Transformers needs well written humans…sometimes the hardest part. I do agree though, that the humans have always been an integral part of the franchise. I think people blow out of proportion the issues of the humans. In my mind, there’s more “fine” humans than there are “bad” humans
You either ruined that kid's life or he became the world's biggest Bulkhead stan and is furious he hasn't done anything since RID15. Nevermind I take it back, either way you ruined that kid's life
@tayojones9460 I never said they needed to be the main focus, just that humans have their place in tf. It can obviously go too far as Paperplane said in the video, but that doesn't mean they should get rid of them entirely.
I think the problem just comes down to how good the writing of each TF media is featuring humans. Skybound's comics is a great example of how to write good human characters in TF stories
agreed, i love the humans in skybound because they are actually likeable and well written, even the ones that took starscream hostage where entertaining
Honestly Rescue Bots has some of the best Human Characters in the franchise. The Burns family and Rescue Force Sigma-17 becoming so close that they essentially become one big family is honestly one of the best parts about the show. Also Cody Burns almost on par with Sari for best Kid Sidekick character in the franchise.
I hate the show for not having autobots battling the decepitcons and for not having the likes of Megatron, Starscream, Soundwave, or even Shockwave. As I wanna see giant robots beating the fuck out of each other
@@justingochioco1121 I mean like, its a preschool kids show, so they cant get too violent. Plus we already have Transformers: Prime for that, if this show did the same it would be utterly redundant. This show is called Transformers RESCUE Bots, and thats what they focus on and I enjoyed it a lot for that.
@@victorfries8859 Absolutely. They're some of the best human characters in the franchise, Massively underrated. Also yeah, thats why I didnt add in Human when talking about Kid Sidekick cuz of Sari's whole situation lol.
Honestly, lot of Sam’s reactions are reasonable. Imagine being a regular high school student, then all of a sudden you’re thrusted into an intergalactic war involving toy robots from the 80s. Edit: Not only that, but your great grandpa made first contact with them, and his glasses hold the key to the very object that gave them life. How would you feel in that moment?
I get why people find Sam annoying but I’ve always found it interesting how a MICHAEL BAY main character was allowed to be not a fighter, get emotional and panic, scream at things, and genuinely not be hypermasculine action hero man like his replacement was
@@Cdr2002 I hate the Micheal bay films (apart from the first one and DOTM has a lot of good moments) but I actually really like Sam 😂 Idk why, but he I find him hilarious to watch
usually, the writers of the movies don't understand that the Transformers are also characters with depth and personality, they just see them as basic machines incapable of carrying an emotional story, hence the story forces a human plot in which the Transformers can be added.
That's just wrong. Even in the first Bay movie, they had very character driven banter with one another its just hard to keep in on screen for long outside of car mode. And even the car modes tend to be hard to keep on screen becsuze they keep picking these ultra expensive cars that most people will never be able to afford in multiples of their lifetimes.
@@nmr7203 Hence, why animation is probably the better route. No need to be sparing with expensive CGI models and licensed cars if the whole thing is CGI and there is no car.
@@nmr7203 Still not an excuse to treat them like nothing more then mere plot devices which is exactly what Bay did (with the only exception being Optimus to a smaller extent)
I think TFP handled the humans quite well when Miko wasn't annoying. Thank god she got some character development. But one of the things I love the most about that show is how it made the humans useful, and I mean all of them, without making them stupidly strong or magical, and they weren't given too much focus. They saved the bots several times and became integral members of the team due to their actions. I mean - blowing up Arachnid's ship, helping the bots get the contents of an important information relic, rescuing Optimus with the key of the Vector Sigma, BECOMING AN ESSENTIAL HACKER FOR RATCHET, come 'on, Raphael literally saved the world and his team numerous times and survived fricking dark energon poisoning, to not even mention how Miko used the Apex Armour to pound the decepticons, or how it was actually Jack who came up with the idea of saving Optimus - yeah, Prime really did do the humans justice often times, I just wish they could've gotten a proper ending later on, or if we could've seen them later as soldiers or agents. That would've been awesome.
I feel like Carly in Skybound is the best use of a human character. Without spoilers, she exhibits being a flawed character with flawed and selfish motives whose presence helps to humanize the giant robots around her. Genuinely, Carly is fucking wonderful character writing being her arc is a part of the story and has effects that splash onto the other characters stories. We don't need human characters that can fight back, we just need human characters that feel human, rather than feeling like a walking reaction emoji.
Here here! We want more Carly in future animations I think there is much more huge potential with her and Skybound is just the start. She has deserved a hell of alot more than what she has been given over the years as with (stair climbing ass shots, being nowhere in sight as her son goes through the wringer in the great war and ends up in a planet eating monster, or gets sold off to an impostor Galvatron by her loving husband to name few) and as little as she has been. I think she has a great future in being a conduit into sharing the substance of the human condition... I never wanted to be a Transformer really I just liked admiring their interesting awesomeness. Maybe see Elita 1 as a role model more than anything else. Since being 11 and watching G1 I just wanted to be Carly getting intertwined in the many robotic tussles that ensued and go to Cybertron in my convertible and scurrying away from Shockwave into small floor crevices like the size of a mouse. I mean, who wouldn't?
I'm new to the franchise, started with TFOne and then started watching Prime (I'm in the middle of season 2). I do dig the human characters a lot, I adore Miko and Fowler is indeed the GOAT. My only issue related to the humans is I just think Jack is boring as hell. I feel like as along as the humans are actually interesting they can definitely bring a lot to the plot. Bulkhead being like Miko's adoptive dad is like one of my favorite parts of the show. As a kid, I remember there was a period where I was playing as Winx Club with some other kids on the playground and we had this one girl who didn't know about the show and ended up playing as a civilian aiding the fairies until she figured out what was going on. I feel like if I was dragged into some kind of Transformers playground role play, I'd be the one weirdo playing as a human doing a similar role to that since I never watched any of it as a kid.
transformers fans when optimus speak about the true value of human being: 🥺🥺🥺🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 transformers fan when the see a human in the screen: 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
I just appreciate how Transformers is consistent in having humans be mutuals, whereas in other shows the transforming robots are summoned or commanded by one kid and his device. Or it's humans as the creators of mecha that may sometimes be sentient.
I definitely agree, just because the Bayverse films had human characters mostly done bad doesn't mean that the Transformers shouldn't have a human companion. We have had Sari, Fowler, Jack, Miko, Raf, Charlie, the Malto family, and in the Bayverse itself Agent Simmons to show that you can give the Autobots actually likeable human companions.
I really do dislike how the general attitude in the community has become "humans always ruin the story", when that's inherently untrue. People act as if no humans is a recipe success, and having humans is a burden that the writers have to grapple with, rather than them being a tool for the writer to use to tell stories they wouldn't be able to tell without humans. P.S i read the description!
Yeah agreed. I know I'm like a broken Record but Rescue Bots is like a pretty good example of how Human and Transformers relations can be used to make a pretty good story. Just the way their relationships develops from butting heads, slowly starting to care for each other, becoming partners, to eventually considering each other as a big family.
I'm sure I've said something along these lines before, but their relationship with the Rescue Bots is so good because they are doing the same thing as them. They can actually help each other with rescuing people, and the Burns family actually has something to offer them in fulfilling the task given by Optimus to basically be an experiment to see how humans and cybertronians can co-exist.
