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The Transformers: the Movie Complete Collected Storyboards
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Zobovor
Jul 5, 2018, 6:05:07 PM7/5/18
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The fan site TF Raw has uploaded a complete storyboard from The Transformers: the Movie. For those who may not know, the storyboard is essentially a picture book developed before the animation begins, so that specific scenes can be planned in advance, including camera movements, special visual effects, etc. The storyboards are given to the animators so they can try to create scenes that are close to what the creators planned for each scene.
The storyboards are fascinating because, while they're much closer to the final version of the film than many of the early, preliminary movie scripts, there are still some interesting differences.
I invite you to follow along (and download this as a PDF, because it's a real treasure):
http://tfraw.blogspot.com/p/tftm-storyboard-set.html
Lithone is described here as a "rocky planet" with molten lava rivers. This is consistent with the original concept for Kranix as "Granix," the granite rock creature.
The Lithone scientist visited by Kranix and Arblus isn't named. He's just "the Lithone scientist."
The opening title sequence was originally meant to include an outer space scene that showcased abandoned space satellites from the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R.
The storyboards specify that Cybertron has two moons. (The movie is never entirely consistent about this, since it shows other moons even after they have been consumed by Unicron.)
Most of the time, the storyboard artists were very specific about which characters appeared in each scene. The drawings of characters are even labeled with their names, just in case there's any doubt about which robots were meant to appear. Gears does not appear in the storyboards, which suggests to me his presence on the Moon Base in the final film was just an afterthought by the animators.
Throughout the storyboards, Hot Rod appears in a very early iteration of his animation model, which includes a round curvature to his shoulders and an Autobot symbol on his "shirt collar" rather than in the center of his chest. The only other such time we see Hot Rod with this erroneously-placed Autobot badge is in his 1986 toy commercial.
After Hot Rod suggests driving to Lookout Mountain, Daniel protests that they're supposed to stay outside city limits and that entering them is a security violation.
The roadblock outside the city is being assembled by Kup and a group of "nameless Autobots." Hound is specified by name but the others are not. This may explain why Sunstreaker appears in two places at once. (Sunstreaker and Hound are specifically storyboarded to appear on Prime's shuttle.)
There's an extended scene after Megatron blasts Lookout Mountain. Hot Rod and Daniel fall, and Hot Rod gets into a tussle with Scavenger and Hook.
There are some illustrations where Blitzwing is labeled as "Triple Changer," suggesting that the movie was, indeed, the first animated adventure in which the writers included him (before a Hasbro name was assigned to him).
When Ultra Magnus first appears, in the storyboards he's actually carrying Springer and Arcee and Blurr in his car carrier mode. In the final film, they're just driving alongside of him.
Ultra Magnus, Arcee, Springer, and Blurr also appear in their preliminary designs. Magnus is very nearly the same (the way his missile launchers attach to the front of his trailer instead of the sides is the main difference). Blurr is shaped more like the Hasbro toy (especially the design of his legs), Arcee is wearing her shoulder pads "backwards," and Springer has a great deal more design detail on his body.
Starscream actually changes to robot mode during his chase with Springer and Arcee instead of afterwards.
There's an extended scene during the Autobot City transformation where Bombshell strafes the city from the air, but Mirage, who is hiding on a telescoping drawbridge, takes a sniper shot and guns hin down. Megatron is watching from afar and blasts Mirage.
There's a storyboard illustration where Steljaw is referred to as "Cubbie," one of the original cassette names appearing in an early version of the script. Originally, the script called for Cubbie, a lion; Stripes, a tiger; Stinger, a scorpion, and Bolts, a humanoid robot.
Bombshell gets another scene where he destroys an Autobot City turret gun before another cannon blast rips right through his body. I find the Bombshell scenes especially interesting, because he was dismissed as one of the badly wounded Decepticons and dumped off Astrotrain, but in the final film he doesn't even see any combat.
When Arcee tends to Windcharger's body, the storyboard only describes "Windcharger and another dead Autobot," but the storyboard illustration clearly shows Smokescreen, not Wheeljack. (In an earlier version of the script, Wheeljack had scenes following the Autobot City battle.)
