Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers
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Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers (ビーストウォーズ 超生命体トランスフォーマー Beast Wars Chō Seimeitai Transformer) is the title given to Beast Wars franchise in Japan. Like its Generation 1 predecessor it was overseen by Takara directly, and saw yearly branding refreshes accompanied by additional cartoons and toys. It consists of the following components:
- A toyline.
- Various cartoons.
- The Transformers brand's second-ever theatrical release in the form of a triple feature combining content from the 1997 season and Beast Wars II with an early preview of Beast Wars Metals.
- A short at an animation expo.
- An accompanying series of comics.
- A stage play.
- And a sausage.
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Continuity
Where Japan-exclusive seasons Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo are situated relative to previous Transformers continuity, the first Beast Wars series, and any contemporary Earth calendar was a source of confusion for many years. Fans in the West spent years attempting to understand two series that were never officially translated into English, which led to a number of misconceptions based on reports from people who spoke Japanese, observing visual media without the context of translated text, and so on. The initial understanding was that Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo starred characters who were contemporaries to the Maximals and Predacons from the American Beast Wars cartoon, who lived a mere three centuries after the end of the Great War. This was mostly a "default" assumption (as in, there was no reason NOT to think it), and it appeared to be confirmed at first by the first Beast Wars II toy catalog, which depicted Lio Convoy and Galvatron directly interacting with Optimus Primal and Megatron, respectfully.
By the end of Beast Wars II, however, information surfaces that refute this assumption. Like ancient Vok-occupied Earth of Beast Wars, the planet Gaia of Beast Wars II is only later identified as a future version of Earth. As early as Episode 2, the Predacons encounter remnants of a long-abandoned advanced civilization on Gaia. Eventually, Episode 36 reveals that the long-vanished civilization belonged to humanity, who had left the planet behind tens of thousands of years ago, placing it in the distant future relative to both Beast Wars and other works of Transformers fiction. Indeed, during the Beast Wars II movie special, Optimus Primal is pulled out of space and time to Gaia, and Lio Convoy's crew treats him as a legendary figure from the past. The Beast Wars II comic series, meanwhile, sticks to the backstory as established in that early catalog and treats Lio Convoy and Optimus Primal as contemporaries in its third chapter.
Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers
The subtitle-less first year of the Japanese franchise was released in 1997, one year after its launch in Hasbro markets. It focused solely on the first year of the cartoon while combining Hasbro's 1996 and 1997 products into one large line. It is notable as the Transformers dubbing debut of prolific voice director Yoshikazu Iwanami. More on him later.
Beast Wars II
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Beast Wars II: Super Lifeform Transformers (ビーストウォーズII 超生命体トランスフォーマー Beast Wars II: Chō Seimeitai Transformer), pronounced "Beast Wars Second", was the first Japan-only Beast Wars sub-franchise, debuting in 1998.
The Beast Wars II cartoon series aired in Japan between season one of Beast Wars and seasons two and three, in order to fill the gap until the later seasons could be dubbed into Japanese. The Cybertron (Maximal) team starts off with Lio Convoy, Apache, Bighorn, Tasmania Kid, Scuba, and Diver. The Destron (Predacon) side starts off with Galvatron, Megastorm, Starscream, BB, Dirge, and Thrust.
The Beast Wars II toyline consisted almost entirely of redecoes (and the occasional retool) of Generation 1, Generation 2, Machine Wars, and American Beast Wars toys, although all new molds were created for the two faction leaders: Lio Convoy, a white lion, Galvatron, a purple dragon, and Moon an oft-abused robot space bunny anime mascot. Most of the Predacons are mechanical while the Maximals all have beast modes.
Beast Wars Neo
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Beast Wars Neo: Super Lifeform Transformers (ビーストウォーズネオ 超生命体トランスフォーマー Beast Wars Neo Chō Seimeitai Transformer) was the second Japanese exclusive sub-franchise, released in spring 1999.
