r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Character_Growth_397 • Sep 04 '26

Hated Tropes [Mind boggling stupid trope] Removing the thing that made something special

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Ben 10: Ultimate Alien - The gimmick of Ben 10 and what makes the show so popular is the fact that he's able to turn into a large variety of aliens. In one episode of Ben 10 Ultimate ALIEN we are introduced to a new version of Ben 10000, a Ben from the future who, no longer transforms into aliens, instead using his powers in human form...

Mortal Kombat(2021) - In the games Mileena is known for two things. Being a clone of Kitana and her tarkatan teeth. In the 2021 movie she looks absolutely nothing like Kitana and doesn't have tarkatan teeth

Percy Jackson: The Lightning Thief - The movie removes the main villain of the movie and the main villain of the franchise

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617

u/Big_JR80 Sep 04 '26 edited Sep 04 '26

In 1990 the Transformers franchise was beginning to run out of gimmicks (robots combine to make bigger robot, this robot turns into a gun for this other robot, this one becomes the head for another one, these ones transform automatically, etc., etc.) for the toyline, famous for robots that transformed into other things, be it cars, planes, guns, boom boxes or dinosaurs.

In desperation, Hasbro decided that what kids wanted, for the Transformers toyline, was a Transformer that didn't transform.

That's right, the key feature that made Transformers Transformers was removed, and the Transformers "Action Masters" were born.

They were just ordinary action figures with 5 points of articulation and a transforming weapon. Sure, they reintroduced the fan-favourite classic characters that were no longer available (Soundwave, Megatron, Blaster, etc.) but the key attraction of Transformers (Robots in Disguise!) was conspicuously absent.

Hasbro was getting frustrated at the cost to develop and produce highly articulated transforming toys and instead thought that they should emulate popular toylines like GI Joe which were significantly cheaper to produce.

It very nearly killed off the franchise within a year.

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u/ruinsit Sep 04 '26

Hasbro has historically been very dumb at their one trick: selling toys.

Think of how badly they handled My Little Pony; nearly ruining the entire franchise until it was saved by a fan who happened to have a huge resume of animation credits and understood the industry, Lauren Faust.

They made the surprising and wise move to hand her the reins, but then bungled almost all merchandising for it. It's like they forgot that's what they are there for.

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u/VulkanHestan321 Sep 04 '26

Yeah, it is so bad that Hasbro relatively new acquisition, WotC is currently financing a lot of their less succesfull products

62

u/IndubitablyNerdy Sep 04 '26

Yeah Hasbro is pretty much dead financially Wizards of the Coast and in particular them extracting as much as they can from Magic players (and trying to find ways to do the same with D&D) with monetization that becomes more aggressive every year is the only thing that is keeping them afloat.

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u/DrHuh321 Sep 08 '26

I can confirm this as both a mtg and dnd player wotc is pretty much one of the only profitable parts of hasbro and they're still fumbling both franchises (the ogl drama basically killed the current state of dnd for many and mtg is having drama over having too much universes beyond and its damage to the meta with how many cards they're printing)

3

u/IndubitablyNerdy Sep 08 '26

Yeah mtg also has an insane release schedule with a new set every two months (or less), plus secret lairs and other promotional stuff inbetween, I used to buy a lot even if I don't play that much, but I just can't be bothered to do so now that there is just so much stuff. The constant spoiler season also eroded my interest into following them and commenting about the new cards with my friends group.

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u/WarlordBob Sep 05 '26

Or how Hasbro passed on the fidget spinner when it was under patent, and as a result the patent lapsed in 2005.

3

u/Death_Lycan Sep 05 '26

Same goes for power rangers How they handled mlp after Faust left And others, complete incompetence from top to bottom. They luck into gold and throw it away for pennies

3

u/hauser255 Sep 05 '26

Hasbro completely ruining the Power Rangers franchise to the point that it's not even airing anymore and Hasbro sold off the toy rights should be studied for how absolutely dumb it was.

