TRANSFORMERS: THE BASICS on OPTIMUS PRIME

it's been a long time coming but here we are at the 100th episode of the basics and there's no character to better celebrate this milestone than the most iconic bot in the entire Transformers franchise the leader of the Autobots Optimus Prime I admit it's maybe a bit strange that it's taken a hundred episodes to cover such a major character but Optimus Prime is so significant ubiquitous so famous that I always felt like I needed a special reason to do it but like any other BOTS we'll start this look at his history at the beginning the toy that would become the original Optimus Prime was first released in the Japanese toy line diaclone in 1983 under the name battle convoy and was imported by Hasbro to become part of the first year of the Transformers toy line in 1984 the figure transformed into a Freightliner semi-trailer truck the truck's cab converted into Optimus Prime himself while the trailer opened into the combat deck a battlefield headquarters for the Autobots containing the Scout car roller used by prime for spy missions prime was one of the very first Transformers characters for whom a profile was written as part of the original treatment for the franchise assembled by Marvel comics writers Jim shooter and Danny O'Neill the latter being responsible for giving the Autobot leader his name optimists they wrote had the personality of an Abraham Lincoln a powerful kind intelligent compassionate commander who believed that freedom was the right of all sentient beings Optimus Prime was the figurehead of the Transformers brand for its first two years his likeness gracing an incalculable amount of merchandise and media as he led the Autobots into battle every weekday afternoon in the Transformers Animated Series and every month in the pages of the Marvel comic each series had its own origin story for prime that related how he came to be Autobot leader and carrier of the mystic matrix of leadership in the comic he was a soldier who rose through the ranks to become leader but in the cartoon he came from more humble beginnings as revealed in the seminal 1985 episode war dawn prime was once a naive young dock worker named Orion Pax who during the Golden Age before the war idolized the Decepticons for their ability to fly until he was deceived and gunned down by Megatron at the outbreak of the conflict rebuilt by the sage alpha Trion he became Optimus Prime the first of a new generation of battle ready Autobots who led the fight against the Decepticon war machine Prime's voice in the animated series was provided by actor Peter Cullen who based his strong but gentle performance on his own brother former Marine Larry Cullen the way he talked there was a gentle and a smoothness to it and he said well if you're gonna be a hero Peter be a real hero we must have courage Huffer we can't ignore the danger we must conquer it don't be one of those pretend Hollywood heroes if you're gonna be a hero Peter remember be strong enough to be gentle hang on to your dreams chip the future is built on dreams in addition to Cullen's character defining voice work and the Orion Pax origin story the cartoon introduced many other concepts that would go on to become some of the most famous recurring pieces of iconography surrounding Optimus Prime in the future including his energy axe weapon his romance with female Autobot commander elita-1 and his classic catchphrase [Music] sadly Hasbro didn't quite realize what Optimus Prime meant to their audience of children at the time viewing him as just another toy to be sold and when that toy was discontinued in 1986 the decision was made to kill Prime off the cartoon sent him out with style on the big screen that summer as the Transformers the movie saw him succumb to fatal wounds sustained during his final battle with Megatron to be replaced as leader by Rodimus Prime in the comic meanwhile he fell victim to his own strong morals which prevented him from accepting victory in a life-or-death virtual reality video game showdown with the Decepticon leader unsurprisingly the decision to kill off their hero didn't sit well with young audiences and the appearance in the cartoon of a reanimated zombie version of prime a few months later was just salt in the wound a torrent of letters from upset kids soon showed Hasbro the error of their ways and a two-part episode was quickly commissioned for February 1987 that saw the Autobot leader brought back to life by one of the alien quintessons taking this profound lesson in the popularity and importance of Optimus Prime to heart Hasbro set to work creating a brand new toy of the Autobot leader for the 1988 product line a huge futuristic heavily armed truck whose cab and trailer could combine to form a super robot this new Optimus was a power master a kind of transformer who came packaged with a partner minifigure that transformed into an engine for their vehicle mode which was required to unlock the larger figures ability to transform crimes partner was an alien scientist from the planet nebulosa named hi-q though the cartoon had come to