So Many Stories of Where I’ve Been and How I got to Where I am, but These Stories Don’t Mean Anything When You’ve got no one to Tell Them to.
More Than Meets the Eye issue 9: Shadowplay a totally epic story based on real events that definitely happened Part 1: Post Hoc.
So, what am I looking at again? Not more violence?
Ironically for a story that wasn’t part of the original plan, it’s fair to say the Shadowplay three parter represents a significant shifting of gears for the series. It had certainly been well received by fans up till this point, but this is the one where everything really comes together to create a little arc that would, by the end, still be very likely to be on most people’s top 3 MTMTE stories, and likely to be very high on any overall IDW ranking.
All whilst also really the environment of fan speculation and guessing by bringing in some large and surprising twists, that would be sustained (and occasionally disappoint) right till the end, creating a community and lasting friendships out of guesswork.
And however outside the originally mapped out shape of the first year this request to include Optimus Prime was from Hasbro, it lets Roberts do a very natural thing, provide a sequel to his first little masterpiece, Chaos Theory.
And this starts immediately, with an opening that directly mirrors (almost literally, as they’re on the other side of the glass to where Megatron and Impactor were sat) the first scene of that issue, with a before the war scene outside Maccadam’s, as Nightbeat (yay!) and new, but based on Animated Perceptor, Quark enjoy a drink. With the opening “What am I looking at again? Not more violence?” question being showing the worsening situation since Impactor asked about poetry.
So, what am I looking at again? Not more violence?
Ironically for a story that wasn’t part of the original plan, it’s fair to say the Shadowplay three parter represents a significant shifting of gears for the series. It had certainly been well received by fans up till this point, but this is the one where everything really comes together to create a little arc that would, by the end, still be very likely to be on most people’s top 3 MTMTE stories, and likely to be very high on any overall IDW ranking.
All whilst also really the environment of fan speculation and guessing by bringing in some large and surprising twists, that would be sustained (and occasionally disappoint) right till the end, creating a community and lasting friendships out of guesswork.
And however outside the originally mapped out shape of the first year this request to include Optimus Prime was from Hasbro, it lets Roberts do a very natural thing, provide a sequel to his first little masterpiece, Chaos Theory.
And this starts immediately, with an opening that directly mirrors (almost literally, as they’re on the other side of the glass to where Megatron and Impactor were sat) the first scene of that issue, with a before the war scene outside Maccadam’s, as Nightbeat (yay!) and new, but based on Animated Perceptor, Quark enjoy a drink. With the opening “What am I looking at again? Not more violence?” question being showing the worsening situation since Impactor asked about poetry.
No beating about the bush here.
Roberts had very likely been itching to write for the Marvel UK legend that is Nightbeat (even with the very long lead-in on the toy pack-in comics, I think we’re still before he’d have realised this might become a regular thing), and is clearly having a blast, making him interested in conspiracies, but with a cheekiness and fun to him that, unfortunately, won’t really be there after Roberts has seen Sherlock.
The main purpose of their conversation is to establish the changing climate since the events of Chaos Theory: The Decepticon movement is growing, and everyone is feeling paranoid about where the future is going. Which is why, before the “U-turn,” the Senate was doing clampdowns and spying on citizens, whilst Quark himself is worried that his own microscope alternate mode won’t impress the working class Decepticon’s if they take power.
So, for all Nightbeat is treating the situation with humour, especially the idea the playing with a model of the Lost Light Rung could be a government spy (now there’s a throwaway moment laying some pipe for the future), the message is clear, paranoia is on the rise, no one is especially trusting of either the state or the anarchists. A storm is coming.
With the rain starting immediately, as Nightbeat changes the topic to mock Quark for nursing his drink, with the microscope explaining that it tastes odd, just as he notices something drip into it from above…
Which turns out to be blood, coming from a corpse hung upside down from the bridge above them.
Which is a nicely dark moment, plus a sly gag on the fact that energon is both a Transformers blood and their drink of choice.
