Talk:Prowl (G1)

I am all for having an entry that consists entirely of "OUR MISSILES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", but is the bold really neccessary? It makes it look like a header. --Suki Brits 02:09, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Trivia says: At OTFCC 2004 that there was no Prowl Alternator in the works. I'm assumignt here's suppsoed ot be a "_____ stated" int here someplace. Who stated? Hasbro? Aaron Archer? Hooper-X? (I could see Hooper wanting to disappoint a room full of Transfans.) -Derik 07:05, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I thought the Prowl2 line was just a joke.

Past Tense?

We probably need a policy statement somewhere (or at least somewhere I can find it) as to whether fictional events are described in present tense (as in the Wikipedia), in past tense (as preferred by at least one of our mods), or in whichever the writer prefers. JW 13:34, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Apparently I'm no good at keeping track of tense, so people sometimes chastise me after I've filled in the fiction sections. Of course, I didn't even know we had a policy. --FFN 13:51, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, apparently we do need a summary of what tense to use where, 'cuz I can't find anything like that. But to sum up -- Introductory paragraph in present tense, fiction in past tense. Basically, "This is who the character IS, this is what the character DID." --ItsWalky 15:25, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Do we have a consensus on that, or are you speaking ex moderata? And, how does this apply to non-character pages, like synopses of comics? JW 15:41, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd say it's a consensus, as I believe most of the top-contributers write the pages in that way. (For a while, Sunstreaker was our "this is how you do a page" project, though it's likely out of date by now for some new developments...) For non-character pages like episode or comic summaries, I'd suggest present tense. I don't think I've actually read enough summary pages close enough to say if they're being written in mostly one tense or the other... but "present" is my off-the-cuff preference. --ItsWalky 15:45, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Most of what we write is past tense, especially when summarizing fiction. It doesn't matter whether it's a character page or an episode/issue page. -- Steve-o 16:06, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Walky's rationale makes sense to me, and I agree with Steve that it should apply to episode/issue pages. A story summary is a story summary, and summaries are written by definition after something has happened. --Sntint 20:10, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

See, I'd vote for present tense on the comic/episode summary pages, but past tense when summarizing fiction on character/object/location pages. In the case of the latter, that's the "Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe"-reader in me - it's the character's whole history, as in, what has gone before, so it should be past tense. But when specifically summarizing one, small, condensed piece of fiction, there's that rule of thumb Wikipedia uses that says to use present tense "as this is the way that the story is experienced as it is read or viewed." - Chris McFeely 20:26, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I find the present tense in story summaries to be a laudable goal-- but often difficult to accomplish. The past tense is more friendly to omniscient narration (because you're looking back on things) and I would have found it vexing to summarize, say, The Magnificent Six!. in the present-tense while reflecting the narrative ignorance that's central to its slowly revealed backstory. -Derik 21:49, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

(Resetting the indents...) It's news to me that Wikipedia perfers present tense for summaries. Personally, I think that present tense reporting sounds amateurish. Compare the present Dreamwave text:

Prowl was an Autobot from Praxus. After the death of Sentinel Prime, Grimlock called him, Jazz, and others to the ruins of Praxus, where he declared that if the new Prime was insufficient, they would take control of the Autobot military. Prowl was present at the ceremony when Optronix became Optimus Prime, and was restrained by Grimlock when Prime was attacked.{{#if:|{{{quote2}}}}}{{#if:|{{{2}}}{{#if:|, {{{3}}}|}}|}}

To a present-tense rewrite:

Prowl is an Autobot from Praxus. After the death of Sentinel Prime, Grimlock calls him, Jazz, and others to the ruins of Praxus, where he declares that if the new Prime is insufficient, they will take control of the Autobot military. Prowl is present at the ceremony when Optronix becomes Optimus Prime, and is restrained by Grimlock when Prime is attacked.{{#if:|{{{quote2}}}}}{{#if:|{{{2}}}{{#if:|, {{{3}}}|}}|}}

Granted, I could rewrite a little bit to make it more elegant...

