Transformers Armada

[beaker]

Well TF Armada premieres soon. Curiously, Entertainment Weekly hated the pilot...the pacing and animation they really disliked. I have yet to see any pictures or videos of it, but man...it has to be better than the recent Pokemon styled TF cartoon on Fox Kids.
Also, if its based on such a cool manga title by Dreamwave, its gotta be worth something(Unless the animation is too americanized and cheap)

Since I dont have cable, I'd like to know how this one is. Between farscape, Invader Zim, and Cartoon Network I am so missing out.

 

[UncleDeadly]

The premier is this friday, correct? If so I will have to tape it. And if I do tape it, I will give you a full report as soon as I can on Friday night or Saturday.

Good to have Transfans around.

And you dont have cable? No Farscape? That is horribly sad. Do you at least have a blockbuster nearby so you can rent seasons 1 and 2?

 

[beaker]

>>>And you dont have cable? No Farscape? That is horribly sad. Do you at least have a blockbuster nearby so you can rent seasons 1 and 2?<<<

Sad? No way...after 4 years of paying $40+ for cable, they have the gaul to nix cartoon network and sci fi for c-span2 and golf.
that was 4 yars ago, been without ever since. Though Ive seen dowloaded vcds of all the so called must see cable shows like Osbornes, etc and realize how glad I am sometimes I got rid of cable. As for Farscape, yeah Blockbuster has the farscape dvds and an exclusive one...I just dont like paying $6 to rent a dvd for 2 nights.

But yes, definately cool to see TF fans...I'd assume any guy on here must have a little autobot in em if they are from the 80's!

Anyways, give us the full armada lowdown(you too grail and anybody else) saturday.

 

[beaker]

So...I cant find any clips or trailers or anything on TF Armada, or any opinions...anybody have a personal verdict on the premiere episode?

 

[UncleDeadly]

I only saw about the last half of it. It has promise but is a little weak right now.

The bots are cool, but there arent many of them yet. Optimus and Megatron are the same voice actors as Beast Wars.

The premise: Three kids stumble upon ancient technology that unleashes the minicons, the working class of cybertron. They were always the pawns of the Autobots and Decepticons. They were lost. When awoken, the two big groups send people to the Earth to reclaim them so they could reclaim the minicons and thus win the war.

Because the minicons bond with bigger bots to power them up. The three kids each find their own Minicon (a bike, a scooter, and a skateboard) and team up with the Autobots to find the other Minicons before the Decepticons.

The problem a lot of fans have I have heard so far is that the fight scenes were a little weak and that they explained the premise too many times in the hour and fifteen minutes.

I need to see it all the way through in order to pass judgement.

 

[grail]

alright...i've been putting this off long enough...

i like Armada, i really do...BUT

something about it just rubs me the wrong way. i really can't put my finger on what it is either, it just kinda grated my nerves at times.

stylistically it definately took a lot from RiD. the Decepticons are silly at times, and the Autobots just seem to be trying to make the best of a bad situation. the Minicons are excellent, and add some depth to the story of the Transformers, but i just don't think of it as Transformers.

there are 2 main problems as i see it.

the first, is that it's supposed to be present day, 2002...but this is the first time the Autobots have been to earth. Any good Transfan should be seeing red flags at this point because one of the best things about them in the past is the fact that all the stories are related. Beast Wars was set on pre-historic earth, but also in pre-historic earth were the G1 set, lying dormant...it was already established, and that's the way it was portrayed. Armada is a "re-imagination" of the Transformers Universe. i hate re-imaginations...i want the REAL Transformers!

the other problem is simple...the kids. where is it written that any anime imported to the states has to have the same little brats in them? is there a law that it has to HAVE children to APPEAL to children? i mean, what was the one thing that was annoying about G1? Spike. but at least he was pro-active, and even proved useful from time to time. the kid in RiD was horrible, and i get the same vibe from these kids.

other than that it was decent, and there's potential for some really good stuff. i'm with whoever else said that they didn't like the fact that they repeated the premise over and over...but the "movie" was really just the first three episodes strung together, so i can't really complain.

overall i give it a B-...it's not as good as He-Man is, but it has potential.

 

[beaker]

>>>the other problem is simple...the kids. where is it written that any anime imported to the states has to have the same little brats in them?<<<

pokemon, digimon, mon colle knights, flint, medibots, etc etc ^_^
Yeah, there seems to be a need for a bratty spikey haired kid in every new anime...at least in Bebop its a hacker girl whose entertaining.

Ok...two questions...

animation/art: Somewhat like the beautiful dreamwave comic, or standard pokemon no budget faire? Or worse, Americanized style(ie: The avengers) I have not even been able to find a pic or a still from TF Armada.

feel: Eek, it doesnt feel like RID does itI cant see how any self respecting TF fan can enjoy that garbage RiD...its insulting to your intelligence, that shark guy alone ruins the feel, etc.
To be honest, I liked the cgi shows better than RiD.
At any rate, theyll prolly be packaging it all as a dvd movie knowing how marketing goes.

 

[grail]

2 answers:

animation/art: the animation does feel a bit like RiD. the lines are softer, and the colors are brighter. it's not crisp like G1 was, but it's not a bad compromise between the two...i don't really know how to explain it beyond that.

feel: there are times it feels very much like RiD. like when Megatron attaches his Minicon and the blaster that he gets from it is so powerful, it pushes him backwards to the point that he falls over and starts shooting up. other times it has a very G1 good vs. evil feel...it's just hard to tack down.

and yeah, from all reports, it and the He-Man movie (which i thought was better, believe it or not) should be out on DVD by christmas. but G1 season 2 will be out in sept! (and the original He-Man series on DVD is in the works too!)

 

[beaker]

So Grail and anyone else with CN...3 weeks in, how is TF Armada? I finally got one of the toys(the yellow car) WOW! I havent gotten a TF toy in like 17 years! Very cool.

I'll have to wait for a tape trade or video release, but Im just curious what youre thoughts on the show is so far.

Im relaly curious about the animation...is there a link to a trailer for it or clips?


And the Fox channel in 2003: TMNT and Muppets...how sweet is that?

 

[Rufus]

They're just rerunning the movie, broken up into it's individual episode parts. Part 2 was on this week, part 3 should be next week, and probably a new episode the week after that.

I gave it another shot tonight and sat down to watch part 2. Man, it's just annoying. The pacing is stop and go, it's like being stuck in traffic. There doesn't need to be a dramatic pause after every sentence, there doesn't need to be reaction shots after everything that happens. Everything just seems so drawn out. And, I noticed that when there is actual animation, it's either for talking (mouth movement) or body motion, but rarely both. At least G1 could have characters talk while they were doing something else.

Not a fan of Armada so far... the toys look cheap. Some of the toys coming out in the future look okay, and I might pick one or two of them up.

There are 2 good things about Armada: the time slot for the show is very convenient (6:30pm on Fri, 10:30pm on Sat... I remeber getting up very early for Beast Wars, but at least that show was worth it. This time slot is kinda wasted on Armada, it really doesn't do me any good 'cause I'm not too worried about catching it every week). And the comic, issue #2 of Armada was a HUGE step in the right direction as far as characterization goes. Still a ways to go, but still tons more personality than the first 4 issues of the G1 series combined.

- R -