And Now the Magic's Over and I Can't Turn Back Time.
Issue 205: Time Wars Part 7.
Like some modern day Canute, Galvatron howls his defiance at the elements...and is swept away.
When working on a project like this--creating a narrative out of history--it becomes almost too easy to twist events to fit that narrative, especially if the reality feels less dramatically right than it should be. Inevitably I’ll have been guilty of this as we’ve gone along, especially now we’re into the part of the book for which less behind the scenes information is available.
Time Wars screams out of the page that it’s the end of an era. Even the Transformation page has declared it as such, though no one involved could have known the extent to which this would be the case. As the final designated UK colour epic, it closes the curtain on the UK comic’s golden age and marks the beginning of far more uncertain times.
However, the reality is the main strip and backup structure will continue for the best part of two months, and we won’t be getting a UK story actually written for the new five page black and white format until issue 223 (or the third volume in the book version of this site). It’s a slower, more gradual transition (albeit one that seems to have been decided upon very late in the day, else Furman would have been far quicker to adapt) than works for a dramatic retelling of these events. We can’t even be entirely sure this is Furman’s last issue as editor, just that it was around this point he left staff to go freelance and focus on his American work.
Like some modern day Canute, Galvatron howls his defiance at the elements...and is swept away.
When working on a project like this--creating a narrative out of history--it becomes almost too easy to twist events to fit that narrative, especially if the reality feels less dramatically right than it should be. Inevitably I’ll have been guilty of this as we’ve gone along, especially now we’re into the part of the book for which less behind the scenes information is available.
Time Wars screams out of the page that it’s the end of an era. Even the Transformation page has declared it as such, though no one involved could have known the extent to which this would be the case. As the final designated UK colour epic, it closes the curtain on the UK comic’s golden age and marks the beginning of far more uncertain times.
However, the reality is the main strip and backup structure will continue for the best part of two months, and we won’t be getting a UK story actually written for the new five page black and white format until issue 223 (or the third volume in the book version of this site). It’s a slower, more gradual transition (albeit one that seems to have been decided upon very late in the day, else Furman would have been far quicker to adapt) than works for a dramatic retelling of these events. We can’t even be entirely sure this is Furman’s last issue as editor, just that it was around this point he left staff to go freelance and focus on his American work.
What we can be sure of though, is that after the highs it enjoyed two years previously, the comic is now teetering towards cancellation and the conclusion to Time Wars was written with at least one eye on it being the final for the entire series. Or at least that if the book did continue it may well have a new writer for the home-grown material, with Furman about to take the first long overdue step into the US market his long term availability would likely have been up in the air at this point as well (certainly he was hoping the American Transformers work would quickly lead to more and plentiful writing for the parent company).
As such, the opening of the issue can only feel like a meta commentary on this state of affairs. As promised by the much homaged cover from Andrew Wildman, Galvatron has won. He has crushed the head of Optimus Prime under a massive rock and now stands astride the corpses of his enemies waving a jaunty flag. Galvatron is now such a powerful omnipresent foe he challenging the very existence of the comic itself.
As I’ve been critical of the meandering and off-point nature of a lot of this story the fact the opening sequence is given over to a massive bait and switch should be hugely annoying. Instead the sophisticated writing from Furman on Galvatron’s victorious inner-monologue couple with some glorious art and well thought out layouts from Lee Sullivan make it feel less a diversion and more the main event. The page where fantasy switches to reality is especially a highlight— a four panel layout with the first and last twisted mirror images of each other (in the fantasy Galvatron is delivering the killing blow to Optimus, whilst in reality he flails ineffectually at the Autobot) and the middle two where the change occurs having Megatron in an identical pose in the background. Structurally it’s perfect.
Considering how much of a fuss has been made of the fight between Galvatron and Optimus in the build up to this, what follows should be a disappointment and no doubt it was to many readers. I however rather like the subversion of expectations where Galvatron’s mental degeneration (as a result of physical and temporal damage) has left him a rabid dog who is only a threat to Prime because he has no real idea how to deal with an opponent who isn’t even aware he is there. When Galvatron manages to get his hands round Optimus’ neck he reacts more with surprise than terror or anger.
