Even though Starscream was killed in the movie, he came back in 2 later TV episodes as a ghost. He also appeared in 1 Beast Wars episode.
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Starscream: Who dares disrupt my coronation?
Galvatron: Coronation, Starscream? This is bad comedy.
Starscream: Megatron, is that you?
Galvatron: Here's a hint.
[Galvatron transforms into a cannon and obliterates Starscream.]
Galvatron: Does anyone else want to fill his shoes?
Mistakes
In the scene where Hot Rod and Kup are stuck underwater, we see Hot Rod fighting a Giant Squid. Just after the Giant Squid swims off we see a shot of Kup lying on the ground with his right arm and his left leg missing. However, when Hot Rod gets to him they have swapped sides, the left arm is missing and the right leg is missing (don't be confused by the fact Hot Rod flipped him). Only two of Kup's parts are missing, as we only see Hot Rod pick up two parts. See more...
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Transformers: The Movie (1986) - 30 trivia entries
Directed by Nelson Shin, starring Eric Idle, Frank Welker, Jack Angel, Judd Nelson, Leonard Nimoy, Michael Bell, Norman Alden, Orson Welles (add more)
Even though Starscream was killed in the movie, he came back in 2 later TV episodes as a ghost. He also appeared in 1 Beast Wars episode.
The creatures that judge Kranix, Hot Rod and Kup are later revealed in the next series of the Transformers cartoon to be the creators of all Transformers, and used to be the masters of them and Cybertron millions of years a go. They are called Quintessons.
When the Dinobots are fighting Devastator in Autobot city, Sludge gets a double-handed overhead punch on the back, his eyes pop out of his head Looney Toons style.
The robots at the start of the movie, who lived on the planet Lithone, were originally suppose to have space ship transforming modes but these were edited out.
Ultra Magnus was suppose to die in a different way at first. The sweeps fired long laser beams that looped round him, and then they all flew off in different directions, ripping Ultra Magnus apart. Censors forced the artists to change it since it was to violent for a kids movie. However, you can still see the Sweeps fire the long laser beams, but when the shot changes lots of little laser blasts his Ultra Magnus.
It seems Huffer dies in the movie, but you don't see this character get killed. The evidence is that in the episode "Dark Awakening" the Autobots find a graveyard ship with a lot of the killed of characters bodies inside, and one grave says Huffer on it.
The opening titles (with the computerized tunnel sequence) were designed by Deena Burkett and Bill Millar. Deena Burkett had worked previously as visual effects scene coordinator for Disney's Tron.
Grimlock's line to Kup, "Tell Grimlock about petro-rabbits" is a reference to John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" in which Lenny continuously asks George to "Tell me about the rabbits."
There are actually two versions of the movie. The PG version has the curse word in it, but there is also a G-Rated one. The G-Rated version is exactly the same as the PG version apart from the bit where Spike says "Oh s--t.", which has been taken out.
One common question about the movie asks about where a few Autobots vanish to after most of the other main Autobots blast off in the two shuttles, such as Blaster, Hound, Sunstreaker etc etc. The "official" reason is that they stayed behind to help repair Autobot city.
One original scene that at least made it to the story board stage was where Ultra Magnus got Sideswipe, Tracks and Red Alert to come and help him fight Devastator, but Red Alert got shot and killed.
The movie is NOT part of the Japanese storyline canon for the cartoon show. Instead, the Japanese version had the episode "Scramble City" which filled in the details between season 2 and 3.
A trailer for the Japanese movie has been found that has a lot of unused footage on it, and can be downloaded off www.seibertron.com The unused footage includes a lot of extra animation for the part where Unicron eats his first planet, Ultra Magnus in different colours, a shot of Autobot City's defences firing at the Decepticons, a shot of the Decepticons avoiding fire (but Skywarp takes a hit), a very different looking Autobot city, unused shuttle footage (with Arcee and Daniel on the same ship as Hot Rod, Kup and the Dinobots) etc. It is believed that this was originally "test" animation to see how the movie could look. Use the link and scroll down, then click on the "TF Movie Promo" http://seibertron.com/media/commercials/?path=/Transformers%20G1.
