Transcription

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  Hello, everyone, and welcome to Movie Goodness, where we examine life through cinema here on the KB Radio Network. I am your host, Kevin Reed, and let's set the stage. Let's hop into the DeLorean, go back 40 years to August the 8th, 1996, and knock on the door. of a young seven-year-old kevin reed ask him to come outside take him to a movie theater and look at the marquee and ask him what do you want to go see 100 seven-year-old kevin reed will look at that marquee and see everything that was released that day and point directly to the transformers the movie animated movie i might add and walk into that theater because that's exactly what happened 40 years ago today 40 years ago seven-year-old kevin reed begged and pleaded with his father to go take him to the movies to go see the transformers film and oddly enough oddly enough and i didn't realize this until this year until i was uh looking at the release date of this film or at least i'm not gonna say i didn't realize but i didn't recall i don't remember this happening but apparently it did happen i begged my dad to go and well come and bring me into the theater to see this and like a good father that he was god rest his soul he took me but the thing is you that was his birthday weekend he was his birthday was on the 6th and this movie came out on the 8th and stella's celebrating his birthday in adult fashion he brought his little nappy head seven year old son to go see the transformers animated movie and that just that's just a testament to how awesome of a father he was. But we went and sat in this theater and my mind was blown away not by the quality and deep storytelling of it but the mere fact that there was a movie of a television show that i watched every single day and see this is during the era of the gi joes the he-mans the uh and the transformers you know the saturday morning cartoons, the afternoon cartoons that helped rear up so many kids in my generation and that's why i always say it's so sad that our children in this current generation did not have the joy of what we had growing up and it really sucks i hate that my kids in particular didn't have those shows they didn't have those uh uh experiences whereas they had to well at least they're their imagination imaginations were challenged you know uh uh getting the toys watching the shows and going get the toys and extending what you just saw on television and things of that nature that that was so much fun and it helped build upon your imagination to build upon your creativity as a kid you know when i think of like when i did write you because i don't write anymore i need to get back into writing but when i was writing stories and short stories uh i kind of transferred back to that era you know where my mind was at its peak of creativity and that was pretty much birthed from watching this era of television with all of these shows and transformers is one of those shows that really really challenged it because When it came to this film that came out 40 years ago, it took your childhood, put it in his hand, and took the other hand and just smashed it. I mean, it just destroyed everybody's childhood. I mean, destroyed our childhood with the death of Optimus Prime. And in case you're getting upset right now because I spoiled that movie. 40 years ago, get over it, it's been 40 years, but nobody knew this, you know, in this day and era, that would have been spoiled in the first trailer, that would have been spoiled in pre-production or something like that, or a set photo, somebody would have spoiled it with the internet and all that good stuff, but back then... we didn't know what to expect and not only did he die in the movie he died in the first what five ten minutes of the film and you're like i'm ready to go home now i don't care what happens next at that point because the star of the film the star of this franchise is gone like that and it was it was traumatized it really was traumatized and i think it it kind of damaged you the franchise after that i mean transformers is still going on to date but it really kind of put put a little damper around that time you know people stopped watching it or kids stopped watching it because they were that upset and it was no disrespect to hot rod or rodimus prime as he came to be by the end of this film it was just optimist we grew we grew a fondness for Optimus, that was our guy. Everybody loved Optimus Prime. You know, with Peter Collins' just felonious voice echoing Optimus Prime's voice. It was traumatizing, man. Still to this day, it was hard to watch. For the rewatch for this show, it was hard to watch it. You know, because my mind went back. I reverted back to seven-year-old Kevin. And it... and it really hurt it hurt and the same thing with other films around that time that was uh traumatizing to childhood you know um the movie was just in my head and it popped right out of my head instantly that just goes to show you that i am officially old but uh it was another film that came out around that time it was the one with the horse uh it was a fantasy film with the horse and the quicksand. and it drowned in the quicksand or was buried in quicksand i should say oh what was that movie was it that never-ending story it could have been a never-ending