Transformation 243: Don't Mind Me.

6/1/2017

Happy 2017!

We made it!

Wow.

To counter all the celebrity deaths of the last year, why not read the start of the return to life of a famous dead person? Several in fact. Plus the UK story that tries to explain it, and Sophie Aldred's midriff.

All in my look at ISSUE 243!

17 Comments

S II

6/1/2017 05:47:26 pm

Ahhh, Sophie Aldred. Those were the days!

The various Megatrons made my head hurt as a child, and probably still will now if I think about.

Back to Sophie Aldred it is. Ahhhh!

Stuart

6/1/2017 06:14:41 pm

I think that was the fastest reply I have ever had to one of these.

And done one handed as well.

S II

6/1/2017 08:41:27 pm

Never let it be said that I am slow to come into the Comments thread. Or indeed anywhere.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

6/1/2017 08:49:47 pm

I've been quite critical of the editing in this period so praise where it's due - reprinting the original Straxus mind swap story in 1989 means that this strand was fairly current for readers back then. And it would probably have taken more just a few speech bubble changes to overcome the whole resurrection theme in the US storyline. But more next on the continuity snarl next week.

Interesting that the Transformation was admitting recent adventures have been published out of order. It makes one wish for another Robot War that could have told us just where everything fits.

And isn't it Outback not Snowjob who's on the run in this one?

Stuart

7/1/2017 11:11:21 am

Of course it is!

I think the Straxus reprint was a happy coincide, just picking up from where the last CC ended.

John D. link

7/1/2017 12:26:21 am

Merry Christmas Stu, and a Halpy New Year! Some good witticisms above chaps, I am no Dr Who expert, was Kylie not an assistant once? Lucky Dr Who, being assisted. As I have said before I have never really believed the UK Time Wars Megatron was THE Megatron, I just treated him as some mad powerful ally Galvatron had picked up. After all, how could somebody as powerful as Megatron just be assembled somewhere? I suppose I have that same kind of reservation about Nebulans building robots. I know MTMTE plays with this idea of some Cybertronians being somehow innately stronger than most others. Back to my point -are you going to speculate on how Furman managed to smash the continuity despite being in control of both threads? I don't know why he did it.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

7/1/2017 01:41:42 am

I'll stick my neck out as I don't know if Furman or Daley have been interviewed on this specifically but I have a suspicion that Furman's early US strips see his *least* control since 1985. This was about the only time that Furman was the less experienced part of the writer-editor combination, at least from the US perspective and particularly from Don Daley. The latter had been on the book for some three years by now and had edited a good number of other Marvels by this stage. By contrast Furman was doing his first work in US comics and was basically an unknown who might have done some good work in an overseas market but that carried less weight.

So it's quite possible that Furman found himself with limited clout to control the details of Megatron's US return in such a way that the UK set-up could easily fit in with it. He might well have planned a vaguer "I am hard to kill" explanation for the US stories (as he later did with Shockwave) and perhaps planned to do a UK story that would once more see Megatron seemingly dead. But instead a detailed account of Megatron's return is given, almost slotted into the story (it is generally more natural to do the "how I survived" before "what I plan to do") that leaves little room to write around.

Stuart

7/1/2017 11:15:08 am

Aye, I'll be talking (a lot!) about this next week, but I think that's the most plausible thinking.

Also, tellingly or not, when Furman talks about his US he rarely mentions Daley whilst having lots of praise for Rob Tokar....

Ralph Burns

8/1/2017 03:35:44 pm

Enjoyable UK strip this week. Great cliffhanger. I still am nonplussed how it gets folks knickers in a twist. Continuity and quality wise, Earthforce annoyed me far more.

SPECIAL TEAMS!

Simon Hall

8/1/2017 06:12:34 pm

Yay Megatron's insane scheme! These interactions between Megatron and Ratchet are my favourite parts of this story.

Two Megatrons I can dimly recall reading at the time, but didn't think too much of it - in terms of the continuity issues and whatnot anyway, I just thought it started off pretty well, but then the stuff next week is as nonsensical as the Airstrike Patrol's attack to draw out Optimus and all the Autobots.

Continuity is one of those things that gets people terribly upset. I used to be one of them! I absolutely loved '90s Ghost Rider, but a succession of crossovers and a change in writers and editors conspired to give the character two distinct origin stories that don't square with each other. When Jason Aaron revived the character as part of his tenure on Ghost Rider in the late '00s, he wrote in an entirely different origin for ALL the Ghost Riders which confused and annoyed a lot of folk (the letters page was crammed with this for about four months before Aaron himself said he was drawing a line under the subject). Its a shame when stuff like this happens, as it can overtake the story that's being told (which in Aaron's case was a huge amount of fun and actually did a lot to straighten out a lot of continuity tangles). You think I'd have learnt my lesson having grown up watching Quantum Leap, which for years referred to Ziggy as a 'he', only for us to find out that the parallel hybrid computer is female in 'The Leap Back' ...and no explanation is ever given.

