Jalopnik: optimus prime

Kid Drinks Gasoline To Be Like Optimus Prime

Ben Wojdyla — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:15:00 EDT

A 14-year-old Chinese boy has been admitted to the hospital with "gasoline dependance" after five years of downing the fuel in order to emulate his cartoon heroes and become a "valiant fighter" like "Optimus Prime."

It started out innocently enough, with the boy drinking lighter fluid after taking a liking to the odor, but as we all know lighter fluid is a gateway combustible and inevitably leads to the hard stuff; Dino-squeezin's, go-juice, petrol... oh yes, he was drinking gasoline. Taking it from his parents motorcycle in such quantities as to regularly drain the tank. He was doing so because he believed it would help him attain energy like those of his cartoon heroes, the Transformers. Of course his parents tried to stop him, but he kept downing the stuff and eventually he started showing signs of reduced mental capacity. His parents took him into the hospital where he was diagnosed with a psychological dependence on gas. It's like a Matrix of Stupidity. [Shanghai Daily via Gizmodo]

Hilariously Awesome Throwback T-Shirts: Chariots Retired

The Auto Insider — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 10:30:00 EDT

TeeFury just released for sale an unbelievably cool ultra-limited edition t-shirt titled, 'Chariots Retired,' portraying our favorite TV and movie cars from the 80's including K.I.T.T., Optimus Prime, the Ghostbuster's Ecto-1, Airwolf and more.

'Chariots Retired' went on sale last night at midnight and will continue on throughout the day, so if you want an opportunity to own this killer limited edition T, you'd better get on it. This writer did.

TeeFury is a relatively new outfit started in 2008 by a bunch of graphic designers and artists interested in limited edition apparel. Their basic catch is that each t-shirt goes on sale for a single 24 hour period of time or until the first run of t-shirts sells out and then... poof! They're gone, never to be seen from again, except for the lucky group that managed to get first dibbs. And at only $9, they're cheap too.

The biggest difference between TeeFury and some of the 'other' limited edition t-shirt sellers is that rather than rely on a community vote, the designs are carefully chosen by a professional team of designers and artists, guaranteeing that the designs are of quality appearance and execution. We're hoping for some more of these 80's autogeek-gasmic Ts for us to grab in the near future. [via TeeFury]

New Transformers 2 Clip Is Robogasmic, Megan Fox-y

Ray Wert — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 14:10:00 EDT

For ShoWest, Michael Bay's dropped a healthy two-and-a-half minute load of footage from summer's upcoming smash-hit, Transformers 2. It features Megan Fox stripping, Bumblebee crying and Optimus Prime getting a kick-to-the-face by Devastator. Robogasm? Yes.

Change Transformers Can Believe In

Ben Wojdyla — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:00:00 EST

Tired of a seemingly corrupt and secretive Decepticon government, running up huge energon deficits and starting robot wars all over the place? Optimus Prime is the candidate you can believe in. Change, Into A Truck.

This very clever poster is the work of graphic artist Tim Doyle and obviously parodies the previously omnipresent "Change" poster of now-President Obama. It was printed as a limited edition 18×24 inch poster which Transformer fiends snapped up for $30 without hesitation. There was even glow in the dark version which disappeared just as quickly. If you're a similarly afflicted Transformers nut, keep your eyes on Nakitomi, where a reprint may happen if demand is heavy enough. Freaks. [SlashFilm]

Transformers Revenge Of The Fallen Hummer H3 Spotted Near Phoenix

Wes Siler — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:00:00 EDT

A reader over at Tformers.com spotted this Hummer H3T sharing its flatbed trailer with Optimus Prime in vehicle mode. The H3T is painted in the same NEST colors as the Hummer HX concept spotted back in July, with NEST appearing to be some kind of mysterious quasi-governmental organization in Transformers 2. Click through for the full report.

I'm staying at a hotel in Arizona and this trucker was checking in at the same time as me. I overheard him talking about having something in the back that he did not want a lot of people to know about.

