Transformers Till All Are One Volume 1 Review

Hi, this is Margaret Scott, the first female

writer on Transformers Comics, and you are listening

to All Things Transformers. Oh my gosh, this

is so great! It record. Yeah, I did that already.

Good job. You've just jumped inside the pull

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further ado, it's time to talk about the comics

we are reading right now here inside the pullback.

Autobotly August 2018 continues as we talk about

Transformers Till All Are One Volume 1. That's

right, the Fembots are back for another week

of Transformers comic goodness here inside the

Pull Bag on all things Transformers from the

Geekcast Radio Network. This is episode 318 of

the Pull Bag. I am, of course, your host, TFG1Mike.

Joining me are those two Fembots that would give

Austin Powers a run for his money. First up,

we have... You're so delusional. No, not really.

Worst leader ever. I didn't cry when he died.

I swear I didn't. Then there's that whirling

wrecker girl who put your eye out. She wrecks,

she rules. It's Amy, a .k .a. Lady Wreck. See,

I added something to it this time because you

didn't interrupt me like last time. Oh, is that

why I became the second in line this time is

because I always interrupt you, right? Well,

I'm working off the original script because Cyclonus,

you know, Rio's girlfriend isn't here, so. It's

not like, you know. I can hear her screaming

wherever she's at right now. I know, right? She's

going to be listening to this at work or something

and suddenly just, like, throw mail everywhere

and, like, run screaming out, kicking things.

It'll be amazing. For the record, folks, Nicole,

Beatles diva hailstorm, loves Cartoon Rio from

Jem and the Holograms. Oh, she totally doesn't.

Come on. Don't misrepresent. yes she does um

all right you do realize that this means war

right she's gonna come after you it's all right

so today we are continuing on with the margaret

scott written books uh this is the third ongoing

at the time that this happened and i i fully

believe they did this on purpose I know the ongoing

didn't last as long as I thought and felt it

should have, but you look at More Than Meets

the Eye, and at that time, Robots in Disguise,

before it became NotRid, XRid, whatever, John's

book and James' book. James' book is Rodimus

and Co. out in space looking for the Knights

of Cybertron and all that. John's book was Cybertron

and now it's kind of at this point in time of

the continuity it's turned into Earth and Optimus

has done a stupid thing of annexing Earth and

everything else because all Earthlings love Transformers.

Wait, wait, wait. John got to tell the political

Cybertron story and he had moved on to the next

thing that he wanted to do. And we had this opening.

with the Cybertron political story that had kind

of, I mean, not wrapped up completely, but he

kind of left it in a good place where somebody

else could jump in and run with it. And Margaret

took on that role and she ran with it. Absolutely.

I see this as an extension of the two Windblade

series that she's already done because that was

where she came in was with the Windblade character.

What my point is here is you have Rodimus and

everybody else out in space doing their thing.

You got John Optimus Jazz, that stupid Thundercracker

stuff on Earth. Are you kidding? It's not stupid.

It is dumb. Oh, Thundercracker is awesome. Amy,

we need to kick Mike off the podcast. You can't.

We totally do. We need to take over. I have dealt

with enough. I mean, I think I was hearing, you

know, the jaw smacking the table at this point

when you said it was all that crap. I was like,

what? It's not crap. John's an excellent writer

and I love his stuff, but. robots and thundercracker

rider no he's not he's great he's not oh come

on he used to bite him in the tailpipe um oh

well those are fighting words i think and then

we need to go start our own podcast and then

we have the uh yeah you can revive the underbase

and then we have obviously windblade starscream

the old married couple on cybertron So you have

Earth, space, and Cybertron in these three ongoings.

And everybody was like, a third ongoing. Are

they crazy? I remember this. Everybody was going

nuts when Till All Or One was announced. Like,

why do they need a third ongoing? We have so

much to read already. I'm like, just give it

a break. Let's just say this, guys. This is the

hair that broke the camel's back on the underbase,

to be honest. It wasn't. One, I was already having

a baby. Two, I just, I couldn't run it forever.

And three, there was just so much coming out

and we were so excited for all of it. Like there

was just no way that I could keep up with all

of it. So that's when I was like, you know what?

We got to put a fork in it because this isn't

going to happen. Darn, that makes me sad because

it's such a good series. I know. It is a good

series, and I really want to go back and talk

about it, but that's why I'm here and not somewhere

else. Life is crazy for me. I don't have the

time that I once had. Having the third child

has seriously changed life. So we'll see how

it goes. I don't know. For the most part. I mean,

I'm not going to say that this killed the underbase.

It didn't kill the underbase. It was already

kind of, I couldn't do it. But I was like, once

I heard this, I was like, oh, it's going to be

brilliant. And I just don't have the energy to

do it. Yeah, no, I get it. I'm just always going

to, like, there's your podcast, the underbase,

and there's the, I just totally lost. title of

it. This other podcast by two fun people who

talk about the comics and both of them ended

and I'm in mourning of both of them. Oh, what

was the other one that ended? She doesn't remember.

I'm trying so hard to remember what it's called.

Was it the other one that was over? Was it another

UK one? No, it was this girl named Nell and this

guy named Greg and what the heck did they blink

and call it? Oh, I've never heard that one. I

should probably go check it out. Give me a second

to click around. Okay, so. tonight we're going

to be talking about till all are one volume one

this is the first four issues of this series

written by margaret scott art by i even asked

her how to do this and it's a french she's like

oh just put it into google translate and it'll

you can hear the i've been i've been listening

to the audio of how to say her last name for

the last three hours sarah petrie doris There

you go. Oh, so the podcast was called Soundwave?

Yeah, Sound .wave. Sound .wave. And it was sauce.

Blinkin' loved it. That's funny. It filled in

once Underbass ended. It started up just about

at that time, and I was like, oh, really? Fantastic.

That's cool. And they went through all of...

It was a girl who loved Transformers and was

super hip to it and a guy who knew nothing but

was into comic books. It was her introducing

him. He starts off being like, Whirl is my favorite,

just to mess with her. Then by issue six, he's

like, No, for serious, Whirl is my favorite.

That's awesome. That's great. This series, I'm

assuming it's throughout the whole series. I

don't know. We'll find out as we go through the

volumes here. Margaret, as I said, is on writing.

Sarah is on art. Priscilla Tramontano and Joanna

LaFuente are on colors. The only males on this

series are Tom B. Long on letters and John Barber

on series edits. So pretty much this is an all

-female -led book. And that's great. That is

amazing. That was fantastic. And this story,

these first four issues, I read this in like

a half an hour when I first read it. I was surprised

that I read the entire volume that fast. And

I did read every word of it. But it just went

by so quickly. I absolutely love it. Did you

read it? Go ahead. Yeah, I was just going to

say, it is a quick read, but Marigrid's scripts

tend to be fast. Especially if you're used to,

like, John and James, where they're, like, really

dense and you've got to pay attention to every

little thing. Marigrid's scripts are a lot faster.

They're still full of cool things to dig into,

but they're fast. What were you going to say,

Amy? And it'll trick me sometimes. Sometimes

it'll trick me. I'll be like, this is kind of,

you know, thin. And then I'm like, no, you're

just not used to this style. Yeah. I'm like,

look at these huge panels. Nothing's happening.

Where are my pages with, like, 30 panels on?

Yeah, but this is so great, though. So what I

was going to say is, what are you reading from,

just out of curiosity? What do you mean, what

am I reading from? Are you reading the volume?

Oh, yeah. I've only got these in trade. I do

not have them in singles. I'm only buying trades

at this point for the Transformers stuff. The

only thing I'm buying in singles only to read

it is Unicron because we won't get to Unicron

until next year at this point. Like you guys

said, you fall off and you start and you stop

and you this and you that and whatever and you

come back to it. For me, I stopped reading Transformers

by single issue because I just could not keep

up. I could not keep up on a monthly basis, especially

at this point in time with three ongoings. Oh

no. As much as I love Margaret's stuff, I just

could not keep up. And like I said, last episode,

I read for the enjoyment of doing it, but I'm

also reading to make sure it's freshest in my

mind for when I record a podcast. So like I read

this. twice before we recorded this. I read through

it once to get the story and I went back and

I looked at the art and I looked at the little

bits and pieces and little nuances and things

like that so I could have that in my head. Yeah.

