Netflix TRANSFORMERS War For Cybertron Siege Trailer
Oh my god! Or should I say Oh my Primus! I kinda heard that this was coming, but nothing could have prepared me for how awesome the end product would look. See this fantastic trailer for yourself.
I am guessing the name of the series is TRANSFORMERS: War For Cybertron, and Siege is the first chapter. Hopefully the first of 3 chapters.
There’s been some decent Transformers material in the last 15 years. There were 6 feature length movies, of which I only liked the first one, and Bumblebee. Transformers Prime was a good series, but it felt radically different from true G1 roots. TF prime also took many cues from the movies, especially in the character design. I mildly enjoyed TF Animated. Some of the later toys were decent, but the show itself was done way too cartoony. And don’t even get me started on Robots in Disguise and TF Cyberverse. Those are very obviously marketed to children. In the last 15 years there were no movie or series catered specifically to fans of Transformers that grew up with G1.
That all changes with TRANSFORMERS: War For Cybertron. This is the kind of TF series that I have always dreamed of. It’s dark and serious in tone, like the 1986 G1 Movie. It’s animated with modern day CG. And best of all, it’s G1 inspired! This series takes cues from G1 only. No movie influences, no TF Prime influences, no Beast Wars influences, nothing! G1 and G1 only! They finally got this right.
What we know for sure is that this takes place on Cybertron. How much time this is before the original G1 series is unclear. And it’s also ambiguous if this will really tie into G1. I’m sure if it does, there will be all kinds of continuity errors. But right now I don’t care. This a true G1-ers dream come true. I know I’ll be watching. And if you’re reading this, you know you will too.
Some take aways from watching this trailer:
- Like I said already, this how feels dark and serious. There will probably be casualties in this series.
- Optimus is not voiced by Peter Cullen. I don’t know who they got, but he does a great homage to Peter Cullen. No complaints here.
- This is not a simple black and white show of heroic Autobots vs evil Decepticons. It feels like even the Autobots don’t agree on their overall strategy. Optimus wants to fight to win, but Ultra Magnus and Bumblebee are happy fighting just to survive. Megatron is seen rallying the troops in a grand speech, and he could be feeding them politically charged propaganda about how it’s the Autobots that are escalating the war. Very nice to see a TF show that incorporates some hot topics of the day.
- Jetfire appears as a Decepticon. We know he will switch sides at some point. Or if this really does tie into G1, he will just leave for Earth before the faction switch. This will be fun to see.
- This is a talking Bumblebee, like G1. The non-talking Bees started in the movies were cute, but I had enough of that schtick. This is Bumblebee like how he’s meant to be.
- One scene has Wheeljack and Bumblebee surrounded by a bunch of Seekers. This is obviously a homage to how those 2 Autobots were the first ones we see in the original 1984 G1 series, then later on their way back to Iacon they get attacked by Seekers. Bravo.
- Elita-One and Chromia appears in the trailer. It’s nice to see they included 2 fembots – having only one always feels like one was included just to be the token female. Both of them get some nice fighting action too. If this does tie into G1, it will be interesting to see how and why they got left behind and not join Prime.
- No stupid whiny humans in this series. Nothing but robot action.
- None of the top Decepticon lieutenants (Starscream, Soundwave, Shockwave) get any speaking roles in the trailer. Hope they play a bigger role so it’s not just Megatron calling the shots the whole time.
- I am so glad Netflix is picking this up. I heard something about Hasbro’s The Hub Network getting acquired by Discovery, which would make TRANSFORMERS: War For Cybertron not entirely suitable. This is all for the best. Everyone I know already has Netflix, and no one I know has access to The Hub Network. Thank you Netflix!
As of this writing I already have most of the WFC Siege figures, so it will be fun to see them get animated on-screen. I heard that some repaints made for the show are coming too. But it will be with the same molds.
I cannot wait for this show!
And I cannot wait for Optimus to utter this line… Transform and Roll Out!