IDW Transformers Comics - retro reviews

[andersonh1]

Ironhide 1-4
Mike Costa, Casey Coller

This is a great mini-series, one of my favorites, though I'll admit that it's two issues worth of story stretched out into four. Casey Coller's art is what really makes it work well, given that there are a number of silent sequences where Ironhide walks around a deserted Cybertron, or spends time fighting the Insecticon swarm. But it's not just the art that makes it enjoyable, I like Costa's crazy old version of Alpha Trion, who is just tremendously entertaining. And I appreciate all the continuity cleanup here as it's revealed that Alpha Trion has been making Cybertron more habitable, explaining after the fact how the Autobots could survive there for an extended period of time back in AHM. This story also finishes off the Insecticon swarm from that story, and brings back Sunstreaker from his years of lying on top of a pile of dead Insecticons.

I'm never quite sure just why Costa chose to kill off Ironhide back in the first issue of the ongoing series, other than just inserting a shocking death to try and get people talking about the first issue, which was probably the entire rationale. That's fair enough, really. Ironhide's "resurrection" does at least not undo that death, it's a case of new body with very old reconstituted memories which essentially means that Ironhide missed out on the last few million years and has to be filled in on events. He's also younger and more idealistic, and I have to admit that I like him better this way. This is just a simple and fun action storyline that restores a couple of characters and explains a few things, and I really enjoyed revisiting it.

[andersonh1]

Transformers: the IDW Collection book 8

Heart of Darkness 1-4
Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, art: Ulises Farinas

We revisit Gorlam Prime and the portal to the Dead Universe in this story that ties in with Infestation as a creature called D-Void (is that the best name they could come up with?) is moving to invade the living universe, and Galvatron gathers an army to stop him. Galvatron gets more time as protagonist than I remembered in this continuity. Arcee and Hardhead return, and so do Jhiaxus and Nova Prime, last seen being shot in the back by Galvatron, so needless to say, the two of them don't get along well.

This mini-series exists to set up the threat for Chaos and the finale of the Costa-written series, and honestly would have worked as well as a series of subplots in the regular series. I'm not sure this story needed to be a separate series of its own. The art is like nothing else we ever see, and it's a bizarre mix of off-model characters and massive levels of detail. I do applaud the return to some of Furman's storylines, but McCarthy did it better by tapping into Sunstreaker's storyline to make the stakes very personal, while the Dead Universe is more of a conceptual threat. But Galvatron and "the Darkess" are an ongoing plot thread at this point that has to be resolved at some point, so I guess they decided now was the time.

[andersonh1]

Space Opera
Transformers 19-21
Writer: Mike Costa Art: Guido Guidi

This story goes back to Hot Rod, floating through space with the Matrix, which has kept him alive and repaired him after Megatron shot him at point blank range. He'd have beem killed under any other circumstances (and maybe he was killed... maybe the Matrix revived him. Who can say?). Hot Rod crashes on the very same planet where Wheelie has been stranded for untold years and years, and between the two of them they outwit a trio of aliens who have also been stranded on the planet. Their leader wants the Matrix to power his ship, which is how Hot Rod powers it up when he steals it, bringing along Karnak, one of the three aliens who helped Hot Rod and Wheelie. Karnak will be a supporting character off and on for years, but I had forgotten where he first appeared, and I had forgotten how Wheelie returned after the events of his Spotlight.

But we're not done gathering characters who "died or were lost" as Sunstreaker puts it. Wheelie takes the ship to Cybertron where they collect Ironhide, Sunstreaker and Bob the Insecticon, Sunstreaker's pet. I love these fun supporting characters. They find that Galvatron is gathering an army and has a major presence on Cybertron, so they head to Earth to get reenforcements. Optimus Prime gets the Matrix back, Hot Rod permanently becomes Rodimus, and most of the Autobots head back to Cybertron to deal with Galvatron, still holding Megatron as a prisoner. Bumblee, Prowl, Ultra Magnus, Streetwise and Jazz stay on Earth to maintain contact with Skywatch and to investigate Spike's killing of Scrapper. I'm not quite sure why Jazz would be left behind since he killed a man and can't leave the base anyway.

Good story, good art, even if it's primarily there to move the pieces around for the big finale and gather some scattered characters back into the fold. It's a story arc with an uplifting ending as Ironhide and Sunstreaker are reunited with the rest of the Autobots and there is forgiveness and welcome rather than recrimination. Karnak even gets to meet some humans. It's a nice happy ending before we plunge back into the drama, and we need a few of those from time to time.

Chaos Theory
Transformers 22-23
Writer James Roberts Art: Alex Milne

This feels like a pilot for "More Than Meets the Eye" that goes back and forth from the present day to the distant past. In the present, Optimus and Megatron hold several conversations about who they are and their long history together, while the flashbacks to the past show who they were before the war. Rung makes an appearance as Megatron and Impactor sit in a bar and discuss societal change, Megatron is arrested after the bar fight and beat up in his cell by Whirl. Orion Pax, tough and capable law enforcement officer, fights thugs sent to break Whirl out of jail, survives the experience, and confronts the Senate and Sentinel Prime about their corruption. A lot of this story will be referenced down the road, but at the moment this all feels like a sidetrack from the plot, a character study of Optimus and Megatron that's probably more interesting in some ways than the main plotline.

