Thoughts On IDWverse?

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Red Dave Prime
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Post by Red Dave Prime »

Fair points. I think I find him inconsistent though. speech to rally people to join the lost light, rambling sillyness when presenting medals or autobot icons.

I just think that given that he's the leader he shouldnt be used for so much comic relief. The rodimus star thing is very funny but its something that might sit better for an over-enthusiastic second in command rather than the head guy. Might just be me in this case but so far he's my least liked crew member.

I once again find myself agreeing with Kinghtdramon - Furman had a good angle on the guy. The ego thing with costa was interesting but bearing in mind that he got screwed by swindle because he believed his own hype you would think he would have learned from that but the way he appears to be written by Roberts makes me think that this isnt the case.

A spotlight:rodimus following a day in the life could be interesting.
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Auntie Slag
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Post by Auntie Slag »

Rodimus is goofy, but he's shown moxie where it counts re: dispatching the Sparkeater, putting Magnus in his place "While you're on this ship you answer to me, not the other way round", making a silk purse out of a sows ear (directly after the Lost Light quad-jumped and blew a hole in the hull), and telling Overlord to shut up (I loved the gutsiness & pointlessness of that).

I think he appears rather light as a character because he hasn't been a main focus yet. The book has been about so many other people so far; Chromedome in particular, other standouts being Pax, Whirl and Ratchet. At what other point in TF stories has the focus not been on the leader? With G1/2 it was always Prime (I know we had some Dinobot-centric stories and Survivors, but it always came back to him). Beast Wars about 80% Primal, the live action movies are (thankfully) pretty much Prime. Not that I've seen it but I'd imagine Prime is mostly Prime too.

Rodimus has been backseat for most of MTMTE (the most we've seen him is probably the Annual).

I've never been a Hot Rod/Rodimus Prime fan, he was always dull and rather one-dimensional. But now I think he's rather great, and will be better still when he becomes more central to the story. I like it because they've taken someone rather dull, and there's bucketloads of potential just waiting to take centre stage.

I'm not a Rodimus whore, by the way. But the character now has interesting layers.

Whirl for the win, of course :smokin:
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Denyer
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Post by Denyer »

Terome wrote:And here's something I've been thinking about: would it have better, do you reckon, do have killed Shockwave and the Dinobots off proper at the end of their debut? None of them did anything particularly interesting afterwards. That one scene in LSotW, perhaps.
I'm against killing characters off completely for the simple reason other authors might do something interesting with them; although there're always flashbacks, I suppose.

Speaking of which, Shockers has been very interesting.
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Terome
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Post by Terome »

Denyer wrote:I'm against killing characters off completely for the simple reason other authors might do something interesting with them; although there're always flashbacks, I suppose.

Speaking of which, Shockers has been very interesting.
Nightbeat has been used well as a dead guy. Nothing has undermined his summary execution but he's had some nice facetime. With this most recent run of Spotlights, Barber has shown that he's not afraid to stripmine the timeline for adventures. That's a good thing and a bad thing, but among the goodness is the ability for a dead character to stay that way.

I would be quite keen on a Transformers iteration that mooted death as a concept right from the beginning. The Marvel comics flirted with that direction with Gears getting smashed up and those damn crystals but veered away from it before too long. Fully backed-up and deathless characters could result in some crazy action scenes and glorious carnage.

Was it a TMUK story that once laid out the fundamentals of a Transformer skirmish as 'last one standing gets to repair his team mates and win?' That's a depressing mode of warfare in any weather, especially considering how similar Transformer psychology is to ours.
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Post by Denyer »

Doesn't ring a bell, but I endorse all of that.
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Post by inflatable dalek »

CounterPunch wrote:I'd go with "generic catchphrases that are suitable for a comic" tbh, although my initial confusion about the titles was because MTMTE could actually have far more relevance to Prowls secretive dabblings than RiD does.
I'd agree with this. I honestly don't buy the idea the titles have any special meanings, because they both mean the same thing. A robot in disguise... is more than meets the eye. If the two titles were switched, it would make no difference whatsoever.

