Beast Wars: Sourcebook

Transformers: Beast Wars is an entertainment franchise from Hasbro, and part of the larger Transformers franchise. The fiction directly follows the Transformers: Generation 1 continuity established by the 1984 series and animated film, while ignoring the continuity established with the Japanese Transformers series, though this franchise would have two exclusive Japanese series of its own. Previous to Beast Wars, Hasbro had attempted to relaunch the original toys and animation as Transformers: Generation 2. Hasbro intended another franchise titled Transtech to follow, combining Beast Wars and Generation 1 characters and aesthetics, but this was cancelled. Instead the franchise began a series of reboots, beginning with the Japanese-produced Transformers: Car Robot series.

Beast Wars was succeeded by Beast Machines, a new series with a new creative team in charge of production. The Maximals find themselves back on Cybertron, malfunctioning and trapped into their first beast modes (the ones they had at the beginning of Beast Wars) without memory of what happened previously, fighting for survival against mindless drones called Vehicons controlled by Megatron and being reformatted into their technorganic forms. With the whole planet empty and all of the Transformers missing, Optimus Primal, Cheetor, Rattrap and Blackarachnia begin a new crusade, this time to free the entire planet.

The Japanese series Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo were created to fill the gap while the second and third seasons of Beast Wars were being translated into Japanese (called Beast Wars: Metals). The characters originate from the future that the Beast Wars teams left, but the events of the series take place in the far future. The series are noted primarily for the return of Unicron, but more negatively, for their childish, comedic nature, as the Transformers franchise is aimed at a very young age group in Japan when compared to Canada. Beast Wars II spawned a theatrical movie. The Beast Wars Neo toyline was created to cater to the Japanese market. Whereas the cybernetic transmetal Beast Wars Transformers sold well in Western markets, Japanese fans preferred more realistic looking beast modes, thus Beast Wars Metals was not as successful with Japanese fans. The second and third season of Beast Wars and its toy line only lasted a few months before being quickly replaced by Transformers: Car Robots in the following new year, in which several unused Transmetal 2 molds were used as Destrongers (Predacons). Beast Machines was also imported to Japan in 2004 under the title Beast Wars Returns, though it didn't gain very much popularity.

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Wikipedia