Transformers: Prime: Beast Hunters: Preadacons Rising thoughts · 3:51am Oct 5th, 2013
Hey there,
So I watched the airing of TF:P:BH:PR, the conclusion to the entirety of TF:P, and decided I might as well post my thoughts on it to break up the monotony of my 'Updates on Updates' posts. Note that there will be some spoilers ahead. I'll try to warn you of major spoilers beforehand, but little ones will be sprinkled throughout it by virtue of this being my thoughts on it. You have been warned:
Overall, I was...disappointed. I mean, it was good, but it didn't quite happen as I was hoping (meaning I was completely biased in how I'm judging thins; sue me). SPOILER: The premise of the movie is pretty much Unicron possesses dead Megatron, tries to destroy Cybertron, then gets stopped as the various factions (Autobots, Decepticons, and Predacons) unite.
Let me start with what I liked about the movie:
Personally, I'm always a fan of when two warring sides or individuals unite to defeat a common enemy, something surprisingly frequent throughout Transformers. It happened in Armada, it happened earlier in TF:P, and it happened here. So, yay! Teamwork! Unfortunately, though, the teams didn't quite pan as I had hoped they would. SPOILER: In the final conflict, almost everyone was aligned against Unicron. By almost, I mean with the exception of 2 important Decepticons, who also happened to be half of them featured in the movie. At the end of the last episode, the only surviving Decepticons are Knockout, Shockwave, Soundwave, and Starscream, though Soundwave was trapped in some shadow zone thing that he really could have escaped immediately had he known that the way to leave was to simply use a spacebridge, of which he's the master of, and Knockout had already joined the Autobots anyways; props to him for learning from Armada Starscream.
That said, in this, the only Decepticons shown are Shockwave, Starscream, Knockout, and Megatron (cause, you know, Unicron brings him back). But Megatron is Unicron's puppet and Knockout's already changed sides, so now that leaves only 2 real Decepticons left.
And they're not even in the final battle!
That's bullcrap! Starscream's absence in the fighting is somewhat excusable, as he's in the Nemisis' (the actual name of the Decepticon ship, not Harbringer (I like Harbringer better, though; sounds more imposing)) brig and is still feigning loyalty to Megatron. But Shockwave's absence is just stupid. What I'm going to say next seems irrelevant, but bear with me; it'll come around. SPOILER: So there's this field of Predacon bones that Starscream finds and brings Shockwave and the two other Predacons that they had managed to clone between the end of the show and then to before the final battle. And Predacon bones are pretty much the thing that Shockwave is able to make the clones from. So as they're harvesting bones with which to clone an army, possessed Megatron arrives and has the same idea. He uses his dark Energon magic stuff to bring them all to life as an army of undead, while also revealing to the Decepticons that he is Unicron, not Megatron. As such, Starscream flees and Shockwave tries to do the same, though, being a slow tank, he can't get far. The army surrounds him and it shows them tipping him on his side and beginning to rip him to pieces, though it never shows his actual dismemberment because TV Y7.
"It vould seem to me zat Shockwave's destruction vould be reason enough for him to not partake in the final battle."
"It's vhat the demented Cyclops deserves!"
Blitzwing couldn't have put it any better, except that they're completely wrong. It's completely implied that Shockwave is mercilessly slaughtered by the claws of the undead, but guess what? He's not! In fact, he's completely fine; not even a scratch (okay, well, except for a crack along his eye; how it got there in vehicle mode eludes me. Let's just call this act of being alive when it was so clearly shown that he should have been killed but managing to get a nonsensical injury in the process Pinkie Pie and leave it at that). After the undead army mobilizes to the well of Allsparks to destroy Primus, the two Predacons from earlier are found by Predaking, who claims leadership over the two of them. They fight about it, but Shockwave appears out of nowhere and tells them that logic dictates that their aggressions should be focused elsewhere (alongside the Autobots against Unicron).
So cool; you can't agrue against that; it's logic, after all. Obviously, the Predacons do just that, and it would only make sense that Shockwave joins them and follows his own advice. But nope! That's the last you see of him. So yeah, a bit disappointed with that.
This movie, in fact, left a lot of things like that unaddressed in the end. Here are just a few examples of things I was left asking after the fact: SPOILERS:
-What happened to Shockwave?
