WEBVTT - Transformers! Are They More Than Meets the Eye? 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.519 You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:12.719 and iHeartRadio. Guess what Will? 0:00:12.840 --> 0:00:13.560 What's that Mango? 0:00:13.800 --> 0:00:16.520 So you know that impulse when you pass an electric 0:00:16.560 --> 0:00:19.720 fan and no one is around and you just want 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:23.120 to lean in and say more than meets the eye. 0:00:24.000 --> 0:00:25.680 I'm not sure if you know what I was doing 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.000 for the ten minutes before you got in here, But 0:00:28.040 --> 0:00:30.280 do you mean like this more than. 0:00:31.920 --> 0:00:32.680 Exactly? 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:41.560 That impulse is officially forty years old. Wow, so Transformers 0:00:41.640 --> 0:00:44.240 might have a new movie out, but they are old, 0:00:44.320 --> 0:00:49.080 baby like, these toys are elder millennials, meaning we would 0:00:49.120 --> 0:00:50.919 have been about five when the first ones came out. 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:53.760 That is crazy, which would have given us plenty of 0:00:53.840 --> 0:00:57.520 time to spend chanting more than meets the eye into 0:00:57.520 --> 0:00:59.640 household appliances everywhere. 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:03.480 Household applian. It's like a toaster or whatever. You know, 0:01:03.600 --> 0:01:06.800 Transformers or for everyone these days. But there are about 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:09.440 two dozen different product lines and the first movie was 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:13.400 directed by Michael Bay that broke the box offices all 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:16.960 from these toys that had us like crunching tiny pterodactyls 0:01:17.000 --> 0:01:18.440 into the shape of cassette tapes. 0:01:18.920 --> 0:01:20.840 Wait, is that is that a real transformer or did 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:21.679 you just make that up? 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:24.560 Yeah, it's totally real. My aunt, when I was in 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:26.600 fourth grade as a birthday president, took me to Toys r 0:01:26.640 --> 0:01:28.880 US and let me pick out anything, and so I 0:01:28.920 --> 0:01:33.319 picked out these tiny mini cassette Transformers. And our fact checker, 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:38.240 slash researcher and resident Transformers guru Gabe said it was 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:40.920 not a pterodactyl. It was a falcon or a condor. 0:01:41.319 --> 0:01:44.880 So I've already been fact checked, just as his intro. 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:48.600 Yeah, you want to get that wrong with Gabe, but. 0:01:48.960 --> 0:01:53.040 It was rad Anyway, Today's episode is a dive back 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:56.280 into the world of Transformers. How did these incredible toys 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:58.880 come to be? And why is it that kids still 0:01:59.040 --> 0:02:01.600 can't get nothing them? So let's dive in. 0:02:20.000 --> 0:02:24.800 Hey, their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm 0:02:24.840 --> 0:02:27.320 Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:29.800 friend mangesh Hot Ticketter and on the other side of 0:02:29.800 --> 0:02:34.959 that soundproof glass trying and sadly failing to convert a transformer. 0:02:35.200 --> 0:02:37.639 That's our friend and producer Dylan fag And he's good 0:02:37.639 --> 0:02:39.440 at a lot of things, but this is something he's 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:41.320 not so great at, and I don't know, if you 0:02:41.320 --> 0:02:44.079 can see it from our angle, mango, But he's sweating 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:46.919 and he's playing pump up music to get him through 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:49.640 it all. And I say that with no judgment, by 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:51.760 the way, like Dylan showed me the instruction sheet and 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:54.720 it takes forty steps to wrestle that thing into a truck. 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:56.919 So he's really got his work cut out for him. 0:02:57.160 --> 0:03:01.280 Well, I am rooting for him, as I always But well, 0:03:01.360 --> 0:03:03.520 I know we were both into basketball and the Lakers 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:06.240 as kids. We were both into SNL pretty early because 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:09.400 of our dads. But was transformer or something you were into? 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:12.120 Oh, it was one hundred percent something I was into. Now, 0:03:12.160 --> 0:03:15.480 I didn't always know what I was talking about. In fact, 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:17.560 to this day, if I were to tell my parents 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:20.519 we were doing an episode on the Transformers, they would 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:24.200 say more to Measdi. Because I would run around the 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:27.360 house pretending to be a Transformer. I had no idea 0:03:27.400 --> 0:03:29.720 what the theme song said, and in my mind they 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:31.960 said more to Measdi, and so I just sang along 0:03:32.000 --> 0:03:34.160 with it. So it meant something to me, and that's 0:03:34.200 --> 0:03:35.040 what's most important. 