Transformers Legacy toyline

[Steamed Hams]

"Our universes are in danger! To save them and the multiverse we must survive the Keepers.
It is our mission.
Elita One, Knock Out, Bulkhead, Jhiaxus, Soundwave and Optimus Prime!
Transform and roll out!"

Then after the recording: "Seriously? I did that for one Cybertron, you SOBs PLAGURIZED a show I did and you think I wouldn't notice? So am I going to voice anyone this time? aw crap I'm done aren't I, and Abby Tott as Megatron? COME ON!"

 

[ZacWilliam1]

1) Yay I found my Iguanus.

2) It was apparently sitting in the middle of the floor in plain sight in the room I searched for an hour. Lucky I didn't step on him.

3) I was fiddling with him and imagining Bomb-Burst next to him and I'm REALLY gonna need a 3rd Core Class Con Pretender.


-ZacWilliam, Two just feels incomplete, 3 is a solid group.

 

[Cybersnark]

2) It was apparently sitting in the middle of the floor in plain sight in the room I searched for an hour.

Was he at least in motorcycle mode?

 

[Alexcoene]

Clearly, Legacy's fiction will be in the form of a japan-exclusive webcomic by Hayato Sakamoto with embarassing fanservice involving Arcee, ten thousands repurposing and redecos, only for the ending to reveal this was all to explain how Beast Megatron began to hate organics because of a nasty breakup with his rubber ducky.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

...So, Universe 2003.

Like, that's literally just Universe 2003.

Universe 2003 was great.

 

[lastmaximal]

More of Legacy and/or Selects should have those wacky unexpected color schemes and energon surge deco.

 

[unluckiness]

I’ll give Universe this: they had nothing to work with in terms of fiction or consistency between available molds and finished with a net positive.

 

[ZacWilliam1]

I’ll give Universe this: they had nothing to work with in terms of fiction or thematically consistent molds and finished with a net positive.

It had some fiction at least. I mean the concept of the story was established on the box and there were bios and those media disks with the lines story included with the toys. And some associated comics.

It wasn't A LOT of fiction, but it was significantly more than Legacy has gotten. Legacy has photos/art of the toys/characters in a rubble strewn be-portaled wasteland and the team at Hasbro saying the words "characters from different universes coming together" and that's it.

If you're being super generous I guess you could add "A Spedia 5000 is run on Velocitron."

It's a shame because despite some hiccups the previous 2 trilogies the whole Prime Wars 3 parters and then the WFC 3 parters both had quite a decent amount of "storyline" baked into them and expressed through the toyline itself and associated material (even leaving completely out the terrible cartoons).

Legacy feels to me like when Netflix passed on the Cartoon the current Hasbro team really stopped caring completely about the fictional concept behind and around the toyline. Which is a real shame imo, because like I said they did them very well in PW and WFC and because having that framing story does a lot to bring the line and characters to life imo and get me interested in the toys and their universe.


-ZacWilliam, I'm always of the school that the more story and lore and world-building you get into the line front and center the better and cooler the whole thing is.

 

[Undead Scottsman]

It's interesting they didn't have IDW make a specific comic for the toyline, instead letting them basically do Siege for 3 years rather than moving onto Earthrise and then Kingdom.

Although maybe that's why IDW doesn't have the license anymore and the next people will be putting out a Legacy comic.

 

[lastmaximal]

Shattered Glass got and is getting more comic support than this, although that's more likely a timing thing as well.

 

[unluckiness]

*essay*

Fiction was probably the wrong term. I think media might be a better choice? The thing had no multimedia support aside from the Botcon comics and script readings which by their nature were confined to a very limited group of fans and were few and far between.

 

[ZacWilliam1]

Fiction was probably the wrong term. I think media might be a better choice? The thing had no multimedia support aside from the Botcon comics and script readings which by their nature were confined to a very limited group of fans and were few and far between.

From what I recall of it (been awhile) the disk that was included with all the Universe toys would definitely qualify as media or multimedia but I do understand what you're saying.

"Traditional mass-released narrative fiction" is a mouthful but the best I can think to call it, and is something both Universe at the time and Legacy now are missing.

Universe managed to put out enough non-mass-released, non-narrative and non-traditional form "story" that it still felt like it all was part of a story to me. Legacy has gotten so little of that "other" story stuff that it feels like there once was an idea for a story and then they just left it in the room where the line was pitched.


-ZacWilliam, it's pretty easy stuff to add to a line too. A sentence or two in the add copy. A trading card or map fragment. A blurb on a package. Box art that tells a tale. The WFC trilogy actually expressed a ton of story through that stuff that Legacy hasn't.

 

[Sabrblade]

I actually did the research awhile back. The Universe toy bios that were on Hasbro.com at the time were just word-for-word abridged versions of the full-length character profiles published in the back of the three 3H Universe comic issues. At the time, Hasbro was working much closely with 3H, telling them what to write in terms of story content (e.g. - the story goes that Hasbro said to 3H "We don't care about The Wreckers. Kill the story and do Universe instead!"), so I think 3H actually wrote all of those Hasbro.com Universe toy bios.

The Universe comics were even originally planned to become an ongoing with 3H releasing several issues throughout each year. But delays pushed back the release of #1 until late in 2003 after OTFCC had already happened that year, and then #2 and #3 were pushed back to release at OTFCC 2004 itself. And then the series just died shortly after when 3H lost the Transformers license and BotCon got picked up by Fun Pub instead. Fun Pub did wrap up the Universe story with their magazine Cybertron comics and the magazine profile for BW 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal (whose separate mass retail toy bio, along with Megatron's, looks to have been written with Universe in mind, anyway), but there was originally supposed to be much more to the Universe comics than just the three issues and two script readings that we got, and released outside of just the convention too.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

We've come a long way since then. And early G1 has become a lot more overbearing since then.

 

[Steamed Hams]

I recall the stink when Armada Megatron killed G1 Galvatron in Armada 16. They would have loved Transformers Deviations back then.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

Now I think we'd be annoyed by G1 dudes showing up in an Armada comic at all.

 

[Sabrblade]

Ah yes, Universe #1. Who else was upset to see the “inferior knockoff” Armada Smokescreen kill the “superior version” G1 Smokescreen? Hopefully I’ve grown since then.

I recall the stink when Armada Megatron killed G1 Galvatron in Armada 16.

On the other hand, both kill cases were very Furman-y things for him to do. Could he do no less?

 

[CoffeeHorse]

It was shocking how few characters die in the Armada comic. The cartoon was more brutal.

 

[Sabrblade]

It was shocking how few characters die in the Armada comic. The cartoon was more brutal.

You make it sound like characters were dying left and right every other episode. Armada was no Movieverse.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

It had its moments.

We would remember it as one of the better Transformers shows if the dub had been any good.