Media Essays: Why Optimus Prime: Awakening Left Me Confused

It's already been a month since Peter Cullen passed away, and Transformers fans are still grieving over the man who made Optimus Prime who he is today. This is probably why when this new short was announced, a lot of people were keener than ever to flock to their local cinema and rewatch The Transformers: The Movie. Not only was the movie rereleased as part of Hasbro's "Apology Tour" campaign to celebrate the movie's 40th anniversary, but Peter Cullen's untimely passing made the whole thing come off as a bad case of awkward timing. But then we had this short announced and it was said to be the last time Peter had voiced the iconic Autobot leader, so what was likely meant to be just an extra to attach to the movie as part of the anniversary ended up being an unintentional swan song for Peter. So with that in mind, people had to go and see it in order to get what will be the last time we'll EVER hear Peter voice Optimus Prime to pay tribute to him. That short...is Optimus Prime: Awakening.

Premiering on September the 17th, Optimus Prime: Awakening was pretty much a bonus for anyone who watched the re-release of The Transformers: The Movie in cinemas. Running for 12 minutes and featuring animation and visuals by The Third Floor, the short came as a surprise for everybody since we had NO idea of its existence until after Peter Cullen passed away. While the timing might seem a little suspicious, I imagine they were planning to reveal the short sooner or later and Peter's passing might've prompted them to reveal it even sooner. This could come off as trying to profit off of his death, but I'm sure that's not the intention. Anyhow, the short not only featured Peter's final performance as Optimus, but also featured Frank Welker reprising his iconic roles as Megatron and Soundwave once again, thus making it the last time we'll hear Peter and Frank together as their iconic characters. The whole thing reminds me of DC's animated adaptation of Crisis on Infinite Earths in how that movie was the last time we'd hear Kevin Conroy as Batman and the last time we'd hear him and Mark Hamill together as Batman and the Joker.

When the short was released, the reception was...very mixed. Some have said it's a beautiful send off for Peter and a lovely bit of G1 fan-service while others feel it's a bad send off for Peter with some even comparing the short to STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI of all things! Like...damn, being compared to that is something no media ever wants to happen! I was baffled by the mixed reception and wanted to see the short for myself and make up my own mind. Given I don't like The Transformers: The Movie, it was out of the question that I'd go and see it in cinemas, so I waited until someone uploaded it on YouTube and watched it that way. Yes, I know I'm committing piracy by doing so, I don't care. =P And as you've no doubt figured out by the title, I was left confused by what I watched. Why is that? Let's dive in...

What's The Story?

The story is about Optimus Prime as he dies from his injuries after the events of The Transformers: The Movie, but he can't go into the afterlife just yet. He has to wrestle with his inner demons and be judged by an entity known only as "The One" before he can be allowed to rest. The One shows him that by continuing to fight over and over, he's only inciting a conflict that never ends and so Optimus needs to end the conflict, or risk dooming everyone...

The premise is a great idea for a short made as part of the G1 movie's 40th anniversary celebrations. I mean a short all about Optimus moving into the afterlife? That's perfect! So why did it leave me feeling baffled by the time it was over? We'll get into that, but first...

The Good Parts

I want to be fair to this thing and at least talk about what was good about the short before I dissect why it didn't work for me.

First of all, I LOVE the animation of this short. It reminds me a lot of the Netflix War for Cybertron trilogy's visuals, only with more lively character animation and dynamic action scenes. It's pretty embarrassing how this 12 minute short managed to look more visually interesting than all 3 seasons of that show. Hey, at least the visuals aren't mostly the characters standing around talking with limp action scenes going on. The art-style is very close to the old G1 designs, but given a 3-D twist to them and there's a lot more detail and textures in everything from the rocky canyons to the tiny paint chips on the character's bodies. I especially thought it was cool how the short starts off with a remake of Optimus' death scene in this animation style to further hit home how this short is tied to the movie. I want to see a whole Transformers show like this, because these visuals do the franchise justice.

Second of all, Peter and Frank are still at the top of their games here. I'm not sure how long ago this was recorded before Peter passed away, but you certainly don't get the impression he was soon to die since he still sounds fantastic in this. He gets to give off a very emotional performance as he sells the desperate situation Optimus has found himself in as he tries to reason with The One and there's something so beautiful and poetic about how his final EVER line as Optimus Prime is him saying he's "going to light our darkest hour". Unintentional obviously, but that really was the perfect final line for Peter to deliver as his iconic character. And of course, Frank Welker deserves a lot of praise too. He still sounds terrific as Megatron and Soundwave, even if his Megatron voice sounds closer to the Prime incarnation than the G1 version this time around, but the voice still carries some of the G1 version in it, thus giving us a voice that's the best of both worlds.

