Talk:Brigadoon

Does the island have a real name from any pseudocanon sources we can use? If not, I think this should be moved to a decapitalized "Flying island" and the article should point out that it doesn't have any known name. --Steve-o 00:08, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

According to the Japanese Beast Wars Universe guidebook, the flying island was named Brigadoon. Since the book was very US-centric, it's possible this is what it was actually called in the scripts, but since Ben doesn't have the script up for either part of The Trigger, it's difficult to say. Presumably, though, the article could still be moved? --Monzo 00:17, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Excellent point. I think a move to Brigadoon would be appropriate then, with sufficient redirects and disclaimers that it is named only in pseudocanon, naturally. --Steve-o 00:58, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. Like you say, it's only named in pseudocanon, and we have a perfectly good and straight-forward description from the episode itself. I think the latter makes for a much better article title. --KilMichaelMcC 01:07, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Just to jump in on a 2 year old conversation, how is Beast Wars Universe, a licensed guidebook, pseudocannon? If we have a name like Brigadoon, from a licensed source, then the generic description 'flying island' seems like a waste. --Jimsorenson 00:55, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I would support such a move. It's not any different than Galactic Olympics planet, Junkion Lady, catgirls, or stoplight Autobot. —Interrobang 01:05, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I am somewhat baffled that anyone would support the notion of moving this article to "Brigadoon." --KilMichaelMcC 01:22, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Why? I know we prefer US names over Japanese names, but in the absence of a US name, we generally go with JP ones unless they're tied up in some sort of US-JP continuity conflict. -Derik 01:46, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Do you have anything against this other than personal dislike, Kil? Why is this case different than the four articles I've pointed out above? —Interrobang 01:59, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I... can't really articulate why. It just me strike me as wrong. It's the flying island. That's what it is and what it's called. The thing isn't called Brigadoon, and it's not some irrelevant side character or location like Nancy or Athenia. If we move the article, are we also going to change the text in other articles? Will Tigatron's fiction section have to say "he was the first to discover Brigadoon," and the like? 'Cause that would seem ever wronger... I dunno, maybe I'm just getting hung-up on the stupidity of the name. --KilMichaelMcC 02:04, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

"Exceptionally stupid" is a valid argument Kil. Lord knows I've used it for article moves in the past.

I kinda agree with you abotu the dumbness of this name... if we do move the article, I think I'd favor limiting the... footprint (?) of the Japanese name. -Derik 02:09, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Hmmm ... I'm not sure that I agree that the name is stupid, but I wouldn't think we'd need to go through and replace all of the uses of the words 'flying island' with Brigadoon. Just because WE have A name for the island doesn't mean that's what the character called it. We certainly aren't obliged to pretend that they did, anyway. --Jimsorenson 02:49, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

And at the same time, since we do have *A* name, I don't see any reason we shouldn't use it. -- Dark T Zeratul 13:53, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I'm never fond of using names for things in summaries of episodes and comics in which the name wasn't used (for instance, I wish we didn't call the Animated Starscream clones by their names in the episode summaries, since they didn't go by those names in the cartoon). I would apply that personal belief here, too. Likewise I'm with Kil in not wanting to move this, because it's a painfully stupid name that makes no bloody sense. - Chris McFeely 15:35, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I agree entirely on not using names in summaries where they weren't called such a thing in the ep. I didn't like the Starscream clone stuff, nor when Interrobang went through and changed every instance of [Sari's] "key" he could find to "AllSpark Key" after the ASAlm came out... - SanityOrMadness 23:23, 4 October 2009 (EDT)

Though this may seem odd, since I'm A: in favor of the move to Brigadoon and B: the guy who came up with some of these names, but I agree with you completely. While I think it's useful and interesting to have names for concepts, I'd generally be in favor of keeping them out of summaries if the names didn't actually show up in the original source material. Given the multiversal nature of Transformers, isn't it possible that the names are from an alternate future / timeline / expression of the continuity? --Jimsorenson 00:08, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

