Controversial Transformers comic so BAD the story was changed!
Vložit
- čas přidán 9. 06. 2022
- #transformers #transgender
Arcee's transphobic and sexist backstory with an author in denial taking no criticism. This topic is tackled by UltraPrimal and I to bring awareness to trans issues and what offensive writing looks like.
My social media: beacons.ai/emperor_kumquat
Donate on Ko-Fi: ko-fi.com/emperorkumquat
Things to read:
Furman’s Response to the controversy:
simonfurman.wordpress.com/201...
Scott’s Comments:
news.tfw2005.com/2013/12/27/m...
TFwiki articles mentioned:
tfwiki.net/wiki/Spotlight:_Ar...
tfwiki.net/wiki/Simon_Furman#...
tfwiki.net/wiki/Female_Transf...
Comics (beware of pop ups and inappropriate ads):
Spotlight: Arcee (2008)
readcomiconline.li/Comic/Tran...
Optimus Prime #25 (2018)
readcomiconline.li/Comic/Opti...
Music:
------------------------------
Fluffy by Smith The Mister smiththemister.bandcamp.com
Smith The Mister bit.ly/Smith-The-Mister-YT
Free Download / Stream: bit.ly/stm-fluffy
Music promoted by Audio Library • Fluffy - Smith The Mis...
------------------------------
Cinematic Horror Sci-Fi Synth - The Void is Calling // Royalty Free No Copyright Background Music
• Cinematic Horror Sci-F...
------------------------------
Asteroid by KV / kvmusicprod
Creative Commons - Attribution 4.0 International - CC BY 4.0
www.creativecommons.org/licen...
------------------------------
Electro Cabello
• Electro Cabello
------------------------------
Purple Flowers | SOSO by Daystar | No Copyright Music - Krátké a kreslené filmy
UltraPrimal and I both decided to share our views on this troubling comic. See her take here: czcams.com/video/Av6eaLN0RvE/video.html
Additional note:
*Do not seek out and message this writer or anyone mentioned in this video. If you choose to be hostile and confrontational, that is a reflection of you. Even if this content angers you, you have no excuse to commit harassment. The point of this video is to confront ideas, not people. Your discussions should bear this in mind; seek to educate, not hate.
Oh and I have recently subscribed to your Channel at least a couple months ago
Well said
"Educate" inorhwr words: Dictate
Solus was one of the 13 so that comic makes no sense cause one of the 13 was A woman Solus Prime. so yeah ill take spotlight as uncannon since there's 100 of female bots now:) an she listed as female.
@@shadowdouglas450 Transformers robots in Disguise 2015 should have been good
Yknow looking back on it, I genuinely don’t see how Arcee being a by-product of a forced sex change operation was even remotely considered for the comic
Stupidity, take the example of pairing Bruce Wayne and Barbara Gordon not to mention the Killing Joke disgusting movie scene along with Barbara losing her baby due to her fending criminals
Batman Beyond 2.0 comic if you are wondering
for a children's toy no less
Imo the sex change thing was a pretty good idea for explaining how there's a gazillion males and one female, but the fact that it's forced and makes her insane just doesn't really come across right. Feels less like something a transformers writer would do and more like Garth Ennis.
I'll say this though, I wouldn't let Jhiaxus anywhere near me with a scalpel. Should have picked like Ratchet or Perceptor or literally anyone else.
@@mattkuzminski8035 you could just like add more female characters...
@@simplynotthere4726 I'm not saying that isn't true, I just thought it was an interesting idea. The way Furman went about it was the issue.
I hated how Arcee was so psychotic. I much prefer when shes fun and bubbly.
G1
Animated
Cyberverse
Energon
Yup those Arcee's are fun
G1 and Cyberverse were the best version along with Animated in which she was a teacher and was shown to be very fond of Sari who is a hybrid😍❤
Only "serious" Arcee I've ever liked is in TFP. That's how you do trauma while still making her a good character. Plus, her whitty dialogue and motherly tendencies towards the human Jack still make her fun and sweet
@@IzzyMarrie Except when she is stubborn, prideful and so know it all as for her hotheadedness it puts others in danger
@@inesatt1313 which makes her better, she wasn't perfect and the show never tried to make her perfect. Just goes to show how good TFP was for making even Optimus have moment like that
“So we’re introducing beloved legacy character Arcee!”
“Nice!”
“She used to be male but a mad scientist irreversibly changed her gender and drove her insane in the process. Now she’s hellbent on revenge!”
“Um…”
“You don’t like it?”
“Well it just seems a little…are we going to explore it?”
“Not really, no.”
“Okay then it just seems kinda…”
“You’re upset. I can see you’re upset. Well what if we took her traumatic experience…”
“Yeah…”
“And made the whole thing consensual. She actually wanted it!”
“What? That doesn’t make it better!”
“No no, you see, we saw people comparing this to trans people. So we took this sci-fi phenomenon and just turned it into a complete 1:1 analogue.”
“And her going crazy enough to embark on a murderous rampage?”
“Oh y’know, it’s just like, bad meds or something.”
“I don’t think this is-“
“Also there were female bots before this so the mad scientist had no reason to do any of it. But they all went to a magical far-off colony of artists so that’s why we don’t see them.”
“Okay wait-“
“Also Galvatron’s her brother now.”
“The guy you drew her in sexy pose with for that cover?”
“Yeah. We wanted to get the Alabama crowd.”
“Okay no, you’re just making it worse!”
“Worse?”
“Yes!”
“Oh.”
“Jesus…”
“Well we gave her a girlfriend…”
“What?”
“Look how cute she is.”
“That doesn’t help anything.”
“But doesn’t she look cute?”
“…okay she looks a little cute.”
TLDR James Roberts is the only one to make good on this idea. Simple and still plays to the logic Furman introduced.
Scott and Barber’s attempts on the other hand, were just a complete shitshow.
So basically an insane Alabama femboy
"ok she looks a little cute" got a chuckle out of me haha
"Isn't this supposed to be about two factions of robots fighting each other?"
"Was it? Probably.....I don't know....."
I agree, the original was bad, but the revision still left it problematic
What I do not understand is why the hell you would have to justify that Cybertronians have Genders like Humans .
No it's foolish nonsense with a strong dose of stupidity 🙄
Because early examples didnt have any fembots and they decided to have a few workshops and all went to shit
Exactly! It literally doesn't matter.
@@Unknown-hb3id Yup
Because the 13 had genders i guess there where alway females in g1 they where Elita one Femme fatales :)
Arcee wasn't the only female autobot either back in the earlier Transformers series. There was others.
In my mind, there's just female and male transformers from the beginning series. No crazy plots or retconing needed.😅
Fr, there’s just male robots and female robots, it ain’t that deep
@@lonewolf9578
Yep. Kind of silly how everyone tries to make anything LGBTQ.
@@ethanhenrichs5677 Mhm, it’s why I’m hoping to whatever divine being is out there that it’s not Marvel getting the comic license once IDW loses it
@@lonewolf9578
Lol, true. Marvel and DC comics have gone down the drain recently.
@@ethanhenrichs5677 when pandering goes wrong and then we realize pandering is always wrong
I've somehow never heard of this despite reading IDW Transformers before. And after reading it for the first time, I can say without a shadow of a doubt, the writers were high
On Drugs and Alcohol
Simon Furman just sucks in general.
That guy is super misogynistic and it wasn't the first time he wrote a sexist transformers comic.
@Kristopher Prime ... Are you like. Ok? Dude? You good?
Either way, no. Just. No. You are very wrong.
There's still the fact that, while work opportunities for women are all time high, discrimination is still all over the place, and feminism and equality is not exclusively for work opportunities . Wage gaps, workplace harassment, expectations, underestimation, beauty standards and other shit is not... fixed? What? are you on about??
Yes, a lot of modern feminism is pretty picky, prickly and pompous, but that doesn't mean every woman ever is one hundred percent equal to men and everyone's just complaining for the sake of it. There's also shit like misogynoir, that's definitely not fixed, and a lot of the modern feminism gloss over.