[andersonh1]

Police Action
Transformers 25, 27, 29
Mike Costa, Casey Coller

I'm of two minds about this storyline. On the one hand, it's good to see Prowl carrying out an investigation and establishing facts and motive for Spike to have killed Scrapper. On the other hand, the resolution that Spike has been doing business behind the scenes with Swindle comes out of nowhere. Thinking back over previous issues, I don't recall any hints that this was going on. Prowl's investigation tells the reader nothing that we don't already know, and indeed, Spike comes right out and confesses that he killed Scrapper once he figures out that Prowl knows.

But one thing this story gets very right is it's assessment of Spike's character, given by a former Skywatch operative who quit and went into hiding rather than do all the illegal things that Spike was willing to do. She describes him as someone who acts like his life is an action movie, and he gets away with all sorts of dangerous and unethical behavior because his father is a general. Spike is shown to be the terrible person he is, and Costa shows here that it was all deliberate. We were never meant to be cheering for Spike, his reckless and poor choices were often bad, and others within the narrative knew they were bad.

This is the end of Earth-based stories for several years, and it ends with bridges burned and the Transformers abandoning Earth, with Jazz destroying whatever Cybertron tech he can. Spike is a fugitive and on the run. We won't follow up with any of this until after Dark Cybertron. I like "Police Action" quite a bit for what it ultimately accomplishes, even though the first issue mainly catches us up on things we already know. It's a last chance to see Prowl as something other than an arrogant "ends justify the means" type of character, and for that alone I appreciate the story.

[Dominic]

I don't know that it made them better either, though an argument can be made that Combiner Wars has some very good "Prowl as villain" scenes that wouldn't have worked with any other character, or at least not without an Autobot as the antagonist for Optimus Prime to have conversations with. There's an argument to be made for Prowl as a slightly shady character, manipulating other Autobots for what he sees as the greater good, but there's no denying that Prowl will eventually lose all subtlety and descend into out and out villain status, which just makes him far less interesting.

This is similar to why "Last Stand of the Wreckers" worked. Prowl and Impactor both did questionable things for noble reasons. (Barber did not write Prowl until the series was being written to a more generic standard. And, that is probably more the fault of editorial then Barber.) Spike, on the other hand, did a number of meritorious things (most notably killing Scrapper) for ignoble reasons.

Not sure how Spike killing Scrapper is a low-point, when it added to the series.

That makes for a better comic than "all of the good guys do the right thing for the right reasons".

And, in real terms, most people would not complain about having an Impactor,Prowl or Spike on their team.

Megatron has been upgraded, given a new and nearly indestructible body by Shockwave and Soundwave, and it contains the ability to generate a spacebridge, something that will not only be important for Costa's plot down the road, but will come back in Dark Cybertron and even MTMTE. The old body has been converted into human-sized Megatron handguns and sent to Earth, because Megatron has decided that he wants revenge not just on the Autobots, but on the humans who nearly killed him as well. The handguns are all connected and Megatron can influence the humans holding them, and he uses this to ramp up hostility between the Autobots and humans. Bumblebee is nearly killed by one of these handguns.

I got a bit of a polemical vibe from this arc (guns and hate-radio).

I'm never quite sure just why Costa chose to kill off Ironhide back in the first issue of the ongoing series, other than just inserting a shocking death to try and get people talking about the first issue, which was probably the entire rationale. T

The point was to highlight how little Ironhide had changed over however many years. Change/growth over time was a theme of Costa's run (also shown with Prowl and Thundercracker).

In this case, Ironhide is not much different with or without his current memories. (If anything, he probably changed more in few days the series was set over than the off-page years before the series started.

Costa's run was one of the smarter runs the franchise had.

[andersonh1]

Not sure how Spike killing Scrapper is a low-point, when it added to the series.

I've just always found it to be highly implausible. It's an important event for the series in the second half, no doubt, but hard to believe that a human could actually kill a Transformer in the way that Spike kills Scapper.

I do like how this comes back to bite him, just as his going AWOL to visit his multiple girlfriends and his use of Breakdown as his own personal sportscar come back to bite him, and how his poor leadership runs off at least one conscientious and capable Skywatch member.

Costa's run was one of the smarter runs the franchise had.

It's held up pretty well while I was re-reading it. It's a long form story that is built around the idea of change and growth and around human/Transformers relationships, so it's fairly grounded for all the shape-changing robot shenanigans. Events and decisions made early on pay off near the end, and not necessarily in a "big event" kind of way, but in a "consequences of choices made" way. I find it interesting at the end that Prowl of all people says that he trusted Spike, while Spike never trusted any of the Transformers.

Of course there is a big event storyline at the end in the form of Chaos, but it feels like Costa's main story ended with Police Action, with Chaos as the start of something else entirely, even though he's still the co-writer.

