Transformers: The Headmasters (1987–1988) User Reviews

Alright, but only for "serious" TF fans (especially G1)

[DragStrip · 6/10 · 23 December 2007]

The first Transformers series produced entirely in Japan, "Headmasters", is worth watching and purchasing if, like me, you're interested enough in seeing more G1-style Transformers episodes to overlook some serious flaws. It is not for people who liked the 2007 movie and want to try some earlier incarnations; for that look to the original 1984-87 series. I might even say it's not really for people who lost interest during the 3rd series of G1, as it carries down an even more esoteric path. This is not to say some of these people definitely wouldn't enjoy it, but in my own personal estimation it has some flaws only a serious Transformer fan could love. Of course, every other version of TF has had serious flaws, but many have reaped far greater rewards for getting past them.

The series is infamous for its poorly produced, ill-researched and risible English dub. It is often very funny, but I couldn't help but think how great the series could have been with a dub from the G1 cast. Unfortunately there are problems with the series no matter what language one watches it in. The show has a continuing plot throughout the 35 episodes, which is initially promising but it gets muddled quickly with some truly far-out concepts. Several familiar characters (chiefly Galvatron's henchmen Cyclonus and Scourge) seem to have had their IQs diminished in the move to Japan, which is a shame because most of the new characters aren't that interesting. The score is often grating; not a patch on the original series and especially not Vince DiCola's inspired work.

But I digress; there are some nice things about Headmasters. The censorship restrictions in Japan are nowhere near as severe as they are in America leading to some interesting scenes; chiefly some deaths which while they are not a patch on the famous scene in the 1986 movie, are quite effective in their own way. The animation is not great, but it adapts more overtly Japanese motifs to the style of the classic series quite nicely. Of course the main appeal for many fans will be to see many TF characters in the classic style for the last time. Though their behaviour and movements may be different, all the characters from the G1 series who appear here are based on the same animation models they always were. "Headmasters" does allow us to get a closer look at many characters who were underused in the original series, such as the Gestalt teams and most notably Fortress Maximus and Scorponok, characters based upon the two biggest toys in the original line. If that last sentence interested you, "Headmasters" is worth watching, if not necessarily going too far out of your way to do so. If it didn't, don't bother! BTW, the theme song contains lyrics which roughly translate to "This current suffering we are going through will be of benefit to future generations". Catchy!

It's An Okay Show But...

[lymondjulian · 7/10 · 5 August 2022]

There Are 2 Problems: 1. The Omni Productions English Dub Is, However Infamous For It's Poor Quality, Full Of Mistranslations, Grammatically Incorrect Sentences, And Incorrect Names (For Example, Blaster Is Named "Billy", Jazz Is "Marshall", Spike Witwicky Is "Sparkle", Hot Rod Is "Rodimus Prime" (Pronounced As "Roadimus Prime" UGH!), Blurr Is "Wally", Soundblaster Is "New Soundwave", Metroplex Is "Phillip", Cerebros Is "Fortress", Fortress Maximus Is "Spaceship Bruce", And The Matrix And The Energon Cubes As "The Power Packs".), As Well As Stilted And Even Bizarre Dialogue, Such As "I'll Send You Express To Hell!" And "Fortress Maximus Has Come Himself". Also, Wheelie Doesn't Speak In Rhyme (But Seems To Have A Slight Scottish Accent), The Dinobots Speak Unusually Normally (Grimlock Does Not Say His Famous "Me Grimlock" At All), Raiden, The Trainbots Combined Form Is Known As "Grimlock" (Huh?), And Blurr Speaks Unusually Slowly (Though This At Least Can Be Chalked Up To The Difficulty Of Imitating John Moschitta's Famous Fast-Talking Style).

2. The Shout! Factory DVDs Of Transformers: The Headmasters Skipped The Previous Episode Recaps, Commercial Bumpers/Eyecatches, And Next Episode Previews. WHAT THE HECK SHOUT! FACTORY?

Mediocre

[Taketsuo · 6/10 · 13 March 2008]

Okay, I'm gonna skip all the explanations to how Headmasters came to be, and cut the chase; Headmasters continues relatively straight from where the season 3 of the American cartoon left off; it ignores the Rebirth three-parter altogether in favor of giving it's titular characters an entirely different concept and origin. This time, there are no little aliens from planet Nebulos; instead, the Headmasters themselves are human-sized robots who fled the planet Cybertron millions of years ago. evacuating to planet Master, where some of them built themselves larger robot bodies they could combine with, called transtectors.