In the scene where Perceptor and Grapple are in the Autobot City trenches and Swoop impossibly runs by, the scene is actually storyboarded to feature Kup and Blurr, not Swoop and Grapple. What's weird here is that it's not Swoop or Kup's legs that are actually drawn in the storyboard, but Trailbreaker's. I wonder what went wrong here.
Only Grimlock, Slag, Swoop, and Sludge are storyboarded to appear in the movie, and the storyboard even mentions "the four Dinobots." No idea why Snarl was totally forgotten about during the planning stages. (As we all know, Snarl does appear in the finished animated film, but I almost think that was the result of somebody telling an animator "draw the Dinobots here," in the same way that Reflector popped up whenever somebody drew a group shot of all the Decepticons.)
Sludge's eyeballs popping out of his head when Devastator smashes him in the back is not specifically storyboarded. I'm sure it was a gag thrown in there by the animators.
When the Dinobots attack Devastator, there's a short scene from within Autobot City where Bluestreak and Wheeljack react to the destruction of the city.
After Prime rushes the Decepticons in truck mode and then starts gunning them down, there's a scene where Blitzwing jumps for Prime but Prime catches him in mid-air. Starscream, Skywarp, and Astrotrain tackle Prime and knock him to the ground.
One of the more famous storyboard scenes is when Ultra Magnus arrives with Sideswipe, Tracks, and Red Alert in tow to confront Devastator after his fight with the Dinobots. They all launch their shoulder missile launchers and break Devastator apart into his component Constructicons. The Constructicons retaliate and the Autobots withdraw. Red Alert takes a hit in the back and falls, presumably dying. (His dead body is storyboarded to show up a little while later, visible in the foreground during the Prime/Megatron fight.)
Dirge sneakily attacking Prime during his confrontation with Megatron has been well-documented. Vestiges of this scene as it was storyboarded have made it into the final film, with Optimus seemingly standing back up after the attack.
When Megatron tackles Prime and they both crackle with electricity, that was originally supposed to be a reaction from broken power cables in Autobot City.
After Megatron is defeated, instead of imploring, "Don't leave me, Soundwave," he says, "Enshrine me, Soundwave." This is left over from an earlier version of the script in which a dying Megatron insists that he be laid to rest in the Decepticon Hall of Heroes so his soul can have eternal peace.
As the Decepticons retreat, it is specifically described in storyboard art and text that Long Haul is carrying a "dead Kickback" and Thundercracker is carrying a "dead Bombshell."
Also during the Decepticon retreat, a dead Trailbreaker is storyboarded to appear in the foreground. There are a lot of 1984-85 Autobots who are completely unaccounted for in the final film, but it seems like nearly all of them were specifically planned to be killed off. A lot of them appear in planned scripts or storyboards, but without actual on-screen deaths, they just vanish.
The design of the Matrix of Leadership was not yet finalized when the movie was storyboarded, so it appears here, basically, as a football.
During the scene on board Astrotrain, there's a drawing of Thrust who appears wearing a backpack, with his wings mounted to his back. I know the artwork in the storyboards is very rough, but it's also usually very accurate. You can even tell which iterations of the animation models are being used. With this in mind, I think the animation model for Thrust may not have been finalized yet, which may mean that, as with Blitzwing, this was also the first animated adventure in which he (and Dirge and Ramjet) were actually written to appear in. I suspect this is also the case with Blaster and Perceptor as well.
During the fight for Decepticon leadership, Blitzwing makes a bid for power: "I am a Triple Changer! I am worth any two of you! I should run things!" The Dirge gets him from behind. "Death comes to anyone who crosses me!" (This echoes the line from "Starscream's Ghost" when OCtane finds the Decepticon crypt and does a Dirge impression.)
When Unicron creates Galvatron and his troops, the creation of Scourge only specifies that a "dead Decepticon" is transformed into him. The storyboard artwork shows a Decepticon jet, but doesn't specify who. The creation of Cyclonus, however, does specify that Bombshell is used. Skywarp is not mentioned.
(As an aside, you can tell that Marvel Comics had access to the storyboards when doing the comic book adaptation, because a lot of scenes are frames and choreographed in exactly the same way.)
Galvatron's attack on Autobot City specifically describes the way Scourge's head pops out of his vehicle form. The movie is the only such time that a Sweep goes from one vehicle form to the other; in the third season, Scourge either had his head poking up, or he didn't.
