Out Of Time: Transformers: The Movie


The title might catch people’s eye considering that even with the under-performance of Transformers: The Last Knight at the box office, Michael Bay’s franchise is still going relatively strong. But we’re not here to focus on that. No, we’re here to focus on the original Transformers movie. The 1986 animated film.
When it was released in August of 1986, it didn’t set the box office on fire the way many people were hoping it would. It opened in 14th place and was the 88th highest grossing film of that year.

Considering the immense popularity of the cartoon and the fact that it featured many well-known actors voicing the Transformers (Judd Nelson, Robert Stack, Leonard Nimoy, Eric Idle and Orson Welles in his last role) it’s reasonable to ask: Why did it not become the blockbuster that a lot of people were hoping it would? I think there are a few factors at work here:
1: The movie was released about a year after the cartoon and the toy line’s popularity had reached its peak. A similar thing would happen with the Masters Of The Universe movie a year later.
2: The fact that it was tied directly into the cartoon (it served as a bridge of sorts between the second and third season) may have been confusing for people who weren’t regular viewers.
3: SPOILER WARNING. Negative word of mouth regarding character deaths. In the film, several beloved Autobots die, most notably Optimus Prime. A lot of parents were probably having to comfort kids who were in tears at the death of beloved cartoon heroes.  The overall tone of the movie was significantly darker than a lot of people were anticipating.

Going back to what I noted earlier about this tying into the series, this was intended as a sort of bridge between seasons two and three. Season three was supposed to introduce a whole new line of Transformers.
4: Critical reception was pretty low. While many critics are not fans of the Bay entries, fanboy tendencies are higher now than they were in the 80s.
So those factors combined caused the Transformers movie to not do too well at the box office. This, combined with the failure of the earlier My Little Pony movie, caused the GI Joe movie to get bumped from a planned theatrical release to video (as well as airing as a four-part episode of the cartoon).
Now we come to the central question: How well does Transformers: The Movie hold up 31 years after its original release? Do the Michael Bay films blow it off the screen?
Let’s address a few central issues. First off, the animation could have been better. In some ways, one senses that the name actors as voices was a compensation for cutting corners in the animation department.
The second factor I noted above also limits its appeal to a large audience, That’s the most likely reason for why Transformers has a cult following these days as opposed to a larger one.
But for that cult audience, this movie holds up quite well. In fact, I’d wager that for most people within five years of my age either way who watched the cartoon as kids, this is the Transformers movie. Forget the big budget noisefests. Those basically use the Transformers as an excuse to show money on the screen for two and a half hours. This one was made by people who were to put some actual thought into the characters and was willing to take some chances. There are some actual surprises here (as I noted above) while the Bay films are quite predictable.
So while Transformers: The Movie may not be a forgotten masterpiece, it actually holds up well as an entertaining movie. It’s way more entertaining and involving than any of Bay’s entries and it actually gibes the characters things to do as opposed to using them as decoration. Yes, the Transformers has the touch. It’s got the power.

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Nicolaij
Nicolaij
6 years ago

The song ‘the Touch’ was also the song that Marky Mark’s character in Boogie Nights was recording in a failed attempt to become a rockstar.

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago
Reply to  Nicolaij

Ha, yeah, that was great. “The Touch” is also in the soundtrack of the video game “Saints Row IV”, and the dialogue for the climatic battle in the game (“Why throw away your life so recklessly Saint?”) is scripted exactly like the one between Optimus prime & Megatron in the film. Dare!

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago

This was the first film I ever purchased on DVD (2001; I’m a little slow buying tech, so I’ll have a smartphone by 2027), and I LOVE IT!!! The soundtrack? Oh, I’ve purchased that in Media Play in 1998; I got it for “The Touch” of course, but wow, I think it’s good overall: “Dare to be Stupid” by Weird Al? Yes, but then I found I liked the two song by Spectre General, “Nothin’s Gonna Stand in our Way” (wanna bet?), and “Hunger”, while the instrumental “Escape” by Vince DiCola (who I think has done some excellent work outside… Read more »