@@fenrirsrage4609 Sigh, more Hardcore TF fans should watch RB and put in a good word on it; I was hurt at every single action figure reviwer (even the big ones) that said 'they didnt watch RB because of reasons" and still reviewed that awesome legacy united Chase figure! I mean, NO those lights on the arms are part of him! Dont take those down! NO they're not mini blasters! They are search lights 😔 And that weapon is not random! It's one of the many tools they use on the show! 😥 they dont know anything about Chase! 😭🤧
It’s the same argument people use for Godzilla and other Kaiju films. “Oh the human story is the worst part. Always will be”. Except for that case, humans have ALWAYS been integral in giant monster films, since a lot of the time we’re seeing things from their perspective. Plus, it gives the story much needed tension when a Kaiju goes on the attack and humans are at risk. You can do Transformers without humans. But if we just had a Kaiju movie with zero human characters in the plot, just the monsters, it won’t feel like a monster movie. It’ll just be a nature documentary at that point.
well sometimes they can drag everything to a vault, i remember when godzilla x kong came out and there was a really great scene with pretty much no dialogue where kong discover every single gorrila that was opress by scar king in the hollow earth thanks to the power of shimu, and that scene takes a lot from the planet of the apes films because with pure visual story telling you understand the poor condition of the gorilas, you understand why scar king is feard and has a lot of power, you understand kong hate for this guy and why his people need him and you even understan how did scar king can control a kaiju like shimu to be on top, everything was so told so great with great pacing with no dialogue what so ever ... until the damm human start explaining pointless lore and shit we already learn 10 minutes ago, like christ that was the point i got sick of the humans in the legendary movies because every time they are on screen the movie just friggin die for a moment until monster comeback
*this comment is all just my personal opinion* i think even though a big part of kaiju films is the humans perspective, alot of the time it just ends up making the kaiju not feel like actual sentient beings, with emotions, motivations, etc, and i feel it dosen't work very well outside of films like minus one, shin godzilla, GMK godzilla, 2014, 2019 kong skull island, etc, and with some of those films (2014 to a small extent and 2019 to a small extent in my opinion) they suffer a little bit from the humans being nothing more than walking exposition and at least in my opinion it would be more interesting to reverse what most kaiju films do, and show us the monsters perspective of the humans, how they interact with them, what they think of them etc, and combine this with godzilla developing as a character through a monsterverse version of minilla/godzilla jr and his dynamic with other kaiju, and then hopefully we'd get peak from the monterverse.
I always hated that the humans have taken up most of the screen time throughout the movies, but it wasn’t until Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts I started appreciate them more because let’s be real, If we all came in contact with a real transformer in real life, we would all want to help throughout their aventures and build strong relationships with our favorite Autobots.
Alot of people don’t understand that a live action Transformers movie LITERALLY CANNOT FUNCTION without human characters, the reason Transformers don’t get as much screen time is because they are very fucking expensive and time consuming to bring to life. The reality is, to have the Transformers take up a majority of the screen time will take up so much money and time that they simply do not have, it’s either an animated movie that focuses solely on the Transformers (which we finally have), or a live action movie with human leads, no in between. Also the Bay movies have Simmons.
@@SM-th7pw i think the problem come when they start to overstay their welcome, i mean shia la beouf work fine in the first one as the geeky guy who understand this species, but after movie 2 he became anoying as balls and kill any serious moment either by shouting all the time or having the hots for megan fox or that blonde wive from fury road
How to make the human characters interesting to an adult audience: use them to explore complex themes that the robots alone couldn’t. How to make human characters interesting to a child audience: give them a transforming mecha to pilot that Hasbro can make toys of. Get all Brave Series in there. Also, these should not be seen as mutually exclusive pieces of advice.
Humans can work, it just needs the right setting for the human characters I personally think the Afghanistan scenes in bayformers 1 were pretty good, its man vs machine and I think lennox is a good human character for this setting. I hope that in the GI joe crossover movie they bring lennox back
Me when I post the Bumblebee opening scene and say “We need a show set on Cybertron with no humans just like the WFC games!” and get 1 billion likes (please ignore the previous three shows set entirely on Cybertron)
I feel like the people behind the Transformers franchise might want to take some ques from the Sonic Film Series. They managed to make some pretty memorable humans who are just as entertaining as Sonic and the other characters from the games.
I'm not sure if that'll change anything since a lot of Sonic fans still complained that humans take up a good portion of those films. Don't even get me started on the initial reactions the Knuckles show got.
@@kingbash6466 to be fair (though i never ended up watching the show, so take this with a grain of salt) from what ive gathered it seems like the criticism of the show is less about the humans being a part of it in the first place, and more that the show was advertised as being primarily about Knuckles, with Wade tagging along (And is even called Knuckles), but ended up being mostly about Wade instead. It was mostly a matter of misleading advertising and some odd writing decisions. The actual movies themselves did the human aspect very well, and Im pretty sure the people complaining about the humans are mostly a loud minority. Most fans loved or were at least fine with the humans, at worst maybe think that the wedding plot dragged on a little bit in the second movie. I think the notion of the tf producers taking notes on the sonic films is a good idea
I know, right? People love fun characters like Agent Simmons in Transformers or Agent Stone in the Sonic movies I know that it can be hard to justify the presence of humans within a franchise whose main attraction are the guys made with CGI, but it's feasible
I never felt that Transformers needed to get rid of the humans to be good as someone who grew up with Animated and Prime. My issue is specifically with the Bay films in how they handle that balance. As admittedly memorable as the cast were in the first 3 films, you can tell that they actively ate up a lot of character exploration that could have been given to the titular giant robots. Like by TLK, Optimus becomes a bad guy, and he practically disappears for the entire middle part of the plot until he unceremoniously shows up, fights Bumblebee for 3 minutes, and then turns good again. Could have actually done something interesting with that concept if they cut out 90% of the scenes where Anthony Hopkins and Cogman were just dicking around.
When the Autobots go to Earth, they WILL run into humans. They can't get off without their involvement somehow (and creating casualties). Their eventual bonding is what led them to protect Earth as their second home. Home is people, not a place.
I would love to see a story about the Autobots reaction to our real world politics, i honestly think Optimus would be kinda horrified on how some humans treat each other
Reminds me of a line from the first movie. Ironhide: Why should we help the humans? They’re a primitive and violent race. Optimus: Were we so different?
@@TheRoomforImprovementalso Optimus had a similar remark to Ratchet in Skybound, where Ratchet calls humans impulsive and violent to their own kind and Optimus quietly goes “exactly the same as us” while Ratchet continues on his tangent. It reminds me of this Analog Horror I watched were the Apollo actually found multiple Earth-like planets but each and everyone of them were completely barren, the culprit were themselves, each and every one of those Earth-esque planets died through mutual destruction. Like the Cybertronians, and if we’re unlucky we humans.
Maybe it is because I am a huge fan of the franchise, but I always felt one neat way of including humans in a TF show would be to create something similar to the Defense Teams in Ultraman shows: Groups of humans tasked with defending people and cities from fantastical threats. They are usually portrayed as at best only really helping with slowing the Kaijus and Aliens down before Ultraman comes in to save the day most of the time. (Though recent shows have tried to make them more competent) You could make something similar with Transformers: A group of I dunno, maybe scientists and engineers, who are tasked with researching alien shit and assist the Autobots perhaps.
Agent Fowler from Prime, Sari from Animated, Simmons and Lennox from the bay movies, Lori and Coby from cybertron, Noah from rotb are all pretty good. Feel free to list more cause i know im missing em
Of course Transformers needs Humans. They’re called Robots in Disguise for a reason. If there aren’t any humans, then the Transformers aren’t robots in disguise. It’s why I get annoyed with people saying that Transformers One is good, all because it doesn’t have humans. Like yeah, there weren’t any human characters in Transformers One, because the movie was supposed to be an origin story on how the Autobots & Decepticons were formed, and how Optimus Prime & Megatron became mortal enemies. The movie’s good for many reasons, but lacking humans ain’t one of them chief.
Humans are essential to a Transformers story that takes place on Earth. The live action movies mostly take place on Earth, therefore humans play a large role in the story.
Transformers Prime handled human characters very well. Agent Fowler is of course brilliant, but the kids also proved how human characters can add to Transformers. Yes the kids spend a lot of time just hanging out getting exposited to, but there’s also plenty of episodes where they wind up being invaluable to the Autobots. Jack traveling to Cybertron to restore Optimus’ memory, Raff convincing Ratchet to keep fighting when hope seemed lost, Miko killing Hardshell and kicking Starscream’s ass, the kids handling the scraplet infestation taking on MECH and trapping Soundwave in the Shadowzone. They held their own among the giant robots, as much as part of Optimus’ team as the bots themselves.
