I've finally gotten through the G1 S1 boxed set, viewing episodes on a very casual schedule. As I watched, I recorded many of my thoughts and observations about whatever caught my attention. This is the first time I've seen some of these episodes in about ten years, if not more. So there's a mix here of technical comments, random comments about animation glitches (at least some of which are probably old news to many fans), musings on the story and TF pseudoscience, reminders for myself of when various "rules" were established, and so on. I think that's all I need to say, so, if you care, read on! MISC o Lots of film specs and scratches. Like, nearly constantly for some episodes. o Original sound, apparently, on the stereo tracks for some episodes, but not all...? Strange. o Voice Processing always credited to one Scott Brownlee, sometimes at Soundtraxx and sometimes at Wally Burr Recording. o Occasional very nice animation, like tracking shots and camera rotations. It seems a bit arbitrary at times, actually, when they decided to go to every-frame animation ("by 1's") instead of the more usual by 2's or 3's. o Subtitles would have been nice. o Cybertron is insanely tiny based on the establishing-shot artwork. Otherwise, those spires, and even the little scraps of "torn" surface are like, a thousand kilometers high, with what appear to be *windows* in the towers clearly visible from high orbit. o I don't know if I've ever seen another cartoon with so many seemingly-careless errors. I've been watching the original Gundam series, for example, and although the animation is clearly primative, I've seen almost no gaffes like we get in G1... body parts blinking in and out, incorrect characters speaking, cels laid down in the wrong order or missing... Were other American cartoons from the 80s this shoddy? o I hate hate hate the disc holders in the case. They have little tabs on them that you might think were squeezable to make the disc come off easily, but they aren't, and there's four of them anyway, which is a little hard to manage. Pressing on the center of the disc's hub doesn't do anything either, because the plastic is very rigid. To get the discs out, I basically have to pry them out with my fingernail, which always makes me think I'm going to scratch them up. MTMTE1 o When the Decepticons fly out of the Ark and land on a ledge, you can see them *through* the rock, as if the ledge's cel was painted too thin. o After the bots wake up, CJ colored like BB. o When Hound and CJ are watching the Deceps, Megatron calls the planet Earth even though they haven't met any humans yet. o Energon cubes aren't new to the Decepticons, just the Bots. But, cubes are used in "War Dawn", right? What about "Forever Is A Long Time Coming"? o People who complain about the transform animation in BM need to re-watch G1... Trailbreaker is especially bad. MTMTE2 o In the recap, the metal frame bars Spike and Sparkplug are behind has changed from thick and orange to narrow and white. o Brawn and Huffer take off to flight from treading water, and the Autobots exhibit perfectly-good maeuverability in the air; this isn't jumping or even limited-flight. o When Jazz retracts his hand to bring out a grapple, there's a flash of light from the interior of his arm and some SFX. o Ravage insert himself on Teletraan-1, and then Soundwave transforms and sits next to him and starts recording...? Is Ravage transmitting the information short-range? Later Soundwave plays back information about Sherman Dam which was, presumably, gathered by Ravage. And that voice... Teletraan-1? o Is that really Ravage's voice coming out of Soundwave, or just the narrator from a TV special he recorded? o Starscream's 'testing' of the cubes implies that they might be a new innovation after all. o So many non-blunderscrounges... o Sparkplug mans an oil rig, *and* has worked the ruby mines in Burma? He gets around. o Since all rubies *are* crystals, what makes 'ruby crystals' so special? MTMTE3 o Ironhide has bullet holes all over him during roll call??? o Ratchet turns into an ambulance that's large enough for Ironhide to fit in as if he's human; ambulance mode as tall as robot mode. o When Ravage's reporting on the rocket-base location, seems like it must actually be his voice rather than a recording... o How does Megatron generate that little energy shield he uses to deflect Starscream's attack? He's never done that before/since. TRANSPORT TO OBLIVION o In the opening, Prime walks up to an ocean cliff while continuing his conversation with with Ironhide and Cliffjumper, who are in front of Autobot HQ... so, uh, where did that cliff come from? When did the ocean sneak up on HQ? o In fact, the whole landscape has changed, since the