an end by the time of pyro master optimus prime's release the toy did lead to primes resurrection in the Marvel comic in which it was discovered that primes brain had been preserved on a floppy disk after his videogame demise allowing it to be implanted in a new Power Master body constructed by haikyuu one further toy of Prime was released by Hasbro in the original series a non-transforming action master figure which came with a huge truck that converted into a battle station and prime adopted this form in the final issue of the Marvel comic when exposure to the super fuel nucleon fused him and haikyuu into a single being now over in Japan on the other hand it was a slightly different story despite his resurrection in 87 Hasbro's Japanese partner Takara clearly believed that prime known in the Japanese market as convoy had had his day only a few months after his return to life in the opening episodes of the Japanese exclusive sequel cartoon transformers the Headmaster's they immediately killed him off again by having him sacrifice his life bringing the unstable mega computer vector Sigma under control and when they released the power master toy in their markets the following year it was marketed as a new Autobot named jin rai who only looked like the departed optimus still in 1991 with the original series on its last legs they finally decided to bring prime back once again as part of that year's return of convoy series through the life-giving power of the mysterious zodiac prime was reborn as star convoy a motorised figure that converted from futuristic truck to giant robot to a base for the lines tiny micro masters in the decade since the end of the original toy line Optimus Prime has remained the premier legacy character of the Transformers franchise the very next series transformers generation 2 included four separate figures of him between 1993 and 1995 and he's continued to appear in virtually every new incarnation of the brand that's followed ever-present in both media and toy lines with more stories and figures to his name than literally any other Transformers character his form changes from series to series he typically turns into various types of semi-truck both flatfish cabover and long hood conventional models sometimes with a trailer sometimes without but several notable iterations of the character have also turned into fire engines not to mention the other random one-off forms he's had including sports cars various types of animal and more he's been a headmaster a pretender a combiner and nearly everything else in between but whatever is ship he has a consistency of design that virtually no other transformer can boast almost always recognizable by his classic red and blue color scheme his mouth plated helmet or his body builder style window packs and grille abs the only series from which he's notably absent are the beast era cartoons of the 1990s but even then his role as leader was filled by look-alikes like his descendant Optimus Primal featured in 1996's beast wars which also included a guest appearance for prime himself when the evil Predacons traveled back in time and attempted to alter history by killing him putting it simply Optimus Prime is both a legend in the fictional world of the Transformers and an icon of 20th and 21st century popular culture recognizable to kids and adults alike all around the world story elements from classic media that commonly recur in new series include explorations of optimises civilian life from before he became Prime with Dreamwave productions comics introducing in 2002 the enduring idea that he was originally a data clerk while other stories have depicted him as a scientist a police officer and more and perhaps most famously his repeated tendency to sacrifice his life and return from the dead something that almost every version of the character has done at least once continuing a trend begun by his power master form it's common for him to combine with his trailer or with other Autobots into new more powerful forms and Optimus toys also have a history of being recolored to create new characters in white as his autobot brother-in-arms Ultra Magnus and in black and teal as his evil clone Nemesis Prime in terms of characterization Optimus Prime has always had the same unchanging noble compassionate core personality described by shooter and O'Neil in their original profile but each series has taken its own unique approach to it the original cartoon for instance initially played prime as a warm fatherly figure who joked and bantered in between inspiring speeches amazing a booby-trap that actually catches boobies but from the movie onward the lighter side of the character dropped away and he became more of a stoic type always speaking in dramatic intonations yes stylings and this time no force in the universe can stop me in the Marvel comic meanwhile especially under the pan of British writer Simon Furman he was a weary er leader upon whom the burden of command often weighed heavily pruned to self-doubt and guilt over the suffering caused by the war each of these characterizations