The Alternate Timeline of Transformers & the Battle Beasts Explained
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- čas přidán 11. 07. 2024
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Join us on a captivating journey through the fascinating history of "Transformers: The Headmasters" (トランスフォーマー ザ☆ヘッドマスターズ) and its intertwined connection with another 80s' toyline, Battle Beasts.
We delve into the origins of "Transformers: The Headmasters," a Japanese animated series that marked a pivotal moment in the Transformers franchise, splitting the Transformers timeline into 2 separate story paths. Learn how the Headmasters brought a fresh perspective to the Autobots and Decepticons, introducing a new wave of characters and storylines.
Discover the unexpected link between Transformers and the Battle Beasts, a lesser-known yet equally captivating toy line from the '80s with it's own set of dedicated fans.
So, buckle up, as we journey back in time to explore the enthralling origins, triumphs, and legacy of "Transformers: The Headmasters" and the Battle Beasts!
CHRIS McFEELY on CZcams: / @chrismcfeely
SOURCES:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tra...)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfo...
tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:...)
tfwiki.net/wiki/Omni_Productions
tfwiki.net/wiki/Metrodome
tfwiki.net/wiki/Shout!_Factory
www.ign.com/articles/2011/06/...
tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_...
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I had a couple of Battle Beasts and I'll never forget the commercials. "WOOD BEAT WATER!"
"WOOD!!"
"FIRE!! FIRE *BURNS* WOOD!!"
Battle Beasts...
"FIRE!!"
"WATER!! WATER PUT OUT FIRE!!"
Battle Beasts...
"WATER!!"
"WOOD!! WOOD BEATS WATER!!"
*"Darn those Decepticons!"*
How could they not bring such a classic to America.
Ironically all of the Japanese g1 shows came to latin america complete with a dub, great voices and acting.....but the same script
I only had Weirdwolf as a Headmaster toy, though I was deathly afraid of werewolves. But this was a robot wolf that transformed into a robot, and had a sword tail, so I could forgive the transgression. Now as a 40-something adult, I'm only a little afraid of a werewolf tearing my foot off when it hangs off the mattress. As long as it's wrapped in a blanket, the dangling foot is safe!
Just when I thought hearing Optimus Prime using Peter Cullen's voice was cool, here he comes using a samurai style voice.
Same Japanese voice actor for their dub of the Batman animated series!
Tesshou Genda is an awesome voice actor! He does a great job as Convoy/Optimus Prime!
This whole video was created in service of that final "head canon" pun wasn't it Dan? Well played sir! 😂
Like a fella' once said, "Ain't that a kick in the head?"
Free super-hero idea. Headcannon. Dude that dual weilds D50s. He's got the ability to alter people's memories. But he has trouble controlling it. In his daily Peter Parker form, his life is a confusing, painful mess, as no one remembers him the same, and 2 friends might have wildly different memories about last night's outing. He becomes a loner, choosing to ignore everything, because nothing makes sense and everyone seems crazy to him.
A perfect allegory for the current state of comics, and our hero is the audience's stand-in.
@@Volyren I'm sure, somewhere, there's a parody superhero strip that has a character called Headcannon. I could have sworn it was Empowered, but apparently not...
Im a malaysian kid, and i remember fondly of headmasters. The concept of the driver become the robot head was cool back then.
I had battle beast. Those toys were so cool and I do remember thinking they looked like transformers. I use to wonder why battle beast disappeared now I know
The Battle Beast playset that looked like a shark was one of my favorites growing up.
That Japanese commercial with Convoy's lifeless body being flown around still cracks me up 😂
The screaming, crying child shouting “Convoooyyyy!” is 😘🤌 chef’s kiss
why was the crowd mostly americans shouting CONVOY ??????? was it a slight dig??????
@@cjlist9731 Convoy was the character's name in Japan.
@@cjlist9731 That struck me as weird as well for a Japanese commercial.
One of the Battle Beasts was a rooster named Laser Cock in Japan. That's the apex of Transformers character names there.