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:39.480 But how about you, Yeah, I mean, I remember when 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:41.720 I was like five or six, living in North Carolina. 0:03:42.000 --> 0:03:45.200 It was the one cartoon that I'd watched religiously in 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:48.400 the afternoons. I was not into G I. Joe, which 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:50.080 I think was the thing that came on after, but 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:53.880 I was obsessed with Transformers. I love the toys and 0:03:54.200 --> 0:03:55.960 just the idea that you could get your hands on 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:59.080 a robot and not know what it would transform into 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:02.320 until you like bent and twisted it into all these 0:04:02.320 --> 0:04:06.240 different directions and then you'd be like totally delighted by 0:04:06.600 --> 0:04:08.720 whatever return to you, like, even if it was a van. 0:04:09.080 --> 0:04:12.280 You know, you've never been so delighted to play with 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:14.480 a van. But just as it adds up, so you 0:04:14.520 --> 0:04:17.640 mentioned Gabe earlier, and he is really a stickler forgetting 0:04:17.640 --> 0:04:21.440 the facts right about transformers and all of toys and 0:04:21.480 --> 0:04:24.039 toy history. And so just to make sure we know 0:04:24.480 --> 0:04:28.200 you didn't transform your transformers, you converted them. I think 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:30.080 we've gone to a new level of nerd here. 0:04:30.120 --> 0:04:31.080 But that is the fact. 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:33.320 Why why did I convert them? 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:36.280 Well, one of the weirdest things I learned this week 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:40.800 is that Hasbro, the company that makes Transformers, purposely avoids 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:44.080 using the verb transform when you know, referring to their 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:47.960 products because they don't want to risk genericizing their trademark. 0:04:48.240 --> 0:04:51.159 It's like how Escalator used to be the registered brand name, 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:53.839 but then the term became so common that people started 0:04:53.839 --> 0:04:57.640 calling every set of moving stairs and escalator. So it's 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:01.040 just really hard to maintain a trademark the protection around 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:04.440 that once the public starts treating your brand name generically. 0:05:04.480 --> 0:05:05.760 So it makes a lot of sense. 0:05:05.680 --> 0:05:09.200 Like Xerox. It's funny my my uncle's firm in India 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:11.600 actually made a campaign with the slogan was make your 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:12.760 Xerox on an HP. 0:05:14.120 --> 0:05:15.000 This is pretty great. 0:05:15.720 --> 0:05:17.719 Yeah, and I guess it's a problem more when the 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:20.440 brand name is a straight up description of what your 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:24.520 product does. Like you can't trademark an electric mixing machine 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:27.320 as a blender because that's what it does. It blends 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:30.719 food together. So the same story with escalators, and it 0:05:30.760 --> 0:05:32.800 could be argued with transformers too. 0:05:34.080 --> 0:05:37.320 So Hasbro wants to make sure that people associate transformers 0:05:37.360 --> 0:05:40.040 with a specific set of characters and not with like 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.119 gobots or any other transforming toys in general. 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:46.480 Yeah, that's exactly right, And part of maintaining that tricky 0:05:46.560 --> 0:05:50.720 legal distinction is never admitting that transformers transform, so we 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:52.919 will not get them in trouble by saying that, and 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:55.120 I'm sure it is a challenge for the marketing team 0:05:56.000 --> 0:05:57.520 that is ridiculous. 0:05:57.800 --> 0:06:01.080 Anyway, I know you've got the backstory on these converting 0:06:01.200 --> 0:06:04.880 robots that we refer to as Transformers, so why don't 0:06:04.920 --> 0:06:05.720 you lay it on us? 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:07.360 All right? 