Talk:Transformers Animated: The AllSpark Almanac II

You know, I'm reallly trying to remain calm, and it's a bit expected after the first one and everything, but seriously, book in hand, and oh my freaking god you guys for reals. - Chris McFeely 11:39, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Is it that cool? Because the first one has already taken the definition of "loaded with Easter eggs, in-jokes and other cool stuff" to previously non-existent levels. ---Blackout- 11:49, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Broke the scale, off the charts, shattered trousers past what Rocherts did with LSotW, and maybe blew our socks off if anything from his reaction. :D All I know is that I'm going to be giggling/squeeing quietly to myself, looking a loon, after I pick them up. --Lonegamer78 13:16, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Let me put it this way: On page 9, we get Octus (Animated). And it's all uphill from there... JW 19:44, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Alignment is now canon

You magnificent bastards. --FortMax 13:29, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Hnnh, and here we all thought Jim was just joking. --Khajidha 13:41, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

The apocrypha template feels unlove. Geewunling 13:44, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

It hasn't even been finalized yet! --Khajidha 14:08, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Alignment? Canon?

Good grief. ---Blackout- 14:18, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

Details, please? I don't know of any way for Alignment-as-a-whole to become canon other than to be reprinted in its entirety in an official publication. --KilMichaelMcC 16:32, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

In the in-universe introduction, the authors note that they were going to take on Decepticon disguises from "Alignment, the true and accurate account of the future of Primax 984.0 Gamma as chronicled by Simon Furman". - Chris McFeely 16:35, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

UNRELIABLE NARRATOR --ItsWalky 21:33, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

The fact remains that the specific story details of Alignment were never approved by Hasbro. Does Alignment become official simply because another official publication says so in such broad terms? Crockalley 07:21, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

You know, that's a good point. I wouldn't think Alignment can become official until it's actually approved as such by Hasbro. --Jeysie 08:19, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Yet another question for the next Hasbro Q&A. ---Blackout- 08:51, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Isn't Liege Maximo being one of the 13 from Alignment? And "Galvatron II"? Seems like at some point it is pointless to argue against it being in canon. --Khajidha 08:55, 1 July 2010 (EDT) (double checking my facts caused me to forget to sign)

Technically, Liege Maximo being one of the 13 was canonically from "Exodus" and "Galvatron II" was from a Japanese exclusive toy. - Starfield 16:50, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Hasbro approved publication of this book, and there's absolutely no other sane way to interpret authorial intent, here. The creators of this canonical Transformers book intended to make Alignment canonical. JW 10:48, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Yeah, it's not like the statement was completely obscured within universal-stream language, either, meaning Hasbro could easily miss it. It's pretty straight-forward. Unfortunately. --ItsWalky 10:52, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Unfortunately? Alignment was awesome. Hell, it's part of my personal canon.

I'll just shut up now before I start rambling. ---Blackout- 11:03, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

I dunno, it all seems kind of silly to me. Because, hey, I have several fanfics (not by me) I wouldn't mind seeing canonized if we can suddenly make official with a single sentence (in a book in a different continuity by a different author, to boot) things that were never approved or officially published by Hasbro. (An author deciding to borrow elements from an unofficial story into his own official one is very different than trying to declare an entire as-is unofficial story as official canon.)

This seems to me like playing a bit too much more fast and loose with the canon wand than we should be. --Jeysie 11:13, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Hasbro also officially approved and published the Ultimate Guide, in which Simon Furman himself says Alignment is unofficial fanfic. As so often is the case when we get into author-intentism, it is now a contest of which author's intent we validate. --Thylacine 2000 11:32, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

I'm much more inclined to go with the intent of the writer of the contested piece proper. Soooooo... --M Sipher 11:49, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Later material, by definition, supercedes earlier material, yes? Ergo, previously Hasbro didn't consider it canon (when TUG went to print), but as of 2010 they do. Same as the singularity-god-Unicron thing overriding his G1toon origin, f'rinstance. - Mammalian Verisimilitude 13:35, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Not unless it's later material in the exact same continuity a la IDW or such where the later writer actually has some "right" to change the work.