The main purpose of their conversation is to establish the changing climate since the events of Chaos Theory: The Decepticon movement is growing, and everyone is feeling paranoid about where the future is going. Which is why, before the “U-turn,” the Senate was doing clampdowns and spying on citizens, whilst Quark himself is worried that his own microscope alternate mode won’t impress the working class Decepticon’s if they take power.
So, for all Nightbeat is treating the situation with humour, especially the idea the playing with a model of the Lost Light Rung could be a government spy (now there’s a throwaway moment laying some pipe for the future), the message is clear, paranoia is on the rise, no one is especially trusting of either the state or the anarchists. A storm is coming.
With the rain starting immediately, as Nightbeat changes the topic to mock Quark for nursing his drink, with the microscope explaining that it tastes odd, just as he notices something drip into it from above…
Which turns out to be blood, coming from a corpse hung upside down from the bridge above them.
Which is a nicely dark moment, plus a sly gag on the fact that energon is both a Transformers blood and their drink of choice.
The million dollar brain.
And this was as far as I’d gotten when writing this on Saturday 14th July 2024, so imagine my surprise when coming back to be a story about what turns out to be a political assassination that’s been staged to allow the rise of fascism, the attempted Donald Trump shooting happened in the meantime.
If life is going to mirror art that much, maybe James should have written a comic about football coming home that could have influenced today instead.
Still, whilst I’m not actually a big believer in conspiracies in real life (and certainly, if Biden wanted Trump dead, he’d be dead. And if Trump staged it, I don’t think he’d have the balls to stand in front of an actual bullet), I do enjoy a good fictional one, and as we cut the Lost Light in the present, this turns out to be a very tangled one.
In Swerve’s bar, Rewind has summoned Ratchet, Drift, Chromedome, Rewind, Tailgate, Skids and Swerve himself, to help the in a wheelchair and hidden behind the bar Rung.
Whilst it might be more a happy coincidence than intentional plan, this is a good framing device to have coming off the Annual and any new readers who have been picked up by the special, quickly, and efficiently introducing each character and their relationships.
If life is going to mirror art that much, maybe James should have written a comic about football coming home that could have influenced today instead.
Still, whilst I’m not actually a big believer in conspiracies in real life (and certainly, if Biden wanted Trump dead, he’d be dead. And if Trump staged it, I don’t think he’d have the balls to stand in front of an actual bullet), I do enjoy a good fictional one, and as we cut the Lost Light in the present, this turns out to be a very tangled one.
In Swerve’s bar, Rewind has summoned Ratchet, Drift, Chromedome, Rewind, Tailgate, Skids and Swerve himself, to help the in a wheelchair and hidden behind the bar Rung.
Whilst it might be more a happy coincidence than intentional plan, this is a good framing device to have coming off the Annual and any new readers who have been picked up by the special, quickly, and efficiently introducing each character and their relationships.
Swerve loves political assasination.
So, Ratchet makes a joke about having abandoned a major operation to come here that no one laughs at, but his actual genuine reason for being late (painting Pharma’s hands red) gets a strong belly laugh.
Rewind is gleeful at the reveal of Rung, with everyone else having differing degrees of shock (Drift being especially disgusted, Chromedome just resigned), except Whirl who thinks having a near corpse behind the bar is cool.
The reason they’re all there is simple though: Rung will become brain dead if they don’t help him make critical neural connections, which they’re going to do by telling him a “Totally epic story based on real events that definitely happened”, because, like any good conspiracy nut, Rewind has a flowchart of how all present were connected by world changing events four million years ago.
He calls it a “sociotemporal hotspot,” Douglas Adams called it “the fundamental connectiveness of all things,” but it boils down to the fact that the CCTV, archival documents and interviews he’s collected over the years have let him put together a narrative.
Which means this is basically The X-Files episode Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man, but which avoids the confusion over how much of the story the Lone Gunmen have put together actually happened (that even had the writers of the episode arguing with Chris Carter over it) by also having people who were there to confirm this all “Definitely happened”, with only one and played for laughs “Unreliable narrator” moment to come.