5:40 to 5:46 This entire sentence sums up probably my biggest problem with Cyberverse. Humans are an afterthought, with only one design for a human ever being shown throughout the entirety of the show and it was for a quick gag. Yes, humans are HEARD and their presence is shown via stuff like news feeds and (of all things) Twitch stream comments, but beyond that, there is nothing for them. The Nemesis lands in the middle of a city for god's sake, but no one except the Autobots cares about that. I did enjoy Cyberverse and I enjoyed that we had a more focus on the Cybertronian dynamic, but they sacrificed the dynamic with Earth, in spite of how much the Autobots say they want to defend it. Why even make it Earth at that point if you aren't gonna focus on it? They may as well have made it a generic abandoned planet in the middle of space nowhere. Just another nameless battlefield in a galactic war.
As a kid, I loved Transformers because giant robots yay, but also I loved Cody, I loved Alexis (a little too much maybe) and yes I loved Sam Witwicky because I thought he was funny. When I played with my action figures I'd always have a few lego minifigures around to be "the humans". I was sad that Sam and Mikaela weren't in the DS Transformers Game because I wanted it to be more like the movie. When I would write or imagine my own Transformers stories, I always had humans in them. I even remember one where the protagonist was a human and he would turn INTO Optimus Prime (I didn't know Masterforce was a thing back then). The only time I remember going "yuck, humans" was in TFA with the super-hero villains but that was more like me not liking that Animated was like "those superheroes shows I don't like" and wanting to see more of the Decepticons. And even then, I remember loving the Headmaster because it referenced something from G1 (yes as a child I knew about Headmasters but not Powermasters, don't ask). So all of this is to say I don't know if kids care or not about humans in Transformers but I definetly did
OH HOW COULD I FORGET. Agent Simmons was my favourite human character from the movies, I thought he was SO funny. I remember being very happy when I watched ROTF at the Cinema and he showed up again.
Yeah she's great! Real shame she hasn't made added to any other continuities. I really hope she ends up being included in the skybound comics. Considering in void rivals the main characters and their species are apparently organic and half cybertronian
@@redalert923 Maybe cobra or gi joe gets their hands on some proto forms and use them to create an army of super soldiers. But one of the scientists (this universe's professor sumdac) realizes that this is wrong and sabotages the operation. However one of the proto forms survives and gets a sample of sumdac's DNA and creates Sari and raises her as his own daughter
If people say TF is bad without humans when the Bumblebee movie, EarthSpark, and the Skybound comics have AMAZING humans, they're just stupid, lol. TF stories CAN be good with humans, they just have to be involved in the story in interesting ways and not be an afterthought.
We need WELL WRITTEN Humans, not annoying humans who exist to take focus away from the Transformers and annoy the audience with their unlikeable personalities.
For me i don't have a problem with humans. I think they focused on the wrong thing. Can you imagine if in tthe bayformers, they made the main human characters lennox and his team. And instead the dynamic is the shared brotherhood between the autobots and their squad. Remember the autobots have been fighting a war for centuries. They are all veterans. It would be cool to see despite being worlds apart the hans and robots can bond over the shared suffering caused by war. The loss of friends. The trauma they suffered. They are united by the scars of war. I think if the movie was like that i think it would be really cool
Besides Earthspark, Rescue Bots is one of the top TF shows with a well written human cast. As in, the humans are actually integral to the bot’s mission and development, and that each bot has a partner to bounce off of; plus there’s emphasis on the family dynamic. (The best way I can describe a human x bot relationship in Rescue Bots is similar to Digimon; the humans and bots help each other develop.)
I really like humans in transformers when it's done *well*. I'm sick of seeing them as barely fleshed out side characters or barely fleshed out main characters that end up taking away from the transformers personalities and just make them big ol' fighting robots with very little else. If there's depth, I'm game. I love when they delve into how different the cultures are or how similar certain issues that arise have affected both Cybertronians AND humans. I think a lot can be done with the dynamic but I suppose I am quite picky about it. It does also feel out of place to me to see some teenage love plot in a story about an alien war
Say what you will about TF Energon but the idea of the cybertronians helping humans become a space faring race with mechs and power suits is frankly awesome and should really come back cause we can do more with the humans then just modern day
Agree, I also like the cross of technology. Like Dr. Jones is the one whom designed Optimus/Convoys drones. They help each other and it’s awesome. Kicker is also fucking awesome don’t care what anyone says. He’s by far the best human character in the franchise. He’s actually helpful, and does have character progression (if you watch the sub). Something most of the humans in the franchise cannot boast.
The problem is that humans are rarely ever written well enough to be likeable and stand on their own. I hope that, if they do continue the One continuity that they adapt Verity and Hunter since they’re A) not annoying and B) take a direct role in aiding Autobots in a way that isn’t contrived or forced, helped by the fact that it also causes them a lot of major personal pain like Last Requiem of the Wreckers so that they’re not untouchable kids
Bayformers is imo the only time when human stories in transformers didn't work, but I don't think it's just from the fact they were there at all or there's not enough robot action, but it's the fact 90% of those movies' run time is dedicated from humans' perspective, which undermines Transformers stuff. I saw take that said you can't make Transformers movie with out focusing on humans cause the robots aren't interesting enough, and I believe this comes from the fact Bayformers was the major exposure to what TF franchise is like to none TF fans. THAT BEING SAID, humans are always the most vital part of transformers stories, and not just because they serve as audiance surrigate, but they serve to show the connection between Cybertronians and Earth. And the Cybertron and Earth relationship can lead to many interesting stories. I do think stories should just be defined by human factor, but it should not be removed either. It's all about how it's utulised and executed. And hey, outside of Bayformers I wouldn't say any humans in transformers were bad, and overall range from fine to ok, with some that were great characters.
Why I love the 2007 movie so much is because I think the whole cast (other than two Decepticons with 3 min of screen time each) are pretty interesting and fun characters. Human characters can do a lot, and I think the hate is overly exaggerated. Lennox, Simmons, and Fowler are all trained military agents that tend to directly advance the plot, or actually fight against the Decepticons. Sam killed Megatron, found the Matrix, and rallied the military and Autobots to save Chicago. Miko saved Wheeljack’s life, and stole the Apex Armour, Jack taught Smokescreen about earth, stopped the Nemesis when it was controlled by Dark Energon, and also saved Optimus by finding Vector Sigma. Raphael served as a really effective “guy in the chair” and convinced Ratchet to fight again. And that’s just in TFP and the first three movies. Transformers is all about someone else’s war coming to Earth, and that angle is a large part of what makes things interesting. That can’t be covered as well without Earth and a lot of writers knew that to the same degree which is why it keeps being brought into the story. Anyway, the US Military is a good character and y’all just haters.
The humans in transformers bring out the best of the autobots morals and the worst of the decepticons depravity, and also give a sense of scale to transformers, and reminds us how big they are. Transformers stories without humans are great still, but humans are a very helpful thing for transformers stories when done well.
Transformers are "robots in disguise"! The whole point (at least, how I see it) is that Transformers is really about how the aliens interact with the human population of Earth. If that's getting stale, maybe we could have a series where Transformers disguise themselves on an alien planet?
Hot Take: One of the main reasons for me on why TF 2007 is the best Bayverse movie is because the fact it focuses on the human angle for so long it'd make scenes like the arrival to earth less impactful.
Some of the best Transformers stories have humans in it. The most recent one being the Skybound comics. I won't spoil anything so people can check it out for themselves. But the point is, if done well, a lot of great themes can be explored through the relationship and parallels between transformers and humans.
2 under appreciated Humans I think are Kicker from Energon/Superlink, and Jan from Victory. Kicker is one of the only human characters who participated in battle and is actually helpful, as well as getting good character progression. The dub kills that progression, but in the sub he slowly matures over the anime and forms a strong bond with Ironhide/Roadbuster. He’s fantastic. Then I like Jan a lot because he humanizes Star Saber. Star Saber adopting him I think does a wonderful job of showing who Star Saber is, It tells so much about him just through that simple act. It’s a wholesome relationship that warms my soul.
