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Saturday, June 27, 2009

Thoughts on the Autobot Twins, Skids and Mudflap, from Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Personal File: I'm sure by now you've all heard how well Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen has done overseas and here in America. I was quite excited to go see TF: ROTF so I went with my brother at the first midnight showing. Unfortunately, we left with mixed feelings. One of the major issues we had with the movie was with Autobot twins, Skids and Mudflap.

If you haven't seen the movie yet, I won't spoil any details. However, you've probably heard how the twins are portrayed as racist stereotypes in the movie. I have to agree with this assessment that the jive-talk, gold tooth, and constant play-violence were not necessary for this kind of movie.

In lieu of this and the fact there were actual twins in the G1 Transformers storyline, Sunstreaker and Sidewipe (who was in the movie but was a Corvette concept! - ugh), my brother and I worked up a different vehicle senario. Using two automobiles that are indeed siblings, the Lamborghini Gallardo and the Audi R8, I think the movie could have been much more cohesive and have eliminated the "Jar Jar Binks" effect with the characters.

I've put together a quick chop of what the vehicles might have looked like in car mode and attached their G1 transformations for comparison. What do you think?

All source photos copyright original owners

2 comments:

  1. Hi Mr Wilcox,
    Haven't seen either movies. I don't really like how different the live- action version is from the anime version. But anyway, what I wanted to say is that I noticed the G1s are both Lamborghini Countachs, why not a either 2 Gallardos ( 1 yellow & 1 red) or 2 Murcielagos (1 yellow & 1 red)? That, two me is more of a twin.

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  2. Thanks for posting. I thought in the comics and tv shows they were considered brothers, not absolute twins, but that is certainly an interesting take on the idea.

    As far as the movies go, they are definitely geared more for a general audience than for the "fan boys" of the original comics and tv shows. So they take a lot of liberties with the source material.

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