I found out about the Japanese G1 originals in the late 90s, when the internet was becoming big and the worldwide fandom was finally coming together. I'd known about Transformers Victory since around 1990 thanks to an American manga called Ninja High School. Lots of American and Japanese pop culture shout outs in that series.
I'll never forget playing with Battle Beasts in my second grade class. I've been waiting for a video from Dan on where they came from.
It was not the revelation I expected
The octopus was my favorite
The shark is my favourite.
@@jaysonraphaelmurdock8812 Yeah Water was the best overall. I don't want no damn chipmunk.
I thought he already did one before
Honestly, Japanese Transformers is both cool and absurd. Like, do they suck at giving names to teams and planets xD.
They gave us Star Saber though, credit where credit is due.
I first learned about the Japanese Headmaster Transformers from an unofficial Transformers collectors guide. It was written by J E Alvarez, an amazing read. Especially when I didn't have internet access. This began my further collecting and interest with Transformers from Japan.
That was one of the first books about the toyline I ever read! Probably one of the few books I ever checked out of my local library multiple times.
Me and my best friend poured over that book everday at lunch. It was like our teenage bible.
If you were lucky enough to get the special release edition of The Movie on VHS, it came with Four Warriors From The Sky on it as a preview show.
@@Gorbz I had that DVD and I did watch the episode.
@@iron-thorne still got my copy original and did the same as you.
I'd love to see you guys tackle the weird connection between the Brave series and Transformers. How that franchise sorta evolved from Transformers, and even reused a lotta G1 molds well into the 90s for the toyline.
I make plush toys, mostly Transformers, and when someone asked for a "Brave Police" toy, I was going to reply that I didn't really want to do a whole new kind of toy- then she sent me pics of Deckard. He was so obviously a TF that I made several from the series and watched the whole thing on CZcams after that~
@@heahterranier6926 Deckerd looks a lot like an unmade Autobot or something. Plus Shadowmaru was just a retooled Sixshot toy. J-Decker is such a fun show too
I'd like to see that as well. Along with Extreme Dinosaurs.
Battle Beasts was an idea/design aesthetic I really liked as a kid. Headmasters? Not so much...
I want Battle Beasts to come back but in the same size as MOTU. 5.5 inch
Thanks for the nostalgia. As someone who watch Transformers Headmasters, Super God and Victory as a kid when it air during the early 1990s in Asia, i never realized the Japanese Transformers was a different continuity from the Original Transformers. It didn't help the Japanese Transformers aired immediately after the Original Transformers last episode so everyone assume Headmasters was a continuation. Kid me never realized how different this Japanese Transformers was like the subpar English voice acting and the introduction of new human characters who could transfom into Transformers as well. I was just excited to see new Transformers episodes.
I remember getting up in the morning back in the day about to go to school and watching the Transformers.
My favorite Optimus death was in the comics when he beat Megatron in a virtual reality game, but only because he was able to let some of the digital word's denizens die, something he could not bring himself to do in real life even for victory, and so he disqualified himself and was blown up. Luckily his mind was saved onto a floppy disk. lol
As a kid, I always assumed that this was because Prime had some brain damage due to the cerebral shell that was removed from his brain. He literally mentions something along those lines when they show the removal.
Today I learned that weird and quirky animal figure I had when I was 5 years old was from a line that was technically part of the transformers line.
What a shocking revelation
Never knew there were any ties between Battle Beasts and Transformers! Still learning new things everyday. Thank you!
Robots in Japan! 😆What an epic history lesson, absolutely love the BeastFormers 🤩
It is wild that EVERYTHING from G1 to Transformers Zone is canon!...in Japan.
And more than enough Manga since then, infact almost every transformers Story from japan not conetcted to any new show form the 21th century (animated,prime, unicron trilogy) is connected to their Version of the g1 cartoon
They are following Toei's formula for Toku series, with a brand refresh each year from 1985 - 1990. It's all considered G1 there.
I loved battle beasts as a kid. They were awesome
Yeah man they need to be brought back again right!
Every now and then I come across collectors selling them and it takes a lot for me not to jump in.
