The new ReGeneration 1 got me thinking about this. What was so wrong with the G2 comic that all (or maybe nearly all) uses of the comic setting since then have omitted G2? Granted it's been a while since I read it... did G2 leave everyone important dead, or something?

May be better suited to the comic section but I think there are uses of the setting besides comics. Maybe!

Because G2 wasn't canon.

Well, Classicsverse was because of the character selection presented in the toy line. Optimus Prime, Hot Rod, Mirage, Grimlock, Jetfire, Starscream, Ramjet, Megatron... mostly Megatron... were all the G1 versions of those characters (not to mention G2 killed a good number of them off). So it made more sense to continue on after G1 rather than try to make it fit after G2.

For RGO, it's my understanding that it will address the many stories left untold when the Marvel run ended. Stories that Simon has been wanting to go back and tell. Stories that fit in after G1 but not G2, since that is where they were originally going to be told.

So I don't think anyone is purposefully avoiding G2, it's just that due to the decisions made G2 didn't fit in with the stories that they wanted to tell.

The Earth, particularly San Francisco is a wasteland.

Well, it's not like the comics had a history of bringing back dead characters who got new toys.

Frankly, with the current Classicsverse status quo, I find the earlier "G2 didn't happen in this because it messes up the world too much" even more difficult to accept.

Personally, I'd have fit #81 - #100 between G1 #80 and G2 #1.

I'd move G2 forward in chronology so that there is more time in the universe to tell a story. There was nothing in the comics placing it squarely in the early nineties was there?

#100 would have a definitive ending still and you wouldn't need to read G2 to understand what was going on. G2 would be more like "the ongoing adventures of the Transformers continue and this other stuff happened a few weeks/months later after #100".

Sure, I'd be limiting myself on the freedom - I couldn't kill off Red Alert since he dies later in G2 for example. But I find it more interesting to work within set parameters. The story would still have suspense - okay, we know Red Alert won't die but then he wouldn't find himself in a situation where there is a possibility of him dying - other characters not featured in G2 would.



Plus its more interesting when the world is messed up.

Except for Quake.

I mean, obviously.

The cover to Generation 2 #1 says it all. "THIS IS NOT YOUR FATHER’S AUTOBOT."

Who am I to argue? G2 is its own thing. It isn't issue #81. It is the second generation of Transformers storytelling.

Same reason Civil War stories omit World War 1.



Some parts of San Francisco are kinda nice.

Problem with G2 comics is that they suffered greatly from 90's extreme BS.

Pretty much.

The comic was literally at the point in which they were bringing characters back just to go kill them off in an effort to make the conflict seem more "gritty" and "real".

It'd have been one thing to, say, whack Chase and Brawn in order to show how powerful Megatron was, Skullgrin himself to show off Jihaxus, and one or two guys in the final battle.

Instead, we had what - 80+ deaths over the course of 16 issues, including a number of guys who either had toys on the shelves or were slated to have toys on the shelves?

1) G2 was "of it's era" definitely. Very, very 90s ish.

2) It blew up it's world too much, killing too many characters and destroying too much setting.

3) It left large and very definate loose ends that any series after would have to deal with.

4) It changed G1 characters and introduced characters that are not "G1 based" to the extent that it is disconected as a G1 sequel.


-ZacWilliam, add 'em together and you get a tangent that's often left behind, despite its many good points IMO.

I've always been more interested in whether Machine Wars:

Follows G2, Proceeds g2, is its own thing like g2, follows g1, leads into Beastwars.

I've always been a bit surprised that Fun Pub and the Fanclub never grabbed MW and ran with it.

I mean it's SUCH a cypher you could do pretty near anything.


-ZacWilliam, I mean it doesn't even have packaging copy blurbs. THAT'S a blank slate.

I've always just looked at it as an alternate continuity.

Same. G1 characters but a different origin to their awakening on Earth.

Machine Wars Soundwave later becomes Universe Soundwave.

Nothing important happened in G2. It was a pretty flat and very soon-dated over-the-top '90s story that never really led to anything else. And for the most part, the characters were G1 characters. It's just an obstacle to storytelling now, so why not supplant it?

I would be open to some MW fiction. Comics, whatever.

I don't necessarily feel that we need updated MW toys or anything. But then again:

The entire Earth was decimated... multiple times. An entire new galaxy-spanning faction was introduced, including the frequently recurring Jhiaxus. The TFs came into conflict with one of the 13 for the first time. A good swath of name characters were killed. Megatron was revived. Starscream was rewritten to be a hero. The Autobots and Decepticons united forces. The Vok were created.

I mean you can berate it for being terribly 90s all you want, that's true. But LOADS of important stuff happened.


-ZacWilliam, stuff that remains important all this time later and in other continuities...

Well, the G.I. Joe folks aren't old and gray, so that limits things a bit.

Plus generally when one wants to tell a bunch of Transformers stories, they want to use Megatron and Starscream. With them being broken up inside the Ark up in the Yukon, that limits a lot of things. Unless, uh, somehow they come out of the Ark, there are a bunch of stories, then they go back there to nap later, and then... go say hi to Cobra! ...who somehow aren't super old by then.

