‘Transformers One’ First Trailer Reaction: What Was THAT!?

The first official trailer for the upcoming Transformers One movie was just released and…let’s talk about it. While the Transformers IP has consistently reinvented itself throughout the decades, there’s a lot of different Transformers happening right now. Transformers: Rise of the Beasts just released last year, Nickelodeon/Paramount Plus has Transformers: Earthspark, there’s the new Transformers comic run by Skybound, and a Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover has been confirmed.

However, Transformers One is the first time an animated Transformers movie will hit the theaters since the Transformers movie in 1986. As a massive Transformers fan, I’ve been a bit disappointed by the live-action films. I loved Bumblebee, but besides that, I really stick to the cartoons and comics to get my Transformers kick. You can even check out my Top 10 Transformers cartoons by visiting this YouTube link!

Now, when they announced that Chris Hemsworth would voice Optimus Prime in the upcoming animated movie, I didn’t mind. I’m not a purist that believes that Optimus always needs to be voiced by Peter Cullen. Earthspark features Alan Tudyk as Optimus Prime and he does a great job. Furthermore, Rory McCann is great as Megatron. My point being that I’m not disliking Transformers One based on the fact that other people are voicing these iconic characters. I’m disliking it because none of the voices fit.

Transformers One is seemingly attempting to capture the nostalgic joy of the 80s cartoon movie by featuring an awesome 80s themed soundtrack. Granted, the soundtrack is awesome. The visuals are beautiful, but the designs of the characters look like some underground video game studio made it. Again, every Transformers cartoon has their own style and my favorite cartoon is Transformers Prime, a show that took huge creative liberties in their designs of legacy characters. However, these designs don’t look good. It’s like they’re trying to incorporate the designs from Rise of the Beasts, but it just doesn’t look good.

To say this is a disappointment is an understatement. Perhaps people don’t realize it, but Transformers is just as big of an IP as Star Wars or Marvel, with just as much lore outside of “big robots fighting”. Now, Transformers One does seem to be setting out to tell a background story, which will be good for the general public to see that these characters existed prior to being enemies. Think of Optimus and Megatron as the Professor X and Magneto of the Transformers world. Megatron being a no named miner is in line with his IDW comic book run, so it’s not like they’re going away from the source material. And people getting a look at Elita-1 when Arcee has taken the spotlight for so long is great. But, the execution is…not good. But, this is the first trailer. Hopefully, it gets better?

Honestly, I’m just now looking forward to Earthspark season 2, which also takes creative liberties, and while not the best Transformers show, is definitely more enjoyable than whatever that trailer was. There were small parts of the trailer that were promising, but overall, this does not spark joy.

What’d you think of the Transformers One trailer?