The Autobot Prowl calls Praxus his home. Upon the death of Sentinel Prime, Grimlock summons him, Jazz, and others to the ruins of Praxus, and declares that if the new Prime is insufficient, they will take control of the Autobot military. Later, Prowl attends the ceremony in which Optronix becomes Optimus Prime, and is restrained by Grimlock when Prime is attacked.{{#if:|{{{quote2}}}}}{{#if:|{{{2}}}{{#if:|, {{{3}}}|}}|}}

...but I still think that sounds like it was written by a 12 year old. The past-tense version is more professional and authoritative. --Steve-o 00:16, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

It's news to me that Wikipedia perfers present tense for summaries.

It's specified here: Writing About Fiction, under "Contextual presentation". I disagree about it sounding amateurish. JW 00:39, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Wiki's insistence on present tense is part of it's "do not ever ever write in-universe on pain of fucking death" approach. To write a summary of the life and activities of a real person, you write in past tense - so since we write in-universe here, as though these were "real" characters, past tense is appropriate. But when you're writing a summary of a single episode or comic, on it's own page, where you acknowledge that it's fiction, present tense flows better, I think. It's "coming alive," in the here and now, as it were. I don't know about anyone else, but when I write a summary, I've got the episode or comic in front of me, and go through it. It's actually "happening" in front of me as the summary is created, hence, present tense. - Chris McFeely 08:27, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Earthforce

With Earthforce being in a separate timeline section, should flashbacks from Earthforce that supposedly take place back during the regular UK run (like Prowl's encounter with the Battlechargers) be in the main body of the Marvel timeline or just in the Earthforce section?--Xaaron 03:13, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

That's something I've wrestled with. They could be considered retroactive additions to canon "before" the timeline split off, or... I dunno. I can see it both ways. I just worry that segregating the flashback material from the context in which they happened is unnecessarily confusing. --ItsWalky 05:04, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Reprolabels?

Given the minor edit war here over whether to include mention of the Reprolabels set available for the Alternators toys, should we cut all mention of Reprolabels from the wiki? It's mentioned on five other pages. JW 15:43, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Reprolabels is pretty clearly Not Official. They probably shouldn't be on the Wiki at all. If they are, they should be either on the Fandom page (I could see mentioning a few sample fandom-based businesses like this, Unicron.com, Justitoys, etc.), or listed in a character's trivia as a response to any outstanding fan controversy surrounding a particular toy -- but that's a very slippery slope, and I'm pretty sure other folks around here would just say Not Official is the whole story, fullstop. -- Repowers 16:25, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, especially this particular invocation of Reprolabels is against our policies here. --ItsWalky 16:47, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Universe Prowl Picture?

How come there isn't a piccie for Universe (2008) Prowl? Shouldn't there be an official photograph somewheres? Or is Prowl that much of a prick that he doesn't want a pic of his newest figure to be displayed? Bobpiecheese 11:53, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

I dunno. Probably no one's done it yet. We do have 22 years of back material to catch up on you know. Has Hasbro put out official pics? -Derik 11:27, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

I thought they did. Buggered if I know where they are. Bobpiecheese 11:53, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Prowl (Magnaboss)

Page needs deleating. Furman has said he's established as G1 Prowl in the upcomming IDW BW mini. Same for the other Magnaboss components and their G1 counterparts.

God DAMMIT Furman...

Is there some way to completely remove Furman from Transformers without doing actual physical harm to him? :( --Rotty 22:57, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Honestly don't see what the big deal is. This guy and his compatriots had ZERO personality anywhere ever, and have long been speculated by fans to be their G1 counterparts, asspecially with the assumed leadership role as counterpart to Tripredacus. I'd a thousand times rather have them be their G1 selves and hence ACTUAL CHARACTERS, than remain blank slates for an eternity. As for Furman he's been doing SPECTACULAR work on the regular IDW books. He's as strong or stronger than he's ever been IMO.