When the Autobots are heading for the shuttles, there's a scene where Scourge blasts Arcee in the back, knocking her to the ground. She shrugs off the attack and resumes her escape. (This may explain why she's late getting to the shuttle, and Springer has to pull her into it.)
The Marvel Comics adaptation includes a scene that didn't make it into the finished animated film, when Magnus and Kup blast an asteroid into fragments, preventing Cyclonus from tracking their escape. In the comic book, Galvatron says, "They did the same thing to me off Beta Four!" but in the storyboard, he specifies that "they did the same thing to Megatron off Beta Four."
The first underwater scenes on Quintessa specify that the sea creatures are "evil fish."
The Planet of Junk is actually described as "Junkion" in storyboards. Likewise, Quintessa is called "Quintesson."
When Kranix introduces himself to the imprisoned Hot Rod and Kup, his typewritten dialogue has him describe the Quintessons as servants of Unicron who put survivors on trial. All of this is crossed out and his actual film dialogue ("I am Kranix; my planet was destroyed by Unicron") is penciled in.
In the storyboard, when the Decepticons have cornered Ultra Magnus on the Planet of Junk, Galvatron commands, "Sweeps, quarter him!" instead of "Sweeps, terminate him!" and, as with the Marvel adaptation, each Sweep grabs a limb and they all yank Magnus apart.
The sequence of events is a little different in the storyboards, with events on Junkion and Quintesson happening in a different order. In the storyboard, Galvatron dismantling Ultra Magnus and seizing the Matrix leads directly into the Autobots finding Ultra Magnus's dismembered parts.
When the Autobots morn the loss of Magnus, in this version, Arcee says, "first Hot Rod, now Ultra Magnus." She's not ticking off the loss of Autobot leaders, but the Autobots who have seemingly lost their lives at the hands of Galvatron personally. (I guess Kup wasn't that important to her.)
The sequence where the Quintesson corkscrew ship is landing on Junkion is handled a little differently. The storyboard very clearly identifies the passengers as Autobots, and they even get some dialogue before they land. I like the way the finished film handles it, putting the Dinobots in robot mode and showing them only from the back, where Grimlock's helmet superficially resembles Galvatron, masking the identity of the ship's inhabitants momentarily.
At one point Hot Rod utter the excessively touchy-feely line, "Then we've got to trust in ourselves and, no matter what the odds, destroy Unicron."
During Unicron's transformation sequence, his robot head pops up very early during the transformation. I like the way the finished film saves it for last. The storyboarded transformation sequence is very, very specific, to the point where they even explain where the "camera" is in respect to Unicron's body.
The storyboard specifies that it's Dirge and Ramjet who attack Unicron, and get swallowed up by him, during Unicron's attack on Cybertron.
When we see Unicron's stomach and the robot victims who are being "digested," the first robots who fall into the acid and dissolve are identified in the storyboard as Decepticons.
After Rodimus Prime unleashes the Matrix, the storyboards specifically mention that Unicron "can't stand the effects of the Matrix" and deliberately rips off his own leg.
That's all I got. Fascinating stuff, all around.
Zob (got way too much sun yesterday)
The storyboards are fascinating because, while they're much closer to the final version of the film than many of the early, preliminary movie scripts, there are still some interesting differences.
I invite you to follow along (and download this as a PDF, because it's a real treasure):
http://tfraw.blogspot.com/p/tftm-storyboard-set.html
Lithone is described here as a "rocky planet" with molten lava rivers. This is consistent with the original concept for Kranix as "Granix," the granite rock creature.
The Lithone scientist visited by Kranix and Arblus isn't named. He's just "the Lithone scientist."
The opening title sequence was originally meant to include an outer space scene that showcased abandoned space satellites from the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R.
The storyboards specify that Cybertron has two moons. (The movie is never entirely consistent about this, since it shows other moons even after they have been consumed by Unicron.)
Most of the time, the storyboard artists were very specific about which characters appeared in each scene. The drawings of characters are even labeled with their names, just in case there's any doubt about which robots were meant to appear. Gears does not appear in the storyboards, which suggests to me his presence on the Moon Base in the final film was just an afterthought by the animators.