Taking place a year after the events of the hate plague, the autobots have established a new base on planet Athenia (which, according to the Japanese series guide, is supposed to be the same planet where the galactic Olympics seen in Five Faces of Darkness took place in). For some reason or another, Cybertron's core computer Vector Sigma has become unstable, allowing Decepticons to attack once more. The Decepticons have help in form of Headmasters, led my mysterious Zarak, but the autobots will not remain devoid of their own Headmasters for long.

The first three episodes play pretty much as a single story arc which establish the series premise. Optimus Prime dies again, allowing Rodimus Prime to take the lead once more. This is but one of the show's many weaknesses; his death is handled very poorly, without any dramatic tension, and considering he only came back a few episodes ago (if we include the season 3 into the equation), it feels sort of insulting. Considering Rodimus Prime and pretty much all the 'classic' Autobots take off ten episodes into the series anyway, there's really no reason for it either, they could have kept him along till then. The only major player who sticks around is Arcee, who is reduced to little more than a secretary.

Anyway. Within the first ten episodes, there's a bunch of single-episode stories, in fashion of the old show, where Galvatron tries to come up with new ways to attack the Autobots, which is kind of nice as it gives a sense of familiarity that should ease you up into things after the third season. In one of these episodes, Battle Beasts make an appearance, which is an interesting crossover.

However, the 9th and 10th episodes are a two-parter; Vector Sigma has began constructing a new type of indestructible alloy, which could change the course of war forever. However, while Galvatron's and Rodimus' troops fight, Zarak reaches the conclusion that the risk is too great, and decides to destroy the entire planet. And the scary thing is...he actually *succeeds*.

Yes, Cybertron is destroyed, entirely. This, too, feels downright insulting, considering the entire American cartoon had the two factions wrestle over it's control, and suddenly it's *gone*. It's like all this fighting has been in vain...

After this, Rodimus hands the leadership (but not the Matrix) to Fortress, the leader of the Autobot Headmasters, and after this, the overall story arc becomes increasingly prominent, with Scorponok building his transtector, Fortress showing off his, and both trying to discover each others' weaknesses.

Although the overall story is fairly engaging, and the occasional one-off story is nice...each episode just seems to use it's plot as an excuse for a fight scene. For a bunch of peace-loving Autobots, the Headmasters sure love to run headfirst into battle. Chromedome, who is the Headmasters' field commander in a way, comes off as a bit of a runt (like Hot Rod, only even more inclined to pull off stupid stunts) while Fortress frequently broods. The dialogue is downright goofy, with almost every command being returned with the exact same phrase in form of a question, and even insults being returned with the exact same ones.

And, of course, the show seems to have made Daniel and Wheelie it's stars. As if these two weren't annoying enough...well, at least Wheelie doesn't talk in rhymes with an annoying voice anymore, but Daniel acts like a total crybaby as opposed to the 14-year old he's supposed to be.

Overall...it's mediocre. You'll be delighted to see a sequel to the third season, with many classic characters showing up, even some from the first year (including Jazz, and Prowl who died in the movie!)...while some from the third season are nowhere to be seen (Sky Lynx I can understand since the toy was never released in Japan, but it doesn't explain Grimlock and Springer, to name a few). The Japanese concept for Headmasters is decidedly less ridiculous than the American one as well. However, Headmasters is pretty *stupid* show, with characters doing stupid things for stupid reasons, like Fortress Maximus running around with a giant floppy disc with his own blueprints on it, as opposed to having used a fake. All this, and not helped in a bit by Daniel. Only hardcore TF fans need apply.

It's still better than Victory, though.

It's a good show

[twu-13149 · 10/10 · 18 October 2021]

If you are a G1 fan or a casual anime watcher, I suggest you watch this show. It's animation is amazing and the theme song is amazing.

First of all, this show is a PERFECT replacement for the "Rebirth" 3 parter. It has an interesting cast of characters that brilliantly moves the cast of characters around. This show is full of important events, and they influence the future series (SPOILERS) Optimus Prime dies (again), Cybertron got destroyed, Mars exploded, and Fortress Maximus is left as the New Autobot leader while MegaZarak (Scorponok) becomes the new Decepticon leader.

Otherwise, it is a great show, and the Japanese trilogy only gets better after this one.

Starts with a bang...and ends with a thud.