It's funny they are related to the transformers. I kinda always thought that they were competition for M.u.s.c.l.e men
@@Nopenotyou yeah they cost just enough that i dont buy them, but they sure were cool.
During their time they were i think 3 dollars, and for a kid that was just about how much one might haven gotten for an allowance.
Still amazed Battle Beasts were with Transformers!!!! Even more so with Head Masters! Still love them!❤ Hope we get something in the future with them for the Legacy Line! If not, one could dream!
Some of the Battle Beasts were remade in Titans Return as Titan Masters, at least in the figures that were released
I've got the Japanese collection box set, and Super God Masterforce is surprisingly good!
I’ll forever be sad they never gave it the Canadian dub treatment studios loved to give old anime in the 2000s.
The opening miniseries in the anime that introduces everyone is actually pretty good. Proper continuity nods, logical follow through, old cameos, etc. Shame it couldn’t keep up the momentum.
They should have bud the headmaster with the r.i.d cast at least or after the 2007 movie sucess they could have dub it with the remaning og g1 cast !!
Canadian dubs were the best. I'm really sad that the Canadian edit of the 1980s Astro Boy cartoon has never been rereleased officially, and only a few episodes have found their way onto the internet. The Canadian dub is infamous for its "spot the fib" segments at the end of every episode, where Astro Boy provides a summary that includes one mistake, and viewers are challenged with identifying it. (For example, in one summary, Astro mentions that his class has 24 students when it actually has 25.)
I never knew about the Headmasters but I was introduced to the Masterforce series by a friend of mine in the mid 90's. He had recordings of the Star TV broadcast and it was my first introduction to the Japanese Transformers series - at least in animation. Back in 89 and 90 we had these trading cards of Transformers featuring box art on them and it was weird because I never recognized a lot of them and some were written in Japanese. Most of us didn't care and thought they look cool. Come the early 2000's until I learn about the Japanese series a little better.
I have forever ingrained in my brain that Battle Beasts commercial: "Fire burns wood! Water puts out fire! Wood beats water!" Even as a kid I called bs on that whole "wood beats water" nonsense.
I mean, I’m gonna guess it has to do with plants absorbing water to live? I can’t help but think of someone slapping a pond with a tree branch though.
I guess "wood floats on water!" didn't sound cool enough.
I like the new ad copy. I don't remember Battle Beasts in stores, but they were common sights at my local flea markets, usually in grab bags of other small figures.
I was too poor to have Transformers, but I loved my Battle Beast Miniatures! I honestly had no idea that they were connected when they were new.
So cool to have an episode with “is it cannon?” It’s been a while.
the funny part if people that are TRUE to the show knows about the Head Masters is, They started how the Head Masters first become part of the show. From what i remember is most of the Bots ended up warping to a unknow part of space where they help the race on the planet, to take back the planet and become the planet The Head Masters come from. They even have in a ep before getting to the planet, a contest where one bot and one bot with a person do target practice. The bot with a person did better do to two mines can split the job/battle then one bot alone. it all take place in the 3 parts Rebirth sort season (A.K.A Season 4) before it did a season 5 in witch was just a remix of most of the show and movie rework in a ep way with a ep or so on most of the songs from the movie.
It's interesting to think of the number of now famous anime animators and directors who worked on the original Transformers series and movie, only for many of them to move on to bigger and better things by the time of Headmasters.
In 2020 Hasbro dropped a small line of Retro Headmasters, retools of the Titans Return molds of the Headmasters characters with better quality control and cartoon accurate colours. They weren’t easy to find in my state, actually a complete surprise to me when I stumbled across them. I’d always had a soft spot for the G1 cartoon and the headmaster spinoff series, and these were the figures that finally got me back into collecting.
Took me almost two damn years to get the whole set, but oh boy was it worth it.
Still gotta be my favourite figures besides the Japanese release of Sixshot.
Funny thing is that the Retro Headmasters were just Hasbro's releases of the Takara Transformers Legends figures. Similar to that Titans Return boxset with "Magnus Prime", which was basically Hasbro's release of LG35 Super Ginrai, a major retool of the craptastic Titans Return "Powermaster Optimus Prime", itself a fair retool of Combiner Wars Ultra Magnus.
