Transformers: More than Meets the Eye season two discussion

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inflatable dalek
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Post by inflatable dalek »

Warcry wrote: The guilt weapon is something that I honestly didn't even remember on first reading, and a reminder there definitely would have made the first few pages more coherent to me -- I'd still wonder about the wisdom of using it when Deathsaurus's characterization was leading there anyway, but it wouldn't have led me to stop reading the story, roll my eyes and say "oh **** off!"
It's worth noting it created an epiphany for Megatron back in issue 50 as well, adding to the nice symetrical feeling of things (and like Deathsaurus, Megs would probably have been swayed towards realising what he'd done to organics given more time, this punched through the denial they were feeling in one go).
Also, does the issue even allude to the fact that Terminus and Roller (and Glitch!) are people that we've already met? I don't recall but I'm leaning towards 'no'. Though I suspect that if the comic had an extra two pages to work with, like it used to, we'd probably have seen some dialogue making it more clear just how important they were to some of the people in that room.
As said I'd agree Roller and Terminus would confusing to new readers as the reminder of them was very sublte with their names on the list, though I don't think knowing who Glitch was is actually remotely important, the key thing is he's not Roller and really was (as far as we're concerned) just Tarn.
The stuff with the time case is more problematic, because there really isn't anything to cite or point back to -- we last saw it when Ravage gave it to Megatron fifteen issues ago and everything that has been revealed to have happened since really feels like a deus ex machina.
But again, I think if you don't remember that story/hadn't read it "We had a time machine that we thought we'd destroyed" is pretty self explanatory as well.
Actually it's interesting you bring up DS9, because I was thinking about it in the context of this conversation after I made my last post. :)
Let's turn it into a Trek thread, old shool style! ;)
Deep Space Nine is my favourite Trek series, you know that, and I'll fight anyone who badmouths it. But it's also the least popular of it's generation by far, and only the flop that was Enterprise saves it from being the redheaded stepchild of the franchise. And stuff like this is a big part of why its popularity has never matched its' quality. It was a very, very well-written show, but it also made some stumbles that made it really difficult for a lot of traditional Trekkies to embrace it. The serialized nature wasn't familiar then, people weren't used to needing to watch certain episodes to know what was going on, and sometimes the show wasn't the greatest at keeping part-time watchers in the loop. And the last half of the last season was practically LOST-tier, but since they knew the show was ending I'm assuming they made an active choice at that point to no longer even pretend to give a damn about such things (and yes, "More Than Meets The Eye" is ending, but the story is continuing under a different banner so that's not the same thing).
I'm surprised anyone would consider it less successful than Voyager tbh, it never hit the iconic heights of TOS or TNG (and I think people downplay how iconic that show was, as someone on another forum I post at recently mused Picard has more internet memes by himself than almost any other contemporary US TV character), but it certainly got more viewers than VOY-a result of how they were broadcast differently of course but still means it was more widespread--and was always more critically acclaimed, especially once it hit that post Worf stride.

And I think that was largely because unlike Voyager, DS9 felt like it was made by people who were aware of klate 90's TV and was moving with the times with shows like X-Files and Babylon 5 (especially of course) and the move towards storyarcs and more serialisation that was so popular at the time and has only gotten more so since.

The best description of Voyager I've ever read was it was the least succesful successful show ever made, running for seven years as the top rated show on its network but even the people who made it think it was a bit shit. I actually think Enterprise has more respect these days, helped by the current films (and especially the most recent) being packed full of references and homages.

And whilst a lot of Trek fans weren't embracing of DS9 (famously it's the Trek show for people who don't like Trek) that's as much to do with things like no space ship like wot proper Star Trek has as the actual quality.
And you know, I actually really like that scene because of what it says about Sisko. As he takes the ship into the wormhole you think he's a desperate man intent on a suicidal last stand, but as things move along you realize that he knows exactly what he's doing and this was the plan (or at least Plan B) the whole time and the dude is basically Space Batman. But a line or two earlier on in the episode definitely could have changed the initial reaction from a "Huh?" to an "Of course! How come I didn't see that coming?" as all the pieces drop into place.
I think my only issue is it's a happy coincidence the Prophets decide to stop for a chat, I think it'd be much better if Sisko had always had a Plan B if the minefield failed, actually planning to go tell God he's a dick who needs to do more is a very Ben thing to do. It's actually quite a bold move considering the outside pressures to downplay/remove the "Dull" Bajoran religion stuff. Instead after a couple of years of "Look, a ship! Worf! Klingons! Space battles!" they go and make the final two years of the show based around the thing they'd been ordered to downplay.