[bajbij · 16 May 2001]

This series starts out promisingly. New adventures featuring Jazz, Optimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, Hot Rod, Galvatron and new transformers like Chromedome, Sixshot, and Fortress Maximus. Transformers live or die, some go away for good. Action packed and filled with funny dubbed dialogue by the infamous Hong Kong people who did the 70's Godzilla films and the early kung fu films of Shaw Brothers. Especially funny is Galvatron's voice, sounding like one of the more infamous kung fu villains in cinema history. Unfortunately, the Japanese show contempt for the old school American Transformers, killing them off or sending them away or keeping them in cameo or supporting roles, thus making space for the Head masters. The one old school transformer they chose to keep is Wheelie along with his human partner Daniel, thus emphasizing the Japanese' love of little boys. Fortress Maximus, who becomes the new Autobot leader is easily the worst Autobot leader ever, almost not even fighting when the Decepticons attack, and his final fight scene with Scorponok in the series is the worst contrived fight ever in a Japanese cartoon. The first 25 episodes are good. After that, it's all a failure from there.

Probably the funniest DVD box-set you will ever see

[allan_traynor · 10/10 · 26 July 2006]

If you are a fan of G1 Transformers, then the comedy value of this boxset will never cease! Honestly, every time you watch it it gets funnier and funnier.

The biggest cause for hilarity is the voice actors in the US dub. I think there were only about 4 of them as everyone seems to have the same voice.

Rather than the heroic, robotic voices from the original cartoons, we have very polite voices in their place. Grimlock, for example, does not speak in his harsh, mixed-up sentences. He is as polite as everyone else.

Galvatron seems to rush through every sentence just to get to laugh. And he does. At the end of every sentence.

As do Sixshot and Zarak.

The dialogue is unbelievably funny at times, you'll find yourself rewinding the DVD just to clarify you heard what you thought you heard. And the plot lines are so full of holes and confusion that even in its own universe it makes no sense! The star of the show is undoubtedly Galvatron - who's evil schemes include building an enormous sword, agreeing then disagreeing with his Aviation Assistant Cyclonus, and his Ninja Consultant, Sixshot, and not to mention his overall masterplan to integrate Earth into his system (?) I cannot stress enough how funny you will find this.

HEAD ON!

Just finished watching this.

[Agarak · 5/10 · 19 June 2016]

Transformers: The Headmasters has its good and bad points. While it doesn't cram all its new characters into three episodes like "The Rebirth," it doesn't devote a lot of time to any of them except the Autobot Headmasters and one or two others. It's also a bit intense for a kids show, not to mention that several episodes feature female characters in revealing clothing, though with the exception of "Head Formation of Friendship" such characters are background and the scenes they appear in can be skipped without losing any vital plot information. Also, way too much Daniel and Wheelie-and I thought they were annoying in English. The subtitling on the Shout! Factory version is also fairly disjointed at times.

Taking a dump on the Transformers

[marlymanson734 · 1/10 · 31 March 2014]

Boy, this makes Victory seem like Gone with the Wind; I had to fast-forward to certain scenes as I had little patience with the idiotic script. The art design is bad; the colors and textures are drained of life and vitality and the robots lack presence and look like huge piles of fertilizer. When the Japanese were solely working as animators for the original show, it was alright, but working also as writers, they show no respect for the source material or the concept of what the show is about.

In anime, why is it that when it's all about giant robots piloted by humans, we are presented with mature stories as in Armored Trooper Votoms or Mobile Suit Gundam but when it's about sentient, giant mecha, it should be treated as a children's show? For the people who made Headmasters, it seems autonomous, independent thinking robots are a license and an excuse to make the shows as stupid as possible and unfit for anyone's consumption. Robots lifting weights, using a treadmill or drinking lemonade? Really? Even children are sophisticated enough to know that robots as a concept are machines, as opposed to organic beings, the writers should work within certain fictional parameters and limits with regard to this concept. Unless it is a cartoony type of show like Ren and Stimpy but this is Transformers we're talking about here. There is no serious treatment of the characters or the story; it's just one big string of retarded, moronic nonsense. If Japanese kids are bombarded daily with this mental hogwash, I wouldn't be surprised if they grow up to become serial killers and mass murderers. The people responsible for this atrocity should be tortured or anally raped by members of the Taliban. Producing this garbage is a heinous crime for Christ's sake.