And things like the Sentinel/Zeta mixup (and there's been implications that "Hail and Farewell" also is an example) show that Hasbro or its appointed editors sometimes approve things they didn't realize the full ramifications of and later backtrack on. Do we have evidence that the current Hasbro folks know what Alignment is, rather than just thinking it was some imaginary book/story Sorenson made up out of thin air as a cute reference?

Unless we do, I'm with Sipher on this one. --Jeysie 15:57, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Furman says Alignment is fanfic, but does that mean that he would be against canonizing it? Saying it is fanfic is a statement of fact, it was produced without official approval. But Furman has used concepts from Alignment elsewhere so he is apparently open to the possibility of it coming into continuity. But the final arbiter is Hasbro, and I'm pretty sure your "thinking it was some imaginary book/story Sorenson made up" theory is correct. --Khajidha 16:16, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

We have never stopped to question whether Hasbro knows or cares about the minutiae in Transformers fiction and works. Why the hell are we starting now? —Interrobang 16:19, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Because up until now (AFAIK) we've never been faced with declaring a previously unofficial story as official and canon, have we? --Jeysie 16:33, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

If it is in-universe, does that mean "the authors" you speak of are Bill Forster (Animated) and Jim Sorenson (Animated)? And this document they are talking about is "Alignment (Animated history book)" and this Simon Furman is "Simon Furman (Animated)"? Unless Alignment crossed dimensions from Quadwal to Malgus or something. - Starfield 16:50, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

If we're getting that down-to-details, I always had a problem declaring Beta Maxx and Caliburn to be Micromasters based on a magazine cover in an Amimated book. Doesn't that mag cover signify the creation of Beta Maxx (Animated) and Caliburn (Animated)? -- Crockalley 17:44, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

They were Micromasters well before then, actually. --M Sipher 19:42, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Right, they were always Micromasters. Also, that magazine spoken of is a multiversal magazine, so all of the folks mentioned on it were the originals. --ItsWalky 20:26, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

There are times I like the way you people think. --Jeysie 17:48, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

And on the other hand, there are times when I want to punch you people really hard. In the face. Twice. - Chris McFeely 18:30, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Only a punch in the face instead of murder? Either you're slipping or we are, McFeely. --Jeysie 19:16, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Do you know how much Cybertronix I've translated tonight? I'm too tired for murder... - Chris McFeely 19:18, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

(Reducing indents for readability.) I'm honestly surprised this is a matter for debate. We have here a genuine Transformers product which says, in the introduction, in nigh-on so many words, that "Alignment" by Simon Furman is now canon for the Marvel Comics universe. I mean, what do we want, a burning bush? JW 20:52, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Primus projecting his voice into our heads. --Lonegamer78 21:19, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Actually, McFeely, I'm joining you in wanting to punch people. This tendency to accept as canon statements from people who have no connection whatsoever to what they're retconning since they're neither editors nor official writers in that continuity is getting into irritating fanwank territory.
Especially when it comes to things like Killzone and Sentinel Major, when you have the people who wrote the stories in question still here and present and telling you basically "No, sorry, it doesn't work that way". --Jeysie 23:15, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Season 4: Apocryphal or . . . ?

So, Almanac 2 contains an episode-by-episode synopsis of what Animated season 4 would have been. Since this is material included in an official Transformers publication, it obviously has a place in this wiki. I assume, however, that we don't count these events as actually having happened in the Animated universe? (I mean, an argument can be made that the events "happened", and we're just learning about them in canonical text-blurb form instead of canonical animated episode form . . . ) JW 23:00, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

The events did not happen. Unwritten and unpublished stories are at the same level as unreleased toys. --Thylacine 2000 23:13, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

...er, these are published, though. Actually, I think I have an easy solution, which will have to be backed up by someone who has the book already. Does this part of the book have the "out of universe" hazard border or not?--Rosicrucian^Talk 23:38, 30 June 2010 (EDT)

It does. --ItsWalky 00:15, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

Then that likely settles it.--Rosicrucian^Talk 00:19, 1 July 2010 (EDT)

What To Do With Bludgeon (Animated)?