Women have been oppressed for a long time. Maybe not all the time everywhere horrible, but still not. Good? Like. You do remember learning in history class that a majority of power in the western world was wielded by men, and the few women who did were often ridiculed if they didn't do it while in support of a man? (For example, queens have been a thing, but they were mostly expected to support the king and birth a proper heir. A sole ruling queen or a woman king were considered abbreviations, like Elizabeth I or Kristina Augusta who both became sole rulers cos there were no other men in the ruling family.) That's not the fault of "chivalry"? I know some people use chivalry in weird ways sometimes (both feminists using it as rhetoric AND incels) but that's just. not. what feminism is about?
The #metoo movement is not to oppress men? Its to bring attention to *sexual harassment*, which, oh! Wait! That doesn't fit your narrative so you cherry pick to make them out to be your oppressors! Wonderful. Love to see it. Yes, there were cases of people using it to slander people but guess what! False charges happen all the fucking time, that's not inherent to the #metoo movement.
You're also while defending Furman just. Ignoring the transphobia. Ok dude. Sure is a Choice..
@@guggelguggel7491 there’s no wage gab
Of course you not Half you clown didn’t start reading IDW in the second Half of it
Leaving aside gender issues, it basically sealed away all other female transformers. Chromia and Elita-1 are beloves characters, and yet they don't appear at all till the retcon during Dark Cybertron. Also, retcons are disgusting, and retconning a shitty history into an absurd one is stupid to the max. Furman hates female bots, period. And fans do not.
@PurpleOwlAnimation A disgusting retcon for a disgusting history that should have never happened.
It was a bad mess, hard to build on it or even salvage it in a good way.
@@evlynm Even worse, Spotlight Arcee is ALSO a retcon. Megatron Origins had multiple fembots on the back, including Elita-1 in the cop burial, and it´s supposed to be the same continuity.
This fan feels there is no need for feminine gender machines
Nah, it was Furman. He gave Arcee the same bad treatment back in the original comics. He just hates the idea of fembots.
I always preferred the Aligned Continuity explanation, which is that Female Cybertronians do exist, but only 1 out of 13, instead of like humans which a more 50 50 split. Or the Animated way of just not giving a reason cause there really doesn't need to be one.
The only reason why I didn't like this version of Arcee was that she was a psycho and not her fun yet professional personality as the Autobots intelligence officer. Prime Arcee while still traumatized, she overcame it and became an even better character.
Prime Arcee really was god-tier in terms of character.
The retcon was completely unnecessary and just plain dogshit in delivery. Arcee was and always will be female no deeper than that. Wouldn't be surprised the writer was on something
Furman hated fembots so much that he even went so far as to make transgender robots to explain their origin and that ended up being retconned anyway and even then he made the first trans transformer a psychopath and when not a psychopath just mean. Gotta prefer the more fun, caring and sometimes bubbly versions of Arcee
Punchline 127 wel org old transfomers comc boks it wasexplinex that transfomers reduced asexually so thre ldgany was nevecmrnt be female trahsfomers at first
Technically transformers are both Male and female some just prefer to be female in appearance they aren't dismantled and rebuilt
Friendly Arcee is of course lovely, but if one wants a mean vengeful Arcee, we've got Transformers Prime for that.
It’s a rough situation, Simon Firman’s stories and characterisations have been extremely important and influential on me (not the transphobic and sexist stuff of course) in particularly tuff times in my life, but this is certainly one of the worst things not just he has done, but TF has done, and it’s sad because I really like IDW arcee beyond this, in the hands of different writers, having to drastically redo and retcon her origin, all be it sometimes not the smoothest of ways but having to retcon a origin this rocky is no easy tast. It really does sadden me that this bad start really paints a bad look on this incarnation of the Character, but I’m glad she was able to find some redemption later on.
It’s just one of those situations that just really sucks and I wish just never happened because it seriously damages the reputation of a Character that I love and the writings of a author that means a lot to me. Especially because I’m a very close ally to many trans people irl, and having this be a mark on a franchise I love, is saddening
I’m glad Trans represented would get better over time in IDW, that being said with full knowledge that there is plenty more and better to be done. And it’s one of those situations where I wish I could just do something about it, physically but right now all I can give is some love to all people out there. And especially my Trans friends out there, thanks for all you do and I always stand beside you, the world is angry enough, hateful enough, fucked up enough, we don’t need to be divided. We should all just stick together, be there for each other. ❤️💚❤️💚
I agree:
-people should stop antagonizing IDW Arcee, she's a great character, but her origins sucks
-not only Transformers, but every media, should learn to be more respectful thowards every kind of people... I'm not saying that there should not be trans/gay/female/whatever villains or flawed characters (that would be going to the extreme in the opposite direction) but maybe try to check with the minorities you are including before making something like this spotlight.
-even the best show/comic can have cringe parts.
I hate how male is considered default, genderless, while female is alien
Jokes aside, it actually makes sense a one-gender alien society being all femenine (biologicaly speaking).
Well Male is usually the most genderless looking gender, but I agree that they didn't need to make females as something so weird, I liked more on movies where fembots are something common or in the animated series where fembots were somehow almost extincted and that's why transformers though they had no gender
The replies to this post are just "Tell me you're a dude without explicitly saying you're a dude."
There are more women on Earth than men. Male is not the average. Hell, it's not even the default in humans- All embryos are female until about a month into development, when male characteristics start to develop. Before then, all humans are female.
@@ToaArcan No, genderless is the mold, male AND female started developing after a few months, it says that it's female bc the male genes by its own doesn't have the capacity to create a body, just to make it male.
But no one is saying that male it's the default, we are saying that male it's the more "genderless"
@@cesar6447 that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Male is male, there isn’t an a-gendered being in existence.
To me it seems author was so obsessed (at the time of writing the comic) at preaching his distaste for female Cybertronians that they didn't think at all about the implications of the story he was writing.
For starters forced sex change has been a transphobic stereotype/rallying call for pretty much always (even though it's not even close how that works), then there's the fact as mentioned in the vid your first female character is a psychotic madwoman who is only let out of prison because they good guys are desperate. There's also the fact that this comic depicts trans people as freaks to be worried about thanks to the only depiction of a trans person being someone who is a danger to herself and everyone around her.
This is a good example of why if you're gonna write about something that has real life implications you should be familiar with the subject as to avoid giving a message you didn't intend to give.
Just FYI:I'm cisgender myself but I know enough trans people that I know it's not simple or easy even if I can't pretend to know even a fraction of the struggle they have go thru daily.
I don’t have a problem with the plot itself, but I do feel uncomfortable with it being from the perspective that no cyber trillion would want to be female. I wouldn’t mind the story alone, but you’re right, the strange distaste for cybertronians ever being female, yeah that’s weird. I am one to appreciate stories about unique psychosis and what it’s like to suffer their psychosis and even if the story doesn’t feel relatable and might even feel wrong, say forced gender transition, I think that’s actually not a bad story. Yet again though, if it’s born out of the feeling that females are Petronia is just shouldn’t exist and the only way you’re willing to have his email Cybertronian is if it was originally a male cyber Tony and forced to be a female Cybertronian and that’s the only and sole way you’re willing to have a female Cybertronian.
@@otakumangastudios3617 A big part of the problem is using transphobic stereotypes in the story, like I said forced gender transition is used to as rallying call to deny transgender people their human rights for ages and that's just the transphobic part of the issues, there's also misogynistic part to it by having your only female character be a mad woman.
Now there's a seed of a good story there but you'd have to be super careful as to what message you're giving to the reader (even if you didn't do it intentionally), now if for example they did so that Arcee was always "female at heart" and the mental health issues came from failed attempts to treat that either by a villain intentionally botching the treatment or better yet Cybertronians not being familiar with concept of gender would be confused as to what's the problem, you'd already have a much superior story and you could still have Arcee as the first "female" Cybertronian while removing much of the transphobic baggage of the original story.
