Transformers: Sins of the Wreckers #1-5

[Death's Head]

(though as with most of her pop culture references, can anyone see her sitting down to watch Hawaii 5-0?)

"5-0" has long been slang for the cops among (formerly) young degenerates like myself. See also "the Feds". The actual incongruity is that it's British slang (unless someone over the pond wants to correct me?).

[Warcry]

I've heard that slang tossed around, but usually by people my parents' age -- people old enough to remember Hawaii 5-0.

"Pig" is probably the anti-cop word of choice for younger folk these days, at least where I live.

[KingMob]

Maybe she just finished watching The Wire.

[Flimflammery]

"5-0" has long been slang for the cops among (formerly) young degenerates like myself. See also "the Feds". The actual incongruity is that it's British slang (unless someone over the pond wants to correct me?).

It's definitely not just British slang; I'm British but I've seen it used as slang on a few US TV shows - most noticeably The Wire, as KingMob points out.

Just finished reading this issue for the first time, having re-read the other three. Wow. Intense. Really loving where this is going, though I hope Hubcap hasn't died. Really felt for him when he mentioned 'small robots dying in dark corridors' - that's gotta be a reference to Pipes, right?

It had occurred to me, too, that Prowl would seem to be just as obvious a candidate for assassination, if not more so. I think the point is that, for the Wreckers, The Mission is generally paramount, especially when some of them have died on it. I doubt, too, that Springer, Kup, or Roadbuster (at least following the revelations of the issue) would have killed Hubcap, but it's perfectly in character for such a morally compromised arsehole as Impactor.

[inflatable dalek]

I must really have led a sheltered life not to have heard that slang. Though I'm not sure how it works as an insult, Hawaii 5-0 was cool wasn't it?

[Flimflammery]

It's not really an insult as far as I can tell, just descriptive. Usually on The Wire it's the cry of the street-level drug dealers and young hoppers echoing back and forth in warning when police are in the area; 'Five-O!' 'Five-O!' 'Five-O!'

You really need to watch The Wire, dude

[Patapsco]

You really need to watch The Wire, dude

then read Homicide: A Year On The Killing Streets, watch & read The Corner

[Flimflammery]

I've watched The Corner. Man that was tough. The books are on the list...

[Patapsco]

I've watched The Corner. Man that was tough. The books are on the list...

The book, well the ending of one character wrecked me. Absolutely wrecked me

[inflatable dalek]

It's out!



Such a shame this has been so delayed and thus probably overlooked. It's bloody great.

I'm tired and talked on this at length on the podcast so I'll go into details later.

But just for fun, here's a bit of trivia: Optimus Prime was in the proof copy Nick Roach sent us to use on the Podcast a month (!) ago. He, Kup, Arcee and Prowl were all standing together during Arcee's narration. Which we actually pointed out during the recording this made no sense, with Tom even predicting it might be changed before the final version (sadly all this had to be cut as it would have made no sense without any context), now Prime has been removed, Arcee and Kup moved about and the panel split so it's now Prowl looking at them on his SPACE TV wherever he is.

Just go buy the comic though, it is good. Insanely good. Oh Ironfist.

[zigzagger]

Gotta run, but so much feels this issue. So much.

I'll need to re-read the whole series for full effect. Reserving final judgement until then. Yes, yes, I know it couldn't be helped, but there was too much time between issues and I need a little refresher.

[inflatable dalek]

And knowing Nick's personal loss during the writing process adds a great deal of poignancy to how the series deals with death and illness.

I was actually surprised at the extent to which the series came down on the anti-wiki leaks side (though perhaps I shouldn't, Transformers is a military franchise after all). The three main characters who wanted to put the data out (Hubcap, Verity and Tarantulas) there are all revealed to be doing it for selfish reasons and two of them recant whilst Tarantulas himself looses all interest in it when he realises his son is still alive.

[Warcry]

I still can't work up much enthusiasm for this, I'm sorry to say. The series as a whole just had zero emotional impact on me. Springer came back from the dead and I didn't care. Characters died and I didn't care. Things happened and I didn't care. The ending was muddled and unsatisfactory...and I didn't care. I mean, who am I supposed to latch onto here? The cast are all uniformly horrible people apart from maybe Stakeout, who wasn't around long enough to make me care. And worse, none of them are entertaining because they're all so damned mopey, so I can't even cheer for them to continue being hilariously awful like I do with Whirl over in MTMTE. The closest thing to a fun character was freaking Tidal Wave, who was probably the 15th most important character in the series.

