Pirates of Dark Water and Transformers

So I'm really not feeling so good tonight. Getting sick sucks. I've been sniffling all day, and just super tired. I went out twice today; both times pretty quickly but I just got cold and tired within a few blocks of my house. So lame. Basically I've wasted away on a fantastic Saturday.

Instead of doing anything really productive I sat around and watched my dvds for The Pirates of Dark Water, which you might recall was a cartoon from back in the early 90s. The show isn't out officially on dvd, but I bought a fan made set of the series maybe a year ago. Had yet to watch it until today. I had really only really vaguely remembered it in the first place, but now that I'm seeing it again I have to say wow. It really is a great show. Only lasted two seasons... well a season and a half, but it was this sweeping fantasy story that had great high seas action-adventure, well developed characters, for an 80s cartoon, and a really well realized world. I mean they went so far as to think out made up foreign swear words! It had a fantastic foundation, and some really unique elements, like people actually being able to die! I'm really impressed and would love to see something come of the series. At the least a proper dvd release. But according to probably the most comprehensive fan site for a show I've ever seen, HERE, that doesn't seem likely. This is just another one of those lost classics from my youth, that like another old favorite, Invasion America, will never be completed. That makes me sad.

From the back of my dvd bax for the show: "When Ren, a young lighthouse keeper, rescues a stranger foundering in the rocks near his home, he learns that the man was his father, the former King of Octopon. Ren is given a magical crystal Compass that guides him to the Thirteen Treasures of Rule. Unfortunately the evil pirate captain Bloth is also aware of the Treasures and is relentless in pursuing Ren to get them. On his side, Ren soon acquires companions like Ioz the pirate, Tula to Ecomancer, and Niddler the fussy monkey-bird. His quest becomes all the more urgent when Ren learns that the Dark Water, a carnivorous black liquid that consumes anything it snares, threatens to envelop and destroy his world, only only the treasures he seeks can stop it." Sounds cool eh? Anyone else remember this? Or was it just me?

Other than that I've really been loafing.. wait, actually that pretty much is loafing. So I guess I've been loafing around all day today. I think I need to go to bed. Before that happens though there was some good news on the Transformers front today. The live Yahoo! chat that I mentioned in the last post was held and names, etc have been revealed. This was accompanied with a few select pictures that have since disappeared, and a few other tidbits of information. Because I know you're all waiting. Here is the list of characters, and their descriptions (as provided in the live chat). I got all of the following information from HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.

Autobots:
Optimus Prime - Classic Prime type character. True hero of the Autobots.
Bumblebee - Underdog type character. The scout. Smallest of the gang. (Spike mentioned)
Jazz - Rock n' roll style character.
Ratchet - New form. Emergency vehicle. Medical officer/Science officer. Repairs Transformers injured in battle.
Ironhide - Optimus' oldest friend. Gritty

Decepticons:
Megatron - Survival of fittest. Less idealistic version of humanity.
Starscream - 2-faced. Secretly plotting to overthrow Megatron. Doesn't necessarily want Megatron's duties, but wants to be leader.
Brawl - Pissed off Decepticon. Heavy lifter. One of the first ones not from G1. More experimental with Decepticons. More G1 styled characters to come with sequels.
Bonecrusher - Closest to constructicon. Hates all other Decepticons except for Megatron.
Barricade - Hunter type. Cop car, likes to get to things first.
Skorponok - closest to a beast era type of character.
Frenzy - Character who evolved from Soundwave. Had contradictions to the original Soundwave, so they changed him to Frenzy. Smaller form. Stealth spy.
Blackout - Takes out ability to fight back. Likes to pulse blast electronics. First tier attacker. Transport, one of the biggest decepticons in the movie.


Also - Prime, Blackout, Group (incl Bumblebee Ratchet, Prime, Ironhide), Optimus toy, Blackout toy, Scorpinok toy. Pretty exciting stuff, I know...

The rest of the information gleaned from the chat, through fan questions didn't really reveal anything too earth shattering. You can go check it out at the links above though if you like. I am pretty stoked about this though. I'm looking forward to seeing Jazz hopefully soon and I thought it was noteworthy that they changed Shockwave into Frenzy. I mean would today's kids even recognize a microcasette? We'll have to wait and see. I'd say good news all around. Maybe for movie #2 they can add in the glaring omission of Grimlock, and hopefully at least one of the mega combining robots like Devastator, or Predaking.

Oh they also will be running a contest on the official movie site starting soon to submit a line you want Optimus Prime to say in the film. My vote is for the exasperated line that he always gave in the fantastic Beast Wars cartoon "Well that's just Prime..." But seeing as that's not cannon G1 TF, nor was it actually the same voice actor, I doubt they'd go for it. Maybe something from the movie like "Until all are one." just as you think he's going to die, but then he could comeback and kick some ass... hmm, maybe not. Honestly that's a pretty weird contest. Presumably they're already planning on having prime say the classics like "Autobots, roll out!" And really that's all I care about.

Ok, I'm off to bed now, night...