This book includes concept drawings for Bludgeon (Animated), who could have been a character in Season 4. (Here's a hint: Arrrr!) Since he never actually appeared, he presumably doesn't deserve his own page, but he's kinda cool. Where should he be mentioned? This page, nowhere at all, in our hearts? JW 01:04, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

We have plenty of pages on unreleased characters. See Category:Things that don't exist. —Interrobang 01:12, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

I assume we also do this with all the other "would've been in Season 4 but Animated got cancelled" stuff? ---Blackout- 11:14, 5 July 2010 (EDT)

We could make a Transformers Animated Season 4 page that could include blurbs of all this information, rather than have small individual articles with little information cluttering up the Things that don't exist category. --Bluestreak7 11:33, 7 July 2010 (EDT)

I agree. As we discussed with the first AA (on things like "M'kraan crystal (Animated)", it is useless to create a unique page that would never contain any more content than the linking and disambiguation pages that led to it in the first place. There should be an aggregated "List of Unused Season 4 Concepts", and possibly even a "List of Minor Characters Mentioned in AA2" (those who are only name-dropped and who get less than one sentence of content). "Overlord (Animated)" is probably right at the threshold of who could ever deserve to have a unique page: we know his faction, have an image, and literally one sentence of story. I think peeps with less than that should all be gang-treated on one page, because they're so slight it would be hard to imagine anybody looking for them on their own. --Thylacine 2000 11:49, 7 July 2010 (EDT)

Then throw the unused S4 stuff in Things that don't exist. It makes sense and I like the category. ---Blackout- 14:26, 7 July 2010 (EDT)

I agree with Thylacine on the creation of a "Transformers Animated Season 4" page, where we can throw the S4 plot synopses and assorted character concepts. JW 15:11, 7 July 2010 (EDT)

Gargent Cluster

Now that the Tonka GoBots have their own Universal Stream continuity family indicator, does that make them canon enough to include on this wiki? PLEASE? -- Semysane 15:42, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

Not to mention the Xobitor stream. Robotix, man, Ro-freakin'-botix! --Khajidha 16:16, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

Robotix is small enough to cover here in one page, alla the Tonka GoBots page. Maybe this could revive the GoBot sister wiki idea. Last I recall it was voted for and then nothing ever happened in constructing it.--99.111.196.209 16:19, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

There's a Quadwal cluster, but that doesn't mean we cover real life. --ItsWalky 17:07, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

To be fair, we actually DO cover beings from Quadwal cluster, such as Jim Sorenson and Bill Forster who are from Quadwal -3760.925 -- Semysane 22:17, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

We cover them if and when they feature in Transformers media!--Rosicrucian^Talk 22:43, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

Say, why don't we write up articles for every single Marvel Comics character ever-ever-ever too? I mean, the TFs fought Doctor Doom, and he fought or met or mentioned nearly all the rest. Right? --Thylacine 2000 23:58, 3 July 2010 (EDT)

Xobitor

Is this the first Robotix crossover, or was Hector Ramirez in the show or something? - Starfield 00:12, 4 July 2010 (EDT)

Annotations

WHA-DOOOOSH. - Chris McFeely 18:03, 10 July 2010 (EDT)

I've only read a small fraction of this, but MY HEAD HAS EXPLODED is my initial reaction.