story but anyways yeah um yeah that was that was traumatizing you're not supposed to watch it as a kid but it was a kid's film you know but it was it was that impactful and speaking of quicksand just go off on another tangent for a second You remember in the 80s with all of these fantasy films or films in general, how quicksand was so prevalent, how quicksand was kind of a worrisome thing. I used to worry about quicksand. When I got older, I'm like, man, what are we going to do? You know, I was scared to go to a beach anywhere where there was sand because I didn't know where the quicksand portion of it was. It was it was so prominent in the 80s. Blake said... was a thing but uh i don't know what happened with that you don't see quicksand in movies no more but anyways anyway moving on uh transformers the movie this of course was based off of the tv show this uh uh story in particular was set in uh 2005 in the in the far future in 1986 of 2005 uh 20 years after the show's second season and the plot follows the autobots robots uh who are hunted by unicron who was a planet-sized transformer and if the film the voice talents in this film was was was phenomenal you know a mishmash of actors and actresses that you wouldn't think would be a part of a Transformers franchise. But you had Eric Idle, you had Judge Nilsson, and at that time, the only thing I knew from Judge Nilsson, it was The Breakfast Club. But he was the voice of Rodimus, or Hot Rod, or Rodimus Prime. Leonard Nimoy, who we all know as Spock. You had Casey Kadem, who was a very famous radio DJ back in the day. Robert Stack from... unsolved mysteries fame and of course you have peter cullen and frank walker who voiced those same characters in the show uh optimus prime and megatron respectively and the biggest star or the biggest name a part of this was orson wells orson wells the man who gave us citizen kane he was a voice It's okay. And not only a voice, but the voice of Unicron. And boy, that was a haunting voice he gave for this character. I mean, spooky as all get out. That was perfect for me. I don't know if they could have picked anybody better for that. Unfortunately, 12 months before, or 10 months before the film came out, Orson Welles passed away. So this was officially his final performance of Unicron in the Transformers, the movie, which is weird. No disrespect to the Transformers, the movie, but... This was a man who a lot of people considered as a genius or one of the great innovators in film, you know, with Citizen Kane. A lot of film that changed the way movies were made in Hollywood, the way you approached films in Hollywood. And this was his final gift to everybody. was the Transformers the movie and I'm trying to I'm trying to say it in a way that's not disrespectful to anything nothing a part of this because I loved his performance in this and it did nothing but elevate this film and so I think it needs you need to put more put some respect on this performance of Unicron uh as the one thing that he left behind for us to remember especially us of a certain age because i mean the target audience here who was watching this film in 1986 didn't know what a citizen kane was didn't know what a rosebud was and so we we just do the voice but as you got older and knew who elson wells was you were like wow that was him you know same thing with leonard nemo you know uh I knew of Star Trek and everything, but I didn't know Leonard Nimoy had portrayed Spock at that time. And so when I found out that that was him, I was like, man, it kind of just puts a little more gravitas to the film. But the true star of this movie was the soundtrack. This had the most rocking, heavy metal, mid-80s soundtrack of any... film i have ever watched this this soundtrack was booming i've been i've been listening to it for like a week since i decided to do this show i'm just just listening to it and i'm not a heavy metal guy or you know i'm not a rock guy but you know i listen to all genres of film so i can stand it man but this was a booming soundtrack to go with this booming movie and thinking back you know which is a no-brainer in the grand scheme of it all the thinking back it's like of course you'll have a heavy metal soundtrack to a film that has heavy metal robots you know so it all made sense but y'all know me i'm slow it takes a while for things to register for me to get it and so it took me 40 years for it to, for I could get an understanding of that. I mean, you couldn't have, run DMC providing the soundtrack for the Transformers, the movie. But any who's, we pick up at the film, you know, they're on Cybertron and there's the battle we're, we're thrust right into it. Now, I don't know, cause I didn't, I was trying to do a little research and trying to find that, you know, what was the genesis of this film? in. was this supposed to be season three or this was always the plan but it felt like it started off like a a continuation of season two i mean we're thrust right into the action uh the the battle is of course going on the decepticons or uh or you know they conquered uh cybertron and the autobots they are. you know operating from the moon of cybertron and they're preparing for a counter offense and so uh optimus prime he sends the shuttles to autobot city on earth for supplies and that was also another thing now you