Transformers: Beast Machines
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
1) What's the next season, movie, or whatever you plan to do after BM going to be in the Transformer legacy? Is there anything you can tell us now about the next series of transformers(Mainframe says that Hasbro wants to go back to Earth before the Beast Wars started and of doing something with that setting and time)?
I haven't the faintest idea! All I know is that the Transformer Universe Will Continue! However, I honestly have no idea whether Hasbro wants to proceed with a feature, another series, or what. All I can say is that Marty and I had a blast writing the Beast Machines series, and that if Hasbro wants to invite us back for more, we'd love the opportunity. (And if they want to hire new writers to approach this world with fresh eyes, Marty and I wish them well.)2) As a Canadian female over forty, I feel better knowing that there are other adults that enjoy BW/BM as much as I do. Now that season 2 has aired in Canada and you know the results i.e. ratings, Is there going to be a season three? As an old science fiction fan, jaded by what is being produced currently, it seems that Mainframe is the only organization putting out anything of any quality. Love your work.There are so many great directions to go into, and I can't wait to see where Hasbro, Mainframe, et al wind up going...
Why thank you. As I said above, Marty and I had a blast writing this series, and we're enjoying tackling the world of Action Man as well.3) When will the BEAST MACHINE SEASON 2 start on Fox?As far as a Season Three goes, the Saga of Beast Machines ended with episode # 26, however I expect that there will be some new series down the road...
The beginning of September, when they premiere their new season. Such has ALWAYS been the plan, despite the angry cries of "Why is Fox keeping us from Season Two of Beast Machines?!" which have appeared all over BigBot.com and other websites. Beast Machines was always designed to be two 13-episode seasons, and the bane of having Fox actually air every episode in order with no repeats during season one was that fans had to wait a full ten months to find out what happened after the #13 cliffhanger! (HINT: the story continues...)4) Hi! I am a huge fan of Transformers and Godzilla. In one episode of BM, Megatron projects pictures of a robot on to the ceiling of the council citadel. Are those pictures of him? If not, who are they of? I'd like to say I love your shows and I think they are very well written.Thanks for watching! I'm not sure who was featured in those pictures, to be quite honest with you.5) I have just witnessed a very awesome thing. I have just seen the last episode of Beast Machines of season two, and I have got to say that you did a very good job ending the series. I loved the irony and the way it made me feel.....no words can explain it, it was magnificent. I was also very sad to see that Beast Machines was over, and that I would not be able to see Cheetor, Rattrap, Black Arachnia, Silverbolt, Nightscream, Botanica, Megatron and all his minions, and last but not least old Bigbot, Optimus again. I especially loved the way Optimus blossomed into the greatest transformer to ever live and will ever live on Cyberton. I congratulate you on your awesome work on Beast Machines. I know transformers will live on in my life forever. Thank you for changing my life and bringing new and great things to me. Thank you Mr. SkirWhat a nice response to our story (and certainly more welcome than the "I want to punch you in the face when I see you" responses of SO MANY people on Bigbot.com!). The ending of our series caused a LOT of controversy, and the people who liked it REALLY liked it, while the people who hated REALLY want to chase Marty and me into the swamp with torches and Frankenstein rakes.6) Hey guys, i just have to tell you that I am 30 yrs. Old and the transformers have been...it would be an understatement to call it anything but a spiritual high for me. Beast machines has especially brought the excitement back that I had in 1984 when G1 came out. Bob and the rest of the crew, thank you so much for keeping my "spark" alive.I'm deeply gratified that you felt so strongly about Optimus being so heroic in the end. I tried to make him a deeply flawed character, who grows as his faith is challenged. I'm glad that came through for you, and hopefully for others as well...
Anyway, I'm glad you liked it, and I hope you'll come aboard for Action Man this Fall.
