Character discussion : This Week 'Ultra Magnus'

[Impactor returns 2.0]

So we come to Ultra Magnus...
A big league Autobot, old and wise?
Worthy leader of the Autobots?
or just a warrior?
Bestowed with to much hype?
Where was he doing his best,
and when was he at his worst?

p.s. someone remind me what he was doing in G2 again please?

[Kaylee]

I always liked Magnus tho he never quite seemed to live up to his potential outside of T2006. Then again I like the reluctant warrior type, its one of the things I enjoyed about Prime before DW decided the Matrix was just going to make him big and strong >.<

That and the whole business about UM being Prime's brother was feeble imo.

I always preferred it that he was built to look like Prime to inspire the soldiers.

[Ozz]

Magnus is in my Top 3 Autobots. I just love how he got **** beaten out of him by Galvatron (almost) every time, but he still could find the courage and go back for more. He couldn't be stopped. His rivalry with Galvy was one of the ongoing plots I liked the most, shame that it never got a proper ending. And even more shame that Ultra Magnus was simply ditched and never appeared again after Deadly Games.

He wasn't bad in 3rd season, either. Sometimes.

I liked the beginning of Age of Wrath when he was afraid of responsibility and didn't believe in himself, but then went in and led Autobots to the victory, just like in Marvel times.

Mick's Magnus was rather m'eh.

[spiderfrommars]

A big league Autobot, old and wise?

Wise beyond his years perhaps, but not old. He was constructed by the Autobot resistance in the 1980s with Operation Volcano in mind. So he's a spring chicken.

Worthy leader of the Autobots?

He was billed as one of the 'New Leaders' originally wasn't he? (at least by Hasbro). In that sense it was all a bit anti-climactic, as he was basically in charge for half an hour in the movie, plus a few Ladybird books.

I sense he wouldn't feel comfortable with the mantle of leadership ("I'm a soldier..." etc.) but he's served well in command positions: see Legacy of Unicron or Space Pirates.

Certainly stronger than Rodimus then, but probably equally uncomfortable with the job.

or just a warrior?

Well he was dubbed The Autobots Greatest Warrior by the resistance.

Bestowed with too much hype?

Lived up to it IMO. Shame that "I can't deal with that now" haunts him somewhat... inevitably he's probably more popular with comic than cartoon fans.

Where was he doing his best,

His steadfast refusal to go down against Galvatron. This lead to 3 of the comics greatest ever showdowns: UK issues 86, 116 and the '87 annual. (funnily enough his eventual victory in Salvage against Galvy rang hollow for me). But his sacrifice in the volcano (Vicious Circle) is one of the most heroic things ever.

He seemed a more skilled fighter than Galvy I'd say.

and when was he at his worst?

From an aesthetic point of view, whenever Dan Reed drew him.

Plus vanishing off the radar after Time Wars was a bit of a downer...

p.s. someone remind me what he was doing in G2 again please?

I'd say he was leading an important offworld mission somewhere. He was back in time for Alignment though.

[Scraplet]

One of my favourite characters, at least from the Marvel run. Theres lots of things that gave him a well-rounded personality and found very easy to believe in. A hero with vulnerabilities to balance his strengths, eg

His decisiveness and courage / his self doubt

Ability as a warrior / his dislike of war

His ability to inspire the troops and act as leader / his inability to see his worth and allow those natural abilities to fulfill their potential.

He's a character that you can genuinly empathise with.....

[Birdman]

Hi all,
Yes, Magnus in the UK comics was an inriguing character: like the way that they contrasted the motives behind himself and Megatron (actually Straxatron) confronting and beating their inner demons in 'Salvage', I think? A shame that it was the FUTURE Magnus that we saw in the Time Wars, but at least even THAT Magnus would have had the memories of the present-day one (assuming that the changes to the timeline didn't screw that up), so there would have been some 'closure'.
Despite being basically the equivalent of an action movie, there was some great artwork in that part of 'Target 2006' where Magnus and Galvy fought, in particular Galvy on top of Magnus in truck mode digging his fingers through the front windows...that's got to hurt!

[Best First]

A big league Autobot, old and wise?

Wise beyond his years perhaps, but not old. He was constructed by the Autobot resistance in the 1980s with Operation Volcano in mind. So he's a spring chicken.

does it say anywhere he was explicitly built for Volacno? Even so the plan may have been gestating for ages.

I suspect he is a little older than 1980s at the very least.

Anyway, i love Mags, he had a great arc in the Marvel run up to a point - sadly i think SF rather screwed up the ending, judging people wanted to see Prime/Galvy more - but in the end that was a bit of a lame duck as well. Essentially i think the fact Mags is so well handled up to Deadly Games really underscores how odd it is that he is entirely absent after this. Sigh.

[spiderfrommars]

A big league Autobot, old and wise?