Throughout the storyboards, Hot Rod appears in a very early iteration of his animation model, which includes a round curvature to his shoulders and an Autobot symbol on his "shirt collar" rather than in the center of his chest. The only other such time we see Hot Rod with this erroneously-placed Autobot badge is in his 1986 toy commercial.
After Hot Rod suggests driving to Lookout Mountain, Daniel protests that they're supposed to stay outside city limits and that entering them is a security violation.
The roadblock outside the city is being assembled by Kup and a group of "nameless Autobots." Hound is specified by name but the others are not. This may explain why Sunstreaker appears in two places at once. (Sunstreaker and Hound are specifically storyboarded to appear on Prime's shuttle.)
There's an extended scene after Megatron blasts Lookout Mountain. Hot Rod and Daniel fall, and Hot Rod gets into a tussle with Scavenger and Hook.
There are some illustrations where Blitzwing is labeled as "Triple Changer," suggesting that the movie was, indeed, the first animated adventure in which the writers included him (before a Hasbro name was assigned to him).
When Ultra Magnus first appears, in the storyboards he's actually carrying Springer and Arcee and Blurr in his car carrier mode. In the final film, they're just driving alongside of him.
Ultra Magnus, Arcee, Springer, and Blurr also appear in their preliminary designs. Magnus is very nearly the same (the way his missile launchers attach to the front of his trailer instead of the sides is the main difference). Blurr is shaped more like the Hasbro toy (especially the design of his legs), Arcee is wearing her shoulder pads "backwards," and Springer has a great deal more design detail on his body.
Starscream actually changes to robot mode during his chase with Springer and Arcee instead of afterwards.
There's an extended scene during the Autobot City transformation where Bombshell strafes the city from the air, but Mirage, who is hiding on a telescoping drawbridge, takes a sniper shot and guns hin down. Megatron is watching from afar and blasts Mirage.
There's a storyboard illustration where Steljaw is referred to as "Cubbie," one of the original cassette names appearing in an early version of the script. Originally, the script called for Cubbie, a lion; Stripes, a tiger; Stinger, a scorpion, and Bolts, a humanoid robot.
Bombshell gets another scene where he destroys an Autobot City turret gun before another cannon blast rips right through his body. I find the Bombshell scenes especially interesting, because he was dismissed as one of the badly wounded Decepticons and dumped off Astrotrain, but in the final film he doesn't even see any combat.
When Arcee tends to Windcharger's body, the storyboard only describes "Windcharger and another dead Autobot," but the storyboard illustration clearly shows Smokescreen, not Wheeljack. (In an earlier version of the script, Wheeljack had scenes following the Autobot City battle.)
In the scene where Perceptor and Grapple are in the Autobot City trenches and Swoop impossibly runs by, the scene is actually storyboarded to feature Kup and Blurr, not Swoop and Grapple. What's weird here is that it's not Swoop or Kup's legs that are actually drawn in the storyboard, but Trailbreaker's. I wonder what went wrong here.
Only Grimlock, Slag, Swoop, and Sludge are storyboarded to appear in the movie, and the storyboard even mentions "the four Dinobots." No idea why Snarl was totally forgotten about during the planning stages. (As we all know, Snarl does appear in the finished animated film, but I almost think that was the result of somebody telling an animator "draw the Dinobots here," in the same way that Reflector popped up whenever somebody drew a group shot of all the Decepticons.)
Sludge's eyeballs popping out of his head when Devastator smashes him in the back is not specifically storyboarded. I'm sure it was a gag thrown in there by the animators.
When the Dinobots attack Devastator, there's a short scene from within Autobot City where Bluestreak and Wheeljack react to the destruction of the city.
After Prime rushes the Decepticons in truck mode and then starts gunning them down, there's a scene where Blitzwing jumps for Prime but Prime catches him in mid-air. Starscream, Skywarp, and Astrotrain tackle Prime and knock him to the ground.
One of the more famous storyboard scenes is when Ultra Magnus arrives with Sideswipe, Tracks, and Red Alert in tow to confront Devastator after his fight with the Dinobots. They all launch their shoulder missile launchers and break Devastator apart into his component Constructicons. The Constructicons retaliate and the Autobots withdraw. Red Alert takes a hit in the back and falls, presumably dying. (His dead body is storyboarded to show up a little while later, visible in the foreground during the Prime/Megatron fight.)
