All language subtitles for Icons.Unearthed.S11E02.Its.Over.Prime.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-Kitsune_track3_[eng]

♪ The Transformers ♪

♪ More than meets the eye ♪

Transformers
revolutionized the toy market
in 1984.

Transformers.

Two toys in one, plus the
puzzle aspect.

Plus a comic book
and a major animated series.

Excellent.

Hasbro was
a marketing machine back then.

With one directive.

The goal was to sell toys.

We can never keep them in
stock.

♪ Robots in disguise ♪

The bots were
masters of deception,

but they couldn't hide
if no one was watching.

It did not perform well.

Who even knows we're here?

The ratings were terrible.

Somebody save us.

The franchise was
sinking.

Two of my best writers
threatened to quit.

We knew it was over.

I was done with it
by that time, frankly.

Prime told me there'd be days
like this.

And just as Hollywood
beckoned...

You write the movie,
and that's what they said.

Hasbro decided
the way to give

its most critical toy line new
life...

You want to kill 'em? Yes.

was actually death.

Die, Autobot.

It was like Custer's
last stand at the Alamo.

America's leading toy
company...

I think it was a big mistake.

was about to learn
that there are some things

you should never toy with.

And halfway through the movie,

every kid starts
screaming and crying.

You killed Optimus Prime?

Hated it, hated it.

And the future of
Transformers...

And I tried to buy Marvel...

- They were just reruns.
- It bombed financially.

This giant puppet.

was a string of
disasters.

And then a real kid talking to
him.

- No.
- I mean, what?

Even with less
than stellar ratings

for the 16 episodes
of season one,

Hasbro refused to give
up on the Transformers

syndicated cartoon and
ordered a second season

with 49 episodes.

More toys,
more concepts,

more writers,
more everything.

But not more
time to perfect scripts.

Well, we couldn't make
them perfect, of course not.

We did 13 in eight weeks.

What did you expect?

I'm amazed that we did
as well as we did.

Bryce had a new
boss too, Flint Dille,

hired by Sunbow Productions
to do one thing, sell toys.

There'd just been a decision,
we want better ratings

and we want this show
to have more edge to it.

It is seeming a little
bit like a kiddie show

and they wanted to power
it in another direction.

A green but ambitious

20-something production
executive.

I remember when Flint
Dille started on it.

Flint was not
dilly-dallying.

If he didn't approve of the
script,

he had the power to squash it.

I thought, well, that's fine,

except you're now in charge

of why we don't have a script
this week.

It was just a very
adversarial situation.

War in the writer's room

brought out the best in Flint.

He got his first big idea

as soon as he heard his
voice actors warming up.

I'm assuming control now.

I realized these actors
are like really funny.

If you got a better line
or a better way of doing it

or you wanna play off
each other, let's do it.

It was a great idea
on paper.

Well, why don't we
just read it ensemble,

who cares if people are
stepping on each other's lines?

I mean, they'll feel more alive.

Except on paper was
exactly

where Flint's ad-libbing
idea ran into trouble.

I didn't understand
why we couldn't change

dialogue in the recording
session.

The voice sessions in
animation are

supposed to lock the script in.
You give them a script

and they read it exactly
the way it is written

because the animators are

getting the same script

and they are going to
be animating the mouths

to match the dialogue.

Not only that,

Flint's unorthodox aroach
would be

going against a golden rule of
animation.

A friend of mine
who really knew
everything about animation,

guy named Gordon Kent,
explained to me,

"Well, they had perfect pause."

I said, "What's perfect pause?"

It was a clever trick

that Hanna-Barbera had refined

to become an industry standard.

Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera
figured out

that if you have one second

between every line of dialogue,

the human brain doesn't
really perceive that.

What's shaking?

The center of the
disturbance is over there.

If you do that and you
have 120 lines of dialogue,

you save two minutes of
animation.

That's a big deal for them.

Because that saved
big money.

But Flint's ensemble table read
style had no money-saving pauses

which made it an expensive
experiment.

So finally, we compromised
and said,

"We will do one read-through
with good enough takes

"and we will record
every line clean."

Old-school rules
for perfect pause.

Then let's record it, do it
ensemble so the players,

the characters actually seem
to be in the same room.

I kind of had a point.

I think we got to a better look
and feel.

Flint was kind of the pioneer
of this.

They can listen to a line and
decide, no,

we don't like that.
Let's try something better.

Perfect or not,
there was little time for pause

as the writing team set to
work churning out 49 episodes.

You're on this moving train

and you're working on each
car in a different phase.

