Transformation 308: This is Mutiny.

6/4/2018

This week, it's the final weekly issue. Optimus barely pauses between speeches, Triggerhappy and Mindwipe try to get away from Starscream and Nightbeat's attempt to rescue Racthet is 50% successful.

All this and Machine Man Update Updated in my look at The Eye of the Storm part 3!

8 Comments

Anonymous X

7/4/2018 05:57:05 pm

I have to agree that the Machine Man backup strip did feel quite the relic when it was reprinted – I hadn’t remembered it from the first time round given my young age during the early days of the comic, but I could tell straight away that the story was old material. Did read every part though, literally the only non-Headmasters backup strip I ever bothered with in during the comic’s run. It’s still memorable to me as the first cyberpunkish-themed fiction that I remember being exposed to.

Simon Hall

8/4/2018 08:47:56 pm

I wonder if budegtary problems were the reason Machine Man was pressed back into service, rather than a (relatively) contemporary Iron Man or similar story. Easy to keep costs down when there's something you've already bought and paid for to hand.

John D. link

8/4/2018 09:18:09 pm

Yes I remember being very confused by Machine Man and wondering if it was some kind of Iron Man rip-off. Then a bad Iron Man actually appeared. And (spoiler) they had a terrific punch up. All incredibly confuding. But finally a back up strip that thematically matched the main feature. Megatrachet is indeed Nightmare Fuel! Fixit did well to reassmeble two separate robots from the pile of poo he was left with...and I liked Fixit being involved as I actuallty had his Micromaster team!

bouncelot

9/4/2018 08:40:26 pm

The change to fortnightly meant that I forgot to go to the newsagents a couple of weeks running. Fortunately I had my copy on a regular order, so I didn't actually miss an issue.

And I remember really enjoying the rerun of Machine Man 2020. I remembered some details from one installment of the original (#36, my first ever issue), but none of the later ones I must have read (#40-42), it didn't help that my copies of everything before #50 disappeared at some point before or during our house move (circa. #89).

Auntie Slag

9/4/2018 11:11:56 pm

I remember reading Machine Man 2020 the first time round. The art style made it seem much more adult, and the theme darker. It was probably about two years before I gave it a proper read, but what a story.

And the art was incredible. Certain panels are etched forever in my tiny mind, and the level of detail was so appealing, all those little wires and bits when he removed his helmet (Oo-er)!

Tim Roll-Pickering link

18/4/2018 03:30:53 pm

Can you really threaten a Headmaster by the neck?

The big shock on reading this issue (well apart from the frequency change) was seeing an early story with so many Transformers drawn in their toy forms, something I'd not seen much of outside of the Ladybird books. It was quite a revelation just how far things have come. The Enemy Within was a good choice for a reprint though because it focuses on what's become a classic theme of the franchise, the Starscream-Megatron relationship, that the comic generally didn't do too much with. So it offered extra authenticity and stability at a critical time.

Felicity link

25/12/2019 08:38:36 pm

I can only think of two possible puns the cover was trying to make, neither of them very good. “Chill-out” [sic] because these are the Decepticons believed to be dead, i.e. in cold storage? Or “Understand?!” because Shockwave is literally standing over him? Neither really works.

I can’t help but feel sorry for Mindwipe and Triggerhappy from this point onward.

And so it begins: everything Grimlock does is supposed to enhance him as a character, while everything Optimus Prime does erodes his character.

However I do love the line “I told Hot Rod not to leave the oven on” (I hope I quoted that right; I don’t have the issue handy and my Google fu has failed me) so a hearty well-done to Simon Furman for that.

That’s twice that Nightbeat has gone “fishing.” Once to get rid of Thunderwing, and once to bring back Ratchet.

JeremiahEcks

11/3/2025 04:45:31 pm

So 'new continuity'. Sigh. It's a bit lazy to just go 'soft reboot' - it's why I don't buy new Marvel comics anymore (serial fiction does have to build on what has come before. If it becomes too unwieldy, then better to hard reboot than soft reboot).

Either way though this is Furman at his best IMO. At least in terms of story and scripting. Continuity though in my opinion should be an editor's purview, or at least an advisor if they have the money for one.

So how do we explain Ravage and Shockers being 'back from the dead'?

Well. Let's try.

1) Shockwave: Going down in flames during the Desert Island in Space, let's presume most of the Cons there thought he *was* dead. Only a few handful of loyalists (like Snaptrap) knew he was alive and he worked from secret trying to concoct a plan to kill Galvatron. Better this in hiding than Galvatron coming for him. Maybe you can even assume he allowed himself to be beaten by Fort Max to go into hiding and give Ratbat a middle finger as he would be the target now...
Rumours of Shocker's death start flying around and make their way to other Con groups (Starscream tells Scorpy's team that it's what happened to Shockers for Mindwipe to hear about it).
Shockwave does appear in Time Wars but a lot is happening and presumably he disappears straight after leading to confusion on everybody's side who they saw or who they didn't see. Starscream isn't there anyway so he can be left with the assumption that Shockwave is dead.
Shockwave goes again into hiding and when he reappears here, Mindwipe and Triggerhappy were simply confused by the rumours from before.
Earthforce may / may not happen. Shockwave may / may not appear to die again.
In Surrender, Mindwipe refers to the Desert Island 'death' but the way he says it, you can squint and take it as 'You keep dying, I remember hearing you died that way once, so how did you come back from it' OR it can literally be however he was written out of Earthforce in that grand finale we never got that deactivated anybody else who needs to be for Grimlock to resurrect them.

2) Ravage: he isn't even dead in the US stories, never mind the UK ones so it's a complete glitch here. He's part of Transformers vs. GI Joe as Shockwave's advisor.
To try and make 'everything' fit I go down this route: Ravage falls down a hole in Showdown and appears to be deactivated. In the UK continuity, Megatron deploys him in secret to look after the Insecticon Clones from Plague of the Insecticons where he is temporarily mind wiped. He's left to wander when he falls underground and is there until time distortions sort his mind out and he's back for Time Wars.
If Earthforce doesn't happen, he goes back into hiding after Two Megatrons to reveal himself to Shockwave and as he was a sneak agent all this time, the Cons thought he died in a mine shaft.
If Earthforce happens, then he's more active but you have to squint and assume they refer to the mine shaft here in the same way they do Shockwave's Space Screw-up -- 'we heard you die a lot, LIKE that mine shaft' - sort of thing. I'm trying hard to squint, but... you have to do that gymnastics for the US story even worse as unlike the UK, it doesn't write him out but has him surviving the mine shaft.

3) Runabout / Runamuck: They're not here yet but are in Surrender.

It never says they were dead IIRC. Nor does Decepticon Graffiti. Indeed thanks to Delbo they appear a couple of times in the background in crowd shots, and if Earthforce is your continuity Jam, then we know they survived Underbase and were active in the background of the main Con forces.
Therefore to my mind, no issue. But nor is there an issue assuming the rest were mistakes or out of continuity and the Battlechargers were resurrected by Shockwave.

It can sorta work.

Transformation 308: This is Mutiny.

Leave a Reply.

Author

Archives

Categories