project
Omega, the giant warrior-bots created by the Autobots as a last-ditch
weapon. Although memory-wiped, she's able to transfer them to
Ratchet. As a safeguard, the Omega units were built with simple
minds, and are required to imprint on a mentor figure. Ratchet
becomes that figure for Omega Supreme. Later, when severely injured,
Ratchet is the one who puts him into special stasis-lock.

Prime's group are anxious to contact Cybertron and warn them of the
mole Longarm/Shockwave, but without their ship they have no comms.
Bulkhead and Bumblebee go to the Decepticon ruins to salvage something
from the spacebridge. Bumblebee finds a component that causes him to
catch "passing transwarp waves" and be transported randomly around the
galaxy.

In deep space, Starscream is able to chew through the energy binders
on Megatron's wrists -- in part because he spontaneously grows a
mouth-cannon. Then the untargeted spacebridge conveniently delivers a
comatose Omega Supreme into their vicinity. The duo board him, are
captured by his intruder-control measures [gee, that's a whole lot of
claw-arms], and convince him (in his suggestible state) to return them
to Cybertron to face trial. Turns out he has a transwarp drive, so
he's independent of the spacebridge network. Megatron is able to hack
his systems, take control (he's please by the irony of turning the
Autobots' ultimate weapon against them), and return to Earth. Prowl
boards and kicks him out, but then Starscream takes control.
Stalemated on Earth, the duo decide to return to Cybertron, but the
Autobots are able to plant the spacebridge component on them, sending
them careening randomly through space. [This removes the three most
powerful characters from the plot.]

Blurr and two of Starscream's clones are transported to a jovian moon.
They're able to free themselves from Quickmix's cement, and Blurr runs
straight off the moon, through the Jovian's rings, and all the way to
Cybertron. [Say *what*!] He reports his findings about the mole to
Lockdown, who immediately attacks him as Shockwave, and manages to
crush him with a set of facility blast-doors. [Why would the facility
have doors capable of acting as trash-compactors?] So his place is
secure.

The scattered Decepticon forces are attacking remote Spacebridge
outposts per Megatron's plan, even though he's late. The Autobots
finally shut down the system. Then Megatron tells them to stand down,
since he has Omega Supreme now. [Presumably they're left hanging once
Megatron's sent on his random walk.]

--
** Phillip Thorne ** peth...@comcast.net **************
* RPI CompSci 1998 *
** underbase.livejournal.com ***************************

Sidecutter

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Mar 15, 2009, 4:09:27 PM3/15/09
to
Phillip Thorne wrote:
> The three-part premiere of season 3 of "Transformers Animated" aired
> on Cartoon Network on Saturday 14 March 2009 at 8:00 am ET.
>
> *
> **
> ***
> ****
> *****
>
> SPOILERS
>
> *****
> ****
> ***
> **
> *
>
> WITH APPEARANCE BY these named and unnamed characters, easter eggs and
> allusions:
>
> Alpha Trion, Arcee, "Blackout" [not-a-helo gunship], Cliffjumper, ARM
> Hot Shot, Ironhide, Jazz Prime, Metroplex, Oil Slick [with "cosmic
> rust" grenade], Perceptor [using a 1980s voice synth -- bad bad BAD
> decision], "Rodimus," Sentinel Prime, "Spittor" [as a bulky purple
> frog-tank with multiple tongue-tentacles] "Strika," Ultra Magnus,
> Wheeljack, unnamed female Autobot medic.

Don't forget that Mainframe and, I believe, Brainstorm were with Ultra
Magnus in the flashback scenes. The female medic was First Aid.

mrjl

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Mar 15, 2009, 6:25:15 PM3/15/09
to
On Mar 15, 4:09 pm, Sidecutter <sidecutter_spamsuc...@insightbb.com>
wrote:
> Magnus in the flashback scenes.  The female medic was First Aid.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Who was the bearded guy in the flashbacks with Magnus and Ratchet. I
almost expected him to outrank Ultra Magnus, but nothing in the
dialogue suggested that.

I think the female medic was supposed to be called Red Alert. And
there was Brawn with Rodimus's team.

