SPOILERS ALERT!!!

Hello everyone! 🙂

Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!

So, after seeing the 40th anniversary re-release of ‘The Transformers: The Movie’ at the Omniplex Cinema in Wigan last weekend, I stayed on to watch the 12-minute short film called ‘Optimus Prime: Awakening’ shown after that. As a short film, it was fascinating to see. 🙂

‘Optimus Prime: Awakening’ features the final performance of Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime, who sadly passed away before the film’s release. It was dedicated to his memory. I don’t think that was the film’s original intention, but it’s nice that it was dedicated to him.

The film itself takes place after Optimus Prime’s sad death in ‘Transformers: The Movie’. It sees him sent to an afterlife where he sees visions of conflict and is confronted by his past choices. It challenges him on whether to stop fighting and to move on to the next life.

Okay, so firstly, the animation for this short film is very good. It’s visually impressive. I like how the film starts with a recreation of Optimus’ death scene in ‘Transformers: The Movie’ before we see him enter the afterlife. 🙂 And the animation is CGI instead of 2D animation.

In terms of the story, I did feel rather confused by the film’s end. I’m not sure I fully understand what’s going on. I believe it’s the One whom Optimus meets in the afterlife persuading him to leave behind his life of fighting to allow others to continue the fighting.

It’s almost like a symbolic representation of the film asking fans who were upset by Optimus Prime’s death in ‘Transformers: The Movie’ to let go of that grief to allow Optimus to continue onto the afterlife. 😐 This also sort-of matches to Peter Cullen’s latest passing.

That’s how I understand it from reading other people’s interpretation of this film. I know that’s likely to upset ‘Transformers’ fans who didn’t want Optimus Prime to die in ‘Transformers: The Movie’, but it was quite a fascinating take on how to resolve that death.

Again, I can’t say I was entirely satisfied by how the film did it considering I was confused and I didn’t fully understand what was going on when watching ‘Optimus Prime: Awakening’ at the cinema. 😐 Also, it’s quite a challenge to tell that story within 12 minutes.

But it was still enjoyable to see. And I like that Peter Cullen got to voice Optimus Prime for this short film before he passed away recently. It was also fun to see this being a tribute to Optimus Prime, not just in his Generation 1 form but also to other forms over the years.

Optimus in his G1 form gets to see other versions of himself from other universes including the ‘Transformers: Animated’ version, the ‘Transformers: Prime’ version and the Michael Bay movie universe version. I’ve only seen the G1 and movie versions of Optimus.

As well as Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime, Frank Welker returns to voice Megatron and Soundwave in ‘Optimus Prime: Awakening’. Like many ‘Transformers’ fans, I’m glad this film has Peter Cullen and Frank Welker return as Optimus and Megatron for a final outing.

There’s also Simon Henderson as the One, Jaret Le Master as Bumblebee, Mathieu Bourassa as Starscream, Scott Law as Kickback and Gray Powell as Shrapnel. It was very impressive to witness these Transformer characters in CGI form for this 12-minute film.

Overall, ‘Optimus Prime: Awakening’ is a visually impressive short film that provides a coda to Optimus Prime’s death in ‘The Transformers: The Movie’. Whether it’s a satisfying coda to Optimus Prime’s death by ‘Transformers’ fans is all down to a matter of perspective.

I enjoyed seeing the short film after seeing ‘Transformers: The Movie’ at the cinema, but I can’t say it was a very satisfying experience. At least, I got to enjoy Peter Cullen’s final performance as Optimus Prime in the film and I’m pleased the film was dedicated to him.

Thanks for reading!

Bye for now!

Tim 🙂