Re-Generation One (IDW retro G1)

[Onslaught Six]

I dunno! It's his argument.

And I fucked up there, somehow. I guess instead of 'mystical,' I guess what I wanted was...more 'arbitrary.' The films don't really do 'anything' mystical, it's just handwaved as shit that nobody understands.

[Dominic]

Which is what I don't get, why would he hate that? Wouldn't taking something that had previously been this stupid mystical gibberwank thing and establishing it instead as an actual physical component of Transformer physiology be preferable to leaving it as some poorly-defined psuedo-soul? For Dom, I mean.

That is more a question of establishing the magic than anything else. One of my peeves in fiction, especially the very soft scifi that is most comics, is that magic/mysticism are not only assumed but so frequently validated. There is a difference between having characters believe in ghosts and maybe having ghosts showing up on very rare occassion and having characters believe in ghosts that way I believe in say....cod versus having ghosts show up and play a substantial role in the characters' daily lives even more than cod plays in mine.


Issue 88:
Furman spares us the tedious details of Grimlock's and Scorponok's invasion. More than a few characters are "turned" off panel. The McGuffin itself is still lackluster. But, that may be forgivable depending on where Furman goes with this. The previous arc set the precedent that it is possible to corrupt a TF to the point where they cannot be salvaged, which makes me wonder how many of the characters who have been turned can/will be turned back. My gut feeling is that Hot Rod's quest and Soundwave's plan are going to dovetail in to the Scorponok plot. Wildman's art is unclear, (which is unlike his normal standard), about how the situation with Punch/Counterpunch was resolved. Grimolock clearly did not shoot him, but no indication is given about what happened to Punch after Grimlock left the room. (Is his faction switching going to play a role in how this arc resolves?)

Hot Rod's narrative monologue while racing through the bowels of the planet reminded me of everything wrong with comics through the early 90s. TF was either cancelled, or close enough to it, before Marvel started to actively push writers away from that sort of thing. And, apparently, Furman and Tokar have still not caught up to the times.

Oddity: One of the Omnibots, (the red one), shows up with a redesigned alt-mode in this issue. Non-G1 forms may seem out of place in "ReGeneration One", but it should be rememberd that both the US and UK ((especially the latter) comics would occasionally show characters in pre-Earth forms. (Outback's appearance in "Prey" comes to mind here.)


Grade: C

Dom
-really irked by the monologue.

[BWprowl]

That is more a question of establishing the magic than anything else. One of my peeves in fiction, especially the very soft scifi that is most comics, is that magic/mysticism are not only assumed but so frequently validated. There is a difference between having characters believe in ghosts and maybe having ghosts showing up on very rare occassion and having characters believe in ghosts that way I believe in say....cod versus having ghosts show up and play a substantial role in the characters' daily lives even more than cod plays in mine.

I'm clearly missing something here. What's 'magical' about sparks the way they were more clearly defined in BM? They were shown as more just the really important core part of Transformers biology (or whatever) and their tangibility and 'true nature' or whatever was never called into question; they were purely real, tangible, solidly-defined things.

Were sparks ever presented as mystical? I was always under the impression that they were just...the physical part of the Transformers that went into their shells/bodies and made them move around. We saw them sitting in stasis pods, and their life signs could be monitored, and everything. Like Six said, they were more like weird ambulatory alien hearts than 'souls' or whatever.

Diamond screwed up the shipment of #88 to my local shop so I have to wait until Friday to buy it.

[Dominic]

Sparks were initially similar to souls (as seen with Starscream's ghost in "Possession"). At this point though, the soul is more or less scientifically established, which is bothersome.

If I am watching a medical show, I do not want to see a doctor examining a patient's soul, ya know?


Dom
-is generally agnostic on this sort of thing, but would never trust a doctor who wanted to do a soul exam.

[BWprowl]

Sparks were initially similar to souls (as seen with Starscream's ghost in "Possession"). At this point though, the soul is more or less scientifically established, which is bothersome.

If I am watching a medical show, I do not want to see a doctor examining a patient's soul, ya know?

Actually, the first we really got information on Sparks was in...'The Spark', which happened before 'Possession'. There they were presented as...the core part of a Transformer, where the consciousness was stored and what made them 'alive' at the end of the day, kinda like a weird alien mash-up of heart and mind. I always took the possession in...'Possession' as presenting "Hey, this is something that sparks can do". Or maybe not even something all sparks can do, maybe just Starscrem, given that he was explicitly listed as having a 'mutant' spark (and the fact that a spark could even have 'mutant' traits just solidifies the 'internal organ' argument, moreso with the fact that Maximal scientists trying to replicate Starscream with Protoform X were able to physically experiment on a spark!).