TigerMegatron

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Mar 15, 2009, 7:57:20 PM3/15/09
to
My impressions of the 3 part saga:

S
P
O
I
L
E
R


S
P
A
C
E


I was expecting the sari situation to be resolved,but not taking up
to
three episodes. far too muxh time was wasted on sari & her problems.
All that extremly fast camera movement on the new guys sucked &
reminded me of micheal bay's TF1 movie. I kinda wanted to see much
more time spent with the new characters. I kinda wanted rodimus to
transform so I could see his alt mode. because these days the word
rodimus could refer to hotrod or rodimus prime. having omega supreme
back in action was cool to see. one has to wonder why starscream
didn't make plans to look for his body when tey went to earth via
omega supreme. the whole switching back of the inner heads in omega
supreme was a nice homage to the takara reissue omega supreme that
had
a omega supreme inner head

Damn Having blurr get chrushed into that metal cube means he's gone
for good. that kinda sucks,I enjoyed his character in animated. it's
a
shame he's gone,because blurr really out did himself in the TF
Animated 3 part saga.

I really enjoyed all the "easter egg" G-1 Homages that were obviously
put there for older TF fans. Seeing Metroplex in city mode on
Cybertron was the coolest thing ever. seeing all those generation one
characters was a real treat.

the animated cartoon series season 3 part saga. mentioned that the
autobots won the great war using omega supreme. I'm trying to figure
out if this is suspose to be in the G-1/BW continuty time frame or
not. because according to BW the great wars was won 500 years ago.
I'm just trying to figure out how many years passed by during
ratchet's flash backs. I'm also trying to figure out how long these
TF
animated characters have had there origins. is this series trying to
tie into G-1 & Beastwars. or is this TF animated series it's own
continuity. was there ever any previous megatron? previous optimus
primes,etc...........

there's 13 more TF Animated episodes. 46 episodes isn't such a bad
trade off from the AEC Standard 52. TFA is only short 6 episodes. I
suspose if anyone wants to get technical Cybertron & energon was
missing a episode or 2 from the 52 count. energon didn't air episode
33 of super link. while cybertron merged 2 galaxy force episodes into
one & later gave us the seperate non-merged episode.

It was nice to finally see TF Animated oilslick in the cartoon series.


Phillip Thorne

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Mar 15, 2009, 9:27:19 PM3/15/09
to
On Sun, 15 Mar 2009, Phillip Thorne <peth...@comcast.net> wrote:
>The three-part premiere of season 3 of "Transformers Animated" aired
>on Cartoon Network on Saturday 14 March 2009 at 8:00 am ET.
>
>*
>**
>***
>****
>*****
>
>SPOILERS
>
>*****
>****
>***
>**
>*
>
>WITH APPEARANCE BY these named and unnamed characters, easter eggs and
>allusions:
>
>Alpha Trion, Arcee, "Blackout" [not-a-helo gunship], Cliffjumper, ARM
>Hot Shot, Ironhide, Jazz Prime, G1-Metroplex, Oil Slick [with "cosmic

>rust" grenade], Perceptor [using a 1980s voice synth -- bad bad BAD
>decision], "Rodimus," Sentinel Prime, "Spittor" [as a bulky purple
>frog-tank with multiple tongue-tentacles] "Strika," Ultra Magnus,
>Wheeljack, unnamed female Autobot medic.

Also (as repliers have pointed out and I've subsequently recalled):

G1-Brawn, G1-Cyclonus, G1-AM-Mainframe, and an officer accompanying
Ultra Magnus with a blue/grey color scheme and a pointy head. I think
there was a G1-Windcharger too at HQ, but I'd have to rewatch.

There's some disagreement as to whether the female medic on the
outpost was First Aid or Red Alert.

But regardless, it was highly entertaining seeing so many ANM-style
renditions of characters from G1, BM and ARM. "Blackout" counts as a
character nod to TF07 (he had EMP powers), but not visually (certainly
not in vehicle mode). I suspect that the Powers That Be give Derrick
Wyatt, "art director/lead character designer" for the show, free reign
with background characters.

<http://derrickjwyatt.blogspot.com/>

Teen-Sari looks a bit like Terra from "Teen Titans."

Thunder Strikes Twice!

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Mar 15, 2009, 11:56:39 PM3/15/09
to
Phillip Thorne wrote:
> I think
> there was a G1-Windcharger too at HQ, but I'd have to rewatch.

Yep. I saw him too--and if it wasn't Windcharger then I don't know who
else it could've been.


t.k.