Wise beyond his years perhaps, but not old. He was constructed by the Autobot resistance in the 1980s with Operation Volcano in mind. So he's a spring chicken.

does it say anywhere he was explicitly built for Volacno? Even so the plan may have been gestating for ages.

I suspect he is a little older than 1980s at the very least.

Hmm, I'll give you that. The timeframe is very murky... could be anything from 1 to 1000 years in the making I suppose. I would still definitely count him as 'very young' in the TF sense.

More info on Magnus' origins for anyone interested:

http://transfans.tfarchive3.com/popup.php?id=750

[Impactor returns 2.0]

im glad in G2 he had more important things to do?
jhaxius V's UM... interesting

[Legion]

and when was he at his worst?

From an aesthetic point of view, whenever Dan Reed drew him.

Plus vanishing off the radar after Time Wars was a bit of a downer...

He vanished long before TimeWars... the UM in TimeWars was the future version of him...

[Dead Head]

An interesting character, and my favorite by a long way. Ultra Magnus is one of the more rounded-out personalities in season three of the cartoon, and when it comes to the comic book series, he was one of the highlights of the series during Transformers UK's peak (along with Galvatron, of course).

Primus loves a trier. Not to mention a robot who can fix the mechanics of a trans-time dimensional portal! (see: Time Wars)

I love that he's this big fighting brute (the hardware's all there), but he's impaired by his own nonsensical misgivings (the softwares a bit buggy). A bit of a mentalist, really. Magnus was portrayed as one of the good guys, for sure, but one almost on the road to becoming unhinged (thanks in no small part to Galvatron), and was prone to the occasional 'human' negative outburst too (e.g. shouting at Hound, threatening Outback, sucking his thumb while Galvy hammered the Sparkabots). All nice things in a character, really.

UM lived up to his profile of someone always on the look-out for his pals, especially the weaker ones. Dare I say it, but that aspect of Ultra Magnus struck me most as a child. The unassuming hero.

Years later I got the toy. It looks cool in tractor-trailer mode. It looks brilliant in robot mode. But it's a _brick_ , to all intents and purposes.

Overall, Ultra Magnus can borrow my lawnmower any day.



WORST MOMENTS: the inexplicabe sidelining and dumb deactivation of UM in "Time Wars"; Magnus' vanishing from the Marvel comic; not getting the expected all-out kick-ass final fight against Galvatron; Hasbro's awful shoehorning of Rodimus Prime in to royally steal UM's thunder; Ultra Magnus' shoddy characterization in the animated movie

BEST MOMENTS: the whole Galvatron vs. Ultra Magnus arc is a very classic Furman story, even in a general comic book sense; his interesting interaction with 'the other side' i.e. with Flywheels in "City Of Fear" / with Soundwave in "Space Pirates"; the animated adverts (really!) for the Ultra Magnus toy; any time he was drawn by Geoff Senior; his general skillz at kicking deceptibutt; standing with Optimus Prime in "The Rebirth, Part 1" and "Resurrection"

THEME SONG 1: "Tubthumping" by Chumbawamba ... #"I get knocked down / But I get up again!"#
THEME SONG 2: "Never Say Die" by Black Sabbath ... #"Don't you ever say die / Don't you ever say die / Never say die!"#

[Bouncelot]

I always thought that something really bad had happened to him between Deadly Games and Time Wars - in #200, Springer mentions something about the situation on Cybertron that meant they had to team up with the Mayhems, but doesn't mention what it was. I'd always assumed that he was alluding to something happening to Magnus.

[bobaprime85]

There are some people that come along who just seem to fit the position of 'second-in-command' and Magnus is one of them. I've always liked his 'soldier' mentality and his reluctance to assume authority, even though he is in fact eminently qualified. If he would get over his doubts, then we would definitely see a situation like AoW wherein he could really take the fight to the Decepticons. However, it seems that he will always be a bit more comfortable taking orders from someone like Prime, Xaaron or Roddy.

His rivalry with Galvatron is legendary, and one of the best things about the comics, which makes the way he got passed over in Time Wars all the more bitter. This only gets compounded by his marked absence from the rest of the series. I've always wondered what the Uncron Saga would have been like with Magnus in the mix.

However, we do have Furman's reassurance that he happily raised two Scraplets and a Mecannibal, so I guess it evens out.

[Hound]

Magnus is probably one of my favourite autobots, pretty much for all the reasons above.

DW Magnus almost killed off my love for him

[Autobloke]

Ultra Magnus. Meeeehhhhhhhh!!!!
The first Optimus Prime to combine with his trailer (albeit in repaint mode).
A cookie-cutter goodguy with a self-doubt personanlity crowbarred in. Why is it that all Autobots made into leaders when Prime croaks seem to have the 'doubt'?
Frankly, I didn't even notice when he disappeared from the Marvel run (only realising when it was recently mentioned in this forum) - he had THAT little influence on me.
In the cartoon he was bland. In the comics he was predictable. Hell, Dreamwave gave him the most characterisation he'd ever had.
I don't know, he just didn't ever 'do' it for me. And I'm not entirely sure why - it seems like he was quite popular from what's been posted so far.