@@SampoPaalanen see that’s the vulnerability I see in American media consumers. What I mean by this is, this is why also anime tends to rub Americans the wrong way. Why? Because there will be controversial characters and character writing such as this, but it’s only intended for you to put yourself in that character shoes, not to be a fable of what is right and wrong. I find it unfortunate so many Westerners really can be that influenced, especially if they’re old enough to actually read this comics. I think it’s kind of mentality goes back to the old days of Europe, where morality was taught through fables, a.k.a. stories. Either you mole yourself off of the main character, or there’s some sort of lesson to be conveyed of some sort of generalization, and often times this was Weaponized against certain groups of people to indoctrinate young Christian children to hate certain people for “going against God “
Even though the west is not nearly as Christian as it used to be, many of these thoughts and feelings and conceptions of media and how to consume it and how to perceive it still remains. I hope for it to change soon, and be more like Japanese media, as well as a more Japanese cultural perspective, where you are seeing that character story, and that the character is not meant to generalize for each and every real person on this earth that may have a similar scenario by any means.
As I said before, it’s about the actual intention of the writer. If they’re writing it from the unique psychology standpoint, as I’ve mentioned before, then that’s completely different. If they’re writing from the perspective of say, the only way they can perceive say a trans woman or a woman in general in a story, as if they were originally male and they were forced converted to be female. That, that’s completely different. As I said before, it’s about the intention.
@@otakumangastudios3617 Just for the record I'm not an American.
@@SampoPaalanen Sorry for the generalization. Perhaps I should’ve said “the Western world “instead, or western influenced, a.k.a., countries that have been colonized or affected by European countries. I suppose it’s just I found way more people from the US who tend to be bothered or offended by Contant in media rather than people from other countries, that’s all. Not saying that I can’t happen but sorry again for the generalization
As a fan of Arcee....when I found out of this story I was just face palming myself thinking who editor approved that and assume was a GOOD IDEA?
Anyone remember the Heart Of Darkness miniseries, you know the one that had the cover with Galvatron looking into the distance while Arcee was doing doing the stereotypical leg cling with him that you'd usually see in Conan comics? Wanna know how that was retroactively made squicky? Years after that series was published, it was revealed in Optimus Prime #10 during a flashback that Arcee & Galvatron were _twin brothers._
Goddammit, Hasbro.
@310165 310165
And least the other one wasn't evil in that set-up, and unlike Megatron and Arcee propably they didn't know they were related
WHAT THE FUCK?????
@@saagabragi6938 Galvatron and Megatron were different characters entirely in IDW Transformers
@@fourthknower9831 i.think Megatronus was reincarnated into Megatron
It says a lot about Furman that even when he was directly told why Spotlight: Arcee was offensive and hurtful to transgender and female readers, he'd rather focus on how insulted he felt that another writer and a lot of fans didn't like his writing. Like, Scott didn't even mention him by name, all she did was make a snarky side-comment and he just had a full-on meltdown and cried about how "disrespectful" everyone was. Instead of maybe educating himself and figure out why his comic was so controversial, he just dug his heels in and whined about being "retconned" and people just not getting his vision or whatever.
Source? Not doubting you I'm just curious
@@SnakeRoadComicsOfficial3677 we. Thre was a a debstevabut if whre or not arcee is bisexuel
Scott at that point was no name compared to Furman.
I don’t think you realize the whole fanbase turned against him
IDW had kicked off his comic run, the writers that replaced him take a fat shit on his work. How do you expect him to react when a literal no name talks shit about him
The original Arcee was just that: arsey! I read the story back in the day and laughed at the joke (I’m a woman). At that time, btw, there was none of this Heinz 57 gender stuff and we still had the ability to laugh at ourselves.
When the Spotlight came out, I didn’t bat an eyelid. It wasn’t offensive; I saw it as a warped version of the Galatea story, that Arcee had a definite reason he felt angry at his predicament and Jhiaxus deserved every damn thing he got. The sci-if answer is that Cybertronians are machine-based lifeforms, but they are adaptive and contact with organics would have raised questions for them; the real world answer is that these were soldier-type toys for boys and calling the characters ‘it’ was never an option.
@@autobotfan11 No One talked shit about him. Scott commented on how problematic his depiction of Arcee was. And, I don't know if you're just a child and thus don't have the concept of emotional maturity down yet, but we expect him to react like an ADULT. We expect him to react with humility, grace, respect, and maturity.
Calling Scott a no name is so dismissive and sexist, by the way. I'm not sure if you think people are only owed respect and consideration if they have a sufficiently sized body of work, but most people would consider that idea arbitrary and childish.
Yeah...Arcee was never the FIRST female Cybertronian(transformer). There has already been in-canon evidence of female cybertronians since the first cartoon.
Just look at the episode of the origin story of Optimus Prime. Before he became a prime he was working at a shipping dock as a records clerk and occasional laborer. Also, he was dating a very nice Cybertronian lady. And that lady in question just so happened to have other lady bot friends.
You had beta who helped alpha trion in the rebellion
I believe that was Alita1
remember reading a few chunks of this comic for the first time (with no context at all), was so surprised that Arcee was even written this way,, anywho,, since these fellas lack reproductive organs and all, how would the trans label apply? is it just them changin their body types or somethin ??
nope. at least in idw1 transformers from cybertron are 'inherently' male-adjacent and use he/him pronouns. the best way to explain it is the in-universe explanation from one of the trans characters herself; she and her wife traveled outside of cybertron, met different species with different ideas of gender and gender expression, and realized that she/her pronouns and fem aligned identities were simply a better fit for them. that's all it is
Remember when Arcee was just a way to get girls to buy Transformers toys in the 80’s? Pepperridge Farms remembers.
And she still sucked
Funny since Hasbro did not actually make an Arcee toy until long after g1 had finished
Girls should feel welcomed buying transformers toys. Transformers toys are awesome. Let's see a female dominated toyline. Arcee, Chromia, Alita1, Blackarachnia and Solus Prime.
Yeah I much more like TFP arcee and I think almost every member who is single on the lost light would intently fall in love with her. mainy cause she isn't some psychotic nut job and is a beautiful, nice, protective, friendly and strong warrioress. they would no doubt they'd try to help her with her PTSD.
Good point
i agree TFP was the first and only transformer cartoon i really like to watch on somedays
@@zacharyisenbletter8944 Interesting😌
@@inesatt1313 what dont judge me pal everyone has that one show am i right
@@zacharyisenbletter8944 Nope I am not just enlightened that's all
Furman's mind was still stuck in the 80s comic, back when they were all genderless. The only thing they took from the cartoon was the 86 movie, that just happened to have Arcee.
The writers were making big deals like why would alien robots need such things and why would they don't do sexual reproduction and stuff. Heck the 07 movie writers plan to have Arcee but then wonder about same thing. They decided to just have her in the next movie and not bother to ask such things.
If anything, it's better not to ask and keep things simple. The spotlight has robbed us of our favorite female bots from appearing in later stories and if they do appear, they have have to have the same backstory as Acree. Thank the Allspark this got retcon.
Seriously how hard is it to just say "some transformers look feminine"
The explanation literally anyone with critical thinking had has since they where 5.
To be honest I am of the philosophy that all of them are completely agender and asexual
@@otakumangastudios3617 but Orion pax had a girlfriend in g1.
@@smurgerburger And that story line was written in the 80s by old baby boomers that simply cannot see the purpose of a female character besides being a potential romantic interest. Notice how every time a female characters entered into Astoria in that era, she ends up and either love triangle or fall in love with some other prominent male character? Thankfully, people have come to their senses, and realize that doesn’t have to have them all the time, especially when they’re a little robot people
@@otakumangastudios3617 okay, so... optimus prime still had a girlfriend. Even in the animated series he had a relationship with elita one and in earth spark. Transformers do have genders and you can't change that.
@@otakumangastudios3617 also, without those boomers we wouldn't have transformers in the first place so...