As such, the opening of the issue can only feel like a meta commentary on this state of affairs. As promised by the much homaged cover from Andrew Wildman, Galvatron has won. He has crushed the head of Optimus Prime under a massive rock and now stands astride the corpses of his enemies waving a jaunty flag. Galvatron is now such a powerful omnipresent foe he challenging the very existence of the comic itself.
As I’ve been critical of the meandering and off-point nature of a lot of this story the fact the opening sequence is given over to a massive bait and switch should be hugely annoying. Instead the sophisticated writing from Furman on Galvatron’s victorious inner-monologue couple with some glorious art and well thought out layouts from Lee Sullivan make it feel less a diversion and more the main event. The page where fantasy switches to reality is especially a highlight— a four panel layout with the first and last twisted mirror images of each other (in the fantasy Galvatron is delivering the killing blow to Optimus, whilst in reality he flails ineffectually at the Autobot) and the middle two where the change occurs having Megatron in an identical pose in the background. Structurally it’s perfect.
Considering how much of a fuss has been made of the fight between Galvatron and Optimus in the build up to this, what follows should be a disappointment and no doubt it was to many readers. I however rather like the subversion of expectations where Galvatron’s mental degeneration (as a result of physical and temporal damage) has left him a rabid dog who is only a threat to Prime because he has no real idea how to deal with an opponent who isn’t even aware he is there. When Galvatron manages to get his hands round Optimus’ neck he reacts more with surprise than terror or anger.
The real highlights of the issue though are all about the Decepticons. Back at Fortress Sinister (in what I believe is its last appearance) Ravage has made his way to the throne room and finds the comatose Shockwave. Unlike Scourge, Ravage has a brain in his head and actually employs some tact, leaving comments on his degradation to the thought bubbles and instead bringing Shockwave round with what he knows best: Logic. Pointing out the inescapable doom they all face unless Cyclonus is returned to the future in a calm and rational way is exactly what Shockwave needed to hear.
But this leads to the key issue that has caused Shockwave’s collapse: He knows that sending Cyclonus back is the only way to save history, but if history is saved he’ll die in two decades (which from a Cybertronian perspective is no time at all) anyway. Damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t. Ravage then gives the most important speech of his life, effectively saving the entire space time continuum by arguing that just because things have happened one way before in future history doesn’t mean they will again now that Shockwave knows what is to come. As he says, “I figure a guy as smart as you should be able to come up with something!”, and Sullivan’s art perfectly captures the realisation dawning on Shockwave’s face.
The other great Decepticon moment comes from Megatron. Furman here is setting up a storyline that will never come to fruition when Two Megatrons! hits the retcon switch hard, but you can’t hold that against this story and Megatron musing on the fleeing cowards around him and how following Galvatron has only led to the same old self destructive crap he always falls into is simply the best writing he has ever had. Effectively Furman is using this to bid farewell to the “I’m mad me” Megatron as featured towards the end of his time in the American series, he’s now self aware enough to see the flaw in his past behaviour and vows that if the Universe does survive a new, calmer and stronger, Megatron will emerge as ruler of the Earth. In just one page it completely redefines the character, and it’s such a shame there’s only going to be one more story that follows up on this naturally.
But this leads to the key issue that has caused Shockwave’s collapse: He knows that sending Cyclonus back is the only way to save history, but if history is saved he’ll die in two decades (which from a Cybertronian perspective is no time at all) anyway. Damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t. Ravage then gives the most important speech of his life, effectively saving the entire space time continuum by arguing that just because things have happened one way before in future history doesn’t mean they will again now that Shockwave knows what is to come. As he says, “I figure a guy as smart as you should be able to come up with something!”, and Sullivan’s art perfectly captures the realisation dawning on Shockwave’s face.
The other great Decepticon moment comes from Megatron. Furman here is setting up a storyline that will never come to fruition when Two Megatrons! hits the retcon switch hard, but you can’t hold that against this story and Megatron musing on the fleeing cowards around him and how following Galvatron has only led to the same old self destructive crap he always falls into is simply the best writing he has ever had. Effectively Furman is using this to bid farewell to the “I’m mad me” Megatron as featured towards the end of his time in the American series, he’s now self aware enough to see the flaw in his past behaviour and vows that if the Universe does survive a new, calmer and stronger, Megatron will emerge as ruler of the Earth. In just one page it completely redefines the character, and it’s such a shame there’s only going to be one more story that follows up on this naturally.