We'll see what else comes down the pike before deleting. Also, I like the false choice you present -- that they can EITHER be the G1 guys OR they can be nobodies forever. Because clearly, making them NEW guys who are not GEEWUN AGAIN LOOK MORE GEEWUN YOU LIKE GEEWUN RIGHT?! can't possibly be an option. --M Sipher 00:30, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

As long as they give the writing to Furman, "HAY LUK GUYZ IM PROWL FROM GEEWUN" is the most characterization they could get. --Rotty 00:43, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

That's pretty funny since Furman's pretty much the only guy to ever give Prowl a personality. He was a non-entity in the G1 toon and early comic only furman's work on the later Marvel book and in IDW have ever brought him to life as the by-the-book Prick everyone loves to hate.

Do you know of any other non-IDW project pending using these characters? If not, there's just NO justification for not deleating these. In their only fiction ever they ARE new bodies of the G1 characters. Fictional portrail IS what we base these pages on, right? If someone else were schedualed to use the characters as seperate beings soon that would be one thing, but giving them seperate pages simply becasue you happen to dislike the fact that they are the G1 folks is totally without merit and against the principles of presenting the facts that this wiki tries to stand by, IMO.

As for the choice bit, no choice was intended. I simply stated that these guys were "total non-entities fan-speculated to be G1ers" for all the years of their existance and now they actually difinitivly G1ers and between those two states I find the latter much preferable. Sure they could have been non-G1ers, and that would have been fine too, but they have *always* been likely speculated suspects for surviving Autobots and now it's simbly been confirmed. It's not like he made Torca = Ultra Magnus or Bantor = Wreck-gar. It was a very small and acceptable step IMO. If the IDW Profile books come out and are FILLED with G1ers reborn that will be bad, but for these three it's rather appropriate and fitting I'd say.

It's not about prowl and co per se, it's about the fact that the autobots are supposed to be gone or extremely rare in BW-era. But every single comic book, or convention story dealing with the BW era has introduced G1 characters int he Beast Era. Scads of them. Soon they will out number the actual Beast Warriors. (I'm not joking, it was only 3 years of a fairly limited assortment with lots of repeat characters.)

Beast Wars entire thing that makes it unique is that G1 is over and thsoe characters are gone. But the first thing any writer does, given a chance to mess with the Beast Era, is introduce more G1 characters.

It's like you give a small child with no self-restraint a marshmellow and tell them "Now, the only thing you must remember is do not masturbate on the marshmallow." And the idea consumes them, and the next thing you know they're jerking off.

Nothing against G1? We'd just prefer BW wasn't quite so sticky with fanwank. -Derik 07:09, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Besides, considering Beast Wars is G1 cartoon canon (Starscream dies in 2005, Nemesis, etc.), shouldn't Prowl and Ironhide be, I dunno.... dead?

Who says its cartoon canon? -Derik 07:48, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Starscream's ghost, the Nemesis, Energon (Shockwave built an Energon making machine once in the comic, but after Bumblebee blasted it, Energon was never brought up again so...), Megatron becoming Galvatron...

The energy siphon came up quite regularly in the UK comics. Primus, Unicron, gods not Primacron...