After he went up to his room I went to the back of the building to check out what he was talking about. Turns out he had the semi used for Optimus Prime on the back of his truck, in addition to a new vehicle. Looks like a humvee with the word Nest stenciled on the side. I took the pictures with my Blackberry as I don't have my camera with me.

Went to dinner and came back, noticed he covered up the Humvee.

[via Tformers.com]

Oh Optimus, What Have They Done To You?

Ben Wojdyla — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 17:00:00 EDT

JList, purveyors of all things Japanese and crazy, is offering for sale an iPod dock in the shape of Optimus Prime towing Convoy. The trailer acts as the actual dock, while Optimus' job is apparently to transform and protect the ~~all spark~~ iPod. It's available in original colors, but it also comes in all-white, which is interesting since white is the symbolic color of death in Japan. Perhaps they're beating the dead horse of marketing and have decided to just run with it. It's available for $138 plus shipping if you happen to be an iPod fanboy and a Transformers dork (...Wert?). [JList]

Shia LaBeouf's Passenger During Alleged DUI-Related Accident Was Transformers 2 Co-Star Isabel Lucas

Ben Wojdyla — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 16:40:00 EDT

The name of the passenger in Shia LeBeouf's alleged DUI accident in LA this weekend wasn't initially released: Turns out it was Transformers 2 co-star and Aussie hottie Isabel Lucas. If you happen to be Shia "The Beef," and find yourself inexplicably famous after last summer's Transformers movie and this summer's ~~horrible crap-fest~~ Indiana Jones flick, you'd be aiming high on the lady ladder too. Oh Beef, you know Megan Fox is going to be all jealous now, stewing on the set of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. She'll probably throw herself at you, even though you never had a chance with Isabel. You sly, sly fox. [TFW2005]

7-Foot Recycled Optimus Prime Sculpture Is A Junkyard Nightmare

Travis Hudson — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:20:00 EDT

This Optimus Prime sculpture should debatably be part of our Junkyard Finds series because this seven-foot monstrosity is constructed entirely of car parts. Unlike the original Optimus Prime, this sculpture lacks color and any Mack truck affiliation, but nevertheless, it's pretty spectacular. The best fact of all is that this 551-pound Optimus Prime is even for sale for a blistering $4,838.71 (likely plus shipping). And Optimus isn't the only Transformer receiving some artistic love.

The company behind this model, Robot-Models.com, also has a smaller version of Optimus Prime currently available as well as Bumbelee. A descriptive paragraph also suggests that Jazz, Ironhide, Megatron, Barricade, Starscream, Blackout and Frenzy will also be available for purchase soon. [Robot-Models via Giz]

Optimus Prime Spotting Reaffirms Transformers 2 Filming

Travis Hudson — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 18:15:00 EDT

Who's that familiar truck spotted on a Los Angeles freeway? Oh! It must be Optimus Prime! This Optimus Prime spotting comes less than a week after we saw twin Barricades in Culver City, Calif., and it just continues to affirm that the sequel to the robogasm Transformers is, indeed, in the early filming stages.

I would assume that the Transformer beauties are being relocated to the film set from their respected storage areas. We'll just have to wait and see for ourselves as more pictures begin to pop up. [Superhero Hype via TFW2005]

Homemade Optimus Prime Costume Also Deserves Props

Travis Hudson — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 16:15:00 EST

It may not quite be the Citroen transformer, but these kids still deserve props for creating a Optimus Prime costume worthy of recognition. It appears to be around 10 feet tall, which is inching closer to a scale model of the real (and by real, I mean not-real) Optimus Prime [Blasphemy! — Ed.] Click the video above for a very anti-climactic video of Optimus Prime getting dressed and ready for work in the morning (and by work we mean killing Decepticon assholes). And y'all thought it would be the new boss-man doing the Transformers posts around these parts, eh?