Decepticon-ish rock formation is about where that little HQ Annex building belongs. o Decepticon ship has moved, changed orientation, and changed shape since the end of MTMTE. o What sort of bizarre comm system allows Shockwave to contact Megatron like that, without even knowing where he is? o In the first roll out scene, and a couple other places, the minicars look off-model... especially the shot where Bumblebee runs up to join the lineup. (Plus, of course, he's standing a bit in front of Gears, but Gears' cel is on top so BB looks like he's further back and really tall.) o The Autobot sigil on Bumblebee's car-mode hood appears out of nowhere when his feet grow. o There are times when the whole background seems to shake back and forth a little bit... very distracting. Sometimes the foreground cels shake, too. It's like they weren't aligned with the camera in quite the same way for successive frames. ROLL FOR IT o Zob once posited that TFs with flying altmodes aren't flying by virtue of their mode, but by TF flight tech. But, the flying Cons make jet sounds when they approach the power station... o Stronger-than-expected continuity with SS's leadership. o Energon cubes here are sparkly before being compressed. o The "battle computer" sequence is absolutely ridiculous. o Chip's face is much more animé than I remembered in closeups. o BB picks up Spike and Chip by transforming on top of them! DIVIDE AND CONQUER o Horrendous Skyraider color errors. o More nice continuity with the space bridge search. o New SFX *do* appear in the stereo soundtrack sometimes. o At the space bridge, there are four Reflector bots, one of whom speaks and is treated like a generic trooper. o Also, an example of Reflectors merging during the fight. o Obviously, there's a breathable atmosphere on Cyb long before TUD. o That acid rain can't be the same as Earth's "acid rain"; sort of funny that it doesn't affect Chip at all. o *Shockwave* is lying on a mountainside after the BFATE, right before Prime shows up. FIRE IN THE SKY o "...in the middle of the desert" in Oregon? Maybe the Ark isn't in Oregon in the cartoon... o Woo hoo! Driving to the Arctic Circle! o Soundwave, TC and SW demonstrate some level of medical skills. o Good old Earthmode-Starscream in Skyfire's memories of before the "final falling out with the Autobots"... ::sigh:: o There are countless errors in this episode with Skyfire's faction insignia but my favorite is when he's shown wearing a red Con symbol on his chest before he's even stood up. o Maybe SS survived the storm that downed Skyfire because of his immortal Spark. ^_^ (Of course, Skyfire was seemingly just in stasis lock rather than dead... so maybe not.) o Some of the details of Skyfire's model change from shot to shot, especially his rifle. When holding Spike and Sparkplug, he raises and lowers his arm and it and his gun are straight-up Macross, except the red forearm armor is colored all white. Is it possible some of the animation was done before the change in his model was decided on, or did the studio just mix up some of the old sheets with the updated ones? o Prime appears dead-grey for a shot near the end... heh heh... SOS DINOBOTS o I know it's been said before, but, finding fossils inside a volcano is just so ridiculous... o Haven't people learned by now to just not work at hydropower stations? They're the Decep's favorite target. o And how does this dam constitute a "perpetual power source... which can provide us with enough energy to vanquish the Autobots and control the universe forwever"? o As previously reported, the Dinos demonstrate their power by blasting away rubble... except their beams aren't there, and the rubble doesn't disappear. Thank you, Rhino. o There's a shot where Spike's hair shakes with inertia after turning his head. Nice. o When the Cons arrive at the dam, there are four of them flying... who is the guy in the upper right? o Again with the "endless energy" bit from Megatron. It's things like this that really force me out of the TFU into saying "it's just a cartoon". Because otherwise, Megatron is a complete buffoon. (So are his troops for following him, and so are the Autobots... "DinoBOTS? You were supposed to build dinoSAURS! HUR HUR HUR.") o The waterfall is just ahead, and according to Hound, it's "magna-spectacular". This is my new accolade, and I suggest others adopt it as well. o Bluestreak drives up, transforms from robot to car, and then is standing behind Prime. o Thundercracker *hovers* in plane mode to shoot at Slag. The skyraiders seem to prefer flying in jet mode, at least for the duration, but they can fly in ways that real jets can't. So, as Zob has suggested, they must be using their Cybertronian flight-tech to some degree, and