So my thoughts on transformer gender for my fanfiction are as follows: Physically and mentally, there are no genders. No fundamental differences in biology or mental structure. However, when mingling with alien races (as in humans) that do have genders, and it’s reflected in the language, they adopt whatever gender identity and pronouns feel comfortable to them for ease of relations. To the majority of them, it’s a non-issue that only comes into play on alien worlds. Does that seem offensive or anything? I’d like to get feedback on that.
That actually makes SO much sense! I'm currently writing a series of fanfics, and my Megatron is referred to as both masc and fem, but it doesn't matter since she/he is still Lord of the Decepticons - which is a genderless title because Cybertronians are genderless. And my Starscream is referred to as fem, as well as Ratchet (a nod to Budiansky).
Or y'know... Use "it" as a pronoun because they're giant bloodthirsty warmongering robots?
And yeah, nothing stops Optimus growing some boobs if he wants too and nothing really stops Starscream from speaking Vietnamese or something. They're robots. Who cares what they do? Drift is a Samurai and no one really questions that. Or how Ratchet almost always acts likr a grumpy old man even though most transformers don't exactly age
Nope its not offensive at all! Thats actually how it went for Lug and Anode
@@NiCoNiCoNiCola
The problem with using "it" is that the Cybertronians are *people* . They have consciousness and know how to differentiate themselves to an object.
Them using such pronouns as "he" and "she" is probably to not confuse us (mammals who have gendered things such as sex) and have to explain a frickton of their culture and biology as to why there are no gender (thus, why they don't use "they").
@@davisdf3064 depends, in Prime they're more machine than people. And still, for all WE HUMANS know pronouns could only be a thing that exists in our planet. I mean, French has words that are assigned to a certain sex, be it masculine or feminine, but English doesn't have it
I already thought this version of Arcee was definitely iffy and her backstory wrong and harmful all around. But you definitely gave me a better grasp on why it is harmful and dangerous to transpeople.
honestly this was one of the reasons I only read More than Meets the Eyes and Lost light to lesser extent. Why does Arcee has to explain her existance when Optimus , Megatron , Onslaught , Vortex , Starscream and every other 'male' cybertronian are the cool and natural and normal ones.
Because Simon Furman doesn't think female transformers make sense.
He's a good writer and responsible for some of the best parts of the franchise, but I genuinely do not understand why he thought that this (or Arcee's bullshit Marvel origin) was a sensible course of action.
@@SirBroccolingtonIII because he is a closeted mysagonist who think the 'male' is the standard form of any natural creature. Too bad , maybe someone should say the first multi cellular organism had female characteristics. Or the lineage comes from female mithocondria. I love his stories but boy do I hate the man.
@@SirBroccolingtonIII In a franchise that started out with humans being the only female characters, and all autobots and decepticons being male adding in female characters really doesn’t make sense. There’s also the point of the characters being robots not created with gender. The only reason characters would refer to themselves and others as “he” was to make it easier for audiences to identify characters. Then we eventually get to season 2 of the G1 cartoon and they completely throw everything out the window and have to work around female characters who were very shoddily added into the story, proof that they were never supposed to be there in the first place. I’m all for adding male/female distinctions into stories, but Transformers is a franchise that I feel doesn’t need it, especially when they can’t seem to ever get it right. If it’s there from the beginning it’s fine, trying to add it into an already established story never works.
@@alexbelcher2206 'female' tra sformers have been in the franchise since 1986
@@berilsevvalbekret772 84/85 actually. Elita, Moon Racer, Chromia, Firestar/Novastar, Lancer, Greenlight (the last two got officially named at a later time). I never said they weren’t in the franchise, just that they weren’t actually female. Transformers don’t have genitalia and as was explained in the comic in question gender was just a concept.
ONE OF THE FEW TIMES WHERE I'M COMPLETELY AGREE WITH RETCONING A STORY OUT OF THE CANON
A huge and unsurprised "NO SHIT SHERLOCK" from me, as you discussed before TF has had a strange history of reluctance for making female robots we really should work to put behind us.
Oh yeah and aside from that its a bit in bad taste to turn a beloved usually caring and friendly character into an edgelord murderer +such a traumatic origin story.
But I suppose that aspect is more up to taste and pretty minor in comparison. I just feel like its a bit too blatant for the end result and she could be written as less edge baity.
Though actually if we ever do get something like Transformers Prime again, a kind of villainous or anti-hero Arcee could be pretty cool, TFP had her be like a cop or soldier, pretty tomboyish but alongside the blue it definitely diverges from the classic design.
"Oh yeah and aside from that its a bit in bad taste to turn a beloved usually caring and friendly character into an edgelord murderer +such a traumatic origin story." This makes more sense as a subject of controversy about this "version" of Arcee, given that she was an established character that predated IDW.
As for his version of Arcee's backstory, the situation here is not one that casts transition surgery in a bad light in my opinion. Instead, I see it as "forcing your idea of someone's gender on them is bad", as that is what was done to this version of Arcee. I see this as a criticism of people that try to talk trans people out of transitioning, as they are trying to force their idea of what a trans person's gender should be onto them. Understand, this is merely my personal opinion. I am not, in any way, trying to invalidate the feelings of individuals that were offended by this story.
@@Lucklaran Oh yeah I should have specified the forced aspect of the ordeal, that is the bit that I have the most creeped out feel for.
@@kennethsatria6607 you know what
I do not care
I get the sense that Furman doesn't understand why anyone would genuinely want female Transformers to exist. He wrote for the Marvel UK run of Transformers and his means of incorporating Arcee into that continuity was that a feminist mob demanded the Autobots have a female Transformer in their ranks, so Optimus creates Arcee. I wish I was joking.
Literally the TF Community’s Andrew Tate
Sounds like something that would actually happen ngl
This story was... a lot. Choices were made, none of them good.
Furman's hangups about robot gender were always so goddamn weird. He's been like this since the 80s, and Arcee was usually the one taking the brunt of it- He just kinda left Elita-1 and her crew out of Marvel, but Arcee almost got a toy, so Furman ended up writing _Prime's Rib_ which reads like it was written by a GamerGater, 30 years early.
Spotlight: Arcee didn't just poison the well, but it also put a moratorium on other female bots appearing until the colonies became a thing in 2014. It took them _six whole years_ to get out of this story's shadow, and while it's good that they did, it resulted in some elements that, while better, were clunky as fuck, as Barber, Roberts, Scott, and everyone else had to awkwardly work around it. And yes, that eventually resulted in a retcon, but this story _was itself a retcon._ One of the first IDW stories was _Megatron: Origin,_ which showed Ariel/Elita at Bumper and Fastback's funeral.
I'm glad that Barber salvaged it. I am not happy that he had to do it.
This is why research and developing a understanding is important before you write about anything you don't understand.
They're Robots. Just because they have female or male voices does not mean they're completely man or woman. But they have soul and feelings, They feel sadness, pain and anger so focusing only on a bots gender is not gonna make a good story.
So Transformers "have no gender", yet all but a tiny handful of them have male voices, physical proportions that we would attribute to males, behaviours and views of the world that we would typically attribute to masculinity and male gender roles, relationship behaviours and styles that would also typically attribute to masculinity and male gender, and of course, copious use of the pronoun "he". And yet the debate about whether Transformers "have gender" or not only comes up when there's a controversy about whether Transformers can be female. Yeah, ok. Sure. Transformers have no gender. Lol
In terms of the fact they have no genitals, no, they don’t. It’s kinda like how Steven Universe does it, where the gems don’t have genders at all.
This is even more stupid when later on they introduce actual female transformers the caminus colony.
Nautica is best girl.
Nautica is indeed best girl.
The “forced feminization” sounds down right terrifying! Retcon or not, that’s part that really bugs me. Also the whole everyone calls “she” because of some “technobabble” which, even back when I was transphobic, I thought it was kinda stupid. Like if they don’t know what she is why would they call her “she” if they don’t know what a she is? Also they were other female transformers before this comic… so… there’s that.
Also it is neat to get a Trans person perspective on this. Imma CIS but I like to hear the other side for things like this. So thanks. ;)
Yup that is SO MESSED UP😡
No respect to femininity whatsoever
It's honestly better to just not have a reason for he/she when it comes to Transformers.
