Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy (cartoon)

This article is about . For other uses of "War for Cybertron", see War for Cybertron (disambiguation)|The name or term "War for Cybertron" refers to more than one character or idea. For a list of other meanings, see War for Cybertron (disambiguation).}}

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Haven't we been here before?

Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy (also known as War for Cybertron) is an animated series produced by Hasbro and Rooster Teeth based on the War for Cybertron Trilogy toyline, with animation by Polygon Pictures and voice production by Horseless Cowboy. F.J. DeSanto acts as the series showrunner, a role he previously, partially held for the Prime Wars Trilogy web series, with George Krstic, Gavin Hignight, Brandon M. Easton, Tim Sheridan, and Mae Catt as writers. The show also sees Jake Foushee, Jason Marnocha, and Frank Todaro reprising their respective roles as Optimus Prime, Megatron, and Starscream, as well as previous Transformers alumni Keith Silverstein and Jessica DiGiovanni returning for voicework. Three seasons aired on Netflix, one for each of the franchise's three toylines; the first season was released on July 30, 2020, the second season on December 30, 2020, and the third on July 29, 2021.

In conjunction with the series, Hasbro and TakaraTomy released a Netflix-branded toyline featuring more battle-worn decoes for pre-existing War for Cybertron Trilogy toys, as well as toys based on characters introduced in the show. Leading up to the release of the final chapter, TakaraTomy announced the Premium Finish line, half of which features characters from the Netflix show with extremely animation accurate paint jobs.

Overview

[edit]

The planet Cybertron has been ravaged by an endless civil war between Optimus Prime and his Autobots and Megatron and his Decepticons, with the former in ruins but refusing to stand down. Frustrated, Ultra Magnus surrenders to Megatron shortly before they learn of the life-giving Allspark, and Shockwave's plan to reformat all Autobots on the planet into Decepticons. Ultra Magnus overhears everything and relays it to the Autobots, launching a hunt for the Allspark from both factions. After an imprisoned Ultra Magnus is murdered by Megatron, neutral scavenger Bumblebee obtains the Alpha Trion Protocols containing the location of the Allspark and reluctantly joins the Autobots. Despite warnings of dooming the planet itself, Optimus Prime forms a plan to flee Cybertron aboard the Ark with the Allspark. The Autobots cautiously trust ex-Decepticon Jetfire to lead them into the dangerous Sea of Rust to obtain the Allspark, while Ratchet and Decepticon Impactor repair a derelict space bridge, and Bumblebee steals raw energon from the Mercenaries to power the Ark. The synchronous plan succeeds, though Elita-1 is left to continue the war effort on Cybertron, the Allspark is lost among the stars, and the Ark is left adrift as an unknown ship approaches...

With Cybertron unable to sustain life, Megatron and the Decepticons plan to search for a new world aboard the newly-constructed Nemesis, though Elita-1 and her team cause trouble by freeing prisoners whose sparks power the ship. The Ark Autobots are captured by the Fool's Fortune Mercenaries led by Doubledealer and contracted by Quintesson Judge Deseeus, though he betrays them, motivating the thieves to help the Autobots escape, while secretly selling out their location to Megatron. After the Nemesis departs to follow the Ark, Shockwave lures other weak Decepticons to Kaon Arena to harvest their sparks, prompting Elita-1 and Decepticon Scrapface's forces to detonate the harvester, though they are all killed in the blast. Elsewhere, the Ark locates the Allspark and travels to the derelict Nebulon Station, but their attempts to destroy it and pass through the accompanying space bridge come to a stop by the Decepticons. After a united brawl against the Scorponok, Starscream uses the Nemesis cannons to destroy everyone present, but the resulting explosion opens a rift to the Dead Universe. Inside, the Ark crew finds the jaded Sky Lynx, who helps Optimus open an exit rift to Earth. Meanwhile, Megatron temporarily meets his future self Galvatron, who urges him to use his hatred to kill Optimus Prime, leading to Sky Lynx's sacrifice to save the Autobots. The Ark, Nemesis, and the in-pursuit Fool's Fortune, now piloted by Deseeus, escape the Dead Universe and lock into a dogfight, culminating in Megatron stealing the Matrix of Leadership. The Fool's Fortune warp-drive explodes, causing the remaining ships to crash—though they are not the only Cybertronians on the planet...