"It depends", I suppose. Taken to the logical extreme of that, how can you say a load of the G1 cartoon episodes take place in the same timeline? They were designed to be airable in any order, end almost all episodes with reset buttons and several official episode orders/versions exist at least in part (the original US order, the Japanese order, the "Season 5" reedits and the "G2" reedits. Plus, if you want to be incredibly pedantic, the Rhino versions with the extra sounds and more animation errors). You could claim, say, B.O.T. (episode) takes place in a different timeline from the other episodes, and have no internal reference points to dispute that. [c.f., The Star Trek: Voyager writers would later claim that the infamous "Threshold" took place in a different timeline once the embarrassment sunk in, and it was deliberately contradicted by a throwaway line in a later episode.]

I wouldn't go quite that far, but when you get to stuff done much later than an original series, by a different company in a different medium without any input from the original creative teams and for a much smaller audience... sure it could be an unrelated timeline. Stuff which fulfils only some of that criteria (e.g., the Titan movie & animated comics) can also be pretty shaky. - SanityOrMadness 09:22, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

a) Are toys "original source material"? I'm thinking of the Starscream clones. When the toys have names, why pretend the characters based on the toys don't (unless there is a good reason)? What if nobody ever got around to calling poor ol' G1 Skids by name in the two episodes he cameoed in? Would he be just a nameless Autobot in the cartoon continuity? b) I think it is OK for something to be named retroactively if the piece of fiction is dealing with that specific continuity. But if the continuity dealt with is a different continuity in the same family, I think they should be separated. The name of G1 Bluestreak's hometown was named Praxus in Dreamwave, but I don't think the name should cross-continuity into being the name of his town in the Marvel Comics or even his toy. - Starfield 00:42, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

Well, on the egomanics... the Activators Thundercracker's colour scheme bore very little resemblance to the show Egomaniac - certainly as little as the two Cowards (the Fistful of Energon one & the Bridge Too Close/TransWarped one) bore to each other. How do you say that the one automatically represents the other in that case?

[And, looking at the evidence of the other characters' reactions in the show... I'm not convinced that the clones ACTUALLY have different colour schemes as viewed by them. Not only does no-one comment on the difference, but there are several points - especially in FoE, but also with Swindle's new helmets for Liar and Sycophant II and a couple of smaller moments in BtC - where characters act in ways which would be nonsensical if the [male] clones genuinely looked different from the original Starscream.] - SanityOrMadness 09:22, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

I support the idea of this page being moved. If the name is used in an officially licensed guidebook, it's an official name. Brigadoon is far from being just a nonsensical name that doesn't mean anything, it's based on the idea of a village in Scotland that only appears every 200 years or something... There was a movie named after it in the fifties, I think. Considering the nature of a hidden island that flies around, I can see the logic in the reference, personally. I don't see why personal preference should have this much sway over an official name. It's out there, just because you don't like it, doesn't mean it'll just go away. Just have "Flying Island" redirect here, and have the opening phrase be something along the lines of "Brigadoon, more often referred to simply as 'The Flying Island,' is a artificial creation of the Vok, blahblahblahblah...." and you're set. --Ascendron 16:46, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Beast Wars Universe is so full of bullshit author-intent noncanon (I won't even dignify it by calling it "pseudocanon," nearly all of it never made it into any story material and was later rendered straight-up impossibly wrong by the subsequent 12 years of official fiction) that its revelations should be examined on a case-by-case basis rather than just being assumed to be actual TF facts. In this particular case, I don't object to using its supplied name of "Brigadoon" because it's just a proper name that adds information where previously there had been none. --Thylacine 2000 00:14, 30 September 2009 (EDT)

"was later rendered straight-up impossibly wrong by the subsequent 12 years of official fiction". So which Beast Wars subcontinuity is "impossibly wrong"? 3H or IDW? I mean, if we're going to pretend sources of information conflicting with each other is something unusual in Transformers... —Interrobang 00:48, 30 September 2009 (EDT)