0:06:07.400 --> 0:06:09.600 This was a fun origin here, so to start with, 0:06:09.760 --> 0:06:12.240 it's easy to overlook this if you aren't familiar with 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:16.520 the series, But Transformers isn't a purely American invention. The 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:19.520 original nineteen eighties toy line was largely made up of 0:06:19.600 --> 0:06:23.640 pre existing products from several different Japanese toy lines, most 0:06:23.680 --> 0:06:26.120 notably Diaclone and micro Change. 0:06:26.640 --> 0:06:29.520 You know both of these, right, Yeah, I'm a huge 0:06:29.560 --> 0:06:33.320 Diaclone head. Of course, I have no idea what you're 0:06:33.360 --> 0:06:34.080 talking about. 0:06:34.320 --> 0:06:35.000 Yeah, I didn't either. 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:36.799 It was part of the research, but it was interesting 0:06:36.839 --> 0:06:39.279 to look into. So Japan was way ahead of the 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:42.360 curve when it came to thinking robots were cool. And 0:06:42.400 --> 0:06:46.040 that's because, unlike the US and other Western nations, Japan 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:48.920 had been developing robotic inventions as far back as this 0:06:49.080 --> 0:06:52.960 seventeenth century, which for reference, was about three hundred years 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:56.839 before the term robot was first coined. So the earliest 0:06:56.839 --> 0:07:00.760 automatons on record in Japan were these tea serving mechanical 0:07:00.800 --> 0:07:03.599 dolls that could wheel a cup and saucer back and 0:07:03.640 --> 0:07:06.080 forth from the kitchen, and they were a huge hit 0:07:06.160 --> 0:07:08.960 with a few wealthy families who could afford them, and 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:13.600 before long, clockwork automatons began popping up in stage productions 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:16.960 and other forms of entertainment that were much more accessible 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:19.800 to the masses. So you fast forward to the early 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:23.160 twentieth century and Japan was already well acquainted with the 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:26.880 idea of robots, far more so than most Western countries 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:29.880 at the time. Then, during the Atomic Age, the idea 0:07:29.880 --> 0:07:33.640 of super robots sparked a cultural craze in Japan, and 0:07:33.680 --> 0:07:37.720 these colorful robotic warriors began to dominate the manga stories, 0:07:38.000 --> 0:07:41.360 the anime shows, and eventually the nation's toy ales. 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:44.960 That's really funny, Like you think about that magazine Giant 0:07:45.040 --> 0:07:47.360 Robot that used to exist. That's all about Japanese culture, 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:50.119 So it's kind of that's about their linked. I'd heard 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:52.280 that the first couple of decades after World War Two 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:55.760 actually were like a golden age of toys in Japan, 0:07:55.840 --> 0:07:58.960 which is obviously not what you'd expect since the atomic 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:00.679 bombings destroyed some to the country. 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:04.120 Yeah, that's true, But the Japanese people were very resourceful, 0:08:04.280 --> 0:08:06.600 like they realized there was plenty of ten lying around 0:08:06.680 --> 0:08:10.640 from the Allied soldiers ration cans, and by recycling that metal, 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:13.800 they were able to produce inexpensive toys that got the 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:16.640 industry up and running pretty quickly, and in fact, the 0:08:16.680 --> 0:08:20.240 sales of those toys actually helped the Japanese population bounce 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:23.640 back much faster than it otherwise would have, because once 0:08:23.760 --> 0:08:26.800 US soldiers saw the innovative and affordable toys that were 0:08:26.800 --> 0:08:29.559 being produced there, they started buying them up and sending 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:31.880 them back home to the States, and it was that 0:08:32.160 --> 0:08:35.800 enthusiasm that eventually led to Japan being authorized to sell 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:38.760 toys in the global market, which means that toys were 0:08:38.840 --> 0:08:42.880 actually the country's first real export following it surrender in 0:08:42.960 --> 0:08:43.920 nineteen forty five. 0:08:44.200 --> 0:08:46.920 Were these metal toys mostly robots then, I. 