Transformation 252: The Long Tooth of the Law.

9/3/2017

This week, who is the mystery killer?

Is it Longtooth?

Is it Red Alert?

Is it the Micromaster Battle Patrol?

If you're too busy to read the comic, the editorial will tell you.

Plus find out who Optimus loves more: Ratchet or Powerglide.

All in my look at issue 252!

15 Comments

Tim Roll-Pickering link

10/3/2017 06:55:36 pm

Oddly the offending bits of the editorial would have worked almost perfectly next week, give or take the numbering - perhaps things got confused over the Christmas break? (I also recall last week's issue coming out a day earlier than usual, and the same thing happened a year later, suggesting disruption all over.)

It's a long time since I last read this saga so is Roadimus's possessor foolishly sabotaging the ship when he's still on board or is Rodimus fighting back earlier than we realise by trying to sacrifice them all to destroy the entity?

Stuart

12/3/2017 02:28:50 pm

Good catch on the release schedule getting skiffy, I'd not noticed that!

John D. link

11/3/2017 09:01:11 am

I remember thinking the black and white strips were getting unnecessarily contrived and weird at this stage. Maybe that was common feedback, and maybe that's where the kind of "let's pretend it's 1986 again" Earthforce idea came from.

Stuart

12/3/2017 02:30:26 pm

Earthforce was mainly about taking advantage of the need to do Classics Heroes promotion letting Furman write about the characters he liked better than the more recent ones.

Tim Roll-Pickering link

12/3/2017 06:41:04 pm

He's said he was also frustrated that it was proving impossible to tie into the US stories satisfactorily because reprints kept altering the schedule and so seized the opportunity to tell a bunch of stories set in their own bubble without foreseeing he'd be asked when they're set all these years later.

Ralph Burns

12/3/2017 05:37:34 pm

If only DARK RODIMUS had killed Longtooth!!!

SPECIAL TEAMS!

Alex Smith link

12/3/2017 05:51:47 pm

What's with Delbo and making the Rescue Patrol's vehicle modes huge? (Not that Micromasters' vehicle modes have ever made much sense, scale-wise).

Tim Roll-Pickering link

14/3/2017 05:04:03 pm

Just about all the artists seemed to struggle with the Micromasters' sizes, suggesting the reference sheets were poor.

If the animated adverts are anything to go by, it's possible the original idea was for the Micromasters to be tiny robots who transform into toy vehicles, which IIRC was the story behind the pre Transformer mini Autobots. But that would have been even harder to pull off in fiction.

Alex Smith link

14/3/2017 05:55:10 pm

That was indeed the story behind the mini-cars - they were meant to be Penny Racers (or Choro-Q), hence the chunky, deformed proportions. As for pulling it off in fiction, don't forget the Throttlebots were toy cars for a while!

The trouble with the Micromasters is that, in the comic at least, we see that they do in fact turn in to vehicles capable of carrying humans. Which means they must be employing size-changing technology to go from midget robots to actual-size cars, surely negating any energy-saving benefit of being smaller. Why not just have them as regular-sized Transformers, with Road Handler the size of Sideswipe, say, and Powertrain the size of Prime?

That's not to say I'm not a fan of Transformers having varying sizes - I'm not so keen on the Robin Smith approach of having everyone be basically the same height. And I also like it when the fiction explores those variances in size (RIP Pipes. Sniff.)

Burstingfoam

14/3/2017 04:30:56 pm

I’m sorry to ask this here, it’s got nothing to do with the issue in question, but I suddenly noticed something today, and I have to ask:

Why do Cybertronian Transformers turn into passenger carrying vehicles? Who are the passengers meant to be? Fair enough that the ones that go to Earth are adapted, but why the others (I’m thinking for example of Fusion in And There Shall Come A Leader) ?

I’m going to ask this until I get an answer. I fear I may have undermined the whole point of this very silly franchise.

Alex Smith link

14/3/2017 06:01:06 pm

Does Fusion have space for passengers? He's based on Prime's Cybertronian mode from the very first issue, and that was basically a box on wheels wasn't it?

However Bluestreak in that same strip looks like he could carry passengers, so who knows? Bear in mind that in those days the characters didn't even get Cybertronian robot modes, so Prime's been walking around with the front of an American lorry on his chest for more than 4 million years before they were invented.

What's also curious is that Shockwave's Universe profile states that 'due to never being modified by the Ark' in his space-gun mode he 'remains in a size consistent with his robot mode', almost implying that size-changing is a unique thing to the Ark-revived Transformers (though subsequently disproved by the Insecticons).

Burstingfoam

16/3/2017 09:48:52 am

I meant Bluestreak, honest. That's what you get for doing things from memory.

I'm suspecting the answer to this was 'because God said so' - but I suppose in a world where God/Primus definitely exists, then that's as good a reason as any.

Simon Hall

14/3/2017 09:44:24 pm

The passenger compartments was a thing brought up during the Dreamwave days - it was used as a sign that the Transformers were perhaps supposed to integrate with other beings/ explore other worlds type stuff.

Weren't t Insecticons also massive in insect mode on Cybertron? I seem to recall Sharpnel was as big as the Coneheads in alt-mode. I'm assuming the Decepticons had learnt how to do the mass-shifting stuff as a by-product of being reconstructed on Earth. Or something.

I always thought that the Micromasters alt modes were the same size as regular cars - just that they didn't turn into a 30ft robot like folk like Prowl did. Makes a nonsense of any of the jets though...

...at least Japan had it right with the Micromasters inhabiting the imaginatively named 'Planet Micro', so they could all be like the toys and no further explanation was necessary...!

I can't really judge on the reveal of Rodimus being all evil here, as I read this in the Titan books and it seemed obvious to me as growed up that Rodimus was doing all the stuff. That editorial is appalling though - why would you read on to see what you've already been told? Its like spoilers in this new fangled future we live in - there's always some prick that has to spoil it for everyone.

Gary Erskine seems to be coming in for some ridicule here - fair enough, Transformers aren't his strong point - but he does go onto do some incredible stuff in Knights Of Pendragon and the early issues of Warheads.

Alex Smith link

18/3/2017 11:52:54 pm

I could have sworn I'd seen the Insecticons appear in small mode as well on Cybertron, but I could well be wrong.

Felicity link

2/12/2019 05:34:05 pm

Budiansky Optimus was also occasionally angsty, but then again, Budiansky wrote Optimus out of the comic for quite a while, so that also has to be factored in.

That’s a good point about Bumblebee not being particularly small and weak as Goldbug. He didn’t seem much bigger than Bumblebee physically but his “Transformers Universe” profile said that he had a new grown-up attitude and didn’t care what anyone thought of him.

There’s another thing that’s confusing about the Jazz panel. The way that Bumblebee’s thoughts continue on into a box with “—even fear me!” just as Jazz is doing his thing makes it seem like Jazz fears Bumblebee.

Transformation 252: The Long Tooth of the Law.

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