So yeah, no, I read and trade. I do not. Very

rarely do I read singles anymore. Gotcha. Well,

I was just wondering just because that would

make sense that you read from issue to issue

and not so I had the same problem. Well, actually,

it's not a problem. When we did our last review

of Distant Stars, the four through seven issues,

it went by really, really fast. I was like, oh,

are we already to Combiner Hunters? Oh, okay.

Yeah. So it goes. It's a good, you get a good

story that flows really well. It's not like.

fast in the sense that oh it's too short but

like but but it has a you feel satisfied when

you get to the end of the arc you know um and

then with me with till all are one i actually

got each one of them in single because i knew

it was going to be good and i wanted to get it

as it was coming out and i wanted to read everyone

and then I decided I didn't I was just gonna

buy everything in single for to all or one when

they announced that they were going to be ending

the series I was like oh I don't care I'm gonna

keep up with this man so I I just got all of

them in single issue and I read all of them that's

all I had so I I read the four that we're going

to review today in single issue so how about

you Heather I did the opposite. This was one

that I didn't jump on right away because I was

kind of like, I don't know, man, I can't read

all this stuff. You know, I got to put food on

the table and whatnot. And I kept, I'm just,

you know, glad that I hear when things are good

from people because everybody was like, no, this

is really good. And so I finally jumped on and

got it. But I didn't get it in single. I'm trying

to remember. How did I do it? I don't think I

started getting single issues until like. the

next trade stuff. Yeah. I mean, I didn't get

it like at the very beginning. I, I actually

bought every single one of them, I think halfway

through because I was like the same thing. I

didn't know what was going on. I mean, I kind

of heard that there was, that it was good. I

suspected it was good because it's Marigrid.

And besides the fact that it was an all female

cast, so I expected it to be, I just like, you

know, just, I have three kids. Like I've said

before, I have three kids. Yeah. Oh, speaking

of Merigrid, that's what I was going to say and

I forgot. The way she writes and everything kind

of trucks along really fast, click, click, click.

Her writing is so, what's the word for it, like

television? It's, yeah. It's cinematic. The way

she puts a story together and the way it's paced

feels like you're watching a movie of it. Which

makes sense because... That's what she was doing

before she came into comic books. She was Transformers

Prime, Rescue Bots. I think Rescue Bots was actually

the same time. She's done stuff on the screen,

whether it be TV, whatnot, series. You're right.

It relays well to the comic. It really does.

It's really cool to see the way... people's different

talents are expressed or different styles are

just, the world is full of awesome people. Awesome

Korean people. All right. So I'm putting the

ladies to work and they're going to synopsize

each of these issues. They have to do something

around here. I do all the other work. Oh, Oh,

Oh, really? So issue one, this is getting expensive.

Oh, hi. That's me. I've got it. I have. Are you

sure about this? I am fully sure of this. I was,

like, zoned out. You sounded so like you were

ready to charge ahead. I was waiting. I was waiting

for words of wisdom to drop from your lips. Okay.

All right. I'm the mighty leader of this podcast.

All right, guys. Here is what happens in issue

one. We start with a scary page of a guy getting

absolutely horrifically dead of a head wound.

And then we see everybody sort of settling uneasily

into this new government with the colonies and

the council and everything. We find out that

Ironhide is running a... security force that

is not Starscream's badgeless police force and

people are starting to hire him instead of the

badgeless. So he gets called in to a council

about because Obsidian and people are ticked

off that these guys are getting killed and they

want to know what's happening and Starscream's

kind of being as justice obstructy as he can.

Meanwhile we see the Combaticons in their like

shared apartment and they're grouching around.

Onslaught is getting Weird messages on his little

tablet from somebody that we don't know. And

Blastoff is worried that he's obsessing about

it. Onslaught charges off angry and Blastoff

sees a new message appear about a gift in the

dumpster and that he should go, you know, that

they need to step up their activities. So Onslaught

goes, or not Onslaught, Blastoff goes and gets

the... Goes to the dumpster and he finds some

badgeless armor. And it's kind of one size fits

all holographic. Change your voice, make you

unrecognizable armor. So nobody can be targeted,

in other words. Exactly. You can hide your identity,

which isn't creepy at all. The badgeless creep

me out. Yeah, no. Starscream, your badges are

not creepy at all. Yeah, not at all. So the Ironhide

gets a call. in his security force capacity because

there's a guy in Blur's bar being racist to someone.

McAdams. Oh, yeah. That's McAdams. It's McAdams.

Amy knows all the things. I don't know all those.

So I think those kind of chill this guy out and

takes him outside, but then a bunch of... Two

badgelists show up, and one of them is blast

off in his costume. And they're like, we're going

to take you to the station. And he gets all defiant

and drunk. He's all, Swindle lives, which is

the conspiracy that everybody's talking about.

And it's freaking out Starscream. And so the

badgelists are like, oh, Swindle lives, eh? We're

going to take you down to the station and nemo

surgery your brain and find out what you know.

And he's like, I was kidding. I don't know. I

don't know anything. And Iron Knight's trying

to protect him, but it doesn't work. And he runs.

and one badgeless is holding Ironhide, and one

badgeless goes and chases the guy into an alley,

and there's some shots, and a crowd appears because

they see what's happening, and the badgeless

sort of shoots at them, and they run away like

they're going to get killed. Windblade and Obsidian

show up, and Ironhide kind of tells them, hey,

the badgeless really are talking about nemo -surgerying

people, and Windblade just... starts yelling

at Starscream's face and he's like, you have

to keep this under wraps or I'll tell what Chromia

did. But then the little cute, adorable news

people show up and they're like, hey, Mr. Starscream,

what do you have to say about this footage that

somebody got of the guy being shot in the back?

And Starscream's like, you can't broadcast that.

And the guy's like, oh, it's already out. It's

live already. Ends. Yes. I love this first issue.

The story is amazing, but I love Sarah's art.

When Sarah's art is light and bright and the

bots look shiny as all hell, I love that. That

first page where you see Airazor and Tigatron,

at first I was like, wait, oh, that's who that

is. And then obviously Windblade and Chromia.

And Alita 1 and Ironhide. And then you get to

the panel of Knockout and Breakdown. I'm like,

hey, good on them putting Breakdown in there

because Knockout was already there too. That

was cool. It still weirds me out because Bumblebee

is still a ghost. He's still a figment of Starscream's

imagination at this point, right? Yeah. That

still freaks me out. Well, it's not the only

creepy thing that he's got going on in his life.

Having Obsidian and Stryker in there, I absolutely

love that. I know. Isn't that great? I mean,

it's like we took the last series and just kind

of picked up within two pages. I remember at

the end of the last series, we were saying, oh,

we kind of want to know more about what's going

on with all the other people. They did that in

like two pages, this huge panel. They kind of

summed up everything we wanted to know that we

didn't see in the last one, and there we go.

Now we're starting forward, and I really liked

that about this. And I think this is the first

time ever I've actually liked the Combaticons.

I've liked Swindle off and on over the years.

But the rest of them, I've never actually cared

because half the time, none of them have personality

in any of the other cartoons, even in G1. I mean,

they had some personality, but Swindle was the

one that had the most personality out of all

of them. And I really dig Blastoff. I want to

see more stories with Blastoff. He was cool in

this. Agreed. You know, it's cool because before

she did this, she did, what was it, Rage of the

Dinobots? I don't think. No, it wasn't Rage.

Oh, you're talking about Merigrid or Sarah? Merigrid.