So, after a quick recap of the status quo (a certain miner come writer is making the word “Decepticon” spread; Nominus Prime hasn’t been seen since a failed assassination attempt, Proteus and the Senate are struggling to stamp down on public unrest and Blurr won the Ibex cup for the tenth time. Much to Swerve’s delight), it’s over to Chromedome to tell the story of how he, as a member of Mehcaforensics, got called into a crime scene at what used to be called the Interstate Bridge.
Rewind is gleeful at the reveal of Rung, with everyone else having differing degrees of shock (Drift being especially disgusted, Chromedome just resigned), except Whirl who thinks having a near corpse behind the bar is cool.
The reason they’re all there is simple though: Rung will become brain dead if they don’t help him make critical neural connections, which they’re going to do by telling him a “Totally epic story based on real events that definitely happened”, because, like any good conspiracy nut, Rewind has a flowchart of how all present were connected by world changing events four million years ago.
He calls it a “sociotemporal hotspot,” Douglas Adams called it “the fundamental connectiveness of all things,” but it boils down to the fact that the CCTV, archival documents and interviews he’s collected over the years have let him put together a narrative.
Which means this is basically The X-Files episode Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man, but which avoids the confusion over how much of the story the Lone Gunmen have put together actually happened (that even had the writers of the episode arguing with Chris Carter over it) by also having people who were there to confirm this all “Definitely happened”, with only one and played for laughs “Unreliable narrator” moment to come.
So, after a quick recap of the status quo (a certain miner come writer is making the word “Decepticon” spread; Nominus Prime hasn’t been seen since a failed assassination attempt, Proteus and the Senate are struggling to stamp down on public unrest and Blurr won the Ibex cup for the tenth time. Much to Swerve’s delight), it’s over to Chromedome to tell the story of how he, as a member of Mehcaforensics, got called into a crime scene at what used to be called the Interstate Bridge.
The new Dempsey and Makepeace.
Chromedome tries to tell everyone his real name, but in an odd moment of seeming jealousy that will come to make more sense later, Rewind has him quickly move on from that and insists they just call him by his current name to avoid confusion.
Not that it matters too much to Chromedome, because everyone back in the day just called him “Unlucky,” because his odd couple cop buddy partnership was with Prowl.
The upside-down body turns out to be Senator Sherma (and he we have, begrudgingly, what is clearly a very different Sherma Bridge to the one Roberts intended before Autocracy threw a lot of plans out of whack), and the writing does a very careful job of not making Prowl too noticeably different from how Barber is currently portraying him, but there’s a lighter touch to him. When Chromedome (in basically his “Classic” look, so for once, the Hachette book with this arc in it has a character on the cover who looks like they do inside) is 0.7 minutes later he’ll get berated, but he also listens serious when his assistant suggests the Decepticons are behind this rather than being dismissive.
Which turns out to be a good thing, because whilst Prowl has a lot of very enthusiastic ideas for how the Decepticons could be behind this (including things like what the angle of the shadows means), but Chromedome has just noticed the massive painted on Decepticon symbol on his back. With what can only be called a blatant clue to hand, Prowl thinks it’s time for what Chromedome calls “the catchphrase,” a full autopsy.
Not that it matters too much to Chromedome, because everyone back in the day just called him “Unlucky,” because his odd couple cop buddy partnership was with Prowl.
The upside-down body turns out to be Senator Sherma (and he we have, begrudgingly, what is clearly a very different Sherma Bridge to the one Roberts intended before Autocracy threw a lot of plans out of whack), and the writing does a very careful job of not making Prowl too noticeably different from how Barber is currently portraying him, but there’s a lighter touch to him. When Chromedome (in basically his “Classic” look, so for once, the Hachette book with this arc in it has a character on the cover who looks like they do inside) is 0.7 minutes later he’ll get berated, but he also listens serious when his assistant suggests the Decepticons are behind this rather than being dismissive.