And it was just kind of
like ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba.

It could get to be very
frenetic.

Short on writers,

some of Marvel's staff
were asked to step up.

I'm Paul Jeffrey Davids

and I had two roles
on The Transformers.

On the one hand, my day job was

being the production
coordinator,

and I was also a writer.

Paul was hired at
Marvel

by Transformers executive
producer Nelson Shin

despite one major problem.

I had never heard
of The Transformers.

I didn't even know the toys.

Paul had zero
Transformers knowledge,

but suddenly found himself face
to face

with professional voice actors.

There were those of us who were
one side of the pane of glass

and the voice actors who
were on the other side.

He had a front row
seat

to watch these actors
unleash Dille's frenetic,

sometimes even
chaotic dialogue...

- You failed to capture the girl?
- We had not counted on.

- You are supposed to be.
- Excellent.

that crackled with new energy.

Voice actors have to
be wonderful actors.

Autobots, transform for
action.

They are giving life

to a drawing,
and the great ones do.

Like Frank Welker.

Anything with Frank Welker
was a party.

Doing Insecticons, in the voice
he'd be a robot.

Scram your ram, Kickback.

There'd be
a cricket in there somewhere.

- Hey.
- You could have him

audition, "Can you have
a little more cricket?"

And there's a cricket
in his mouth with the character
and the robot.

Yeah, sure. Let's try
the Redwoods for a change
- change.

He was unearthly.

Okay, Autobots, let him have
it.

The gravitas of
Autobots leader

Optimus Prime was created by
Canadian actor Peter Cullen.

No, Ironhide, they're
not shooting at us.

I had written for
him before Transformers

in a thing called Robo Force.

♪ Robo Force ♪

Flint soon
discovered being a producer

meant managing talent

and not just inside the voice
booth.

Latta was the one who both the
voices

and characters he did

and his presence in the room

kind of defined why Sunbow was
different than everybody else.

I had to bail him outta
jail a couple times.

Three o'clock in the morning,
phone rings, "Hi Chris.

"Oh, you're in jail again?"
I'm thinking,

what does your life have to be

if I'm the adult you're
calling up to bail you out?

I never knew what he was
arrested for.

Jaywalking? Oh, okay.
Jaywalking, of course.

While Flint was
trying to reign in his talent

on The Transformers TV show,

the newly commissioned
Transformers movie was

in the hands of a writer
enjoying free reign.

I never met with Hasbro and
Sunbow.

They never met with me.

We didn't compare notes.

Ron, who had developed

the GI Joe series for Hasbro,

was a proven hand.

They went with me, they
trusted me.

Ready the shuttle for launch.

They trusted him so
implicitly

that his brief
was surprisingly brief.

Write the movie.
And that's what they said.

The directive was
write the movie.

Working off of almost
nothing.

I think they gave me some
pictures.

I think they gave me
some, what I call blurb.

But a picture
wasn't worth 1,000 blurbs

until Ron helped Hasbro
solve a future problem.

When a five-year-old kid
gets to be nine years old,

not into the same stuff anymore.

So they have to reinvent
themselves.

♪ The Transformers ♪

It would take years

to animate Ron's script
and get the movie into theaters.

And by that time, Hasbro
worried kids would lose interest

in the original G1 Transformers.

Those kids
are not in this anymore.

There's a whole group now.
It needs to be fresh for them.

Sold separately,
from Hasbro.

If you had a good product,

maybe the first year

you did X amount of business.

Second year because it was so
popular,

you'd do X plus 20%, 30%, 40%.

By the time you get to the third
year,

kids are looking for something
different.

They're looking for what's new.

To avoid losing these
bored children of the future,

and the consequent drop in toy
sales,

Hasbro wanted to future-proof
The Transformers Movie

by adding new lead characters.

By changing out the lead
characters and creating new
ones,

there was this theory
that that was going to make

the brands larger

because the audience had
changed.

And a new
generation of kids meant.

Big roles for all the new
characters.

That's too dangerous.

What choice do we have?

And by the way,

we can make new toys of all
those things.

To make room,
Hasbro wanted

to shelve some of the old
characters.

Toys were being discontinued
all along.

It's just we didn't usually kill
them.

Discontinuing a toy,
that was just business.

Killing them off in a
major motion picture,

a bold, creative decision.

It was decided that that was
what was gonna happen.

They were gonna kill off these
characters.

Well, there's some toys
were not doing too well.

You want to kill 'em? Yes!

Attack!

And not just a few.

There were an awful lot
of casualties that day.

This was
going to be a massacre.