Yes, Merigrid did Rage of the Dinobots. So she

took a situation with them as well and made them

all characters that had different personalities

and things like that. And so this is what Merigrid

likes to do. And before this time, Like, Devastator

had more stuff going on for him. We haven't seen

Bruticus really do anything for a while. Like,

he's been in the background, but we don't get,

like, an actual centric story with just him doing

stuff. I mean, the Combaticons, not Bruticus

himself, but, like, the Combaticons. Usually

it's Bruticus going around smashing stuff because

we've done a lot of stuff with combiners. But

we haven't done it with the rest of the team,

and that's what I really like about what's going

on at this point in IDW's... run of stuff they're

giving each of the the combiner groups like actual

personalities or just groups of people like i

said the dinobots before but it wasn't just america

that was doing it i think they've done a few

other things and other stories as well i mean

we've got the victorian and the torchbearers

so we're getting stuff and so it's like it was

really cool because now that we actually have

some story tied to these guys they're There's

somebody to us. Everybody's enjoying them because

of that. And so it's really cool to see, like,

oh, yeah, I want to have more Blastoff. I want

to have more Onslaught. I want to have more of

these guys. They're not just that guy that makes

up Bruticus. And that's the great thing about

nowadays in the comics. And Swindle, sorry. I

mean, Swindle had stuff because he was selling

stuff, but everybody else was just part of Bruticus.

And now they can become individual entities.

Onslaught is this... Within four issues, we're

like, I love these guys. They're shady, but I

love them. Yeah, Blastoff gets some particularly

good characterization because through the whole

thing, he is the most fuzzy one, the one that

you most want to plush of. And then all of a

sudden, he's horrible and scary to... um, Wheeljack

and Chromia. He's like, no, I'm totally going

to shoot Chromia in the head. And you're like,

wait, he's not a nice man. I was like, I was

totally on your team blast off. I was like, is

it peer pressure though? Because he's part of

the team. I mean, it's not peer pressure. He's

totally acting on his own. on his own agenda

but his agenda is to save onslaught and he really

doesn't care what he does i mean he totally fully

shoots that guy in the alley yeah yeah that's

true he was shut up in the alley yeah say that

but you can make the assumption he was also the

guy that said hey we're gonna you know he was

totally loading that whole situation he was there

to to to pad it in that way i think what what

gets me is the fact that then we see an issue

four no three where he's becoming the sympathetic

character because you're like oh but the guys

like him and he's being so cool and you know

but it's yes it is an act but some of it wasn't

because when we get into the fourth issue then

we see he's like no i don't want this He's changed.

And that was really cool to see that within a

four -issue arc, go from being the guy that was

willing to do whatever, kill, is doing it because

he has his own motive and he's part of a team.

But then he starts going, but I kind of don't

want to do that at the very end. He has what

he wants, but he doesn't want... And here's the

thing. He sees that Onslaught just wants to...

destroy and have vengeance and everything and

he can't get out of the war blast off is mentally

out of the war yeah and he's trying to get everybody

else out of it but he's still or at least let

me put it this way he thinks he's out of the

war yeah but obviously he's not really because

he does all this stuff but guys another thing

i totally noticed we were talking about bruticus

and stuff i think we all just assume bruticus

the combiner has totally been around in idw at

least i did i wasn't even paying attention He

hasn't this is the wake like when they when when

rat trap brings the Enigma combination and they

combined that's the first time they die Because

we've been up to our eyeballs in costas he was

in costas He was he made an appearance in costas

on point. Did he though? Yes, because I think

that was Bruticus and a sore because swindle

was hanging out with Manas or Now I'm going to

have to go look it up. And to be fair, that's

not me figuring it out. That was the wiki being

all, this is finally the first appearance of

Bruticus. I'm like, wait, what? Yeah, he has

not, to my knowledge, as long as I've been reading,

and I have not and will not read Costa's run,

like I said last week, and not trying to consistently

repeat myself, even though I am. But Mike, don't

you want to read about the Combaticons working

for North Korea? It was amazing. It was amazing,

right? Anything's better than the interview.

Okay, having been one of the persons that reviewed

it for the first time on a podcast as it was

coming out, I don't blame you. I do not blame

you. It's a very... I haven't gone back and read

it. I have not gone back to read it since it

ended and I moved forward. That's a close fight

against the writer. I just don't care to self

-abuse. In the five years that this podcast has

been online, all of this Transformers comics

coverage is all Ender's fault. He went on and

on and on and on and on about how, oh my god,

shockwave, oh my god this, oh my god that, oh

my god whatever. My bad. It was Minotaur. I was

thinking for some reason, but maybe it was because

Swindle was in there. Yeah, Swindle being involved

really throws you off and you think it's Bruticus,

but it isn't. It's not. I expect to get hate

mail over that. They'll be like, hey, don't you

know your stuff? It's like, yeah, I did review

all that, but I haven't read it since. You can

send hate mail to Mike at ThisWeekInGeek .net.

That's a really bad inside joke because it's

not my email address. Oh, really? Oh, no. It's

okay. But, like, Ender really set me straight.

He was like, okay, do this. Start with Death

of Optimus Prime. Either, you know, basically

Robert Frost it, two roads diverge, or you can

take both roads. And I obviously took both because

we've reviewed. At this point, we've reviewed

every single thing IDW has done. Not every single

thing, if you haven't gone through the Kasa stuff.

Every single thing IDW has done that actually

matters. Oh, what I thought. It does matter.

That's where we got Thundercracker. And Bob.

What the hell is wrong with you, Kasa? And Crazy

Sniper Wheelie. Oh, and your bad boy, Rodimus.

There is good stuff in there. You just have to

really plow through a whole lot of issues that

have issues upon issues until you get to something

that's actually kind of cool. Chaos was actually

not bad. Or not chaos, but chaos theory. Oh yeah,

no, that was killer. Chaos theory was amazing.

It was also not written by Mike. Before that,

you get the Rodimus story and Wheelies story.

That was actually not too bad. I thought that

was good. And the Ironhide mini wasn't too bad

either, and neither was Drift, but that also

wasn't... Oh, yeah. I fully plan on doing this.

Picking all the good stuff out. I fully plan

on doing the spotlights, and I have read several

of the spotlights themselves, but what I'm saying

is the actual ongoing that was written? Oh, no.

No, no, no, no, no. I know better than that.

You can just... Nothing really... hugely important

happened in that, I'd say read the ending and

you're good. Just read the ending. Maybe the

first issue to kind of hear the state of affairs

and then just read the whole end. There's not

enough money in Donald Trump's power for me to

do that. We're not here to review all of the

ongoing DaCosta era. Let's go back to something

good. Hey, I have to point out this because this

is really cool. At the very beginning of this

issue, we get the two -page panel that has everything

going on at the same time. I thought this was

really amazing because it didn't make a difference

to me until the very end. But you see this bot,

and you find out later that, well, you can probably

figure out that it's Chromium. When I first saw

it, I was like, what is this? And then I came

back to it. Oh, that's right. This really awesome

little thing happened. Chromia has written the

names of the people that died when she did her

thing in the first Windblade mini. She wrote

the names of the people that died in that accident

that she started, the bombs that she threw off

that started an earthquake. She wrote the three

names on her head. And when she takes her helmet

off, you can see the names etched behind one

of her, like where I'd say her ear is. And I

was like, oh, crap, man, that's dark. But I was

like, oh, it's so good because it's just this

small little thing that you see on the first

page, the first two pages. Actually, the first

page is the guy that got the Decepticon that's

bleeding out his head. It's like, oh, bleh. And

the next page is literally the second page in.

And it comes back full circle by the end of the

four issues. It was like, oh, that is so gold

right there. Yeah, that was amazing. And if you

weren't paying attention, you're like, oh, what

does that mean? Yeah, well, it's kind of important.

Sarah can do all the covers for the rest of everything,

as far as I'm concerned. Because issue two's

cover with... Windblade having her magical girl

appearance for the cover, and then Metroplex

basically in the center there. I love this cover.

This cover is amazing. So we're on to issue two.

Yes. Take it away. This is going to be juicy.