I would say that the biggest issue is assuming that relatability and the giant robots can't be mixed, or that humans can't be cool next to said Transformers and always have to have some kind of "normal life" that is comparable to that of the audience member. If you actually try, anything can seem relatable. You could have a story that starts with humans in space even, I don't need a "point of view character" to say "wow, alien robots, pretty crazy" just explain the status quo, or where the characters are starting from in your story, and I (and I assume many others) will get invested.
The fact that I played as Starscream instead of like... Optimus, Bumblebee, or heck even the main bad guy Megatron kinda makes sense to how I am the way I am as an adult today ngl.
To be honest the Transformers need one permanent human character, like there was always the same Transformers characters and then different writers would take them and give them their own twist, so it would be cool if there was one human character like that
If the bots and cons are on earth, human characters are a must. It just comes down to how they're integrated in the story, and how well they're written. Edit: And frankly, having humans allows the writers to make the giant alien robots much more alien and actually feel giant.
I always had a fascination for humans in the franchise. To most people, they're annoying and distract you from the main attraction: The Transformers. Nonetheless, they're a key part of the brand. Without them, their disguises would barely have any use (Aside from transportation). The main problem for most of them is that they're just... there. You don't care about their problems, you just want to see robots punching each other. However, people DO care about characters like Sari, Charlie, Noah, Verity or Carly (Skybound), why? Because their inner conflicts are what makes them interesting as characters. Trying to discover where you came from, mourning the loss of a loved one, trying to get a better life for your younger sibling or wanting revenge against some alien invaders are all good motivations for the human characters (Unlike the character arcs for Sam or Cade, that sometimes feel very hollow and forgettable). Also... wherever you are, Description Writer, I salute you.
I salute you, anonymous description writer. Your sacrifices are known. I fully agree that humans are an important part of many Transformers stories. Transformers stories can work just as well without them, but I always find it incredibly interesting when cybertronians get to interact with species that are so much different from them in terms of size, strength, abilities and lifespan. It creates potential for so many interesting dynamics and conflicts and I wish more Transformers media tried to focus on those.
Daniel Witwicky was the first time i can remember realizing habing human kids in Transformers franchises is a bad idea. I enjiyed Beast Wars, the War for Cybertron games, and Transformers One and never thought they couldve improved it with some fleshy humans.
Alot of examples of poorly written or boring human characters are from shows or movies that are also poorly written or boring in general human characters are never really uniquely bad in whatever the story is to me
My favorite human's are... Alexis, Miko, Charlie, Makaela, Idk how to spell his name but his little brother calls him Sonic. Agent Fowler, Agent Simmons, Becks, Breaks, and Gears, Witwicky. (My character's.) And! Sari.
I understand people hate annoying or useless human characters but human characters are necessary. I like human characters along with Transformers because it makes the universe feel bigger. If every single character is a transforming robot, it makes the Transformers less special.
The ONE Transformers movie that had no human characters bombs, This is why we can't have nice thing's.......But in all fairness my favourite human character's are the transformers prime human cast, Spike and Carly from skybound and Charlie from Bumblebee 2018, I'd say animated as we'll but Sari technically isn't a human
The ONLY time this complaint has any validation is the Bay movies because the Transformers are barely characters in those movies. Decepticons were mostly monstrous robots, and Autobots were stereotypes like the twins in ROTF. They were making the Transformers too alien as in they weren't characters we could relate to or understand their motivations. Humans are definitely important to the franchise, but there needs to be a balance. The major difference between Transformers 2007 and the Bumblebee movie was that 2007 spent half of the movie with the human think he had a wierd car while Bumblebee had the human discover the truth about her car and struggle to hide this secret from everyone.
I remember when I was younger, me and a friend would play transformers the last knight (we were kids we thought the movie was epic) and I was bumblebee and he was hound, he wasn’t fat or anything he just liked hound’s guns.
I found Transformers interacting with humans to be the most interesting. Seeing Transformers and humans sharing ideas and just getting to know each other.
out of all the amazing things you can appreciate in the transformers franchise , the many different autobots and decepticons , their stories , cybertron and so many other things. Out of all those , something as BASIC as seeing humans interacting with transformers interested you the most!?!!
Humans in Transformers is the same as the Doctor's companions. They have to be well written to work. However, the only thing better than humans in Transformers is Dinosaurs in Transformers. I know we have the Dinobots, but having actual dinos follow them is pretty cool too.
Transformers needs well written humans…sometimes the hardest part.
I do agree though, that the humans have always been an integral part of the franchise. I think people blow out of proportion the issues of the humans. In my mind, there’s more “fine” humans than there are “bad” humans
Just adapt the humans from the skybound comics but also focus on the transformers
Anyone who claims humans are the weakest part of the franchise has never heard of the icon and the moment Agent Fowler.
Agent Fowler is easily the best part of prime.
Agent fowler is so goated I could care less he was so funny and was well written imo
He and agent simmon were one of the best parts of tfp and the bayverse to me
Fowler is the 🐐
We need a crossover where he meets Captain Fanzone and Agent Simmon.
I love seeing millenia old alien robots trying to handle chaotic ass teenage kids
Peak fiction right there
Cut to clips of Cybertron with Lori vocally manhandling Scourge or Coby and Bud screwing with Sideways while trying to escape the Atlantis.
THANK YOU
You either ruined that kid's life or he became the world's biggest Bulkhead stan and is furious he hasn't done anything since RID15. Nevermind I take it back, either way you ruined that kid's life
9:38 I commend your hope of TF One getting a sequel despite everything recently.
HARD agree. Humans have always been apart of tf, and getting rid of them for good doesn't help solve the issues they can cause.
So your solution is for them ti hog the spotlight from the alien robots? Why not have Sam kill Unixron while we are at it!
@tayojones9460 I never said they needed to be the main focus, just that humans have their place in tf. It can obviously go too far as Paperplane said in the video, but that doesn't mean they should get rid of them entirely.
I think the problem just comes down to how good the writing of each TF media is featuring humans. Skybound's comics is a great example of how to write good human characters in TF stories
agreed, i love the humans in skybound because they are actually likeable and well written, even the ones that took starscream hostage where entertaining
Honestly Rescue Bots has some of the best Human Characters in the franchise.
The Burns family and Rescue Force Sigma-17 becoming so close that they essentially become one big family is honestly one of the best parts about the show.
Also Cody Burns almost on par with Sari for best Kid Sidekick character in the franchise.
And since Cody is actually human he takes the cake lol no hate im just messing around 😉🙂
Anyway, yes, the Burns family *are* the best.
I hate the show for not having autobots battling the decepitcons and for not having the likes of Megatron, Starscream, Soundwave, or even Shockwave. As I wanna see giant robots beating the fuck out of each other
@@justingochioco1121 your hatred is misplaced. And your attitude is dumber that that on 3 years old. Think before speaking up, dumb4ss
@@justingochioco1121 I mean like, its a preschool kids show, so they cant get too violent.
Plus we already have Transformers: Prime for that, if this show did the same it would be utterly redundant. This show is called Transformers RESCUE Bots, and thats what they focus on and I enjoyed it a lot for that.
@@victorfries8859 Absolutely. They're some of the best human characters in the franchise, Massively underrated.
Also yeah, thats why I didnt add in Human when talking about Kid Sidekick cuz of Sari's whole situation lol.
Honestly, lot of Sam’s reactions are reasonable. Imagine being a regular high school student, then all of a sudden you’re thrusted into an intergalactic war involving toy robots from the 80s.
Edit: Not only that, but your great grandpa made first contact with them, and his glasses hold the key to the very object that gave them life. How would you feel in that moment?
I get why people find Sam annoying but I’ve always found it interesting how a MICHAEL BAY main character was allowed to be not a fighter, get emotional and panic, scream at things, and genuinely not be hypermasculine action hero man like his replacement was
@@Cdr2002 honestly I just like his adhd vibes and watching him become more unhinged throughout the trilogy lol
@@Cdr2002 I hate the Micheal bay films (apart from the first one and DOTM has a lot of good moments) but I actually really like Sam 😂
Idk why, but he I find him hilarious to watch
@ that’s fair honestly he has this high energy almost YTP insanity that can just be funny to watch
usually, the writers of the movies don't understand that the Transformers are also characters with depth and personality, they just see them as basic machines incapable of carrying an emotional story, hence the story forces a human plot in which the Transformers can be added.