Thank you for making my day and taking my mind off the stuff that took place over some edits to the TF3 page. ---Blackout- 18:15, 10 July 2010 (EDT)

...Oh, man, this is awesome. I have to get this! -- SFH 18:22, 10 July 2010 (EDT)

They referenced the STATLER BROTHERS!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my god! My hed asplode! --Khajidha 19:10, 10 July 2010 (EDT)

Nice! Two minor reference corrections, though. "Bored now" was also said by "Dark Willow" and the company from Alien is spelled Weyland-Yutani. —Interrobang 01:33, 11 July 2010 (EDT)

And I will be sticking my fingers in my ears when it comes to the "English names" of the BWN planets. —Interrobang 01:35, 11 July 2010 (EDT)

I think I'll join you in the "sticking my fingers in my ears", but not because of the BWN planets. No, I'm doing it because of the Cybertronian term for a rhino, which is "Nosoron", which is the Polish name for BW Rhinox. ARGH. ---Blackout- 04:56, 11 July 2010 (EDT)

"Gizmo" is the name of the robot from Superbook. "Robik" is the "this is totally not Gizmo!" name. --ItsWalky 08:36, 11 July 2010 (EDT)

Errors and notices in the annotations

• Pgs 80-81 - "The Gargent cluster was discovered by Advenas and Cheetor of the TransTech universe," - Adventus' name is misspelled and it should say Silverbolt instead of Cheetor.
• Page 81, the answer to 155 DOWN in the crossword is missing.
• Pgs 92-93 - "September 19, 19239" hasn't happened yet (in A.D./C.E.).
• Pgs 104-105 - "In the upper right are two “seals”" - upper left, actually. Also, you've neglected to mention that the Autobot Security Services symbol is set inside a Powerlinx symbol from the Energon series, and that the Ancient Autobot symbol in the lower-right corner is set inside an Energon symbol also from the Energon series.
• Pgs 114-115 - A bit minor , but New Kaon is not written in bold text.
• Pgs 114-115 - In the McColamo description, Epsilon Ariadne is misspelled as "Epsilon Airadne"
• Pgs 114-115 - Regarding Hive, technically the Headmasters version of this planet is called "Hachi no Susei" (or just "Susei" for short), it's only "hive" in the Omni dub.
• Pgs 114-115 - Again minor, but it isn't mentioned that the book spells Methuselah as "Methusula". Also, Protos is said to be Primacron's lab, not Methuselah (but then again, the way it's worded can make this debatable).
• Pgs 114-115 - In addition to Gaia's connection to Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, what about it also being the name of Earth in BWII and Neo (after all, Energoa got put in there too)?
• Pgs 114-115 - Telezart is missing from the list of neutral/unclaimed planets.
• Pg 125 - funny unmentioned tidbit, but "D2rz" kinda sounds like "detours"
• Pg 128 - the book misspells Xaaron as "Xarron"

That's all for now. --Sabrblade 20:14, 16 January 2011 (EST)

Nintenduu LVIX

Don't have the Almanac myself, so is this the correct spelling? 64 should be LXIV, not LVIX. --Khajidha 09:25, 1 August 2010 (EDT)

It's LXIV in the book. --abates 15:50, 1 August 2010 (EDT)

Title

This may be a stupid question, but why isn't the article at "Transformers Animated: The AllSpark Almanac II" like on the cover? (And as seen here.) - Starfield 00:10, 9 August 2010 (EDT)

My vote is to change the page title to be consistent with the actual book title. - Servitor 2152 12:48, 25 August 2010 (EDT)

I agree. Let's be consistent. ---Blackout- 12:56, 25 August 2010 (EDT)

Some more planet references

Cpt Rufus here when I should be going to bed. So I cannot go all cited references right now.

But here are more planets I spotted. Someone feel free to cut n past and cite if you want, or prove me wrong if I am mistaken. Its why I am posting it here instead of on the wiki proper. There are a TON of nerd references on this map. I get the feeling almost every single one is even if its an actual astronomical location.

