(Pre) Ask Me a Question: The Transformers & G.I. Joe The Movie

"Autobots! Transform and roll out!" To the Egyptian Theater on Saturday, March 7th at 7:30PM. Or, "Yo, Joe!" The Transformers and the G.I. Joe animated movies are playing at a Sunbow Celebration! And end my infomercial...

Dammaged Goods Presents is back, this time celebrating another glorious aspect of the 80's, cartoons! Try and tell me you didn't grow up on Masters of the Universe, G.I. Joe, Transformers, My Little Pony, Jem, Duck Tales and the like. One of the main contributors to the era of animated toy commercials that became so much more is Sunbow Entertainment, an animation studio that ran from 1980 to 1998 founded by Griffin-Bacal Advertising out of New York. Working with toy giant Hasbro and comic book mainstay Marvel, Sunbow gave the world G.I. Joe, Transformers, Jem, Inhumanoids, Visionaries, My Little Pony and Bucky O'Hare among other series. While the main goal was to sell toys, Sunbow managed to create worlds and mythologies that have lived on 30 years later.

From these daily animated series, four films emerged: The Transformers, My Little Pony, Inhumanoids and G.I. Joe. The first two titles would be released in theaters to weak box office thus relegating the remaining titles to go straight to video and sliced up for broadcast. I grew up on Transformers and G.I. Joe though and their movies have a special place in my heart. In a weird twist I watched more Joe episodes and followed the brand through comic books, toys and whatnot more so than Transformers. But when it comes to movies, I know the tale of Robots in Disguise just about front to back. From the opening scene where a planet is devoured by the mysterious Unicron to the awesomely 80's heavy metal soundtrack, Transformers: The Movie has just always been a treasured part of my life that opened up my imagination as a kid while also making realize that life is beautiful but life is also sad when Optimus Prime died. Although it's lived on through midnight and anniversary screenings, I've never seen it on the big screen. And in all my years I've never heard of G.I. Joe playing on the big screen. So here I am rectifying the situation and putting on a Sunbow Celebration to honor those who gave us so much wonderful entertainment as kids. While the shows were attacked for being glorified toy commercials, the worlds, characters and messages of good VS evil helped shape a generation of kids.

Taking place once again at The Egyptian in Hollywood, site of both Dolph Night and An Evening With Carl Weathers, we're doing our best to make this more than just a double feature. So far guests include:

Donald F. Glut - Writer and actor who scripted episodes of Joe, Transformers, Shazam!, Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, G.I. Joe, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, Go-Bots, Transformers, Duck Tales and Robocop, phew! Glut also wrote the hit novelization of The Empire Strikes Back among his 65 published books as well as comic books.

Flint Dille - Writer and director whose resume includes Garbage Pail Kids, Mister T, G.I. Joe, InHumanoids, Transformers and Visionaries. Dille was credited as Story Consultant on Transformers: The Movie hashing out the story and pounding out a new script. Also worked on video games Diablo III, Ghostbusters, Transformers and Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu.

Buzz Dixon - Writer on Thundaar the Barbarian, Alvin & The Chipmunks, Transformers, Jem, Visionaries, Bionic Six, Story Editor of G.I. Joe and Story Consultant on the movie.

Larry Houston - Storyboard Artist and Director on EVERY FRIGGING CARTOON YOU'VE EVER SEEN AND LOVED! Seriously, The Incredible Hulk, Spidey and His Amazing Friends, Defenders of the Earth, G.I. Joe, Jem, The Real Ghost Busters, Denver the Last Dinosaur, Pryde of the X-Men, C.O.P.S., James Bond Jr., Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Captain Planet, X-Men...is that enough? He still has more.

Neil Ross - Voice of Shipwreck from Joe and Springer from the Transformers Movie, also worked on Voltron, Kung Fu Panda, Spider-Man, Garfield and Friends and many, many more.

Don Jurwich - Director, writer and producer. Veteran of Hanna-Barbera and Sunbow with Smurfs, SuperFriends, Jabberjaw, Hong Kong Phooey, The Flintstones and acted as Supervising Producer on the Joe series and directed the movie.

We'll have memorabilia on display and for sale in the lobby from personal collections, trivia and prizes! Tickets are only $11 or $7 for American Cinematheque members and are available here. Yo, Joe!