Tuesday, February 3, 2009

The Ark Addendum - The Ark II

After taking a week off of posting behind-the-scenes production material, I thought I'd try to find something extra cool. And so, I bring another installment of The Ark Addendum. This week it's The Ark II, the abortive spacecraft that was to carry the Autobots back to Cybertron with enough fuel to revitalize it. This plot element was dropped once Transformers went from a mini-series to an ongoing series, but they nevertheless designed a pretty cool ship. It's reminiscent of The Ark, pictured below, without being slavish.

Overall, I think that The Ark II is a pretty cool ship. It's kind of a shame that they never did anything with it, but I can understand why they'd want to keep the focus of the show firmly on Earth.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Going by deleted stuff from "Transport to oblivion" script:

"IRONHIDE (CONT)
All systems ready for tomorrow's launch to Cybertron!

OPTIMUS PRIME
Acknowledged. At last we can return to our homeland--if it indeed still exists.."

it seems that they have planned to use Ark II in the regular series.

Check it out for more interesting stuff that unfortunatly naver made it into final product:
http://www.bigbot.com/transformers/scripts/cartoon_show/transport1.shtml

Jimtron said...

Neat stuff. That ties nicely in with the bible comments about how it was the Decepticon attack that disrupts the launch. Too bad it was cut, it would have been a nice bit of continuity.

Anonymous said...

What I find most interesting is that this bears some resemblence to the Ark's alternate design from the comic book to me.

I wonder if it could possibly be the source of that variation between Comic and Toon?

Jimtron said...

you know, it's an interesting idea, but I'm guessing it's just coincidence. I've come across a LOT of the old marvel production material and I haven't seen this drawing among any of them. The classic ark drawing I've seen in many different sources.

LBD 'Nytetrayn' said...

Hmm, glad to see this... it gives a little bit of closure to a mystery I had always wondered about.

--LBD "Nytetrayn"

Anonymous said...

I assume this was Mr. Dery's work & not one of his assistants (it looks like his). Very awesome.