They never really stopped, though they kind of went down for 2 years during the early 90's. Europe and Japan kept making them for a time, then America got Generation 2, basically the same old thing with some new things and a good comic book. Beast Wars was next, and yes they made an Optimus that was a gorilla, but it was a DIFFERENT CHARACTER, as was Megatron. Optimus PrimAL was a ship captain who got stranded on prehistoric earth while chasing the badguys through time from 300 years in the future. Vehicles aren't technically useful millions of years in the past. Beast Machines continued that, and though I liked it, many didn't because it was too much of a departure on any concept. Robots in Disguise, the current series, is a kiddie anime they imported solely for nostalgia appeal and the characters Optimus Prime(aka Super Fire Convoy), Ultra Magnus(aka God Magnus), and Megatron/Galvatron(aka Gigatron/Devil Gigatron) are new characters that use the names because they are the original series names. Period. Oh, and anyone who wants Megatron that turns into a gun, good luck getting it through the law system here. The best you can hope for is a green toy-ish gun with an orange muzzle. Next up: Transformers Armada, which utilizes similar characters in futuristic forms battling over a race of tiny TFs that give them special powers. Hopefully Armada will be less kiddie.
Slashdot Mirror
They never really stopped, though they kind of went down for 2 years during the early 90's. Europe and Japan kept making them for a time, then America got Generation 2, basically the same old thing with some new things and a good comic book. Beast Wars was next, and yes they made an Optimus that was a gorilla, but it was a DIFFERENT CHARACTER, as was Megatron. Optimus PrimAL was a ship captain who got stranded on prehistoric earth while chasing the badguys through time from 300 years in the future. Vehicles aren't technically useful millions of years in the past. Beast Machines continued that, and though I liked it, many didn't because it was too much of a departure on any concept. Robots in Disguise, the current series, is a kiddie anime they imported solely for nostalgia appeal and the characters Optimus Prime(aka Super Fire Convoy), Ultra Magnus(aka God Magnus), and Megatron/Galvatron(aka Gigatron/Devil Gigatron) are new characters that use the names because they are the original series names. Period. Oh, and anyone who wants Megatron that turns into a gun, good luck getting it through the law system here. The best you can hope for is a green toy-ish gun with an orange muzzle. Next up: Transformers Armada, which utilizes similar characters in futuristic forms battling over a race of tiny TFs that give them special powers. Hopefully Armada will be less kiddie.