Tooned In: Gobots Commercials

Happy Saturday! I’m taking a rest from Transformer ads and instead looking at its 80s rival, or to some, their “bastard siblings.” For the record, growing up, I didn’t hate the Gobots and actually had them alongside their better-known/more fondly remembered brethren. Of course, I usually singled out the characters seen on Challenge of the Gobots, but regardless, it was just more transforming robots for me to collect and I didn’t want to pick one or the other.

This compilation is just six minutes long instead of the hour I was culling the TF commercials from. Always in the Cybertronians’ shadow, huh?

Watch along: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inXdX6UydUE

Starting with a spot for the Super Gobots, aka the premium figures that are actually the same size of most Transformers. Kids are playing with Stacks, an orange truck, who’s faced with Cy-Kill, the leader of the “Enemy” Gobots. Yes, the factions started out as “Friendly” and “Enemy,” it took the cartoon to establish the far-better “Guardians” vs. “Renegades.” The villainous motorcycle has the upper hand when Leader-1 swoops in to save the day. Hmmmmm…a Gobot easily fighting off a robot who transforms into a truck, who then needs help from the almighty Friendly Gobot leader? Was Tonka THAT clever?

The dreaded “You can imagine…” begins the next spot, as does an animated intro. Hard to tell if this too was Hanna-Barbera’s work. And why’s Leader-1 flying alongside Cop-Tur and Cy-Kill? Unless this is some sort of, I don’t know, let’s call it Gobots Uno, where we learn that they were all friends until Cy-Kill turned to the dark side. Anyway, the usual backyard roleplaying, no doubt prompted by the announcer reminding kids that they in fact have imaginations. This is not unlike how some of the early Masters of the Universe ads played out, with the kids personing the heroes to defeat the villains controlled by their dad. And why yes, MOTU IS on my to-do list for commercial reviews.

Okay, this is unique compared to other commercials I’ve seen lately, because it depicts boys going to the store to check out the newest Gobot figures. The planet “Gobotron” name is in place, but they’re still Enemies or Friendlies. Characters like Small Foot, a submarine named…Dive-Dive and Night Ranger are introduced. No word on if the latter had a sister named Christian, though. Or did he have a dad that Christian could say is dead? Of note on the Enemy side is a garbage truck named “Fly Trap,” okay, that was somewhat clever, Tonka. There’s also “Spoons,” a killer forklift…and now you can’t unhear That MST3K Riff. This spot brings to mind a problem about the Gobots line: see, Small Foot I recognize from the cartoon, so that would be the one character I really cared about. And the cartoon only had three regulars on each side, and everyone else just dropped in from time to time. It would be like if Transformers was Optimus Prime and Bumblebee vs. Megatron and Starscream and not much of anyone else. Good thing that’ll never happen! As it was, the G1 cartoon usually tried to feature as many characters as they could within every half hour. More characters you see in action = more toys you want to buy. It’s not that hard.

But never mind that, it’s time for the Gobots Command Center! The bigger base playset that every toy line had to have, it doubled as a Not AT-AT Walker. Someone actually made a good point: why WAS there never an Ark playset for the Autobots to use in the Transformers? Then again it took them the modern lines to fully present a Unicron figure. In today’s role play, Cop-Tur tries to take it over but is thrown into prison by Leader-1, and boy does that prison have a dark side…

Either be vaporized or lobotomized, pick your poison, Cop-Tur!

On a lighter note, it has a cafeteria too!

And there is the Challenge of the Gobots animation style. I’d recognize Cy-Kill’s vaguely robotic Homer Simpson face anywhere. And now that we’ve established that, let’s present two characters we…barely see on the cartoon: Renegades Tux (cause he’s a limo, so he’s stylish, so let’s name him after a suit) and Zero (cause a “zero” is a type of plane), who face off with the blue version of Leader-1. This, and the red and yellow Cliffjumper and Bumblebee deal, were my earliest experiences with repaints. So was the black and white Cy-Kill (who was doubly ahead of the curve, predating the various ReAction toys that had B/W variants). Luckily Guardian Flip-Top, who we also totally always see on Challenge, is there to make sure his leader isn’t outnumbered. And wouldn’t “Chop Top” be more appropriate for a character with a helicopter mode? Guess they don’t want to be confused with the member of the Sawyer family down in Texas.