The movie's body count
would run to dozens,

including some old favorites
and even the favorite.

"What about Optimus Prime?"
I said, yeah, great.

but you're gonna have to
bring him back in 90 days.

My biggest issue was Optimus
Prime.

- I mean, what?
- Like why?

And every time I asked that
question,

she's like, Vinny, don't ask.

But Hasbro was
convinced

the much-loved character that
launched the toy line had to go.

They had no clue of
the emotional investment

that so many children
had put into this.

You can't kill big daddy.

That made
it personal.

I was really worried that it
would be

very traumatic to kids.

Prime, you can't die.

Hey, we're killing the main
character.

Hope nobody minds.

Hated it.
Hated it.

While the
small screen Transformers
rumbled along,

a writer with a vision
was determined to take these
tiny toys

and reincarnate them for the big
screen.

I try to think in terms
of humanity, human beings.

He's like a warrior Buddhist.

I always kept that going.

The philosophy was
beautiful.

But what did the corporation
make of this?

Hasbro didn't care about the
characters as characters

because they still looked
at them as product.

♪ The Transformers ♪

They're all there just to sell
toys.

And so as long as we
have this opportunity,

we should introduce new
characters.

Like a brand-new
teenage Transformer.

It's Hot Rod.

Just one of a whole
family of new characters

Ron was creating to replace the
Autobots

Hasbro had consigned to the
scrapheap.

If you're gonna ride
Danno, ride in style.

So this guy is a goodhearted
teenager

who has nobility in him.

Guns aren't exactly friendly.

- Young.
- It's a whopper, all right.

- Kind of brash.
- Come on, you big bozo.

His ideas, they're not fully
formed.

Not bad for an old timer.

Old timer?

The shoots before he
thinks kind of person

that matures through the
storyline

because of everything that's
happening, and he becomes

the leader that
he was always meant to be.

A maturing teenager
was

the perfect role model for an
audience

that was itself growing up.

We can't hold out forever, Kup.

He is the keystone then

of The Transformers moving
forward.

Ron was transforming

the future of
the Transformers universe.

- Transform.
- Transformation in life,

in real life extends to
transformation to afterlife,

which is the central
conception of every religion.

You will be reborn.

So I had Megatron reborn.

Behold...

Galvatron.

A mutant version...

- To the Cybertron.
- of the old son of a bitch.

Megatron, is that you?

- Galvatron.
- But would

a born-again Transformer
make a better toy?

You might introduce characters

or products into the storyline

and then make a determination

as to whether those characters
might

lend themselves to toys.

♪ Transformers ♪

Ron's ideas for
characters

were not always
what Hasbro could see

kids playing with
on Christmas Day.

Go now while stores
have a good selection.

I wanted a female Autobot.

I thought that was essential.

And they said, no, little
girls don't like this.

There was a somewhat
antiquated thought process

that this isn't a girl's line,

so why are you putting a
girl character in there?

Stay close to me, Daniel.

The first
female Transformer, Arcee,

appeared in the movie but didn't
graduate to the toy stores.

Given the cost of tooling...

Or, manufacturing
the toy.

...which is an investment,
it didn't make sense

to add her to the line.

The character of
Arcee would have to wait

a decade to be made flesh,

or rather, die cast metal.

But Ron had already seen Arcee.

You'll get the hang of it.

In fact,
he lived with her.

Arcee was my wife, Val.

Actually I never
told her that.

She doesn't like animation.

The look of Arcee was

inspired by another
strong female character,

definitely not Ron's wife.

Arcee was supposed to be

sort of modeled
on Princess Leia.

Hasbro's edict
to refresh their toy line

- with new characters...
- We agreed on that.

was about
to lead Ron

into writing
one of the saddest chapters

in Transformers history,

a headline-grabbing death,

and being a fan of Buddha,
Ron was all for it.

It's called yin and
yang, dark and light.

Hasbro made their bed.

And now Optimus Prime
was going to die in it.

I fear the wounds are fatal.

Do not grieve.

Hasbro made the decree

and it was up to Ron to inject
the pathos.

And then I had Optimus
die with the color leaving,

because I know that worked.

Prime's tragic
fade to black ending required

just the right touch.

And Ron had a divine idea.

I wanted a visual,

something that could be the
keystone.

Kind of like the Petrine touch.

It was borrowed from
Catholicism.

And the first pope was Peter.

He touched the next Pope.

So each Pope theoretically
has touched his successor.

So the idea was with Optimus,
he's able to do that.

But how do we visualize that
touch?

It's the matrix.