All hail Starscream! All right, so issue number

two. In the wake of the Vageless Officers murdering

a Decepticon, civil unrest takes to the streets

and it's not just the septicons they've gained

support from every new newcomer on the planet

an angry mob takes to walking on the council

onto the they're walking to the to the council

building where everybody is at and it's observed

by obsidian and air razor so star stream plans

is to his plan is to meet the force with force

an idea that ironhide challenges and then he

proposes a new idea to be put in charge of security

and the council of course agrees they're like

hey we don't want another war breaking out here

um he meets the crowd to announce that he's the

new head of security of this ih what was it called

ironhide security something yeah Ironhide security

something. Yeah. All right. Whatever. So he meets

the crowd. He's the new head of security and

he vows to investigate the murder to the fullest

as well as to find Swindle. And then he invites

members of the crowd to step forward and join

him and help him. And this kind of diffuses the

situation, which is exactly what they were trying

to do. Two of the Combaticons are in the crowd,

hoping for some smackdown. It's Onslaught, who

has a bone to pick with Starscream, which is

also revealed in this issue and then later touched

on later. He tries to attack Ironhide. Blastoff

stops him, and we have this legitimate parting

of friends played up in front of the crowd. And

it pulls off. I mean, you kind of believe, wow,

those guys are not friends anymore. Okay. So

as the crowd disperses, Blast off, asks to join

Ironhide. And he says, yeah, sure, absolutely.

So meanwhile, the council watches from above

inside the building and starts to use chambers.

He's like, as the crowd starts to break up, he

asks everybody to leave and ushers them all out

so he can collect his thoughts to make an official

statement. But Windblade stays to ask him, honestly,

do you have Swindle's body? And he says he does

not, and reveals that Onslaught is the only Combaticon

to ever outthink him, and he's dangerous. And

he also uses this moment to blackmail her into

dealing with the Combaticon. So, hey, while you're

here, you're going to take care of this little

problem for me. So, yeah. Final sequence is one

with the Tankors, one of the Tankors. We've got

Tall Tankor and Fat Tankor. Thank you, Margaret

Scott. Yeah. He offers Blastoff to stay with

them, and he accepts, but he says he has to go

clear his head and goes off to encounter Onslaught,

who tells him they totally bought it. You find

out, oh, crap, we've been played. Yep. So it

was awesome. One of my favorite things in this

issue was seeing Airazor and Obsidian in the

same scene together, because you never really

see that, because obviously Obsidian is from

Beast Machines. At least originally he was. Yeah.

Yeah, I just... I just love Starscream and Windblade

in this issue. they were really fun they did

a good job yeah yeah absolutely um especially

the whole thing oh you know i'm sure if i do

so oh no that that's the next issue that's the

next he says that but yeah yeah yeah absolutely

i absolutely love the art in this sarah her art

is like if there's anything they need to animate

it's this It would be a really good animated

thing. You know, you were saying you love Sarah's

art because it's so bright. That is Priscilla's

colors. And she is just in top form. Priscilla

does the first two issues. Joanna does the last

two. She does the second two. Priscilla's coloring

is... in my opinion, not usually quite. She doesn't

do usually this style of coloring. And so this

is the first time I've seen her be as luminous

as Joanna is. And so I'm like, rock on, Prips.

Good job. Yeah. It just glows and shines and,

you know, it's good stuff. By the time we get

to the page of where Ironhide is trying to quell

the crowd, where he's like, please, help me.

Screw you, Autobot, and they throw a rock at

him. Like, I don't think I've ever seen Ironhide

look that shiny. Like, his red on his head and

stuff, it's never looked that shiny and that

bright red before. And even the very next panel

where... Tankor is saying, boss, boss, again.

Both the Tankors, yeah. Fat Tankor and Tall Tankor

are both going, boss, boss. That panel, before

we see them, we see Ironhide with his head down.

And it goes immediately from the light and bright

to where you get the rock thrown at him to just

really, really dark. And it is so good. That

sets the mood. I mean, that whole scene is just

like, Ironhide's not one. He took down all the

Insecticons. Come on, you think this crowd would

be that hard? But still, I mean, it's just like

he's doing the right thing. And to have a rock

thrown at him, it's just like, oh, especially

think about like nowadays, the political atmosphere

that we have in our own time. And this just really

hit home for me when I read it a second time

going, oh, geez, because he's not a guy. He could

punch every single one of those guys in the face

and take it. But he took that, and that takes

a whole lot more because he's not fighting back.

And at that moment when you think that, ooh,

just hit me really emotionally that, dude. He's

trying to do what's right and he gets a rock

thrown at him. I don't know if anybody's ever

been hit with a rock like that. At that moment,

I have. And it's not fun. So it really kind of

hit home for me. But, you know, the mood that

that set and how they darkened that and they

made it look like they did. It's like, Crisola.

You did glorious on this, making the mood work

really, really well at that point. It really,

really worked for me. I had to wait on that panel

for a minute to go, ooh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, this

whole series is, I think, the Ironhide appreciation

series, because he's so good. It starts off with

his line, I think it's in the first issue, where

Starscream's like, you know, the people who think

like that are little people. And Ironhide goes,

speaking as a little person. Yeah, exactly. And

then from then on, he just goes on and on to

just become a better and better dude, where you're

just like, I pick you, sir. You are a good person.

oh but but guys i gotta while we're on this page

okay so the page just before where ironhide gets

hidden where you see onslaught and blast off

listening in the crowd a that's really good art

because they're the only ones in focus and everybody

else is blurred but b i had i was reading it

the second time just before we did the podcast

and i'm like man i so want onslaught to be listening

to this and then reach over and like start speaking

hand to blast off and be like so here's the plan

you're going to pretend that you hate me now

because they don't have a chance to really plot

that out I think they did it off screen I think

that was the whole point is that they were doing

it off screen yeah but that's my head canon now

because I think it's hilarious yeah that is oh

wait are you talking about the page where the

two of them are standing in the the midst of

the yeah in the in the crowd gotcha i have something

to say about this panel here because um she uh

sarah did it once in the first issue i haven't

i i'd have to go back and check to check see

where it was onslaught has the eyebrow thing

i know i don't know how she did it i don't know

how she did it was like he's got no facial features

except an eye and a face plate And he moves.

Oh my gosh. It's just subtle differences in how

she arranged the face. He's emoting. And I just

went, oh my gosh. It's like the top line of his

visor. Oh, it's just subtle. And she just totally

hit that. And I just went, Sarah. That gave me

goosebumps. It's giving me goosebumps right now

just talking about it. Yeah, that's good. That

was good. I love that panel. That's like the

perfect panel. Blast, I was not even looking.

It's just like this little eyebrow from Onslaught.

You're just like, ooh. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, he's

sneaky. Absolutely. I think my favorite panel

in this issue, outside of that with the coloring,

my favorite story part of this issue for the

paneling, again, goes to the old married couple.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a statement

to make. There is a line in Starscream. Is there?

Well, I'm sure you'll scream when I cross it.

There's not many people anymore. Obviously, Chris

Lott is gone. He's been gone for years now. There's

not many voice actors that can repeat that. I

believe when Steve Bloom was doing Starscream

in Prime and whatever else he's done it in recently,

when Steve Bloom was Starscream, when I interviewed

him, we asked him a question of, did they want

you to try to mimic Lotta or impersonate Lotta's

Starscream, or did they want you to do your own

thing? He said... They wanted me to do my own

thing. However, whenever they wanted me to go

as high as being Lada, he said everybody in the

production booth would throw up jazz hands, and

that means go Lada. I could see and hear Steve

saying these lines that are here in this panel.

That would be amazing. Jazz hands! Jazz hands!

That's awesome. Wow. Issue two. I absolutely

love it. I want to know, I've been meaning to

ask this, but we were two issues in. The final

panel, and I'm looking at it in the trade, so

it's after, it's like the closing of it. It's

like this silver thing, like, I don't understand

what that is all about. Oh, just the divider

page between issues? I always interpret it as

the nearest Cybertronian wall. Okay. Okay. But

it's just, you know, a divider thing. Because

normally, at least in Lost Light and Optimus

Prime to this point, because we've already recorded

that episode at this point, you know, they would

just have the alternate covers, like one alternate

cover show. But yeah, absolutely. Any other final

thoughts? I like this way better, though, because

then you know you're done with that issue and

it doesn't visually confuse you. Absolutely.