Which turns out to be a good thing, because whilst Prowl has a lot of very enthusiastic ideas for how the Decepticons could be behind this (including things like what the angle of the shadows means), but Chromedome has just noticed the massive painted on Decepticon symbol on his back. With what can only be called a blatant clue to hand, Prowl thinks it’s time for what Chromedome calls “the catchphrase,” a full autopsy.
Accidentally putting the editorial notes into the script.
Which is where Skids interrupts to ask if Prowl is going to be a recurring character, and if so, they need fleshing out.
Which is on the surface a rather on the nose writer joke, but the fact Skids has no memory at all of this Prowl (he does remember the other Prowl who died on Delphi, apparently he just really liked hugs) and the idea we may only be seeing Prowl on a superficial level are things that are pointing the way for both books over the next year.
Unfortunately, we also get the establishment of a running joke that Roberts would go to once too often, with Rewind and Chromedome defining Prowl by how he flips tables when he’s angry (something Rewind himself can’t even manage), making a one-off moment from the first issue a run into the ground character trait.
Hmm, maybe Skids was right.
As they debate how many times Prowl has actually tossed off (five), Drift is getting increasingly irate texts from Rodimus, so it’s time for his part of the story.
Which is on the surface a rather on the nose writer joke, but the fact Skids has no memory at all of this Prowl (he does remember the other Prowl who died on Delphi, apparently he just really liked hugs) and the idea we may only be seeing Prowl on a superficial level are things that are pointing the way for both books over the next year.
Unfortunately, we also get the establishment of a running joke that Roberts would go to once too often, with Rewind and Chromedome defining Prowl by how he flips tables when he’s angry (something Rewind himself can’t even manage), making a one-off moment from the first issue a run into the ground character trait.
Hmm, maybe Skids was right.
As they debate how many times Prowl has actually tossed off (five), Drift is getting increasingly irate texts from Rodimus, so it’s time for his part of the story.
Milne really Pax in the detail.
Which is another go of his running gag of his happy clappy hippy persona not quite matching the reality he lives in, as he talks about how his holistic energies were low at the time, which is a long winded way of saying he was a cyber-smack head in the Dead End, easy prey for the washout collecting Sonic and Boom (another callback to the Delphi two parter), who take great delight in roughing up their latest completely out of it victim before handing him in. All with a cutaway to Ratchet warning about the dangers of circuit boosters that Tailgate takes as being aimed at him.
But back in the past there’s a boost of another kind, as “Super cop” Orion Pax arrives, and quickly sorts of Sonic and Boom, after throwing his gun aside just to show he doesn’t need it. Notably though, Roberts seems to have rethought some of the portrayal of Pax in Chaos Theory, as this time he’s helping a drug addict rather than rounding them up and arresting them for existing.
It’s then a call to Roller (who doesn’t actually appear in this issue even though I was sure he did, interesting how it’s already playing as if there’s a mystery about this character even though none was intended) to pick up the perps, as he takes Drift to the drop-in clinic Ratchet clandestinely run on Pax’s suggestion to both battle his own lack of satisfaction with his life and to help those the Senate might not otherwise want helped.
But back in the past there’s a boost of another kind, as “Super cop” Orion Pax arrives, and quickly sorts of Sonic and Boom, after throwing his gun aside just to show he doesn’t need it. Notably though, Roberts seems to have rethought some of the portrayal of Pax in Chaos Theory, as this time he’s helping a drug addict rather than rounding them up and arresting them for existing.
It’s then a call to Roller (who doesn’t actually appear in this issue even though I was sure he did, interesting how it’s already playing as if there’s a mystery about this character even though none was intended) to pick up the perps, as he takes Drift to the drop-in clinic Ratchet clandestinely run on Pax’s suggestion to both battle his own lack of satisfaction with his life and to help those the Senate might not otherwise want helped.
Narrative drift.