The matrix of
leadership holds

the collective wisdom of
all past Autobot leaders.

Is it more than that,
the soul of the Autobots?

What they're about?
Yes.

A dying Optimus
passed the matrix to Hot Rod,

a succession plan in a story

that would also determine
the success of the movie.

You are releasing a movie
of a TV show

that people watch for
free every afternoon.

You better do something
different.

What can you do?

You can kill somebody.

Not everyone was so
sure.

They kill Optimus Prime
amongst other characters.

I said, what?

It's a terrible idea
because I think

it's really gonna
upset the kids.

While Marvel
executives fretted

about cutting down Optimus
in his prime.

All I could do is
register my concerns.

Executive
producer Lee Gunther was

searching for a director
to make it happen.

Transformers animated series
producer Nelson Shin

was an obvious choice,

but the script wasn't
speaking his language.

I had some problems
understanding the English,

you know, like I'm not a native
person.

But Nelson spoke
the creative language

of The Transformers universe

and understood how to bring it
to life.

Lee Gunther says to me,
"There's nobody, you can do it.

You do it.
This is your baby."

So,

I accept.

Marvel felt the
crucial first film was

in good hands.

I think that one of
the best things we did is

assign Nelson one of the movies.

He wasn't afraid.

He would stand up for what he
believed in

and he wouldn't back down.
And I liked that.

Ron's big-boned
script.

Thick, very thick script.

Was a
challenging read

no matter how good your English.

Ron wrote brilliant stuff.

It's like this warehouse of
amazing images

and dialogue and all that.

But it's sort of every idea,

you get this thing is
incomprehensible.

Which was confusing
for Hasbro's

marketing agency, Griffin Bacal.

Tom Griffin said,

"You made the villains too
interesting.

This isn't the show."

I might've done that
'cause villains are

far more interesting
than heroes.

At 219 pages,

the script was overwrought
for a young audience.

With time running out,

executives flew into a panic.

It was just, we gotta
have something in a week.

Lee Gunther
ordered a rewrite

or whatever Flint Dille
could do in a matter of days.

We've gotta get this thing
done.

Flint Dille and
his co-writer, Steve Gerber,

had just seven days to rewrite

Ron Friedman's script of the
first Transformers movie.

We were in a mode where we've
gotta get this thing done.

And the premise was

Cybertron was Unicron's
brother, basically.

Look, it's Unicron.

So you had this fight in
space, these two giant robots,

these things are hammering each
other.

The writers
blew through the battle

of the planetary bots.

But it was the death
of a major character

that threatened to blow through

the seven-day deadline.

Mechatron must be stopped

- no matter the cost.
- How do you do it?

You know, what are the
circumstances

in Optimus' death?
We were stuck.

I didn't know whether
anybody was gonna care

that Optimus Prime got
killed, but we cared.

And exactly how
Optimus Prime would meet his end

was influenced
by an unexpected guest.

And Steve says, "Oh yeah, I
got this friend coming over

for lunch."
And I thought, okay,

that means we're gonna have
to knock off in 10 minutes.

Over lunch, Flint
discovered

he was in esteemed company.

Yeah, it's Frank Miller,
he's doing The Dark Knight.

His new acquaintance
was

about to complete a landmark
work in the Batman canon.

You know, comic books
would never be

the same
after The Dark Knight.

But that's another
story.

And we're sitting
there plotting out

how to kill, you know,
Optimus Prime.

So Frank says, "Well, have you
ever seen

The 300 Spartans?"

And I said, "No, that's
like Battle of Thermopylae?"

And he said, "Yeah, oh yeah,
it's great."

And he walks me through
the whole 300 Spartans.

Maybe it was
drawing a long bow,

but this scene from the 1962
classic

gave Flint a new angle.

So he certainly
got me to rethink

how the death ought to feel
and death of a kind of more,

you know, epic guy
who'd gone there to die.

With a little
help from Frank Miller.

So he showed up for
lunch.

He was there till 10 o'clock at
night.

Flint and
Steve met their deadline.

We wrote an entire script
in a week,

which you can do at that age.

We thought
it was the greatest thing

anybody had ever written
for any reason.

The film's producers
did not.

Ron Friedman was called back

to rewrite the rewrite
on his original script.

So I did another one.

What resulted was a morph

between all of the above

and ended up being the
movie that we have now.

While the movie was
filming.

We now return
to The Transformers.

Production on
season two of The Transformers

TV series was simultaneously
grinding on,

fueled by an ever-expanding toy
range.

We started with 26
different vehicles

or products the first year.

