After enjoying the first two episodes of Machinima’s Titans Return, feast your optics on an interview with the voice cast’s legendary Peter Cullen in which he talks about a certain Autobot leader’s core values, shares more about that character’s evolution and even reflects upon favorite scenes:
What is one thing you look for in an offer to play Optimus Prime that makes you say, “Yes”?
It’d be no surprise to say that [it’s] the consistency of the character. As long as the character is the original, then it’s a go. If it varies from it, without good reason or explanation, then I would … I’ve never had to say, “No,” but I would if it didn’t meet those prerogatives.
What’s [your all-time] favorite moment or scene as Optimus?
I would probably have least-favorite scenes. [laughs] I would include, the most important one, when I did the death scene. The other ones are doing all the screaming, yelling, blood-throat scenes; those are my least favorite. My most favorite scenes, which they don’t do enough, are when he’s written to express compassion and understanding. They never really want to express that level of Prime, which I thought was his most important, valuable trait.
Check out the entire interview here, then sound off on the 2005 boards!
Enigma2K2
Hmmm… interesting.
Inikalord
Not sure if it counts but in 2005 he declined to work on Robot Chicken involving a sketch involving Optimus getting prostate cancer.
Enigma2K2
For all we know, the movies may well be the reason he now feels this way, hmmmm……
Shizuka
They haven't treated his character poorly at all. So what if he's the most aggressive Optimus we've gotten, at least he has more personality and isn't the usual father figure, wise leader type we always get. We've gotten an Optimus who would sacrifice his body for humanity, one who understands the sacrifices sustained during war, losing faith in humanity, seeking vengeance on the people who have killed his friends and an Optimus who has been emotionally lost. These are traits that characterize him and allow him to grow. Just because he's thousands of years old old it doesn't mean he still can't grow. People complain about how the characters on these films lack personality and characterization but often ignore what's right in front of them. At least this is what I think.
Inikalord
Speaking as someone who just finished rewatching the first movie along with ROTF a few hours ago and is continuing with the other movies… I think it's time most of us did give the movies a rewatch if you haven't done so in a while.
The first movie's portrayal of Prime, while still "Murder-Prime" in a few scenes is easily the closest portrayal of the classic Optimus Prime that a lot of people associate with the character. Note that even when Sector Seven ended up capturing Bumblebee, he held back Autobots who clearly disagreed with his decision to not interfere and save him because as he said, it would end up bringing harm to the humans.
Later on with Bonecrusher, he only engages him in the first place because he was bringing harm to humans on the highway. The Decepticon he was dealing with was clearly not somebody who could be reasoned with diplomatically.
Actually, that is something I want to bring up. The Decepticons in the movies *are not* like how they are usually portrayed in almost every other piece of media. These ones will do anything it takes to get what they need and they actually do go through with it, even including bringing harm to humans if it will serve their purpose. They are not the type of enemy that the Autobots can simply chase off to fight another day like they typically have been. Let them go and you're risking untold amount of damage and lives lost. Look no further than when Scavenger tried escaping, visibly running over humans and laying waste to property.
Even when it came to tensions between the Autobots and humans over why they still remained on Earth in ROTF, Optimus was still compliant and understanding of their fears and reasoning, going so far as to accept the possibility of them having to leave Earth if a decision like that was made while still giving them the ultimatum of "What if you're wrong?" which ultimately ended up being true.
Dark of the Moon, his most trusted and close relationship with Sentinel Prime showing a further glimpse into his softer side, possibly even a further look into his character. This may just be me speaking but I think this incarnation of Prime knows he is flawed, is aware of who he is and may honestly even regret his past actions. Sentinel could have easily taken the Matrix back but even if he was planning on backstabbing him to achieve his goal, he still saw something worthy in Optimus to lead the next generation of Autobots even under the pretense of Earth being a new experience and thus, a new relationship between the two of them.
Then comes the betrayal and Optimus is obviously deeply hurt by it all. For lack of better wording on my part, the man who he likely looked up to and may have even been a sort of Father-figure to him has gone against everything that they both shared in experience with. The same man who has then joined forces with the last person you expected them to and is aiding in not only the destruction and death of their own kind, but also the species they have sweat blood and tears for to protect. On an even larger scale than the previous two movies no less. No matter who you are, I don't think you honestly can say if you were in Optimus' shoes, you wouldn't at least feel partially the same.