Which is where Drift insists Ratchet declared “Adaptus be praised!” and “Primus guide me!”
Which is all played for laughs, but it’s really the tipping point between the original idea of Drift going to be a villain and the reader feedback generated gentler path the character is going to take.
On the one hand, he’s the only person in this narrative who outright lies about what happens in the past. On the other, Ratchet reacts to this in a far pallier way than he would have before, jokingly placing his still wet hand (there’s a good chance that Roberts is making a gag on the old “Do you want to be in the red hand gang?” playground trick) over Drift’s face whilst yelling “Unreliable narrator alert!”
Which, compared to how they were actively trying to kill each other at one point in the only just come out Annual, is a major shift in the relationship of two characters who were meant to be antagonists.
Especially as his claim for Ratchet’s final advice to him (including hilariously in retrospect telling him to go see the Functionists) ending with “You’re special—I can tell. Now get out there and prove me right.” Which Drift points out is something that he’s thought about a lot since, which simply gets a “Me too, kid.”
Which is all played for laughs, but it’s really the tipping point between the original idea of Drift going to be a villain and the reader feedback generated gentler path the character is going to take.
On the one hand, he’s the only person in this narrative who outright lies about what happens in the past. On the other, Ratchet reacts to this in a far pallier way than he would have before, jokingly placing his still wet hand (there’s a good chance that Roberts is making a gag on the old “Do you want to be in the red hand gang?” playground trick) over Drift’s face whilst yelling “Unreliable narrator alert!”
Which, compared to how they were actively trying to kill each other at one point in the only just come out Annual, is a major shift in the relationship of two characters who were meant to be antagonists.
Especially as his claim for Ratchet’s final advice to him (including hilariously in retrospect telling him to go see the Functionists) ending with “You’re special—I can tell. Now get out there and prove me right.” Which Drift points out is something that he’s thought about a lot since, which simply gets a “Me too, kid.”
Swapping your body in for the Blurr toy is an hilarious idea.
Which is again far more genial than their interactions have been up to this point, more quiet introspection than anger over the idea he could have been responsible for what Drift did next.
Though his immediate plans were just to ignore Ratchet’s advice and go to a Replenishment Clinic to donate his body. Which is where Tailgate’s noob status lets Rewind play an old advert (wonderfully based on G1 box art) for the service that let’s Transformers with fancy alternate modes “Rent out” their bodies to lower Cybertronians who only turn into drills or microscopes.
In both time zones, Ratchet regards it as “Cheap and nasty body tourism” (that present Ratchet implies led somewhere very dark), but his trying to get Pax to join in with him persuading Drift to not go down that road is interrupted by big news on the TV: Nominus Prime is dead.
Oddly not a result of the assassination attempt, but because of a long-standing rust infection. Which puzzles Ratchet as there was no such thing when he treated Nominus. As the Marvel UK cameoing Matrix Flame is being observed and there are indications someone close to the Senate is “Showing signs of affinity,” Pax decides it’s time for the worried he’s becoming a conspiracy freak Ratchet to meet another friend of his…
Though his immediate plans were just to ignore Ratchet’s advice and go to a Replenishment Clinic to donate his body. Which is where Tailgate’s noob status lets Rewind play an old advert (wonderfully based on G1 box art) for the service that let’s Transformers with fancy alternate modes “Rent out” their bodies to lower Cybertronians who only turn into drills or microscopes.
In both time zones, Ratchet regards it as “Cheap and nasty body tourism” (that present Ratchet implies led somewhere very dark), but his trying to get Pax to join in with him persuading Drift to not go down that road is interrupted by big news on the TV: Nominus Prime is dead.
Oddly not a result of the assassination attempt, but because of a long-standing rust infection. Which puzzles Ratchet as there was no such thing when he treated Nominus. As the Marvel UK cameoing Matrix Flame is being observed and there are indications someone close to the Senate is “Showing signs of affinity,” Pax decides it’s time for the worried he’s becoming a conspiracy freak Ratchet to meet another friend of his…
Someone run off with his robo-cock.