Dirge sneakily attacking Prime during his confrontation with Megatron has been well-documented. Vestiges of this scene as it was storyboarded have made it into the final film, with Optimus seemingly standing back up after the attack.
When Megatron tackles Prime and they both crackle with electricity, that was originally supposed to be a reaction from broken power cables in Autobot City.
After Megatron is defeated, instead of imploring, "Don't leave me, Soundwave," he says, "Enshrine me, Soundwave." This is left over from an earlier version of the script in which a dying Megatron insists that he be laid to rest in the Decepticon Hall of Heroes so his soul can have eternal peace.
As the Decepticons retreat, it is specifically described in storyboard art and text that Long Haul is carrying a "dead Kickback" and Thundercracker is carrying a "dead Bombshell."
Also during the Decepticon retreat, a dead Trailbreaker is storyboarded to appear in the foreground. There are a lot of 1984-85 Autobots who are completely unaccounted for in the final film, but it seems like nearly all of them were specifically planned to be killed off. A lot of them appear in planned scripts or storyboards, but without actual on-screen deaths, they just vanish.
The design of the Matrix of Leadership was not yet finalized when the movie was storyboarded, so it appears here, basically, as a football.
During the scene on board Astrotrain, there's a drawing of Thrust who appears wearing a backpack, with his wings mounted to his back. I know the artwork in the storyboards is very rough, but it's also usually very accurate. You can even tell which iterations of the animation models are being used. With this in mind, I think the animation model for Thrust may not have been finalized yet, which may mean that, as with Blitzwing, this was also the first animated adventure in which he (and Dirge and Ramjet) were actually written to appear in. I suspect this is also the case with Blaster and Perceptor as well.
During the fight for Decepticon leadership, Blitzwing makes a bid for power: "I am a Triple Changer! I am worth any two of you! I should run things!" The Dirge gets him from behind. "Death comes to anyone who crosses me!" (This echoes the line from "Starscream's Ghost" when OCtane finds the Decepticon crypt and does a Dirge impression.)
When Unicron creates Galvatron and his troops, the creation of Scourge only specifies that a "dead Decepticon" is transformed into him. The storyboard artwork shows a Decepticon jet, but doesn't specify who. The creation of Cyclonus, however, does specify that Bombshell is used. Skywarp is not mentioned.
(As an aside, you can tell that Marvel Comics had access to the storyboards when doing the comic book adaptation, because a lot of scenes are frames and choreographed in exactly the same way.)
Galvatron's attack on Autobot City specifically describes the way Scourge's head pops out of his vehicle form. The movie is the only such time that a Sweep goes from one vehicle form to the other; in the third season, Scourge either had his head poking up, or he didn't.
When the Autobots are heading for the shuttles, there's a scene where Scourge blasts Arcee in the back, knocking her to the ground. She shrugs off the attack and resumes her escape. (This may explain why she's late getting to the shuttle, and Springer has to pull her into it.)
The Marvel Comics adaptation includes a scene that didn't make it into the finished animated film, when Magnus and Kup blast an asteroid into fragments, preventing Cyclonus from tracking their escape. In the comic book, Galvatron says, "They did the same thing to me off Beta Four!" but in the storyboard, he specifies that "they did the same thing to Megatron off Beta Four."
The first underwater scenes on Quintessa specify that the sea creatures are "evil fish."
The Planet of Junk is actually described as "Junkion" in storyboards. Likewise, Quintessa is called "Quintesson."
When Kranix introduces himself to the imprisoned Hot Rod and Kup, his typewritten dialogue has him describe the Quintessons as servants of Unicron who put survivors on trial. All of this is crossed out and his actual film dialogue ("I am Kranix; my planet was destroyed by Unicron") is penciled in.
In the storyboard, when the Decepticons have cornered Ultra Magnus on the Planet of Junk, Galvatron commands, "Sweeps, quarter him!" instead of "Sweeps, terminate him!" and, as with the Marvel adaptation, each Sweep grabs a limb and they all yank Magnus apart.
The sequence of events is a little different in the storyboards, with events on Junkion and Quintesson happening in a different order. In the storyboard, Galvatron dismantling Ultra Magnus and seizing the Matrix leads directly into the Autobots finding Ultra Magnus's dismembered parts.