If I have to mention one episode for sheer levels of stupidity, there's "The Death of Ultra Magnus". The rest I cannot remember; and there's that fight between Soundwave and Blaster; the two masters of espionage kill each other and are later rebuilt: Soundwave as "Soundblaster" and Blaster as "Twincast" or whatever. There are ideas floating around here that are later fully developed in Power Rangers, err, Super God Masterforce and Victory like Fortress wielding a sword and such.

Headmasters is a C-rate show and campy as f—k like Beast King Golion, probably much worse. It is recommended only for those with sado-masochistic tendencies.

Not really weak, actually good

[MovieCriticMarvelfan · 3 January 2004]

Actually "The Headmasters" do get introduced in the last eps of US Version of the Transformers unlike one critic said.

The writing is much better in that the writers finally killed of Galvatron once and for all, but in the same breath Optimus Prime too, but Primes death is really weird. He and Galvatron fight for the Matrix, Galvatron is thrown to it, but Primed dies anyway? Weird.

Its not really the weak part of the Trinity, its good. Theres an ode to Voltron as Autobots start using Swords as weapons as well. If your lucky enough to find a good copy consider yourself lucky, most of the dubbed copies are in horrible condition. The person with a good copy of the subtitled version can be very rich seeing as there is a shortage of good quality episodes on tape.

Not as good as remembered, doesn't hold up

[TheLittleSongbird · 5/10 · 12 November 2013]

Not that Transformers: Headmasters is terrible, it is certainly better than Victory and the Unicron trilogy(especially Armada), but for great Transformers shows look to the 1984 series- the best-, Beast Wars and Prime. Reviewing Victory, I mentioned that Headmasters was very good, but this was from memory. This was a prompt to go and watch Headmasters again and see whether it was still that from an adult perspective, unfortunately it wasn't.

There are some good things, the animation while not mind-blowing is slick and shows some evidence of detail and love. There are some very funny lines like Where is Galvatron? Is he alive?"/ "He told me not to tell anyone"(though not always for the right reasons) and some imaginative episode titles(The Emperor of Destruction Vanishes on an Iceberg, anybody?), while the theme tune is relatively catchy and some episodes like Planet Cybertron is in Grave Danger and the finale are securely paced. The story arc is straightforward there are some funny and dramatic moments that don't feel too strange- the episode with the eye-patched-lion leader is an exception- or too daring and some effective death scenes- the only one that didn't work was Optimus Prime's which didn't make much sense- and Rodimus and Galvatron are serviceable characters.

However, there are other things that don't work. The worst aspect is the dubbing which is horrendous. It just sounds so disengaged and without any signs of life, some of the voice actors even sound as though they were recorded in a cave. The Japanese version is a little better but with not enough dynamic range. Most of the characters don't work with not much substance to them(Scourge has never been this dumb or dull before), Daniel is incredibly irritating and having Sixshot, Hortrod, Blur and Cup come and then go again with no mention of them again was a waste and an example of lazy writing. The music did agreed have one too many moments where it did grate, some of it didn't fit with what was happening, some of it repeats itself too much and some of it is at times too dramatic that it's overbearing. There are funny lines sure but from a characterisation and story development point of view Headmasters is rather lazy. Dull isn't the word to describe the execution of the story arc and story lines, in fact the problem is the opposite. It's not disastrous as there are some good moments here but some episodes cram so much in and go at a rapid pace that the storytelling can feel muddled and confused that could have been avoided if less was incorporated and the pace was slowed down. Headmasters also ends on a rather anti-climatic note

Overall, not terrible, as a matter of fact the opinion is very mixed feelings, and not among the worst of the Transformers franchise but it wasn't as good as I remembered and it doesn't really hold up. 5/10 Bethany Cox

The weakest of the trinity.

[Ayatollah · 12 December 2003]

(A few spoilers.)

Western Transformers fans are captivated by the Holy Trinity of Japanese Transformers shows: "Headmasters," "Masterforce," and "Victory." Why? Because we never got them, obviously. Well, thanks the Star TV, we have them...sort of. Ignoring the poor dubbing, this is actually a fairly solid show. Don't let the fact that I call this the "weakest" of the three G1 Japanese-only series taint your perception of it: "Headmasters" must have been brilliant stuff at the time.