@@Unknown-hb3id Yup TFP was better at handling this subject than comics and Furman's stories are
@@Unknown-hb3id Couldn't agree more☺️
@@Unknown-hb3id Exactly.
Trans Arcee as a concept is ok, and i kinda like the idea that she is in other continuities as well.
but the way it was written is....bad.
the fangs were neat though.
Terrible idea
The idea of her being trans is great, though I'm not sure why a body change would be necessary, especially since she lives primarily in a world of almost exclusively boxy dudes with little to no base frame variation. Maybe it was just frame preference, later tied in with beong referred to as "she" and "her"? I like that theory personally, as it shows how the concept of diverse gender would develop in the transformers IDW universe. Perhaps other Cybertronian mechanicals were driven to copy her same frame type as a way to distinguish themselves from their male counterparts, and adopted her pronouns (because of course they would). Better than whatever this is.
@@thilsiktonix naw it's just so boys can be like "holy cow a girl transformers!" And buy Arcee toys. The body type thing itself is pretty poorly explained. Nobody on Cybertron calls an animalistic shaped transformer an animal and etc
Take this with a grain of salt since I'm a cis man talking about trans issues, but the idea of the male Transformers being able to instinctively identify Arcee as "she" strikes me as gender essentialist rhetoric, and is way too similar to how IRL TERFs and other transphobes will insist how they can instantly clock a trans person (and the fact that transphobic rhetoric has become increasingly mainstream in Furman's home country doesn't exactly help this impression of mine). James Roberts treated depicted how male Transformers would react to meeting femmes way better by them initially assuming a given female Camien was a "he" and needing to have it explained to them, which makes more sense as to how a single-gender society would react to the concept than all of them having instinctive woman-sensing powers.
Its also more fascinating lorewise to me if they ever do choose that approach again
As a transwoman, I didn't think about that but yeah, definitely
Actually It doesn't make any sense to them assuming everyone as male if they are supposedly a genderless society. If you choose "he" as the norm, is just to accomodate the male audience at the cost of the femenine one.
Is just a way that writers and audiences exclude femenine identity from existing in their works, by making it (and the people identified as women) as abnormal, dirty, that have to be questioned for being un the same space.
@@kiriki4558 You're right but in their defence I don't really think that's what they meant
My partner is trans, and we find Britain 100% more accepting than other countries we have lived in, not to mention safer. When we were last in America she had to literally run for her life while I was beaten for being her partner. The UK are way more open and supportive.
I haven't gotten into IDW TF comics (yet), so I wasn't familiar with this comic, and damn, I didn't expect it to be this bad. Thanks for this video and bringing these issues to light.
Read Mtmte. Trust it's *chef'a kiss*
@@returnedtomonkey8886 I'm actually planning to; I've got a majority of the IDW TF comics from a couple of bundles on Humble Bundle over the years. I just haven't gotten around to getting started with reading yet, although it's been on my to-do list for some time already. :)
@@WindySilver to a begginer, i recommend you read "More Than Meet The Eyes" and aftee "Lost Light". In some editions of MTMTE have a crossover with other comic "Robots In Disguise", but still reading, i dont recommend you read "Robots In Disguise" crossover editions because dont gonna make sense if you never read a IDW Transformers before
@@TPSCP Thanks for the recommendation :)
This has been an interesting dive, glad you introduced Ultra in this collaboration, coming from a very sheltered environment it’s so fascinating to hear these prospectives and insights on these topics.
Anode was the first trans exposure I properly had and I think the explanation there was really cool.
Hopefully these topics continue to get tastefully explored as the franchise moves forward.
These analysis talks are helpful to point out the specifics, a lot of people just don’t have ways of easily learning these things in a way to understand, most people are ignorant, not understanding but open to learning, it’s the arrogant that cause harm, those that don’t understand and refuse to learn
Fact of the matter is if you give your robots obviously male voices (animations), give the ones with human faces obviously male looking faces and refer to all of them as he then they are all gendered.
I love modern day comics and animations. I just wish they would stop giving all the girls boobs.
Stiker is awesome. More variety in body shapes are great. TP starscream could easily be female if they wanted to.
I have no problem with a psychotic female character. Just not a trans one (because its offensive, when done like that)and *not* arcee. She is a sweetie and I want her to stay that way.
I don’t have a problem with a psychotic trans character because it’s their individual story, but what I do have a problem with is, if it’s born out of the background of the writer themselves having a problem with female transformers existing, and this is the only way they’re willing to portray a female transformer. That’s my problem, because believe it or not yes, there are non-consensual gender alterations and there’s times that people are brainwashed into doing what they don’t want to and sometimes it’s in the form of being convinced that they are one gender when there are not and then they go through surgery. This is the end by any means to deny trans rights, it’s more of a matter of pretty much anything can happen, and absolutely everyone’s story should be valid. It’s different though, when it’s born less out of a fascination of psychology and unique psychology, rather than born out of the discomfort of having female cybertronians. If you the only way you are willing to portray a female Cybertronian as a male Cybertronian forcefully gender changed , Then yeah that’s problematic
For my own personal fanfiction, I'd intended to show trans representation through Decepticon Dead End (who for some reason has always been my favourite Decepticon lol) whose nihilistic personality was an unfortunate product of his dysphoria for his alt mode, as my idea is that Dead End was once a jet forced into being a car, and his wish to return to his jet alt mode is dismissed by the others, which exacerbates his depression, so he secretly defects and seeks aid from the Aerialbots in order to recover his jet alt mode (though faces disdain from the Autobots by virtue of once being from the former faction, despite now identifying as an Autobot), and once he does, the Autobots notice a sense of euphoria and contentment come over him, though his former allies still refer to him as a car, and call him selfish as Menasor is now incomplete because of him (I imagine Knock Out would replace him), which was my attempt to represent the shame that some transphobic parents place onto their children. I tried to encounter this as delicately as possible, so if any of this appears problematic, I'd love for someone to tell me so I can fix it :)
as a trans person i fucking love the idea of alt modes being a trans allegory. it's very silly but i think it'd be fun. I do think it shouldn't be the ONLY trans thing cause transformers has so many characters you can afford more than one trans character but i do really really like the alt mode allegory
Basically Arcee got "The Skin I Live In"'d with Ghiaxius being Antonio Bandaras' character and Arcee being Vincent, getting forced into a sex change and forcibly feminized, despite still identifying as male.
That just makes me shudder and feel so icky.
I LIKE TO THINK THIS:
*1.- ARCEE SPOTLIGHT IS NOW OUT OF CANNON*
*2.- ARCEE WAS ALWAYS A FEMBOT & SHE ONLY SAID THAT TO THE LITTLE GIRL TO NOT CONFUSE HER WITH ALL THE GENDERLESS STUFF IN TRANSFORMERS*
Ugh. I thought we all collectively agreed Spotlight : Arcee didn't actually happen. It was so bad. Just such a clumsy, out of character , bad piece of writing.
I just read the title and immediately thought it was about that one Arcee story.
The way he wrote this doesn't make sense, A genderless robot that goes by he makes the first "female" cybertronian by altering his body and he hates it, this makes Jeaxius seem like a sexual creep. If you want to tell a story about how Jeaxius changed someone through mad science and now they cant stand to be in their body because something is wrong that's ok but to make this the origin of the first "female" transformer, that he were forcefully changed and that somehow made him "female" just makes this feel... predatory.
If I had to re-write this Arcee is born genderless (everyone on cybertron uses they/them) and feels off throughout her life, something isn't right/ is missing. Through the war she is introduced to gender form other species and learns about males/females and finds the thing she found missing now identifying as trans female and using she/her pronouns. If Jiaxus had to be included Arcee could go to them for surgeries to fell better fit in her body and they would break the trust she had in them by using her body for science to make a better soldier or something.