Trust me, despite the forced Headmaster gimmick and fairly weak ankles & feet, Super Ginrai is way more accurate to both the Chou-jin Masterforce anime and both Takara & Hasbro G1 toys than that abominamation masquerading as Powermaster Optimus Prime. And the best iteration is the LGEX God Ginrai set, which has a revamped Super Ginrai (the windows are clear blue plastic), LG42 Godbomber (now with chromed out silver parts), and as a bonus, Headmaster Juniors Cab and Minerva. The combined God Ginrai looks incredible.
In the decade or so before fan subbing became fairly commonplace something like this seems very likely to happen. Before things like the internet we're really a presence and understanding and connecting the dots was difficult. It was a different time that we will never see again kinda cool that something like this could exist and not be known by the majority of the fandom.
Oh yes, knew all about Headmasters and even have it on DVD. Glad I wasn't the only one reminded of that from those old Head-On commercials.
Was my personal high point in my love for transformers. Scopinox was my favorite toy ever as a kid.
Transformers: Headmaster, Masterforce, and particularly Victory tell some of the best stories in Transformers history, and Victory has some of the best animation in the history of the entire franchise.
It's also cool how in Japan the comics and anime are set in the same continuity, unlike in the west. Japanese G1 is just huge, and really went a great way to fix a lot of the continuity errors in the original G1.
I'm still trying to catch my breath after the "I used to be a piece of shit" stinger. Brilliant.
In the long lost days of weird AOL newsgroups, my sister and I met up with another fan in a Pizza Hut who sold us a box of 30 VHS tapes with all the Japanese shows on them- no subtitles, terrible quality, but a real work of love by the guy to copy that many for us. We watched them over and over growing up and I was so happy they finally came out on DVD in 2011. It was still hard to throw away all the tapes...
WOW! Thank you for solving a life-long mystery for me!
I actually had a Battle Beasts toy when I was a kid. I never knew where it came from or what it was called, but you answered everything. In fact, the very figure I had was in one of clips you showed! I have been reunited with a piece of my past I didn't even realize I had forgotten about. Thank you again.
I have all 3 of the Japanese series you mentioned. There is also Scramble city which happens between season 2 and the movie and there was a follow up show I can't think of the name of. In this age of tech and AI now, I wish there was an audio patch to play the Japanese series with the original voice work from the north american series.
The build up to the “is it cannon?l was just *cheffs kiss*
Great writing on whoever wrote the script
Every time Regan allowing advertising to kids is brought up, I thank him for a great childhood.
I had quite a few of those Battle Beasts and knew about the Headmasters...thought it was a cool idea then. I didn't realize the Battle Beasts were attached to Transformers though. I did like the commercial for them though.
Fantastic video! I personally go by Japanese continuity which has led to a number of expensive Transformers purchases.
battlebeasts , huge fan of the toys when i was a kid, never saw the cartoon, but loved the toys
So glad yall covered this series. I've watched the Japanese version a couple (cough...torrent) and laughed hard at the bad dubbing. Shame because 6-shot was one of my favorite TFormers. I also have the Rebirth eps on DVD (cough...not torrent) 😏
Headmasters had quite a distinct legacy to it
That Japanese commercial with the little boy yelling, "Convoy!" freaking triggered me.😭😭😭
My mind was completely blown when i learned about this crossover! It's worth mentioning that the Beastformers only appeared in two episodes of Headmasters. And much respect for mentioning Chris McFeely's excellent DVD commentaries and channel 👌Although you did a great job of condensing a mountain of information into this video, as always!
Given the Pretenders line, I'd have thought Battle Beasts would darn near fit in perfectly.
Heck, it would make us all wish the little rubber bonus figures that came with early generations had an element sticker.
This series started the kost complex transformers continuety ever, the japanse g1 cartoon universe
Loved the idea of tiny Transformers piloting lifeless husks and turning into their heads. Makes more sense than two individuals sharing the same body (and psyche).