I guess I'm not seeing it then because I have

the individual issues. Oh, yeah. You don't get

to look at a wall, Amy. Too bad. Oh, bummer.

Oh, well. I've got plenty of walls around me,

so, you know. Sadly, they're not all padded.

True. And I have to be careful of that because,

you know, I don't like bruises all over my, you

know, arms and face. So, Issue 3's cover is depressing?

It's basically the Combaticons with poor brain

-dead Swindle in the front and then Bruticus

in the back. And they're all like hanging. It's

so funny because you see Swindle in the very

front of this cover by Sarah. And then you see

all the other ones. And as they go up, the first

one is just looking straight. The next one is

just kind of looking straight. The final two

in the back have their heads down. And then obviously

the Bruticus version, which is in shadow, has

his head hung. I'm like, damn. That's a statement.

That's a cover that would... If I was in a comic

shop when this originally came out, I would probably

pick this issue up just based on this cover alone.

Do you also notice the eye color? Oh, yeah. Whoa.

Because the only one that's standing out as different

is a blast off. Holy biscuit. I never noticed

that before. Good spot. Oh, yeah. And not only

that, his eye color is the same as the blood

that's coming, or the energon that's coming off

of Swindle. Yep. Yeah. Holy crap, Biscuit. It's

dark. I'm sad now. it's so good it's very subtle

but it's like it's so good this would probably

ruin the cover but imagine this cover as done

as done as done by sarah as a poster on my wall

okay well there's that but imagine this where

blast off's eye color the tear is coming off

his chest plate and touching swindle's head oh

snap yeah I think we just broke Heather's brain.

Well, no, I'm sitting here analyzing it, and

I'm like, no, I think that'd be a little too

emo. It might be a little too emo, but I get

what you're saying. Yeah, it is cool. All right,

Amy, take issue three away. Okay, so issue three.

Following through from the last issue, Windblade

starts to investigate the Combaticons. Lacromia

catches her and finds out why. She volunteers,

Crimea volunteers to help them both get out of

this mess by finding Swindle's body first. Sorry,

I can't speak today. She tries pulling up her

own secret footage cache of the night that Swindle

disappeared from the end of the Combiner Wars,

but someone has corrupted the footage. Over the

next few weeks, Cromia works to unscramble the

corrupted data while new security chief Ironhide

starts to train his recruits, Blasthoff having

to go through the process of proving himself

as well as the other recruits. But they impress.

When Ironhide reports his progress to the council,

Blasthoff is invited by the other recruits. to

go celebrate at McAdams. He feigns needing more

study time with the booking system. When he's

really trying to access the same security footage,

Chromia has been working to reveal. Unfortunately,

he accesses the video when Chromia finally finishes

unscrambling it. Both Chromia and Blastoff find

that it was Wheeljack and Rattrap who took him.

I suspected Rattrap, but Wheeljack was a reveal

for me when I read through it. Chromia is unable

to contact Windblade, who's been detained by

an impatient Starscream. She races to Wheeljack,

but two of the Combaticons show up to overpower

her and kidnap both her and Wheeljack. The other

two Combaticons pick up Rattrap, and they all

go to where they stashed Swindle. Wheeljack then

explains that it wasn't Starscream. that they

actually grabbed Swindle to try and save him,

but they were too late by then. He was already

padooped. Fueled by his obsession to find out

what Swindle knows so he can destroy Starscream,

Onslaught refuses to give up, even though Swindle

appears to be brain dead. Blast off questions

Onslaught again, but he says that he has one

final card to play. Rattrap returns to them with

the Enigma of Combination. Got to the end of

that with, oh, snap. Yep. Yeah, outside of the

stuff with Windblade and Starscream and the stuff

with Wheeljack and Chromia, favorite panel out

of this one is where Onslaught is basically talking

to Rattrap, and I think Rattrap here might be

able to help us get them. Yeah, I'm gonna have

to disagree with you on that. Alright, alright!

He basically scrunches Rattrap's head into his

bod, like... Oh, man. Scott McNeil, where the

hell are you, dude? Oh, man, I can hear his voice

in my head. Yeah, the reveal of Swindle's body.

Poor Swindle. Like, I know the guy's a schemer

and he's a double dealer and he's just out to

make a buck, but he did not deserve this. No,

he didn't. And he's also adorable. It really

doesn't help that, like, everybody has been making

him just a fun little obnoxious punk for the

last while. So we're like, but we love him. Yeah,

issue three, I thought it was super fun. I thought

the story really picked up. I can't say, and

I've gushed all over Sarah, Priscilla, and Joanna

at this point, because all three of them, you

just give these characters to them, and honestly,

it doesn't matter. These three women can do...

anything in Transformers in the comics as far

as I'm concerned. I don't even care once Till

All Are Gone and Unicron destroys the universe.

I don't care what comes next. These three women

need to be on something because holy wow. Just

the fact that you had Chromia sitting there pouting

as she's trying to break this code. Day 12. Never

cross that out. Way too many. It's like, yeah,

it's just that alone was really awesome just

to see that. I mean, how often are you going

to see a transformer laying on the ground pouting

because they can't break a code? It just, wow,

that was really cool. I mean, I was just the

little things like that in here and just really

fun. It's so relatable the way like. I was going

to bring that up too, Amy, that the art here,

because they're also in the panel on the previous

page. It's a smaller panel, but it's where she's

sitting with like a keyboard in her lap. She's

sitting cross -legged, staring up at Metroplex's

brain, trying to like get it. And then you see

her later and she's now just like on her stomach,

like with her face propped on her arm and like

just flopped on the ground. I'm like, we have

all done those exact things. Yeah. And it's just

so good because we so hardly ever see. I think

that's one of the things that makes this art

so good is that they all are in, you know, the

best possible way. So humanized in the way they

move, the way they emote, the way they express

themselves in their entire body. Yeah. It's really

good. It is so good. And the story is writing.

I mean, I mean, this woman has done some amazing

writing over the years, both for television and

the comics and everything like that. And it just

keeps getting better and better. Yeah. I have

a question. I feel like I've missed something,

and I was wondering if you guys knew. Who hacked

Chromia's files? Who corrupted them? They haven't

said. They haven't said who it was that did it.

And I kind of get the sense, because I wasn't

quite sure about that either. I went to the wiki,

and it kind of gives the impression that I don't

think that we know, at least in this issue, at

least in this arc, who it was that did it. Blastoff

knows about those files, too, even though they're

Chromias? That was where it fell apart. Yeah,

it got a little fuzzy there for a minute. I'm

trying to flip through that right now. I thought

it was Blastoff, because somebody else was Chroming

through the files, no pun intended, but I thought

it was Blastoff, because he was trying to save

Onslaught. Yeah. You know, it could actually

have been Onslaught that found them originally,

because like he said at the beginning in issue

one, where he's like, I've been trying to find

some dirt on Starscream, trying to figure out

what the heck, what exactly. We don't know who

this guy is, this DC 537. That's the other thing.

Yeah, we don't know who he is yet, at least not

in this arc. I don't know if we ever did find

out. I can't remember right off the top of my

head. But I suspect that maybe that's the person

because he's also, well, I take that back. It

could be Zach. It could be, but we never do find

out. Yeah. DC 537. I mean, thinking about it,

I'm going, I don't know. I really don't know

if we ever find out who DC is. The guy that's

giving them the information. If it was him that

was corrupting the, well, and that's the thing.