And even after all of that, after they were explicitly told they they needed to get the hell out of dodge and away from Earth, Optimus still held onto his self-imposed rule of never bringing harm to a human.
It was only once Age of Extinction came around that he actually broke that rule and who could blame him? Honestly, I don't think much can be said that already wasn't stated and observed in the movie to understand why Prime is feeling how he is. DOTM was the planting of the seeds of betrayal and distrust that AoE ultimately expanded upon and gave us an insight into an end result of Optimus that I personally find far more interesting than some other incarnations we've had over the years. Especially RID01 and the Unicron trilogy, who might as well all be the same character (and two of them even are).
It's a side of Optimus that I wish was explored more often, which is why I ultimately wish there was a cartoon connected to the movies that went into further detail and had the opportunity to explore the characters even further. I damn well love Animated but I do have thoughts from time to time of a "What If?" cartoon more closely tied to the Movieverse.
TLDR – Movie Optimus, while not a complete and total cut-and-paste of past incarnations does inherently carry the spirit of his "Ancestors" but also gives us another look into the character that has never been explored before.
thunder117
I would think that it's fair to say that Mr. Cullen doesn't have a problem with Movie Prime. I think the character arcs don't pose an issue to him (I think he gets why Optimus would be broken down like others have said), but there have been several lines which have been cringe-worthy. Most of which sound like they came from Megatron, not Optimus.
savio-prime
Unwatching this thread.
Hot Shot.
Even if you weren't missing the point, these edgy, cliche one-liners still wouldn't help your case.
kaotika
the man knows optimus prime
its funny/sad how much more rescue bots optimus prime reflected this then prime optimus prime
he couldnt/wouldnt connect with the kids where g1 optimus connected with spike and rb optimus connected with cody – and even blades
hell even energon optimus prime had some father figure infuence on kicker
prime optimus prime was so disconnected he was practically autistic
John TheDestroyer
Aoe is definitely my favorite performance of his. I think its fairly easy to tell that he put more heart into a lot of his lines in that one than any of the others.
ultramagnus1
Yes he did. He liked that he had to do a " bit of acting" in aoe as he put it in another interview. He did a great job in those movies showing his voice talent that a lot of us have taken for granted with him.
I'd love to meet the man. And frank Welker too. Gents
ultramagnus1
As did yours
You failed to see the point I was trying to make about prime. So let's drop it. Because its a pointless argument.
I've been an optimus prime fan since the very beginning. I liked how he was depicted in the bay movies and that's it. No one here has to justify why they do or don't like his depiction.
Continue your pointless argument but I or anyone else on here does not have to justify liking or indeed hating bay prime or murder prime or whatever label you put on him.
I certainly don't.
Driskull98
Congrats, your twelve-year old mentality failed to understand the meaning of the post.
Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
Lovecraft
The Bayfilms are most wqtchabl when you take them on two levels.
A popcorn flick, and an extreme self parody.
I like Murder Prime because the phenonmena of him existing at all is fascinating and on top of that they\'ve actually written some albeit brief but compelling stuff with him.
It\'s a shame Mr. Cullen doesn\'t really like that version of Prime, which he has mentioned before, but this interview doesn\'t allude to it all that much.
It\'s a testament to Peter\'s unwavering professionalism that even though he didn\'t necessarily vibe with the material that was given to him that he delivered some of the most rock solid vocal performances of his career and of all time in those movies.
ultramagnus1
"Give me your face"
"I rise….you fall…
" I'll take you all on….
"Today we take the battle to them….
Yep how embarrassed am I?……
Nope….
John TheDestroyer
Nope. He said if it didn't meet that criteria, he would have to turn it down. He hasn't turned down one of the movies yet.
Enigma2K2
Can we take this as him finally giving his opinion on the Bayformers version?
NotRamjet97
Even the stuff meant to advertise the show can't bear to be associated with it
Alphard
I don't know how TR is gonna treat Optimus, or Cyberverse for that matter.
Continuing the emotionless Optimus doll path is something I really don't want to see Hasbro doing. It takes the magic away from what made G1 Optimus so loved: his compassion and warmth.
Driskull98
Probably because the interview barely talks about the Titans Return show. It's mostly just a straight-up interview with Peter.