have to think about this movie in the sense of in the sense of 80s logic as opposed to you know common sense or reality whereas cybertron is like directly next to earth by their logic that's the way they made it seem you know oh just go get like it like it's at the corner store go get supplies from autobot city on earth and so it is it's one of those suspend disbelief days and there's a lot of them plus it's a cartoon so there's all that but anyways i'm sure i'm breaking it down 47 year old kevin that now it's seven year old kevin this is a completely different review uh they go to get the surprise and and immediately immediately they're discovered uh the decepticons discovered their their plan and they killed the autobots they killed i think it was ratchet ironhide uh somebody else but they died and so immediately i'm like wait wait this is this is this ain't like the cartoon they are legit dying here and so they are uh the stakes are a little higher they're going more grander in this film and uh that was more in the effort to kind of set you up to what you have in what you have in store for you well what they have in store for you in a few minutes or this in this movie and so okay we we get to Autobot City Hot Rod he's there with Daniel uh who is the son of Spike and you know in the cartoon Spike was a kid. So we get to the movie and He's grown up now. Like I say, it's been 20 years. And so he's grown up and he has a son of his own. I was confused. This was the first moment I was confused watching this movie as a kid. I'm like, wait, so this is Spike? No, this is Daniel. But this is Daniel is Spike's son. Wait, he had a son? You know, I didn't know. Like I said, we didn't have internet back then. We didn't have. tea leaves and all this other stuff to kind of explain the story before you got to the theater you had to just run with it and so all right we get that we get this kind of scene where it's explained a little bit you know but my adrenaline was picking up around this time and i really wasn't paying attention just to be honest and fair and so hot rod he sees the Decepticons and attacks and the Decepticons they all leap into battle Optimus arrives with reinforcements and engage Megatron in combat both of them are mortally wounded and this forced the Decepticons to retreat into I forgot where they went but anyways we get to the scene we get to the scene where where... Optimus Prime, I mean, Optimus Prime has been shot before on the show. He's been beaten to a pulp before on the show. But this one was different. This was so different to the point to whereas he was changing colors. His colors were starting to fade. The paint was starting to fade on that 18-wheeler. And you wonder what? what's his what's his problem i mean won't he won't he get up he's laying on a table and everybody's everybody's freaking out what is happening right now and he opens up his chest he gives the matrix of leadership to uh ultra magnus and he tells him that the power of the light uh well at least its power will light the autobots darkest hour and then he dies um every every kid that was in the theater cried every kid cried i remember that so fondly like it was yesterday it was traumatizing to us man i i don't recall crying i'm gonna be 100 honest i don't recall crying i could have But I don't think I did. And the reason I didn't, I think because my dad was sitting there. And so I didn't want to cry in front of my dad. But trust me. I was hurt what was definitely hurt that I can I can guarantee now I probably did shed tear or two I think I was more confused than anything I think that's probably why I didn't cry but I was so confused because I'm like wait this doesn't happen in movies you don't kill the hero you don't go see die hard and Bruce Willis dies five minutes into the movie in in the rest of the movie is supposed to play out no who who wants to watch that who does that and so i didn't it didn't make sense it did not make sense to me i was trying to wrap my head around what was going on it and i know i didn't cry but i remember i remember everybody else crying but it definitely it definitely hurt because i was i was a big transformers fan i'm i'm at the time i had all the toys but not all of them But I had, I definitely had the, Optimus Prime toy with the trailer that turned into the base. I had all that. I was, I was all in with Optimus and I just could not believe it. I refused to believe it. So as the rest of the movie played out, it took me a while to get my bearings together. It, it, it didn't happen. Honestly, didn't happen until the, the reveal of Ultron. or unicron not ultron that's a completely different franchise uh unicron and unicron had found megatron floating in space and megatron was floating in space because star stream who was like the punching bag of megatron throughout the tv show finally stood up and grew a pair then and stood up to megatron who was also wounded mortally in that battle with uh uh optimus prime he threw him off the plane he he he declared a mutiny i guess you could say and threw him off of the ship that they were on and he was left dying in space drifting and unicron frowned and offered him a chance of life because he was dead he was good is dead and Unicron in exchange wanted his service wanted him to serve him and megatron is like fine no problem