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:49.520 Mean there were lots of wind up toys, but also 0:08:49.559 --> 0:08:52.240 a lot of vehicles. And as time went on, production 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:56.240 methods improved and more materials became available, but robots and 0:08:56.320 --> 0:09:00.800 vehicles remained the lifeblood of this industry. Started to pair 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:04.640 the two categories together in different ways. Sometimes the robot 0:09:04.720 --> 0:09:07.320 came with their own vehicles to ride in, and other 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:10.559 cases a fleet of non transforming vehicles could be combined 0:09:10.600 --> 0:09:14.360 together to form kind of like a giant robot. But 0:09:14.440 --> 0:09:17.439 it wasn't until the mid nineteen seventies that the Japanese 0:09:17.440 --> 0:09:21.640 toy companies in Takara, they began to push the marriage 0:09:21.679 --> 0:09:25.920 even further by making robot figures that could convert into vehicles, 0:09:26.320 --> 0:09:27.920 and it was the best of both worlds in a 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:30.880 single toy, and kids just went nuts for them. 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:35.280 So these early transforming robot toys sound great, but they 0:09:35.360 --> 0:09:37.880 still weren't technically transformers. 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:39.440 Right, Yeah, they were both toy lines from a company 0:09:39.480 --> 0:09:43.280 I mentioned earlier called Takara. So back in the nineteen seventies, 0:09:43.280 --> 0:09:47.000 Takara found success with a series called Microman, which centered 0:09:47.000 --> 0:09:50.320 on a race of tiny cybernetic spacemen who had come 0:09:50.360 --> 0:09:53.559 to protect the Earth from an alien invasion. And they 0:09:53.559 --> 0:09:56.120 came with all these interchangeable accessories that could be put 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.560 together in all sorts of ways, and you would build 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:02.040 these vehicles and robots for the little guys to pilot. So, 0:10:02.160 --> 0:10:04.720 after a couple of years of success, the designers at 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:07.840 Takara decided to launch a spin offline and that would 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:11.719 focus more on transforming robot toys rather than the spacemen, 0:10:12.240 --> 0:10:15.040 and the resulting series was called Diaclone, which is a 0:10:15.040 --> 0:10:18.400 combination of the words diamond and cyclone. 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:21.120 Which sounds like those diamond storms where rains diamonds on 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:24.320 Neptune or Jupiter, which is just an incredible phenomena. 0:10:24.920 --> 0:10:25.600 Yeah it does. 0:10:25.679 --> 0:10:28.920 But you know, these toys were small, like. They consisted 0:10:28.920 --> 0:10:32.920 of tiny little robots that transformed into these futuristic vehicles 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:37.320 and sci fi fortresses which the new even smaller micromen 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:38.360 could interact with. 0:10:38.800 --> 0:10:42.080 Which sounds fun. But it still feels a bit off 0:10:42.120 --> 0:10:43.160 from the Transformers. 0:10:43.160 --> 0:10:45.640 We know, Yeah, we just you know, it's evolution. 0:10:45.800 --> 0:10:47.880 It takes a little time. We're working our way there. 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:50.000 It wouldn't be as exciting if it just happened over night. 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:53.679 And this is still the nineteen seventies, all right. So 0:10:53.960 --> 0:10:57.280 fast forward nineteen eighty two, just two years before the 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:00.880 Transformers first came out to Car release the line called 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:04.560 Car Robots, and unlike all the transforming toys that came 0:11:04.600 --> 0:11:07.880 before it, these ones converted into real life cars and 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:10.640 trucks instead of made up sci fi vehicles. 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.600 So do you know why they decided to move from 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:16.240 sci fi into something that was a little more realistic. 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:18.880 Yeah, I mean sometimes these kinds of things come from 0:11:18.920 --> 0:11:21.880 the preferences of those who are working on this stuff 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:24.280 like this came from the head designer, a guy named 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:27.080 kojin Ono, and he thought it would be more fun 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:28.839 for kids if they were playing with the kinds of 0:11:28.920 --> 0:11:31.640 vehicles you might see in real life. Of course, there 0:11:31.679 --> 0:11:33.800 was a little in fighting among the group there, and 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:36.920 other members of the team weren't quite convinced, but when 0:11:36.920 --> 0:11:40.800 the sales department backed up Ono's ideas, the company decided 0:11:40.840 --> 0:11:43.240 to give it a try. But if you're wondering why 0:11:43.280 --> 0:11:47.160 the sales team felt confident, Ono recently offered an explanation 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:50.719 during a twenty twenty four interview with Figure King magazine. 