The plot of Headmasters, though, eeeeeehhhh...
Yeah. I think Super God Masterforce had the best overall lore for the master concept, though, sort of combining the two conflicting lores of the US and Japanese 1987 series: Headmasters and Godmasters (i.e. Powermasters) were human beings controlling lifeless robot transtectors.
Dan gets all choked up on "Yes."
Beautiful, Man.
You know what the best part of The Headmasters cartoon is? New Soundwave.
That, and Sixshot: Ninja Consultant 😆
@@Gappasaurus I really need to put that on my resume next to "giant cow pilot."
I was waiting for “Is it cannon.”? The whole video and then sure enough. 😂🙌🏼
I was hoping for an entertaining dub showcase! This was around the time Omni and other rotating voice talent were working on Korean martial arts disasters from IFD (and, more famously, Godfrey Ho "Ninja" flicks), and one phrase probably explains the majority of their challenges: "a deadline of yesterday". My favorite is Galvatron, voiced by the infamous Rik Thomas, sounding like Popeye in retirement, yelling "ALL DA DOO ARE GOING TO DIE!!" (Meaning "all of you")
dropping in that HeadOn commercial is such a perfect joke. bravo.
That sassy ass "Oh yeh?" from Magnus is amazing
Battle Beasts we’re one of my favorite toys as a kid. I loved the snake who had extra snake heads as hands. The purple fish was my favorite.
I had a couple Headmaster toys as a kid but had no idea I never watched a single episode with them in it in the U.S. 😅
Thanks for the video! I saw alien characters in the original 80s G1 show which looked like Battle Beast, but I had no idea plans were in development for their story.
Own Rebirth on VHS. I’ve watched it MANY times. Love it & the new characters
I didn't know Battle Beasts were tied to Transformers, but then I'd never heard of Battle Beasts until the 2000s and thought they were just a toyline. Either way, I've learned a lot today.
Headmasters were my jam! Never saw the show but my first big transformers toy was Apeface, a decepticon Headmaster. I got the Shout Factory DVD set. The show really seemed to suffer from it's heavy influence from Japanese culture. Killing Optimus and Ultra Magnus was just standard fair in Japan. They seem to love killing heroic leaders in their shows. Then tgere was reducing Arcee to little more than a secretary, because boy cartoons can't have girl characters fighting. Or making Wheelie from the Transformers version of a pixie to a wannabe tough guy. And they did the same old thing with Six Shot. The ruthless villian who then we are supposed to like because he was nice to Daniel once. Ignoring the fact he murdered two of Chromedome's friends for his own goals.
And don't forget potentially making folks who already don't like Hot Rod/Rodimus Prime to hate him even more; that bit about Cybertron being destroyed anyway? That was on Rodimus's watch.😮
And then unceremoniously killing off Galvatron - allegedly with the power of friendship - wasn't a good look, either. (No worries, this wouldn't be the last the franchise would see of Optimus & Megatron/Galvatron)
I had to find the DVD with the Omni Productions dub just for the pure hilarity of it. I was not disappointed.
Saw all three of them a few years ago, but also saw Victory half way through during the old TFCog FanDub project in the late 00’s.
I liked Super God Masterforce. Its not what I want from a regular mainline Transformers, but as a one off, it was interesting in a different way, for sure.
You should do an episode on Beast Wars II: Super Life-Form Transformers. No one ever talks about it and it's fantastic!
I totally bought the Famicom Disk game without realizing it was from this series. Such a great video, thanks for hard work on this one guys!
As a fan of Transformers & Battle Beasts back in the day, I had no idea about their connection 😮
Good video as always, entertaining and informative, and really nice to see a shout out to Chris McFeely!
I know there were some out-of-continuity Japanese Transformers cartoons, and I'm enough of a Transformers fan to have sought them out. I have vision problems though so subtitles are straining for me, and of course the dubs are horrible.