By the time they got to the
second year,

it was well over 100
different pieces of product.

There were new characters
for every script.

So many new
characters,

they literally couldn't fit them
in.

If you're gonna
establish these characters,

you can't do it in 22 minutes.

Even if they could
fit them in,

the writers still didn't know
who they were fitting in because

We didn't have the toys yet.

I would beg Sunbow,
"Can we get the toys?

We can't go any farther
till you tell us."

And, "Yeah, we'll get
that to you right away."

As desperately
as the writers needed toys,

Sunbow needed scripts,
with deadlines looming.

It was like there was
a freight train going by

and every day a completed script
had to be thrown into a car

and you couldn't miss.

It was a real madhouse rush.

Two of my best writers
threatened to quit.

We've had it.

Meanwhile,
Griffin Bacal, the ad agency

who partnered with Hasbro
to launch Transformers

wasn't helping.

Griffin Bacal had a toy

that they wanted to
promote in this episode.

But they didn't know
which toy it would be.

So they wanted the
writers to write a script

and then they could fill
in who the character is

when they knew.

You can't write a script

if you don't know who
the main characters are.

But Griffin Bacal
only knew how to sell the toys,

not tell the story.

Griffin Bacal approached the
project

not as a TV series but
a 30-minute commercial.

They're an ad agency,
they're selling toys,

they're not selling cartoon
shows.

Over on the movie
production,

Marvel had a financing problem.

The lesser animated movies
have

much more money than Hasbro
could afford

or could put into it.

The Transformers
movie budget was

just $6 million.

Not even enough to animate

these two furry tales.

One thing Hasbro could afford,

even on a modest budget,
was talent.

We went a lot for voices.

They wanted big-name voice
actors

'cause the dirty secret of
animation is

you can get people you would
never get

for anything like a real budget.

From the hottest
contemporary names...

Judd Nelson, who was
that edgy kind of character

from "The Breakfast Club",

that he would be Rodimus Prime,
Hot Rod.

Eat

my

shorts.

Optimus, forgive me.

to genuine icons.

Leonard Nimoy doing Galvatron.

I will rip open Ultra Magnus.

TV veterans.

You just don't get a chance
to say,

"Well listen to Robert
Stack play an evil robot."

Little story you told me a few
weeks ago

never did come true, did it?

He was really
nervous about it.

And I'm saying, "You kidding?
You're Eliot Ness.

You're perfect for it."
He has the perfect voice.

Springer, you and Arcee
transform Autobot City.

- Comedy stars.
- Thank you.

Eric Idle did Wreck-Gar
so well.

You check in, but you don't
check out.

And there was
one name so legendary.

The great Orson Welles...

You can take my word for it.

who was the voice of Unicron?

Destroy the Matrix.

He was as scary
as the villain he portrayed.

Everybody was afraid of him
'cause there was a scary tape

going around of him ripping some
creative director a new one.

Now what is it you
want

In your depths
of your ignorance?

This is a lot of shit,
you know that.

You are such pests.

That just terrified everybody.

But when
the great man arrived

at The Transformers studio,

his bite was much worse
than his bark.

Welles couldn't deliver the
booming voice of Unicron.

So we put into synthesizer,

make the sound change.

I am the Unicron.

This is my command,

you are to destroy

the Autobot matrix of
leadership.

And we used that.

And so the
planet-sized mega-villain.

This thing, this monster
planet.

Turned out to be
the last role

Orson Welles would ever play.

We were really sad
he passed away

within six weeks of the
time that he recorded

the voice of Unicron.

You underestimate me,
Galvatron.

It was a big
deal having Orson Welles

in The Transformers Movie.

It was his swan song.

But there was an
even bigger deal brewing.

There was a word in the movie

that was like a big deal.

Like, oh my God.

Where'd that come from?

During the
voice recording

for Transformers: The Movie...

writer Flint Dille heard
something he wasn't expecting.

It was not anything I ever
wrote in there, you know?

It was the inclusion
of an unscripted word.

Just one little word.

Look, it isn't even dented.

Shit.

Oh shit,
what are we gonna do now?

Flint encouraged
improv in the recording studio,

but it turns out the S-word
wasn't ad-libbed at all.

They did it
in the recording session

to make sure
they got a PG rating.

- Hooray, we did it.
- We've done it.

Because they didn't want to go
out with an animated movie
with a G rating.

I can almost remember
listening

to Joe McCall, just,

"No, it's gotta be this
because we're edgy."

Who knew if a
single, four-letter word

would give Transformers
the edge?

But it certainly
put others on edge.