Wait… is it just me or is this video just going in circles? Talking about logic in a race of sentient robots that can also become vehicles seems kinda dumb
They also don’t have gender
I just assume that Primus made Solus Prime, and all Female Transformers descended from her,
I honestly feel like the main issue behind this comic and it's controversy was the fact that it was created by someone who's subconscious was so drenched in outdated and sexist ideas about gender and gender roles, that he never considered the implications his story would bring. As for him forcefully introducing outdated and sexist human understanding of gender into transformers universe made perfect sense, since "why a genderless race would need gender" (despite every other robot using MALE pronounce and presenting as MASCULINE). This idea that being male is "normal" and the obvious default, and being female is "abnormal" and needs to be forced in and excused insted of just accepting it, in my opinion is the main reason as to why this comic so infamous and problematic. Besides ruining Arcee's character by turning her into a bloodthirsty psychopath and the author's reaction to people not liking his comic and his later whining about it, of course.
Fantastic video. I'm a cisgender fellow and have been, frankly, purposely ignorant about it the issues behind it. This has really opened my eyes. One thing I did notice was how there is, perhaps, an interesting story about how Arcee could have hated their body but continued to identify as "he". Course, that's not great either, but it certainly would have been an interesting story. Course, my question comes down to, well, why is it so difficult to write a story about a female robot when they are, well, robots. All shapes and sizes, and I would assume genders, could be, and would be explored. Course, I am ignorant, but this doesn't seem all that hard. Even more interestingly, why would you introduce fembots like this? People like Arcee, real women identify with Arcee, why would you write her like this? Jeez man, just, jeez.
what's a cisgender?
@@lewiswhite1680 A person who identifies as the biological sex they were born with.
@@MilkyKoi oh I see...
@@ummelofilo9642 oh I see... sounds made up but ok lol
@@lewiswhite1680 it's stupid I wouldn't get into the if I were you
Still For me
All Female Transformers Came from Solus Prime
and the either their sparks were mixed up from Other Primes thus have multiple characterizations of different female transformers
Or just make the primes past some planets and saw that some beings living on those planets had Gender then tried to Imitate them and Liked the idea
Idk why this even has to be explained to people. If you first thought isn’t “yikes” hearing that origin story then idk what to say
this is barely scratching the surface but what IS it with male authors making female characters "cRaZy" in their stories???
Some characters are just crazy, male or female.
Wasn’t there a G1 Marvel comic issue that made fun of this type of stuff? I think it was either the US marvel comic or Uk marvel comic?
Yup
Yeah and that was Simon Furman too
Yes, Spotlight: Arcee was the SECOND time Simon Furman wrote a sexist origin story for Arcee.
The first was the Marvel UK story "Prime's Rib".
It's always annoyed me that a fair sample of the Transformers comic stories, starting with Marvel, have been reticent to have Cybertronians of any gender other than male. Even 17 years ago when I first read the Marvel comics (and I was far more ignorant of social issues in society), I found the dismissal tone the writers had to Cybertronic gender offensive.
I'm currently doing a hard(ish) science fiction prosaic reboot of *The Transformers*, with the story starting in 1984 like the original cartoon and comic, but since I'm sick of female transformers being an 'oh, by the way', I included every non-Torchbearer G1 Female Autobot amongst the crew of the *Ark *(Except Aileron, Maxima, and Windblade, as I want the Autobots to be largely confined to the ground before they activate the Dinobots) plus eight original characters. I also rendered Greenlight as non-binary, and will explore how (I extrapolate) society in 1984 reacts to that.
The Decepticons are all male, however, as not only was it easier to just go use the cast list from the first two seasons of the cartoon, I also patterned my version of Megatron after a certain someone who was a KGB officer during the events of my story, and as such, he's a male chauvinist. (In order to make it clear that I'm *only* assassinating Megatron's character, I also have Mirage and Trailbreaker shine as heroes).
If you read all the above, I appreciate you greatly for indulging my enthusiasm.
Hum. I dont know if you want ideas, but heres one: Try to add Megatronia (Female alternative megatron from mangas of Transformers United). And i want know: How i can this ween you end it? Or is private?
@@TPSCP Thanks for the suggestion, but I don't see how I could fit her into the storyline, unfortunately. I may post the stories on fanfiction.net or a similar website sometime by November. If I do, I'll be sure to link you to it.
You think this was rough? Look up the first story Furman ever used Arcee for. It's... interesting...
what was it if you don't mind me asking?
@@mangodelmal9753 IIRC it was one of those Action Force issues. Mob of angry feminists protest a lack of female TFs & Optimus commissions Arcee's creation to try appeasing them. They aren't.
@@alexlemonds2838 h u h
@PurpleOwlAnimation See, I don't think he's a full-blown misogynist. I just don't think he understands.
@PurpleOwlAnimation I believe he wrote a story about three human woman kicking butt in Marvel UK.
The big deal is more about about female transformers than females in general.
Wow. Wow, Hasbro. There are SO many ways that this could've been done, and the guy chose easily the most offensive plotline he could think of. Why!? The idea of Cybertronians being genderless or gender neutral (i.e., using they/them pronouns) is fine IMO. After all, Cybertronians are sexless robotic beings with no capacity for autonomous procreation. Sex and gender are completely different things, but they are being treated as if they were one and the same in the context of this story.
If gender is going to be a thing for Cybertronians, it needs to be believable and done in a way that doesn't demonize or paint trans-people (or women) in a bad light. A transgender Transformer is a fantastic concept, but this is NOT the way to introduce it into the cannon. I actually thought up a possible scenario for Arcee explaining her self-discovery and transition backstory while watching this video. It's easily 1000 times better than this! 🤦♀
As offensive and as sexist as this story is, I can't help but feel a little bit intrigued by the concept of Jhiaxus conducting experiments on transformers that use she/her pronounce.
I remember Emperor Kumquat once making a good point about stupidity of adding breasts to female transformers, just because we as humans associate them with female gender. I would like If some future interpretation played with that, simultaneously criticizing stereotypical trope.
Imagine Jhiaxus trying to make female transformer "more human" by fusing her genes with human ones. Resulting in female transformer who's design feels reminiscent of characters such as BW Blackarachnia, or Cybertron Thunderblast.
Maybe even leaning towards this "traumatized psychotic carnage spreader"-type of personality...
This is just something I thought of when I first heard of this controversy... I just hope this idea isn't offensive to anyone.
I think it’s actually very interesting! I honestly don’t see anything wrong with a story about someone’s gender being forcibly converted and then them becoming angry about it. It’s just telling their story, and again if it’s more out of a psychoanalysis standpoint that the writer had rather than a dismissal of the female gender and the only way they’re willing to incorporate the female gender into a story is if a male character was forcibly turned female and then they go batshit over it, That’s completely different.
Playing around with gender and sex can be very interesting for a story. It's just...there are better ways of going about it than what I've seen in recent history.
I personally like it when it's used to explore what truly makes a character or personality, and how much of that is influenced by their sex? How would they be different if they were the opposite sex? Would they be different? Does it change who they're attracted to, or who is attracted to them?
And it actually could be interesting to see how a character reacts to this sort of thing being forced on them.
And also, partially organic cybertronians can be interesting too.
RC's backstory is literally the where my dick at meme
I fucking despise how well that works.
Just one of the many Mistakes John Barber had to fix
Bless that man
@@sparklesparkle3370 we didn’t give him enough credit for trying to make Phase 1 make sense
I’m soooo glad they improved on the whole “explaining why the robots have genders” with Anode and Lug. The way they framed it there, where they interacted with species with genders and decided that they were more comfortable as something else than whatever the hell spotlight arcee was. At least they tried to improve Arcees origins later, with her actually wanting the treatment and Jhiaxus not giving appropriate aftercare, but it was too little too late.
I think it's a bizarre story, but I will say that I'm happy with the end results of Arcee being a fierce warrior.