Not necessarily. It's freakin' expensive to 3D model multiple robots with thousands of constantly moving parts.
That's just wrong. Even in the first Bay movie, they had very character driven banter with one another its just hard to keep in on screen for long outside of car mode. And even the car modes tend to be hard to keep on screen becsuze they keep picking these ultra expensive cars that most people will never be able to afford in multiples of their lifetimes.
@@nmr7203 Hence, why animation is probably the better route.
No need to be sparing with expensive CGI models and licensed cars if the whole thing is CGI and there is no car.
@@nmr7203 Still not an excuse to treat them like nothing more then mere plot devices which is exactly what Bay did (with the only exception being Optimus to a smaller extent)
What do you expect? These Hollywood shills wouldn’t understand Transformers even if a scraplet bit them right in the tailpipe
I think TFP handled the humans quite well when Miko wasn't annoying. Thank god she got some character development. But one of the things I love the most about that show is how it made the humans useful, and I mean all of them, without making them stupidly strong or magical, and they weren't given too much focus. They saved the bots several times and became integral members of the team due to their actions.
I mean - blowing up Arachnid's ship, helping the bots get the contents of an important information relic, rescuing Optimus with the key of the Vector Sigma, BECOMING AN ESSENTIAL HACKER FOR RATCHET, come 'on, Raphael literally saved the world and his team numerous times and survived fricking dark energon poisoning, to not even mention how Miko used the Apex Armour to pound the decepticons, or how it was actually Jack who came up with the idea of saving Optimus - yeah, Prime really did do the humans justice often times, I just wish they could've gotten a proper ending later on, or if we could've seen them later as soldiers or agents. That would've been awesome.
My favorite human characters in Transformers are:
1. Agent Fowler
2. Agent Simmons
3. Charlie Watson
I agree with you.
Mine are:
1. Sari
2. Agent Fowler
3. Captain Fanzone
@@bowserbreaker2515I would put Sari, but I’m not certain if she counts lol
@@Wyvernatus She does. She lived her whole life as a human and serves that role. She also looks like one.
Here's mine:
The Burns family
Alex Malto
Denny
G1 Spike and Sparkplug
G1 Chip
I feel like Carly in Skybound is the best use of a human character. Without spoilers, she exhibits being a flawed character with flawed and selfish motives whose presence helps to humanize the giant robots around her. Genuinely, Carly is fucking wonderful character writing being her arc is a part of the story and has effects that splash onto the other characters stories. We don't need human characters that can fight back, we just need human characters that feel human, rather than feeling like a walking reaction emoji.
Here here! We want more Carly in future animations I think there is much more huge potential with her and Skybound is just the start. She has deserved a hell of alot more than what she has been given over the years as with (stair climbing ass shots, being nowhere in sight as her son goes through the wringer in the great war and ends up in a planet eating monster, or gets sold off to an impostor Galvatron by her loving husband to name few) and as little as she has been. I think she has a great future in being a conduit into sharing the substance of the human condition...
I never wanted to be a Transformer really I just liked admiring their interesting awesomeness. Maybe see Elita 1 as a role model more than anything else. Since being 11 and watching G1 I just wanted to be Carly getting intertwined in the many robotic tussles that ensued and go to Cybertron in my convertible and scurrying away from Shockwave into small floor crevices like the size of a mouse. I mean, who wouldn't?
Humans deserve to be in Transformers due to the actions of ONE MAN
ALONE
BETRAYED BY THE COUNTRY HE LOVES!
BETRAYED BY THE COUNTRY HE LOVES
StOp SaYiNg ThAt!
Tell Megatron let's tengle
I'm new to the franchise, started with TFOne and then started watching Prime (I'm in the middle of season 2). I do dig the human characters a lot, I adore Miko and Fowler is indeed the GOAT. My only issue related to the humans is I just think Jack is boring as hell. I feel like as along as the humans are actually interesting they can definitely bring a lot to the plot. Bulkhead being like Miko's adoptive dad is like one of my favorite parts of the show.
As a kid, I remember there was a period where I was playing as Winx Club with some other kids on the playground and we had this one girl who didn't know about the show and ended up playing as a civilian aiding the fairies until she figured out what was going on. I feel like if I was dragged into some kind of Transformers playground role play, I'd be the one weirdo playing as a human doing a similar role to that since I never watched any of it as a kid.
transformers fans when optimus speak about the true value of human being: 🥺🥺🥺🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
transformers fan when the see a human in the screen: 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
I just appreciate how Transformers is consistent in having humans be mutuals, whereas in other shows the transforming robots are summoned or commanded by one kid and his device. Or it's humans as the creators of mecha that may sometimes be sentient.
I definitely agree, just because the Bayverse films had human characters mostly done bad doesn't mean that the Transformers shouldn't have a human companion. We have had Sari, Fowler, Jack, Miko, Raf, Charlie, the Malto family, and in the Bayverse itself Agent Simmons to show that you can give the Autobots actually likeable human companions.
ONE MAN
@@kaijuwarrior8917 ALONE
I really do dislike how the general attitude in the community has become "humans always ruin the story", when that's inherently untrue. People act as if no humans is a recipe success, and having humans is a burden that the writers have to grapple with, rather than them being a tool for the writer to use to tell stories they wouldn't be able to tell without humans.
P.S i read the description!
Exactly
Yeah agreed.
I know I'm like a broken Record but Rescue Bots is like a pretty good example of how Human and Transformers relations can be used to make a pretty good story. Just the way their relationships develops from butting heads, slowly starting to care for each other, becoming partners, to eventually considering each other as a big family.
I still have to watch the video: The Burns family from Rescue Bots are the best humans. Change my mind.
I'm sure I've said something along these lines before, but their relationship with the Rescue Bots is so good because they are doing the same thing as them. They can actually help each other with rescuing people, and the Burns family actually has something to offer them in fulfilling the task given by Optimus to basically be an experiment to see how humans and cybertronians can co-exist.
I'm so glad to see ssomeone with a very similar opinions. The Burns Family are mad underrated Human Characters in the Transformers Franchise.
@@fenrirsrage4609 Sigh, more Hardcore TF fans should watch RB and put in a good word on it; I was hurt at every single action figure reviwer (even the big ones) that said 'they didnt watch RB because of reasons" and still reviewed that awesome legacy united Chase figure! I mean, NO those lights on the arms are part of him! Dont take those down! NO they're not mini blasters! They are search lights 😔 And that weapon is not random! It's one of the many tools they use on the show! 😥 they dont know anything about Chase! 😭🤧
I can't. This argument is un-arguable.
@@victorfries8859 it's so crazy how much transformers lore was put into that show
It’s the same argument people use for Godzilla and other Kaiju films. “Oh the human story is the worst part. Always will be”. Except for that case, humans have ALWAYS been integral in giant monster films, since a lot of the time we’re seeing things from their perspective. Plus, it gives the story much needed tension when a Kaiju goes on the attack and humans are at risk. You can do Transformers without humans. But if we just had a Kaiju movie with zero human characters in the plot, just the monsters, it won’t feel like a monster movie. It’ll just be a nature documentary at that point.
well sometimes they can drag everything to a vault, i remember when godzilla x kong came out and there was a really great scene with pretty much no dialogue where kong discover every single gorrila that was opress by scar king in the hollow earth thanks to the power of shimu, and that scene takes a lot from the planet of the apes films because with pure visual story telling you understand the poor condition of the gorilas, you understand why scar king is feard and has a lot of power, you understand kong hate for this guy and why his people need him and you even understan how did scar king can control a kaiju like shimu to be on top, everything was so told so great with great pacing with no dialogue what so ever ... until the damm human start explaining pointless lore and shit we already learn 10 minutes ago, like christ that was the point i got sick of the humans in the legendary movies because every time they are on screen the movie just friggin die for a moment until monster comeback
*this comment is all just my personal opinion*
i think even though a big part of kaiju films is the humans perspective, alot of the time it just ends up making the kaiju not feel like actual sentient beings, with emotions, motivations, etc, and i feel it dosen't work very well outside of films like minus one, shin godzilla, GMK godzilla, 2014, 2019 kong skull island, etc, and with some of those films (2014 to a small extent and 2019 to a small extent in my opinion) they suffer a little bit from the humans being nothing more than walking exposition
and at least in my opinion it would be more interesting to reverse what most kaiju films do, and show us the monsters perspective of the humans, how they interact with them, what they think of them etc, and combine this with godzilla developing as a character through a monsterverse version of minilla/godzilla jr and his dynamic with other kaiju, and then hopefully we'd get peak from the monterverse.