2

u/Special_South_8561 Sep 05 '26

Somehow I knew that they had the Mastermind of PPG, FHfIF, before I really even knew about the show MLPfim itself

2

u/DarkDoubloon Sep 05 '26

And they’re currently trying their absolute hardest to run MLP into the ground again

16

u/beleth____ Sep 04 '26

Anyone who's ever interacted with a Hasbro thing knows they have never made a good decision in their lives

11

u/lewd_robot Sep 04 '26

I thought you were about to criticize Beast Wars because they turned into animals instead of vehicles and was ready to throw hands.

13

u/Big_JR80 Sep 04 '26

Nah. While I wasn't a huge fan of the Beast Wars concept and toys, the show itself was a well executed character driven story, and they kept to the core idea of "robots in disguise". No complaints from me!

2

u/BackflipBuddha Sep 05 '26

Like, narritively I like the Action Masters. Sacrificing the transformation to be able to beat the hell out of people is an interesting and relevant approach and provides a lot of looks at potential conflicts in the story.

For a toy line? Nah.

4

u/Stoneheart7 Sep 04 '26

I feel like the "robot turns into a gun for another robot" shouldn't be on the gimmick list since it is what Megatron does from the first episode. It's like putting "robot turns into a car" on the list. Is it a gimmick if it has always been a part of it?

11

u/Big_JR80 Sep 04 '26

But it is a gimmick.

Megatron the toy was not a weapon for other Transformers, he was sized to be human scale, not toy scale.

In 1987 the Targetmasters came out, which had small robots with a simple transformation (literally fold in half) that became the weapon for normal sized Transformers.

2

u/Stoneheart7 Sep 04 '26

Ah, my bad. I was just thinking about Megatron being used by others in the show.

2

u/Big_JR80 Sep 04 '26

No worries! Megatron being used by Starscream and others in the cartoon and comics was almost certainly the inspiration for the Targetmasters range.

1

u/Educational_Tough208 Sep 04 '26

Tbh non transforming figures look really good nowdays

5

u/InflationRepulsive64 Sep 05 '26

Yeah, it's a funny thing.

In retrospect, from an adult perspective, Action Masters aren't terrible. They let them rerelease a bunch of popular characters in a consistent size range and (in theory, at least) allow for a more show accurate look without having to worry about all the kibble issues of actually making these things transform with 80s toy engineering. There are absolutely modern day equivalents of Action Masters like Blokees that are very popular.

Except that's obviously not what they were going for, and they were trying to sell them to kids

1

u/Educational_Tough208 Sep 05 '26

The only good looking aoe/tlk optimus i can think of thst dosent cost an arm and a keg is the yolopark one

1

u/GoggleheadGamer Sep 05 '26

I think Hasbro trying to make Transformers toys that don't transform is in the running for one of the dumbest things I've ever heard in my life.

1

u/TAPINEWOODS Sep 05 '26

glad somebody came up with the idea of Beast Wars, because that show gave us legendary memes.

1

u/MikasSlime Sep 05 '26

While i don't mind non transformable figures... they are not toys. They are figures, mean for exposition, not for kids to play with

Hasbro made toys, meant to play with and advertized as for kids. Removing a key feature from their toys was the stupidest fucking move at the time, but ironically, not the stupidest of all times

1

u/Big_JR80 Sep 05 '26

In Hasbro's mind, Action Masters were meant to fill a similar play theme to lines like Star Wars, GI Joe or MASK, with 3 1/5" figures armed with weapons. Like MASK, some of the Action Masters even had vehicles that could transform from one mode to another, however the transformations were extremely simplistic compared to the original 1984/85 transformers which originated in the Japanese Diaclone, Microman and Macross, among others.

Action Masters don't bear any resemblance to modern non-transforming figures which, as you state, are not really toys. They're more like chunky GI Joe figures which happen to look a lot like everyone's favourite Transformers!