With Drift now excusing himself to go answer the increasingly frantic calls from Rodimus, Chromedome resumes his narrative with a fantastic visual gag of the dead Senator after his autopsy, separated into a very neat collection of separate parts on the floor like a car taken apart for clues.
Though Prowl only found two things: The Sherma was shot (no big surprise), and there was glass in his heels from Translucentica Heights. With Prowl even gifting Chromedome a smile when he successfully works out the last part.
Which is the turn of Ratchet to take over again, as he joins Pax on his latest meeting with the Senator who helped him back in Chaos Theory, now in different colours and, because he’s a famous politician, without a need to be introduced to Ratchet by name.
They’ve met at the Ark 1 memorial, where Ratchet has his hand over the list of names as he studies it, meaning we only see a “Tail—” alongside Galvatron and Straxus.
Making it amusing that Ratchet’s narration talks about Roller joking that Pax is just being strung along by his contact, as Roberts himself is dangling carrots in front of the reader than many of us easily chowed down on as both of those moments started debate and speculation as we started to attune to the Roberts tease.
Though Prowl only found two things: The Sherma was shot (no big surprise), and there was glass in his heels from Translucentica Heights. With Prowl even gifting Chromedome a smile when he successfully works out the last part.
Which is the turn of Ratchet to take over again, as he joins Pax on his latest meeting with the Senator who helped him back in Chaos Theory, now in different colours and, because he’s a famous politician, without a need to be introduced to Ratchet by name.
They’ve met at the Ark 1 memorial, where Ratchet has his hand over the list of names as he studies it, meaning we only see a “Tail—” alongside Galvatron and Straxus.
Making it amusing that Ratchet’s narration talks about Roller joking that Pax is just being strung along by his contact, as Roberts himself is dangling carrots in front of the reader than many of us easily chowed down on as both of those moments started debate and speculation as we started to attune to the Roberts tease.
Transformers fans working out something was going on with this Senator from the dialogue working around not saying his name was the Doctor Who fans working out "Sue Tec" of 2012.
Ratchet is mainly just there to provide cover as the other two chat, with the Senator revealing that Nominus was indeed killed by the Senate, in particular a scary in the ambition of his power Sentinel after he realised the Matrix in the Prime’s chest was a fake.
Which is another way of squaring the circle of what Roberts had already written with Autocracy.
The Senator himself has lost a lot of his influence because he’s such an angry and volatile character and, though he doesn’t regret standing up for Pax before as his best hope for the future, it’s also left him finally politically outcast, with Sentinel clearly planning something terrifying, possibly involving the Decepticons. Oh, and Megatron is alright as far as he knows, mining on Messatine…
Which is the moment Rewind stops the narrative as a “Perfect cliffhanger,” but clearly the comic doesn’t agree as Chromedome picks up on his and Prow’s trip to Translucentica Heights on Sky Darts. With Chromedome pointing out that if they had decent alt modes they wouldn’t been secondary vehicles, whilst Prowl in nostalgic for once having lived in a district run by Functionist hardliners who wouldn’t even let people talk negatively about their alt modes, something that taught him to respect the rules.
Chromedome thinks these days hardliners just send you to “The Institute”, which gets a “Pfft” from Prowl at even the idea of such a place existing (“How do you make that sound?”), but it’s a understated creepy moment that Chromedome is fascinated by the idea of such a place, not horrified.
Which is another way of squaring the circle of what Roberts had already written with Autocracy.
The Senator himself has lost a lot of his influence because he’s such an angry and volatile character and, though he doesn’t regret standing up for Pax before as his best hope for the future, it’s also left him finally politically outcast, with Sentinel clearly planning something terrifying, possibly involving the Decepticons. Oh, and Megatron is alright as far as he knows, mining on Messatine…
Which is the moment Rewind stops the narrative as a “Perfect cliffhanger,” but clearly the comic doesn’t agree as Chromedome picks up on his and Prow’s trip to Translucentica Heights on Sky Darts. With Chromedome pointing out that if they had decent alt modes they wouldn’t been secondary vehicles, whilst Prowl in nostalgic for once having lived in a district run by Functionist hardliners who wouldn’t even let people talk negatively about their alt modes, something that taught him to respect the rules.
