From kendrick@io.com Tue Oct  3 10:54:56 CDT 1995
Article: 23880 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 10/2 - The God Gambit
Date: 3 Oct 1995 10:54:43 -0500
Organization: Illuminati Online
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TF Weekday Oct 2 1995 - The God Gambit

The EI/AD: Organized religion misused as a political pressure tool is
this episode's evil invention, deftly wielded by Astrotrain.

The plot: Cosmos is shot down by Astrotrain after our little green friend
has just finished taking energy readings around Saturn. He lands painfully
on the blue moon Titan, which is inhabited by blue-skinned humanoid
squishies who are in the midst of a religious crisis. Astrotrain claims to
be a god and enslaves them. Meanwhile, Prime sends Omega Supreme, Jazz,
and Perceptor out into space to look for Cosmos after Talaria, the leader
of the atheist Titans, reactivates Cosmos' radio. Omega lands on Titan out
of energy and balanced delicately on a cliff, and Jazz and Perceptor run
into Talaria escaping from the Cons. Jerroll, the Titan high priest, shows
Astrotrain the crystal caves, the source of the energy readings that
Cosmos found. After a few fights, a capture, a rescue, and a botched up
plan, the Decepticons blow up the crystals, declaring that if they can't
have them no-one will. The Autobots take what crystals they can to
reactivate Omega, who transports all the Titans over to the next continent
away from the exploding crystal hazard. The Decepticons run away and the
Autobots are able to rescue Cosmos.

The characters: Astrotrain is a little inappropriately cast as the leader
in this episode. If you don't like your characters shuffled around like
that, you can either assume that Starscream got temporarily demoted or
that Astrotrain was pounding home the point that nobody'd be able to get
home without him. Starscream and Thrust are background bad guys, and not
a lot more, although Thrust's cowardice comes to the fore very often,
especially in the face of even odds. Jazz is style, grace, and panache
>from  hood to wheelbase, but Perceptor doesn't get a lot of
characterization. One nice little cameo from Red Alert, who is less the
fritzing paranoid and more a cautious security guy; he warns Cosmos not
to transmit his data lest the Decepticons intercept it, and he stops
Prime from going to Titan himself. Talaria is a rarity in TF; a strong
female leader character. Too bad she falls too quickly into the
damsel-in-distress mold as soon as Jazz shows up to become the rescuer.
Omega reveals a lot more special abilities, like a dynamic track system
and the fact that his parts all fit into his rocket mode. Gotta love that
big laser blaster thing he's got too.

The plot holes: Too many to mention, really. This is a good story out of
context with the rest of the TF continuity, so I have to wonder if Dixon
wrote this before or after getting familiar with the characters. Besides
the really silly techno-babble and psuedo-science, you have to wonder why
a humanoid race living on Saturn wasn't discovered already. The
interstellar bit and the herky-jerky animation make this ep feel a LOT
like a post-movie episode. Probably a Toei training vehicle, from the
looks of it.

Moving pictures: Besides what was mentioned above, the animation often
went to about four or eight frames per second, making things appear jerky
and messy. One nice bit was a shot of Thrust and Starscream walking over
some debris in the crystal caves; if you ever wondered how a
second-season seeker walks around with those damn wings attached to his
legs, this is the episode to watch.

The cuts: A lot of exposition in the first and second segments, but
nothing truly important. Honestly, I don't remember this episode well
enough to know what was cut, even though it is one of my favorites.

Toys they should reissue: Triple changers; A-train and B-wing are some of
the most loved Decepticons partly for their cool transforms and partly
because they're such clowns.

Quotables:
"If the god isn't ready in time, you'll clean the temple floor with your
tongues!"

"Use larger crystals!" (coffee not sweet enough, A-train?)

KKC, wonders if anybody is keeping a running tab of humanoid characters
that show up in TF... I'm thinking more and more that a Talaria figure
would look good next to one of my four Jazz toys. Maybe the squishies
>from  'Only Human' and the bounty hunter from the post-movie eps too?
--
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