I forget the names and sequence of the Japanese media, but it was nice of the IDW comics in the 2010s to homage or bring back or merge some of the continuity of the US media, Japanese cartoons, and UK comics. The IDW comics stand on their own, but as I see a somewhat unfamiliar character or event, I could go to the tfwiki and look it up, and see a lot of the history behind it.
Have to admit, the Japanese Headmasters cartoon was actually great (definitely better than 'The Rebirth') and that theme tune...superb! HEAD ON!!!!
Transformers HEadmasters was an awesome anime, and everyone should watch it at leat once
I got those shout factory dvds and was completely blown away by the battle beasts episode! I was disappointed in the lack of English dub, even though I knew it wouldn't get the same cast, but I had hopes.
Tbf, I loved whe Hasbro brought back the Headmasters gimmick about 6/7 years ago. Didn't like that non-HM characters got the HM treatment, but we at least got some mainline Headmaster characters.
That said, would love to see the rest of the Targetmasters and Powermasters get mainline figures before I stop collecting figures entirely.
Power of the Primes?
@@IllMatic97 that and Titans Return
I was so obsessed with the Headmasters’ toys. There was something about the head swapping thing that really grabbed me. Would still love to have one of those figures today.
Whoa, never knew Battle Beasts were connected to Transformers.
4:08 WUAB channel 43 was the station I watched G1 Transformers on! Thanks for that bit of nostalgia!
Same here!
I remember picking up the masssive Transformers G1 DVD box set about a decade ago, produced by TV LoonLand, and in all the Bonus Features was a TV spot for a contest WUAB ran to promote the 1986 movie. Watching bonus features on Australian DVDs when I'm living in England, and seeing a beloved nostalgia-gasm from my childhood in Ohio? Mind-blowing.
RIP Marty "Superhost" Sullivan, whose Saturday Matinee show introduced me to loads of hilariously crappy movies that later showed up in "Mystery Science Theater 3000."
We need to bring the tradition of Saturday Morning Cartoons Back!
Now is the time to do it, people are looking to see what worked in the past more now than ever.
Haa!
"Head Cannon"
Splendid 😄👍
I remember having a half dozen or so Beast-Formers figures as a kid... @10:44
Didn't know what they were from (parents probably just saw them in the Transformers section at Toys R Us) & they weren't fun to play with (as I recall) so they didn't last long for me.
Battle Beasts were fun. I had no idea they were supposed to be part of the Transformers. That is interesting.
God. That "Head On" commercial is forever imprinted in my brain.
One of the Titans returns transformers figures - double cross - had a removable head that was an homage to the lion battlebeast. I think he was called Dabaru
Awesome video! Weird, I had the impression you guys had covered Headmasters already, Mandela effect I guess. Along with Masterforce, was such a strange thing to discover in the days of the internet (or alternately at one of those dodgy VHS dealers you used to see at Cons).
My nostalgia brain is SO happy now! :)
I knew the Japanese version existed but didn't know it or the American version. I'm out of my depth by season 3 so headmasters were always mysterious and not quite "real".
This helps a lot.
Battle Beasts eventually with their 4th element, that could beat all the others upsetting the Fire/Water/Wood power balance, the Sun. Was kinda always into them but didn't get very many of those toys.
I have around 30
Battle Beasts were a fav of mine. Didn't know they were connected to the Transformers until a few years ago. Still have some of my collection.
Holy crap... I think I may still have one of those Battle Beasts toys.
Also the best thing from the Headmasters show (the American version) was Scorponok.
I saw the ads for the toys, but had never seen any episodes or knew that they existed. Thank you for outlining what happened so nicely!
Great shout out to Transformers basics! Totally awesome❤
Whoa I remember that. What a funny time.
A+ video!
Another fantastic video that clearly and comprehensively explains these shows!
Had no idea Battle Beasts came from this. I own every one of them to this day. Was obsessed as a teen in getting all of them.
Damn right it's canon! Headmasters > The Rebirth.
My oldest cousin got to watch The Headmasters in Japan back when he was my age, and HE LOVED IT.
Never before have I seen a video so clean use the word “headmaster” so often.
I don’t remember headmasters much but thx for the info Secret galaxy !