I always hated that the humans have taken up most of the screen time throughout the movies, but it wasn’t until Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts I started appreciate them more because let’s be real, If we all came in contact with a real transformer in real life, we would all want to help throughout their aventures and build strong relationships with our favorite Autobots.
Yessir
nah. we'd be scared shitless like sam witwicky lol
@ eh at first yea, you’re not wrong. But later I would asked to fight along the Autobots later.
Alot of people don’t understand that a live action Transformers movie LITERALLY CANNOT FUNCTION without human characters, the reason Transformers don’t get as much screen time is because they are very fucking expensive and time consuming to bring to life. The reality is, to have the Transformers take up a majority of the screen time will take up so much money and time that they simply do not have, it’s either an animated movie that focuses solely on the Transformers (which we finally have), or a live action movie with human leads, no in between.
Also the Bay movies have Simmons.
Well it’s a good thing I don’t like live action as a medium so the choice is obvious
Yeah theres a reason the tra transformers look so good in those movies cause you barely see em lol
@@billyboleson2830 basically
@@SM-th7pw i think the problem come when they start to overstay their welcome, i mean shia la beouf work fine in the first one as the geeky guy who understand this species, but after movie 2 he became anoying as balls and kill any serious moment either by shouting all the time or having the hots for megan fox or that blonde wive from fury road
@@motor4X4kombat you got annoyed from him being attracted to Megan fox? What does that even mean?
How to make the human characters interesting to an adult audience: use them to explore complex themes that the robots alone couldn’t.
How to make human characters interesting to a child audience: give them a transforming mecha to pilot that Hasbro can make toys of. Get all Brave Series in there.
Also, these should not be seen as mutually exclusive pieces of advice.
"Give them a mech to make toys out of"
Thats basically what the unicron trilogy did and the whole thing is basically one big brave reference
@ I know. I’m saying they should do it more often.
Conclusion: we need good written stories and characters
Special Agent William Fowler needs a WHOLE ENTIRE VIDEO DEDICATED TO HIM.
"Robots in Disguise"
What the fuck are they disguising and hiding their big robot forms from? A bush?
Decepticons are also what they have to watch out for. I'm also reminded of that one Robot Chicken Sketch involving Beast Wars.
Humans can work, it just needs the right setting for the human characters
I personally think the Afghanistan scenes in bayformers 1 were pretty good, its man vs machine and I think lennox is a good human character for this setting.
I hope that in the GI joe crossover movie they bring lennox back
Me when I post the Bumblebee opening scene and say “We need a show set on Cybertron with no humans just like the WFC games!” and get 1 billion likes (please ignore the previous three shows set entirely on Cybertron)
God Netflix trilogy was so bad
I feel like the people behind the Transformers franchise might want to take some ques from the Sonic Film Series. They managed to make some pretty memorable humans who are just as entertaining as Sonic and the other characters from the games.
I'm not sure if that'll change anything since a lot of Sonic fans still complained that humans take up a good portion of those films. Don't even get me started on the initial reactions the Knuckles show got.
@@kingbash6466 to be fair (though i never ended up watching the show, so take this with a grain of salt) from what ive gathered it seems like the criticism of the show is less about the humans being a part of it in the first place, and more that the show was advertised as being primarily about Knuckles, with Wade tagging along (And is even called Knuckles), but ended up being mostly about Wade instead. It was mostly a matter of misleading advertising and some odd writing decisions.
The actual movies themselves did the human aspect very well, and Im pretty sure the people complaining about the humans are mostly a loud minority. Most fans loved or were at least fine with the humans, at worst maybe think that the wedding plot dragged on a little bit in the second movie. I think the notion of the tf producers taking notes on the sonic films is a good idea
I know, right?
People love fun characters like Agent Simmons in Transformers or Agent Stone in the Sonic movies
I know that it can be hard to justify the presence of humans within a franchise whose main attraction are the guys made with CGI, but it's feasible
But the scene in sonic 2 where Rachel drives a golf cart to get revenge on randall was REALLY unnecessary
I never felt that Transformers needed to get rid of the humans to be good as someone who grew up with Animated and Prime. My issue is specifically with the Bay films in how they handle that balance. As admittedly memorable as the cast were in the first 3 films, you can tell that they actively ate up a lot of character exploration that could have been given to the titular giant robots. Like by TLK, Optimus becomes a bad guy, and he practically disappears for the entire middle part of the plot until he unceremoniously shows up, fights Bumblebee for 3 minutes, and then turns good again. Could have actually done something interesting with that concept if they cut out 90% of the scenes where Anthony Hopkins and Cogman were just dicking around.
At least anthony hopkins is funny to watch because hes basically just shitposting throughout the movie but age of extinction has no excuse
I think people painting issues with the Bay films as issues with the franchise is a general problem
Earth without humans is like a ant-farm without ants or a aquarium without fish personally I don’t mind the human great video
When the Autobots go to Earth, they WILL run into humans. They can't get off without their involvement somehow (and creating casualties). Their eventual bonding is what led them to protect Earth as their second home. Home is people, not a place.
I would love to see a story about the Autobots reaction to our real world politics, i honestly think Optimus would be kinda horrified on how some humans treat each other
Reminds me of a line from the first movie.
Ironhide: Why should we help the humans? They’re a primitive and violent race.
Optimus: Were we so different?
@@TheRoomforImprovementalso Optimus had a similar remark to Ratchet in Skybound, where Ratchet calls humans impulsive and violent to their own kind and Optimus quietly goes “exactly the same as us” while Ratchet continues on his tangent.
It reminds me of this Analog Horror I watched were the Apollo actually found multiple Earth-like planets but each and everyone of them were completely barren, the culprit were themselves, each and every one of those Earth-esque planets died through mutual destruction. Like the Cybertronians, and if we’re unlucky we humans.
@@トーキ-g8v What's the name of that Analog horror series?
@@LoveSoBlueI think he's talking about Spaceman Scott's clip at the end of his second analog horror ranked video.
@@kingbash6466bingo
Maybe it is because I am a huge fan of the franchise, but I always felt one neat way of including humans in a TF show would be to create something similar to the Defense Teams in Ultraman shows: Groups of humans tasked with defending people and cities from fantastical threats. They are usually portrayed as at best only really helping with slowing the Kaijus and Aliens down before Ultraman comes in to save the day most of the time. (Though recent shows have tried to make them more competent)
You could make something similar with Transformers: A group of I dunno, maybe scientists and engineers, who are tasked with researching alien shit and assist the Autobots perhaps.
Agent Fowler from Prime, Sari from Animated, Simmons and Lennox from the bay movies, Lori and Coby from cybertron, Noah from rotb are all pretty good. Feel free to list more cause i know im missing em
Of course Transformers needs Humans. They’re called Robots in Disguise for a reason. If there aren’t any humans, then the Transformers aren’t robots in disguise.
It’s why I get annoyed with people saying that Transformers One is good, all because it doesn’t have humans. Like yeah, there weren’t any human characters in Transformers One, because the movie was supposed to be an origin story on how the Autobots & Decepticons were formed, and how Optimus Prime & Megatron became mortal enemies. The movie’s good for many reasons, but lacking humans ain’t one of them chief.
Humans are essential to a Transformers story that takes place on Earth. The live action movies mostly take place on Earth, therefore humans play a large role in the story.