It's just annoying for no reason as not only are both titles needlessly cumbersome (especially MTMTE... hence the use of acronyms) but they both have prior associations with prior versions of the franchise. Did they really need to name both comics after a previous cartoon and a less than ten years old Dreamwave comic respectively?

A far better, and more appropriate, title for MTMTE would have been Transformers: Lost Light. RID could have been... well that's a bit harder. Transformers: Peace? Transformers: Prowl's a Twat... OR IS HE?!?!?!?!?!?.

I'd buy that last book.
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Post by CounterPunch »

I stayed away from this through fear that I might run in to spoilers of stuff I havent read yet, but issue 14 of MTMTE is next on my list, and issue of 11 for RiD..

MTMTE - Wow, I am so in love with this book, I just think it's fantastic. Roberts is doing wonderful things with the characters he is using, he's shining a spotlight on a number of characters who would normally be scene fillers at best and he is providing them with their own characteristics and personalities. I think the way he has used Swerve is brilliant, but I think Tailgate might be my favourite, the end of Shadowplay where he realised Pax was Prime was great.

Also, when did Alex Milne become such a great artist? Really goes to show how much the whip was cracked at DW to fit Pat Lee's "style".

RiD - While I still enjoy reading this book, when read concurrently with MTMTE it is a bit of a slog. I praise them trying to make what really is a bit of a political drama/thriller out of a book, but I just don't find it all that interesting in its execution. Technically it is a decent book but it lacks the fun and adventurousness of MTMTE.
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Red Dave Prime
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Post by Red Dave Prime »

issue of 11 for RiD
political drama/thriller
Very curious how your reading of issues 12-16 of RiD feel. Things a turn which puts the whole tone of the book in question.
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Post by Knightdramon »

I don't know, the biggest fun I'm having with RID is how it just connects and fixes all the continuity issues in the franchise so far.

And once you get to issue 12-15, a big revelation occurs that puts everything in perspective. I just re-read the annual a couple of days ago, and some dialogue made a lot more sense now than it ever did.
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Denyer
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Post by Denyer »

CounterPunch wrote:Also, when did Alex Milne become such a great artist? Really goes to show how much the whip was cracked at DW to fit Pat Lee's "style".
Yeah, he's a good mimic (appropriately on a book called Transformers) who these days can do a more balanced Roche than Roche does, but some of it almost certainly has to be the time gap and more experience. Unless he was reallyreallyreally taking the piss drawing panels for issues that had Pat Lee's name on as artist.
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Post by CounterPunch »

OK, 8 months after my last post and I am NEARLY caught up, I'm currently reading the Dark Cybertron preludes of each title.

MTMTE - This book... Genuinely, I think it may be one of the most entertaining comics I read, it's maintained brilliant dialogue, great action, an awesome cast, great plot points, truly emotional moments. Roberts really is a great talent and I'd be very surprised if he wasn't snapped up by one of the big two in the future.

RiD - Feeling very "meh" about this book, the artwork and writing don't meet the quality of MTMTE by a long shot. It reads like a fanfic tbh. Thinking Prowl had turned but being controlled all along by Bombshell, becoming the head of Devastator, Sky-Byte (or however you spell it), Bumblebee being rebuilt, Rattrap and Waspinator. I've also not been a fan of the Optimus story or the Shockwave story all that much unfortunately, just hasn't really been interesting, so I am concerned at the fact that Dark Cybertron will be focusing on it.

Also very curious about the direction the books will be going in April.
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Cyberstrike nTo
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

On the universe itself I think it's boring. The Transformers are about the WAR between the Autobots and the Dcepticons the post-post war stuff seems to be going nowhere. It's been tried for what for 5 years and it's time to restart the war.

MTMTE can be at times a very great series but at other times I find it downright boring and the same with RID (hell the Prequel to Dark Cybertron arc is the most BORING TF story I've ever read or saw).

