Transformation 95: Bye Bye Donny, Bye Bye.

7/3/2014

It's the end of a mini-era as the totally essential Donny Finkleberg leaves the book.

Also, the end of the Warpath's Wanders storyline. But that's less important, right?

All in: Decepticon Graffiti! Part 2.

From this weekend the Top 30 Transformers characters piece is going up, so to see the (occasionally surprising) winners as they're announced and you're not already follow me on twitter @infltatabledalek.

17 Comments

Tim Roll-Pickering link

7/3/2014 11:18:46 am

Do the Battlechargers have the shortest initial lifespan of any of the featured toys? They're killed off in their introductory story and don't get revived for years. Other than some obscure toys getting wheeled out to be cannon fodder in great massacres, I can't think of such a short gap from introduction to death. A pity as Budiansky seems to have enjoyed writing them and they are very different from the run of the mill Decepticon troops. Maybe this is another meta comment on the task at hand.

As for Marvel salaries they could be quite variable depending on how much work the creator was doing, whether or not they had a day job in the industry (Budiansky was a staff editor) and also the royalties bonus scheme which IIRC kicked in on sales above 100,000 and could deliver quite sizeable cheques to creators - later on seven of them even made enough to go and start their own company. If the Statement of Ownership figures I've seen reproduced for the US sales are correct then in the 12 months up until about this one's original saw Transformers selling on average 300,982 copies an issue which was higher than even the Amazing Spider-Man that year (though possibly boosted if Marvel was selling the series via bags in toy stores as well). If licenced books delivered royalties then a permanent writer who also worked as an editor should have been making a bit on that. Donny Finkleburg, however, seems to be a non-staffer in the obscure character & series stage of his career and not getting his ideas picked up on plus he doesn't seem to have a back-up day job so he would have been earning far less.

The flat point may be a more general reflection of how in a lot of mid 1980s American fiction "success" was often depicted in materialistic terms related to accomodation - e.g. Back to the Future and Batteries Not Included both see the characters end the film in rather more upmarket conditions from how they started - but here Donny is foregoing "success" due to an attack of conscience.

snowkatt

7/3/2014 12:27:29 pm

those seven are off course the image founders
erik larsen
todd mcfarlane
marc silvestri
jim lee
rob liefeld
jim valentino
and while portacio

but keep in mind that they werent just any artists but came hot off the enormous success of spiderman and x men titles

those comics sold in their millions spiderman 1 shifted around 2 million
and x men 1 5 million
x force 1 was also around 1 million ditto for youngblood

even if the artist royalty was just a pittance on top of of their regular work for hire fee
but 5 million times a pittance amounds to a lot

this whoel comic was probably a cynical jab at the corporate structure of the time at comci book creators the inherent greed in anything successful and off course a meta comment at shilling toys
what does it matter if i develop these characters or not ? next month there will be a new stack of toys on my desk to shill

the american issue after this ( 24 afterdeath ) doesnt even try to explain why the protectobots or combaticons are there and its pretty damn blatant in its shilling with the death of optimus prime

Felicity link

27/10/2019 01:58:21 am

Hmm. Seven Image creators, seven missing Autobots!

Felicity link

27/10/2019 01:00:47 am

When they make Potato Salad Man part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, then Donny will be rich!

snowkatt

7/3/2014 12:41:30 pm

and things are looking up for a few weeks till we hit afterdeath at least ( urgh )

i dont have much to say about this story other then that it just clicked that this is the almost final apperance of circuit breaker ( good riddance ) untill very late in to the comic series

i wouldnt say that budiansky takes the piss in his choice for the new leaders ( they wouldnt last anyway ) i always thougth they were refreshingly offbeat

its just that in the execution of one of them he goes off the deep end

especially after the way gr...ahem the autobot leader was chosen
but thats for when we get there
first up prey
the harder they die
distant thunder
fallen angel
and err that cybertron story whose name eludes me for a moment

should be good

Harry

7/3/2014 02:37:18 pm

I absolutely love the run of UK-written stories coming up next, they've stuck with me since way back in 1987!

Stuart

8/3/2014 05:08:51 pm

Excellent point Tim (as always, curse you) about the life span of the Battle Chargers, because of my "Era" of the comic being from around the time of Perchance to Dream/their Random Delbo Cameos the idea this was an entirely one-off appearance for them never even occurred to me.

Off the top of my head, I think the second wave Decepticon Headmasters (Fangry and company) get given equally short service by Bob, but becuase Furman takes over so soon after that and does use them it's not as noticeable.

Auntie Slag

12/3/2014 12:51:19 pm

Hey Dalek, first it was Fasttrack, now its dates!

Your byline at the top of this issues review says:

Issue 95: Decepticon Graffiti! Part 2. 3rd January 1986.

Yet the .jpeg of the comic cover states 10th Jan '87.

Sort it out, son. That's a whole year of Den n' Ange's life at the Queen Vic you've scrubbed out!

Scrubbed aaaat, of existence [/Back To The Future, Eastenders style]

snowkatt

13/3/2014 11:40:34 am

at least 4 commenters and nobody bloody notices that for a week -.-

Harry

14/3/2014 09:56:40 am

Including you, Snowkatt... ;)

snowkatt

18/3/2014 03:05:04 am

when the decepitcons will in cite the revolution you will be the first against the wall !

viva la revolution !

; )

Stuart

14/3/2014 10:03:51 am

But now no one will ever know, as long as we all Murder on the Orient Express Slag our secret is safe.

Uncle Snarl

14/3/2014 11:00:50 am

*dons clever mustache*

Felicity

25/9/2016 10:49:58 pm

I’m glad they used the American cover for this issue. It’s a pretty rad cover, even if it does have a spoiler.

Felicity link

27/10/2019 01:57:38 am

When I reread this issue it always frustrates me that Finkleberg donates his entire cheque to restore the Statue of Liberty. Save a little for basic living expenses, Donny! And yeah, what about the other cheque? Surely he can ask Prime for it now that the missing Autobots are back.

That thing Circuit Breaker builds out of the Autobots sort of grosses me out when I try to see it from the point of view of a Transformer. Imagine if the artist had gone with a more Autobot X from “Autobot Spike” direction! That would have been rad!

Stuart

27/10/2019 01:54:48 am

That would have been fun.

Thanks for all the recent comments as you've read through, I've not had much chance to reply, but I've enjoyed them all.

Felicity

27/10/2019 04:09:32 am

Thanks! I’m enjoying the blog :-)

Transformation 95: Bye Bye Donny, Bye Bye.

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