not relying entirely on the physics of their airplane shape. FIRE IN THE SKY o Where do SS and TC put those huge steel beams when they transform? o Ah, yes... Prime's classic "Why did the Decepticons take those steel beams...? Any thoughts, Bumblebee?" o After Sky Spy is blown up, you can still see the mountain on Teletraan's screen for a moment. o In the shot where Wheeljack's weapon is melting the ice... what the heck is that in the ice? It looks nothing like Skyfire... o Brawn and Windcharger are able to steer the flying 'cons by jerking their shoulders around, like they're riding horses or something. What does that say about the flight technology? o The barrel on Soundwave's gun recoils when he shoots... nice touch. o Skywarp looks like Thundercracker when he teases SS and TC and flies off to get the alloy. o Skyfire colored like Skywarp(!!!) in two shots when carried into the temple. Very, very weird... o Why the heck wasn't Bumbleee ever issued a firearm... it would have helped a lot in his brawl with Ravage. o Ravage should have been designed with claws. o When Prime lifts Megatron, the shot is animated by 1's instead of 2's or 3's... very nice and smooth. o It's a good thing the walls of the ancient temple can contain the energies that would build up inside after Wheeljack caps it. I hadn't previously realized that the whole pyramid was airtight... WAR OF THE DINOBOTS o What kind of crazy observatory is that? The telescope sticks *out* of the dome. It appears to be mounted with its pivot point right next to the wall, which means you basically can't aim it at 80% of the sky. Lastly, the room where Chip is making his by-eye observations is brightly lit. o "That meteor is a mystery *and* a menace." The delivery sounds like Dr. Hibbert... if only he chuckled at the end. o What's up with Prime's fist going all sparkly when he talks about the meteor's energy? o Megs: "Brilliant, my boron compressor!" Conclusion: Boron Compressor means ASS. o The meteor impact is painfully bogus... the entire ruined cityscape it landed in should have been leveled, plus the meteor would have dug out a crater at least half a kilometer across, as well as burying itself several meters below the surface... o Does Soundwave's brain scan cause the Dinobots to vocalize their dissatisfactions, or did they coincidentally decide to have a conversation right when the scan started...? o Sparkplug is reading the plans, and the cover says...? "out line plan desge"??? Plus it has a big Autobot sigil on it... must have been written on the official Autobot HQ letterhead. o Uncharacteristically nice drawing in Grimlock's act-3 closeup... during his ~prime stronger than me think~ line. o Starscream is frequently more prudent than Megatron... o Tech: "power core"... the main storage battery in a TF's body? o They say the new Dinobots can reach the meteor in time even though the other bots can't -- then they fly off. Seems like a pretty willful statement by the writers than the Dinos can fly while the others can't. Of course when they arrive, Swoop is carrying Snarl... maybe that's faster than flying in robot mode? o What a dissapointing explosion, if Prime is able to endure it unharmed at practically ground zero. I'm glad we spent the entire episode worried about the devastation it would cause. ULTIMATE DOOM 1 o Hehe... 300 "units" of energy per second. How precise. o This maharaja doesn't look especially like a native of India. o I think the Autobots didn't actually ski the whole way across the Pacific... when they hit water, they're already surrounded by jungle. They probably flew to India in Skyfire or something and then just drove over to the palace. o The Autobots *really* need to invest in some security systems... Soundwave is standing out in plain sight in front of the Ark, and then Rumble is able to waltz right into the base without any alarms going off... o Prime's logic circuits make his windows glow when they're dissatisfied. ^_^ o Prime orders a roll out as soon as Prowl says he has a plan. Doesn't matter what the plan is, he's sure they've got the cast- iron manifolds for it. o When Megatron talks to Shockwave about the space bridge, he slowly floats down from the top of the screen... this has got to be a Rhino-only goof, right? o So is the Prime decoy programmed to take a fall when somebody hits it in the ankle, or is it made of some incredibly low-density material so Sparkplug could actually knock it over? o When Brawn punches the wall, water should start flowing in from the hole in the floor, at least as much as through the wall... o So did Megatron plan to have the Autobots rescue Sparkplug all along? They would normally reveal such a plan to the audience, but choosing Sparkplug as the first