80's and 90's

Chat about stuff other than Transformers.
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dura
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Post by dura »

I think wind-up Insection toys would be great for attracting kids into the line.

We need old-school race tracks/place set that kids can put together, place their motorized Autobots with electric brushes underneath. You press a button and watch them go, press down more to go faster and let up to slow down.
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Post by Skyquake87 »

Really? Haven't things like Scaletrix gone the way of Hornby Trains and become a ludicrously expensive product that only men in their 50s can afford?

Those Hex Bugs seem to do alright, and Transformers have done their own versions of those.



..they don't Transform though.
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Post by dura »

Technology will create the demand which will create competition which will lower the price point.

For example, now almost anyone can afford getting Internet, laptops, tablets, smartphones whose electronics are way more advanced than toys.
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Post by Skyquake87 »

Aye, but conversely, whilst technology gets cheaper, toys aren't. I think we're seeing the start of the end for physical toys, especially as personal technology gets cheaper and cheaper and if and when VR becomes a thing.
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Post by Sades »

Skyquake87 wrote:Aye, but conversely, whilst technology gets cheaper, toys aren't. I think we're seeing the start of the end for physical toys, especially as personal technology gets cheaper and cheaper and if and when VR becomes a thing.
For older kids, yeah. But I think they'll always have a place when it comes to the younger set. It's important for young kids to play.
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Post by dura »

Kids aren't buying toys anymore. All the toy stores like KB Toys and Toys R Us are going away or have gone away.

Hasbro needs to go high-tech with their Transformers, to the point that Best Buy will sell them. Or maybe get a deal with Apple for a iTransformers line.

It's adult collectors that want their toys stripped of all tech and electronics.

It like Blackberry saying people like a physical keypad and not progress to touch screen, because some customers kept saying they hate touch screen. So Blackberry bowed to these dinosaurs and looked what happened to them.
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Post by dura »

The 80's were a magical time:



Dark and gritty does not work. Watch Batman v. Superman.
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Post by Sades »

dura, due to the amount of double posts being made by you these past few days I'm going to have to ask that you please cut back a bit. If you really feel like adding to a thread you were the last poster in, please edit your last post. Thanks.
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Post by dura »

Why have the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles taken off and He-man and She-ra are forever stuck in development hell?
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Post by Skyquake87 »

Part of the thing with Turtles is that they've never really gone away. They've always gone through various updates, but kept to the core concept. Their popularity has perhaps levelled off somewhat, but they keep appealing to kids regularly enough.

After the original trilogy of films, it wasn't long after that Image started doing new comics and Saban did that pretty decent live action show for Fox Kids. From there, there's been various comic book series, one-off animated films and stuff. I think what probably saved them from the same fate as He-Man was not rolling out a nostalgia tinged reboot around the turn of the century when '80s Nostalgia properly kicked in. Things have gathered pace again since Nickelodeon's rather ace cartoon series kicked off and now we've got a new set of live action films which seem to be doing alright.

As for why He-Man and Thundercats haven't managed to keep to this pattern, I don't know. Not ninja enough? Probably the dominance of things like Harry Potter and Ben 10 in the world of magic and transformative power ups. I think as well that fantasy type stuff is a much tougher sell (look how those things like the Golden Compass and the Percy Jackson films have foundered on the rock of indifference) - especially to children these days. I've pondered given how popular Game Of Thrones and Vikings are whether some sort of live action show would work better for He-Man.
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Post by dura »

Was Voltron a Japanese cartoon dubbed in English?

Was Robotech as well?

I know they were animated in Japan. Were they also written by Japanese writers?

While I'm trying to watch the Japanese G1 I hear the same sound effects, choreography, general feel and tone of Voltron and Robotech.

Perhaps is the Japanese G1 cartoon episode were all dubbed in English, they would have been just enjoyable to me as a kid watching Voltron and Robotech.

Were Voltron and Robotech just Japanese animated and written cartoons dubbed in English?
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

dura wrote:Was Voltron a Japanese cartoon dubbed in English?

Was Robotech as well?

I know they were animated in Japan. Were they also written by Japanese writers?

