Toon Zone Talkback - "Transformers Animated" Season Two: Still Kicking Skid Plate, but Slipping Gears

My take on this, whole Optimus Prime thing as someone who grew up with the original series and really likes and enjoys the new series is, this isn't the same Prime.

The G1 Optimus Prime was created back in the 80's when back then heroes and villians were still in the field of US cartoons very "Black and White" and had usually been fighting the enemy in question for awhile before we(the audience) first meet them, while today heroes are portrayed with having flaws and learning as they go and usually having their first encounters with the series main villian during the first episode.

Also both G1 Optimus Prime and Beast Wars' Optimus Primal were older than Transformers:Animated's Optimus Prime. G1's Prime had been fighting the Decpticons for years by the time we had been introduced to him and had become a wise, experienced and respected leader. Primal may not have had the battle experience, but had already been in a leadership position for along time and had the trust and respect of most of his crew, and earned through his actions the respect and trust of others. Transformers:Animated's Prime is a young Prime, he's not all that different than the way that G1's Prime wa presented in the first Transformers:War Within mini-series that Dreamwave released a couple of years ago and that IDW recently re-released in a complet collection of all the War Within mini-series.

I think age has alot to do with it, I don't think that any of the Autobots/Maixmals or Decpticons/Predacons ever had given ages, but in terms of human years I think both G1 Optimus and Primal were probably in their late 30's to mid 40's, while Transformers:Animated Prime seems to be in his very late 20's to mid 30's.
 
Season 1 was pretty good and season 2 was good as well, I wonder how much longer this show is going to last with CN usualy only carrying a show for a season or two. I personaly hope at least one more season is in store for us as I feel this show was a nice addition to the CN action roster.

I'll buy season 2 when it comes out because I did enjoy it and I like to support stuff that airs on CN (as long as its good).
 
Go and buy it then. It was released this past Tuesday.

I generally agree with Ed's review, although I kinda liked the Constructicons for their comic relief, and overall I did enjoy S2 more than S1 for the Elite Guard eps and the 2-part Season finale which for me was more entertaining than anything from the original series. It was the sort of action I'd been waiting to see for two seasons in the show, and I completely geeked out at the two major character reveals in the season finale even though I'd already figured them both out in advance -- the way they were introduced was quite satisfying.

I do have one correction:

That voice actually goes back much further than that. Tara based it on an impression of actress Mae West, one of the first "sex symbols" of the silver screen. Here's a classic example of West's unique acting style.
 
Yeah, I know JJL was basing her character on a long line of classic dames of cinema -- there's lots of 'em from the 30's and 40's that I could have cited instead. The thought crept in there to add that to the comment, but the review (and that sentence) was running way too long as it was. As relatively obscure as Hudsucker is, I figured it would be more recognizable to the average reader of the site than citing Irene Dunne in The Awful Truth, for instance.
 
I should add that you are actually correct that the voice is indeed reminiscent of JJL's performance in that flick, it's just that that particular performance wasn't the source of Tara's inspiration.

And there was a crapload of actresses back in the day that used that acting style too. Made me wonder what kind of acting schools were around back then that they were teaching that sort of odd method acting.
 
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