However, this is also the page where the real weakness of the issue and the storyline shines through. The future Decepticons rushing off back to the future without having contributed anything to the story is something I’ve repeatedly bemoaned and it is just awful in every way, showing some usually poor plotting from Furman. Especially as he’s not normally shy about giving Soundwave good material to work with. If the first issue was a Bondian pre-credits sequence then the future ‘Cons presence would be the equivalent of Colonel Toro from Octopussy hanging around with Bond for the rest of the film but never actually doing or saying anything, just standing there before making his excuses about how he needs to go back to Generic South American Country That Totally Isn’t Argentina during the circus tent climax.
It’s so easy to focus on the waste of time the future ‘Cons involvement is because the entirety of the opening was devoted to getting them involved, but just about everyone except Galvatron, Optimus, Shockwave and Ravage is given short strife (even Megatron only gets a page, however good, despite the story largely being sold as a team up between him and Galvatron) to an almost embarrassing degree. The present day Decepticons drag Scorponok off in a sheepish way (and despite what I’ve said previously, you do actually see Ultra Magnus here, laying dead looking on the floor. Though the future Autobots do pick him up he will indeed never be seen again) and Arcee and Blurr at least get to shoot at Galvatron, but that’s about it. Most shockingly Cattila is the only one of either the Wreckers or Mayhems to appear properly (though presumably they’re amidst the more generic hard to identify background characters), as a one panel non-speaking extra. After all the build-up given to their rivalry and alliance this is almost as poor as the treatment of Soundwave.
Worse of all though is how poor old Rodimus is handled, at the start of the story he was the lead “Good” character, but here he’s relegated to standing on the side-lines and looking slightly embarrassed as his Decepticon counterpart is dealt with by Optimus. He even has to have it very patiently explained to him at the end by Optimus that maybe keeping time machines after this would be a really, really stupid idea.
It’s so easy to focus on the waste of time the future ‘Cons involvement is because the entirety of the opening was devoted to getting them involved, but just about everyone except Galvatron, Optimus, Shockwave and Ravage is given short strife (even Megatron only gets a page, however good, despite the story largely being sold as a team up between him and Galvatron) to an almost embarrassing degree. The present day Decepticons drag Scorponok off in a sheepish way (and despite what I’ve said previously, you do actually see Ultra Magnus here, laying dead looking on the floor. Though the future Autobots do pick him up he will indeed never be seen again) and Arcee and Blurr at least get to shoot at Galvatron, but that’s about it. Most shockingly Cattila is the only one of either the Wreckers or Mayhems to appear properly (though presumably they’re amidst the more generic hard to identify background characters), as a one panel non-speaking extra. After all the build-up given to their rivalry and alliance this is almost as poor as the treatment of Soundwave.
Worse of all though is how poor old Rodimus is handled, at the start of the story he was the lead “Good” character, but here he’s relegated to standing on the side-lines and looking slightly embarrassed as his Decepticon counterpart is dealt with by Optimus. He even has to have it very patiently explained to him at the end by Optimus that maybe keeping time machines after this would be a really, really stupid idea.
But having mentioned the ending, it has to be said it`s a corker. At the moment reality can no longer handle the building paradoxes, a massive rip in the space time continuum emerges and engulfs an entire page as Galvatron ineffectually shouts defiance at it like—as the narration gloriously points out in what may well be the cheekiest joke the comic ever did—a “Modern day Canute”, before we get the page that for many people is the Lee Sullivan moment. Panel by panel, Galvatron’s “skin” is ripped off leaving only a skeleton that is then sucked into the vortex.
This is stunning, even horrific (the way his remaining eye goes flying out of the socket!) art that is a more than fitting exit for the UK stories greatest villain. Whilst I can understand why Furman would bring Galvatron into the US series (especially as he’ll basically treat the British stories as a dry run for his American), this should have been the end of him as far as the original UK material was concerned. His couple of encore showing in the black and white era are very much going to be a case of slightly confused diminishing returns.