The story was well-conceived, but without anyone in the cast that I can care about the whole thing just felt hollow. It's only fitting that the whole thing ended with them literally tossing Ironfist's corpse in my face, as if in one last, failed attempt to invoke the deeply emotional feeling of the last Wreckers mini. But it was so transparent an attempt that I couldn't do anything but laugh at it.

I'm sad, because I was super excited for another Wreckers mini and really wanted to like it. But this story just didn't work for me, not on any level. I'm glad other folk managed to get more enjoyment out if it than I, though.

[inflatable dalek]

See, I thought the Ironfist bit was brilliantly twisted, and as with a few bits I could almost hear Nick giggling madly as he wrote it (Terome on the podcast-yeah, I'm a shiller-also suggests that it's just in Verity's imagination which is a neat idea as well).

[KingMob]

The Roadbuster issue/plot was worth the price of admission. One of the best things in the IDW era.
I could do with losing the font used for Carnivac if he ever shows up again.
Impactor is a good character. The whole setup with Tarantulas and the backstory to the main plot was excellent.
I didn't care so much for the need to have a running fight in the background for most of the issues to give the other characters something to do. The Mayhems were generally unsatisfying as a plot element and took up real estate that could have been used on more character work.
I think it could have been tightened up a lot, even though there was a lot going on. Cut out extraneous stuff and stick to the plot and character beats.

I think on the whole, it was a slightly not-great series for me. I liked many of the developments and much of the tone. But I felt it dragged in unimportant areas and rushed through important ones.
I'm glad it happened though. Roche is a talent.

[Tetsuro]

(though perhaps I shouldn't, Transformers is a military franchise after all)

Outside of the Baymation movies, I find that hard to believe.

[Patapsco]

Tried to read it last week but I was in the throes of the worst UTI ever. Tried to start again from the start over the weekend and gave up after issue 2. Probably ain't going to finish it either

[Skyquake87]

I enjoyed the conclusion, which was, as I expected things going t**s up. I get why Warcry didn't get on with this series - the characters are all difficult to like (never been much of a fan of Kup personally), and my ultimate feeling on the book has been bleak and sickly, but I enjoyed the overall thrust of the series. I think it will read much better collected as its quite a dense, nightmarish story.

The main triumph for me has been someone doing something interesting with the Beast Wars characters. I like the idea of these being the result of Tarantulas bio-engineering and amoral science-play. That was really cool and they were likeable enough for me to care about as supporting characters. Tarantulas himself was aces. That's much better than the RID approach of having Rattrap and Waspinator about for no good reason and having Rattrap as some Jiminey Cricket character to bloody Starscream.

[Red Dave Prime]

I think Warcry has summed up a lot of problems I had with this comic. I really wanted to like it more than I did and it does some bits really, really well. It's not terrible or a waste of space so like so many other IDW minis. But I just couldnt really get a feel for what was at stake and whereas Last Stand had a clear aim in how it was portraying its characters, I think Sins lacks an overall point. I thought maybe it was that we all have to live with our sins, but thats not the case. Was it that your sins will catch up with you? Dont think that was the case either. At its lowest points the confusing action was matched by the over-wrought dialogue.

I'll also throw to a point someone made a while back (maybe Patapsco) that at times in the early stages it felt like stuff had happened but the reader wasnt really aware of it. Overall, things felt muddled even though the actual plot is quite simple.

There were some great highs - Tarantula was a bit too talky (you could cut down his speeches and still have the same effect imo) but he was an interesting character. The Roadbuster thing was excellent as well. I liked the Guzzle on 'roids aspect although I hated how he was wrapped up. The mayhem crew were decent as well but because you had so many new characters, i felt they got lost quickly and buried under everything else.

The art too was mostly genius stuff. It sold a mood in a way I dont think I've seen since the original spotlight kup. I did feel it felt cramped at times with the style maybe not quite suiting the scale of some of the events. In close quarters it was great but the noize mase bits maybe resembled too much of what they were showing.

Also felt the choice of some characters was off. Prowl again? Fine in a pure nick roche based world but barber should have shut that down given all he had done with prowl over the last two years. Arcee and Kup kept bugging me as I couldnt help thinking about how this all felt as well. And to be honest, I dont think you needed Arcee at all.

I think I'd go with KingMob

I think on the whole, it was a slightly not-great series for me. I liked many of the developments and much of the tone. But I felt it dragged in unimportant areas and rushed through important ones.
I'm glad it happened though. Roche is a talent.

[Patapsco]

Yeah, it was me that specifically pointed out that there seemed to be bits missing from dialogue, or that the book was referring to something we should be aware of but did not in fact exist. I will say that the art is amazing, and Roche & Burcham deserve all the credit in the world