I remembered playing transformers as a kid with my friends at school i was always optimus prime since i said if they wanted to play with me
Transformers Prime handled human characters very well. Agent Fowler is of course brilliant, but the kids also proved how human characters can add to Transformers. Yes the kids spend a lot of time just hanging out getting exposited to, but there’s also plenty of episodes where they wind up being invaluable to the Autobots. Jack traveling to Cybertron to restore Optimus’ memory, Raff convincing Ratchet to keep fighting when hope seemed lost, Miko killing Hardshell and kicking Starscream’s ass, the kids handling the scraplet infestation taking on MECH and trapping Soundwave in the Shadowzone. They held their own among the giant robots, as much as part of Optimus’ team as the bots themselves.
0:30 when this dropping 😂
i think that being referred to as bulkhead is a compliment and he should be proud of being compared to that character
5:40 to 5:46 This entire sentence sums up probably my biggest problem with Cyberverse. Humans are an afterthought, with only one design for a human ever being shown throughout the entirety of the show and it was for a quick gag. Yes, humans are HEARD and their presence is shown via stuff like news feeds and (of all things) Twitch stream comments, but beyond that, there is nothing for them. The Nemesis lands in the middle of a city for god's sake, but no one except the Autobots cares about that.
I did enjoy Cyberverse and I enjoyed that we had a more focus on the Cybertronian dynamic, but they sacrificed the dynamic with Earth, in spite of how much the Autobots say they want to defend it. Why even make it Earth at that point if you aren't gonna focus on it? They may as well have made it a generic abandoned planet in the middle of space nowhere. Just another nameless battlefield in a galactic war.
As a kid, I loved Transformers because giant robots yay, but also I loved Cody, I loved Alexis (a little too much maybe) and yes I loved Sam Witwicky because I thought he was funny.
When I played with my action figures I'd always have a few lego minifigures around to be "the humans". I was sad that Sam and Mikaela weren't in the DS Transformers Game because I wanted it to be more like the movie.
When I would write or imagine my own Transformers stories, I always had humans in them. I even remember one where the protagonist was a human and he would turn INTO Optimus Prime (I didn't know Masterforce was a thing back then).
The only time I remember going "yuck, humans" was in TFA with the super-hero villains but that was more like me not liking that Animated was like "those superheroes shows I don't like" and wanting to see more of the Decepticons. And even then, I remember loving the Headmaster because it referenced something from G1 (yes as a child I knew about Headmasters but not Powermasters, don't ask).
So all of this is to say I don't know if kids care or not about humans in Transformers but I definetly did
OH HOW COULD I FORGET. Agent Simmons was my favourite human character from the movies, I thought he was SO funny. I remember being very happy when I watched ROTF at the Cinema and he showed up again.
Sari sumdac it’s clearly the best human character (sort of) in transformers
Yeah she's great! Real shame she hasn't made added to any other continuities. I really hope she ends up being included in the skybound comics. Considering in void rivals the main characters and their species are apparently organic and half cybertronian
@ how would that work in the story?
@@redalert923 Maybe cobra or gi joe gets their hands on some proto forms and use them to create an army of super soldiers. But one of the scientists (this universe's professor sumdac) realizes that this is wrong and sabotages the operation. However one of the proto forms survives and gets a sample of sumdac's DNA and creates Sari and raises her as his own daughter
@ that actually sounds pretty good
The problem isn’t the human characters, the problem is that the human characters are the main characters instead of the Transformers.
Thing is… why is it always humans? Why is it always Earth? There’s a whole galaxy out there!
If people say TF is bad without humans when the Bumblebee movie, EarthSpark, and the Skybound comics have AMAZING humans, they're just stupid, lol.
TF stories CAN be good with humans, they just have to be involved in the story in interesting ways and not be an afterthought.
Earthspark is shit
We need WELL WRITTEN Humans, not annoying humans who exist to take focus away from the Transformers and annoy the audience with their unlikeable personalities.
For me i don't have a problem with humans. I think they focused on the wrong thing. Can you imagine if in tthe bayformers, they made the main human characters lennox and his team. And instead the dynamic is the shared brotherhood between the autobots and their squad. Remember the autobots have been fighting a war for centuries. They are all veterans. It would be cool to see despite being worlds apart the hans and robots can bond over the shared suffering caused by war. The loss of friends. The trauma they suffered. They are united by the scars of war. I think if the movie was like that i think it would be really cool
Besides Earthspark, Rescue Bots is one of the top TF shows with a well written human cast.
As in, the humans are actually integral to the bot’s mission and development, and that each bot has a partner to bounce off of; plus there’s emphasis on the family dynamic.
(The best way I can describe a human x bot relationship in Rescue Bots is similar to Digimon; the humans and bots help each other develop.)
I really like humans in transformers when it's done *well*. I'm sick of seeing them as barely fleshed out side characters or barely fleshed out main characters that end up taking away from the transformers personalities and just make them big ol' fighting robots with very little else. If there's depth, I'm game. I love when they delve into how different the cultures are or how similar certain issues that arise have affected both Cybertronians AND humans. I think a lot can be done with the dynamic but I suppose I am quite picky about it. It does also feel out of place to me to see some teenage love plot in a story about an alien war
Humans are good in TF, however we have had WAY too many humans recently. Give us more TF films with just the transformers
They're usually either nothing burgers or they're really bad.
@Diii-e3z I saw it in cinemas twice
Watch the video
Then watch the Netflix movies 😂
@Thecheeseman3512 I did watch the video
Don't worry, PaperPlane, I feel fairly confident you don't have to worry about Transformers One 2 coming out, ever.
3:41 so that’s why you shot my arm off at Costco. Say no more.
Oro: William Fowler (Transformers Prime)
Plata: Marissa Faireborn (IDW 2005)
Bronce: Charlie Watson (Bumblebee Movie)
Mención honorífica: Dorothy "Dot" Malto (Transformers: Earthspark)
Say what you will about TF Energon but the idea of the cybertronians helping humans become a space faring race with mechs and power suits is frankly awesome and should really come back cause we can do more with the humans then just modern day
Energon has such a good premise
Agree, I also like the cross of technology. Like Dr. Jones is the one whom designed Optimus/Convoys drones. They help each other and it’s awesome. Kicker is also fucking awesome don’t care what anyone says. He’s by far the best human character in the franchise. He’s actually helpful, and does have character progression (if you watch the sub). Something most of the humans in the franchise cannot boast.
The problem is that humans are rarely ever written well enough to be likeable and stand on their own. I hope that, if they do continue the One continuity that they adapt Verity and Hunter since they’re A) not annoying and B) take a direct role in aiding Autobots in a way that isn’t contrived or forced, helped by the fact that it also causes them a lot of major personal pain like Last Requiem of the Wreckers so that they’re not untouchable kids
I am not a human hater but I am just saying, shows like Prime Wars and the WFC trilogy did not do no human Transformers justice.
Bayformers is imo the only time when human stories in transformers didn't work, but I don't think it's just from the fact they were there at all or there's not enough robot action, but it's the fact 90% of those movies' run time is dedicated from humans' perspective, which undermines Transformers stuff. I saw take that said you can't make Transformers movie with out focusing on humans cause the robots aren't interesting enough, and I believe this comes from the fact Bayformers was the major exposure to what TF franchise is like to none TF fans. THAT BEING SAID, humans are always the most vital part of transformers stories, and not just because they serve as audiance surrigate, but they serve to show the connection between Cybertronians and Earth. And the Cybertron and Earth relationship can lead to many interesting stories. I do think stories should just be defined by human factor, but it should not be removed either. It's all about how it's utulised and executed. And hey, outside of Bayformers I wouldn't say any humans in transformers were bad, and overall range from fine to ok, with some that were great characters.
Why I love the 2007 movie so much is because I think the whole cast (other than two Decepticons with 3 min of screen time each) are pretty interesting and fun characters. Human characters can do a lot, and I think the hate is overly exaggerated.
Lennox, Simmons, and Fowler are all trained military agents that tend to directly advance the plot, or actually fight against the Decepticons. Sam killed Megatron, found the Matrix, and rallied the military and Autobots to save Chicago. Miko saved Wheeljack’s life, and stole the Apex Armour, Jack taught Smokescreen about earth, stopped the Nemesis when it was controlled by Dark Energon, and also saved Optimus by finding Vector Sigma. Raphael served as a really effective “guy in the chair” and convinced Ratchet to fight again.
