Transformers On the Move Again

jonerik writes "In a sequel of sorts to Monday's post on Max Headroom, the Associated Press (by way of CNN) is reporting on the revival of the Transformers. Perhaps the ultimate '80s TV cartoon experience, the Transformers were (and still are) also marketed as a seemingly endless collection of toys; robots that could transform into cars, trucks, planes, and almost anything else their designers imagined. Rhino Records has just released a 4-DVD boxed set of the show's first season, and Hasbro is considering a reissue of the original '80s toy line, something that Japan's Takara Toy Company has already done, with great success."

Re:I'm getting too old

[Karlt1]

it is not the story creators that suck. They were forced to have childish cartoons by their higher ups. If you look at some of the work of the most admired animated TV writers today like Bruce Timm, Paul Dini, etc. (Batman TAS , Superman TAS, Justice League). They all wrote drek to pay the bills. As you can see from thier work in the 90's, they were talented but just had thier hands tied.

"Began"?

[mblase]

Scooby Doo didn't "begin" the Transformers resurgence. Transformers never actually died out -- Hasbro's been keeping the brand active ever since the mid-80's, in one form or another.

What's new here is the activity with the "Generation One" line of toys, from the mid- to late-eighties before "Generation Two" and, eventually, "Beast Wars". And the reason is simple: all the fans who've been actively demanding DVD releases of "Transformers: The Movie" for years and snatching up mint-in-box versions of every TF toy that's come out since 1990 are now in their mid- to late-twenties, with oodles of disposable income. It's now economically feasible for a company to release the entire first season of TF cartoons on DVD, or for a fairly small company to license a new comic book based on the original toys, because the fans now have money and even the people who haven't thought about TF since the movie was released have enough money to start reliving their childhoods.

If Hasbro decides to re-release the original G1 toys the way Takara is in Japan, rest assured there will be a sizable audience of buyers. Meanwhile, the new "Armada" toys, comics and cartoons coming out are being targetted towards children, not collectors (despite reusing many G1 names and faces) -- because, hey, they're still toys, right?

There's just something about these toys that people love, and never forgot about. You ask me, it's the attention to detail -- all of the G1 vehicles were modelled on real cars, trucks and planes, and even the Dinobots and Insecticons were identical enough to their organic counterparts to impress. The robots were a bit chunky (okay, a lot chunky in most cases), but still beautiful in their own way.

These are exactly the reasons I love the "Robots in Disguise" [transformers.com] toys, incidentally -- authenticity and elegance, with the added bonus of much, much more posability for the robots. "Armada" may take the posability tack, but the vehicles aren't "real" anymore and the robots are far less elegant. I may buy them, but probably not. G1 is where it's at for me.