[bobaprime85]

Ultra Magnus. Meeeehhhhhhhh!!!!

*sharpens knife*

Shall I execute him now, later, or painfully?

[Guest]

However, we do have Furman's reassurance that he happily raised two Scraplets and a Mecannibal, so I guess it evens out.

The Poker Fiend!

Then again, when you've been twatted by Galvy so many times that your face is stuck in permanent grimace...

[Autobloke]

Ultra Magnus. Meeeehhhhhhhh!!!!

*sharpens knife*

Shall I execute him now, later, or painfully?

I think that you should execute Ultra Magnus right now.

[Ozz]

Painfully it is, then.

[Snowcat]

Well, I always loved Magnus. The fact that he truly had self-doubt instead of just being a whiny bitch like Rodimus made for a better characterisation, IMHO.

[KingMob]

Autobloke: the new Predabot?

I like what Ozz and Dead Head said the best (tho everyone else's stuff was great too)...esp 'Primus loves a trier'. 'Coz that was made Magnus the hero of the book for me, more than Prime and Grimmers. Magnus was portrayed as a real hero, he took a kicking but - eventually - got back in the game.
And what Scraplet said about empathising with him.

And I agree that the fact that he did have weak moments were what made him more appealing. Because everyone thinks a variation along 'oh crap, have I gotta do that/face him, I don't wanna'...esp kids who have problems with bullies.
Now there's an audience identification character, not yer Bumblebee or yer Buster/Spike.

A lot of why I like Magnus is based on things that I thought as a kid, obv...

Nobody is really like Prime, or Grimlock. Or Prowl. Not 90% of the time anyway. But Magnus...I think we can see more of ourselves in him, our weaknesses and hopefully, our strengths. Magnus performed heroic deeds that translated down to our levels are admirable, everyday levels of 'goodness'; do your duty; but not if it means doing the wrong thing; stand up for and help your friends, conquer your fears and be a good guy.
Simple.
The borderline berserker rages were pretty cool as well tho

He was also a good 'middle-man'...he liked to talk his way out of things and vocally promoted 'good' morals. But he had the punch to back it up. I think even that was important, as a kid...know your limitations, it's good to have something to back the talk up.

Prime and Grimlock are, for me at least, pretty much fairy tale characters, 'oh wouldn't it be cool to be that smart/strong/confident/have a posse of ultimate bad-asses as your best mates'. Ultra Magnus is someone a lot closer to a role-model, and his way is the most sensible when compared to real life.

Pretty inspiring guy. Wish he was in the comic more, shame he got vanished. He was pretty much the only humanist main character. Apart from maybe Scorpy(!).

I can see, esp as I get older, how he can be viewed as kinda boring. Coz all his dramatic bits were fights or interior.

[Scraplet]

.....the fact that he did have weak moments were what made him more appealing. Because everyone thinks a variation along 'oh crap, have I gotta do that/face him, I don't wanna'...esp kids who have problems with bullies.
Now there's an audience identification character, not yer Bumblebee or yer Buster.

[applauds loudly] You hit the nail on the head, buddy. I'd have been about 12/13 years old when UM came into the comic, and you're right. He's one of the few characters who actually provided something reasonably deep I could identify with.

[Impactor returns 2.0]

this guy was never gonna become leader was he?

ever notice the different moods of Magnus? one was confidence extream (when he was around OP actually) and the other was the one of self doubt (generally around Galvatron!)

[jboyler]

Prime and Grimlock are, for me at least, pretty much fairy tale characters, 'oh wouldn't it be cool to be that smart/strong/confident/have a posse of ultimate bad-asses as your best mates'. Ultra Magnus is someone a lot closer to a role-model, and his way is the most sensible when compared to real life.

You said it better than I could.


-J

[Shanti418]

this Ultra Magnus lovefest is giving me a headache.

[Autobloke]

was there ever a Marvel or cartoon depiction of Magus' (shudder) white Optimus configuration? Or was it ever only addressed in the (yeek!) DW stuff?

[Ozz]

No, there wasn't.

And since I'm not familiar with toys, I thought Dreamwave came up with it. I gave them too much credit.

[Autobloke]

Far too much. Check out a toy TF toy site (do we have toys here? I only come to the forum - to venture further scares me). The white Prime part of Magnus was a repaint if the G1 Prime toy. How can you NOT know this?

[spiderfrommars]

I think it happened in a Japanese cartoon as well.

[Autobloke]

Any stills? Did it just look like a recoloured cartoon Prime? Like he was in 'Return Of Optimus Prime' after the paintjob?