The mandate from Hasbro was for a Transformer series with a deeply spiritual side. I'm glad that you liked that aspect of the series (especially since you are a G-1 era fan, whose numbers have included the loudest of our critics).7) I don't really have a question so much as I have a comment. I just saw the last 4 episodes of season 2 and I have to say I'm glad I didn't read any spoilers about them because they KICKED ASS! Oh my god! I loved how Megatron was in the Diagnostic droid and the romance between rattrap and botanica, seeing Thrust/Waspy was wicked, You guys did an awesome job on this series and if there is to be any new Transformer series I want ya'll doing it.I always saw this show as a chance to do a religious epic for television, and I'm glad that Hasbro and Fox encouraged Marty and I to follow our ideas to their logical (if extreme) conclusion.
I just wish they kept the kiss between Rattrap and Botanica onscreen, the way it was in the animatic! Why is it okay for a spider lady to kiss a bird dog, but it's not okay for a rat to kiss a tree?! I mean, what's that about?!8) Would it be possible to post something on-line to show a behind the scenes look at how the beast machines are created. it looks as if you have a plenitude of fans(me being one) and I'm sure they're as interested as i am. thanks and keep up the ground breaking animationI'm glad you had a opportunity to see the shows without spoilers SPOILING the surprises. (And I'm puzzled why people seek out spoilers knowing they'll do just that! Aren't the twists a huge part of the fun?!)
Anyway, thanks for watching Beast Machines; I'm glad you enjoyed it.
Well, my part of the show involves me sitting at my desk and typing a whole bunch; anybody really want to watch that?! As for watching the computer animators, contact Mainframe and see if they've got anything...9) I'm a big fan. Beast Machines is a great series and I commend you on your work. Now I got a question. What happened to Obsidian and Strika after Season 2 of Beast Machines, are they dead? Will Obsidian and Strika return?Obsidian and Strika had a MAGNIFICENT scene in which they return to Cybertron and decline an offer to be reformatted themselves (partly because they feel unworthy because of their role helping Megatron, and party because I wanted them to remain "pure" when I brought them back in the next series... which (as of this writing) I haven't been invited onto yet.10) Why did you decide to have Megatron and Optimus(he didn't even get to say goodbye) die in the end?. I'm going to miss Optimus(sniff). What exactly happened to Optimus and Megatron(were their bodies vaporized?) Optimus's last words were "Prepare to be reformatted" but how can that be when afterward they both died?Sadly, their finale got cut for time. As one producer put it (albeit more nicely than I'm putting it here:) "The story is over, enough with the epilogue scenes, roll the damn credits already!"
Well, they got reformatted into being the new Cybertron, their bodies being vaporized in the process.11) Now that you're done with the series, is there anything you'd change if you could do it all over?Will they be back in some other form, or have we seen the last of them..? Only time will tell.
(BIG, BIIIIG LAUGHTER). Having finished the show, I'd have to say, Yeah, there ARE things I would change.12) I'm wondering if Hasbro will make a Botanica toy, or if they will do a whole plant line(that would be cool!)? I've heard rumors that the won't be a Botanica toy and that you, yourself, said that you weren't certain! Also about the Strika toy I also heard that she would be the Blastcharge toy, is this true? Because in my opinion the vehicle form does look like her, but the robot form I would have to disagree.Most of my choices for change involve Season One, since I was totally in charge of Season Two and it turned out very much the way I wanted (yes, especially the ending of series, despite/because of how controversial it proved to be!)...
SEASON ONE: In retrospect, whereas starting the story in the middle was a good idea, waiting eight full episodes before revealing ALL of the backstory was maybe not the brightest decision we could have made. Although it did provided us with a really cool surprise, that the brutal, idiotic Tankorr was actually the brilliant, pensive Rhinox. That surprise was worth the wait. But overall, I would have ended the exposition by episode three or four.