While I'm trying to watch the Japanese G1 I hear the same sound effects, choreography, general feel and tone of Voltron and Robotech.

Perhaps is the Japanese G1 cartoon episode were all dubbed in English, they would have been just enjoyable to me as a kid watching Voltron and Robotech.

Were Voltron and Robotech just Japanese animated and written cartoons dubbed in English?
I know dura is banned, but I'm bored and I want to talk about something other than politics and video games.

Voltron was 2 Japanese shows dubbed into English, the first show Go Lion was the more popular show in the US, the second show whose name I can't remember or even know how to spell was never quite as popular. Both series were made by the same animation company and Voltron was so popular and made so much money in the US that World Event Productions (WEP for short) went back asked them to make new episodes of Go Lion and a team-up special called The Fleet of Doom which finally had the two Voltrons team up (kinda). In the 90s WEP brought Voltron back as a CGI show and from I saw of it the story was OK, but the CGI was awful even by standards of the 90s. There was a Nickelodeon series that didn't do all that well because it was coming in after Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. Currently DreamWorks animation has a new Voltron series on Netflix.

Robotech was 3 different Japanese shows and anyone who care can read my posts in this thread.

Headmasters, Masterforce, and Victory were dubbed into English but it's abysmal dubbing and writing (you can find these dubs on youtube but don't say I didn't warn you). According to Shout Factory they wanted to do a new dub but were told by Hasbro "NO DUB" because some at Hasbro were never liked these shows and were only wanting to release them to shut the fans up.
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Post by Selkadoom »

Cyberstrike nTo wrote:I know dura is banned, but I'm bored and I want to talk about something other than politics and video games.

Voltron was 2 Japanese shows dubbed into English, the first show Go Lion was the more popular show in the US, the second show whose name I can't remember or even know how to spell was never quite as popular. Both series were made by the same animation company and Voltron was so popular and made so much money in the US that World Event Productions (WEP for short) went back asked them to make new episodes of Go Lion and a team-up special called The Fleet of Doom which finally had the two Voltrons team up (kinda). In the 90s WEP brought Voltron back as a CGI show and from I saw of it the story was OK, but the CGI was awful even by standards of the 90s. There was a Nickelodeon series that didn't do all that well because it was coming in after Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. Currently DreamWorks animation has a new Voltron series on Netflix.

Robotech was 3 different Japanese shows and anyone who care can read my posts in this thread.

Headmasters, Masterforce, and Victory were dubbed into English but it's abysmal dubbing and writing (you can find these dubs on youtube but don't say I didn't warn you). According to Shout Factory they wanted to do a new dub but were told by Hasbro "NO DUB" because some at Hasbro were never liked these shows and were only wanting to release them to shut the fans up.
Amusingly the new Voltron cartoon is animated by the sane studio that did Avatar and is very much ripping of designs from the characters.
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Post by Tetsuro »

I think what put the final nail in the coffin for me, at least as far as saturday morning cartoons are concerned, was the proliferation of badly animated CGI shows, as well as the increased use of dubbing instead of subtitles and realizing just how bad the Finnish TV cartoon dubs actually are.

When I was little in the early 90's, I think about half of the cartoons I watched were subtitled, which is par course for Finnish television in general; in fact, dubbing is pretty much reserved only for children's programming, but back then, you could still watch shows like Ducktales, Captain Planet and Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles with subtitles. In the 80's, a popular form of "dubbing" was more similar to the Lektor which is used in Poland and Russia, where a single narrator speaks everyone's lines - or just narrates the whole thing, while you could still hear the original audio faintly in the background. Fortunately, that had gone out of fashion by the time, but I could still catch it via re-runs and such.