I'm not talking about any continuity. I'm talking about the non-story ideas Larry DiTillio had circa 1997. Like how the Vok invented sparks. Like how when Transformers die their sparks go to Nexus Zero to commune with and get brainwashed by the Vok. Like how the Vok had already used their Planetbuster to destroy prehistoric Earth a bunch of times before "Other Voices" and each time simply waved their magic wands to fix the timestream such that the pre-emptive erasure of G1 wouldn't have any actual effects--which is not only overconvoluted and pointless, but also raises horrible continuity errors with the actual show since Tigerhawk says the Vok are worried about BW Megatron trying to do the exact same thing they themselves had already done with no ill effect. On critical foundational issues of Transformer history and biology BWUniverse is just irreconcilably wrong, which makes sense since it's all just waving around unpublished ideas from 12 years ago. That is why I don't give the book's suggested background material carte-blanche acceptance as fact. --Thylacine 2000 23:05, 4 October 2009 (EDT)

I kind of like the name, but I'm wondering, what does it actually mean that the island's name is "Brigadoon", (in-continuity I mean)? Did the Vok call it that? Is that how the Maximals referred to it? Was that what it was called in the Cybertronian history books? As the island is presented in the story, it doesn't necessarily make sense for it to have a name at all. - Starfield 17:09, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Well the sourcebook probably didn't say, but I'd assume that it was the Vok name, since it didn't exist long enough for any of the Transformers to name it. -- Dark T Zeratul 17:24, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

I'm never fond of using names for things in summaries of episodes and comics in which the name wasn't used

This, at the very least. Same reason I've tried to purge "Darksyde" from our BW episode summaries.

Given the multiversal nature of TF fiction... are we sure the source book was talking about the cartoon continuity? Exclusively so? In a way that applies to the undubbed English version of the show? A move to "Brigadoon" seems like an effort to hide the article, somehow, in this place where like, nobody would ever think to look for it, 'cause nobody ever called it that. -- Repowers 20:29, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

At least someone on the show did call it "the Darkside". Using the Japanese name for something from a piece of English fiction is fairly weird. I don't really think of "Signal Lancer" as the guy's name except in the Japanese version of the show. But as far as hiding the article, you could still keep the "flying island" redirect. - Starfield 20:52, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Didn't they say "Welcome to the dark side", speaking figuratively? That is, if you started a new job and one of your new colleagues said "Welcome to hell", you wouldn't assume the building was actually CALLED "Hell"! Same thing with the Pred ship - "dark side" wasn't used as a name, despite the later attempts to retcon it as one. - SanityOrMadness 23:23, 4 October 2009 (EDT)

In English, it could easily go either way. If my new job was in a dentist's office I would assume he was speaking figuratively, but if that new job was janitor on a Predacon ship I'm pretty sure I would take that as the name of the ship. Anyway, why impose a figurative interpretation when it is more fun to take his words as-is? - Starfield 00:42, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

I don't see why this is different than Athenia or Nancy or the Starscream clones or the Grand Mal or Kelly or any of a host of examples. Lots of concepts aren't named directly in the fiction and get one later.--Jimsorenson 21:11, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Characters sometimes have the same name in English and Japanese. So Signal Lancer's English might be, but isn't necessarily "Signal Lancer", as far as I'm concerned. Technically, the closest thing we have to an official English name for "Athenia" is "Sidnea" but we don't use the RTM dub for that, probably because it isn't a Western English name. - Starfield 21:32, 29 September 2009 (EDT)

Or maybe because the RTM dub is fucking nuts. —Interrobang 00:48, 30 September 2009 (EDT)

OK, I've reviewed the conversation and while some people don't like the name, no one's really advanced any arguments that it's invalid. I'm moving the article, but I'm 'limiting the footprint' so to speak. --Jimsorenson 13:49, 3 October 2009 (EDT)