In terms of the show ending though, don't forget the 24th century Trek was continuing in both Voyager and the TNG films (no one knew when season 7 was finishing Insurrection would lead to a big gap and a rethink), with some serious thought given to bringing Voyager home now the Alpah Quadrant was freed up. The show was ending but the overall Universe was carrying on... just as with MTMTE.
Also, given that you pointed him to my post as an example of people being WRONG about stuff...
Aww, now I feel bad. It was only because your post and my my responses to it covered everything I wanted to say generally though (much easier than 50 000 tweets) rather than because you're a WRONG man.
SPOILER! (select to read)
No one tell Warcry every time he posts I tweet a link and go "Look at the WRONG man!"
I think another thing to remember is that where MTMTE has found its audience and its success has been digitally rather than through the physical copies (which-last time I checked-have remained the same level with RID and basically every main comic since Schmidt, you could argue that audience is captive), which does change what you can get away with in terms of audience expectations. Someone coming to the comic this week off the back of someone else's recommendations just isn't going to start with issue 55 as it's promoted as part 6 of a six part story, the fact all the digital issues are out there to buy still means they can jump on with issue 50 and--if they like that--work forward. There's a good chance they'll even start all the way back with issue 1.

That doesn't mean there shouldn't be room out there for the more traditional "Any issue can be your first" generally stand alone comics, any more than there's nothing wrong with TV shows that do standalone episodes (Voyager's big issue was that it tried to do that with a format that actually required more serialisation than even DS9 did and the stories they wanted to tell and the show they were telling them in never meshed), the shifts in how media works now just means there's the option for more variety in how you tell stories. Which is no bad thing.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

Original Rewind is still missing. Is he on the Galactic Council's ship? In which case they would have access to Cybertron's biggest historical database (more or less). I'm guessing not, because they don't seem that clued up. So maybe someone else rebuilt him and Overlord, the latter escaped and since got tangled with the Galactic Council?

Or was Overlord simply telling the truth, that he really did murder Rewind in the slow cell?

I feel like original Rewind will save Megatron at the expense of the Council killing Terminus.
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Post by Patapsco »

If Overlord did do what he said and chomped down on his head, original Rewind's deader than dead because his brain module is toast. Delicious, delicious toast. Besides, if he was alive, alt Rewind would have vanished as the universe sets its timey wimey parallel quantum dimensional bullshit to rights
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Post by Auntie Slag »

Hmm, I guess you're right there. Does it set stuff back to rights? If the alt-Lost Light crew were never slaughtered couldn't the Universe handle two of every crew member? From the point of duplication, they're living separate lives.

There was also the thing about Rung not being on the Alt Lost Light. Was that a stated fact in the comic, or am I loosely remembering that from a thread comment or tweet?
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Post by Patapsco »

It's cosmic abeyance, or something. Both Lost Lights existed until one got to close to the other, when the actual one got dragged to limbo while the alt still existed. Once the quantum engines were fixed, the alt one ceased to exist, taking all of its duplicates with it... except Rewind because presumably as the original one wasn't there to come back from limbo
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Post by Auntie Slag »

Oh crap, so he really is the only Rewind in the universe? I wonder if that also meant that Overlord's severed head poofed out of existence aboard the Peaceful Tyranny? Tarn didn't seem overly bothered, although he was busy killing Megatron when Overlord turned up out of the blue a few issues ago.
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Post by Red Dave Prime »

Rung disappears from the alt lost light when the quantum engine thing happens. Evidently, there can only be one rung in the universe.
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Post by Unicron »

We don't know that Rung disappeared from the Alt-Lost Light, all we know is that 'Rung was lost in the explosion'. Incredibly vague statement that may or may not point to Rung being some kind of special that only allows for one to exist despite quantum duplication (and that would have to be some kind of special, since if this theory is true, the universe decided to have Rung be on the LL that was going to continue existing...).