slave makes no sense otherwise. o Spike says there's an alarm that should have warned them of the Decepticon attack!?!? Oh, I know: it was installed after the previous attack. Yeah, that's it... o Man, being hypno-chipped has made Sparkplug speak with a much more dramatic syntax. o The apex of those pylons as drawn is so *not* beyound our galaxy. It's not even beyond our troposphere. o Once activated, the shot of the beams as seen from space indicates that the pylons reposition themselves to move the apex out, but they were not set up that way earlier. ULTIMATE DOOM 2 o Jazz refers to Thundercracker as "Blunder-cracker". Is this some sort of blunderscrounge / non-blunderscrounge joke? Perhaps blunderscrounges are seen as second-class or inferior by the non-blunderscrounges, and this was a way of making TC feel bad about hmself. o Those audio-disruptor-waves seem amazingly effective... the entire Autobot army retreated when Soundwave started playing them. Why don't the Cons use them more often? Like, all the time? o When he gets a flat, Bumblebee removes his own wheel bolts for Spike to put the spare on... how does he do that? Little motors in the bolts or the threads? Matrix-based metal-moving power? And what's that "W" for at the hub? W like in VW, or is it like a Microman "M"? o Bumble keeps his spare tire in the trunk, which is in front for him as a VW Beetle. When he transforms, that part of the car shrinks significantly to become his feet. So, he's able to cause the spare tire to shrink, even though it's not an integral part of him... I don't think there's anything technological about the spare itself. It should be just metal and rubber. *Any* spare tire should be fine. And he can make it shrink when he transforms. Can he shrink anything that happens to be in his trunk? o When Skywarp flies off to Cybertron, it's shown with the blanket of overcast stratus clouds *behind* it... stratus lie just over a mile above the surface, and Cybertron is fully visible, so it's top edge is less than a mile up. Hmm. Or, maybe that's a mistake. o What's with the satellite that passes by the camera during Grimlock's "not care if whole planet fall apart" voiceover? That makes absolutely no sense at all based on the visuals. (Not that this is a change of any sort.) o Why do exterior shots of the Ark keep switching between orange and grey? o Cybertron is depicted with blue skies and clouds in this episode. ULTIMATE DOOM 3 o We're now on the night side of Cybertron. o Nice to see tetrajets again. o I'd managed to forget about the Autobots' jet-powered surfboards. o Prime and Ironhide make mention of early warning scanners. That's good, actually. I was just thinking how silly it was that TFs don't have optic sensors facing in every direction so they can't be surprised by somebody sneaking up behind them. This makes that a little easier to accept. (Still not easy, though.) o Nice animation: Starscream's hand coming out of the water. SS transforming and dropping Archeville in his cockpit. o A new establishing-shot painting of Cybertron is shown before the Wheeljack's Lab scene. It looks kinda crappy. Even the ground- level shots look a little different... it's sort of bland, and a different color. o Shockwave's power cable swings nicely when he's about to shoot Sparkplug and Spike. o I'm seeing a lot of lip-synching problems in this episode. o Starscream, who is no dummy, thought he might be able to extract an energon cube of "brain energy" from Archeville. What did he base that supposition on? o When Mirage went invisible, he was depicted as translucent (for our benefit, I'd imagine) and didn't use his yellow box. When he reappears... this has to be a Rhino quick fix... It looks horrible. The screen freezes and it looks like a paper cut out of Mirage is placed on the background. o Oh, Primus! Prowl's face just fell off! He says "Ask and you shall receive," as he see Skyfire approaching... the others turn to look, and Prowl's face disappears out of his helmet! o Megs was able to make an aimed shot at a moving target in gun mode by doing a jumping flip as he transformed. That takes some skill. o Astroliters is a unit of energy used twice in TUD. o Bumblebee finally has a gun! o The bots were able to shoot Megs' ship with their handguns enough to make it blow up and push Cybertron out of orbit. The visuals are inconsistant. Was the ship already in space? How could the explosion push Cyb away without decimating it and Earth? o No indication of where Cybertron went after the explosion... it just zips off into the distance with an accelleration that would easily tear it to shreds. COUNTDOWN TO EXTINCTION o So, is Cybertron still relatively near if SS can collect the energy of Earth's explosion from