I also like how we get little clips of Optimus Primes throughout the franchise's history, which felt like another celebration of Peter's time in the role...even though it shows Animated Optimus Prime at one point, who WASN'T voiced by Peter, he was voiced by David Kaye, so what's that about? Also for some weird reason, they show clips of Transformers: Prime twice, one with Optimus in his Season 1-2 body and the other with Optimus with his Season 3 body. Showing a clip of him from the War for Cybertron video games would've made more sense if you ask me. Still, it was a nice bit of fan-service, and also kind of a meta commentary on how Optimus tends to die a lot in this franchise.

But that's where the positives end, I'm afraid. So now let's talk about...

Why It Left Me Confused

I'll start off with a minor point first, then cover the major thing that made this short fall apart for me. First of all, I have to agree with fans in how it's such a missed opportunity that the short was attached to the theatrical re-release of The Transformers: The Movie and yet Hot Rod is nowhere to be seen outside of the opening that recreates Optimus' death scene from the movie. Had I made the short, I would've had Hot Rod in place of Bumblebee. Given Hot Rod was partially responsible for Prime's death, he SHOULD have been in this short, so why wasn't he? Imagine how wholesome it would've been if we had a scene with Hot Rod begging Optimus to forgive him and Optimus does so, then walks off into the light saying to Hot Rod "I truly believe you will surprise us all, Hot Rod...", foreshadowing when he would become Rodimus Prime during the movie. It's baffling that this didn't happen and that we didn't get a scene like that in the short! Talk about a waste.

But that's not the only thing as to why this short left me puzzled at the end. No, the big thing, the Pandora's Box that opens up all the problems of this short for me is the message and lesson that it's trying to preach. For many fans, this is where their confusion comes from as well, and I'm among them. So what's the situation here? Throughout the short, The One is preaching to Optimus how he's doing more harm than good because he battles the Decepticons and thus is causing a conflict that never ends, thus he needs to stop fighting in order to end the conflict. This...is extremely confusing logic to me. So what is the short trying to say? That fighting is bad and therefore we shouldn't fight, even if we're fighting to stop the enemy from destroying everything we know and love? That's a horrible message! So what, we were wrong to fight the Nazis back in WWII because "fighting is bad" and so we should've stopped fighting them to "end the conflict"? Anytime we fight for our freedom and fight for peace and equality, we should just give up and let the bad guys win because it'll "end the conflict"? No, that's a terrible thing to preach! How is Optimus not fighting the Decepticons going to achieve anything? Not fighting the Decepticons will make things worse for everybody!

It'd be like if throughout BIONICLE's story, Tahu and the other Toa are scolded by Mata Nui for fighting against the Makuta and his forces and that by doing so, they only create more conflict and that they shouldn't fight Makuta in order to "end the conflict". Or if in Avatar and The Legend of Korra, Aang and Korra were viewed as the bad guys for trying to stop the Fire Nation's takeover of the world and the various threats Korra went up against in her show and that they should stop fighting to "end the conflict". It's just baffling logic and has you wonder what point the short's trying to make. It's like these dumbass plots you get in superhero media where some idiotic civilian tries to make it out like superheroes are somehow making things worse when they fight the bad guys and the characters (somehow) think they have a point. What point exactly? There's no shades of grey in this situation! It's as simple as "The bad guys are causing conflict and we have to put a stop to it". Where's the moral dilemma? There is none! In a situation like this, the heroes would look worse than the villains by not fighting to stop them from destroying everything and trying to conquer the world! So I really don't see the One's point and what Optimus is meant to take away from this.

It's especially annoying when Optimus confronts a twisted version of Bumblebee and he says "Everyone who follows you dies!" as if that's somehow Optimus' fault and it's something he should be guilty of. So what's Bumblebee's point here? That Optimus is somehow a bad guy because people who follow him die? Like...that's how war works, you know. We follow our leaders into battle and we're not always going to make it out alive. But that's why we fight, because it's better than just giving up and letting the enemy win. Besides, the same holds true for Megatron as many Decepticons follow him and end up dead, so how is Optimus the one who should be shamed for that instead of Megatron, the ACTUAL bad guy in this conflict! Also, Bumblebee is objectively wrong and his argument holds no weight because many Autobots have followed Optimus into battle without dying, so no, not everyone who follows him dies! So what is he trying to preach here? That people who follow Optimus into battle die? Yeah, no duh! That's what happens in a war! But far more people would die if they didn't follow Optimus into battle and stop the Decepticons, so I don't see how that's supposed to take Prime down a peg, especially since again, Megatron's way more guilty of that than Optimus ever will be.