Chromedome thinks these days hardliners just send you to “The Institute”, which gets a “Pfft” from Prowl at even the idea of such a place existing (“How do you make that sound?”), but it’s a understated creepy moment that Chromedome is fascinated by the idea of such a place, not horrified.
A running Prowl joke that does work.
The Heights have 2,987 privileged “Alt-mode exempt” members of the intellectual class, a group that, despite Prowl encouraging him to try, Chromedome could never join.
Maybe for the best for, as they talk about the warden being a great informant who was always passing on information about Tripple M and the Decepticons, a headless body is thrown out of a high-rise window, landing at their feet with a large Decepticon logo on his back.
2,986.
Unfortunately, the actual cliffhanger is a strong visual undone by some strange dialogue, as present-day Drift arrives at the oil reservoir to find Rodimus and Grapple fishing a headless body out, that of Red Alert. With Rodimus glad Drift is there as a witness, so he won’t have to justify what he does to Cyclonus.
Which considering there’s no obvious link between Cyclonus and what has happened here, is a very odd note to end on. Roberts would later regret going as far as decapitating Red Alery for it making him seem too dead, creating the impression he’s doing nothing but fake-out death following the more arc relevant recovery of Rung.
Red Alert continuing the theme of decapitation from the previous death is also a bit of a cheat as a red herring as this will turn out to not have anything to do with the events in the past.
Maybe for the best for, as they talk about the warden being a great informant who was always passing on information about Tripple M and the Decepticons, a headless body is thrown out of a high-rise window, landing at their feet with a large Decepticon logo on his back.
2,986.
Unfortunately, the actual cliffhanger is a strong visual undone by some strange dialogue, as present-day Drift arrives at the oil reservoir to find Rodimus and Grapple fishing a headless body out, that of Red Alert. With Rodimus glad Drift is there as a witness, so he won’t have to justify what he does to Cyclonus.
Which considering there’s no obvious link between Cyclonus and what has happened here, is a very odd note to end on. Roberts would later regret going as far as decapitating Red Alery for it making him seem too dead, creating the impression he’s doing nothing but fake-out death following the more arc relevant recovery of Rung.
Red Alert continuing the theme of decapitation from the previous death is also a bit of a cheat as a red herring as this will turn out to not have anything to do with the events in the past.
Just assuming Cyclonus did this is more a red flag than a Red Alert.
But the slight weakness at the end there aside, this is an incredibly strong issue, densely plotted, throwing out clues and hints that won’t payoff for years and still finding time for strong character moments and some lovely gags. It’s everything Roberts does well and shows a briming imagination excited rather than daunted at having to include Hasbro requests, because it lets him revisit his very strong version of Pax.
Unfortunately, he’ll not roll with the punches of a licenced property so well in the future, but here, a potential disadvantage gets to play to his strengths.
This is also very much Alex Milne’s show as well, lots of glorious striking images, especially of Pax as the broad-shouldered hero that makes you wish good cops were real.
Next week, it’s back to the other side of the Hasbro Pax mandate, as he tries to get hold of Monstructor once again.
ROBOTS IN DISGUISE ANNUAL 2012
2012
COMMENT
KO-FI
Unfortunately, he’ll not roll with the punches of a licenced property so well in the future, but here, a potential disadvantage gets to play to his strengths.
This is also very much Alex Milne’s show as well, lots of glorious striking images, especially of Pax as the broad-shouldered hero that makes you wish good cops were real.
Next week, it’s back to the other side of the Hasbro Pax mandate, as he tries to get hold of Monstructor once again.
ROBOTS IN DISGUISE ANNUAL 2012
2012
COMMENT
KO-FI