there? o Does Laserbeak record stuff on regular tape that you can play in any tape player, or does Jazz have the ability to play him for some reason? Perhaps Laserbeak uses some sort of standard Cybertronian storage technology... o Shockwave's base has medic-roids. This doesn't preclude specialized medic Decepticons, but at worst they have these droids to carry out repairs. o Megatron: "His catalytic data assembly is mine!" Conclusion: Catalytic data assembly means ASS, too. PLAGUE OF INSECTICONS o The Insecticons are able to transform food into energy... I'd forgotten about that... o Voice processing makes them sound really insect-like. o It's that stupid grey ark again... grr. o The Skyfire-boarding shot is *horrible*. Brawn walks right through the wall, Bumbleebee's torso phases through part of the door, and then when the hatch slides shut BB and Spike are still standing outside, frozen in a wave with stupid grins. o Tech: TC refers to "identi-computers" which the Insecticons would have used to get their Earth forms. o Bombshell's "insectishells" with Shrapnel's "electronic clone beams" will spell the Autobots' doom. o Skyfire can't transform without functioning "transform circuits". This implies transformation isn't something they can do merely by willing it, or even by simply shifting their body parts around. Is this related to Beast Wars' computer-controlled transformations? How do we reconcile this with the many partial transforms we've seen over the course of the series? With injured TFs being able to transform only slowly and seemingly with great expenditure of effort? o Additionally, Skyfire doesn't seem able to fly in robot mode. o It's good to see that refinery workers worldwide all wear the same uniforms. o Shrapnel has electronic clone beams, override waves, shrapnel granades, *and* the lightninng shtick. o When Kickback's gun pops in it makes a little "wootwootwoot" sound effect. o Megs: "Soundwave, activate the Ravage cassette!" What an odd way to give that order... o I just want to reiterate for everybody: the lightning defense the Autobots use is completely bogus. You're safe in a car because all the electricity goes through the surface of the metal frame, leaving you, in the interior, unharmed. It has nothing to do with insulation. You will not be safe from lightning just by wearing rubber-soled shoes. Your car can be hit by lightning, and if you are touching any part of the metal frame when it happens (say, with your arm out the window or something) it will be very bad. o When Shrapnel's "control beams" (the name changed) are cut off, the clones immediately crumble into junk. o Whoa... Prime lifted the whole oil tanker and hurled it at Megatron... that's definitely an uncommon show of strength... I love the way huge constructs like the tanker are somehow able to not completely fall apart even when their entire weight is being distributed only across the area of the holder's hands. o I also like the way Trailbreaker's FORCE field (which protects you by applying a force on things that atouch it) is able to stop Shrapnel's transmissions. HEAVY METAL WAR o So many film specks... o Long Haul's cargo: I guess he sent it into subspace when he transformed? o The Constructicons seem quite uninterested in actually hurting the humans... Scrapper even picks the one up but just delivers a threat and drops him on his buddies to break the fall. OTOH, he then makes a really overt statement about working for Megatron, so maybe it was part of the plan to have the workers survive and tell the Autobots. o Rhino clumsily inserted the energy disk components in Long Haul's bed when he transforms to show them off. o Hmm. Ironhide has Go Bot-ish fist blasters. o They put their "power chip rectifiers" in the "exchange furnace". o Starscream's little "but I need my power chip rectifier" line makes he think he was planning go in to Toshi Station and pick up some power convertors. o I've got a theory: The strength transfer is a temporary process. Power chip rectifiers don't actually provide the power all on their own. They contain some sort of imprint of the "power"... an energy signature that's part of their rectifying job. The chip sort of manages the power while it's in use. All of those signatures were encoded into Megatron's chip in the strength transfer. Over time, those signatures will fade out from his chip because they aren't being reinforced, and the other characters will get theirs back as their own signatures are built up again by exposure to their actual *parts* that provide the power. Make no mistake: This is, of course, a very stupid theory. It presumes that all of their powers work by means of an energy signature, which is impossible. Also, energy signature is a