Transformers US Generation 1 Rewatch- Introduction

The Transformers cartoon was the lynchpin of my teenaged afternoons. Prior to that I began watching it when if first appeared on Sunday mornings, while syndicated animation was figuring out what to do with itself. 

Note- I'm pretty sure it was Sunday morning, but I can't find a reference that doesn't say "Saturday Morning" or "Weekdays." Maybe Sunday was only G.I. Joe? Being a teenager that early in the morning on weekends led to grogginess, but syndication was also highly variable back then. Your mileage may vary.

Regardless- the main viewing was after school, frequently with friends.
 
Sure, on days where I was having an existential crisis and avoiding homework, I’d watch the whole line up:
Tranzor Z (Original Japanese title Mazinger Z. All I remember was thinking “Oh, that’s what Shogun Warriors toys came from,” and the pink female mecha that fired “boob missiles.”)
Voltron (Both versions, but the lions were WAY cooler.)
Transformers (Unquestionably the best one.)
G. I Joe (FAR goofier since it was two huge armies that weren’t allowed to shoot each other.)
Thundercats (Honestly, even back then I thought this was terrible, but I REALLY didn’t want to do homework.)
 
The original Transformers series always stuck with me as being cool, though. The Larry Hama G. I Joe comics were and are fantastic, and far better than the show. However, I could never get into the equally acclaimed Simon Furman Transformers comics even though the characters and stories were just as well executed. This is not counting crossovers. Somehow, in comics pairings that have no right to work, do. My inability to enjoy the standard comics, I believe, comes from needing to see Transformers move, being that that is a key element to their awesomeness.
 
The main toy releases landed between my heavy Star Wars figure playing days, and the dawn of my more recent “As should be crystal clear by now, I do have a problem” superhero action figure addiction. While Lee, my frequent partner in crime (for watching cartoons, gaming, and many other ridiculousnesses) used some of his after school job funds to fill a set of book shelves with an awesome Decepticon collection. I only had a handful:
Soundwave: Because he was always my favorite. Yet another hyper competent second in command, far more intelligent than the leader, but loyal to the cause and with no desire to take over command himself. (See Spock and Chewbacca.) I probably would have bought an Ironhide if the original toy looked anything like the cartoon. In Season Three I was a fan of Cylconus. Clearly, I have a type.
The Insecticons- I got Mom to bring me to a toy store with some gift money intending to buy Grimlock, but they didn’t have any of him, or the other Dinobots. They did have all three of Kickback, Bombshell and Shrapnel, for a little more in total than what Grimlock would have been.
I bought them instead… and I think I’m still in trouble with my Mother for that.
Wreck-Gar- A birthday present from Lee, well aware of my Transformers, Monty Python and Weird Al fandom, all of which converge on that character.
And yes, when the re-issues first started when Anabelle was little, I did purchase my very own Grimlock...

plus a couple of minis later on. As should be crystal clear by now, I have varied problems.
 
A year after Rosa and I were married in 2001, the Generation One Transformers series started to be released on DVD. Watching them in half season chunks as they came out, over two years, I felt they held up pretty well. Their recently aired (at the time, which I first saw in Peru visiting Rosa) follow ups with the Maximals and Predacons kept my interest as well. (Though now I, once again, note that hand drawn animation ALWAYS seems to age better that CGI work.)
 
After the inspiration of returning to this franchise that was Transformers One, I finally embarked on a full rewatch of everything in the American Generation One Transformers cannon in a row. Yes, I know there are Japanese only continuations of that first series at a few points, and…
I do not care.
The thing that made the Transformers magical to me, was how they took multiple disconnected Japanese toy lines (previously released here as the far less popular Micronauts, which I also owned) and told a bunch of American Comic Book writers to go crazy making Heroes and Villains out of them.
 
Now watching the series en mass, I feel “Held up pretty well” may be a bit of an overstatement. However, they are still my favorite version of one of my favorite franchises. While not what anyone would call stellar production values, they remain an absolute hoot and a half. In spite of complaining, (because it's funnier that way) I was focused on, and enjoyed every episode. Even *shudder* Kremzeek. 

The viewing led me back to the Converse web site after receiving a black Friday sale email, because I determined I did “need” custom sneakers with these characters. (And I have a loving and enabling wife with a good eye for design that provided some visually enhancing suggestions.)

There are enough episode guides out there, in several different media. Therefore, these are straight up “reaction shots”-
Surprises, laughs, notations of weirdness, "Hey I remember them!" all around good times and “what in the heck was that” moments were recorded as I took an enjoyable tour back to Cybertron.
 

Note- The Animation and Art errors from this time period are LEGENDARY, and frequent to the point of not being worth mentioning. An early story had no less than FOUR Starscreams on the screen simultaneously. This is far beyond the normal coloring errors as at that point there were only three Seekers in total.
 
More Notes, this time for the uninitiated braving this foolishness-

“Seekers” are Decepticon jets. Originally there were Starscream, Skywarp and Thundercracker (Red, Purple and Blue with fully shaped heads.) They were the cool ones. Three others showed up in Season Two with “face in the nosecone” heads. They were less cool.

Also- A Combiner is a group of usually five (except six for the first one) Autobots or Decepticons who merge, Voltron like, into one huge robot. The one huge robot has a distinct personality. There is no good explanation for this.

And the bleeding obvious- Autobots are the good guys, Decepticons are the bad guys, but they all came from Cybertron, hence they are Cybertronians. The toy line and show are called “Transformers” but they aren’t referred to as that until Season Three. I think this is most likely because by then we’d met a bunch of other planets with various transforming and non-transforming robotic life forms that did not originate on Cybertron …as well as all kinds of other weird aliens, presumably because the creative teams had an insane number of episodes to knock out in a year and were getting goofy.

Finally the even more bleeding obvious- As "Transformers" the whole point of the franchise is they can transform from one thing to another. Initially, most Autobots go from Robot to Car, and kind of most Decepticons go from Robot to Jet. Very quickly, while "robot" stays constant, both sides change into all manner of things, including animals, electronics, and probably furniture at some point. Later there are Triple Changers, who have three forms, and eventually one with Six forms shows up, because they lost their minds and wanted to give the kids buying the toy an aneurysm.

 
I did start watching these last year (2024) meaning this counts as part of the Transformers Fortieth Anniversary Celebration. Plus, it is the Fortieth Anniversary of Season Two. The DVD sets were nice enough to reorganize Season Three into the order they should be shown, as original broadcasts of both Season Two and Three were heinously out of order. Therefore, the actual reaction write ups are in the correct viewing order, not the original broadcast order listed in the index. They were not nice enough to do that for Season Two, but the out of order parts were jarring enough to be noted easily.
 
While I doubt I could handle a full series run of G.I. Joe; there are shared characters in one episode of Season Two plus a couple of direct follow up individuals to that show in Season Three (following the time jump) of the Transformers. Therefore, I am including a reminder watching of the first two miniseries of that franchise I picked up on the cheap.

 
As far as I’m concerned Beast Wars and Beast Machines (Cheese Puff explosions and all) are in continuity with the US Generation One. They directly reference past events and characters, are a fun ride, and provide a quality ending. So there.
 
Care to accompany me on this journey?
TRANSFORM AND ROLL OUT!!!
 
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