Unfortunately, subbed kids' shows pretty much no longer exist on Finnish television - even the subscription channels that show re-runs of the shows I used to watch as a kid now show them dubbed.
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

Selkadoom wrote:Amusingly the new Voltron cartoon is animated by the sane studio that did Avatar and is very much ripping of designs from the characters.
No wonder Allua looked like Korra with elf ears. :p

Overall I would say Voltron: Legendary Defender is a great example of how you do a reboot and make it better than the original (like Battlestar Galactica).
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My review of Voltron: Legendary Defender w/spoilers

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I'm a child of the 80s. While I'm still a huge fan of The Transformers, Robotech, Robotix, G. I. Joe: A Real American Hero, and Voltron: Defender of the Universe I also tend to treat Voltron as something I'll get around too, which is something I'm working on. The original Voltron: Defender of the Universe is a pair of Toei Studio anime shows that were re-wrote, re-edited, re-dubbed, remixed, and basically remade by a company called World Events Production (or WEP for short) into the American series Voltron: Defender of the Universe. The series is probably best remembered for being an animated version of Power Rangers and being the other 80s robot show that had Peter Cullen and Neil Ross. The first series basically had 5 space explorers crash landing on Planet Arus, a planet that has been under siege by Planet Doom and it's ruler the evil King Zarkon. The leader of Arus, the beautiful Princess Allura needs help and the five explorers (whose names are Keith, Lance, Pidge, Hunk, and Sven) to find 5 robot lions that form Voltron a powerful robot who can stop Zarkon's evil plans. They do and then each episode basically has Zarkon and later on his son Prince Lotor cook up and evil plan that never works and then they send a robeast, (giant robot monsters that Zarkon's witch Haggard creates), that Voltron ultimately defeats. Eventually Sven gets injured and is sent to another planet to recover (in the Japanese version the character dies) and Allura becomes the pilot of the Blue Lion. The second series is about another group of space explorers trying to find a new planet to colonize due to over-population. It features a Voltron made from 15 different land, sea, and air ships. While the series was extremely popular in the 80s during it's 2 season run, it was so popular that WEP actually went back to Toei and had all-new episodes of the Lion Voltron show made and a crossover special called Voltron: The Fleet of Doom. After that WEP decided to try out some other projects. In the late 90s they made a semi-sequel show called Voltron In the Third Dimension a CGI show that didn't last very long due to poor designs and the CGI looking like crap. WEP tried again with Voltron Force another sequel series that didn't fans and critics didn't like. The rights were sold to Classic Media and then they were bought by DreamWorks Animation who signed a deal to create a bunch of new cartoon shows for Netflix and one of those was Voltron: Legendary Defender which is a reboot series.

Voltron: Legendary Defender takes the basic concept for the Lion Voltron keeps the basics but also makes some real radical changes to the characters. The basic plot is that in the future humanity is exploring the outer planets and on one such mission Commander Holt, his son Matt, and Shiro are captured by the Galan Empire. One year later 3 cadets at Galaxy Garrison (Hunk, Lance, and Pidge) with the help of an ace pilot Keith, who left Galaxy Garrison for mysterious reasons, find out that Shiro has escaped and crashed landed on Earth warning that Zarkon and Galan Empire is coming and they are looking for a weapon called Voltron. They rescue Shiro and then they find the Blue Lion on Earth. The Blue Lion that takes them to Arus and the Castle of Lions where they find Allura and her steward Corran in cryogenic status for 10,000 years, also in Allura's pod is family of space mice that have gained some of her intelligence and/or telepathic link with her. With the blue lion awaken Zarkon's forces are now able to find the other lions and the Castle. So five raw rookies become the new Paladins of Voltron. Allura gives Keith, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge each a device called baynad that becomes a different weapon for each other of them Keith it's a sword, Hunk it's mini-gun, Lance it's a rifle, and Pidge it's a dagger/grapple hook combo. The black baynad is missing and since Shiro has a cybernetic arm he doesn't really need one. They find the other lions and form Voltron just barely and defeat a war fleet. Over the course of the season we learn that Shiro lost his arm in a gladiator match and we learn that Pidge is actually girl and was undercover so she can find out what happened to her father and brother who were on the same mission that Zarkon captured Shiro. We also learn that Zarkon was the original Paladin for the Black Lion and has it's baynad!

There is a lot of universe building in only 11 episodes and strangely Voltron is not in every episode and there are only 2 robeats in this season and that works. Allura looks like Korra from The Legend of Korra if she were elven space princess. While she's not a pilot...yet. She is smart, funny, and has a tragic backstory that her and Corran are the last of their race. They are also not from Arus but another planet that Zarkon destroyed 10,000 years ago. The animation is solid and the new look for Voltron is nice blend of classic with some new features. The voice acting is top notch with Kim Brooks (Ash from Mass Effect video game series) doing a really great turn as Allura.