no problem didn't die and he starts to kill megatron and he's like no i'm good i'm gonna serve you i'll serve you and he he started the transformation and this this is where i got locked back in in the film because this was the coldest scene when you Megatron exchanged his body to a new body to become Gravatron and Galvatron was such a sleeker cooler design than Megatron and he was actually more frightening in this in this new new version of himself and his mission was to go and get the matrix of leadership who is currently being possessed by ultra mag so uh that's where the movie starts to pick back up and it wasn't a long gap between those moments there but it was just it was and when you think about it now like i felt this way when i re-watched it uh a few days ago i was i said okay this is really good storytelling here i didn't appreciate it back then because i didn't care i just wanted to see robots fight. you know but now i appreciate the storytelling there because you have the death of of of one character in the rebirth of another really the death of two um you had the death of optimus prime and you had the death of megatron and megatron he was reborn into galvatron I know that sounds crazy, but you get the gist. But it was actually some good storytelling there in those moments. So now we get to a portion of the film where it kind of it goes off the rails a little bit for me. You know, when you have the gearhead things, you had the Dinobots. And I never was a Dinobot guy. I did not like the Dinobots. It is nothing. that they were doing that was upsetting it was just for me logically it was stupid why would you have dino bots you know why would you have robot dinosaurs or or robots that transform into dinosaurs you're not disguising nothing you're still metal so in my mind and this is me at seven in my mind i'm like this is stupid and i still feel that way to this day that is dumb i did not like but i get it for the toys aspect of it all for the business aspect of it all over there at hashbro or is it hashbro yeah they they they were just looking to sell toys but it just did not logically makes sense and with the the junk trons or junketrons or whatever they were called didn't like that either it was like y'all just trying to make more toys or sell more toys it those those characters really held no bearing on the movie so uh we get to the point where megatron uh not megatron i'm sorry gavitron has found them and he starts to attack uh the remaining autobots ultra magnus is trying to open up the lead uh matrix of leadership because he think this is their darkest hour no he couldn't open it up he couldn't he couldn't open it and they continue fighting eventually the planet that they were on unicron arrives and unicron is already like a planet but he's more like a moon a small moon. you know scale wise but still a giant transformer and he can transform and he transformed into this big old robot i mean bruh this was gangsta i'm like how on god's green earth or out of space god's green out of space how are they going to venture fankris this villain he's too big he's too big. But anywho, one thing leads to another. Galvatron gets the Matrix of Leadership from Ultra Magnus. So instead of having this and handing it over to his new master, Unicron, he threatens Unicron with it. In typical Megatron fashion, he wants Unicron to do his bidding now that he has the Matrix of Leadership. And so this is when he transformed, I believe. This is when Unicron said, oh, you think you must you must you must don't know who you messing with. So he transforms into the big old giant humanoid version of himself. And he just decimates Cybertron, destroys. I mean, it wasn't even about eating it. He just wrecked it. like oh you playing with me no problem so gavitron he went to attack him and unicron swallowed him and me and so the autobots they arrived uh and they continued to battle with the decepticons uh and um the other one you know the the junk junketrons or whatever and the uh uh dinobots or trying to defend Cybertron and you have Hot Rod's ship is damaged and he and his group of Autobots they crash into Unicron's eye they go through his eye and now they're inside of Unicron and Daniel is there as well who he's there to save his father along with the other Autobots who were there and trying to survive the digestive system of Unicron And the group, they managed to help him out. And so Galvatron, he attempts to, you know, ally himself with Hot Rod. But Unicron forces him to attack Hot Rod and almost kill him. But he recovers and activates the Matrix. And this was the peak moment of the Transformers, the movie. When, when... When Hot Rod rolled over, got that Matrix, and began to open it up. And he just opened it. Because everybody throughout the film, this was, like I said, perfect setup throughout this movie. That's why it took a while. you had to grow old to appreciate the storytelling elements that they used in this film throughout the film they set it up to whereas uh ultra magnus tried to open it he couldn't um uh galvatron tried to open it he couldn't uh a unicron is is seeking it so but they put so much emphasis on this matrix of leadership and nobody could crack it and to have hot rod just open it with ease because he is the true leader he is the one that the the matrix of leadership