*Ahem* Please, I hear enough claims of "Bay/Hasbro/Takara has raped my childhood" on Transformers boards as it is. Let's at least pretend that the few members here are mature enough not to resort to such insulting remarls.
For one, it trivializes the horror behind the word and concept of "rape".
Second, your childhood memories are still alive and well in your mind, as well as in numerous old comics (and reprints) as well as DVDs.
Third, this is not the first time that a major change happens in the franchise followed by immediate overreaction.
Remember Beast Wars? Fans screamed in outraged at the thought of TF turning into animals with flesh. A decade later though, it is remembered fondly as the series that revived Transformers after the death of G1/G2 as well as one of the best written and animated series.
Remember Beast Machines? It too was reviled, this time because TF didn't turn into robots covered in flesh, but because they became a fusion of both machine and organic tissues and morphed instead of transforming. Death threats were even made toward the series' story editor Bob Skir, which convinced him not to show up at Botcon one year. Nowadays, while some fans still carry a bit of hate, it is considered to be the most serious and most daring of the cartoons, and although many consider it a poor TF series, they still see it as a good series by itself.
In short:
-Fan likes property
-Change happens
-Fan's world turns upside down, crys "rape!"
-Fan matures and gets used to it (hopefully)
-Lather, rinse, repeat
And I get to watch it from both the inside and outside and laugh at the mayhem. I have this priviledge because I too used to be ranting TF & Star Trek fanboy but thankfully I wisened up over the years
But please, go ahead and provide me with further entertainment by denouncing the utter trashiness of the upcoming cartoon which will most likely do pretty well with its target audience, that is boys under 12. Just don't take it personally if I laugh while you rant, because like Revned I have a hard time standing stupidity and/or immaturity.
And don't worry, I'm no hypocrite and will gladly grant license to anyone here to mock me if I act this way myself.
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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard
B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me