[Techeblog]

Optimus Prime Hit With $236,000 Insurance Premium

Wes Siler — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 13:45:00 EDT

Saving the world from evil Decepticons isn't all it's cracked up to be. For one, the overheads are ridiculous. With gas set to hit $4.00 a gallon, Matrices of Leadership running a cool $6.5 million and less than understanding insurance agents, we're surprised they don't pack it all in for a lucrative reality TV show gig or just subcontract the work to Halliburton.

A Letter to Optimus Prime from his Insurance Agent [McSweeney's Internet Tendency]

Photo credit: Mike Bernardo

Slate's Swansburg Pits 1986 Transformers Movie Versus 2007 Transformers Movie, Forgets About Generation One

Ray Wert — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 14:30:00 EDT

I cannot believe I'm about to engage in a toolerific blogosphere tête-à-tête with John Swansburg on Transformers mythos — but whatever, I must defend an egregious display of fan-boy cultural blasphemy. Swansburg tries to provide a compare and contrast on the 1986 Transformers movie and the 2007 Transformers movie debuting today. The problem is Swany has totally missed the point here and is making the cinematic error of basically correlating apples to Decepticons. The new movie was never meant to be any kind of a replacement, re-do, remake or re-anything of the 1986 movie. Rather, it's an attempt...

...to provide an "Origins" story — something more akin to the first three episodes of Generation One cartoons. If anything, Johnny-boy should have been trying to relate the new Bay-directed film to those episodes rather than attempt something so silly as trying to say "the original Transformers movie is better than the new one." I mean, come on — there's no comparison. The original movie had more of an impact on our generation of males than any other cultural event coming from 1984 cartoons — this new movie doesn't replace that. If anything it does an excellent job of retelling the mythos, doing as good a job, if not better. But here's to hoping the sequel of this movie will cause the same type of nightmares the original movie caused and allowing the Swan to compare it to the '86 movie. You know, by like, killing Prime again and stuff for all of the kiddies of today. Let the slaughter begin, I always like to say. – Ray Wert

When Orson Welles Was a Transformer [Slate]

The Jalopnik Transformers Movie Quasi-Review: An Ameribot Revolution!

Ray Wert — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 00:01:00 EDT

Last night Ben Wojdyla and I made our way over to Birmingham to take in a sneak preview showing of the new Transformers movie. This review is split into two parts — one that's safe and spoiler-free (starting here above the fold) and then the nitty-gritty of the film (at the bottom of the area in italics below the fold). Peruse the part below the fold at your own risk and may the maker have mercy on your non-robotic soul. Oh and the pictures, there's some LA preview pics in there and some pics the General gave us of some of the designers — oh, that first one's Brian Smith, he put the stripes on Bumblebee, and yes, that's the light-up Autobot t-shirt. — Ed.

For the next few weeks General Motors is the luckiest and most important automaker on Earth. Seriously. I'm not kidding. Forget the June sales numbers next week, forget the job losses, forget the gas-guzzling SUV's and trucks from the past ten years and a recent history of shoddily-built vehicles. None of that's important — at least for the next few weeks. That's because the General has an opportunity to be the most important automaker on earth — well, at least they will be to a very important demographic for GM — 18-35-year-old males.

And really, that's because watching this movie's like watching a 144-minute commercial for the General. But, if I were really watching a 144-minute commercial for GM, you'd find me face down on the floor of the theater after the lights came back because I'd have performed some form of ritualistic suicide after minute number eleven. But the reason I'm still alive and able to talk about my experience, and do it in such an exuberant way is because despite feeling sometimes like I'd spent hours watching that Michael Bay Super Bowl ad over and over again, I didn't. That was because deep down I understood that the driving scenes which seemed to come ad nauseam — interspersed with intensely visually stunning transformations and bot-battling of course — were nothing more than the realization of just about every scene of the Generation One Transformers. The only difference was in the cartoon, they weren't real cars. In the live-action movie however, they were — and necessitated a real automaker to play a role. In this case that automaker's General Motors.

