From kendrick@io.com Thu Sep 28 08:57:21 CDT 1995 Article: 23545 of alt.toys.transformers Path: news.io.com!io.com!not-for-mail From: kendrick@io.com (Kendrick Kerwin Chua) Newsgroups: alt.toys.transformers Subject: TF Weekday 9/28 - City of Steel Date: 28 Sep 1995 08:55:22 -0500 Organization: Illuminati Online Lines: 90 Message-ID: <44e9ga$sig@bermuda.io.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: bermuda.io.com Status: RO X-Status: TF Weekday Sept 28 1995 - City of Steel The EI/AD: No single identifiable EI/AD, unless you want to count a recycled Prime or the actual New Cybertron construct itself. The plot: Megatron and the Constructicons build a vast subterrainean network of passages under New York for the purpose of taking it over. They collapse the Empire State Building (keeping it for later, of course) and put up a new, gleaming duralloy tower, alerting the Autobots. During a fight in Central Park, Prime is captured, deactivated, disassembled and made into parts, and Megatron threatens to terminate him permanently if the Autobots don't leave. Running into several of his parts (among them building struts and a robotic alligator) the Autobots get Prime back together except his gun arm, while the Decepticons continue to rebuild. The Really Big Fight at the End involves retrieving Prime's arm, fighting Devastator, and ejecting the Decepticons. But they haven't lost the war, only the fight... And New York goes back to the way it was, of course. The characters: Frenzy and his non-existent pile drivers make an appearance in central park, and he appears again underground driving a subway train. Buzzsaw pops up in the RBFatE alongside Laserbeak as they do sniper duty on the grounded Bots. Reflector shows up once on an elevator, the Seeker jets all have brief appearances... But the real shine is saved for the Constructicons, whose characterization is brief but effective. Long Haul expresses his dissatisfaction with his duty, Scrapper exercises his genius muscle, Hook gets snobby, Mixmaster gets loopy, Scavenger is nearly useful and Bonecrusher is violent and pushy. The plot holes: What a silly episode... It completely contradicts everything we fans now know about the matrix, about Transformer anatomy, and about real robotics in general. That, and the New York puns aren't even funny. Just how long does it take to drive from Oregon to New York, for example? Why is Megatron collapsing buildings from underground? Isn't this rather wasteful of energy? To what end does a body build a new Cybertron here on Earth? Prime has telekinesis, or is this some cartoon writer's take on the Matrix power as shown in the comic book to date? To say nothing of the REALLY silly stuff. Remote controlled taxi-tanks and weapon-operated metal doors are among the more believable parts. Devastator climbing the HQ building like King Kong is stupid made laughable by Wheeljack's helicopter response. Bonecrusher lifts and hinges his shovel like he's a front loader rather than a bulldozer. Moving pictures: Keep in mind that this episode was done by Sunbow's cheaper American contactors, which means that it has a "Hanna-Barbera" feel to it the whole half-hour. Which means it's not as slick as the anime-look we're used to, but still has its merits. Watch the pile-driver scene or the shot where Scavenger is rolling up the ramp and you'll see that they use a sped-up film trick to bring more frames per second into the shot, which is good because it makes the motion more fluid. The characters are all drawn like Romita's models for the most part, and transforms are nearly the same as the toys'. Watch Scrapper's transformation carefully; his legs stay in one spot while the rest of him folds up, which is realistic and believable. Too bad the effects animations sucks rocks... Seeker jets ramming through a whole building? A subway train explodes and Frenzy doesn't get hurt a bit? Since when does sewer water flow so quickly and efficiently anyway? A few still shots that lasted too long (what a well behaved cloud of dust that is around the new Empire State Building) ruins a few otherwise good effects too. Probably the only reason to watch the episode is to see the "I NEW YORK" sticker on Bumblebee's front bumper, something I'm considering adding to my Bumblebee toy. :) The cuts: Too many, as usual... But in this case, the cuts make the story more effective. They cut a lot of unnecessary drive time out of the beginning segment, as well as a lot still shots and animation screw ups that detracted from the episode as a whole. One thing they DIDN'T cut was the "Emergency Autobot Alert" tack-on at the end that foreshadows the Return of Optimus Prime episode, which was simply messy. Toys they should reissue: This episode was one of the many that was made into a G2 episode, for those of you not in the know. Obvious this one was intended to help sell the Constructicon reissues (in lemon yellow and intestine orange...) Again though, a reissue of the Tapes wouldn't be a bad idea, especially with action accessories and sound packs. Quotables: "Silence! I want you working, not nagging at each other like a bunch of hyper-driven chatteroids!" "Say 'Uncle' or I'll shove your nose into your afterburner!" KKC, guys, if you ever grow long hair, make sure your toy shelves are all waist level or higher. Otherwise when you reach down to pick up your Triggerbots, your hair will knock down about 50 GIJoes and all your Micromasters. And they take forever to pick up... -- kendrick@io.com - Kendrick Kerwin Chua - WTB: 80s Transformers and GIJoe toys "What would you have me do with Washington,Destro? Pepper it with spitballs?" Necronomcon FAQ home page at http://www.io.com/~kendrick/necronomicon or anon FTP at io.com:/pub/usr/kendrick -Personal home at http://www.io.com/~kendrick