-What happened to Megatron now that he's rejected the Decepticon ways?
-What happened to Ultra Magnus? And why did they make him so useless? And why hasn't Ratchet replaced his had with a fully functional one?
-Why are guns so useless? (Alright, to be fair, this is just a nitpick of mine that the movie helped reinforce. I mean, their guns do almost nothing. Everything but Vehicons seem to be invulnerable to them. Heck, the Autobots were shooting up the interior of the Nemisis when Starscream tried to take it over, and there were no explosions or anything. The terminals tat got hit didn't suffer any damage, even.)
-What happens to the Predacons after they exact revenge on Starscream?
-Did Starscream even die? I mean, they do the same thing to him as they seemed to do with Shockwave; switching scenes as soon as it would appear that he was screwed. And Shockwave managed to get out of a horde of millions of undead soldiers, and he's a tank; Starscream could have very well escaped by some similar black magic.
-Bulkhead had some vehicons working on a landing pad for refugees earlier in the movie, so why aren't they seen helping to fight off Unicron? Not that they'd help anyway, but still...
-Does Soundwave ever come back? He's not dead, after all, and could, you know...come back in less than a second...'cause spacebridges...and if he did, would he continue the Decepticon name, of would he follow Megatron's example?
-How does Cybertron fare in the distant future?
Evidently, things don't wrap up, at least for me. To be fair, though, I watched from 8:00 to 9:30, but hubworld.com shows that the allotted time ran until 10:00. So maybe I missed a type of after-credit epilogue that answers some of those questions. In which case, I must ask why they would do that. TV programming just isn't the place for that.
Pretty much everything in the movie was solid to me; I liked what was there, but as a conclusion to everything, it fails epically, as shown in the list above. As such, it's safe for me to conclude that I'd have really liked it if it wasn't the finale. With it being so, though, I can't help but feel unsettled by the lack of closure. That's pretty much my only issue with it, but with it being a conclusion and all...that's bad. I could understand them not having a "Cybertron in the future" type scene to show how everything resolves; we don't need that to get an idea of how things end.
Just look at Star Wars. Episode 6 doesn't show anything beyond immediately after the death of the Emperor, but it still shows that everything turns out well and that the galaxy will be at peace. Everyone's celebrating, there are no important villains left alive to worry about, and pretty much all loose ends are tied up. None of that really happens in TF:P:BH:PR, though. There's still at least 2 important Decepticons alive,-
"Zree including me!"
-those being Soundwave, Shockwave, and Blitzwing (not really, but I just don't want to argue with him about it; just go with it), and possibly Starscream because Pinkie Pie. So...yeah...plus the Predacons...
I'm droning, aren't I? You get my point, though, I hope: this movie makes a good extended episode, but a terrible finale.
Right, back onto the things I liked (man, I went off topic): Megatron's portrayal. To me, Megatron has almost never been likeable beyond the 'hate so much you like him' factor. But Megatron finally pulled something out of the Armada Starscream's Almanac for Being Awesome, Co-authored by Rainbow Dash and actually went through a change of heart. The only other Megatron/Galvatron to ever do that was Armada Galvatron, but I suspect he only sacrificed himself to save everyone because he was screwed, even if he didn't do so. This change was genuine and actually had good reasoning behind it, though I'll let you watch for yourself. Pretty much, I loved this, and while it doesn't beat Armada Starscream's transformation (ha, pun), it put him very near the top of my favorite Prime characters. Soundwave's still #1, though.
Still, though, this fact doesn't make up for the lack of closure, and thus the movie still disappointed me.
So what would have redeemed the movie in my opinion that no one cares about anyways? Well, let me share some things that I would have liked to see:
-Shockwave should have died.
-Soundwave should have returned. He's smart; he would have figured out the way out of the shadow zone in no time at all. The only deterrent for leaving would be capture. But hey, he had a perfect opportunity to return to the bridge when Starscream tried to commandeer the ship! Allow me to share in more detail how I would have handled this entire thing:
SUPER SPOILERS AHEAD! SUPER SPOILERS AHEAD! READ WITH CAUTION!
Starscream comes to the Nemesis after witnessing Unicron raise the undead Predacons, called Terrorcons, and watching them dismantle Shockwave without mercy. His goal is to steal the ship and get as far away from Unicron as possible. Knowing that Knockout is on board, he sneaks on and comes to the brig to free him and a few other Vechicons that managed to avoid death at the end of the show.