[Ursus mellifera]

Not sure how Spike killing Scrapper is a low-point, when it added to the series.

I've just always found it to be highly implausible. It's an important event for the series in the second half, no doubt, but hard to believe that a human could actually kill a Transformer in the way that Spike kills Scapper.

I was conflicted about that scene, because I liked the idea that humans could kill a transformer using ingenuity, but the way Spike does it seems to also include a questionable amount of luck.

[andersonh1]

Not sure how Spike killing Scrapper is a low-point, when it added to the series.

I've just always found it to be highly implausible. It's an important event for the series in the second half, no doubt, but hard to believe that a human could actually kill a Transformer in the way that Spike kills Scapper.

I was conflicted about that scene, because I liked the idea that humans could kill a transformer using ingenuity, but the way Spike does it seems to also include a questionable amount of luck.

Yeah, he got a little too lucky. It's a case of a scenario that's hard to accept leading to a good story. It's not the fact that he killed Scrapper that bothers me, it's how he did it that makes me skeptical. But the consequences make for good storytelling.

[andersonh1]

Chaos
Transformers 24, 26, 28, 30
Mike Costa, James Roberts Livio Ramondelli

Like "Police Action", this story originally ran in alternating issues, while the collected edition puts it all together, which I think is obviously the best choice. Set up in "Heart of Darkness" and alluded to earlier when Rodimus found Galvatron on Cybertron with an army, "Chaos" pits the Autobots against Galvatron and his army as Galvatron thinks he is stopping D-Void from entering the universe by putting the Heart of Darkness into Vector Sigma. But not only is he wrong and actually opening a door to D-Void by doing this, he's being influenced without his knowledge, and he's far too stubborn to actually stop and take the time to tell Optimus Prime what's going on. He invites Optimus and the Autobots to join his army, under his command of course, but refuses to explain himself. Obviously that's not going to work for anyone.

So that plotline collides with Megatron's plan to use his in-built space bridge to bring his Decepticon army to Cybertron, which he does after escaping imprisonment in Omega Supreme. But D-Void has gained a foothold and combines every Decepticon on the planet into a giant gestalt which Megatron, who has enough willpower to resist this, takes on single-handedly. It's honestly a pretty heroic moment for Megatron that shows how so many Decepticons could be inspired by him.

In the end, the only way to stop the corruption in Vector Sigma is, of course, by opening the Matrix inside it, which Optimus Prime does. Everything goes white and the story ends with Optimus alone on a barren landscape with two halves of the Matrix lying before him...

There's some fun dialogue in this story, with one of the characters wondering if other races have conversations about dead universes and universe ending threats every day like Transformers seem to. This story was set up as long ago as the Infestation tie-in and has been running in the background for a while. I appreciate that it draws on Furman's storylines once again. It's always felt like Furman got a bit of a raw deal having to wrap up his plots so quickly, but since he laid the foundations for this Transformers universe, it's good to see the writers that followed him making use of his ideas. And the ramifications of this story will go on for years, with every character present affected in some way, and Cybertron itself transformed, as we'll see in a couple of issues. It's a strong way to wrap up Costa's run on the Transformers, though we have one more issue to go which is a standalone "distant future" type of story.

I think this is the first time we've seen Livio Ramondelli's art. I did not like it at the time, because I found it too dark and hard to tell what's going on. While that's still sometimes true, i've done a 180 and now really enjoy his vastly different style. What he lacks in clear storytelling progression from panel to panel he makes up for with a unique use of light and dark and texture. He has improved over time, and I'm always glad to see him turn up on a Transformers project.

Pax Cybertronia
Transformers 31
Mike Costa, Casey Coller

The final issue of Costa's run is another great Costa/Coller Ironhide story as we visit the far distant future when Ironhide is an old, old bot and pretty much the last survivor of the old days, where he's revered as a hero and gets to tell his stories. A number of pages in this story are full page illustrations of major storylines up to this point, including Megatron as a gladiator, Prime and Megatron's fight from Escalation, Thunderwing, All Hail Megatron, Megatron's fight against D-Void, etc. It's a great little coda issue that could honestly have been a final issue for the continuity as a whole if they'd wanted, and that's what it feels like. It is the end of "Phase 1" as IDW has retroactively categorized all the material prior to the start of the two ongoing series written by Roberts and Barber.

So that's Phase 1 re-read, and all the Furman, McCarthy and Costa material done, along with the various other writers of Spotlights and mini-series. And it's the end of the war. It always feels odd to me that IDW published more post-war than wartime Transformers comics, since the Civil War was always the foundation on which the series was built. But they will take everything in a couple of new directions which will be quite successful for a number of years.

[Ursus mellifera]

Pax Cybertronia
Transformers 31
Mike Costa, Casey Coller

It's a great little coda issue that could honestly have been a final issue for the continuity as a whole if they'd wanted, and that's what it feels like.

I was kind of disappointed that it wasn't, honestly. I thought it was a great final issue (that wasn't actually a final issue).