0:11:51.040 --> 0:11:53.520 The sixty five year old designer, who still works it 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:57.160 to Kara, by the way, told the interviewer quote, there 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:00.199 was a part conveniently located right in front of our company, 0:12:00.600 --> 0:12:04.000 allowing us to easily conduct surveys of children. Of course, 0:12:04.040 --> 0:12:06.719 nowadays such practices would be an absolute no no from 0:12:06.720 --> 0:12:09.760 a compliance standpoint, But as I mentioned earlier, there's a 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:14.640 certain persuasiveness in directly hearing from children. Their enthusiastic support 0:12:14.679 --> 0:12:18.000 played a pivotal role in propelling us forward, and that's 0:12:18.040 --> 0:12:20.319 what led them to making these toys that could transform 0:12:20.360 --> 0:12:21.240 into real cars. 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:24.959 Okay, so now we've got transforming robots that turn into 0:12:25.040 --> 0:12:28.880 these realistic looking vehicles. But we've got to be getting 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:31.400 close to the capital t transformers. 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:33.120 Right, Yep, we are almost there. 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:35.480 In fact, a lot of figures that were designed for 0:12:35.559 --> 0:12:38.120 car robots in the early eighties were the same ones 0:12:38.440 --> 0:12:43.600 that would later be repurposed actually as the original Transformers toys. So, 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:46.320 for example, the first one that cojin Ono designed was 0:12:46.320 --> 0:12:50.640 this red super tuning Lamborghini, which was later released in 0:12:50.720 --> 0:12:55.160 nineteen eighty four as a yellow autobot sports car named Sunstreaker. 0:12:56.080 --> 0:12:59.040 And so what about all the other early transformers that 0:12:59.240 --> 0:13:02.160 don't turn into cars and trucks, Like I know, there 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.920 were also mechanical animals and dinabots. And wasn't there even 0:13:05.920 --> 0:13:08.439 one that turned into like a handgun Megatron? 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:11.360 I think that's exactly right, Megatron. 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:14.160 Good memory, Mango. And so in one of the universes, 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:18.000 he turns into a Walter p. Thirty eight pistol, which 0:13:18.040 --> 0:13:20.600 is really embarrassing that you didn't know that, But actually 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:23.000 I only know that because of Gabe once again coming 0:13:23.040 --> 0:13:25.600 to the rescue here. But no, you're right, they really 0:13:25.720 --> 0:13:29.680 left no stone unturned when choosing the figures alt modes, 0:13:29.720 --> 0:13:32.040 which by the way, is the official term for the 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:34.400 non primary mode of a Transformer. 0:13:34.600 --> 0:13:36.959 I love that we have all the jargon down thanks 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:37.480 to Gabe. 0:13:37.960 --> 0:13:40.560 Yeah, he insisted. I slipped that in there. 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:44.360 So just to recap here, like, Takara had a bunch 0:13:44.360 --> 0:13:47.800 of standalone toy lines in Japan which contributed to elements 0:13:47.840 --> 0:13:51.360 of what would become Transformers, but none of those treated 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:55.160 the robots as distinct characters. And then what Hasbro comes 0:13:55.160 --> 0:13:58.040 in and ditches the spacemen and makes the robots the 0:13:58.080 --> 0:14:00.640 stars of the show is not what happens. 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:03.199 That's basically right. So Takara struggled to find a foothold 0:14:03.200 --> 0:14:06.160 in the crowded American market, but then in nineteen eighty 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:09.199 three their products caught the eye of a Hasbro representative, 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:11.680 and this was at the Tokyo Toy Show. So the 0:14:11.720 --> 0:14:14.600 rep brought back some sample figures, and before the year 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:17.600 was out, Hasbro had signed a contract with Takara to 0:14:17.720 --> 0:14:20.800 license the figures for the US market, but the next 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:23.200 step was figuring out how to rebrand the toys for 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:26.440 an American audience. Hasbro's partner in the task was an 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:31.200 advertising agency called Griffin Bacall, who had helped develop Gi Joe, 0:14:31.560 --> 0:14:34.040 and it was the ad firm's idea to combine Takara's 0:14:34.120 --> 0:14:36.720 various toy lines under one umbrella and to make the 0:14:36.840 --> 0:14:40.520 robots the main characters. The company also suggested having the 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:44.760 robots be sentient aliens rather than just accessories to the spacemen, 0:14:45.240 --> 0:14:49.160 and proposed splitting them into two rival factions to create 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:52.640 a bit of built in conflict. Hence the heroic autobots 0:14:52.680 --> 0:14:55.600 and the evil Dysepticons first time we mentioned them in 0:14:55.600 --> 0:14:57.400 this episode. I can't believe it took us this long. 0:14:57.440 --> 0:15:01.280 A git there, but lastly, the all import named Transformers 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:04.920 was contributed by j Baccall, the son of the company 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:06.280 chairman Joe Bacall. 