Bob and Larry always intended it to be a new continuity that blended the elements of both cartoon and comic. -Derik 08:15, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't Magnaboss or his components appear in Universe #3? --Crockalley 13:44, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

If they do, the I think questions that arise are: 1) are they an alternate reality version (it is Universe after all) and 2) is there anything in the portrayle there that specifically contridicts/prevents them being the G1 characters then too. If not then the pages still need to be merged, I'd say. --ZacWilliam 14:14, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Here we are: Maximal High Council. So, no, not alternate universe. But no details on "G1 or not", I'm sure. Should there be any thought given about Magnaboss' two appearances being from conflicting continuities (3H's comics vs. IDW's Beast Wars comics)? IDW says they're G1, but IDW conflicts with 3H on many other things. Just a though. --Crockalley 20:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Your opinion doesn't matter

Unfortunately, no matter how stupid certain revalations about the new BW series are, it's happening. The wiki isn't a discussion forum... we'll give boatloads of leeway when it comes to random thoughts being put on talk pages, but really, this isn't the place for heated debate about news. And anonymous user is correct; when the series actually comes out, we'll have to merge the Magnaboss component character pages. As it stands now, it's a non-issue. --Suki Brits 00:50, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Split?

Could someone create a separate toy page? It's about time, but I'm not sure how to do it properly. Geewunling 15:38, 7 October 2009 (EDT)

Autobot Insignia

It appears to be based off of Prowl's head. No, seriously, take a look. And I think we should make a note of this. 156.3.149.15 15:58, 22 April 2010 (EDT)

Not really, no. --Detour 16:13, 22 April 2010 (EDT)

It's already mentioned on Insignia --HotAndCold 16:42, 22 April 2010 (EDT)

Yeah, this is not new information. --ItsWalky 16:57, 22 April 2010 (EDT)

The note about Soundwave and the Decepticon symbol is on his page, so I could see the desire for this page to parallel it. Khajidha 17:00, 22 April 2010 (EDT)

Big quote/picture overlap

Does anyone else see the big quote and the top picture overlapping? Or is it some glitch on my end? If it is real, how can we fix it? --Khajidha 16:13, 19 May 2012 (EDT)

Changed bigquote to quote and it works fine now. --Khajidha 20:32, 21 May 2012 (EDT)

IDW chronology

I thought i would ask before there would be some editing, but I think Prowl's actions in LSOTW#4 happens in between Spotlight: Prowl and For All Mankind. Mojotron 20:06, 29 December 2012 (EST)

Kreo Class of 1984 Superlatives

I'm unconvinced that Prowl's superlative has somehow been switched with Shockwave's. "Logic" is a term that could apply to either. Conversely, "Best Optics" (a play on "best eyes"), would appear to be a joke on Shockwave's face.

More importantly, Prowl's toy bio does not actually include any reference regarding trajectory tracking. (It does read "has most sophisticated logic center of all the Autobots.") --Randomus (talk) 12:12, 11 May 2020 (EDT)

The versions printed on the boxes were extracted from longer versions. The fuller version published in The Transformers Universe (see here: https://www.ntfa.net/universe/english/index.php?act=view&char=Prowl) does include the bit about his eyes. --Khajidha (talk) 13:18, 11 May 2020 (EDT)

Inappropriate Caption Jokes

I feel like the 'Kent State' reference is in poor taste. Ironhide1975 (talk) 08:50, 1 November 2021 (EDT)

The caption in question has been removed, thank you for letting us know. If you find inappropriate captions of that sort in the future, please feel free to delete them. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 13:30, 1 November 2021 (EDT)

Wow! Thank you, I'm impressed that I was able to contribute something positive to the world. While we're along these lines, I don't know why Prowl is considered a Prick. I had the original Prowl G1 toy and my father was a cop so as a kid, I looked up to Prowl and even cried in the theater when he died in the movie. While I'm not as familiar with the comics versions, I would recommend adjusting this page to something a bit nicer and more pallettable. --Ironhide1975 (talk)

Prowl was mostly a background character in the cartoon. His being a "prick" comes more from his comic depictions, specifically in IDW's 2005-2018 comic run, in which he was much more prominent, had a dubious sense of ethics, and was willing to cross certain lines that others normally wouldn't. While that may sound less righteous on paper, IDW really worked to give many fascinating layers to his character to make him feel more three-dimensional, even if that also made him less of a "nice guy". --Sabrblade (talk) 11:08, 22 December 2021 (EST)