phrase so generic and vague as to be completely meaningless. It's still my theory, though. o When they head off to the battle and Optimus gives the transform order, everyone is in the Ark, except Trailbreaker, who's outside for some reason, but still hears the order and transforms too. o SS's chip gives Megatron cluster bombs and null rays? Ooookay. Maybe we shouldn't even bother trying to theorize about this, then, if it's going to be that nonsensical. o There's some very nice animation in this ep: little animé-ish motions with a little pause before them, fluid motions like Meggy dodging laser blasts when he delivers the challenge, Prime getting flung about in the fight and lifting the boulder, Slag's flame breath... o And then, too, there's the Rhino bugs like Megatron teleporting but still staying in place so the rock splits in two on his head. o I also like the extra voice processing on the Dinobots that makes them sound all growly, and Devastator's extremely tinny sound. o Overall, I didn't notice nearly as many blunders in the DVD of this ep as I expected based on other people's reviews. What were they going on about? SPECIAL FEATURES o This disc is very, very uneven. Some of the features are pretty neat. Many or most of them are bizarre if not completely baffling. The fact that about a fifth of them are mislabeled in the menus is also a point against Rhino. I'll actually explain what each of the features contains just to remined those of you who have the disc, and to fill in those of you who are reading but don't have the set yourselves. (Hi, Zobovor!) o Restoration Process - In silence, text scrolls across the screen explaining some aspects of the restoration work that Rhino did to prepare the set. The text vanishes into the distance like a Star Wars movie prologue, and there is a fancy outer space / nebula background. - Why do this as just text instead of a voiceover? And if it had to be just text, why the bizarre foreshortened scrolling-through- space thing? - After the text is done, for some reason, they show some clips from MTMTE: establishing shots of Cybertron from space and from the surface. Why? Then, the "Transformers" logo is superimposed on the last shot with a weird flaming effect around it. ????? o Frame By Frame Analysis - A slo-mo of Brawn shooting Shockwave in TUD. Wow. That's a really special feature. It's not like I can already slo-mo any scene from the entire boxed set that I want to, right? We all know how lousy DVDs are at doing slo motion and still frames. This clip seems to go on for an eternity, even though at normal speed it's no more than two seconds' worth. o Remastering Comparisons - Side-by-side comparisons of the 1" 'broadcast master' videotapes from which all previous video releases have come with Rhino's new 'digital Betacam' masters which come from the same film stock that the 1" masters were made from. Or, at least, would have been made from if these film reels hadn't been a first-try that was full of errors and sent back to Asia to be fixed. The corrected film reels are apparently gone, or have degraded to the point that Rhino chose not to use them. - The 1" braodcast masters are definitely washed out compared to the new transfer. It's sort of like everything is being seen through a haze, sometimes with discolorization, too. I don't think I would have really noticed this if I was just provided with the old stuff, but in comparison, I can see the improvement. - The first sequence in this section is the beginning of MTMTE 1. They let it go on for a very, very long time... - After the first sequence, they keep things changing scenes enough to make it interesting, until they start doing post-MTMTE episodes and just show, like, the entire first act for a bunch of them... ugh... I just watched these on the other discs... why again? - The introduction claims that both the old and new audio tracks are in this feature, but, they aren't. - I mean, really, do we need 45 minutes of this? Were they just filling up space? - Why do they have some sequences twice? - They certainly get clever with different ways to split up the screen between the two versions, but, I don't quite see why. Most of what they show here is very uninteresting... *nothing* important happens or changes among nearly all of this stuff. o Japanese Bumpers - The Masterforce and Victory material is clearly taken from an inferior video source. They're washed out and fuzzy. o Outtakes and False Starts - This consists of, apparently, various strange clips that Rhino came across in somebody's film vaults. - There's nothing obviously wrong with some of these, like the first few Laserbeak bumper runs and many others. - All the photos of people's hands are sorta funny, though. - Why