My personal headcanon is that transformers have no gender. "Females" are the same as males but with higher toned voices. Though mainly seen in slimmer more feminine body archetypes, they come in all shapes and sizes. Only upon reaching earth do they receive gender assigned pronouns for various reasons (make it easier for humans to identify them, some finding it fascinating, and some find it better to identify one another, as they use to use descriptions of body archetypes (seekers, miners, laborers, medics, etc etc) though those fell out of favor with the whole war being started over class inequalities. Thus gender was the next best thing.
Idk why any company's hire people who make a story of females alien, animals, AI and many more lifeforms. If I was a in charge of that story I will say the females Transformers races was born the same way with males Transformers life. To think, act and be who they are like they do. I agree with everyone I hate a lot. IDW comic should be care with doing anything. Thanks for for making this video.
personal if I should ride a transformers Story and introduce arcee I just wanted her to be a part of the core cast from the beginning and if I had to introduce more females i just wanted them to crash on earth or Use a space bridge or something like that
I still don't know how they got this though
I'll never understand Furman's hang-ups about female transformers. Like, these are giant shapeshifting alien robot men. Some of them being women is the _least_ fantastical thing about them!
"How would you have done it?"
Me: one (or more) of the next generation of transformers were formed after Solus's bodytype.
Still confused why aliens have earth genders
Why wouldn’t they?
They did her dirty
If you check the original Transformers cartoon from the 80s, there were female transformers in an episode introducing Elita-One and others. Arcee did not appear until the good 1980s Transformers: The Movie.
"The Search for Alpha Trion" (2nd season episode)
it's funny because Arcee is not even the first fembot
There was a whole episode about it in G1
Basically Furman is blinded by his stick up about the whole idea of female transformers, and let it paint his writing
I just prefer the pre furman/idw Canon (that also went to on to be included within the covenant of primes) that there aren't actually male and female transformers. It's an easy visual distinguisher for the reader to interpret the difference between the two types of cybertronians; the majority being the generic type (male) and the others, being able to interface,access and utilise systems embedded within cybertron/primus (female).
If I'm not mistaken, is this partially fundamental to fermanagh story arc here?
Remember when Arcee was the respected leader of an entire race? It was a weird old time watching these comics unfold. To take one of the few female characters at the time and churn out 'Jihaxus's forced gender affirmation clinic' as a backstory is just bizarre.
It's funny how all it takes to turn a good story into a bad one is a single misplaced detail. I feel like we'ed be singing a different tune if Mr fermen just said she was tortured physically and mentally and left it at that. Or better yet, why not take a page from tf primes book and instead make her a stoic character scared by trauma and prefers to work alone as a result. Anything would be better than this.
I personally found the production idea a dumb and a lame excuse like Michael bay wanting a reason why there are female transformers. Why do they need a reason at all, no cares. If they needed a reason they can just say they built like the other transformers or they were created alongside with the male counterparts. They have solus prime who alongside with the other 12 primes were created primus. Why need a reason to justify their existence.
I won't lie, i like the concept of arcee's backstory and how traumatic/dark it was for her and wanting revenge but using this as a reason why there's female transformers is just ignorant and makes no sense.
This truly is the TRANSformers
Don't just don't
@@blueraccoon1088 Don't what?
I really disliked it as a kid (I've never revisited it since I first read it), but it’s not because I thought it as transphobic or sexist (which, now that you said it, I think the former may be the case), it was because it took itself too seriously, and was trying to hard to be dark, which is a problem with all originally children media turned into adult media. I don’t think that turning one into the other is something bad, but the way it’s done when it’s from childish to adult is always the same: it’s always something no-nonsensical, dark, violent, but filled to the brim with references to the original material, and always trying to make sense of those core or memorable elements from the original that were either silly or outlandish. The Arcee comic was, beat by beat, that: because doesn’t make much sense for a robot to have genders, lets dedicate an entire story addressing said matter to make it harmonize with the common and more logical preconception of genderless robots, instead of just making it so that the transformers just happen to have personalities that to us remind us of those of our genders, like in Digimon 3; all that made in a way that makes you think that the world the story is set in has never seen a puppy before (and I'm not saying it can’t be dark, I'm just saying that they usually try too hard to the point it’s ridiculous).
In short it's dogshit and shouldn't exist
If there is one…ONE singular positive light of this whole Arcee IDW controversy, is that later writers, namely John Barber, really fleshed out Arcee’s character a lot better and made her go through a bit more of compelling arc and finally manages to find closure, peace and happiness.
Hell Arcee basically becomes the one of the biggest main stars during the end of Phase 2 and for the rest of Phase 3.
Arcee was not the first female Transformer..Prime had a girlfriend. so, it's all a lie
look how they massacred our gal
Female Autobots? I thought they were extinct
- Shockwave
Yes, we are still here and will always
- Chromia
Such noble nonsense
- both Shockwave and Megatron
First off, Happy Pride!!!
Second, THANK YOU for tackling this topic. I’ve had so many dudebros cis-splain to me why this “isn’t as bad as you think” because their idol Furman said so.
Third: Furman is trash. Yeah he would never do anything intentionally to harm the trans community blah blah blah. BUT HE DID. Because we (the trans community) said so. And our experiences MATTER. Our voices MATTER. He doesn’t know cus he’s not trans, so maybe listen to the experts on their own experiences. So NUT UP and take responsibility.
Finally, saying Transformers are genderless by therefore the default referent pronoun is he…. So the default is male? Ummmm sexist male supremacist much?? That’s kind of like saying the default race is white, and anyone else is an aberrant inconvenience. If you want a default pronoun for a genderless race, pronouns “they/them/theirs” says “hi.” The hellfire fuck kind of “writer” doesn’t know that gender-neutral pronouns exist for a genderless concept race? Oh, cus maybe his content is informed by his PERSONAL BIASES??? HMMMMMM….
Lol. Furman has generations of fans that's not going to change.
A idea could be that cybertronians are genderless and come in a variety of shapes and sizes that could be considered feminine or masculine to outsiders but there's really no difference and because they interact with other species that do have like gender as a thing they adopted stuff like pronouns mostly cause some decided that it sounded cool or to make interacting with other species easier But like idk even then you don't really need a justification to have female robots
i feel like how gender works in transformers lore is a answer we dont want to know
Jhaxus was a mad scientist. The retcon can work from that perspective. It was a harsh way to do a transition for Arcee no matter the species. I just took it as IDW's universe.
When I decided to read the online version of the comic before continuing to watch the video I didn’t notice anything wrong, and when I came back the memory of the comic burned in front of me as Emperor Kumquat pointed out everything wrong about it
In latin langueages like Spanish, gender-neutral pronouns are usually the masculine pronouns, I briefly learned Spanish: Ellas means "those woman" or "they", Ellos means "Those men" or "they" but is also used to say "those people." The word man used to be genderneutral and refered to just humans, that's why a lot of fantasy stories refer to humanity as "man."
I say this simply to state that there's real world president.
I'd write my Transgendered character in a way that's respectful
And if I don't know a lot about it I'll ask someone who is Transitioning or has Transitioned so I can accurately portray how they feel about it.
As for myself, I don't really see myself as a Singular gender from an point of view
My physical gender is Male
I have Masculine Personality traits
And
Female Personality traits
My own Pronouns, I'm fine with any pronoun as long as it's used in a way that doesn't sound insulting
Ok really i read that comic and didn't find offense about a made up world of transforming lifeforms. By the way Solus Prime was female and 0ne of the 13 lmao :) Arcee not the 1st hell elita 0ne was made before her .
Solus Prime didn't exist till the mid-2010s when Aligned finally gave us the full roster. She was included after the retcon and later writers were drawing from later material. Retroactively, she did ended up as the 1st female
@@DarkknightChris But it was before the spot light of Arcee an yeah they did not have any Primes really named before than . Except Vector Alpha Trion an Megatrnous.
The first female transformer should have been Solus Prime. I know I didn’t get her name right, I need coffee.
WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?!
I actually liked the backstory, it made sense to me that Arcee would be furious after her body was manipulated against her will. As a trans person I can understand how horrible it is to be in a body that feels wrong. I guess I can just relate to Arcee since I'm ftm so being called she almost feels like an insult.