We see Jhiaxus's head in the first pages of 80.5 along with other characters/situation from Marvel G1. Surely that means at least *some* of G2 happened? I know Simon has said things somewhat indicating otherwise, but it's hard to argue with Jhiaxus's presence on that page...

No, there was no evidence of destruction outside San Francisco. And from "City of Steel" to "When Continents Collide", we've had many examples of TFs destroying cities and killing people and it not mattering. It led to nothing. Reminds me of Glen's plans to have the Four Horsemen of Unicron devastate Cybertron: who cares? It's a continuity that doesn't matter, that leads to nothing, that gets ignored. Why would anyone care about even a billion deaths, when the main ongoing storyline just hits reset?



Of which only Jhiaxus even slightly matters. Sky-Byte came from RID but he doesnt make the RID story matter. OMG, the Decepticons kidnapped a hundred thousand children with Galvatron's brain-bats?!! It didnt lead into anything and nobody ever talked about it again so who cares?



That's a retcon, a retcon that was then retconned out of "muktiversal singularity hood" because it never meant anything to the story in the first place. In 18 years, Liege Maximo never actually was the subjectvof any story again - he existed only to give weight to the singularity conceit which Hasbro then got tired of and abandoned.



Simpsons did it. Seriously, all of that happens like every eight episodes / issues.



Another outside-the-pages retcon, this one extremely stupid and paradoxical, only taking away from and contradicting BW instead of contributing to it. And again, not mattering to the story in the tiniest bit.

The Beast era gave us sparks, the Allspark, and a canonical future timeline. Armada gave us Minicons. Animated gave the Elite Guard and the Magnus Hammer and Lockdown. Those are storyline contributions that lasted and mattered. G2 was a self-contained series and its ignorability is demonstrated by what a good job the next near-20-years of storytelling did of ignoring it.

G2 gave us Jhiaxus. And things hovering over other things like vast predatory birds. Other than that it had no lasting impact on the storytelling.

I think you need to read G2 again, because there very much is. The Cons under Bludgeon reduce planetary capitals to rubble right at the start of G2. Then the G2 cons do more. The Earth is absolutely wrecked in the series.



You just said G2 doesn't matter because nothing important happened in it and now you've said nothing that happened in it can be important because the series doesn't matter? You've definately covered your bases there.

You clearly have different ideas of what equals important than me, in story and out.




By your logic here nothing in any TF continuity that has ever ended, Which is 90% of them, matters in any way ever? It can't be important the continuity ended so it's all pointless, let's go hang out with Dead End.






Leigh Maximo is one of the 13. This is still canon. And the first of them to ever do anything and matter in a TF story. And his use in Alignment inspired Furman to birth the concept of the 13. So, nothing can matter if the series that birthed it ends, and if it does have lasting impact beyond its series and add to ongoing TF lore that doesn't matter either?





1) No it really doesn't. And 2) Doesn't make it any less big important events in its universe.





So, this time it doesn't matter because you happen to think it's dumb whether it had a lasting impact or added to the mythos or not.



G2 gave us Jhiaxus, whose shown up as much and in as many places as the Elite Guard, and the Magnus Hammer, or Lockdown. It started the concept of the 13 going really with the Liege Maximo. It gave us the origin of the Vok.

All of that aside though, I don't believe "anything of Importance happening in the story" is something to define by how much it has had borrowed by future series, but largely by the big things that it did In its own story and Universe.


-ZacWilliam, TF stories and universes end all the time, I don't define their "mattering" by how much is borrowed or homaged from them.

There are lots of small things G2 gave us which can easily be taken for granted, looking back on it twenty years ago.

For example, the idea that Transformers don't have to be drawn just like their Sunbow character models. You can have fun with them and draw them as more complicated robots in a different style. Sure, the art in G1 comics varied by artist, but Derek Yaniger differed from those guys by purposefully meching everyone out and adding rivets and seams and joints.

And it gave us Tank Megatron.

Just to needlessly playing Devil's Advocate, but isn't "stupid ways to slip stories in-between other stories and explain how Megatron ended up here then there then back to here" where Simon Furman is a Viking?

There's always Straxus.

Yeah, but I wrote that with "not Simon Furman" folks in mind, since we were talking about Classics.

And saliva.


That would be the better G2 that took place withing G.I. Joe comics.

Whoops! Thought we were talking about Regeneration; my bad.

I remembered this, it just never occurred to me that you'd present it as something distinct about G2. Battles in cities happened in every TF series. RID had enough of it that it had to be censored after 9/11. All of Energon, man.



No, I've shown you my logic here and you even quoted it a few paragraphs later. It's the logic by which, say, the Sunbow cartoon and Armada mattered more than Blackthorne 3-D or Machine Wars or, yes, the G2 comic. What is used as the foundation for ongoing storyline elements, and what is not? And wish-retconning jive in between the lines really shouldn't count as a reflection on the original series, or else RID would be immensely important because Sideways was in it.

