Italy

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Italy, formally the Italian Republic, is a Western European nation in the Mediterranean Sea. It's heavily involved in international bodies (including NATO), is a democracy with a high standard of living, and has been responsible for many cultural movements and influences such as the Romans, the Renaissance, and opera. Its capital is the city of Rome.

Unfortunately, we haven't yet found the occasion to edit a joke about pasta, the mafia, or Super Mario Bros. into this page.

Fiction

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Italy is the boot-shaped country, and perhaps the least inaccurate on this map.

Generation 1 cartoon continuity

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The Transformers cartoon

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The transcontinental Europa 2000 car race cut through Italy. Trans-Europe Express

Victory cartoon

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The Decepticons destroyed Egg Rock in Italy and used the site to spring a trap on Star Saber, involving metal-eating Doriya. The Death-Bringing Space Insects!!

Young Corgi continuity

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In the near-future of 2000 AD, Italy and the rest of Western Europe is part of the Federation of Western Europe. Battle Beneath the Ice

Transformers/G.I. Joe

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Italy was briefly conquered by the might of Cobra and their Decepticon allies in 1938. Transformers/G.I. Joe

Cybertron cartoon

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Starscream's Ancient Decepticon army swarmed over the nation, spreading panic. Invasion

Live-action film series

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IDW Revenge of the Fallen comics

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Under Soundwave's command, Fracture and her men Gunbarrel and Reverb landed in Italy. Fracture smashed into an Italian military base to find the others some suitable alt modes, then they destroyed the place. Alliance #3

They then proceeded to do... well, not much, cos NEST and the Autobots destroyed them all. Alliance #4 Presumably this would make Italy a member of NEST.

The Veiled Threat

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Starscream and Italian criminal Bruno Carrera made a deal, where Carrera would help to destroy Optimus Prime in exchange for ruling Europe for the Decepticons.

Under this plan, Swindle and Deadend begin causing chaos on the streets of Rome to attract Autobot attention. After this was achieved, Starscream challenged Optimus to a battle in the Coliseum.... where Carrera had arranged a trap door and set of restrains for Prime, bwa ha ha! The Autobots would've been terminated in this ambush if not for the human allies in NEST.

Carrera would later find out Starscream was very unhappy... The Veiled Threat

2005 IDW continuity

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Thundercracker arranged a meeting between Marissa Faireborn and her father on the Italian island of Sicily. Dance Among the Shadows

Transformers in Italy

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They could release this but not projectiles that don't look like mushrooms.

Italy has a very strong and often overlooked connection with the Transformers franchise, starting even before the establishment of the "Transformers" brand proper as it was one the first non-Japanese countries to receive a pre-Transformers toyline (that is; to have a licensed international release of the Takara figures that would later constitute the original The Transformers toyline). There's also the longstanding debate on whether the very name of the Transformers brand was either born in Italy or just sneakily stolen by one of its companies at an opportune time.

In 1982, GiG launched their localization of Takara's Diaclone toys, under its original Japanese toyline name <ref>"GiG's Diaclone & Trasformers (Part 2: Diaclone)" on soundwavesoblivion.com</ref>. In early 1984, GiG rebranded their Diaclone toys into Trasformer as the Diaclone Car Robots - as well as the now newly-acquired Micro Change toys - were rolled out, parallel to Hasbro introducing the Transformers name in the U.S. to designate their own releases of Diaclone / Micro Change toys <ref>"GiG's Diaclone & Trasformers" (Part 3: Auto Robots) (Part 4: Micro Change) on soundwavesoblivion.com</ref>. Inevitably, this has led to long heated discussions as to who exactly merits the credit for the Transformers name: on one hand, GiG's renamed toyline was first advertised two months after the reveal of Hasbro's Transformers at the 1984 Toy Fair and five months after Hasbro's registration of the Transformers trademark, but on the other hand, GiG already used terms like "trasformazione" (Italian for "transformation") and "trasformare" ("to transform") to market their Diaclone figures dating back as far as 1982, thus; given how temporally close all these marketing decisions were, it is ultimately not at all implausible that either toyline might have inspired the other. <ref>"The Chicken or the GiG?: Part 1" on TFSource</ref> Notably, GiG also used the term "Autorobot" to describe their Car Robots, which seems to bear some similarity to the Autobots. Their projectiles also had a unique funky flat shape.