TigerMegatron

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Mar 16, 2009, 12:23:04 AM3/16/09
to
Phillip wrote: "and an officer accompanying Ultra Magnus with a blue/

grey color scheme and a pointy head."

the officer looked like a TF Animated version of 1986 Kup.

Sidecutter

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Mar 16, 2009, 12:40:58 AM3/16/09
to

You're right, the medic was Red Alert, my mistake.

And yep. Brawn was there. The visored red and grey guy was Mainframe,
natch, who I believe is intended to represent Cerebros. The bearded one
is the one I think was meant to be Brainstorm (he had the circle details
on the chest similar to the circles on the sides of Brainstorm's chest
on the Headmaster toy). I took him to be the head scientist.

primustf

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Mar 16, 2009, 3:43:47 AM3/16/09
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I actually thought the same thing when I first saw it. However Kup was
known for his street smarts not his book smarts. I can't picture him in
a factory building bots. I would have expected to see him out in the
field protecting the space bridges.

primustf

mrjl

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Mar 16, 2009, 7:51:33 PM3/16/09
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the beard was such a prominent feature I didn't think he was a good
representation of Kup or Brainstorm

Sidecutter

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Mar 17, 2009, 11:53:33 AM3/17/09
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*points directly at Wheeljack, who has a Jamie Hyneman mustache*

Onslaught Six

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Mar 17, 2009, 5:13:16 PM3/17/09
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On Mar 17, 11:53 am, Sidecutter <sidecutter_spamsuc...@insightbb.com>
wrote:

> *points directly at Wheeljack, who has a Jamie Hyneman mustache*

There's a difference, though, Wheeljack is still very clearly
Wheeljack.

Sidecutter

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Mar 17, 2009, 5:26:33 PM3/17/09
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And "Brainstorm" has other elements of the original head too. But both
of them are rather off model from the G1 toys or cartoon.

Brainstorm also has the "circle with a dash in the middle" details on
either side of his cockpit that are on the sides of the chest on the
original toy. He has the right shape of "vents" in the middle of the
forehead, and also has the low-in-the-torso cockpit of G1 Brainstorm.

No One in Particular

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Mar 17, 2009, 11:18:08 PM3/17/09
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"Sidecutter" <sidecutter...@insightbb.com> wrote in message
news:9-WdnVWeM6IRiF3U...@insightbb.com...


Was it just me, or did Perceptor sound pretty much like Stephen Hawking?

Brian


Sidecutter

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Mar 18, 2009, 12:12:01 AM3/18/09
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Sort of. They used a text-to-speech type program to do his voice.

Thunder Strikes Twice!

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Mar 18, 2009, 3:13:23 AM3/18/09
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It was an interesting gimmick but I prefer the classic G1 voice better.

t.k.

primustf

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Mar 18, 2009, 3:01:52 AM3/18/09
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I would prefer ANY voice over what they used. That was just awful.

primustf

ShadowWing

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Mar 18, 2009, 10:45:52 AM3/18/09
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"No One in Particular" wrote
>
> Was it just me, or did Perceptor sound pretty much like Stephen Hawking?

I wonder if that was what they were going for. I'll be curious to see
how he's used in later episodes, to see if they explain it. (It might be
similar to Movie Bumblebee's dilema in the first movie.)

Not_Available321

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Mar 18, 2009, 2:36:28 PM3/18/09
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On Mar 18, 12:12 am, Sidecutter <sidecutter_spamsuc...@insightbb.com>
wrote:

> Sort of.  They used a text-to-speech type program to do his voice.

Which was a cool-ass concept, but failed in execution. I couldn't
understand half the crap he was saying!

Trolly McBeam

No One in Particular

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Mar 18, 2009, 11:41:04 PM3/18/09
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"ShadowWing" <the...@SPAMBLOCKADEsnet.net> wrote in message
news:CS7wl.20746$YU2....@nlpi066.nbdc.sbc.com...

It was kind of a cool idea, but I'm with Trolly. It was very hard to
understand. They could still use it, they just need to tone it down, maybe.

Brian


primustf

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Mar 19, 2009, 4:22:13 AM3/19/09
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Thank you I thought I was the only one who couldn't understand him.

primustf

SteveD

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Mar 20, 2009, 1:05:07 AM3/20/09
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Me either, although going back over his lines a couple of times gave me
the gist of most of them.

Yeah. Cool idea, poor execution. Would have been better to use an actual
voice actor and simply filter the heck out of them, as there's more
control available that way.


-SteveD

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