chose to lead the autobots into the future and he opened that thing and became rodimus prime the new autobot leader at that moment was phenomenal he easily beat a galvatron he just he just tossed him through Go. Unicron like he was a little a little uh crumbled up piece of paper he threw into the trash and then he used the matrix power to destroy Unicron and then they escaped with the other Autobots as Unicron uh uh exploded you know uh blew them up and uh Decepticons they all retreat like they normally do and this was like just epic It was an epic conclusion to this war. And then as the movie has gone off, you know, this is pre post-credit scenes and films. We got a post-credit scene at the very end of the movie when you see the severed head of Unicron orbiting Cybertron. And the movie cuts to black. This movie was phenomenal. I still get joys. Is it the greatest animated film of all time? No. Is the artwork a little rough? Yes, it was 1986. You know, this is before Pixar and DreamWorks and Illumination. You weren't going to get top quality animation. But if you appreciate the style of the 80s animation and the style of the animated series that came out around that era, this is a... perfect representation of that this was uh such a joy to watch over again um not not so much a joy in 1986 for a child but it's definitely a joy to revisit and to uh you know go down this nostalgic road and conjure up all of these memories you have a plan with your transformers and playing with your gi joes and uh having a crossover in your own living room or in your bedroom or whatever wherever you played with those toys is something that you didn't get from the michael bay transformers films you you just didn't get that and the as much as the live action films have their charm it pales in comparisons to me to the transformers the movies 40 years later, it's still, still a joy to watch. But now I believe in September they're doing a re-release of the film in theaters. It's called the Apology Tour. That's legit. They're doing the Apology Tour. And it's supposed to be extra scenes, deleted scenes. it's it's going to be like an apology tour to whereas i guess they're going to apologize for the optimist of it all you know it took them 40 years but they're they're finally going to apologize to everybody for ruining their childhood so big ups to them for that i i i appreciate that uh does it go back and erase all the trauma i deal with no but hey it helps it's a step here's a step yeah i plan to go see it because i want to see the new footage i want to see what uh you know does it change the movie any does it does it what kind of changes are they going to make to be honest with you i don't want to see octopus in i don't want to see him resurrect octopus prime in the film even though i feel that's probably what they're going to do but the movie the movie needed that to be honest with you you know to elevate hot rod to become rodman's prime without that without that there is there is no movie you know so i i'm really uh i really hope they don't touch that So just leave it be. Leave it be. But we'll see. I forgot the date, but I know it was in September. But I want to know, honestly, if you're around my age, if you grew up in the 80s and you went and saw this movie, if you watched the animated show, did you feel the same way I felt? Were you as traumatized as I was as a youngster? Did it? Did it? did it break your heart when optimus prime passed away in that film and what was your favorite who was your favorite autobot who was your favorite decepticon i will i would love to know and do you think that the live action films this is my last question i know that's a lot i don't think the act's have this many questions but do you ever think that that live action films will ever capture what the animated tv show or or this movie gave us i would love to know that because i don't think so the closest one you got to it was bumblebee that was the closest you got to it but all the rest no i don't know if they can do it because it's number one number well Anyway, that's a whole nother show. That's a whole nother show. I'm just curious. I'm curious. Do you think that we'll ever, ever get a live action version that can have that same charm, that same nostalgic throwback feel that we got back in the day? Subscribe to the kbradionetwork.com website where you can be notified of... all new episodes and go back and listen to previous episodes here on the site also don't forget about the kb radio network channel on youtube subscribe to the uh youtube channel and like this video while you're there don't forget about the five stars the reviews and sharing this show if you're listening on apple podcast spotify iheart radio wherever you are currently listening to movie goodness here on the kb radio network everybody thank you for joining me for this retro throwback review of the 40 year anniversary to the transformers the movie oh man it's it felt so good to watch it again i'm not gonna lie it's been so long since i watched that movie and i had the i had the dvd just somewhere i don't know where is that but i found it i found i found where i can watch it i watched it again and man it felt good to go back in time i want you all to know that i love you continue to love everyone and until we speak again you all be blessed