All Hail Megatron Discussion thread

[Dominic]

I had no idea about international TF content until I saw "Man of Iron". And, even then, I did not consider Japanese content because I figured there was so little chance of me getting ahold of it, let alone understanding it.

The cartoon and comics were just irreconcilable. At times, I preferred one of the other. But, I could never reconcile them.


Dom
-liked both Ratchet and Ironhide as characters despite the awful sticker faced toys.

[Gomess]

Well you see, when the Aerialbots travelled back in time in War Dawn..... *slaps self*

I dunno whether I should consider myself lucky, then, for effectively growing up with Victory. That's a hot and cold TF show if ever I saw one.

I can still remember the first time I saw the Motorvators on the shelf and went 'OMG BRAINMASTERS?! ...with "energon mini figures"?!? -_-' Yeah, being exposed to the Japanese stuff set me up for falls like that.

G1 did have some excellent voice acting. Gotta check out some Challenge of the Gobots and compare... Hey, Welker and Burghardt were in it, at least, I think.

[Onslaught Six]

See, I've never seen Thundy as that. Maybe I blew the whole "has doubts about Decepticon cause" thing out of proportion in my head, but Thundy has ALWAYS been, to me, the guy who kills and regrets it later. To me, Thundy is the guy who burned Bluestreak's village to the ground. (And found Bluestreak, scared and alone, and that's what made him snap. But that was a fanfic that never panned out.)

I dunno, I always thought that was his whole thing. And that he'd tried to challenge Megatron before--and lost. So he stays there. He doubts. He makes his voice heard. They all know he doesn't like what he's doing. But he hasn't had a reason to switch yet. Because the Autobots are just as bad.

(Until they get to Earth, and humans are involved. That's the straw that breaks the camel's back.)

To me, Thundy is the oldest. Starscream is the middle child. Skywarp is the baby. Thundy knows it's futile to try and overthrow Megatron. Starscream thinks he can lead better than Megs. Skywarp thinks Megs is God.

[Gomess]

I think both you and Dom have taken a bit more of a melodramatic route with Thundy. It's interesting. For me he's just a grunt with no aspirations or morals to speak of. But that's what makes him interesting to me.

[Onslaught Six]

God, no, that was always Skywarp and Rumble and Frenzy to me. The Decepticons had enough of those. Thundy was the interesting one. (He also had the best colours.)

There's a reason I was pissy Thundy never came out at retail, and that's because he was my favourite one. Not that I was worried I had an incomplete set or any nonsense like that. I just wanted Thundy because I like Thundy.

[Gomess]

You'd have been disappointed, the toy was a way darker shade of blue (as you probably now know). =3

Skywarp I saw as a grunt *with* ambition. Not Starscream-style, but he relied on Megatron and wanted to make him happy. Subtly different to Thundy (and subtle is what makes characters appeal to me).

As for Rumble and Frenzy... Rumble was just Skywarp with Short Man's Disease and a Real Daddy, while Frenzy was.... a goth.

[Dominic]

Thundercracker's original profile painted him as a guy with doubts who was kept in line by fear. He was concretely afraid of Megatron and abstractly afraid of having no purpose. There has to be scans someplace....

You'd have been disappointed, the toy was a way darker shade of blue (as you probably now know). =3

I love the blue on that origional figure. That is big part of why I still want the BotCon toy, which I think is closer than the retail figure.


Dom
-FIBRIR

[Gomess]

Thundercracker's original profile painted him as a guy with doubts who was kept in line by fear. He was concretely afraid of Megatron and abstractly afraid of having no purpose. There has to be scans someplace....

That's all well and good, Mr. Guglieme, so long as you know it won't change my interpretation of the character. It sounds like it examines him too deeply. And fear of purposelessness is WAY too close to Skywarp. I mean, I guess it's ok if they both depend on Megatron, and one enjoys it while the other doesn't... Meh. I always thought the tech specs gave enough character to be getting on with.

FIBRIR

Yup.

Gom
-admit it, you checked whether I'd changed it to FIRRIB

[Dominic]

Where do you get Skywarp being afraid of being purposeless? (See, this is what I am talking about with mixing official content and fanfic.)

Dom
-actually did check.

[Onslaught Six]

You'd have been disappointed, the toy was a way darker shade of blue (as you probably now know). =3

Nope--I prefer Toy Thundercracker. Cartoon Thundy's shitty light blue has been a plague on depictions of the character for years.

Here's Thundy's original TFU profile, which we know were what the tech specs were derived from. (I assume Budiansky also directly wrote the tech specs, and not some other Hasbro minion cutting them down to appropriate levels.)
http://www.ntfa.net/universe/english/in ... dercracker

As I said, I probably extrapolated more from that than others, but Dom's reading is spot-on. (I think I wasn't too fond of the idea of Megatron directly keeping him in check by fear and intimidation. Incidentally: Thundy's overall character reeks of Armada Starscream, that guy who wanted to overthrow Megatron not because he didn't think Megatron was an effective enough Evil Guy, but because Megatron was an Evil Guy.)