And that’s just in TFP and the first three movies. Transformers is all about someone else’s war coming to Earth, and that angle is a large part of what makes things interesting. That can’t be covered as well without Earth and a lot of writers knew that to the same degree which is why it keeps being brought into the story.
Anyway, the US Military is a good character and y’all just haters.
The humans in transformers bring out the best of the autobots morals and the worst of the decepticons depravity, and also give a sense of scale to transformers, and reminds us how big they are.
Transformers stories without humans are great still, but humans are a very helpful thing for transformers stories when done well.
Transformers are "robots in disguise"! The whole point (at least, how I see it) is that Transformers is really about how the aliens interact with the human population of Earth.
If that's getting stale, maybe we could have a series where Transformers disguise themselves on an alien planet?
That's such an insult to Bulkhead. 😭
Hot Take: One of the main reasons for me on why TF 2007 is the best Bayverse movie is because the fact it focuses on the human angle for so long it'd make scenes like the arrival to earth less impactful.
I kinda like the one-dimension (ironically enough) robotic-acting humans but in smaller dosages, lol they can serve to create proper comic relief imo
Some of the best Transformers stories have humans in it. The most recent one being the Skybound comics. I won't spoil anything so people can check it out for themselves. But the point is, if done well, a lot of great themes can be explored through the relationship and parallels between transformers and humans.
2 under appreciated Humans I think are Kicker from Energon/Superlink, and Jan from Victory. Kicker is one of the only human characters who participated in battle and is actually helpful, as well as getting good character progression. The dub kills that progression, but in the sub he slowly matures over the anime and forms a strong bond with Ironhide/Roadbuster. He’s fantastic. Then I like Jan a lot because he humanizes Star Saber. Star Saber adopting him I think does a wonderful job of showing who Star Saber is, It tells so much about him just through that simple act. It’s a wholesome relationship that warms my soul.
I would say that the biggest issue is assuming that relatability and the giant robots can't be mixed, or that humans can't be cool next to said Transformers and always have to have some kind of "normal life" that is comparable to that of the audience member. If you actually try, anything can seem relatable. You could have a story that starts with humans in space even, I don't need a "point of view character" to say "wow, alien robots, pretty crazy" just explain the status quo, or where the characters are starting from in your story, and I (and I assume many others) will get invested.
The fact that I played as Starscream instead of like... Optimus, Bumblebee, or heck even the main bad guy Megatron kinda makes sense to how I am the way I am as an adult today ngl.
Adding humans could expand the world of transformers like how they did in animated.
To be honest the Transformers need one permanent human character, like there was always the same Transformers characters and then different writers would take them and give them their own twist, so it would be cool if there was one human character like that
If the bots and cons are on earth, human characters are a must.
It just comes down to how they're integrated in the story, and how well they're written.
Edit: And frankly, having humans allows the writers to make the giant alien robots much more alien and actually feel giant.
I always had a fascination for humans in the franchise.
To most people, they're annoying and distract you from the main attraction: The Transformers.
Nonetheless, they're a key part of the brand. Without them, their disguises would barely have any use (Aside from transportation).
The main problem for most of them is that they're just... there. You don't care about their problems, you just want to see robots punching each other.
However, people DO care about characters like Sari, Charlie, Noah, Verity or Carly (Skybound), why? Because their inner conflicts are what makes them interesting as characters.
Trying to discover where you came from, mourning the loss of a loved one, trying to get a better life for your younger sibling or wanting revenge against some alien invaders are all good motivations for the human characters (Unlike the character arcs for Sam or Cade, that sometimes feel very hollow and forgettable).
Also... wherever you are, Description Writer, I salute you.
I like to imagine I'm the human in the movie, show, whatever, so I can pretend they're my friends
Real, king speaks the truth again naturally
I salute you, anonymous description writer. Your sacrifices are known.
I fully agree that humans are an important part of many Transformers stories. Transformers stories can work just as well without them, but I always find it incredibly interesting when cybertronians get to interact with species that are so much different from them in terms of size, strength, abilities and lifespan. It creates potential for so many interesting dynamics and conflicts and I wish more Transformers media tried to focus on those.
11:07 fully justified
Daniel Witwicky was the first time i can remember realizing habing human kids in Transformers franchises is a bad idea. I enjiyed Beast Wars, the War for Cybertron games, and Transformers One and never thought they couldve improved it with some fleshy humans.
Alot of examples of poorly written or boring human characters are from shows or movies that are also poorly written or boring in general human characters are never really uniquely bad in whatever the story is to me
My favorite human's are...
Alexis,
Miko,
Charlie,
Makaela,
Idk how to spell his name but his little brother calls him Sonic.
Agent Fowler,
Agent Simmons,
Becks, Breaks, and Gears, Witwicky.
(My character's.) And!
Sari.
I love Sammy, I love his mental breakdowns in the bay films they really funny and Agent Fowler is cool too.
If the Autobots never met humans, they'd be up the creek without a paddle.
I would like to see human characters be able to have a Headmaster/Powermaster role, but without too much reliance on them.
Rescue Bots is my favorite example of humans done right.
The Burns Family matters SOOOOO much.
being compared to bulkhead is a compliment tbh
I understand people hate annoying or useless human characters but human characters are necessary. I like human characters along with Transformers because it makes the universe feel bigger. If every single character is a transforming robot, it makes the Transformers less special.
Humans tend to have a way better track record in the comics, interestingly enough.
The ONE Transformers movie that had no human characters bombs, This is why we can't have nice thing's.......But in all fairness my favourite human character's are the transformers prime human cast, Spike and Carly from skybound and Charlie from Bumblebee 2018, I'd say animated as we'll but Sari technically isn't a human
It had the worst marketing
The ONLY time this complaint has any validation is the Bay movies because the Transformers are barely characters in those movies. Decepticons were mostly monstrous robots, and Autobots were stereotypes like the twins in ROTF. They were making the Transformers too alien as in they weren't characters we could relate to or understand their motivations.
Humans are definitely important to the franchise, but there needs to be a balance. The major difference between Transformers 2007 and the Bumblebee movie was that 2007 spent half of the movie with the human think he had a wierd car while Bumblebee had the human discover the truth about her car and struggle to hide this secret from everyone.
Agent Simmons is the goat and needs to show up in more media. Same with Agent Burns because John Cena had some of the best lines in Bumblebee.
Anything can fit anywhere as long as it’s properly written and enhances the narrative.
I just want my girl Kelly back,poor girl did not deserve any of what she went throught man
I remember when I was younger, me and a friend would play transformers the last knight (we were kids we thought the movie was epic) and I was bumblebee and he was hound, he wasn’t fat or anything he just liked hound’s guns.
Can't lie Sari is the best human in tf media
Sari is great! I think I prefer Jack from TFP but that might be because I haven’t finished Animated yet
except agent Simons he's the goat
"Human" they say
@@sefronsuper Oh yeah, Simmons is one of my favorite parts of the otherwise pretty mid (in my opinion, no hate) Bayfilms
@@TheBabyCaleb fr, he got me through the bayverse tbh
The title caught me so off guard lmao. I thought this was gonna be some spicy hot take about how transformers needs human characters to be good
I found Transformers interacting with humans to be the most interesting. Seeing Transformers and humans sharing ideas and just getting to know each other.
out of all the amazing things you can appreciate in the transformers franchise , the many different autobots and decepticons , their stories , cybertron and so many other things. Out of all those , something as BASIC as seeing humans interacting with transformers interested you the most!?!!
@manoranjanchakraborty6314 yeah it can be very interesting
The human cast in 'Rescue Bots' is one of the best (if not THE best) imo 🙌
Humans in Transformers is the same as the Doctor's companions. They have to be well written to work.
However, the only thing better than humans in Transformers is Dinosaurs in Transformers. I know we have the Dinobots, but having actual dinos follow them is pretty cool too.
Bold of you to assume we’re still getting transformers two 🥲