The bestial Maximals and Predacons locate their ancestors, the Autobots and Decepticons respectively, in the harsh landscape of prehistoric Earth. While the Decepticons and Predacons consolidate their troops together under the command of two Megatrons (who get along surprisingly well), the Autobots and Maximals initially face each other with hostility. Ultimately, the two heroic factions set aside their differences to beat the two bands of 'cons to capturing the Allspark. The mystical artefact creates a series of unsettling illusions to mislead the two sides. However, the Predacon Dinobot betrays his comrades and steals the Matrix of Leadership back from the original Megatron, returning it to Optimus before giving in to his wounds from Predacon Megatron. The Allspark's eerie illusions culminate in a duel between Optimus Prime and a projection of Ultra Magnus. The spirit of the Allspark ultimately sides with Optimus; guiding him to its physical resting place. Upon reaching the Allspark temple, Optimus is greeted by both Megatron and Optimus Primal, the former waging a climactic battle between the two rivals. An Allspark projection of Elita-1 tells Optimus to surrender the Matrix to Megatron against Primal's advice, resulting in the Matrix rejecting Megatron and sending him into a nightmarish vision. As Prime and Primal return with both the Matrix and the dying Allspark in hand, the Nemesis crew attacks the Ark, resulting in a desperate struggle to get the Ark's systems online while fending off the 'cons. Incredibly, the Ark gains consciousness and transforms into robot mode, having been given schematics for conversion within the Dead Universe and enabled by the Allspark. The transformed Ark completely turns the tables on the Nemesis; with the Decepticon and Predacon troops being sealed within the ship's stasis field. The defected Predacon Blackarachnia forms a temporary alliance with the Ark's crew.

As the Ark lands on a desolate, frozen-over Cybertron via a spacebridge network, Megatron is freed from his imprisonment by Galvatron. The Autobots and Maximals emerge from the ship and plan to return the Allspark to its rightful place within Cybertron before the planet is lost for good. As Bumblebee and Optimus set out together, they encounter Optimus's deranged future self Nemesis Prime, who lashes out at his past self for the Allspark. While Megatron and Galvatron join forces with Nemesis Prime, Bumblebee finds the Temple of the Allspark hidden within a canyon, and manages to enter the temple. As the four factions arrive under Optimus Primal, Megatron turns on Galvatron at Optimus's and Starscream's encouragement. As Bumblebee replaces the Allspark in its altar, the golden spirits of many deceased Cybertronians appear, and magically transport Galvatron and Nemesis Prime away. As the spirits reunite with the Allspark, Cybertron is saved, and the Decepticons and Predacons reconcile their conflict with the Autobots and Maximals on the condition the two sides stay apart, leading to an uncertain age of peace. Meanwhile, Unicron punishes Galvatron and Nemesis Prime for their failure, and reformats them...

Continuity

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The series is its own distinct continuity, though one firmly rooted in the Generation 1 continuity family, particularly the original franchise, Beast Wars, and the 2005 IDW comics. When characters, settings, dialogue, and plot beats are clearly inspired by previous Transformers content, it's almost entirely those precursors. The one major element borrowed from elsewhere is the concept of the Allspark as a physical artifact sent into space from Cybertron by Optimus Prime and then pursued by the major players, which originated in the 2007 live-action movie. The Allspark stands in for several MacGuffins from previous series: the "new supply of energy" that the Ark left Cybertron in search of, More than Meets the Eye, Part 1 the Matrix of Leadership as the thing capable of destroying Unicron,The Transformers: The Movie and the crashed Ark as the object of Predacon Megatron's time-traveling journey to prehistoric Earth.The Agenda (Part III) However, this series also reincorporates the afterlife aspect of the Allspark as it was introduced in the Beast Machines cartoon,The Reformatting with Transformer ghosts shown entering and exiting the artifact. In addition to the aforementioned changes that set this series apart, other major departures from its precursors include an absence of present-day Earth as a setting, as well as a markedly different unfolding of the Beast Wars and their future-history, as summarized above.

