TF Views

A sale at the comic shop and a discount card knocked a significant amount of money off of the "Rage of the Dinobots" compilation (~8 bucks) last week.

Rage of the Dinobots:

Hasbro has decided that "Fall of Cybertron" and "War for Cybertron" (the games) are meant to be consistent with "Exodus" and "Exiles" the novels *and* "Transformers Prime" (a franchise including a cartoon, comic and action figures that is not wholly consistent with itself) under the ironically named "Aligned" brand. The sheer number of inconsistencies (and lack of editorial over-sight) more or less obligate writers to either spend time on "fixing" mistakes that they did not make (and allowing for those fixes to cause more problems) or to try to keep their work relatively self-contained and keep the necessary connections to the work of others vague. Johnson definitely opted for the latter option with "Rage of the Dinobots".

Some stuff happened before the the first chapter. After quickly checking over summaries of other "Aligned" stuff, my best guess is that most of the other stuff happened in the video game (which I have no intention of playing).

Johnson opens "Rage of the Dinobots" by essentially saying that some stuff happened. "Autobots fought Decepticons. Cybertron lost. ....The End. But, alot can happen after The End." Johnson tries to patch over some of the inconsistencies, leaves others alone. Over all, his approach works. Johnson avoids significant retreads of origins and infodumps in favour of writing an introduction for the modern Dinobots and managing to tell a coherent (if basic) story about the Dinobots trying to rescue Ultra Magnus and later one of their own.

Over the course of 4 chapters, Johnson manages to incorporate and modernize several past iterations of the Dinobots. Grimlock and the other are not consistent with their G1 counterparts. But, there is no reason for them to be. "Transformers" has been around for nearly 3 decades, and "Aligned" should not simply duplicate what came before.

There is enough information that a new reader (which is what "Prime"/"Aligned" related media should be pitching to) will have some idea about what happened before. But, it does not go in to any great detail. Generally, the art favours "Prime" style art. But, a few characters (such as Blastoff) are shown in "Fall of Cybertron" bodies. (Shockwave is shown in a "Prime" style body. But, this is reconciled with the game by establishing that Shockwave uses multiple bodies at the same time.)


Grade: B


-Debut reading Dom....

For a moment I thought this was the Fall of Cybertron comic from last year. It was written by either Barber or Roberts (I can't remember which of the current two TF writers wrote, I think it was Roberts) and I just have to say that you have to have a particularly singular talent for sucking to make me hate a comic that so prominently features Shockwave in it. But I did. It was boring. It was literally the same "Shockwave mutates the Dinobots" story that's been retread so many times that at this point it just puts me to sleep.

Shockwave
-Better than valium.

For a moment I thought this was the Fall of Cybertron comic from last year.

It's, arguably, the sequel to that comic.

They held a copy for me at my local shop, I passed because Prime is not a badge I can see buying comics from. Apparently I'm not alone as every shop in the neighborhood has stacks of this issue #1 still, it's the only consistently findable TF book right now.

The "Prime" comics are not bad. They are arguably the most accessible TF comics on the shelves now, and are alongside "ReGeneration 1" in terms of having "pass down" (to a kid) value. (I would be a little wary of passing along "More than Meets the Eye" and "Robots in Disguise" to a kid.)

I am, however, only buying compilations of the "Prime" and alligned comics.


-Distribution Picky Dom....

(I would be a little wary of passing along "More than Meets the Eye" and "Robots in Disguise" to a kid.)

Define kid! Because remember, at 12--the same age I first started posting at--I was already bored by Armada and was already writing "gritty" "mature" TF stories with 86. (Because literally none existed in 2002. Now? Take your pick.)

Shockwave wrote: It was literally the same "Shockwave mutates the Dinobots" story that's been retread so many times that at this point it just puts me to sleep.

That's why I skipped it. I flipped through the book and kept feeling like I'd read that story before somewhere...

andersonh1 wrote:

Shockwave wrote: It was literally the same "Shockwave mutates the Dinobots" story that's been retread so many times that at this point it just puts me to sleep.

That's why I skipped it. I flipped through the book and kept feeling like I'd read that story before somewhere...

Fall of Cybertron just friggin' covered it in this very same universe, even. So lame.

That is probably why "Rage of the Dinobots" went with the "some shit happened earlier" option. If somebody read the previous comic or played the game, "Rage of the Dinobots" can fit.


And, "Shockwave rebuilt the Dinobots" is their new origin. I cannot blame Hasbro for trying to cement it. If nothing else, it works better than their previous origins. (If we want the Dinobots, and we want them to be dinos, they need to have a reason for being dinosaurs and this is the least stupid way that Hasbro could have handled it. (And, I am saying that as somebody who liked "Spotlight: Shockwave".)


-Domosaurian....