Also, the whole Transforming As A Martial Arts thing was my least favorite idea in the world. Always hated it. Not my idea, but it got sold and it got into the show I let other people deal with it... (And the training sequences? Yuck! I did everything I could not to have them!) (And just why the hell would machines need to LEARN how to transform? Either you can, or you can't. It really is that simple!)
(Plus: the big boo-boo, about how the Autobots "settled onto Cybertron", as if they had come from somewhere else... that verbiage was part of the development before we got to it, and by the time we discovered how fundamentally wrong it was to Transformer history it was too late to change it!)
Additionally, Marty and I had no say over character designs. And whereas we were overall thrilled with how the characters looked, for my part, I would have given Rattrap a less wimpy/goofy robot mode (although we DID have fun with how inventive the character had to become in order to overcome his weaknesses.) And DON'T EVEN get me started on Nightscream's robot mode! (The toy's robot mode is a LOT more like what I had in mind for him. Not dopey at all: no Namor wings on his ankles, and no Leonardo curl across his face!)
SEASON TWO: I wish I could have introduced Botanica, Obsidian, and Strika a lot earlier. They were HUUUGE model builds for Mainframe, which is why they turned up so late in the series... and I really wish I could have used them earlier.
I also wish that the scripts didn't have to be so short. CGI eats up time quicker than traditional cel animation, meaning that (since chases are more easily animated than conversations and "complex" scenes) a lot of story had to get thrown over the side. (Episode # 16, in which Silverbolt comes back, especially suffered from all of the necessary cutting.)
Anyhow, despite the changes I would make, I am deeply happy with how the series came out.
I am more proud of Beast Machines than any other series I have ever done.
I am not sure whether they will be making a Botanica toy or not. However, Strika will most certainly be on toy shelves.13) I was watching Saturday cartoons on May 20th and saw "Action Man." At first I thought it was another kiddy show when I saw Robert N. Skir as the writer. I was partially asleep at the time and was wide awake as soon as I saw the name. I watched and sudden resemblances to BM appeared in my mind.Rattrap = Rikki. He's the complainer (duh!)
Grinder = Optimus. Sort of, the philosopher, but a little more cool.
Fidget= Blackarachnia. Can't really find a big connection. But both babes doing dangerous stuff.
Alex Mann= Cheetor? Well, sort of fits. High flying. Lots of energy. Also like Optimus, since the AMP thing is like his connection to the Matrix.
Brandon Caine = Noble/Savage. Mutant. Changes to a freak.
Dr. X = Megatron. I mean, he's both organic and technological. Leads mechanical drones. With all this upgrade talk probably wants to get rid of organics.
Well, love the show, however, don't know when the rest of the show goes on. The premiere is there and the whole show disappears. I love your work. It's the greatest. I bet my life on that.
I'm glad you liked the show. The execution was very much Marty's, since I was busy running the scripts on Season Two of Beast Machines while Marty was overseeing the first season of Action Man (and it totally rips! Every episode is an E-Ticket Ride!)14) Please develop the character of Fidget on Action Man, I want to know more about her, and for her to have adventures of her own. Thank you for the bottalk.com discussion boards.The premiere itself was a special showing, a movie-for-television in anticipation of the new Fall series. So watch for on Fox beginning in September!
Anyway, I don't really see the characters in Action Man as being analogous to any of the characters from Beast Machines. (And as the series goes on, I think you'll agree as well.)
Talk to the folks at Fox and Hasbro. I would personally LOVE to see Fidget get her own series, since I'm the guy who created her (making her, technically speaking, my daughter.). I'm also glad to see people glomming onto her after the way people were trashing Nightscream, whom I created for Beast Machines. (Hmmmm... I wonder if that means people would have liked him better as I originally conceived him... as a female. Yep, Nightscream was originally Belle Bat, patterned after Newt from Aliens -- as opposed to John Conner from T2, as she/he eventually became.)15) What the freakin' heck was that!? I, like many of us old timers gave Beast Machines a chance. It had great potential in that it took place exclusively on cybertron as no other transformers series has. And the fact that you created this forum for the fans to express our thoughts directly to the team creating the show, I thought that you, of all people, would heed the suggestions and the warnings that we gave.More information than ANYONE wanted to know...