Cast

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{{#if:true ||(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)}}

{{#if:;Ark crew
Cybertron cell
Other
{{#if:;Ark crew
Cybertron cell
Other
Ark crew
Cybertron cell
Other
Cybertron army
Other
  • Impactor (Brook Chalmers)
  • Skywarp (Mark Whitten)
  • Refraktors (Edward Bosco,
    Shawn Hawkins, Kaiser Johnson,
    Frank Todaro, Mark Whitten)
  • Seekers (Kaiser Johnson, Sean Wright)|
Autobots }}{{#if:;Nemesis crew
Cybertron army
Other
  • Impactor (Brook Chalmers)
  • Skywarp (Mark Whitten)
  • Refraktors (Edward Bosco,
    Shawn Hawkins, Kaiser Johnson,
    Frank Todaro, Mark Whitten)
  • Seekers (Kaiser Johnson, Sean Wright)|
 Decepticons }}{{#if:;Decepticons
Maximals
Predacons
Other
 Future timeline }}{{#if:*Alpha Trion (Ben Jurand)
Mercenaries
Quintessons
 Others }}{{#if:| Misc }}{{#if:| Misc }}
Nemesis crew
Cybertron army
Other
Maximals
Predacons
Other
Decepticons
Maximals
Predacons
Other
Mercenaries
Quintessons
Mercenaries
Quintessons
 
}}{{#if:|

}}

Episodes

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Chapter 1: Siege

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{{ #if: {{#ifexpr: 3 }}

|

3

|

  1. Episode 1
  2. Episode 2
  3. Episode 3
  4. Episode 4
  5. Episode 5
  6. Episode 6

}}

Chapter 2: Earthrise

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{{ #if: {{#ifexpr: 3 }}

|

3

|

  1. Episode 1
  2. Episode 2
  3. Episode 3
  4. Episode 4
  5. Episode 5
  6. Episode 6

}}

Chapter 3: Kingdom

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{{ #if: {{#ifexpr: 3 }}

|

3

|

  1. Episode 1
  2. Episode 2
  3. Episode 3
  4. Episode 4
  5. Episode 5
  6. Episode 6

}}

Evocative titling, huh?

Reception

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With the same production team as the notoriously unpopular Prime Wars Trilogy cartoon series, fan expectations for the War for Cybertron Trilogy were lukewarm prior to its release, but it was generally considered to be an improvement over its predecessor, though not without flaws of its own.

A proposed sequel series based on Legacy was in the discussion stage at one point, but Netflix passed on the pitch,<ref>{{#if: Per FJ DeSanto: they had a series for Transformers Legacy planned out, but Netflix passed on it. #TFconLA |"Per FJ DeSanto: they had a series for Transformers Legacy planned out, but Netflix passed on it. #TFconLA"—|}}{{#if: https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375 |Mike Seibert|Mike Seibert}}{{#if: Twitter |, Twitter|}}{{#if: |, ""|}}{{#if: 2022 |, 2022{{#if: 3 |/{{#switch:{{#len:3}}|1=03|3}}{{#if: 13|/{{#switch:{{#len:13}}|1=013|13}}|}}}}|}}{{#if: https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375 ||}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375%7C7%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375%7C8%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375%7C7%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://twitter.com/MikeSibertRadio/status/1502847896458170375%7C8%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#if: | (dead link)}}</ref> likely due to declining expectations for adult-oriented Transformers cartoons.

Voice acting

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Like contemporary shows Cyberverse and Rescue Bots Academy, the War for Cybertron Trilogy cartoon used a non-union (a.k.a. cheaper to hire) cast of voice actors, meaning that many major characters—such as Optimus Prime and Megatron—lack their iconic voices, and some of the performances were criticised as being amateur, inexpressive, or otherwise ill-suited to the characters. The performances were especially noticeable for actors who had appeared in other series such as Jake Foushee, Jason Marnocha or Jessica DiGiovani, whose performances in other series were generally either well received or at least considered superior to what was delivered in the War For Cybertron Trilogy. In most cases, it seems the actors received poor voice direction; for example, Predacon Megatron's dialogue was scripted with David Kaye's delivery in mind, which is not borne through in the performance. Notably, the same voice director worked on the Prime Wars Trilogy, which had similar issues with delivery.

Animation

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In terms of visuals also, the show exhibits clear budget limitations when compared to previous Transformers cartoons of the 2010s, having more in common with the 2005 Cybertron cartoon. Nonetheless, the show is distinctly a visual upgrade over the Prime Wars Trilogy, with detailed backgrounds and character models (the latter usually based on CAD models for the toys, although not all characters from the toylines appear) and a deliberate murky style. However, character animation is generally just passable at best.