As I've always read Transformers a bit arse about face, continuity niggles don't bother me so much - I'm more interested in the story being told being any good.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

9/1/2017 12:11:19 am

Was that anything to do with the headache inducing details in the below post that attempted to summarise the Ghost Rider history? My Ghost Rider knowledge is pretty much just the original run.

http://marvelmasterworksfansite.yuku.com/sreply/657312/Any-GR-fans-Need-help-deconfusing-me

Felicity link

26/11/2019 10:56:17 pm

The second “Ghost Rider” comics series was the first one I read and I was prepared to accept whatever they said the backstory was. Since I never found more than a handful of issues of the original series I never had enough information to know if it was being contradicted.

This is probably how comic companies wish it worked with all readers. Only whatever is happening “now” is canon and all the fans are young enough not to have read the earlier work.

Unfortunately for the comic companies, as the industry contracts and only people over a certain age are buying anything on paper at all, let alone superhero comics, they’re going to have to reckon with the older nostalgic readers.

Stuart

8/1/2017 07:27:59 pm

The continuity patching probably wouldn't have been such an issue if it didn't undo such good character development on Megs.

Earthforce's continuity issues more sort of sneak up on you, I don't think a lot of the disconnects don't really become apparent until after the UK stories have finished. Till then they could still be set vaguely five minutes after the US stories (as implied by that few "See upcoming US strips!" caption).

Tim Roll-Pickering link

8/1/2017 11:31:54 pm

I think it also becomes such a big issue because it impacts on the question of who Galvatron (or at least some of the Galvatrons) is and in turn rewrites our understanding of Time Wars.

We'd probably shrug off Ratchet's lack of knowledge about Megatron running around on Earth - he probably didn't get to read Grimlock's reports if the latter bothered to log any and was more concerned with repairing casualties of Time Wars than learning who had fought alongside Galvatron. Even Prime's belief that Megatron was dead could be swept over or we'd assume he thought his old foe perished in the rift.

Alex Smith link

9/1/2017 09:40:05 am

"Even Prime's belief that Megatron was dead could be swept over or we'd assume he thought his old foe perished in the rift.
Reply"

That's all it would have taken really, wouldn't it? A few changed lines in the US strip - "I thought you'd blown yourself up" becomes "...you died in the rift" etc. The confusion post-Time-Wars which saw the likes of the Wreckers and Mayhems abandoned on Earth is perfect for fudging continuity.

Oh, Simon.

Felicity link

26/11/2019 11:06:33 pm

Before I forget again, there’s a small thing that bothers me about the previous issue. Our “mysterious character” has a line of dialogue that has evidently been altered by someone who wasn’t paying attention to the story. He says “Excellent, Whisper…” as if the character speaking in the previous panel was Whisper. The comma has been clumsily added. In actual fact the original correct dialogue (“Excellent. Whisper…”), which indicates the following panel is addressed to Whisper, is the correct one.

A minor nitpick but it’s always frustrated me.

Simon Furman lampshading the “how I survived” and “my insane scheme” tropes is something that he can get away with here because it’s 1989 and that kind of flippant ironic dialogue hasn’t been done to death yet. Today it would be tiresome and Joss-Whedon-y. But since Furman was doing it this early, it’s clever and funny. So kudos to him. :-)

Aw, Megatron’s cat loves him. :-)

Now I’m curious to see Monstero’s makeover.

The “Next Week” box chooses the odd “drooling vampire” panel with the green skin and the slobber. I guess that was supposed to be Transformer blood (oil?).

LiamKav

21/12/2021 10:45:16 pm

"Considering this is very much trying to be a crowd pleasing arc it’s perhaps surprising Furman won’t be pitching Megatron against Optimus"

Thinking about it, I don't think Powermaster Prime ever really gets a one on one moment with Megatron in the entire US comic run, does he? Perhaps because it wouldn't work as well as theoretically PM should physically outclass him in ever way. (It's usually far less interesting to have stronger goodies than badies. BW season 3 gets around this by having Beast Megatron's main strength be his intelligence and also by having the good guys on the back foot the entire season.)

Transformation 243: Don't Mind Me.

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