Transformers: Prime Director’s Commentary, Ep1-5
So I recently got a physical copy of season 1 and it came with director/voice actor commentary alongside the episode, so I’m jotting down some stuff I find interesting and/or funny that they talk about
Darkness Rising, Part 1 (Jeff Kline, Mike Vogel, Therese Trujillo, David Hartman)
-the ten second shot of Bumblebee in his alt mode and transforming mid-fall is what gave the team the green light for the show’s models and art direction
-the doodle of Arcee that Miko drew was a sticky note doodle by one of the guys commentating (couldn’t tell who was talking, no captions :sad: )
Darkness Rising, Part 2 (same as Part 1)
-the team got a big kick reading the message boards when Ep1 premiered, particularly about Cliffjumper’s “death” and how they wouldn’t do that bc Dwayne Johnson was voicing him and he was a legacy character
Darkness Rising, Part 3 (Brian Lenard, Tania Gunadi, Ernie Hudson, Jose Lopez)
-"I remember asking Josh [Keaton] to help me, and while I was screaming, he was shaking my shoulders really hard" -Tania Gunadi talking about the scene in the third episode where Miko and Bulkhead were rolling down the hill in the beginning
-"wasn't there a scene once where Miko, [the Polygon animation team] animated her doing flips and the description was like 'Miko walks into the room'"
-when Gunadi got the callback for her voicing Miko she hadn’t seen the illustration of her at the time, so when she saw the picture she realized she had hair done up like Miko’s at the time
- "Can I just say something? Starscream is not wearing high heels." *laughter* -Jose Lopez
Darkness Rising, Part 4 (same as Part 3)
- "We didn't want to give [Ratchet] cannons, we gave him the blades and we gave him these welding equipment on his arms, so we wanted to keep him so he's more about dissecting and building" -Jose Lopez
-Bulkhead’s alt mode is Tania’s dream car IRL (”You truly are like Miko in every way”)
-*scene of Vehicons holding Jack and Raf* “These guys are like ‘we found some action figures’”
-Welker did the scratch voice for Bee before the sound FX were added
- "Originally, I wanted to make [Starscream] huge, total buff, beefy robot, but Jeff Kline always pushed it back, saying 'lean, lean, lean, he's a snake'... I painted a cobra over his design and that's how he got approved" -Jose Lopez
-"I think I wanna be Starscream" -Gunadi when asked about whether she'd be an Autobot or a Decepticon
-"I originally wanted no mouth [for Optimus] just like G1, but we wanted more emotions on his face" -Jose Lopez
"look at fowler taking a nap"
-Tania has two cats named Ricky and Lucy
-Tania noted some similarities to her and Miko, in that she was 16 when she won a green card lottery and traveled to America on a plane all on her own from Indonesia with only $200 and stayed with her brother there without knowing any English at the time
Darkness Rising, Part 5 (Brian Tyler)
-much of the music, mostly orchestral and operatic, was inspired by 2001, star wars, star trek, etc