Hasbro told the writers of the movie to kill off any of the characters whose toys were no longer selling.
In the credits at the end of the movie, Inferno is credited. Why? He is not in the movie at all, let alone says anything. It's rumoured that in the early scripts of the movie Inferno was in it.
One scene that is in the script and almost made it into the movie involves Dirge trying to tackle Optimus Prime as he talks to Megatron, but Prime manages to slam him into the ground. In the actual film, this deleted part of the scene was suppose to happen just after Megatron says "Why throw away your life so recklessly?" This is why Optimus Prime looks like he is getting up from a crouched position.
This film was originally intended to be part of a double feature with the movie version of the cartoon series "G.I. Joe" ("Action Force" outside the U.S.). In both cases the makers were granted permission to kill off the majority of the cast so that new characters (and therefore new toys) could be introduced to carry on the storyline. Transformers was the first to be released to a veritable onslaught of negative feedback (possibly due to the slight technicality that children don't like seeing their favourite characters die). This prompted a massive overhaul of the G.I. Joe movie with the result that in the finished film, many of that series' main cast sustain the same level of injuries that Optimus Prime and others suffer, only they just lapse into comas.
The movie marks the first ever appearances of Blaster's cassette transformers. However, originally they were suppose to be different designs. There was only 1 robot, called Bolts. The other three with animals. Cubbie was a lion, Stinger a scorpion, and Stripes a tiger. They were changed later to two robots and two animals, a rhino and a lion.
John Moschitta Jr., who played the voice of Blurr, has held the Guinness World Record as the world's fastest talker. He also reprised his role of Blurr for seasons 3 and 4 of Transformers.
It seems like nobody knows if Orson Welles (who died before the release of the film) did complete all of his lines. This is because even official sources don't seem to know if he did. Take the Transformers Series 2 Part 2 DVD set. This has a quiz on it and one of the questions goes something like "Orson Welles was unable to complete his lines in Transformers the movie, who completed them for him?" The only correct answer is Leonard Nimoy. However other official sources say that he did complete his lines, such as the voice actor for the character Arcee, who said she thought that Welles had done all of his lines.
This film was not released in Japan until 1990.
A lot of fans may wonder where a load of the characters are. Just where are the likes of the Combaticons, Protectorbots, Omega Supreme etc etc? Well, the movie actually began to be made about midway through season 2 of the Transformers cartoon show, so any new characters in the show after that couldn't be used. So the likes of Blaster and Perceptor made it into the movie, since they came in early season 2, but any other new ones after the middle of season 2 did not.
At one point this movie was broken down into a five part mini series a year or so after it came out. It was the same as the cinematic release apart from obviously Spike doesn't curse, but Ultra Magnus' line of "Open damn it, open." was changed to "Open......open." when he tries to use the Matrix.
This film is the only occasion in the run of the original series in which Megatron transforms into gun mode and hits an Autobot with his first shot. In all the previous episodes the first shot always missed.
When the Decepticons retreat to Astrotrain, if you watch really carefully as Astrotrain transforms from train to space shuttle mode, he will do a 360 degree turn. Surely the Decepticons inside will be a bit unsettled?
Shockwave was suppose to die in the movie. After he said "Decepticons, were under attack, scramble." Unicorn was suppose to crush the area he was in and kill him. It's rumoured this bit was actually made but was cut out. Shockwave did appear in later Transformers episodes.
In the original script, the Junkion shuttle was split in two by Unicron, but the Junkions manage to get both halves working as independent ships. This never made it into the film, Unicron crushes the Junkion ship instead.
Originally, the writers had the idea of keeping Optimus Prime alive until the end of the movie, then have him "merge" with Cybertron to fight Unicron, and be killed there after defeating Unicron. This idea was scrapped very early on.
Originally the Autobots were actually suppose to build the shuttles they used to blast off from Autobot city, but this was changed.
In the original script, Brawn was supposed to be blasted in half, but the censors forced the artists to change it, as it was too violent for a kid's movie.
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