"Shit" in Transformers,
to me, was the wrong move.

Just because it may
make it hip,

hip isn't what makes things
work.

Superman saying, "Hey,
you, Lois", you don't do that.

The S-bomb was cut

from the home video release,

- but the real...
- Oh, shit.

moment for
fans had already landed.

Optimus Prime died
in the first half hour.

I shall be one with the
matrix.

Director Nelson
Shin had picked out

the fatal color scheme.

Gray color, for the gray means
ash.

Is no more, no more life.

The colorful language
that gave Transformers

a PG rating was nothing compared

to watching Optimus fade away.

It just simply was not a
G-rated movie,

especially for how
upsetting it was.

'Cause they're robots, the
death doesn't really count

the same way as if they're
human.

It was a dramatic
moment.

But Hasbro's intentions had
nothing to do with drama

and everything to do with
profits.

Hasbro had this new
toy called Rodimus Prime.

So we had killed off
Optimus Prime

at their suggestion so
that they could sell

a lot of Rodimus Prime toys.

And this transfer of
wealth was

executed by depositing the
matrix,

the essence of Optimus Prime,

into Hot Rod,

to transform him into...

Transformation in life

extends to transformation
after life.

the profits.

♪ You got the touch ♪

♪ You got the power ♪

Arise, Rodimus Prime.

This dramatic exchange

was all about the money.

To improve the profit
margin on the toys.

The bottom line,
Optimus was in the can,

like the movie,

but after an early screening,

the film's publicist had some
concerns.

They asked me, "Well,
what do you think?"

I said, "There may have been
a couple of mistakes in here.

You killed off
Optimus Prime."

in the business sense
I just thought,

I don't know if this is the
wisest move.

They didn't listen.
They said,

"Well, the word
has come down from Hasbro

that they've got a new line of
toys

that they want to get in.

And they think these characters
are old

and they wanna expand the line."

Unsurprisingly,
Paul's marketing strategy

avoided unpleasant spoilers,

focusing instead on the
positive.

I would go and I'd say,

"This is a bigger budget
Transformers,

all the robots that you
know and love are in it.

It's got a lot of action.

It's got a really interesting
'80s crazy soundtrack.

Weird Al Yankovic is in it."

But even the significant
powers

of Weird Al Yankovic couldn't
distract from the fact...

Die, Autobots!

that Hasbro had gutted
its Transformers lineup

in just 84 minutes.

It was like Custer's
last stand at the Alamo.

Brawn, Prowl,

Ironhide and Ratchet never saw
it coming.

And we wiped out like
the entire '85 product line

'cause we figured it's
all discontinued anyway.

Optimus Prime was
the character

that the whole franchise
was based around.

If Hasbro was
concerned, they didn't show it.

No, it was in the can.

It's a cartoon for kids.

Why would spend any more money,
you know?

Well, I'll just put it out
there.

Which is exactly what
Hasbro did

in August of 1986.

And they hoped the kids
would get on board.

Prime, you can't die.

Kids loved the character
Optimus Prime.

This would be as bad as
killing off Batman or Superman.

Optimus Prime wasn't just a
superhero,

he was a real character.

Let's give 'em a show
they'll never forget.

Unfortunately for
Hasbro,

the young audience was
in no mood for this.

Halfway through the movie, every
kid starts screaming and crying

and the parents are going,
"What, what, what happened?"

"Mommy took me to see
The Transformers: The Movie

and you killed Optimus Prime."

Nine and ten-year-old kids
weren't ready

for Optimus Prime to get killed.

Not that many
kids would be seeing it.

I remember going to see the
movie

in the big screen and I went
with several colleagues.

The theater was almost empty

and I thought, uh-oh.

It seemed Hasbro
had killed

more than just a few robots.

We were getting the
results after it came out.

It bombed financially.

It wasn't the success
we hoped it would be.

Transformers grossed
a mere

$5.8 million worldwide.

It really did not
perform when it came out.

Following a $1.7
million opening weekend,

sales cratered down
48% the following week.

It was the children
themselves.

They were traumatized.

The collateral damage

from Transformers
was widespread.

Soon GI Joe was caught in the
crossfire.

The Transformer Movie came
out,

the De Laurentiis company had
promised

three Saturday screenings
and two Sunday screenings,

and instead they only got
two Saturday screenings

and one Sunday screening.

And that ticked off Hasbro
enough to kill the deal.

So the GI Joe movie was

never officially released
theatrically.

The fallout from
from the Optimus Prime debacle.

The bad reaction to that...