Overall I'm constantly wanting to something.. anything to happen! I generally dislike Earth TF based stories that run longer than 12 issues but I'm hoping that the return to Earth creates something exciting and bring some much needed action and excitement back to the comics.
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Knightdramon
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Post by Knightdramon »

Cyberstrike nTo wrote:On the universe itself I think it's boring. The Transformers are about the WAR between the Autobots and the Dcepticons the post-post war stuff seems to be going nowhere. It's been tried for what for 5 years and it's time to restart the war.
Even though, in-story, the war took a hiatus during the first half of Ongoing, it officially ended right around the time of MTMTE1-RID1. So it's like 2 years...and in my opinion we've had some of the best stories of the franchise in those 2 post-war years ;)


In my opinion, being off-Earth is a great thing. You guys notice that on average, there's 3-4 Earth bound stories, and each time we just get these stories in random order?

Story 1 is the cast arriving to Earth, hiding, going by their own way without being noticed, and continuing their war.

Story 2 is of course, story 1 with a human or 3 thrown in, and how these humans are just "oh my god wooooow you've been here the whole time and can we speak to your leader oh wow he's a truck".

Story 3 is a group of humans trying to capture and gut a transformer for their own reasons and either create a personal army or a militarized nation.

Story 4 is usually the villains succeeding in devastating a city/area/small town, the world uniting against them while the Autobots collect themselves, and a big offensive in which the Autobots of course win but the humans are mistrustful of them.

I mean, there's only so many ways you can do the same story over and over on Earth before you're just shuffling the players and the order of the events.

Heck, in the last 3 iterations [Animated, Movies and Prime] 3 of the main cast Autobots are the same characters [Prime, Ratchet, Bee]!
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Post by CounterPunch »

Knightdramon wrote: I mean, there's only so many ways you can do the same story over and over on Earth before you're just shuffling the players and the order of the events.
This is what has made MTMTE so entertaining for me (still pre-Dark Cybertron). It's an adventure yarn, a road trip... Hell, a school trip, you've got the outsiders, the geeks, the nerds, the ones who like to get rough to make themselves look cool, the one who tries to be everyones friend.

It's been an adventure with no real end goal in sight, a "the evil Decepticons are invading Earth and plan to conquer it" story which has constantly been retold has a very obvious ending, something like MTMTE has the hope of an end goal (find the Knights of Cybertron) but it's been the basis for a story which could lead anywhere, and so far has.
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Post by CounterPunch »

Rattrap's dialogue has got to rank amongst the worst I've ever read. It's so painful reading it that I genuinely think I might be brought to tears.

On chapter 4 of the crossover thus far and man, it really has been a complete bore. The only highlight thus far was Brainstorm finishing Perceptor's sentences and claiming they were simpatico.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

This is most likely an inane question, but is Springer back on-line? The last reference to his state that I can find is in the text story 'Zero Point' (from the LSotW hardcover). Is that really the last that's been said of him?
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Post by inflatable dalek »

Zero Point is indeed the last we've seen of Springer, though the ending suggests a recovery was likely. Roberts has actually been pretty restrained in not throwing Springer and Impactor into present day MTMTE considering it would be a obvious LSOTW fan pleasing move hasn't he?

Mind, if Springer's new toy had been released a year later his inclusion in Dark Cybertron would have been inevitable.
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Knightdramon
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Post by Knightdramon »

Springer wouldn't add anything Fortress Maximus hasn't already.

If anything, it could be more or less exactly the same story.
Nearly killed by Overlord, recuperated, has angst about the mission and his subsequent abandonment from Autobot high command.

Impactor could be interesting, especially for S2. They [appear to] have Megatron on board, Whirl appears to be on board, Perceptor [one of the very, very few survivors of Garrus 9] is on board...now there you could do something.
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Terome
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Post by Terome »

I can't think of anything interesting for Springer or Impactor to do but then it's not my job to think of such things. Impactor & Guzzle as a crimefighting team works a bit better unseen than it would on the page, I think.
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