Peak G1: What next after Titans Return?

Before I begin, let me state this upfront: I SELL TOYS. Toy seller. Capitalist scumbag. OK? That's my bias, please keep it in mind.

I have a concern. Its been bugging me for a while. Not a problem, but a potential one......

Its probably a self-evident truth that we are in something of a golden age for Transformers collectors, or to be more precise, Generation 1 kids. The people from the 80's. Yes, fans argue about paint applications, parts count, or IDW's latest crossover, but we've been in a privileged place since about 2013. While collectors lines have historically been infrequent filler or fragmented, sandwiched between movies and cartoons, we've had a largely uninterrupted run since the Thrilling Thirty line. Combiner Wars was, all things considered, a complete success, and Titans Return looks to be matching it for the most part. We've had characters and concepts return we never thought we'd see again, to the point where the Third Party option has almost become obsolete. Combiners work so well they probably can't be bettered at retail with Titanmasters, nee Headmasters, much the same. And its all so G1 its almost unbelievable. I mean, Japanese exclusive character Black Shadow is on his second Hasbro toy now. Sextuple-changer toy Six Shot is basically the G1 toy with articulation. And because Hasbro has been keen to use every big name lately, its easier to list a character whose head isn't a little dude that one that isn't. Or similarly wasn't part of some bigger dude last year. At this point however, we must now face an unfortunate fact. We are now scraping the bottom of the barrel.

We have hit peak G1.

Peak as in scalp, perhaps.

Now, what do I mean by that? And what is G1, if you are unfamiliar with the term? Well, "Generation 1" is the fan term used to refer to the original Transformers toys circa 1984 until the sequel Generation 2 in 1993. Like most fan concepts, there's some debate as to precise definition, but a lot of people default to the most recognisable media, the 1980's cartoon, especially the bits before the movie. You know, the Ark, the 80's lots of cars, jets, oil, and then suddenly Dinobots and Combiners, and so on. How correct this is depends a lot on where you stand and what you encountered first, but suffice to say, there's a lot more to the brand than two series of cartoons. The fundamental difference between Hasbro and TakaraTomy, the two companies which partner on Transformers, also involves this term. Hasbro takes a relaxed attitude to continuity, is quite happy to switch between toys, cartoons, comics or just make stuff up, but they do tend towards the cheapest option. Takara meanwhile will do absolutely all it can to make something match the 1980's cartoon, which has earned them some serious brownie points lately, if not without the periodic oddity. Takara usually defaults to a direct sequel to those cartoons, and the high-end Masterpiece line is their baby. By comparison, Hasbro has been far more eager to embrace new media, as evidenced by the numbers of IDW inspired toys that now exist. Hasbro is about toys on shelves, not necessarily collectors, but that aspect is there, while Takara is more the other way around. Yes, my point is still some distance away, but this is context we need to establish.

Right now, we have Titans Return out, which has endeared itself to more or less everybody, essentially being the headmaster concept modernised, with a better name. And how its been treated by each company reflects the above. Hasbro has taken a very relaxed approach, having both toy bios and somewhat truncated IDW comic event. TakaraTomy tied things back to the G1 cartoon, reshuffled the solo Titanmaster to other sets, thus being more G1 although more on that shortly. But regardless, there's a very strong 80's nostalgia thing going on. This is possibly the last big “Hey, I remember that in Woolworths” option they can take however. After the Headmasters, the cartoon ended, the toys went places a lot of fans want to dismiss, before the brand largely died. As far as mass market nostalgia goes, G1 might as well have ended circa 1987, only to resurface for Beast Wars in the 90's. And the next toy line, Prime Wars, is being teased. What's it gonna be about?

Pause for effect.


Now, of course G1 didn't end then, but there was a period there when the brand went from "pop culture staple" to "hey, they still make those?". And actually memorable or popular concepts from that period seem thin on the ground. After Headmasters comes Pretenders, whose play pattern was completely ignored until very recently. Here, some simplistic robots could be inserted into hollow figurines with typically 2 points of articulation. These could be very visually varied, and the shells could eventually transform too, but the concept was dropped, and has yet to be revisited by the brand proper. A third party company and Fun Publications have experimented with shells. Bludgeon is a legacy character too. But its nothing people have been clamouring for, and nor have gold rushing third parties been filling that gap like they did with combiners. And after the Pretenders, we just find variations on older themes, and stuff we definitely have modern versions of. Micromasters? Well, there's all kinds of legions, cyberverse and minicons. Obscure combiners? We've gorged ourselves sick on those. Actionmasters? Um, Mighty Mashers and those really expensive statues? Targetmasters?Well, Takara seems to want to revisit the concept with their releases of Hot Rod and Kup, but a vast majority of those characters are now Titanmasters. Plus, approximately all of the solo Titanmasters and a sizeable proportion of minicons do that gimmick already. Nostalgia gets another blow due to the fact that East and West also diverged sharply at this time. The Japanese cartoons continued on their own after 1987, and the fictional differences are immense. The Japanese versions of Titans Returns toys are not "G1 accurate", in the sense that they are closer to the cartoon you remember, although they are lovely. They are accurate to a Japanese anime you probably didn't know existed until you got the internet. Western collectors will of course enjoy these, but the general public? Less so. Why do you think the “Breast Force” got a limited edition Combiner Wars boxset rather than a full release?

Other than the name, of course.


Sorry, went on a bit of a tangent there. Anyway, with all that dismissed, only two nostalgia tugging options remain for the Prime Wars toyline to exploit. The first is to beastformers, like say the original Predacons, and ideally moving onto the Beast Wars continuity. There seems to be some hint of that with both Hasbro and Takara, with recent fan polls and Masterpiece releases, not to mention Third Parties. The trouble is, actual organic beast modes have not been a thing since about 2008, while mechanical beasts have been hovering around Prime and the bayverse for some time. It may be that the toy factories think this niche is being filled, or don't want to risk confusing John Q. Public, whom probably thinks all Transformers turn into machines. Which leads us to option 2, just keep on recycling G1 concepts forever.

Which, as you may have noticed, is already happening.

While the nostalgia driven, and popular, Combiner Wars gave us 5 classic teams, a big chunk of it was legacy characters remade into combiners despite there being perfectly good versions already. We had two waves of that, plus a general dusting. Titans Return has evidence of this right out of the gate too, with a lot of 1986 movie characters, tapeformers, triple changers and what not. Its also devoured most of the Target' and Powermaster characters, so depending on how you want to count, its hit 6 major gimmicks in one line. There are arguably no new characters either, the closest thing being Sentinel Prime, and some heads which now have an independent existence.

And don't forget, we've had neo-G1 in some way since since 2007ish. Maybe its time to homage something else.  Just rest it for a bit. Maybe more of this?

Oh, don't look at me like that. Just saying.

Images Copyright Hasbro etc.