Pacing and story direction

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Despite cramming an absurd number of characters and concepts into its short 18-episode-miniseries run, the War for Cybertron Trilogy cartoon feels slow. Dialogue is drawn-out, both in terms of constantly reiterating exposition (drink every time someone says "Allspark") and in terms of the delivery itself. The plot of Siege in particular is highly protracted, while Kingdom conversely is rushed in many places. Characters often have little if anything in common with their previous incarnations beyond appearance; some of the reimagined portrayals were well-received by some fans, others less so. The three Kingdom episodes written by Mae Catt markedly stand out from the rest, with clear fan appeal in how the likes of Dinobot, Blackarachnia and Starscream are portrayed.

Notes

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It's been alleged the robots featured in this show are 80% clones by volume.
  • The series features extensive use of generics, though both sides use different character models as the base for their troops. The Autobots use Cog, Sideswipe, Mirage, Ironhide, and Hound to pad their forces while the Decepticons use Impactor, Refraktor, Barricade, and, as usual, the Seekers. All of these generics except for Cog and Impactor are used for the Sparkless, with Laserbeak used for the Sea of Rust birds, Omega Supreme for the Guardians, Impactor for the Dome Guards and a gladiator, Ironhide for the Deseeus Army Drones, and Scorponok for the Predacons. Hasbro decides which characters can be used as generic soldiers.<ref name="interview"/>
  • In addition to generic character models, many characters use generic firearms based on certain toy accessories as opposed to a dedicated weapon. The weapons are Cog's "RT-5 Circuit Welder", Refraktor's "EMM Distortion Blaster", Chromia's "RT-5 Anti-thermo Blaster" with the "SR Hushfuze" barrel, the Seekers' "HPI Null-Ray Laser Launcher", Ultra Magnus's (who ironically does not use this weapon) "RT-15 Stethoscopic Detector" with an extended "SR Hushfuze" barrel, and Rattrap's fusion blaster.
  • Upon its initial release in the United States, War for Cybertron Trilogy was given a TV-Y7 designation, despite the show's dark tone, violence, and brief use of coarse language in the first episode. Presumably due to these very criteria, the series was later re-rated to TV-14, making it the first Transformers television series to carry that designation. Due to the separation of seasons into separate listings (below), Earthrise and Kingdom keep the TV-Y7 rating.
  • Despite the three parts being advertised as three chapters of one series when the second Earthrise trailer was released, it also received a separate page on Netflix, and Kingdom followed suit. The original War for Cybertron Trilogy page's title graphic was also changed to include Siege and the number 1 behind it. This also means that Netflix calls the Earthrise and Kingdom episodes each "Chapter 1" as well.
  • While the Siege chapter received a recap on the Earthrise page, the Kingdom page featured no such recap for Earthrise. Drat!
  • The sequel series bible had been written by Gavin Hignight, who said the proposed sequel was ready to go before Netflix pulled the plug on it.<ref>{{#if: We had all but had a sequel series green lit. It was like ready to go. I had written the bible, I was working with FJ on it, and we were really excited about what was to come, and Hasbro was like "toys are ready, let's do it" and Netflix didn't want to do it. |"We had all but had a sequel series green lit. It was like ready to go. I had written the bible, I was working with FJ on it, and we were really excited about what was to come, and Hasbro was like "toys are ready, let's do it" and Netflix didn't want to do it."—|}}{{#if: https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900 |Gavin Hignight|Gavin Hignight}}{{#if: YouTube |, YouTube|}}{{#if: |, ""|}}{{#if: 2024 |, 2024{{#if: 10 |/{{#switch:{{#len:10}}|1=010|10}}{{#if: 09|/{{#switch:{{#len:09}}|1=009|09}}|}}}}|}}{{#if: https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900 ||}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900%7C7%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900%7C8%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900%7C7%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://youtu.be/ptqvScphqzo?si=46NLY4APR_aTI5_k&t=900%7C8%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#if: | (dead link)}}</ref>

Foreign names

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  • Chinese: Biànxíng Jīngāng: Sàibótǎn Dàzhàn Sānbùqǔ (Taiwan, 變形金剛：賽博坦大戰三部曲 "Transformers: Cybertron War Trilogy")
  • German: Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy: Die Belagerung (Siege), Erdaufgang (Earthrise), Eine neue Welt (Kingdom)
  • Italian: Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy - L'assedio (Siege), Il Sorgere della Terra (Earthrise), Il Regno (Kingdom)
  • Japanese: Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy (トランスフォーマー: ウォー・フォー・サイバトロン・トリロジー Toransufōmā: Wō fō Saibatoron Torirojī)
  • Portuguese: Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy - O Cerco (Siege), O Nascer da Terra (Earthrise), O Reino (Kingdom)

References

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<references />
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