do I want to see the Ultra Magnus bumper five million times? o Anomolies - Pretty interesting to start out: they show very brief clips from various episodes, then freeze them when a video defect appears and explain the source of the defect with text on the screen. "Animator's hair", for example. - Some of the clips freeze and then say "Ask Dr. Rhino". What's with that, anyway? I can't find anything about this on the Rhino website. In fact, the Dr. Rhino section of their site seems to have almost completely disappeared. I remember a time that there was actually information there... am I missing something? - As this feature carries on, they start doing comparision shots sort of like the Remastering Comparisons section, but they do it the way that other section should have been done... side-by-side comparisons of things that are *actually different* instead of being identical aside from a little fading. - Clearly, they substituted many of the broadcast master shots for betacam shots when there were differences between the two, but, not in nearly every case. Why? - The HMW strength transfer scene is shown with comparison shots, but *neither* of them matches what they have on the other disc... - Woo hoo! TUD episode titles! They are provided on the pre-ep title cards from the master tapes. Transformers Mini-Series Two: Part 1 "Brainwash", Part 2 "Search", Part 3 "Revival". And of course "The Ultimate Doom Part IV, Countdown To Extinction". - Wow! The "pencil scenes" were beautiful! Black and white pencil sketches of Cybertron landscapes... I wish there was more of that on here... - The editing in this feature is much more like what I would expect from a commercial release, unlike the Restoration Comps. o Alternate Sequences - Textless Opening: This seems exactly like the regular opening of MTMTE. That is, the first scene... not the opening theme. There's no text in that scene anyway for them to show it without, so, I really don't understand this one... I don't see anything at all different or special. - Textless End Credits: These are from late season two, after the new characters appear... but it's on the season one set anyway. - Textless Opening, Episode 1: This is textless *end* credits for season one, not an opening. It might actually be from episode one, as they say, but who can tell? - Opening Credits Domestic: The season *three* FFOD opening. - Opening Credits Domestic - Season 3: Non-FFOD S3 opening. What is going on? Why all this later-seasons stuff? - Alternate Opening Sequence: The Season 2 opening. The title card calls it the "disco version". It's the same music as in the S3 clips, though, as far as I can tell... this is the disco version? I thought this was the "oom pah" version? - Japanese Opening: Victory opening, starts with title card attributing it to Sunbow Productions which shows a still frame of the Cybertron Pretenders from Masterforce. When the Transformers V logo appears, there's just the big V and the English word "Transformers" superimposed over the V in plain block letters. No Japanese lettering in that shot, although the rest of the opening has lots of Japanese in it. Why would Sunbow have been involved in this animation? - Japense Opening With Slate: Same Victory sequence, but with a "slate" at the front writen all in Japanese instead of the English title card. After the opening, an episode title screen from *Masterforce* featuring a shot of Jinrai, complete with the dubbed announcer ("The appointed hero!"), then the opening shot of an episode (probably the same one) with a marine research station of some sort, and then a Masterforce bumper. !?!? I know some people's bootlegs of the dubbed anime starts with the Victory opening, regardless of which series it actually is... was "Takara Transformers" broadcast that way on Star Asia? Is that what we're seeing here? - Japanese Recap: Clearly from Victory, based on the character names. This, too, is from the cheesy dubs. A transcript, with my attempts to reproduce some of the cheesiness: "Hellbat is able to sneak into the Autobots' head QUARters, while Star Saber and the others are fighting with Icepick and the dinersaws. Hellbat intends to steal vital information from the mainframe computer about the Autobot warriors and their weak points. If Hellbat succeeds, this will put the Autobots in a very dangerous position. ?indistinct? and Fixit bump inta him, and are captured. Whot is gonna happen next?" - Japanese Scene Clip: Worst clip ever. Diver (Waverider) is riding in Jinrai when they go off a cliff. Diver jumps out, they fall, and scream, and right before they start talking, it cuts away. Even the screaming though, it clearly from the Cheesy Dubs. Who would have thought you could act a scream that badly?