Beast Wars Neo followed (and was a semi-sequel to) Beast Wars II. Of note is the fact that the Beast Wars Neo comic was considerably more different from its anime counterpart than Beast Wars II's had been.
Unlike the Beast Wars II toyline, which consisted almost entirely of redecoes (and the occasional retool), Beast Wars Neo was largely composed of all new original molds with only a few reused American Beast Wars toys to fill them out. The Maximals have organic beast modes of mostly present day animals (with the exception of the Mammoth Big Convoy), while the Predacons featured mainly extinct/prehistoric animals such as dinosaurs.
Beast Wars Metals
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Super Lifeform Transformers: Beast Wars Metals (超生命体トランスフォーマー ビーストウォーズメタルス Chō Seimeitai Transformers Beast Wars Metals) is the third and final Japanese sub-franchise of Beast Wars released in fall of 1999.
The Beast Wars Metals cartoon consisted of the North American season 2 and 3 episodes. While Yoshikazu Iwanami and his voice team had been relatively restrained with respect to ad-libbing for the franchise's subtitle-less first year, Beast Wars Metals was a full-bore self-parody, constantly breaking the fourth wall and demonstrating awareness of its own status as a TV series. For good or ill the show proved a shot in the arm for the franchise, and this aggressively "punched up" dubbing style has become synonymous with imported Transformers cartoons in Japan to this day.
Metals was a smaller line than its predecessors, sticking entirely with characters who appeared in the show (even if not in Transmetal bodies). The first wave of toys had different, more "show-accurate" decoes and, notably, name tampographs were replaced with generic "CYBERTRON" and "DESTRON" markings. However, toys in later waves were functionally the same as Hasbro releases (other than minor changes to Optimal Optimus/Powered Convoy). The line also included a Takara-only retool of Transmetal Cheetor into Ravage (reflecting a character model re-use in show), which was quickly a very sought-after item outside Japan.
Post-series media
Telemocha
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Ten years after the release of the cartoon, the Beast Wars characters were revisited with the Beast Wars Telemocha Series toys, redecoes of Beast Wars figures packaged with DVDs including first-season episodes as well as a brand new "Diorama Story" feature.
IDW Publishing
IDW Publishing's Beast Wars comics from 2006–2008 took place parallel to the original Beast Wars cartoon. They starred other Maximals and Predacons leaving from the same present and traveling to the ancient past to have their own conflict behind-the-scenes while the Axalon and Darksyde warred. These comics incorporated characters from both Beast Wars II and its immediate sequel, Beast Wars Neo, into its rebooted Beast Wars timeline. In IDW's timeline, however, the events of those two series did not take place thousands of years after Beast Wars, but hundreds of years before it. Lio Convoy, Magmatron and others were already veterans of those conflicts when the Axalon and Darksyde vanished. Relevant material includes:
Fun Publications
Fun Publications' 2015 English language prose epic Beast Wars: Uprising made heavy use of Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo characters in its dramatic reimagining of the Beast Wars setting from the ground up, centering Beast Wars II commander Lio Convoy as the de facto protagonist of the small franchise.
Beast Wars Again
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2023 saw a sudden revival of Japan's Beast Wars franchise as TakaraTomy sought to ensure children knew what the heck a "Beast Warrior" was ahead of the Beast Wars cast's big screen debut in Rise of the Beasts. The franchise was composed of meticulously screen-accurate redecoes of the Beast Wars figures from the earlier War for Cybertron: Kingdom toyline along with a re-airing of the original cartoon.
Trivia
- Despite its scramble to fill air time between imported material, constant flip flops between mediums, casts, and settings, steadily declining sales, and razor thin turnarounds, Beast Wars: Super Lifeform Transformers nonetheless managed to air like clockwork on TV Tokyo in the 6:30 PM Wednesday slot from October 1, 1997 all the way through March 29, 2000, even frictionlessly passing the baton to the next Japanese Transformers franchise, Transformers: Car Robots.