As for Alt-Rewind persisting after the engines being shut off, we have no idea why. While it may be because of Rewind possibly being dead, it could also have been proximity to the briefcase and it's paradox locks (that was the only other thing we know of persisting through the engine shutdown).
Alt-Rewind's survival may also have been proximity based, or from a lack there of. Everybody who we know disappeared vanished in relative proximity to the Alt-LL. We have no evidence that Overlord, Drift, or Cosmos temporarily winked out like the others and all 3 of those were on-board at launch but gone by the time of the Lost Light's cosmic abeyance. It's possible Alt-Rewind stuck around after the engine shutdown because there wasn't another one nearby to make him disappear. (The flaw with this idea being the lack of spare Drift, Overlord, and Cosmos corpses floating in space. Though if I were to reach, I could probably explain that away by them being overlooked in the various debris of the big battle over the Alt-LL.)
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More Than Meets the Eye #56

Post by inflatable dalek »

I'm not going to be going too much in depth here because, let's face it, I didn't like the last two Big Crossover stories IDW did, so I've only myself to blame for buying out of obligation and getting stuff I don't like.

So ignoring the Sentinel bits (beyond suggesting you see how many times you can shout "JUST SHOOT HIM!" during the last scene)...Loved Red Alert and Fort Max though it does feel like it's pushing Cerebrus as the new Getaway (implied sinister past! Wants to do things to peoples minds!) a bit too hard. It'd be amazing if he doesn't turn out to be a lovely fellow really. He also seems to be overworked, we already know he does psychology and it seems he looks after the prison and does brain surgery as well.

I also really appreciated the last appearance of Max being followed up amidst all this. Possibly baffling to anyone here for the toy commerical but very welcome and contains probably the highlight of the issue with SQUAWK.

Actually, no, the realisation that Red Alert isn't paranoid, he just knows he's in a work of fiction and can spot all the stock writing ticks is the highlight.

I do think it was an odd mistake to put this out before the next Ex-RID though, it's not just the recap page but the actual contents helpfully tell you the basics of what happened in that issue and some bits are just odd without the context (Blackrock. Oh Blackrock). Switching the release order hurts the "Main" story and I do think anyone especially interested in that should probably wait till next week for reading (apparently the two MTMTE issues happen after the two RID ones, which makes it more confusing. I would have thought ending both books with 55 and doing a five part miniseries with the issues in the right order would have made more sense...).
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Post by inflatable dalek »

Sharing in here as well as there's lots of talk of Dying of the Light and reader feedback. The podcast interview we did with James at TFN:

http://tfarchive.com/fandom/features/po ... ode_18.mp3
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Post by Patapsco »

you missed a slashie in your BB code
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Post by inflatable dalek »

Whoops, ta.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

I picked up the paper copy of this today. Really nice work on Max and Red, and great to see them back. It offers a different feel to a regular MTMTE issue. I enjoyed Cerebros, but how has he not expressed any interest in Spinister; a character with the ability to reverse a lobotomy and teach it to Max. I wonder if Cerebros and Spinister were colleagues at The New Institute?

I also like the references back to Issue 6 (or whenever it was), re: Red's attempted suicide, confident that his readers can remember back that far, and especially the pattern of certain sparks in the ground referring to a single cutaway panel in Shadowplay.

Prowl comes across as very odd compared to his previous depictions in MTMTE. It doesn't quite feel like him. And how is Sentinel going to react when he finds out that Megatron is with the Autobots on the Lost Light?

Lots of other neat touches too, questioning Sentinel's age, and Outrigger... who I think only appeared in the text story at the end of Remain in Light?

The only thing that worries me is all the stuff at the end of the comic about crossovers of Mask, TF, My Little Pony, Rainbow Brite, The Get Along Gang, Planet Terry and god knows what else. I don't care about any of that, and I hope it interferes as little as possible. Just leave MTMTE alone please, its quite alright as it is.

I think the price has increased too, by about 50p. Same number of pages though.
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Post by Patapsco »

Auntie Slag wrote:I picked up the paper copy of this today. Really nice work on Max and Red, and great to see them back. It offers a different feel to a regular MTMTE issue. I enjoyed Cerebros, but how has he not expressed any interest in Spinister; a character with the ability to reverse a lobotomy and teach it to Max. I wonder if Cerebros and Spinister were colleagues at The New Institute?
Also makes you wonder what was done to Spinister to make him so paranoid. And as for crossovers, this... this is the ultimate: from Transformers vs GI Joe

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Post by Auntie Slag »

Yeah, Spinster's got a massive tale to tell, if he can ever get his brain in order. And I can't wait to find out what the feud is between Skids and Misfire.

And that crossover is truly epic!
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Post by Auntie Slag »

So does this mean that Sentinel is a big wheel at the new, or the old Institute? His mention of Pious would suggest perhaps the old, and that Cerebros is part of the new, which is why he hasn't turned to the dark side like Red.