Now, while I understand that you do ultimately have to answer to Hasbro and that you didn't call all the shots on the show, I think that you still could have done something. Beast Machines flies in the face of everything that we grew up loving. First the characters aren't the giants that we loved, but that was fine, we accepted that. But now you have turned Cyberton into a glorified green house. It is the opinion of many of us out here in cyberspace that both the staff of the show and Hasbro no longer care what we long time fans of the transformers think despite this site you created.
It should show you how devoted we are when we continue to give a show that many of us out and out hate, chance after chance after chance. The only way to salvage the franchise is to follow Takara's lead and bring back the Autobots and eventually the Decepticons. It could be done very easily, we saw at the end of Beast Machines that Primal's spark left cybertron to join the matrix, which means that it is not on cybertron. You could start it off with our current heros or some new characters going off is search of the matrix and go from there.
You have much to make for Mr.Skir.
We fans are legion, and we are not happy.
First of all, I want to thank you for watching the series. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy this particular incarnation of Transformers; maybe the next one will be more to your liking.Let me add that I totally understand your frustration and disappointment. Years ago I was working on Fox's X-Men series, which was a dream project for me (having been a total X-Men fanatic, and having written an X-Men feature completely on spec out of sheer love for the characters). Although the head writer tried to get things right, he didn't know the characters very well at first. He was very open to listening to history lessons and suggestions from this very young, eager writer, and yet many things in the series still weren't right. Characters weren't exactly the same as the comics -- they didn't talk the same and some of their origins were completely messed up. It drove me nuts! The bottom line was: despite the fact that the series was terrific (and remains the single best adaptation of any Marvel property ever), it was never good enough for me, never right enough for me, never the way I personally would have handled it. And the head writer was a genius and a good friend (and we remain good friends, despite the strains caused by that series...) -- but I was an X-Men fanatic and I love those characters and I wanted/needed to see them done exactly right.
So when you say you were left angry by the Beast Machines series, I know exactly how you feel. Really.
But the bottom line is very simple: Hasbro, Mainframe, and Fox could have hired any writers they wanted. Lots of writers out there are G1 literate, and virtually all of the G1 writers are still alive and active in the industry. The simple fact is that they hired Marty and I precisely because we were Transformer illiterates -- they wanted us to approach this series with fresh eyes, and actively discouraged us from watching the old shows. They wanted us to make this show ours, and we did exactly that.
And Hasbro hired Marty and I to do a Transformer series with a strong spiritual edge. We gave them EXACTLY what they wanted, and made ourselves and Fox happy, too.
We delivered a show of which we are very proud.
We delivered a show that made Fox, Mainframe, and Hasbro very happy (so happy they hired us to do Action Man while we were still working 20 hour days keeping Beast Machines on schedule!).
We delivered a show that, in turn, delivered exactly the kind of audience Fox wanted. An audience that keeps returning, even in fourth and fifth repeats. Big numbers.
And we delivered a show that many Transfans love...
... and just as many hate.
They hired Marty and I to deliver a show, and we gave them exactly what they wanted.
We didn't set out to make anybody angry, or to diminish the love anybody had for Transformers, and we're sorry if it's had that effect on anybody.
However we wrote the show we set out to write, and we're very, very proud of it.
(Just to clear up a misconception, Marty and I had nothing to do with the formation of any websites... Renaud created it to give Transfans a forum to discuss Transmatters with one another. And I agreed to the formation of bobskir.com so that I could answer questions from fans. However, I do not appear there for suggestions, ideas, or history lessons. It's merely a place to talk.)
Maybe you'll like the next incarnation of Transformers better.
In the meantime... thanks for watching, and thanks for caring.