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:08.840 Okay, so the ad agency comes up with the bones 0:15:08.880 --> 0:15:11.840 of the story, these two warring factions of alien robots, 0:15:11.840 --> 0:15:15.200 But who actually ends up filling in the details here? 0:15:15.640 --> 0:15:17.960 That job actually fell to the writers and editors at 0:15:18.040 --> 0:15:21.240 Marvel Comics, who had already helped Hasbro flesh out the 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:24.600 world of Gi Joe just a few years earlier. The 0:15:24.680 --> 0:15:27.840 original story treatment was written by Marvel editor in chief 0:15:27.920 --> 0:15:31.360 Jim Shooter, and it explained that the Transformers had been 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:34.280 locked in a civil war fighting for control of their 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:37.960 home planet, Cybertron, for millions of years. Millions of year, 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:41.160 that's a long war. The constant fighting had left the 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:45.480 planet in ruins and almost completely devoid of eon, which 0:15:45.520 --> 0:15:48.160 is the life blood or fuel that powers both the 0:15:48.240 --> 0:15:52.160 robots and the planet itself. So the two factions left 0:15:52.200 --> 0:15:55.560 their home world in search of news sources of energy, 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:59.600 only to crash land on prehistoric Earth. So they spent 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:04.600 the next four million years than the side of a mountain. Then, 0:16:04.640 --> 0:16:07.760 after being awakened by a volcanic eruption in nineteen eighty four, 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:11.440 they adopted the forms of Earth's machines and resumed their 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:13.160 endless war once again. 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:16.320 I mean, it's a great soap opera, but it is 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:20.000 interesting that Shooter framed this conflict does a struggle for 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:20.960 resources right. 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:24.960 It's also interesting that he drew his inspiration from real life, 0:16:25.000 --> 0:16:28.760 like specifically the energy crisis of the nineteen seventies, So 0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:32.440 in his conception, the difference between the two factions was 0:16:32.480 --> 0:16:34.520 what they planned to do with the energy. 0:16:34.240 --> 0:16:35.119 That they collected. 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:37.520 So you have the Autobots that just wanted to restore 0:16:37.560 --> 0:16:41.400 their home planet and live in peace, but those evil Decepticons, 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.360 like they wanted to conquer other planets and then create 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:47.080 an empire. Of course, it is worth noting, though, that 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:49.960 Shooter's treatment left plenty of room for future writers to 0:16:50.080 --> 0:16:51.560 deepen that mythos. 0:16:51.920 --> 0:16:55.360 So did Shooter's treatment delve into all the character names 0:16:55.400 --> 0:16:59.080 and backstories because I actually, like separately, was looking up 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:02.680 the earlier trends and they were like thirty different characters 0:17:02.720 --> 0:17:05.119 released in just the first year of the toy line. 0:17:05.160 --> 0:17:07.600 Like that is so many bios to write. 0:17:07.760 --> 0:17:09.080 Yeah, I mean, I think it would be a pretty 0:17:09.119 --> 0:17:11.600 tall order for just one person, And that's probably why 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:14.960 Jim Shooter decided to hand the job off to somebody else. 0:17:15.320 --> 0:17:17.840 It was a Marvel writer named Danny O'Neill who came 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:21.240 up with the name Optimus Prime, but the rest of 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:24.760 the original cast was developed by an editor named Bob Budianski, 0:17:25.320 --> 0:17:27.359 and he was just given a few days to come 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:31.760 up with the names. Personalities, powers, weaknesses, and even personal 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:34.800 mottos of dozens of different robots. That's a ton of 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:38.439 pressure and nothing to go on except the toys themselves. 