Did Red get too close when snooping and they did the nasty on him, making him a set of eyes for their own purposes, like at the fancy tower block in Shadowplay. Momus's two body-gloved killers got in, but who let them in? As security guard was Red watching the skies as well as the ground (seems reasonable when you have sections of a race that can fly). Cyclonus once referred to Red Alert as being a nice guy, but a totally incompetent security guard. Perhaps before the Institute Red was a shit hot detective, on to the Institute long before people like Chromedome and Prowl. Perhaps his natural skills were diminished as a result of their brain tamperings?

And prior to the paranoia, did Red work with a team? i.e. Spinister; the only other character I can think of who may have been messed with by the Institute. And why mess with him in particular? Unless he was a dynamite surgeon who rebelled against the Institutes machinations, or he did it to protect himself?

I wonder if Max actually is Pious Maximus? Back in issue 6 (the hostage issue), Whirl referred to Max as being Warborn. And perhaps he was; bastardised from the peaceful Pious into the warmongering Fort Max thanks to some heavy Shadowplay and a colour redeco?

Was Spinister the one who did this to Pious, and Red was trying to get Spinister out of the Institute but failed? All too much guessing, but there must be so many brilliant stories from the past waiting to be told. I find this just as interesting as finding the Knights.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

How come there's so little activity in this, a regular MTMTE thread? Were not many people able to get the comic in either form this time around? There's not a peep from Unicron, Warcry, Death's Head and the other regulars.
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Post by Unicron »

I assume because at present it's not really tied into the main story, it's just the current 'big event' forcing it's way into MTMTE.

To comment on various things:
I doubt Sentinel's Pious reference was anything Institute related. Pious was a public figure back in Sentinel's time, and would have been known to those in power as a dissident they'd like to silence.

Ever since Shadowplay and Whirl's 'Warborn' comment, I've been speculating that Fortress is Pious after some post-Institute fixing. No real evidence for it, or against it, though.

I don't think there's anything indicating the Institute did anything to Red beyond getting him to steer Prowl and Tumbler towards finding that Momus was a closet-Con.

Red joining Sentinel may not be due Institute tinkering. Or at least not changing his thoughts. I suspect Red turning is a result of Sovereign's energon dripping onto and seeping into the old mnemosurgery points on the back of his neck. Might be that allowed Sovereign to get control.

Spinister... for right now I'm not thinking Institute victim. I'm leaning more towards autistic savant-equivalent or perhaps a genius who is faking low intelligence to hide from something/one.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

I read a quite cool theory at another site that Red might be a titan master too. The link being his unusual suicide method of removing the head before casting his own body into the oil reservoir. I guess that is a bit unusual, the only time a Transformer has ever bothered to willingly remove his own head has been for the Headmaster process.

The other interesting thing is Cerebros mentioning that Red left his door unlocked. That's comedy levels of ineptness for a security chief, and Red Alert isn't that dumb surely. Was he really yelling in his sleep, or was he having something done to him?
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Post by Skyquake87 »

I bought this, but its kind of passed me by tbh. I've read it twice, but its just not stuck in my memory. Also, if this is part of a crossover, why no helpful 'next read this' style cross-promotion? Or am I supposed to be online 24/7 to follow where to go next? Or indeed, just the banner at the top of the cover like the Dark Cybertron stuff had.

Speaking of which...


I've been having a re-read of Dark Cybertron and enjoyed it a bit more but am still unchanged on my opinion on the following : Scoop and Rattrap are deeply irritating and I don't understand what their point or purpose is. Is Rattrap supposed to Jiminy Cricket to Starscream's Pinnochio? His character design is ugly as sh*t too. He looks like a tortoise without its shell. Shockwave's plan was utter nonsense. Maybe I missed something, but I didn't think seeding other planets with Energon was to turn them into the Transfomers equivalent of the Inifinty Gems, but more to secure a fuel source so the Transformers could continue to survive. The 'logical' outcome of all his experiments was to create some sort of feedback loop that would destroy everything except Cybertron itself? Really? Why? What sort of helpful science is that? There'd be no benefit as everyone would be dead. Bobbins.

Onto Season Two and just up to the Functionist Universe stuff, which is still one of my favourite issues. All proper 1984/ Brazil style horrors wrought on the population (something I often feel we're sleep-walking into). Brilliant.
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