Some background: after the third season of the original Transformers show, we in the US got stuck with the miserable "Rebirth" 3-parter. In the East, however, they were fortunate enough to get this series. A lot happens here. We are introduced to both the Autobot and Decepticon Headmasters. Blaster and Soundwave kill each other in mortal combat but are then resurrected as Twincast and Soundblaster, respectively. Optimus Prime dies again. The planet Cybertron is destroyed by Scorponok and the Decepticon Headmasters in a failed attempt to assassinate Galvatron. Ultra Magnus is killed by Sixshot in a climactic battle. Galvatron is killed by the Autobot Headmasters and Scorponok assumes command of the Decepticons. The only real problem is that there is no coherent plot to string it all together. It's a lot to absorb and events just sort of happen over time for basically no other reason than Galvatron (or whomever) doing something nasty. However, there was a strong sense of continuity (no matter what some reviewers say) from episode to episode and there weren't many errors at all in the writing of the series (one important thing to remember is that Transformers The Movie had not been released in Japan at that point and you can't exactly fault them for making errors based on things that hadn't even happened as far as anyone in the country knew).

One reason why I say this series is weak is not because it's bad but simply because the other two are so good. Please keep that in mind when pursuing "Headmasters."

a mixed bag

[velcrohead · 18 September 2005]

I'm not sure how to rate this series. If you put it up against the silliness of some of the American G1 series, it seems more mature. However, if you put it up against some of the subsequent (and better) Japanese G1/G2 series, it seems almost sophomoric.

I understood the need to move past or do away with some of the older characters, but it seemed so contrived to just have them just all of a sudden walk away just for no real reason at all. The whole Prime-gets-killed-for-no-reason-at-all thing seemed extremely cheap. Rodimus and the guys just walking away after Cybertron is destroyed just seemed contrived. Some of it was well done. The death of Ultra Magnus was almost (but not quite) as gut-wrenching as the death of Optimus Prime in the movie. The destruction of Galvatron was okay.

But then you have a bunch of largely unsympathetic characters left, and no strong presence of a Prime or Megatron to lead them and make them make sense. Fortress Maximus is a pathetic Prime substitute to say the least. Scorponok seems cheap. And you get the feeling that the whole reason they're leaders is simply that they're large bots.

And of all the G1 characters we get to keep, why Wheelie and Daniel?? Why???? Couldn't we trade them both for Bumblebee or something? This is not really to say that this is a horrible series, though, because it does have merit. It's just not as good as the next couple of series.

how to lose continuty in one season

[nomercyxtreme · 11 January 2001]

Ok this series just hurts my head to think about. In the dubbing they screw up names Rodimus Prime = Roadimus Prime, The Matrix = the power pack, vector sigma = the sigma computer, Blaster = billy and Blur = Wally. The stupidity doesn't end there. In one epesode Sixshot tries to get energy from earth so he hides in the shadows in each of his six forms to hide himself. Which ACTUALLY WORKS. He fools the autobots and the decepticons into thinking that its some mystery robot. When its obvious its him. The dubbing sounds like its by five guys in there basement. I'm a transformers fan so that tells you something about this. If your going to watch it don't watch it in a serious frame of mind because you'll just end up with a headache. Its good for a laugh thats about it!

The middle road of the responses...

[ShiekJ1 · 12 September 2005]

Look, I agree with most of the previous comments on this series. But please use some common sense. Yes, if you go by the idea that the Original WESTERN 'Transformers' series is the CORRECT, PERFECT series (that can't stand up to some differences), you are going to think something is really screwed up when watching this series. But you need to realize that for the Japanese audience, translations and rewriting were done with the first saga. Hence, part of the reason the storyline is different. Now with that in mind I continue. Think of the last three episodes of the original U.S. series as one of those pulled out movie like things, the way DBZ did with the movies that don't actually fit into the story line at all. If you ignore those three episodes (which fixes the fact that Daniel doesn't transform into Arcee's head, and no one has ever met the Headmasters) the story line does make much more sense. Plus keep in mind that even if you get a dubbed version (I found all three later series on an Internet auction site, dubbed really well on multiple DVD's), the writers didn't rewrite the storyline, only the lines into English. So pardon them if it doesn't fit your idea of the perfect series because many ideas and even jokes don't translate well from one culture to another. In my opinion (not that it would ever happen, but feel free to prove me wrong C.N.) they should bring all of these series over to the U.S. on cartoon network, re-written and re-dubbed for a limited run on Toonamie or Adult Swim. I think it would play really well in a block with 'Big O', 'Full Metal Alchemist' and 'Cowboy Beebop'. (especially around the time that the live action movie comes out)