In fact, the spark as presented in your 'Possession' example is actually an example of the writers trying to present a more scientific/solid explanation for a previously mystical element: Starscream's ghost! Of course the idea of an alien robot having a 'ghost' could seem patently absurd, and the writers of BW forwent any mystical explanation for something so goofy and instead simply presented it as "Actually Starscream just has a mutant indestructible spark that can possess other bodies". Recall that Megatron's spark ended up taking on similar 'mutant' traits towards the end of Beast Machines.

Megatron carves out part of Rampage's spark and keeps it in a box! They're clearly presented as physical, vital-organ-esque things!

As a footnote, I'll point out that very hard sci-fi series Ghost in the Shell *did* canonize human souls in the form of 'ghosts', and used them rather well.

[andersonh1]

#89

Got the latest issue today, and there are a lot of plotlines juggled, though the Scorponok/Grimlock storyline is prominent. I'm still not quite sure what Grimlock is playing at here... it looks as though he genuinely joined Scorponok in the hope of getting new bodies for the rest of the Dinobots, but ultimately can't go as far as Scorponok insists that he go. Or else he's got some plan that has dozens of Autobots being turned eeeeevvilll as a side-effect. Meanwhile, the plot with Hot Rod interests me the most, and it seems the return of the creatures from the last few issues of the Marvel series, apparently calling him

Spoiler

Creator

. And Soundwave is working with Bludgeon, with the Warworld from G2 making an appearance as Bludgeon's craft. Very nice.

[Dominic]

Issue 89:

Despite the complaints about this series not continuing properly from issue 80 (published 20+ years ago), Furman is definitely still using concepts from the original series. Perceptor's conversation with Scorponok and Hotrod's history lesson are thematically close enough both to the origional series and to each other that it is obvious that the current arcs are not only going to run together, but that they are building on Furman's old work. (Part of me wonders how significant Jhiaxus' brief appearance in issue 81.5 might prove to be, given that evolution and change are likely going to be themes before this series ends early next year.

Grade: B

On a personal note, one thing about this series that brings me back is the near constant reminder that we never got good toys of most G1 characters. The scenes with Optimus Prime in Canada really drove this point home for me. (Yes, the Masterpiece toy had a trailer. But, that set is more than some of us can reasonably afford.) Very few of the characters in this series ever got good toys representing their original character art. This is not really a problem with the comic. But, it is something that I find myself thinking about when readingthe comic.


Dom
-for a brief and bowel freezing moment, considered the possibility that Furman was going to effectively create a "Shattered Glass" setting....

[BWprowl]

This story arc's been kind of a slog for me, just feels like it's blurrily going by without leaving as much of an impression on me. I read #88 last month realizing that I barely remembered the details of anything that had happened in #87, it's all dudes attacking the planet and Rodimus looking for...something (I completely forgot that he'd gone underground when I opened up #88). The most 'interesting' thing going on is the faction-switch ray, and that's hardly something that hasn't been done in TF before, though admittedly not on this grand a scale. Anyway, #89 was better, Perceptor repeating the oft-opined concepts about Transformers and conflict, though Furman pushes it a little further here, postulating that Transformers aren't just predicated towards conflict, they actually need it to survive! Makes a good situation for the Dinobots to take center-stage in, anyhow.

One thing I wasn't crazy about this issue was Furman recycling (once again) from his old 'Omega Point' story, including the Sword of Primus's design, and the idea of a preliminary group of 'prototype' Cybertronians that got scrapped. It's a little macabre in this interpretation, Primus just creating a race of guys, deciding that their conflict annoys him, and dropping them all into chasms, 'Mysterious Stranger'-style. I can definitely see why the remnants of that race would have it out for Rodimus, at any rate.

[andersonh1]

The most interesting portion of it to me is the whole question of just what's going on with Hot Rod, and what his connection to Primus is. It is nice to finally have the question of what the creatures that attacked the Dinobots back in the last few issues of the old series are, and what they're doing on Cybertron, though I have a feeling there's a lot more to the story that could be told than we've been given so far.

[Shockwave]

The most interesting portion of it to me is the whole question of just what's going on with Hot Rod, and what his connection to Primus is. It is nice to finally have the question of what the creatures that attacked the Dinobots back in the last few issues of the old series are, and what they're doing on Cybertron, though I have a feeling there's a lot more to the story that could be told than we've been given so far.

And this actually would mark my main problem with Furman: Pacing. There's always more to the story but he won't just get off his ass and get to the damned point. Then whatever series he's on gets cancelled and he has to try to tell his story somewhere else. And then people just get sick of the same build up again and again. This why people hate Unicron.