TF Views

Nick Roche
EJ Su

Not sure what the high-concept is beyond "Rodimus hiding on an old west planet".

Short summary: Rodimus is hiding on an old west planet, disguised as a courier's (animal-drawn) wagon. There is an over-all theme of change/progress (for good or ill), with draft animals being displaced by mechanical engines.

Rodimus is tracked and discovered by another Cybertronian (that looks like a recolor of Rodiumus). The other Cybertronian is not specifically hostile, but Rodimus kills him.

This does not appear to fit in with the main series.

I don't have the book yet, but I have to say that it's nice to see E. J. Su getting some more Transformers work before IDW's license expires. He started the whole thing out, and I always enjoyed his art.

Last Bot Standing #1 - I take it back. I expected more from E J Su and Nick Roche, but this is a bloated, dull exercise in watching a bunch of characters I have just met and have no investment in argue over issues I don't care about. Is the reason why Rodimus is here in this situation a mystery worth exploring? Maybe, but in a book with Transformers on the cover, I expect more than a few pages of actual Transformers. I'm actually a bit angry that I wasted my money on this. I won't be buying any more issues.

The fact that is it Roche is enough to make me patient. (I am thinking back to the Kup "Spotlight" from 15 years ago.) He has earned my trust, especially for using 1 issue of a multi-issue story as set-up.

I don't care who wrote it, because at the end of the issue...

Spoiler

The bunny from Beast Wars 2?

Really?

The fucking BUNNY?!

HOW can this end well?

Roche is arguably the guy who made IDW's run with the TF license unique (for good or ill). He is personally responsible for the some of the best content that IDW has produced over the longest run that any license holder has had. I am willing to take a chance on him closing out the license.

Roche has earned my trust.

So how have subsequent issues been? Has this series improved?

I was able to borrow copies of issues 2 and 3, and this is about as nihilistic an "end" for Transformers as we could get. Feels like it belongs in the previous continuity rather than the Ruckley or Marvel versions, particularly with the grim tone of the story, the reference to "Lost Lights" as stars go out, and the way no one in this distant future remembers Hot Rod or Optimus Prime, but they all know who Thunderclash is. Rodimus believes that all Transformers need to die, because they brought nothing but death and destruction for the whole of their existence. And so any time he finds another Transformer, he murders him or her right on the spot, if he can. Doesn't matter who they are, he thinks they need to be dead. He's disgusted by the way they consume organic creatures for fuel (thought not, of course, the way organics consume organics, cause that's different). Energon is a thing of the past, long gone.

Except that there's a tiny bit left, on the planet Rodimus has been existing on, passed down through the generations in a specific family, and Rodimus's friend is able to inject him, after which Rodimus starts slaughtering the last existing Transformers in the universe, other than him. Issue 3 ends with Rodimus promising Steeljaw and the others that they won't get off the planet alive.

So this is essentially a "Rodimus commits genocide on the last remnants of his species" storyline. Glad I didn't spend any more money on it. Not at all the type of story I want to read under the Transformers banner.

andersonh1 wrote: ↑Sat Jul 23, 2022 10:22 am So this is essentially a "Rodimus commits genocide on the last remnants of his species" storyline. Glad I didn't spend any more money on it. Not at all the type of story I want to read under the Transformers banner.

That sounds... awful. I'm glad that I stopped reading it after issue 1.

This is a "last of the the..." story.

It is meant to be an ending, meaning that it is hard to grade it until the end. (Can you imagine the fantrums and crying for Alan Moore's "Last Superman Story" if the internet had existed in 1985, especially if they only read part 1?)

Most iterations of TF depict the species as a problem for everybody else. (This goes back to Marvel, and was a factor in Ruckley's run.) The problem might be less that Rodimus is killing other Cybertronians and more than he assumes that he is better.


I need to pick up issue 3.