Transformation 151: Head's Up.

3/4/2015

It's the departure of Death's Head and the arrival of Bryan Hitch in my look at the final exciting part of:

The Legacy of Unicron! Part 6.

Also, anyone in London over the next few weeks should pop into Orbital Comics, not only is it run by a fan and as such full of a surprising variety of Transformers toys, it also has a nice display of original work from Irish artists that includes the mighty and wonderful Nick Roche.

13 Comments

Ralph Burns

6/4/2015 11:25:58 am

That 'Best of two Comics...in one' ad began a hatred of GI Joe that took 20 years to leave me before I could properly appreciate it. The UK Action Force strips in the doomed weekly were great but I had stopped reading due to not liking the US Joe material (I wasn't fooled). Then that stuff turned up in Transformers (not the good UK stuff) and kept going and going and going...and the logo polluted the cover. ARGH FUCK YOU 'ACTION FORCE'!!!'

Leg-end of Unicron was tops though.

SPECIAL TEAMS!

Benway

6/4/2015 12:32:30 pm

Yeah. I loved the rotating back-up strips. Some of them were really great and the sort of thing I'd never have known existed otherwise, Hercules, Rocket Racoon... Action Force wasn't too bad, but it wasn't particuarly good either... and it was here forever!

This prompted me to write an actual hacked off complaint letter to Marvel!

Stuart

6/4/2015 01:57:28 pm

I didn't know a time before Action Force in the comic so their presence didn't bother me so much in terms of blocking better material, but I always thought it was a bit crap still.

John D. link

6/4/2015 05:13:24 pm

For a kid who devoured books and comics I bizarrely rejected the action force/GI Joe stuff and just never read it. I still have no idea if it was a out action force or gi joe or what the difference was. I recall one episode being about snake eyes fighting animals in the jungle and I read it because I liked the art work.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

8/4/2015 06:38:04 am

I think that one was a reprint of one of the UK stories from the weekly used to put the Christmas break on the middle of a story rather than before the last part.

John D.

6/4/2015 05:14:47 pm

Thanks for explaining the Cyclonus and scourge thing, that makes sense - I think!

Benway

6/4/2015 06:02:20 pm

Another thing that rankled was that at this point Spider-man was for the first time out of print. The Fantastic Four were out of print. The Hulk? Limbo. And yet Action Force are worth saving?

snowkatt

8/4/2015 06:01:50 pm

at hasbro's urging ( and cash injection) no doubt

Ralph Burns

24/4/2015 11:51:29 am

It must be hard for those not there at the time to remember the dark times was Spidey just wasn't printed in the UK! But I never forget...never forget...never forget...

SPECIAL TEAMS!

Harry

7/4/2015 12:28:42 pm

'Another thing that rankled was that at this point Spider-man was for the first time out of print. The Fantastic Four were out of print. The Hulk? Limbo. And yet Action Force are worth saving?'

Another Hasbro toyline conveniently also promoted by a Marvel comic...

Dave

7/4/2015 01:25:07 pm

Chalk me up as another that hated Action Force. I never got into it and rarely bothered reading it (the only one that sticks in my mind is one that had no dialogue in it). I had to avoid telling my parents, as I knew they wouldn't carry on buying the comic if they knew i wasn't reading a third of it..... I loved Visionaries and Machine Man that both came later but Action Force never worked for me. Interesting to see it was so common!

Tim Roll-Pickering link

8/4/2015 06:42:00 am

I'm another who arrived later on by which time the AFers were installed but knew from back issues it hadn't always been so. I read them at the time but was never too excited. Come 1991 the repeat of Machine Man was an amazing change and I found myself both ignoring the G.I. Joe special that continued the Civil War story (but never concluded it!) and nominating it as the worst back-up strip in the readers' poll.

Felicity link

6/11/2019 09:05:12 pm

“Hindhead” sounds like the name of a Transformer. Maybe a Headmaster.

Transformation 151: Head's Up.

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