I don't think it would be him corrupting the

files because he wants him to find Swindle. And

they can't find Swindle without the files. And

so somebody else, yeah, it's got to be somebody

else. And who knows, maybe Starscream was that

thorough that he found them and he corrupted

them. Who knows? It makes sense in a way. It

never really said. Sorry, what? It never really

says who corrupts them. But I also suspect that

it wasn't the Combaticons because they want to

find themselves. They want the thing. And I kind

of get the feeling that what's going on, and

maybe this is just a little loss in translation,

I kind of got the idea that maybe Blastoff was

monitoring these files. Yeah. And when he sees

that somebody else has accessed them, He waits

for them to crack them before he piggybacks on

that to find out what the information is. It's

Chromia reacting really fast. My guess is that

she didn't know if anybody sees it or not, but

it could happen at any time. I mean, she just

rushes off to go help them. So I guess it really

doesn't matter whether or not she knew somebody

was watching or not. She just assumed that somebody

would find that information as well. So she was

like, nope, got to get there really fast just

in case. They don't trust Starscream further

than can spit, which is true. It does make sense

to me that Starscream actually would be the one

sending messages to Onslaught. Because what it's

doing and what Blastoff sees and why he's trying

to break him out of it is it's keeping Onslaught

spinning his wheels. Also, Starscream doesn't

know where Swindle's body is. So if he can get

Onslaught to use his brain to help him unknowingly,

but help find out what happened to Swindle. Yeah,

but I don't think the Starscream would do that

because he lost a little bit of power. He's not

one to give up power so easily. And that's the

thing. But that would gain him power. If Onslaught

finds Swindle, and he can be on it enough to

know when he does. That's why he's pressing Windblade

so hard then. Yeah. Yeah, it makes sense to me,

but I don't know exactly. Here's the thing. I

was listening to our previous podcast today just

because I was at work and I wanted to see what

we said because I don't remember. And I said

something about thinking that Till All Are One

had a rocky beginning because of one of the other

Titans Return or something. That's actually the

next one. This one, this trade, this story is

incredibly tight storytelling. It's so good.

And so when there's something that doesn't make

sense. I think we forget in this particular series

of issues, we forget that it's an ongoing. Because

it feels like such a self -contained story. So

we're like, Margaret, you didn't answer this

question, Margaret. But she will. Well, we did

with the last one because it wasn't part of an

ongoing. Because there were a few things that

we had questions about. But like I said earlier,

some of those questions were answered in the

first two panels. The thread, we wanted to know

about a few things. She kind of wrapped those

up a little bit, not like completely, just gave

us a little bit more information about it. So

I was like, oh, okay, that's where we're at.

But again, coming back to Starscream, it kind

of makes sense. If he is the DC 537 or whatever

that number is, if he's using Onslaught to find

Swindle, he also is... walking a very, very tight

rope because if he doesn't get enough information,

isn't there fast enough to stop that, him getting

the swindle, it means that he's going to get,

he's going to get, you know, so that's a huge

thing. I don't know if he would take that risk.

So that's why I'm like, it's interesting that

we're sitting here on a podcast debating who

was this guy. And I don't even remember if we

ever find out who that guy was. But it's quite

fascinating to see that in both cases, whether

it's someone or somebody else, just the fact

that he's spinning that, that he's taking those

risks to see if it pays off in the end to get

these guys taken care of. If he can't take care

of the Combaticons himself, he's putting other

people in the path to do that. And so he's manipulating

from both sides. It's just like, oh, my gosh,

Margaret Scott. Holy cow! That's brilliant. Yeah,

it's very brilliant. Whether or not she did it

or not, I was like, you know what, just leave

that dangling, see what happens. It might make

it. Speaking of brilliant writing from Marigrid,

there's this killer good line from Blastoff that

is the summary of his entire arc, and it's when

they're staging their falling out, and Onslaught's

like, you know, And he looks up at Onslaught

and he says, I tried to help you, Onslaught.

I did everything I could, even more than I should

have, but I can't save you from yourself. And

I'm like, oh, my gosh. Because, like, we know

what he does later. Yes. Like, wow, dang, that's

really good. And then, like, there's this, like.

Just the little nuggets. Yeah. Because if you've

already read the whole thing, you're like, oh,

now you go back the second time. Oh, I know what's

going to happen. You're like, yeah. Oh, that

setup is really good. I found that going back

through and reading this again, I understood

it so much better because, to be honest, I could

not tell the Combaticons apart the first time

I was reading this. Like, you know, when it first

came out, I felt like an idiot because I'm like,

everybody can tell these guys apart, but not

me. Because, like, they have the same head. You're

not the only one. I have to say, I admit that

there have been times where I struggled, where

I had to go back a couple panels, like, what

are we talking about again? They've been so a

non - entity for so long, it's easy to blend

them all together. And that's why I latched on

to the fact that Blastoff was the standout character

in this first part of the ongoing, because of

the fact that he has purple eyes, just like Swindle

used to have purple eyes. So if... Yeah, that's

fine. It's Brawl, Swindle, Onslaught, Blastoff,

and Vortex. So you take Vortex, Onslaught, and

Brawl. Those are the three with red eyes, and

then Blastoff and Swindle have the purple eyes,

supposedly, because we don't really see Swindle's

eyes in this. No, he's got purple eyes. That's

what I figured. He always has. But you never

know. Someone might have changed it. They didn't,

obviously. Thank God. And that's how I could

tell. Onslaught and Blast Off, I knew. Vortex

and Brawl, the only way I knew the difference

between them is I know Vortex is a helicopter.

That's the only way I know the difference between

the two of them. Well, I mean, even that. I mean,

they have a couple of things that are different

about them, yes. But it's just that they all

seem to be the guy that has the big stick that

just wants to hit everything. And that's what

I'm talking about in terms of character. We haven't

really gotten much of them other than they're

all, they're just a live wire ready to pick up

the hammer and start whacking things. That's

all I've ever seen them as until Blastoff. And

I'm like, dude, I love this guy. Yeah, Blastoff

needs his own miniseries or something. Oh, we

get it. We get more. I'm sure, yeah. Yeah, there's

a lot of characters in the last 12 or 13 years

that they have done stories with that I would

love to see just separate. It was Bertram. Bertram,

a number of years ago, when I first started following

Josh Bertram on Twitter, he said something about

he always wanted to do a punch -counterpunch

story where he would write it, he would draw

it, he would do everything on it, essentially.

I'm still waiting for IDW to make that happen.

They will never probably do that. They actually

did have a script that was written and ready

to be done, from what I understand, when I talked

with Andy Schmidt. they had one yeah but the

the story moved so quickly that it moved into

a place where everything that was going on in

that script specifically kind of it ended up

being outdated too quickly and so they were never

able to green light it from what i understand

but they did take some elements of that script

and kind of folded it in different ways into

the story i don't know We never got the script,

so I don't really know. But from what I understand,

they took some of the elements and kind of planted

them in there. So we maybe didn't get the punch

-counterpunch, but some of the things that were

laid in there that maybe hadn't been mined did

get put into the story. I just don't know what

those are. And, yeah, Issue 3 was really, really

awesome. Any other final thoughts on Issue 3,

ladies? It was cool. Let's just say I was genuinely

worried when Chromia gets her ass handed to her.

She was definitely going to protect Wheeljack,

like, big time. And you knew she was going to

because it's Chromia. I mean, come on. Yeah,

absolutely. She's really awesome. But then when

she got shot in the back, I was like, oh, crap,

man. And the, you know, blast off putting the

gun to her head, I was just like, whoa, whoa.

This is not good. I was genuinely worried for

her. I was genuinely worried. Yeah, it's not

good. I mean, because it might have been worth

their while to just shoot her in the head before

you leave because, you know, she's going to fight

you one way or the other. If you don't put her

down, you don't keep her under release, she's

going to turn around and start swinging her battle

axe and you're going to have a problem again.

I'm going to watch that one with two optics.

Just saying. You know, that is actually a good

compliment because as we read, you know, comic

books specifically, we're already in the mind

space of shooty, shooty, fight, fight, fight.

And so to have a scene like that really hit in

your gut where you're just like, oh, and it feels

again, you know, like you're watching, you know,

a really good dramatic television show. Yeah.

That's really well done. Yeah. And then lastly,

when you got the Enigma combination, I was like,

oh, crap. You know where this is going, right?

Yeah, they're going to merge. Finish with Combiner

Wars. No, no, no, no, no. We just got Combiner

Wars. They're going to merge with a brain -dead

bot. And there's that, too. Which is like, ew.

There is a sense of you with that. There really

is. He's dead. Well, you know, maybe that'll

give him a... Do you really want to be in the

brain of something dead, though? I'm just saying.

Not really, no. Only Transformers. Only a Transformer

can do this. I like to imagine that when Bruticus

is walking, it feels like his entire leg is all

tingly and asleep. Sorry. Okay, take it away.

