Toonami Article | Analyzing The Anniversary Teaser

Originally Posted 02/22/07 by Jeff Harris

The most mysterious teaser to come along since 1999 (you know, the one that said Change is Coming to Toonami that relaunched the block?) premiered on January 27. In it, several closeups were seen but it remained ambiguous. Is that TOM, a Clyde, or is the block retooling from scratch?

At the time I originally wrote this, I had no idea what was being planned, so I wrote this article. My original theories remain intact, but the truth will be in bold. Here goes:

Frame 10:
The top of a tail end of a machine. It could be a Clyde or it could be a vehicle of sorts. The color scheme of the design is similar to the current Clydes as well as former Toonami series, Megas XLR (you can still catch the classic series on Toonami Jetstream). If memory serves correctly, Coop was a customizer of many things, and when he customized that robot of the future, this is the kind of paint job he put on the mech. It can't be a Clyde because they, like TOM, are nuclear powered, so what could it possibly be?

This was the very first peek at Flash, one of the three new characters of the new Toonami. The paint job was hot rod-inspired and fitting for the character, who talked fast.

Frame 44:
This is a confusing, but interesting shot of a huge robot lumbering about with a head similar to TOM's. I'm not saying this is TOM because his paint job is rather faded and handmade, so this could be an older robot of sorts. I doubt that it's TOM which leads me to this question. Are they scraping the whole Absolution universe at Toonami for the 10th anniversary? It wouldn't be the first time they scrapped one continuity for another without explaining anything. Remember the segueway between Moltar and TOM? Of course not, it didn't happen. So, is this new robot the new host of Toonami or a robot controlled by the true power of the block?

It was indeed TOM, a new version of the character. While the iconic host's face wasn't seen, you could tell this was the TOM we all knew and loved based on his movement alone. I'll tell you more about the movement in a minute.

Frames 76 (left) and 107 (right):
Again, we have something we've never seen on any mech or droid in any incarnation of Toonami. There's a wheel connected to something rolling along and another closeup of an engine. Here's another interesting theory. Perhaps this new Toonami takes place on the junk planet world last seen in the Endgame comic.

Again, these are two close-ups of Flash. About the junk planet, here's the skinny on that theory. If you remembered the Endgame comic that was released during the revamp of 2003, you'll remember that TOM, destroyed by the villianous Ocelot Rex, was dumped into a garbage chute where he encountered a group of robots, prisoners of Rex, who not only forged TOM's new body using Sara's downloaded plans, but also gave the hero and his companion the new Absolution. They built a robot and a spaceship out of scraps! The fact that they were rusted-looking designs gave many people the belief that the new Toonami was going to be on the junk planet.

To backtrack for those just joining the program, Toonami.com presented a comic to explain the changeover from TOM's second shell as well as the new Absolution. Sara got kidnapped by this despotic bounty hunter who trapped TOM (who barely escaped the Absolution, which blew up) and tore him limb by limb. The denizens of the underground world rebuilt TOM using his head as a template and rebuilt him to be bigger than ever before. In the end, the robot citizens built TOM and Sara a brand new Absolution, and the rest you've seen. I'm not saying this new world may be the underground world seen in Endgame, but it could be a similar robot society.

Continue the examination of the teaser here.