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Admin
admin
6 years ago

Oh, I didn’t like the character’s deaths in 1986 though; at the time I sent a letter of complaint to…somebody. Maybe it was to Hasbro, I can’t remember, but I never got a reply. Again though, after a few years passed and I understood things better, the wound healed. As for the animation in this film, yeah, if Nelson Shin and AKOM had anything to do with it, that’s explains everything: they later got booted from “Batman: The Animated Series” for subpar animation, so Shin and AKOM always did seem to cut corners. I like the first Michael Bay Transformers… Read more »

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago

Well, to be fair many animated shows of that era had errors: I know “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” was loaded with them (wrong turtle talking in a certain voice, all the turtles wearing the same bandana, etc.), so it wasn’t just Nelson Shin and his AKOM crew, I just gave him a mention due to the fact that his company didn’t up their game in later years. I think the production values for The Transformers animated film were WAY better than the television series, as those quite frankly are very poor, and the errors weren’t that glaring in comparison to… Read more »

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago

Speaking of moviechat.org, I’m happy to see that some of my comments from the IMDB message board survived; I never thought I’d see my sentence babies again, a la the the disaster that was the writing site Triond.

Carl
Carl
6 years ago

I was 13 when it came out and at the time had virtually a complete set of Transformers (if only I had held onto them instead of getting rid of them in a move!). So this movie was perfectly timed for me and I loved it. Seeing actual deaths and even swearing was amazing for me then. I had really hoped for a sequel but then again if they had done it we’d be looking at 2-3 years later and I was pretty much done with toys like that by age 14-15.

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago
Reply to  Carl

I hear you; I was a couple of years younger, but the animated film was probably the apex of Transformers for me (I still had no idea about generations or that the Transformers model would sustain itself), but after dabbling into Generation 2 a little bit (I had Blur, Kup, Hot Rod, Rodimus Prime, Glavatron, and an Ultra Magnus that also stood in for my broken Optimus Prime) I was done by 1988, and by the end of 1990 my family moved, so I have no idea what became of my Transformer figures. For me though, it was fun to… Read more »

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6 years ago
Reply to  jeffthewildman

I was into G.I. Joe at first, until it was taken off the air for censorship or something (the time G.I. Joe WASN’T there), and after that I didn’t care about the show anymore (still played with the toys though). I had this one white Transformer via mail order, but it was stolen by this kid named Eric in second grade summer school (we were good friends during our senior year, and he copped to the theft, so we kind of had a laugh about it. He payed for my “To Die For” ticket, numerous food court meals, and some… Read more »

Terrence Clay (@TMC1982)

Pre 86 Movie Character To Replace Optimus Prime? http://officialfan.proboards.com/thread/560924/movie-character-replace-optimus-prime Post by CMWaters on about an hour ago Title had to be short to fit, but I’ll explain better here: I was watching a video that gave the overview of the G1 Transformers cartoon, and the person doing it had an interesting thought: what if instead of one of the new characters we got for the movie, one of the pre-movie characters had become the new Prime and led the way. You could still get a new toy out there, but you would also have had a better connection with the… Read more »

admin
Admin
admin
6 years ago

I wouldn’t change a thing; many Autobots were slaughtered anyway, so Hot Rod “growing up” to be Rodimus Prime, lighting the Autobots’ darkest hour, w is fine by me. Like I said before, the Ultra Magnus toy was basically a white Optimus Prime (kind of white in the style some vehicle models are before you paint them), but the film had Magnus unable to open the Autobot Matrix (hard to believe; I’m sure Robert Stack was quite capable of opening it), so there goes the best candidate to replace Prime.

Terrence Clay (@TMC1982)

Killing off Prime in the G1 Movie
http://officialfan.proboards.com/thread/563951/killing-off-prime-g1-movie
Post by andrew8798 on about an hour ago
One of the most famous deaths in a Animated Movie. but as everyone knows Hasbro thought OP could have been easily replaced but boy was they wrong. It almost killed the franchise off. And it’s not like every damn series haven’t try to kill him off either hell even Bay fell in that trap. At least They haven’t don’t that stupid death from the Marvel comic. So if you was charge back then would you have kill him off?

Terrence Clay (@TMC1982)

Transformers
https://www.sfdebris.com/videos/animation/transformers.php
March 14, 2018
The animated movie based on the series that children loved because of its characters and cool toys. So naturally it’s a dark nihilist fantasy where everyone dies horribly.

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