Okay, so issue four... Am I interrupting? No.

Not yet, anyway. Issue four, basically, we start

off with the fact that the Combaticons have the

Enigma combination. They are going to combine

and... We have the first IDW appearance of Brubicus,

and it is glorious, I guess. We have a nice little

screamy shot with Ironhide. All units, I'm getting

reports of a major disaster in Sector 4. Everyone,

move out! Couldn't you have changed move to roll?

Come on, now. Yeah, but that's Optimus Prime's

ship. I know, but he's on Earth doing whatever

the hell. destroying stuff because he's the worst

leader in Transformers history. True. She agreed

with me. Oh, my God. I'd rather just not be on

Earth, but that's just a personal peeve. Yeah,

that's because IDW Optimus isn't the true one.

No, that's Bavers. He has his moments. He's just...

lost the Matrix right now, so he's kind of doing

his own thing. It is what it is. They go on to

have to basically stop Bruticus. They try to

actually reason with Blastoff, and that doesn't

work at all. Starscream and Windblade continue

their marital counseling issues as this chapter

goes along. Chromia. Just basically goes off

and does her thing with revealing all like basically

just taking all the blame They eventually do

take Bruticus down they basically separate him

I just the sacrifices that Chromia makes in this

the the actions that Ironhide and Windblade take

And, you know, Starscream is just there in the

background, as always. Because, heaven forbid,

he get anything on his wingspan. Heaven forbid,

Starscream actually has to take responsibility

for something. He will eventually. Well, yeah,

eventually, but not in this initial part of the

story. There are a lot of really gold parts in

this. Oh, yeah. Basically, this one kind of ends

where Chromia, like I said, fesses up to everything,

and it's not Windblade's fault. It's not Windblade's

secret to keep, and the secrets are out. I just

love the final page of the final panel of this,

where Windblade is like, It's continuing on from

earlier. At some point, no matter how hard it

is, you have to step into the light. And the

final page is just her stepping into... I almost

didn't recognize... It's very rare that I see

Windblade from this profile shot of her just

looking at her by the back. And it's like, what

the hell? But it looks really good. It's a huge

contrast because here she is, she's an optimist.

She's been trying to pull things up and make

things better. And in this case where she loses

one of her closest friends and confidants because

of things, it's a huge sacrifice. And she has

to be stepping into the light, and she is, but

it ain't light. I mean, that's a really dark.

You can see that she is conflicted in a huge

way because of what's happened and what she's

losing on this. Even if you have stepped into

the light, that is a very weighted downwind blade.

She doesn't have her wings up. She's not this

hopeful looking forward. She's hurt, frustrated,

and looking down. That is hardly... you know

the place that you'd expect her to be even though

she's just stepped into the light that type of

thing ah it's such a good contrast such a good

contrast that's one of my favorite panels right

there because you just see we talked about earlier

in the previous podcast how every single time

something happens she loses a little bit of ground

and she changes and she's seeing herself change

from who she is to something else and while she's

making good steps in the right direction Like,

there's been a cost that's involved, and this

is part of that cost that she is experiencing,

is the fact that she can't protect everybody.

You know, yes, she probably should have protected

Chromia, but at the same time, she didn't have

anybody else. But the price of peace is to allow

her friend now to take that burden, and it was

kind of taken out of her hands. But it's everything

else. It's the fact that she was manipulated.

I mean, even in this... this issue alone was

it in this issue last issue no it was in this

issue because she's like look we've we've got

this stuff going on and he he basically tells

her she's like uh -uh i ain't doing this i'm

not it's not worth it and what is it he says

uh don't tell me you don't recognize those color

schemes that come by whether they were to say

oh it's like okay so he's basically starscream

is getting on her case for that he would uh the

Bruticus wouldn't even exist if you'd done your

job. And she's like, my job is to help Cybertron

and Caminus prosper, not to be your spy. And

he comes down to this, well, consider yourself

promoted to assassin. He's basically telling

her, you will murder these guys to protect everything.

And she's like, I ain't doing it to protect your

secrets. And he says, then kill to protect yours.

And that's when she's like, uh -uh. Push has

come to shove, and I'm like, dude, I could have

told you that. You're willing to go that distance.

Starscream's willing to go that distance and

manipulate everybody else around him to be the

murderers for him. Maybe if he's not doing it,

he's already done it himself. He's just trying

to put everybody down at the same level as him

so that he can manipulate them, which he thinks

he has with her. But I could have told you right

now, she doesn't think like that. This is where

he erred because he expected that she would be

willing to do anything and everything to protect

that secret. And she wasn't. There was a line

that she was not going to cross. She even hinted

at that, that there is so far that she's going

to go. Where is the line going to be? And he

says, oh, I'm sure you'll scream at me when I

cross it. He never thought about when she crosses

it. She's not that bot. She ain't going to do

that. And if you push her to do that, what's

going to happen is either one of two things.

Either she will buckle or one of the people around

her will buckle, and you will lose your peace

with her. And he did. He did. I was like, dude,

you really didn't know the people below you did

too. You didn't really know. You think that you

could push her enough? You push her too hard

too fast. There's no way she's going to get there,

especially how you're treating it. It's like,

dude, you totally erred there. Starscream, really?

You really wanted this. You want to push it that

far. But he did. So he lost that play piece.

Starscream, you done fucked up. But, you know,

it's so good because, like I said, we're sitting

here on a podcast talking about it, you know,

a year after the fact, going, this is so good.

It's just brilliant how it's played. it wasn't

that hard to set up. I mean, just, she makes

it look like it's so easy. And that's what I

liked about. That's probably like a lot, a lot

of Margaret's writing is the fact that she makes

us have a personal connection because she makes

it believable. And we, you know, we, we get something

out of it. It was so good. This was so perfect.

So, so good to read and to just like, ah, anyhow.

Yeah. Yeah. It is. I knew going into this, my

first read -through for these four issues, I

felt like I was lost because of how the last

Windblade story was collected so incorrectly.

We went through all that last week. That's the

only hiccup. That's really the only hiccup in

all of the run. Yeah, that was the thing where

I was like, hmm. And then I felt like, when I

read the first two issues the first time, I felt

like I lost something or I was missing something.

But, like I said, I read it two different times

before we recorded this. And I was like, okay.

You know, that works. I get it now. I fully understand.

That's great. And just absolutely love it. Marigrid

writes stories so well. Sarah, Joanna, Priscilla.

on art and colors oh it's just so good so the

last thing that i want to say on this issue especially

because this is such an interesting part we've

seen combiners as they are together and they

work as a team and they talk and things like

that to see one of them have a dissenting voice

uh at least on the decepticon side we did with

when uh optimus prime and a bunch of them kind

of got together and probably this way. But it's

just cool to see the Combaticons in this sense,

that as they combine, you get Blastoff and his

dissenting comments. And I like how they did

that in the art. I like how we get the information

that they've been looking for, why Swindle was

offed. what he had on Starscream. We get that

there's a tape that he recorded of the whole

situation. And it gets lost in the noise because

Onslaught is like, no, I just want to burn, baby,

burn. Because there are some people out there,

no matter what you do, all they want to do is

see the world burn. Onslaught is that guy. And

Blastoff isn't. You see the part where he's like,

no. where they're like, burn, burn. He's like,

guys, don't want to do this. Stop. And he can't

do it. He's like, our mission is to get after

Starscream and to get him put out of power. And

they get lost in the frenzy of what they want

to destroy everything. And he's the only one

that's like, no, stop. This isn't our mission.

Stop. Stop. They might be in the way, but that's

not what we're trying to get rid of. They're

not the enemy. And he's just like, burn. I was

like, oh, wow. It was just really cool to see

that. I really, really loved that about the whole

moments between them. And then, of course, just

before they try to hurt Ironhide or what? No,

Chromia jumps in the way because Windblade got

knocked down. And that panel is amazing. Yeah.

Which panel? Where she gets knocked down? Okay.

The panel where she jumps to save Windblade.