When the Autobots morn the loss of Magnus, in this version, Arcee says, "first Hot Rod, now Ultra Magnus." She's not ticking off the loss of Autobot leaders, but the Autobots who have seemingly lost their lives at the hands of Galvatron personally. (I guess Kup wasn't that important to her.)
The sequence where the Quintesson corkscrew ship is landing on Junkion is handled a little differently. The storyboard very clearly identifies the passengers as Autobots, and they even get some dialogue before they land. I like the way the finished film handles it, putting the Dinobots in robot mode and showing them only from the back, where Grimlock's helmet superficially resembles Galvatron, masking the identity of the ship's inhabitants momentarily.
At one point Hot Rod utter the excessively touchy-feely line, "Then we've got to trust in ourselves and, no matter what the odds, destroy Unicron."
During Unicron's transformation sequence, his robot head pops up very early during the transformation. I like the way the finished film saves it for last. The storyboarded transformation sequence is very, very specific, to the point where they even explain where the "camera" is in respect to Unicron's body.
The storyboard specifies that it's Dirge and Ramjet who attack Unicron, and get swallowed up by him, during Unicron's attack on Cybertron.
When we see Unicron's stomach and the robot victims who are being "digested," the first robots who fall into the acid and dissolve are identified in the storyboard as Decepticons.
After Rodimus Prime unleashes the Matrix, the storyboards specifically mention that Unicron "can't stand the effects of the Matrix" and deliberately rips off his own leg.
That's all I got. Fascinating stuff, all around.
Zob (got way too much sun yesterday)
Optim_1
Jul 6, 2018, 10:35:55 AM7/6/18
to
On Thursday, 5 July 2018 18:05:07 UTC-4, Zobovor wrote:
>
> One of the more famous storyboard scenes is when Ultra Magnus arrives with Sideswipe, Tracks, and Red Alert in tow to confront Devastator after his fight with the Dinobots. They all launch their shoulder missile launchers and break Devastator apart into his component Constructicons. The Constructicons retaliate and the Autobots withdraw. Red Alert takes a hit in the back and falls, presumably dying. (His dead body is storyboarded to show up a little while later, visible in the foreground during the Prime/Megatron fight.)
>
It's not clear that Red Alert is dead. He took a shot in the back but it could not necessarily have killed him. The storyboards never specifically state he is dead. They go out of their way to mention that Trailbreaker, seen lying on the ground as the Decepticons retreat, is dead, but not Red Alert, lying during the Optimus/Megatron fight.
>
> One of the more famous storyboard scenes is when Ultra Magnus arrives with Sideswipe, Tracks, and Red Alert in tow to confront Devastator after his fight with the Dinobots. They all launch their shoulder missile launchers and break Devastator apart into his component Constructicons. The Constructicons retaliate and the Autobots withdraw. Red Alert takes a hit in the back and falls, presumably dying. (His dead body is storyboarded to show up a little while later, visible in the foreground during the Prime/Megatron fight.)
>
Which makes sense because Red Alert, being from 1985, was still sold in toy stores while poor Trailbreaker was not. Those bastards at Hasbro and their cold business decisions, that prey on children as cash cows. I'm being serious here. The movie upset me as a kid with all the violence and deaths of established characters.
Zobovor
Jul 6, 2018, 1:46:28 PM7/6/18
to
On Friday, July 6, 2018 at 8:35:55 AM UTC-6, Optim_1 wrote:
> Which makes sense because Red Alert, being from 1985, was still sold in toy
> stores while poor Trailbreaker was not.
I'm pretty sure Hasbro gave up on the 1985 Autobot Cars after the movie. They weren't listed in the "you can kill these robots off" referendum, but they weren't in the toy catalogs for 1986 and they never showed up in season three. They didn't get on-screen death scenes, which irks me, but they must have been killed during the events of the movie because none of them ever showed up again.
> Which makes sense because Red Alert, being from 1985, was still sold in toy
> stores while poor Trailbreaker was not.
Zob (meanwhile, Cliffjumper actually does survive to the end of the movie, and yet he mysteriously disappears, too)
Rodimus_2316
Jul 6, 2018, 7:08:16 PM7/6/18
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