But Galvatron’s death isn’t enough. Rather wonderfully Scourge goes flying past like he’s caught in the tornado from The Wizard of Oz, with his tired resignation to the whole thing being a fine note for him to depart on. It’s the story’s Han Solo moment that really stands out though, as Shockwave appears in SPACE gun mode at the very last second, towing the body of Cyclonus beneath him in the net that was previously part of his wall decoration. Multi purpose tools, most logical. He of course also feels the need to not just release Cyclonus into the rift but also to shoot at it because screw logic, it looks cool.
In fact, it’s such an effective and memorable moment—being a twist that both would have been impossible to guess when the story started and yet a logical (ha!) progression of its events—that it almost makes you forget that Shockwave and Scourge are the only characters to actively contribute to the resolution of the plot. The Autobots and Decepticons of all time lines might as well have stayed home (though Springer by motivating Ravage and Ravage motivating Shockwave means they at least helped).
Things then conclude with something of a sour note in retrospect as Furman completely rips off the end of the forthcoming (for UK readers) Dark Star as Optimus and Shockwave have an almost word for word identical “Today we fought as allies but next time we meet as enemies” exchange to the one that closes that story between Optimus and Scorponok.
Still, as an instalment this is strikingly memorable, dramatic entertainment that in particular shows why Lee Sullivan has gone on to such a long lasting career in comics; even at this still early stage his mastery of layouts and composition is evident and there’s barely a panel that doesn’t scream out to be turned into a poster.
This is stunning, even horrific (the way his remaining eye goes flying out of the socket!) art that is a more than fitting exit for the UK stories greatest villain. Whilst I can understand why Furman would bring Galvatron into the US series (especially as he’ll basically treat the British stories as a dry run for his American), this should have been the end of him as far as the original UK material was concerned. His couple of encore showing in the black and white era are very much going to be a case of slightly confused diminishing returns.
But Galvatron’s death isn’t enough. Rather wonderfully Scourge goes flying past like he’s caught in the tornado from The Wizard of Oz, with his tired resignation to the whole thing being a fine note for him to depart on. It’s the story’s Han Solo moment that really stands out though, as Shockwave appears in SPACE gun mode at the very last second, towing the body of Cyclonus beneath him in the net that was previously part of his wall decoration. Multi purpose tools, most logical. He of course also feels the need to not just release Cyclonus into the rift but also to shoot at it because screw logic, it looks cool.
In fact, it’s such an effective and memorable moment—being a twist that both would have been impossible to guess when the story started and yet a logical (ha!) progression of its events—that it almost makes you forget that Shockwave and Scourge are the only characters to actively contribute to the resolution of the plot. The Autobots and Decepticons of all time lines might as well have stayed home (though Springer by motivating Ravage and Ravage motivating Shockwave means they at least helped).
Things then conclude with something of a sour note in retrospect as Furman completely rips off the end of the forthcoming (for UK readers) Dark Star as Optimus and Shockwave have an almost word for word identical “Today we fought as allies but next time we meet as enemies” exchange to the one that closes that story between Optimus and Scorponok.
Still, as an instalment this is strikingly memorable, dramatic entertainment that in particular shows why Lee Sullivan has gone on to such a long lasting career in comics; even at this still early stage his mastery of layouts and composition is evident and there’s barely a panel that doesn’t scream out to be turned into a poster.
As a whole though, Time Wars is deeply flawed for all the reasons I’ve discussed at length over the last seven weeks. One of Furman’s main recurring weaknesses is a tendency for stories to fall apart at the climax, and this is probably the worst example of that during the Marvel run. As noted there were all sorts of behind the scenes problems (not just on this book, this issue was released the same week as the penultimate Dragon’s Claws and the collapse of that title was liking consuming Furman’s time as he tried to wrap it up quickly) and Furman getting his foot in the door on an American title during the writing of this may have been a distraction as well. But equally a lot of the structural issues such as the future Decepticons’ roles feel like the author making a rod for his own back. Something much, much better could have been done with the raw material and constraints here.
However, going through it on a weekly basis does help hide a lot of the flaws as you tend to get caught up more in the individual moments rather than worrying about the overall progress, and it’s easy to see why it was so memorable for readers at the time. It’s a mess, but at times it’s a glorious mess.
Transformation oddly tries to claim this is the issue that pays off on the promise that no one is guaranteed to survive. This despite Galvatron and Scourge being the only casualties of this eleven pages and I would argue the death of two villains wouldn’t be that much of a surprise. The sidebar also continues to try and claim the next five issues are set before this one in as fine an example of a blatant lie as you will ever see.