While I know the series is aimed at a younger audience the jokes tend to be about Hunk getting space sick and throwing up and in the first episode Lance farts in the Blue lion when it's taking them to Arus. Not my kind of humor, but it's not as bad as it could have been. The show also has fun with the lore of the original series in ways that I find amusing and other fans may not.

Keith seems to be only Paladin that doesn't get much characterization since most of it goes to Shiro, Hunk, and Pidge. Lance is still a jerk who thinks he's the best pilot but Keith is the better pilot and everyone knows it. Keith seems only there to be slight less of a jerk than Lance and seems to be there to verbally spar with Lance. There is a sub-plot in the final episodes where he gets drenched with some magical chemical that is the fuel to Zarkon's forces that maybe allows him in the red lion to battle Zarkon to a draw. Shiro seems to be destined to become a villain or die and while season 1 teases both they don't do either.

The biggest problem with Voltron: Legendary Defender season 1 is that it needed more episodes to help flesh it out but that is also a problem with many Netflix shows like Jessica Jones, Orange is the New Black, and Fuller House, but if that is the worst thing I can say than it's doing something right.

Reboots are a dime a dozen now of days and while a lot of them suck, most of them hover at just being average, then there are a very few that actually better than the originals and this is IMHO is one of those, the only other reboot in recent memory that is better than it's original is Battlestar Galactica and now Voltron: Legendary Defender. All 11 episodes are currently streaming on Netflix. I give Voltron: Legendary Defender season 1, a legendary 4.5 out 5. Check it out on Netflix.
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Post by Denyer »

It's a very low bar to clear, the original series is appalling, but definitely enjoyed the new version.
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

Denyer wrote:It's a very low bar to clear, the original series is appalling, but definitely enjoyed the new version.
Yeah the original series was weird. Some of it owning to American standards and practices still being pretty strict in 80s even for a syndicated cartoon show. I honestly don't know how Robotech got through some of it more "controversial" stuff (stuff like the death toll in First War, and Lancer cross dressing to be Yellow Dancer in the Third War) to air. Although to be fair I think WEP was playing it far safer for Voltron: Defender of the Universe than HG was for Robotech.

Now of days none of that stuff wouldn't bat eyelash. I'm generally surprised that was no major outcry (or at least none that aware of) over Pidge's gender and if Pidge is a transgender character or not.
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Post by Tetsuro »

Cyberstrike nTo wrote:Yeah the original series was weird. Some of it owning to American standards and practices still being pretty strict in 80s even for a syndicated cartoon show. I honestly don't know how Robotech got through some of it more "controversial" stuff (stuff like the death toll in First War, and Lancer cross dressing to be Yellow Dancer in the Third War) to air.
I think Robotech debuted as a network show and hit syndication later while Voltron was made for syndication first. Either that or Voltron was a weekday show and Robotech in saturday mornings.

I get the impression that companies like WEP played it safe - like real safe - when it came to editing Japanese shows for American distribution, by applying even stricter standards on them than what you'd find on a contemporary American cartoon.

Although in the case of Voltron, I think it's a combination of both them being unlucky since they originally requested Daltanias as "the one with the lion" but got sent Golion instead, and Golion itself only being noteworthy because of the violence. It was pretty bloody even at the standards of Japanese super robot shows of the time - and they were forced to edit all of it out.

I do find it amusing though that despite of all the censorship claims on wikipedia over Tranzor Z (the US edit of Mazinger Z), I ended up checking the final episode and the villain pretty unambigiously dies at the end, even in the edited version, unlike the bad guy of Voltron who is simply seen flying away at the end shaking his fist at the heroes and swearing to get them another day, that dastardly villain that he is.
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Post by Marisa »

Were 80's cartoons the best, like Voltron, Robotech, He-man/She-ra, G1 Transformers, GI Joe, Super Friends, etc...?

Were the toys better too?
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