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:41.480 And to make the assignment that much harder, his deadline 0:17:41.560 --> 0:17:44.360 was set for the Monday after Thanksgiving. I mean, how 0:17:44.440 --> 0:17:46.159 cruel is that? It just seems like the way that 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:49.440 it works, I guess. But Bob rose to the challenge, 0:17:49.520 --> 0:17:52.200 and the work he did over that long, long weekend 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:56.159 became the basis for the four issue comic mini series 0:17:56.160 --> 0:17:59.120 that launched the franchise later that year, and he came 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:04.280 up with some real heavy hitters. He had Bumblebee, Starscream, Megatron. Also, 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:06.399 his work didn't go unnoticed. Bob is only one of 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:10.160 four human inductees into the Transformers Hall of Fame. 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:14.159 I was not familiar with the fact that they have 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:15.440 their own Hall of Fame. 0:18:15.880 --> 0:18:17.639 Yah. Pretty amazing. 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:20.920 Well, I want to switch gears and talk a little 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:24.160 bit more about the lore of Transformers, but first let's 0:18:24.200 --> 0:18:40.000 take a quick break. 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:42.679 Welcome back to Part time Genius. 0:18:42.680 --> 0:18:46.280 Okay, Mango, So we're in the weird wide world of Transformers, 0:18:46.480 --> 0:18:48.200 and I'm curious where do you want to go next? 0:18:48.520 --> 0:18:51.199 Since you gave us the real life history of Transformers. 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:53.480 I thought i'd share a little bit about the origin 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:57.840 story in the Transformers universe because it's actually pretty strange 0:18:57.880 --> 0:19:03.200 and like surprisingly spiritual, because transformers have souls. 0:19:05.640 --> 0:19:05.800 You know. 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:09.600 I took I think two philosophy courses in college, and 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:12.359 neither of those covered this, and so I'm curious to 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:12.959 learn about it. 0:19:13.320 --> 0:19:14.960 Yeah, I mean, for the amount of money we paid, 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:19.120 it shouldn't have. But in the transformer's lore, they all 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:22.040 have something called sparks, like the spark of life, and 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:26.240 unlike most conceptions of a human soul, a transformer spark 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:29.399 is a tangible object, so it's kind of like an organ. 0:19:29.720 --> 0:19:32.439 It is a weird idea, but Gabe pointed me to 0:19:32.560 --> 0:19:36.200 a nice explainer from tfwiki dot net, which he assured 0:19:36.240 --> 0:19:39.439 me is the foremost Transformers wiki on the internet. 0:19:39.480 --> 0:19:41.800 No, I'm definitely familiar. I forgot to put my phone 0:19:41.800 --> 0:19:43.879 on do not Disturb the other night, and I just 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:46.600 kept getting text with these links to the information on 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:48.919 that on Gabe. So let's go ahead and share what 0:19:48.960 --> 0:19:49.640 you've learned here. 0:19:50.520 --> 0:19:54.159 Okay, So tf wiki rights quote, the spark is the 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:58.879 core of Transformer life and electrically charged massive positrons formed 0:19:58.920 --> 0:20:03.320 from the supernatural absence known as rarefied energy. On like 0:20:03.320 --> 0:20:05.879 a heart, a spark pulses at a certain frequency to 0:20:05.920 --> 0:20:09.439 animate a mechanical body frame like a soul. A spark 0:20:09.520 --> 0:20:12.600 is generally accepted to contain some part of a Transformer's 0:20:12.640 --> 0:20:18.840 immaterial being, which persists after death by transcending into the afterlife. 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:22.560 So you're saying in Transformers, there's a robot heaven too, like, 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:24.560 is there a robot god who made them all? 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:27.600 I am so glad that my kids never asked me that, 0:20:27.640 --> 0:20:31.199 because I would not have been prepared. But just like 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:33.520 in the real world, the answer kind of depends on 0:20:33.600 --> 0:20:35.920 who you ask. So if you go back to the 0:20:35.960 --> 0:20:39.800 first Transformer story ever published, that Marvel comic that uh 0:20:39.880 --> 0:20:44.600 Boudianski worked on, the origin story is completely secular, right, Like, 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:48.760 so life on Cybertron springs up through the naturally occurring 0:20:48.800 --> 0:20:52.399 interaction of gears, levers, and pulleys, which you know is 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:55.000 kind of a silly idea, but I also love it. 0:20:55.080 --> 0:20:58.719 But then in later comic books and the cartoon series, 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:00.919 and now actually with the latest movie, the creation of 0:21:00.960 --> 0:21:04.880