Meanwhile, Soundwave has figured out how to get out of his prison (I should clear up now that the shadow zone is. It's another dimension that one gets transported to if one is caught between two space bridges in close proximity. The shadow zone itself is only a small looping area dependent on where one is when transported. For Soundwave, that'd be the bridge, and anytime he tries to walk out of the bridge, he walks down a short corridor that leads back to the bridge. The shadow zone is still connected to the real world, though. One in the shadow zone can still see and hear everything in the real world that is happening in the area that they're transported in (so Soundwave can see everything going on in the bridge), but the imprisoned person can't be seen or heard, or felt; essentially, they're a ghost. However, they can still send and receive signals, such as cell phone calls and space bridge coordinates. Space bridges can be made in the shadow zone which lead to the corresponding location in the real world (so a space bridge made by Soundwave would bring him back to the bridge), but there has not been a good moment for him to free himself and take back the ship; ever since his imprisonment, there has always been at least 2 Autobots on the bridge. He knows he could take out one easily with surprise on his side, but then he'd be screwed by the others. So patiently, he waits...
And then Starscream and Knockout arrive, armed with the immobilizer and the phase shifter thing. The Decepticons have the Autobots out manned and outgunned; it's the perfect time to show that he's not been outdone. As the standoff between the 'Bots and 'Cons happens, he opens up a spacebridge and returns to his normal dimension. But he had been listening as the Autobots discussed Unicron, and he knows that Unicron is a more immediate threat than the Autobots.
But his sudden reappearance utterly distracts everyone for some time. The Autobots, however, capitalize on this distraction and beat back the Decepticons, and additionally, Knockout knocks out Starscream and Soundwave, proving his allegiance to the Autobots.
Things happen as the movie portrays things for the most part: Predaking finds the other Predacons and reasons, after some fighting, that leadership quarrels should wait 'til after Unicron's dealt with, and they pursue Unicron and his army. Meanwhile, the Autobots discuss a game plan, concluding that Bulkhead should pilot the ship while the others search for weapons. Fortunately, though, Knockout suggests asking Soundwave to take control of the ship, as Soundwave is the most knowledgeable of it and the most capable.
In the brig, Soundwave and Starscream are asked to help them take down Unicron. Starscream initially rejects the offer, but after some aggressive negotiations from Soundwave, he concedes. Soundwave then pilots the vessel while the others prepare for their final fight.
They approach the well of Allsparks just as the Terrorcon army does, and Soundwave unleashes the Nemesis' full power against the army. But there are just too many for the ship to handle, and despite Soundwave's expertise, he can't manage them all. As the ship continues to take damage, the Predacons arrive, and with their arrival, the tide begins to turn. The combined might of the Predacons and Nemesis begin to throw Unicron's forces to ruin, at least, until Unicron decides to get personally involved. Needing something to draw Unicron's attention as the Nemesis and the Predacons destroy the Terrorcons, the Autobots, Knockout, and Starscream leap from the ship, hopping from Terrorcon to Terrorcon to reach the ground safely and confront Unicron.
At first, Unicron is taken by surprise as Bulkhead, Bumblebee, Arcee, Knockout, and Smokescreen rush him (Starscream, being the coward he is and not wanting to incur Unicron's wrath, simply circles above and doesn't get involved). Together, the five ground soldiers provide effective resistance and manage to successfully distract him, allowing Soundwave and the Predacons to work their magic on the Terrorcons.
Things change, though, as Unicron manages to gain the upper hand. One by one, the Autobots and Knockout begin to stumble before Unicron's might, though are able to escape death. All except Arcee. After smashing back a charge from Bulkhead with a massive dark Energon hammer, Arcee believes him to be exposed, but she's wrong. Expecting the attack, Unicron throws her to the ground with his free hand, stunning her briefly, just long enough for him to bring his hammer down upon her small body. But the contact never happens, as Starscream finally does something, ramming Unicron and saving Acree's life. Once again, Unicron is taken by surprise, and Starscream is able to use this to get numerous blows on him before jetting away.
Unicron makes to pursue, but Bumblebee, smokescreen, and Knockout are on him before it's possible for him to do so.