Eventually, starting from 1985 and beyond, GiG would get the Transformers license from Hasbro and release their toys using the official Transformers packaging - with all the writing translated into Italian - using both the international brand logo and also, added at a smaller scale, the Trasformer logo so as to create some continuity between the two toylines. This would continue up until 1988, where the Pretenders would drop the Trasformer sub-branding entirely. Nonetheless, GiG would remain involved with the distribution of Transformers figures in Italy up until Beast Wars, with their logo dropping from multilingual European boxes - and thus, presumably, marking the end of their relationship with Hasbro - during one of the later Transmetals waves. Most famously, throughout their era of involvement with the Transformers brand, GiG also managed to get an Italian release of the otherwise Japanese-exclusive Galaxy Shuttle.<ref>"The Chicken or the GiG?: Part 2" on TFSource</ref>

It's also impossible to talk about the history of Transformers toys in Italy without mentioning the large amount of knockoffs that flooded Italian stores throughout the 80s and 90s: a bootleg of Diaclone's "Build Combination 6 Figure Set" - the pre-Transformers version of Devastator - released early on in the country (potentially even before its original Hasbro version) <ref>An Italian-distributed Diaclone Devastator KO, dated to 1983</ref>, and various national toy companies like Globo, Ceppi Ratti, Fantastiko, and ADG, would either manufacture and/or distribute a multitude of Taiwanese-made Transformers knockoffs, most of them under the "Metamorphs" name: the most common by far and away being copies of the Micromasters, sold in blister cards identical to their originals save for the aforementioned Metamorphs title replacing the Transformers logo. Even GiG entered the bootleg market shortly after losing their Transformers license, distributing a couple of imported G1 Constructicons toys sometime during the 2000s! <ref>A TFW2005 post featuring a multitude of Italian bootlegs, including the Micromasters of Globo, Ceppi Ratti, and Fantastiko, and the GiG Constructicons</ref>

On the media side of things, Italy is notable for having received a national airing of Transformers: Super-God Masterforce <ref>Italian opening of Transformers: Super-God Masterforce</ref>, one of the Japanese-made cartoons that hadn't been exhibited in other territories like the United States or the United Kingdom (albeit it was aired in a couple of other European countries, like Spain and Russia). Transformers dubs in Italy have also received a few entirely unique theme songs, from Generation 2 to Energon and even all the ways into the 2010s with Prime! National publisher Panini has also released multiple Transformers comics across Europe, as well as creating the 1986 The Transformers Sticker Book.

Cultural influences

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Ha-ha, the complete disregard for copyright infringement in the 1980s toy car market means that I can turn into a realistic Ferrari and he can't!

Italian culture has had a significant influence on Transformers nomenclature, with various characters using names taken from or inspired by Latin. There are also a handful of Transformers characters with Italian-derived names, like Rosanna, Angela, and everyone's favorite Italian-coded 'bot Dino.

Italy is also home to several iconic car manufacturers, many of which have been featured in both official and unofficial capacities as the alternate modes for Transformers characters in both media and toys, the most represented of these definitely being Lamborghini. The very first pre-Transformers toy was Takara's 1982 Diaclone "Countach LP500S" - evidently based on the eponymous Lamborghini Countach - and even before this; Takara had already made a transforming sort-of-robot-looking toy in 1978 by the "Cosmocountach" name under the Microman Command brand <ref>"A Brief History of Transforming Robot Toys: Part 1" on TheTransformers.tumblr.com</ref>, with several other later characters bearing - and occasionally fully-licensed - Lamborghini alternate modes ensuing (even Optimus Prime was a Lamborghini Diablo at one point!). Ferrari is also a popular recurring inspiration for vehicle modes, with a handful of G1 characters bearing Ferrari-inspired alternate modes and the later Dino featuring a fully-licensed Ferrari 458 Italia vehicle mode as seen in 2011's Transformers: Dark of the Moon, as well as being endowed an accent and personality that's very stereotypically Italian (and his name being a homage to Enzo Ferrari's son, Alfredo "Dino" Ferrari). Unfortunately, due to licensing reasons, he has never received an official toy with a proper accurate 458 Italia vehicle mode. <ref>Mattel famously had an exclusive licensing agreement with Ferrari, although this is no longer the case since late 2014... As Ferrari now has an exclusive license with Maisto and Bburago instead. So, we probably won't see an official Transformers Ferrari anytime soon.</ref> Other Italian car brands represented in Transformers include Lancia and Pagani.

Fandom

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Perhaps unsurprisingly given the country's extensive history with the brand, Italy has one of the most active Transformers fandoms in continental Europe. One of its largest online hubs used to be the now-defunct Autorobot.it forum, whose userbase has since mostly migrated into the eponymous Transformers Autorobot.it Facebook group. <ref>https://www.facebook.com/groups/transformers.autorobot.it/</ref>

Notable people

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  • Guido Guidi, an Italian comic artist who has worked extensively with the Transformers brand.
  • Emiliano Santalucia, another Italian comic artist who has also worked extensively with the Transformers brand.
  • Marco Balzarotti, an Italian voice actor who's dubbed multiple Transformers projects.
  • Lyrian, a Japanese Transformers voice actress and designer who grew up in Milan (and whose Italian upbringing likely influenced her naming of the aforementioned Rosanna and Angela).



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  • [[wikipedia:{{#if:|:}}Italy|{{#if:||Italy}}]] at Wikipedia
  • {{#if:||Italy}} at the IDW Hasbro Wiki

References

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