• • The 8 planets in the Tiresia union are planets from the Robotech Sentinels series that were mostly only mentioned in the novels. The classifications are correct.
  • Yautja is the novel name for the Predator species of fighting Arnold fame.
  • Necronom IV is the name of the HR Geiger painting that became the basis for the Alien of fighting Ellen Ripley fame.
  • Eberron is the name of a Dungeons & Dragons campaign world.
  • Gor is the name of the planet from the misogynistic fetish novel series of the same name.
  • Arus and Doom are the main planets in Lion Team Voltron.
  • Stroggos is the alien world and race from Quake 2 and 4 as well.
  • New Avalon is the capital planet of House Davion in the Battletech franchise.
  • SR 388 is the Metroid homeworld from the Nintendo Metroid games.
  • Kobol is the apparent birthplace of humanity (kinda) in Battlestar Galactica.
  • Fleed is the home planet of Duke Fleed from Go Nagai's UFO Robot Grendizer.
  • Mongo may be a reference to Flash Gordon, the home planet of his nemesis Ming the Merciless.
  • Ork is either Mork from Ork, the early 80s sitcom starring Robin Williams, or the Orks from Warhammer 40,000 who seem to be the only Orcs who use a K instead.
  • Airlandia may be a reference to Hasbro toy property "Air Raiders".
  • Crystallium might refer to Remco's "Crystar" toys.
  • Melmac is the home planet of the fuzzy cat eating race "Alf" belongs to.
  • Jion is another spelling for Zeon, the kind of Nazi-ish antagonists in Mobile Suit Gundam.
  • Macron may refer to Macron-1 a Saban import of 2 unrelated anime series that aired in the US alongside G1 Season 3.

Im sure I am right on most of the ones above, but a few are more or less unchecked guesses based on memories and speculation.

And is it wrong I want to run an RPG campaign using the Animated verse and this galaxy map?

We know. And nobody cares about your RPG. —Interrobang 18:12, 15 August 2010 (EDT)

Well, I was impressed anyway! --abates 19:09, 15 August 2010 (EDT)

The Transformers References section, red links, and consistency

Okay, this is bothering me. In the Transformers References section, are we linking to the things from previous Transformers incarnations that all these little shout-outs actually reference, or are we creating new "Whatever (Animated)" pages for all for all of them? Currently, we have a little of both, and the lack of consistency bothers me (as do all the red links for articles that haven't been created yet). Take Sari's Master Blades, for example. The name is obviously a reference to the Master Blade from Masterforce; do we send the link there, or do we send it to "Master Blades (Animated)"? I personally vote for the former method; this is the Transformers References section after all, so it makes sense to point to the thing that's being referenced. If we do actually make articles for all these places and things that get mentioned, we can link to them from the appropriate character/episode/whatever main article.

Detour, I'm especially interested in hearing your opinion on this, since I suspect you probably don't agree with me on this point. - Servitor 2152 02:54, 20 August 2010 (EDT)

Third option - "Sari's Master Blades are named as an homage to the Master Blade from the Masterforce franchise." --Khajidha 09:17, 20 August 2010 (EDT)

I nominate the third. --Detour 09:39, 20 August 2010 (EDT)

If we'll never ever be able to populate a page with more info than what is already stated on the page that linked to it, I suggest not creating it in the first place--in this case, not creating a separate page for "Master Blades (Animated)" at all. We went through this with Almanac 1, deciding not to create "M'kraan Crystal (Animated)", and recently people have suggested the same thing for the moons of Thulsa Doom. --Thylacine 2000 10:16, 20 August 2010 (EDT)

Then it should be "Sari's Master Blades are named as an homage to the Master Blade from the Masterforce franchise." That way it is clear that what is in the Almanac is an homage to the original and not the same thing. --Khajidha 13:16, 25 August 2010 (EDT)

Is that not made obvious enough by the fact that a) it's listed in the References section and b) Animated and Masterforce aren't even the same continuity family, much less the same continuity? It seems that in the few cases where they are the same thing (IE the Vector Sigma bits and the various reports on things happening in different universal streams), we could draw attention to the fact, and that the default assumption would be that anything else familiar-looking is an homage. -- Servitor 2152 12:16, 26 August 2010 (EDT)

No, I don't think you can assume that sort of thing with the Almanacs. Best to explicitly note it as a homage. - Starfield 16:08, 26 August 2010 (EDT)

