Poor Optimus

Recently I went to Target and I bought folders and notebooks. I needed them for classes. One of the folders I bought has Optimus Prime on one side and Megatron on the other.

When I was checking out, the cashier was really excited that I was buying a Transformers folder (I was excited, too) and he pointed something out to me.

He said something to the effect of: "You know, it's a shame that we won't see like the old versions of the transformers, man. Now all the Transformers you see are the movie versions."

The Target Cashier (and I apologize for just calling dude "Target Cashier". I wish I knew his name. Perhaps I should name him for the purposes of this blog post? Yes, I'll name him Gob.) is refereing, of course, to the Michael Bay movies that defiled the Transformers franchise and have given us shitty versions of Transformers on our folders and notebooks and as action figures.

Gob the Cashier is right. The old animated series, models of the Transformers are SO MUCH cooler than the Michael Bay versions. But, due to the films' successes, we may never see the old versions of the Transformers (the ones most of us grew up with) again.

The Michael Bay Transformers are the ones the kids of today have to grow up with. And that saddens me.

Here's the old version of Optimus, the "non-Bay" version:

Compare that to the shitty "Bayified" Optimus:

The Bay version is butt compared to the old one, right?

But, the movie Optimus is ubiquitous these days. It's a real bummer that the IDW Transformers comics are the only place where the Transformers keep their old look.

Who reads those comics, though, right? I honestly don't. Yes, Nick Vogt, in all his comics-ness, does not read the IDW Transformers comics. I think if I don't read them, no one does.

Ok. Let's compare another transformer's "old look" to the "movie look" shall we?

Here's the old Bumblebee:

Now, here's the new Bumblebee:

Why did they make Bumblebee, the cute transformer, into a hideous abomination? Why did they change him from a VW Bug (which makes the name Bumblebee make sense...) to a sportscar?

Everything in the Transformers movies is forced to be badass or to be sexy. That's what happened to Optimus and Bumblebee. Bay tried to sex them up and in the process ripped out all their charm. Poor Optimus. Poor Bumblebee. Poor Transformers.

However, for as much as I constantly rag on Bay and how he fucked up Transformers, I will say this: His version of Megatron is a cooler than the old Megatron.

Here's the old Megatron:

Now here's Bay's new, nightmarish Megatron:

The one, and I repeat THE ONE, thing Michael Bay did right when he got his grubby mits on the Transformers was to make Megatron appropriately menacing. Megatron is a villain, but the old one doesn't necessarily look the part. Well, Michael Bay, I'll give you this: you made Megatron look like the villain he is.

Finally, I'd like to add that on Yup We Blogging, there is a report of a man who made a 14 ft. Optimus Prime statue. Although the man made his Optimus in the style of the Bay films, it's still pretty damn incredible.

Check that out, and also check out YWB because it's a great blog and really I should have mentioned Yup We Blogging on Awesome Town a while ago.

There are great people blogging on YWB including the proprietor of my other blog: Ronald Metellus. There's also a man I do not know in person, but follow on Twitter named Vlad, and someone I don't know at all named Broken Android. They're a good team and do a great job on YWB. Check that site out!

Yeah!