I've had somebody try to defend this by saying the One's point was to convince Optimus to let go of his need to keep fighting and let himself rest. He's spent his life putting others first, but now he's allowed to think for himself and he doesn't have to carry the burden of the entire war on his shoulders. That's a pretty fair assessment, especially since the One does say that Optimus has allowed Cybertron, the Matrix and Earth to determine his actions. But then the One says if Optimus refuses his warning, then everything is doomed. So what's that supposed to mean exactly? That Optimus is somehow making things worse by fighting to protect those three things from the Decepticons? But then if he doesn't fight for them, how will that be any better? How does fighting for them doom all of existence when NOT fighting for them will doom it even worse? Optimus demands for the One to tell him what he wants, and he says "For you to break the cycle". But...how will Optimus not fighting break the cycle? By not fighting, the Decepticons win and the conflict continues! That won't break the cycle whatsoever! And as the short demonstrates, it doesn't! Optimus lets Megatron win despite having the chance to kill him, he abandons the Matrix of Leadership and walks off into the afterlife, and then an end credits scene shows Megatron coming across the abandoned Matrix. So what did that accomplish exactly? That hasn't broken the cycle at all! Megatron hasn't changed his ways and now with the Matrix of Leadership abandoned and at his fingertips, Megatron will no doubt try and use its power for himself and keep the battle going, thus the cycle continues! SO NOTHING GOT ACCOMPLISHED!!!

The One just preaches like a dumbass without having any idea what he's talking about and he didn't get Optimus to break the cycle at all, he just caused more conflict to happen! But then you take in the fact this is supposed to be Optimus going on a spiritual journey before he reaches the afterlife, so you have to wonder if any of it was real, but then that end credits scene shows Megatron approaching the Matrix of Leadership and laughing gleefully, so is it real or not? That only further muddies the message this short was going for and why it leaves me so utterly confused! Why did they include that end credits scene when it made no sense? If the short wanted to get across how Optimus needs to let go of the conflict within himself and be put to rest, then they should've dropped that end credits scene and The One should've straight up said that instead of being annoyingly vague and cryptic for the sake of it. He should've said "Your time has come, Optimus Prime. You need to let others continue in your absence. Now is your time to end the conflict within yourself and rest". At least that would've made it clear that's what the point of the whole thing was. But he doesn't. He never says anything like that. He just says Optimus will (somehow) doom everyone if he keeps fighting, how killing Megatron "isn't a victory" (when it is) and that the Decepticons will just be replaced by a new threat, which doesn't mean anything or further argue his point on how Optimus needs to break the cycle. It's all pretentious, quasi-philosophical nonsense that thinks it's more profound than it actually is, and it really hurts what could've been a fantastic short that truly was Peter Cullen's swan song.

The fact Optimus ends up buying into the One's nonsense in the end doesn't help either. It's no wonder people were comparing this to The Last Jedi, cause it really does have that kind of feel to it. It's definitely not as bad as The Last Jedi because Optimus wasn't utterly character assassinated like Luke was in order to make the story happen and given Optimus comes back to life in the "Return of Optimus Prime" two-parter that aired after the movie's release, we know that Optimus doesn't actually abandon anybody or give up on the battle. But now I mention it, it really makes the short's lesson even less poignant in hindsight. The short keeps preaching how Optimus needs to "break the cycle", yet again, he comes back to life during the cartoon's post-movie era and he keeps fighting the Decepticons as normal! So what did this accomplish exactly? Optimus hasn't learned anything, he isn't changed by the experience and after his revival, it's all business as usual for him! So this short's entire existence is worthless! It's this big character journey for Optimus as he moves onto the afterlife that doesn't do anything for his character or change him in the long run! It's all journey, no destination! And that's ultimately why this short left me so utterly confused. The lack of Hot Rod is confusing, the terribly executed moral is confusing and even its existence is confusing! What was the point of this short's existence if it wasn't going to say anything profound or moving and whatever it was trying to preach ended up changing nothing in the long run?

I'm just glad I didn't pay to see this in cinemas, cause I really would've wanted my money back afterwards...

Conclusion

Peter Cullen deserved a much better send-off than this, he really did. I really wanted to like this short. I was expecting to find it a moving send-off for Peter Cullen that would be among the most emotional and heartfelt pieces of media in Transformers history. Instead, we got a very confused story that has no idea what it's trying to preach and whatever it was trying to say falls on deaf ears because nothing got accomplished and nothing changed going forward. With a few rewrites, this short could've been truly special. Instead, it felt like 12 minutes of wasted time that could've been put to better use. It'll take a lot more than the Matrix of Leadership to light this short's darkest hour, that's for sure...

And that's it for this essay. I hope you enjoyed it and feel free to share your thoughts down below. Do you agree with what I've had to say? Do you feel the short's actually really good? Or do you think it's a let down as well? Do let me know.

Come back tomorrow for my review of The Legend of Korra. See you then media fans!

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