Ugh! Duke!

...was enough for
Hasbro to cancel plans

to kill off another much-loved
character.

- Die.
- No!

Duke?

They changed their mind.

They told us we gotta
work in some dialogue

so that Duke doesn't die
at the end.

He's gone into a coma.

And Duke
got a reprieve.

Men, Doc says Duke's
gonna be a-okay.

Yo, Joe!

But it was too late
to save

the leader of the Autobots.

Optimus Prime and the box office

of The Transformers Movie
were dead.

♪ Transformers ♪

Following the train wreck

of the first Transformers
movie.

There was a buzz about
it, but it immediately died

the instant the film came out.

The robot franchise
was staring down the barrel.

By the time of the movie
and the third season,

they were disappointed in it.

Sunbow was taking
more control

of the third season of
the animated TV show.

I was done with it
by that time, frankly.

And ringing in the
changes,

story editor, Bryce Malek

no longer had his reserved
parking spot at Marvel.

A year and a half of
working on a robot show is

kinda like, okay, that's fun,
but--

But as the
newly-promoted story editor...

- Flint Dille came in.
- Flint Dille

had the chance to take
the robots somewhere new.

Rodimus Prime.

Let's do it.

Rodimus Prime didn't work out
too well.

Sometimes when you
bring in new characters

and kind of force them on
people,

they reject them.

He wasn't embraced as
the same kind of superhero.

Well, that was a barrel of
laughs.

If I've got a toy at home

and then the character gets
killed off and they're like,

no, but here, have this one,

not gonna be the same.

Why do I keep seeing
you in my dreams, Optimus?

Are you telling me I'm
not the leader you were?

Disappointing
sales proved Rodimus was

a long way from reaching his
prime.

Hasbro decided there was
only one thing to do.

Oh, we have to bring Optimus
Prime back.

Yep, bring Optimus
Prime back from the dead.

Fortunately, you can do that in
animation.

Flint Dille had to write a
series called,

"The Return of Optimus Prime",

in which they restore Optimus
Prime from his very atoms

that have been scattered
across the universe.

I've done it, Optimus Prime
lives.

Unfortunately, the
resurrection came too late.

There was a definite
tapering off of demand

for Transformers and the
decision was made

not to make any more new shows.

Autobots, roll out.

Transformers had
passed its Optimus Prime.

And don't even mention Rodimus.

Hasbro had decided
it had run its course.

The turning point was
the disappointment we had

in the performance of the movie.

People were just looking at
the cost

and told themselves,
don't need it,

on the decline.

They had already defunded
Transformers animation.

Only three episodes

of the planned fourth
season were commissioned.

We knew it was over.

Meanwhile, at
the company where the seed

of The Transformers story
originally took root...

Now I get a little bit of
credit for it, which is nice.

Robots in disguise
still had

a third act with a twist,

and it played out in Marvel's
boardroom.

Apparently they were
doing their accounting there

as if there was going to
be syndication revenues.

And of course the syndication
revenues

on GI Joe and Transformers
would've been huge

and worldwide.

Marvel sure liked
those numbers on paper.

They factored in projected
syndication revenues.

Especially with the
company

about to go up for sale.

Marvel was a hot
potato, and in a good way,

people were wanting to buy the
company.

Well, guess what?

Hasbro got all the syndication
revenues.

And so with Marvel,

they were operating
under the misapprehension

that Marvel productions
got those revenues.

No.

When potential buyer
New World Pictures conducted

their due diligence,

the absence of Transformers
revenue

turned Marvel's book value
decidedly red.

They didn't realize it was
losing money.

Along with faces at
Marvel,

including President Jim
Galton's.

What a disaster, what a mess
that was.

I don't know how it happened,

but I remember that it happened.

I often heard it referred
to as Galton's Folly.

Marvel's
perceived value downsized

faster than a Transformer.

When it all starts
to come out,

the phenomenal price
they were asking

for Marvel comics dropped

to $46.5 million.

That's like chump change.

That's nothing.

♪ Transformers ♪

Defunded and now
curtailed.

Hey, I'm well aware of
the damage that's been done.

We had stopped investing
in the TV show.

This is very bad for business.

The Transformers "
animated series

needed to be reimagined.

Instead, it got repeated.

They were just reruns and
re-edits

and the ratings were terrible.

Optimus.

Transformers needed a hero.

Instead, it got...

This giant puppet of Optimus
Prime

that was just his head and
shoulders.

Not quite the hero we
wanted,

more of a host, actually.

And a real kid talking to him.