It makes sense that Michael Bay would choose GM for this movie — he's worked with them in the past on almost every one of his movies and even on the previously mentioned commercial ( Hey, we're assuming the dude needed some cash, ok?). But what makes this arrangement so amazing is that GM didn't pay Paramount a single dime to get it done. That's right — not a single penny changed hands between the big n' beefy automaker and the big n' beefy studio. Sure, GM provided some in-kind contributions of concept vehicles and the like, and of course they've got their own marketing budget running their own marketing campaign — but unlike other automakers, they didn't drop a single pence into Paramount's pocket for the privilege of having themselves featured in a movie about good-guy cars that change into robots.

So all I'm saying is — this fell into GM's hands. So give the General a break when you see the shots of their vehicles every other second. Suspend disbelief for a moment and let yourself get transported back to when you were a kid and Optimus Prime was your latchkey surrogate father, and just let the memories flow. It may be what GM's hoping will happen to you — and the reason why I've said they're the most important automaker in the world over the next few weeks to men of my age and demographic — but, just because it's what GM wants doesn't necessarily mean it's a bad thing. As two of us can attest — suspending disbelief for a few hours can allow you to have one amazingly fun ride.

And now — here's the plot spoilers and little stuff to watch out for that I wrote down while watching the movie:

-Automobile magazine gets a shout-out in the movie — in the form of Sam Witwicky carrying a copy of it in the car on the way to pick up his first car.

-The Decepticon tank's called "Devastator."

-Check out the Bee-Otch rearview mirror ornament in the old-school Camaro.

-One of the most funny car lines of the movie is when Sam calls Bumblebee "Satan's Camaro."

-I knew this was fiction at the point I saw a Saturn, Hummer, Cadillac and a Pontiac all in the same dealership.

-Best lines were a tie between "What's up bitches?" (Jazz) and "You want to lay the fate of the world on the kid's Camaro?" (Agent Simmons)

-Best car porn of the movie: Every dessert shot of the Autobots rolling out. Seriously, I got the chills every single time.

-Bumblebee loses his legs and has Megan Fox drive him around.

-Best scene of the movie: Mustang v. Camaro — seriously had a cargasm, then a robogasm, then a cargasm...epic.

-Megan Fox is hot.

-Jazz gets ripped in half by Megatron on top of a building and dies.

-Optimus has a power-sword, and he wields it like a mad sweet gladiator.

-"One shall stand, one shall fall..."

-Most important thing I have to say about this movie: I owe Michael Bay an apology — Bay delivers with a robotic tour de force unlike anything I've ever experienced. It was the best robogasm of my life and I'm going to see it again and again."

And that's all I've got to say about that. – Ray Wert

Vote For Brian Lam, Our Little Gadget Bitch

Ray Wert — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 20:15:00 EDT

This is Brian Lam. Brian runs our little site obsessed with gadgets. Brian's usually a good guy, but today he's pissed one of us off a little. Can anyone guess why he may have pissed off one of us? If you can't figure out why, then you obviously haven't been reading us enough. But we won't hold any grudges against Brian. Oh, wait — is there some sort of ~~nerd popularity contest~~ poll going on over at Business 2.0 today where you can vote whether or not Brian matters? We wouldn't want to influence that in any way now would we? Hmm — well — just to show we're good sports — we ask you guys to head on over and help Brian out by giving him "100" after you're done looking at him playing with toys below. – Ray Wert

Why Megatron Will Never Beat Optimus Prime [Gizmodo]
Honk if You Like Gizmodo: Business 2.0's Poll [Gizmodo]

Transformers Movie Update: MTV Shows Over A Minute Of New Hot Robot Action!