has been revisited in new media and as the Transformers franchise has expanded exponentially in the 21st century each new series has continued to put its own spin on the Autobot leader actor neil caplan emulated Peter Cullen's voice for the 2001 robots in disguise animated series matter of fact I never doubted that for us Megatron the first fire engine version of Optimus he was conceived in Japan as a separate Autobot named fire convoy but was reimagined as a new incarnation of prime for Hasbro markets Optimus Primal actor Gary chalk voiced Prime in the Unicron trilogy of series who was forced to question his own worthiness to carry the matrix while defending the galaxy against the titular monster planet in transformers Armada Energon and Cybertron from 2002 to 2006 our worlds are in danger 2007 Transformers Animated saw David K voice a younger Optimus Prime struggling with his command of a disorderly Autobot space bridge repair crew who was still trying to prove himself a hero after his rival Sentinel Prime let him take the fall for an unsanctioned mission gone wrong leading to his expulsion from the Autobot Elite Guard the same year marked the beginning of the live-action film series which catapulted Optimus Prime back into the pop-culture limelight and saw Peter Cullen return to once again voiced the character he had made famous my name is LOF thomas prime Sam Witwicky you hold the key to birth survival the live-action optimist was more in the action movie hero Vin a grimmer more violent character who didn't hesitate to kill Decepticons ironically the kind of tough-guy Hollywood hero type that Larry Cullen had encouraged his brother to avoid playing Optimus AHS over 20 years before still Cullens returned to the role also saw him voice other incarnations of Optimus Prime outside the films in the vast majority of new Transformers media released over the next decade chiefly he portrayed the new version of Optimus featured in the aligned continuity that debuted in 2010 featured principally in that year's Transformers Prime animated series and occasionally guest starring in 2011 spin-off RESCUE BOTS before finally stepping down as leader and allowing bumblebee to take his place in 2015 sequel robots in disguise the Optimus of this continuity served as Hasbro's definitive modern take on the character a former data clerk who was once friends with Megatron in the days before the war until the Decepticons quest for power drove them apart he was the most stoic depiction of Optimus yet still kind and compassionate but a serious commander who let little emotion show whose every word was a portentous declaration if there can be no diplomatic solution to this perpetual conflict that I must not allow more darkness to fall this Optimus was a truly mythic hero he was the reincarnation of the last of the original 13 primes the epic heroes of Cybertronian legend from its primordial past and the first true divinely appointed prime to lead the Autobots since those days of old with all others before him having been pretenders to the title these ideas would also be explored in the world of IDW Publishing's comic books which gave Optimus his own self-titled comic series in 2016 and questioned whether the Autobot leader was falling victim to an inevitable tragic legacy of corruption and failure that had defined the primes before him after he annexed earth into the Cybertronian Empire for its own protection while transformer series come and go Optimus Prime persists since the late 2010s actor jake foushee has taken up the role of prime across various animated projects including the new Optimus featured in the Transformers cyberverse cartoon continuing to perform him with an emulation of Cullen's gravitas autobots roll out and those are the basics on Optimus Prime there's a lot more that could be said about him and I'll definitely dive into the more specific history and lore behind roller Orion Pax the 13th prime all those deaths and rebirths and other aspects of the character in separate dedicated episodes in the future but for now I'll leave it up to all of you to leave a comment down below telling us all which is your favorite incarnation of the greatest Autobot of them all and that's a wrap on episode 100 thanks for supporting the basics all this time guys I hope you'll stick around as there are still so many more transformers characters concepts and series we haven't dug into yet hit like hit subscribe and if you can't visit patreon to support the show and don't worry I'm not gonna make you wait another hundred episodes before I do Megatron

Channel: Chris McFeely

Views: 1,551,475

Keywords: generation 1, peter cullen, orion pax, powermaster, hi-q, star convoy, generation 2, car robots, robots in disguise, armada, energon, cybertron, animated, revenge of the fallen, dark of the moon, age of extinction, the last knight, neil kaplan, david kaye, gary chalk, aligned, rescue bots, thirteenth prime, arisen, idw publishing, dreamwave, history, lore

Id: yvvDrvflY_4

Length: 17min 12sec (1032 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 25 2020