Current text for Season 4

Hi there, I'm sorry I didn't create an account here to write this comment but I shall be brief. Someone on another site e-mailed me asking me if I could provide them with information about what was going to happen in the cancelled Season 4 of TFA. I answered in full, using a combination of information from the AllSpark Almanac II, various interviews with Derrick Wyatt I had listened to, and also some 'filling in the gaps' logic. This person then, without my knowledge, copied and pasted my answer onto this page in the Season 4 section. However, as some of it doesn't come from the AAII, isn't it inappropriate for this page? I personally am not too comfortable with someone directly lifing a conversation I assumed was in confidence and puttig it on the wiki. Also, I'd hate to be responsible for any misinformation coming from my 'hunches' being on here. If anyone who uses this site agrees, would they be so kind as to delete it? Thank you. - Ridikill

Yes, it is inappropriate for this page if it contains information not from the book. Also it says underneath the edit box "You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource." and emails are not public domain. Thanks for letting us know! --abates 18:12, 12 December 2010 (EST)

Which character models should I scan?

I'd really like to contribute to the wiki more than just the occasional link fixing, typo fix and vandalism reverts, so I thought why not take advantage of the fact that I got the Almanacs recently? If I am allowed to scan in character models from this (I'm a little fuzzy on this whole image uploading malarkey), which ones? Besides the obvious ones for characters that don't have pages yet (Chase, Mirage, Wheelie, Pipes and Ramhorn) and the ones who don't have images (Lightbright, Magnificus, Stretch and Volks to my memory), I think Furao, Sedan, Sky Garry, Dai Atlas, Yoketron, Alpha Trion, Red Alert, Brawn, Highbrow, Seaspray, Huffer (maybe), Cosmos and Cyclonus could benefit from this (some more than others). Maybe some headshots from the Cyber-Ninja Corps pages Any thoughts? Particularly on how to scan the ones closer to the middle (if you catch my drift)? Bobpiecheese 17:33, 13 January 2011 (EST)

If you do scan images, make sure to set your scanner to magazine color mode so the images are free of spot color artifacts. I do agree that there are quite a few characters that need images. --ItsWalky 17:52, 13 January 2011 (EST)

...spot colour artifacts? What are those? Bobpiecheese 18:02, 13 January 2011 (EST)

See the pattern of tiny colored dots that make up Rapture's skin tone? If this image were scanned in "magazine mode," that would be a solid color. --ItsWalky 18:13, 13 January 2011 (EST)

Ah...well, I'm in deep shit. My test scan of Dai Atlas not only has those tiny dots, but the outline is blurry and you can see the text from the previous page behind him. I don't think my scanner has a magazine colour mode, it just has Document, Photo, and two kinds of ADF things that I have no idea what they are. There goes my attempt at being useful. Although maybe I can create the pages that need to be created and then people with better scanners can do the pictures. Yeah, that's the ticket. Bobpiecheese 18:21, 13 January 2011 (EST)

Tons more of characters to go!

And I mean a lot. Just sayin'. - CFB 07:26, 11 February 2011 (EDT)

Shorts

Okay I've read over this part of the book a few times and seen the red links on other pages. What the hell is up with Starscream's Fantasy and Logo? I've never seen them on youtube like all the others, they've had red links forever, and yet they still get mentioned in the almanac as if they're exactly the same as the others and nothing's wrong with them. Someone please explain. --Ninjabot33 14:18, 3 April 2011 (EDT)

They've been shown off at conventions, and when they do a S3 they'll probably be included. --Jimsorenson 14:28, 8 August 2011 (EDT)

500 links!

I just checked, 501 pages link to this badboy. Hehehehehe. --Jimsorenson 14:28, 8 August 2011 (EDT)

Reformatting the Errors section?

On the first edition's wiki page, each chapter has its own Errors sub-section. On this one, all of the errors are grouped together under Notes. Should this be standardized one way or another? Foortress (talk) 18:29, 25 April 2021 (EDT)