Prime, just tell me how
you and the other Autobots

- got to Earth.
- Okay, Tommy.

And that's how they would
introduce the episode.

While giant puppet
seemed to be

all that was still
standing of Transformers,

the man who first dreamed up
this crazy robot world was

attempting to realize

his $81 million dream
of owning Marvel.

There was an auction.

We did bid, we were the only
bidder.

So for two weeks we thought we
won.

We signed papers and my
financial guy calls me up.

He says, "Have you read
the 'Journal' yet?"

And he said, "Perelman bought
Marvel".

What?

Banker Ron Perelman had

the inside track all along,

thanks to his holding in
New World Entertainment.

Perelman, he bid $82.5
million.

And so he wins.

Jim Shooter's dream was

sold to a Wall Street
billionaire.

It was all about making money.

Was the future of
Transformers paved in gold?

We wanted to be profitable,
but we wanted make good shows.

Or littered with
regret?

What are we gonna do
next for Transformers?

Because G2's not working.

♪ Transformers ♪

♪ Robots in disguise ♪

Marvel's new
billion dollar owner.

Was interested in one thing.

A big collection of
money.

Stock value.

Leaving the head

of Marvel Productions feeling
creatively bankrupt.

I didn't succeed in working
out

a good relationship with the new
owners.

So Margaret
left for a job at Fox.

The Transformers were
now alone and adrift.

For Hasbro,
the next big idea

would have to come from within.

And a young executive named
Vinny D'Alleva

was right at the heart of it.

When I came on board,
we were at the tail end of,

what we call Generation One.

And Hasbro was at the
front end

of fumbling Generation Two.

Transformers,
generation two.

Unlike G1,

G2 wasn't gift wrapped with
a TV show, just commercials.

G2 was a flop, loud toys, quiet
sales.

After buying Kenner in 1991,

Hasbro turned to Vinny for a
reboot.

Come up with what are we
gonna do next for Transformers?

'Cause G2s not working.

Listen to the voice of doom.

Vinny and his team
knew one thing for certain.

We want everything
to look more realistic

than it's ever looked before.

And this time, it
wasn't going to be a vehicle.

Things were about to get hairy.

They looked very different.

And very furry.

- We had animals.
- Transanimals?

They looked like they had fur
on them,

even in the robot mode.

And it was a very
bio-organic look to them.

But what advantage did

a four-legger have over an
18-wheeler?

They had to find a way to hide

because everyone had gotten
to know them as the vehicles

and the other things that
they transformed into.

So this was a means to...

This little deception.
Yes.

hide, you know,
deeper undercover.

Robots in disguise.

Cheater, maximize.

Cars were out,
cats were in.

And arachnids.

Tarantulas, terrorize.

Transformers had
evolved.

Let's just call it a different
name.

Why don't we call it Beast Wars?

Beast Wars.

Beast Wars was
a creative breakthrough.

Even if some of the cold-blooded
villains

sounded familiar.
Megatron, terrorize.

Naming the predatory
bad guys

Predacons was a no-brainer.

Obliterate them.

But when it
came to naming the heroes,

Vinny had a brain freeze.

I could not come up with
a name for the good guys.

Really frustrating.
We went through dozens

of name searches
until one day.

Vinny's assistant
came to the rescue.

Well, her car did, anyway.

We're walking out to the
parking lot.

All of a sudden, I see the back
of her car

and it's Maxima.

And I said, "That could be
Maximals."

The Nissan Maximals?

It's got maximum and
animals all together in it.

And sure enough, that cleared.

And so a humble
mid-sized Japanese sedan

helped relaunch an entire
franchise.

And that's how those
names got established.

Thanks, Nissan.

And that set the storyline

for not just the product line,
but the advertising.

And then the TV show,

which was the first time we did

3D animation.

Transformers was back.

We relaunched it.

Beast Wars.

Gigantic gorilla Optimus Primal.

Back on Christmas
wishlists

for Santa and back on TV.

And the TV show
was being worked on

and that launched
in the second year.

And all of that together
continued

to build.

The future of
Transformers was wide open.

Once a humble toy from Japan,

Transformers had grown
into their own universe,

traversing animated film
and TV over 23 years.

But their next transfiguration.

Live, real-time action
filmmaking.

Would dwarf
everything that came before it.

Oh God no.

But in the hands of
Hollywood's

most disruptive director.

Get out of the way, I'm
rolling cameras.

- Ready.
- Would they be

in good shape at the end of it?

We call it Bay-hem.

It's fast cars, it's
giant robots, it's guns,

it's explosions.

What else do you need, right?