Now, Combiner Team Warfare enters the Gobots Universe with Puzzler, the Renegades’ team of evil car robots with – get it? – names like Jigsaw, Crossword, and Tic-Tac. Props to Tonka trying to be wink-wink with the name Rube, however. Though that name just makes him sound like he’s not very smart, almost like he’s a big square? Maybe such a square, he’s a…cube? Now, how does Puzzler measure up to Devastator, Bruticus, et al? He…looks fine. Though going with the Gobots’ occasional lack of imagination (and they DARE think they need to tell kids to pretend?) it looks like a bunch of cars held together, mostly. At least the Transformer combiners usually tried to add variety.

Another combiner coming up, and this one has an extra gimmick. The Power Warrior is the Guardians’ answer to Puzzler…only he’s not a group of robots who combine to form a bigger robot. He is an aerial craft who forms the head and body. His limbs? Four power suits you can fit your Gobots into. The Renegades would eventually get their own black and white colored version. Their official names? Courageous and Grungy. Sounds like the names of enemies in an 80s arcade game.

And now we have the Jumpstarters/Powerdashers edition in Scales: a pull-back motor racecar who reveals a vaguely reptilian mouth underneath its hood. Not much more to say, as is the norm with these types of toys.

The next commercial features a kid’s house being possessed by the Super Gobots. Windows and doors fling open and the toys are just standing there in blue smoke as the Gobots cartoon appears on his television. This is a great ad…for the Real Ghostbusters toys, because who else will get the spirits of these robot toys out of your room? And by the way, isn’t the announcer for these Gobot commercials the same guy from the Oxy Clear ads from the ‘80s?

Contest time! Enter Nestle Quik’s drawing to win a collection of Gobots! From the heights of Danny O’Day and Farfel the Dog to Leader-1 and Scooter, how the mighty have fallen. And don’t get me started on all those cereal and food product giveaways, I need to track them down and talk about those. For example, after 40+ years, I’m still wondering who won DC’s Create a Villain contest for Post cereal? Others were bit more documented, like He-Man’s similar create a character contest.

It’s time to see what happens when the Gobots name is licensed out to other companies. Playtime being the company in question, and they introduce Radio Gobot, a blocky version of most of the Super Gobot cars, but wait! He can actually pick up radio signals! Among them are music, a football game, and…a hurricane warning? Those kids better stop playing with their Gobots, and haul ass to an evacuation center. As it is, they high five each other, clearly for owning the Transformers fans whose Soundwaves and Blasters can’t play music.

We follow this with a basic ad for the line, now with more laser effects and stop motion. A scene of numerous Gobots lined up at the ready seems like something out of Skynet, then it pulls back to reveal they’re just toy shelves. Oxy Announcer goes over the top loudly and slowly pronouncing the characters’ two-syllable pun names.

And we finish with a mail-in offer. Crasher is impressed with the scorpion robot “Creepy” but a graphic flashes saying “Creepy Free,” which made me wonder if that was his full name, or is he a diet version of another Creepy? The other cartoon Renegades are equally happy and offer 1-2 word salespitches not seen since Mr. T told us to buy his cereal because “It’s cool!” As for the toy, Creepy himself with his neon-colored creature mode answers the question what a Generation Two line of Beast Wars would look like.

So that’s all for Gobots. Sad they didn’t include an ad for the motorized Renegade monster Zod so I could fit in the too easy Superman II joke, and of course say RIP to Terence Stamp.

As a bonus, check out this ’70s (?) Toys ‘R’ Us print ad:

Apparently TRU operated similarly to the WWF’s ’80s A- and B-house show system. I bet Hanna-Barbera sent Yogi Bear, Fred Flintstone, and Scooby-Doo to New York and LA, while this poor store got…The Funky Phantom and Hair Bear. A live action Cat in the Hat? What could possibly go wrong? And Captain Who and Professor What?