Liege Maximo and the Swarm remain utter nothingburgers.

I think our concepts of what matters - let alone what is good - are too vastly different for this conversation to be further worthwhile. But if you're asking why there have been several post-G1 stories that ignored or overwrote G2, the reasons are not exactly Stonehenge-caliber unfathomable mysteries for the ages.

Man, I've already had this exact argument with Neale Davidson and I don't want to have it again.

(Hint: You're Neale Davidson.)

G2 Sideswipe, guys! G2 Sideswipe!

I'm not sure I understand the argument going on, really. I didn't enjoy most of the Marvel G1 or G2 comics. But the start of G2 when we saw the Firestormers, a band of Autobots on their own mission, was too cool. G2 Sideswipe. And Air Raid (Skydive?) being a Firestormer instead of an Aerialbot. I loved that.

The stuff that happened later, I didn't need.

The Firestormers/small strike teams was a cool concept that should have been in more timelines. TF: Prime would be well served to have it. Let Prime and his group do the Earth thing, and have a running mini-story about various strike teams lead by such TFs as Prowl and Jazz and Hound have subplots running on other planets. Eventually, tie it all together in an epic story.

Course, that would have required cel animation since CGI models are expensive.

Also, a lot of G2 characters are awesome. Rapido doesn't get enough love (yeah, yeah, Botcon, big deal). Skram. The Predators. Any of the Rotor-force. The original character Go-Bots (the same molds that became Spychangers later) had a lot of potential that was never seen.

Having G2 and to an extent MW being the black sheep in the continuity family is unappealling to me. There's so much potential in them that a good writer can use to make some fantastic stories, even in new continuities that's not a G1-verse.

The way I interpreted Machine Wars backstory is that it was happening at the same time as the Beast Wars story according to the pre-show canon based on their tech specs. Optimus, Megatron and gang were on earth (in the modern day) and Starscream, Soundwave and those folks were on Cybertron. Which meant, (At the time) There wasn't really a major divide of tech vs beast, it was just two stories taking place along side each other.

Beast Wars got a show and that kind of put the kibosh on that.

A silent shadow rises...
Gliding across the darkened parking lot pavement...
A truck so massive it threatens to eclipse the moon!

Headlights of a tow truck hunting its prey...
The super-swift HUBCAP springs! But cars are not on this hunter's mind...

Whose spoiler gleams in the night?
The wild Formula One racer, one of the most feared of ESPN2!

"Optical sensors detecting thermal emissions and fusion activity -- I think we've found it! Auto-motion detectors tracking something outside Fusion Building's perimeter... it appears to be a harmless military jet!"

"Guess again, OPTIMUS! You may have located our mechanics lab, but you'll never survive to see its secrets inside! Decepticons ATTACK!"

That's my new Machine Wars canon.

Firestormers FTW

Only thing I disliked about G2 was taunting us with G2 Hound, G2 Hot Rod, G2 Kup, Jhiaxus, etc.

Hound, Hot Rod, Kup and many others were just the G1 toys drawn in the G2 style.

Is that Classics MW Starscream just a digibash?

Its just, comics.

Things are ridiculously explosive all the time. Starting a new story and saying "the Earth got better" is all you need to move on from some cataclysmic, world shattering event. Marvel and DC do it all the time. Saying this takes place after G2 didn't have to be an obstacle at all.

I know! Why does this matter...? A lot of characters with G2 toys were drawn as their G1 selves in the comic. It didn't stop them from having toys come out.

The toys come first, the comics had no influence on what toys came out.

I do wish that more characters in the G2 comics had their G2 toy color schemes or new bodies.

Classics Rodimus always reminds me of his G2 self.

I'm looking forward to Regeneration but it saddens me that G2 is to be ignored.

Anyone else notice Machine Wars characters in the Botcon G2 comic? I love G2 but that comic bugged me for two reasons. It was set in the cartoon continuity, not Marvel G2 and the modern technique of giving a Transformer an accent instead of actual personality. Double Punch and Rapido, I'm looking at you both.

I wanted a series that continued from G1/2 for years but after the constant G1 reboots and new series like Animated and the Movies, I've given up on that. I did like the UK Beast Wars dvds that attempted to tie Beast Wars with the Marvel G1/2 books. Universe could also be tied in. I've found the best approach is to give each series a chance as they all have their merits.

Yea, that was weird. Sideswipe, Darkwing, Prime, and Megatron were about the only ones. And only like eight new guys.

Transformers having accents over characterization is kind of a transformers staple.

That being said, I like Rapido.

Presence of Jhiaxus =/= "some of G2 happened"

...any more than having a different-looking Jhiaxus in the current club fiction's Wings universe means that the Wings universe means that some of Marvel G2 happened.

Or Jhiaxus appearing in IDW's comics.

Jhiaxus just doesn't mean "G2" like he used to.

No.

Dude. I am saying seeing those characters in the comics made me want G2 toys of them. There is nothing to argue here. Stop.