As Starscream loops around, he sees Arcee looking to him with a grateful smile, and he feels...satisfied. He realized that Unicron will now want him dead, but he's surprisingly okay with it. Instead, he knows that he did the right thing, and is proud of himself. Maybe, he realizes, he doesn't need to rule the universe to be happy with himself.
By now, most of the Terrorcons have been destroyed, but similarly, the Predacons and the Nemesis have suffered a lot of damage. Worn and weary, the Predacons a failing to keep the Terrorcons away from the Nemesis, which is in turn being wrecked and less capable of destroying Terrorcons. Starscream redirects his efforts towards the Terrorcons and to helping the Predacons, leaving the others to Unicron.
All in all, though, they are not enough. Unicron is too mighty and the Terrorcons too numerous. The Nemesis goes down, Unicron had pushed back his attackers, and the Terrorcons enter the Well to get to the planet's core and destroy Primus.
But then, Wheeljack and Optimus make their triumphant return, and things pan out essentially exactly as they do in the actual movie, with Unicron being defeated and Megatron retaking his body. Everyone's beaten and battered, so they take the night to recuperate. In the morning, Optimus shares with all those gathered with him, Bumblebee, Arcee, Bulkhead, Smokescreen, Knockout, Soundwave, Starscream, Megatron (who decided to rename himself Galvatron and purge himself of the negative things associated with the name Megatron), and the Predacons, the fact that he put the Allspark in the Matrix of Leadership, and must then sacrifice himself to give the Allspark back to Primus to shat Cybertron can live again. He tells them all that he feels that Cybertron will have a long line of peace ahead of it, then unites with Primus.
After that, all the characters pretty much resolve their own little quarrels. Galvatron leaves so as to reflect upon his past wrongdoings and on ways to essentially redeem himself, the Autobots forgive Starscream and Soundwave for their having been Decpeticons (after all, they helped defeat Unicron), and Predaking forgives Starscream for mistreating him earlier, as Starscream pretty much saved him from the Terrorcons by intervening as he did.
So yeah, everyone get along and stuff, generic 'good guys win' ending, with he final scene being a close-up of Soundwave's face displaying a happy face (just because it'd be a) funny and b) an interesting way to show his change of heart (earlier in the show, Soundwave was taken captive and was interrogated, but instead of giving any information, he simply annoyed the Autobots with remixing their voices and displaying the same happy face to show that he was trolling them...then he effectively kills himself, supertrolling them as a result).)
Wow. I actually didn't intend to do a 'how it should have ended', but...well, now you pretty much know how the movie would have gone if I had wrote it. As you can see, this series of events would cover most of the closure issues I had, and would bring back Soundwave, as well as redeem both him and Starscream. Obviously, I'm a big fan of redemption. Additionally, while I'm not a huge fan of Megatron renaming himself whenever he changes form, I think this would have been one instance in which I would have preferred it. Galvatron hasn't been in the series, so had no name in the continuity. So...perfect opportunity to show that Megatron is symbolic of evil, and that Megatron (Galvatron in my version) wants no further part in it.
So yeah, those are my excessively lengthy thoughts on the movie (or what I saw of it. If any of you also watched it and it turns out that there was an after-credit scene, let me know what happens in it and which of my listed questions get answered by it). If you watched it, share your own thoughts and what you would have liked to see. Or even if you didn't watch it but could sort of follow my HISHE, let me know what you think of the idea.
Keep being awesome,
Lego and Blitzving!
I didn't even know there was a movie. I'ma have to check that out.
Atleast it's not Equestria girls or Batman and Robin.
1395642 Hey Equestria Girls is leagues above that pathetic piece of scrap that is Batman and Robin. That movie didn't even try.
1396205>>1395642 I've never seen Batman and Robin, but I've heard some bad things about it. How bad is it?
1396207 I haven't seen it either but just watch the Nostalgia Critic review it. It's pretty bad. It even has believe it or not A BAT CREDIT CARD! Yes you heard me A BAT CREDIT CARD!
Even Batman Forever was more enjoyable then that. Even if Clooney was a better Batman then Kelmier.
1396207 so bad it made star wars episode 1 look good (also just watch a clip of the movie and you will hate it).
1396791 Send me a video of the worst scene in the movie and I'll be sure to watch it.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8socbX_a3Gw
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FzhISE-r5ps