Darkmount, NV
Directly continuing
from the cliffhanger of Season 2, all mystery and despair is erased when we are
shown Optimus survives in the first few moments. *sigh*, the least they could do was pull a
Beast Wars and let Optimus stay dead (or at least make the viewer think he
died) for a few episodes before he is inevitably brought back to life. Anyway, this episode doesn’t have too many
things going on. After twenty minutes,
you will think back and be surprised at how little we have learned, there are
also a few belief suspension sections, such as a simple change of paintjob
means Decepticons can’t detect or recognise an Aubobot. Jack was quite annoying in this episode doing
some idiotic stuff (and I’m pretty sure he would have died with what he
did). Not a great start to Season 3.
Scattered
This is a more
interesting episode than the season opener.
It introduces not one, but two new characters near the end of the
episode, Ultra Magnus and Predaking (not really spoilers since their toys were
so prominent in the Beast Hunters toyline).
The Autobots are still scattered but they are slowly piecing together
again. Vehicons remain as cannon fodder
which is a shame and feels like a really cheap way to pad out the Decepticon
force. I guess it does make for some
good destroying scenes and showing the awesomeness of Wheeljack. Ralph remains as an awesome hacker and even
able to use some Cybertronian technology.
Once again, the episode finishes in a cliffhanger of sorts. One disappointing thing is the decision to
reuse Optimus’ model for Ultra Magnus, sure, there are changes here and there
but on the whole, it’s obvious they did it for lowering the costs of animation.
Prey
The collection of
Autobots continue throughout this episode until all bar Smokescreen and Optimus
so things should get more interesting from now on. Season 3 seem to have many cliché moments in
play, such as Ultra Magnus being an unlikeable character by making everyone
calling him “sir”. We also get to see
Predaking (thus unnamed so far in the show) in action, being absurdly powerful
but in the end, still easily defeated when the plot calls forth. It’s hard to doubt the animation quality, it
is stunning and the character models are detailed. The plot still tries to be too serious making
it a slog to get through at times but there is an injection of humour through a
one-liner here and there which elevates the boredom.
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Other Transformers: Prime episode reviews can be found here.