Ray Wert — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 12:00:00 EDT

We just got a chance to check out the new shots of the live-action Transformers movie coming out next month that were shown on MTV last night. Until you've got a chance to check them out above we'll try not ruin it for you — let's just say the footage is — right, robogasmic. Yeah, so what if it's kind of like watching a long commercial for GM products — how many chances do you get to see Optimus Prime battling the Constructicon-like Bonecrusher on a freeway, and toppling over the edge to fall in front of a Cadillac. Crap — now it's a friggin' commercial again! Damn you, Michael Bay! – Ray Wert

Optimus Prime vs Bonecrusher [MichaelBay.com]

Transformers Movie Update: Fifty Hot Screen Shots Of Movie Action!

Ray Wert — Mon, 07 May 2007 14:32:00 EDT

Despite the whole "Optimus Prime with lips" thing, we've got to say we're still pretty excited about the upcoming live-action movie. Of course, maybe that's only because we were able to snag these fifty some-odd PR shots from Paramount Pictures. Enjoy the ensuing robogasm. [Please note, we cannot be in any way held liable for those of you having a robogasm and any other -gasm simultaneously due to the hot robot action spliced in with the hot Megan Fox action. Just sayin'...] – Ray Wert

[via /Film]

Transformers Movie Update: Michael Bay Forum Reports Optimus Prime WILL Have Lips

Ray Wert — Sat, 05 May 2007 17:58:41 EDT

It looks like there's now a definitive answer on the question of "will he or won't he" when it comes to giving Prime the lips that whatever robotic god never wanted him to have over the past however many years he's been around. TFW2005's pointed us to their scoop on everyone's favorite Autobot leader via Nelson over on the Shoot For The Edit forum. He's saying:

"The photo of OP in the LA Times [above] should tell you what the final decision is on the mouth/faceplate/battle mask is."

Guess that means there's still potential for Michael Bay to create some kind of Optimus on Megan Fox makeout session as part of his desire to push the boundaries of unnecessary love stories in an action movie. The part though that's killing us is that the site Admin who tossed it out there is asking for us to "quit the whining." Yes, well — one of us will quite the whining when his boss decides not to so liberally toss around my childhood memories like an empty energon cube. Just sayin'... – Ray Wert

It's time to rest and relax [Shoot For The Edit via TFW2005]
He's not toying around [LA Times]

Transformers Movie Update: Optimus Prime, It's You — It's Really You!

Ray Wert — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 16:00:00 EDT

In case you can't tell from the splice below, the Lam-man and the Chenster from Gizmodo have the first hands-on with the Optimus Prime toy from the new live-action Transformers movie. I think I just had a robogasm over this here long-nose semi. We've got a taste of the gallery below, but head over to our gadget-obsessed friends to check out the hands-on. – Ray Wert

Hands-on With the New Optimus Prime Transformer [Gizmodo]

Transformers Movie Update: Optimus Prime Will NOT Have Lips — So Sayeth Michael Bay!

Ray Wert — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 02:01:00 EDT

The Bay speaks, and here's what he has to say about our little video we obtained of Autobot king trucker Optimus Prime speaking with the lips:

"The unreleased ad (Prime speaks) that was posted on youtube was a test that European were making with the ads. The clip where OP was "speaking," lets just say that it wasn't OP or Cullen speaking. It was something the European studios added on their own. In fact, it was a test shot."

Glad he finally cleared that up. Oh yeah, we've also got some new screen shots from the movie to show you — enjoy. We know we will, because tonight will be the first night in a long while we can finally sleep soundly knowing Bay hasn't fubar-ed at least this one tiny part of our most cherished memories of childhood. – Ray Wert

Spoke to Michael [MichaelBay.com via freezedriedmovies]

Transformers Movie Update: Optimus Prime Has Lips?!

Ray Wert — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 18:50:26 EDT

WTF? That's it — Bay officially may have just ruined the movie for me. I'm going to go cry in my corner now and remember back when I was a kid before I accidentally crushed my Optimus Prime toy with a rock. Ooh, I know, maybe I'll spend some time looking through other, non-lip pictures from earlier posts. – Ray Wert