The return of Dread Tiddings means Gavin Morton from High Wycombe gets to be the first person to point out the new tiny tiddly Transformers are not called Microbots but Micromasters. He does say the dwarves on the Autobots side are referred to as such as their subgroup (with the Decepticons being Microcons), but if that was the case it won’t be carrying over to the comic.
More notably Dreadwind is extremely scathing of the idea from Lee Birdson of Wirral that the comic should run Action Force profiles. And I would love to know what was in the contents of the Christmas card sent in by John from Lifton that Hi-Test says was hilarious but can’t easily be explained. That’s the sort of thing I hope Classics UK Volume 6 will uncover.
Action Force sees Destro arrive home only to find an imposter has taken his place, resulting in him being carted off to jail. It’s a nice idea but doesn’t really make any sense. Destro’s face may be unknown to us, but his household staff should know what he looks like under the mask as he clearly doesn’t make any secret of his real appearance, only last issue he was happy to fly under his own passport without it on. So you’d think proving who was who would prove fairly easy.
However, going through it on a weekly basis does help hide a lot of the flaws as you tend to get caught up more in the individual moments rather than worrying about the overall progress, and it’s easy to see why it was so memorable for readers at the time. It’s a mess, but at times it’s a glorious mess.
Transformation oddly tries to claim this is the issue that pays off on the promise that no one is guaranteed to survive. This despite Galvatron and Scourge being the only casualties of this eleven pages and I would argue the death of two villains wouldn’t be that much of a surprise. The sidebar also continues to try and claim the next five issues are set before this one in as fine an example of a blatant lie as you will ever see.
The return of Dread Tiddings means Gavin Morton from High Wycombe gets to be the first person to point out the new tiny tiddly Transformers are not called Microbots but Micromasters. He does say the dwarves on the Autobots side are referred to as such as their subgroup (with the Decepticons being Microcons), but if that was the case it won’t be carrying over to the comic.
More notably Dreadwind is extremely scathing of the idea from Lee Birdson of Wirral that the comic should run Action Force profiles. And I would love to know what was in the contents of the Christmas card sent in by John from Lifton that Hi-Test says was hilarious but can’t easily be explained. That’s the sort of thing I hope Classics UK Volume 6 will uncover.
Action Force sees Destro arrive home only to find an imposter has taken his place, resulting in him being carted off to jail. It’s a nice idea but doesn’t really make any sense. Destro’s face may be unknown to us, but his household staff should know what he looks like under the mask as he clearly doesn’t make any secret of his real appearance, only last issue he was happy to fly under his own passport without it on. So you’d think proving who was who would prove fairly easy.
Still, we do get a fun jailbreak sequence as Lady Jaye pretends to be a lady of Christ to get into Destro’s cell so she can wrestle him to the ground before Flint (with the help of the SAS Chappies) blows a hole in the wall. That’s the sort of thing that makes Scotland want independence. Destro then agrees to give Action Force the Terrordrome plans in exchange for helping him regain his position, beginning a long and fruitful slightly awkward alliance between the former enemies.
In a nice bit of backup strip synchronicity, Semi-Automatic Steve decides to break Combat Colin out of jail as well, with Colin pointing out he’d have been out on bail that afternoon anyway. The loyalty Steve has for Colin is actually rather sweet, and they rush off in the Combat Tank to confront Madprof, but instead find the Evil Colinbot instead!
As noted in the opening, this really feels like the end of an era. But the reality is it’s business as usual next week as we switch back to the Underbase and a story that will, over the next five weeks, have a death count that makes Time Wars look like Teletubbies.
ISSUE 204
1989
COMMENT
In a nice bit of backup strip synchronicity, Semi-Automatic Steve decides to break Combat Colin out of jail as well, with Colin pointing out he’d have been out on bail that afternoon anyway. The loyalty Steve has for Colin is actually rather sweet, and they rush off in the Combat Tank to confront Madprof, but instead find the Evil Colinbot instead!
As noted in the opening, this really feels like the end of an era. But the reality is it’s business as usual next week as we switch back to the Underbase and a story that will, over the next five weeks, have a death count that makes Time Wars look like Teletubbies.
ISSUE 204
1989
COMMENT