I'm fortunate enough to never really have faced discrimination, harassing or bullying because of my gender so I didn't fully grasp how harmful this might be. Also changing the story later takes from forcefully being mutilated.
I still like the original but I now see how harmful it is and can be. Without even mentioning how it effects gender in transformers
I haven’t read transformers for a very long time what the hell is going on here?!?
I like how this video pointed out that even if we set sexist and transphobic implications aside, the story made no logical sense and doesn't address the questionable question of why gender exists in transformers.
If I were to explain gender, I would say humans assign them gender pronouns based on how their appearance fits in our cis-mainstream culture, and transformers themselves just simply don't care about it so they allowed humans to say whatever they want.
Maybe their Cybertronian language doesn't even have pronouns, like not even gender-neutral ones, they'll just repeat the name 23 times in a sentence.
Gender is not some cis invented social construct, it's an objective reality determined by your chromosomes.
i see your point on the arcee comic to be censoreship of a different ponit of view that may spark discussion if we censore all bad works we may never learn from a persons mistakes
what is the "dog" type of transformers called... Like ravage and servo.
Transformers who Furman hate
Arcee she was a corpse in rg1
Wheelie
Hosehead
He love killing slingshot
Furman didn't like ratchet or Megatron he loved torturing both
He had Meg's processes by straxus and then auntie
Furman didn't even mention ratchet in g2
Thunderwing was made to die again and again
Furman loved these neo apocalptic futures
He loved killing off characters sometimes before they finish a sentence
He hated the binary bonded transformers he killed them off ruthlessly in issue 75 through 80
Poor circuit breaker
I think Furman was gonna bring back spike in g2 as circuit smasher or something similar but didn't get ito it
I think I read both comics, but I didn't think much about the message they were giving. It kind of just went over my head, I guess.
I was never interested much in Arcee, I was always just excited to see more of Starscream, as I went through the series. ^^;
But now that you've pointed it out in this video... that's so ridiculous and really does make no sense, and I definitely understand how offensive this is to trans people and misinformation for cis people like myself.
I mean, the message about transitioning being bad was lost on me anyway, I just saw it as a madmech torturing Arcee but not as trans surgery being bad.
Though I think when I did reach the comic where Arcee says she wanted to be female, that I was a bit confused, since the first comic suggested otherwise. But again, I didn't think much about it. ^^;
I don't know how easily typical people interpret certain scenes and their hidden messages, all I know is that I just... see what's in front of me and only think about what it means in the fictional universe and never really interpret it in a way that corresponds to our own real world.
I don't know how to explain it. ^^;
I have made the mistake myself of mostly using "he" for my OCs in my TF fics and mostly including males while not really caring much about the females, not sure why. Maybe it's just because I'm used to seeing a LOT of male bots and few females, but I dunno if I used to also think of "he" as genderless or just liking the male characters better because the females are usually exaggeratingly designed as females, to look "sexy" or "hot" or for whatever reason, rather than have their kibble be part of their bodies like the males do.
I do like the female Transformers better in the newer shows, like in Cyberverse, Rescue Bots, RBA and RID 2015 where they actually look similar to the males and not trying to look like human women, some even being buff and masculine-looking, like Strongarm and Clobber.
I also really do like that many male bots in IDW decided to change to females because they felt better about it, and I even really like that several male characters were changed to female in Cyberverse, like Skywarp, Nova Storm, Cosmos, Swoop (I love geeky girl Swoop), and Acid Storm... sort of, Acid Storm often changes their face from being male to female and back, even in the same episodes or the same SCENES, though always speaks as female. So I decided to headcanon Cyberverse Acid Storm as non-binary and describe them as "they" instead of "she", in my Cyberverse fic.
I also decided to include a few more characters in my Cyberverse fic and even change their original gender to female as well, for now just Hotlink and Ion Storm being female, the latter because the other two "Storms" were female (or partly female, at least), so I thought it would be fitting if Ion Storm was also female. And I gave her the original Nova Storm's colors (yellow and orange), since Cyberverse Nova Storm is purple, similar to the original Ion Storm (though he was blue). And Hotlink is female, simply because I think it suits Hotlink, I don't know why. :)
Definitely gonna try to include more unused characters in my Cyberverse fic (and maybe future fics? I dunno) and turn some into females, coz I love that feature of Cyberverse. :D
Cyberverse definitely says trans rights, even if they were hesitant with making Skywarp female in the start and decided to replace her with Nova Storm instead, but then made her female later anyway, but didn't give her speaking roles anyway... ehhh, at least it's a step forward, right?
I think I got a bit off track here with my comment, heheh. ^^;
Now I'm just sitting here, thinking about one of my stories where I included a bunch of random OCs I made up, but they are all male, and all bandits. And I've already posted the chapters on AO3, Wattpad and FanFiction, so I feel like I can't just change any of their genders now, since that would be bigger than just fixing typos or having written Skyquake instead of Dreadwing (which happens QUITE A LOT with me, actually lol).
But... I dunno. There is at least one character I would like to go back and change his gender to female, since he's the only one who survived past his first appearance, and I'm not planning to kill him.
I feel a bit apprehensible about killing females in my stories, for some reason, I don't know why. Maybe just because I still see female Transformers as rare compared to males, and I am hesitatant to kill or destroy rare things, coz rarity interests me.
Then again, that story is set in Aligned where it is pretty much canon that females are rarer than males, so I guess I'm not wrong there... but it still feels wrong. I feel oblivious and inconsiderate now to not treat female Transformers in my stories as I would the males. Killing them off, make them jerks, describe them as ugly, make them stupid, it just feels wrong to do that with a female character as opposed to a male one. Which is wrong, of course, and I feel bad about it now. I do like RID 2015's idea of making ugly female characters, like the bestial Decepticons, maybe I shouldn't think so much about their genders anymore and just be like "this is this and that is that, they can behave however they like, whether they're this or that".
Sorry for the long comment and contemplating my own stories here at the end. It just feels better and easier writing about it.
Arcee being trans made me a little uncomfortable as a trans person, kinda got some mixed signals out of that one. I know they probably had good intentions but still its kinda a bruh moment.
I would argue there needs to be a reason for male and female transformers to be a thing in-universe, but you got a point that the Spotlight Arcee did it badly and something I didn't realize until this video was it actually doesn't really explain female transformers at all, it just explains Arcee as Transformers are still forged or constructed cold. It would effectively mean that most if not all existing female cybetronians were constructed cold and that's clearly not the case.
The reason why it needs to be explain on a Worldbuilding level is there is no practical reason for there to me male and females robots when they don't reproduce sexually....at least originally. The two methods being Forged and constructed Cold, which can result in either. If a species is artifically made by another, there is no reason to have multiple genders unless you are actively copying something.
In this case, a better solution and one that could answer on why Transformers have a humanoid build in general is by having it so that whatever created Primus or however he gets said information is he has data on a existing or multiple exisitng biological species, and since they have genders he just kinda copied that. While it would still be pointless for Primus to do, it would still explain how males and female naturally occur. This could also be used to explain the crazier designs they want to use such as Decepticons from the Bayverse like Demolisher, Rampage, and Overload as well as some original G1 guys like Trypticon and Skylinx.
Personally I find using trans concepts around Gender incredibly dumb for Tranformers, specifically the IDW series. Why? Because males and females realistically wouldn't be different beyond design. Male and Female biological species are different on purpose, for survival, we literally have different brains, hormones, etc. There's no real point to it in machines because your brain wouldn't be different really. Why would it be, it doesn't help you in the slightest and male and females would ultimately just be for looks.
Hilariously they do have a way to represent feeling in the wrong body that Trans people feel and its not gender related, but rather their point of origin and they've decided to ignore it entirely. That being Constructed Cold. Due to the nature of Constructed Cold Transformers being put into Pre-fab bodies rather than naturally occuring shapes you get from forged transformers, it is a very real possiblity that these guys would often feel like they are in the wrong body, because well....they quite literally are, never given a chance to actually grow into their own form.