And now..."Normal" Mudflap

The experiment continues. If Skids can have a "normal" TF head, why not his bro?

Compare the head to...you know, this thing:

It required a lot more drawing than Skids since his head is so bizarre, but I suppose I like the result. The monocle serves to further strengthen the "twin" element between he and Skids, I feel.

What do youuuuu think?

More fun with ROTF Skids

Dr. William F. Vangelus of WTF@TFW fame, amongst other various corners of the internet, asked to see my Normal Skids with the original's trusty monocle in tow. Anon King Laffo always delivers:

So hey, all one of you that looks at this blog: What are your thoughts?

New Transformers Animated toys found at retail!

Deluxe wave 7 of Transformers Animated is out! This was found by Sixshot of TFW2005 in Tuscon, Arizona at Wal-Mart. Repaints or not, seeing something new for this line actually out in the wild really warms the old nerd-heart. I hope some of the new molds follow quickly!

Medicom's Rockman Kubricks

Aren't these guys great? These are Medicom's first two sets of "Kubricks" and "Be@r Bricks" for the Rock Man video game series, more well known to those in the west as, of course, Mega Man. The Kubricks represent the titular character and "Blue", or Protoman, with the Be@r Bricks being called 1UpBears. You can preorder them here and here at HobbyLinkJapan. They're a little pricey, but I love 'em. I'm in.

War Within Animated - Episode 2

Here's episode 2 of the fan-animated "War Within" Transformers comic, in which I play Skids, Kickback, various crowd voices, and Gravitas in the look back at episode 1. Only for the super nerdy. Check it out.

Further Preview of Transformers Ongoing #1

Comic Book Resource has a new look at the big new Transformers comic. If you wanna check it out, please know that it contains a major spoiler.

As with most news about this comic series, the discussion over at TFW2005.com has been mostly that of negative reaction toward the new art style Don Figueroa has adapted. You know, the grand "experiment" that just happened to land on something more movie-style than anything. Also criticized this time around is the coloring, which is obscenely bright despite the dialogue hinting that this takes place at night time. I'll give you a look at one of the panels, spoiler free:

Over the years, I've loved Don's Transformers art and I hate having anything bad to say, but I just can't help being turned off by these designs. Some of this is retread of some older opinions, but screw it, this is my damn blog! It's mostly the faces, same as most. Some defend the style's ability to emote better than the "standard" look, but I don't see how it's any dire improvement in that field.

Old Hot Rod up there is fairly expressive, but the construction of the face made it hard for me to even tell what some parts were at first. I "get it" now but it was initially a bit hard to read, and no, I don't see how that design allows this expression "more" than a simpler one. Plus, given the general skeletal look, pretty much any expression is going to read more "hey I'm a mean scary robot, argh!" than anything. That's about all any of the drawings so far have done. Cold grimaces everywhere! One forum post mentioned how tired the "humans mistake Autobots for evil!" angle is, but heh, if they did look like this, I can't think of any other appropriate response.

Maybe that's unfair. It probably depends completely upon context, but come on...you know that seems about right.

I know the old, simple "liquid metal" faces and general aesthetic might be seen as too cartoony to some, or too worn out, but I feel this is kind of so far in the other direction that some of the general attributes that have made me love Transformers in the first place are a bit lost. I don't look at these guys and see cool robots I could actually relate to and be friends with, I don't see "heroic Autobot", I just see machine here to smash shit.

Oh well.

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