And then they're both about to get smashed. Bruticus

is, like, getting his guns down and aiming. And

you see, like, this amazing, like, perspective

up shot of Bruticus's guns. Chromia just standing

there holding her shield. And Windblade kind

of crashed behind her. And I so want that to

be bigger because it's a really cool panel. It's

in the page fold where you don't see it as much.

I'm like, dang, Navit, that's awesome. Okay,

gotcha. Yeah, I can see it really good with mine

just because. I've got, I'm looking at the digital

version. But you also get this little thing where

Blastoff's off to the side saying, no, no. Yeah,

and it causes Bruticus to like, like that little,

where he's just like, like he, he. stuck for

a minute that the page the page the double page

spread where you see how it works inside their

mind and that's just really cool that is the

one where not being able to tell the combaticons

apart really really bit me in the bum yeah and

this was the first time where i started really

getting it i'm like okay wait that's this person

that's this person that's this person and understanding

who is who in that section really helps the storytelling

and if you don't understand who is doing what

in that mind space it makes it very confusing

and you don't get it and so that really held

me back first time through and then I I feel

like like even now I'm looking I'm like oh wait

the guy reaching that's onslaught that's not

blast off you know it's still Kind of unfolding

as I figure out, all right, whose head has got

what doohickey on it? Next time. That's all right.

You're right. It adds another meaning to it.

You recognize who each one of them is and what

they're trying to do. And not only that, I like

how the bottom panel, it's Bruticus. While they're

trying to figure stuff out, Bruticus is running

after people. I'm just saying. So it's like they're

multitasking. And being angry. It's just like

so much is going on at the same time. It's like,

whoa, I don't know how I could be in somebody's

head. Let alone four other people's heads. And

one of them is dead. Okay, now I think I just

hit my overload on that one. So I'm like, oh!

So what you're saying is Swindle is Jerry Garcia.

He's a deadhead. I don't know who Jerry Garcia

is. What? Oh, he's the lead singer of The Grateful

Dead. Are you kidding me? Oh, okay. Sorry. My

bad. You know Swindle would be, though. He would

love those comics. He totally would. And then

once everybody was wasted, he'd take their stuff.

Well, of course. He totally would. And sell it.

That's what he does. So there's the tape, guys.

But the only one that knows it now is Bruticus,

and he's been torn apart. This ending is so tragic.

It's so, so tragic. And it is an ending, but

it really isn't an ending. It feels like this

is a full -on... It really feels like an ending.

It feels like these four issues are just another

miniseries, even though this is an ongoing. And

that's great, because we have a beginning, middle,

and ending. At the same time, you know more is

coming. Sadly, I don't particularly like where

it falls, because Volume 2, when we get to that

in a couple of weeks, starts with the revolution

issue. Okay, I'll have to go back and read that.

We'll discuss it when we get there. Yeah, we'll

get there when we get there. It's good to have

these four issues that are untouched by anything

except Marigold's story. Yeah, no kidding. It's

so good. So good. And I love where it goes later,

because start screaming, and we're going to get

more Bruticus. We'll get more. Oh, I'm sure.

We'll get more Combaticons, let's just say that.

There's more coming. If you haven't read it,

go out and read it, because we're going to discuss

it later. It's going to be awesome. Yep, absolutely.

There's going to be more character development,

let's just say that. And that's one thing that

all the writers are good at nowadays, but Marigrid,

her... Like I said earlier in this episode, the

fact that she gave the Combaticons a place to

go. She gave them the personality aspect of it.

She created for them in my mind personality traits

that I've never seen before in them. When I think

of the Combaticons, like most old... male Transformers

fans, I think of G1 and the very short time they

were in season three. Part of, yeah. Yeah, season

three. You know, so it's like anything that expands

on that, that's great. The only one that's really

had any character development has been Swindle.

He's been the guy that did the Fonz and then

he did other things and we loved him because

of the character that he's been since then you

know after uh cybertron got rebooted and the

the role that he's played in that um because

he's gotten story but then he got you know knocked

out out of the story he's been dead um and everybody's

been running after him and then we had this whole

swindle lives things going on and it's just like

hey we're focused on swindle in the meantime

everybody else kind of just fell into the background

and the only character development that i've

had with them it's just it's not been idw's character

development it's what i've seen on fall of cybertron

i loved him in that game that was fantastic yeah

i loved playing the combaticons they're great

but this this we actually get some really like

onslaught blast off they take the front stage

oh yeah so it's funny because Before this book

came out, I could have told you, I wouldn't have

always been able to come up with their names,

but I would have been like, okay, so Onslaught

is the smart one, and Vortex is the helicopter

one who's crazy, and Brawl is the dumb tank one,

and I would not have been able to remember that

Blastoff existed. And the fact that Merigrid's

like, I'm going to take the most nobody. of this

team that nobody can really tell you much about

and make him just you're gonna like be this character

by the end of the book yeah yeah absolutely so

like random all -encompassing comment about this

particular volume so i was reading it in the

knowledge of stuff that happens in volume three

right i had forgotten that this blinking volume

of four books is like one of the most romantic

things I've ever read and I'm still on the fence

about like robots liking each other but it is

really and I think honestly it's because Sarah

will totally draw that and so there's so many

panels and so many things where like Onslaught

is like I only trust you Blastoff it just needs

to be us or when Starscream and Windblade are

fighting Wait, what? Or when Starscream and Windblade

are fighting. I can't get my head around those

two being anything, so that can be your world

and have fun in it. But, like, just, yeah, there

were a lot of things just drawn or written in

this very understated, but very, like, there's

a thing that is done in writing where you're

just kind of... building the tension between

characters where there's like this sense of unfulfilled

connection. And that is so incredibly blinking

strong in this book. It is. Yeah. And holy crap.

Yeah. Even just like where, where blast off goes

and he kind of reports back to onslaught. He's

like, Hey, I got it on iron Heights team. And,

and you've just had this, the line that, Onslaught

drops of like, I've spent enough time with this

ooze as I care to. I'm like, oh, that is cutting

because I happen to know that Blastoff is like

living his life to try and save you, dude. Yeah.

And then he goes and he's like, hey, you know,

I did the thing. And Onslaught's like, he like

hugs him. He's like, I couldn't be more proud.

Oh, yeah. Holy crud, Sarah. Those guys hugging.

wait what those guys hugging you would not it

seems like such a not ridiculous thing to do

and i can see where well now that i've read the

rest of it i know where it's going but it's just

like oh yeah that was interesting that's just

that's a nice little moment i'm sure that blast

off really enjoyed i know i know gosh dang it

this blanking book i'm like throwing stuff right

now Well, you all, everybody is, well, every

one of us, I'm sure, has had a crush. But, like,

if you really, really want to have that type

of attention from somebody, you finally get it.

You're just like, flipping heart attack, you

know? Yeah. I'm sure that's what he's going through.

He's like, aw. Yeah. I have a completely different

reaction to this now, having read the whole thing,

than what I was when I first read that. Just

going, oh, my gosh, this is so perfect. I love

this. And it's funny because, like, it feels

like where you sit there the whole time being

like, I'm not reading into this, right? This

is really, yeah, it's really there. And then,

you know, of course, yeah, it's totally really

there. But, ah, there's just, yeah, back to the

whole, they're so expressive. You did a great

job with it. Absolutely. Yeah. And it's, oh,

you know what it is? I was saying that, you know,

by the time we're done with this, we have become

Blast Off. It's the same deal as in the beginning

of More Than Meets the Eye, where we were all

tailgate. Yeah. Or we all been swerved. Yeah.

At the end of this, we're just, or at least I

am, I'm so completely immersed in, like, absolutely

everything that Blast Off is feeling and experiencing

and whatnot. I'm just like, it's hard to come

out of it, even. It's like that feeling where

you've read a really, really, really good book

and then you have to go to work and you're like,

huh. Yeah. Yeah, there's one more thing that

I forgot to kind of mention because Ironhide

has to arrest Chromia. Oh, that's so cute. I

mean, it's sad. Up until now, because those two,

and it's kind of not, we haven't really touched

on them that much, they've been working together.

pretty much since the beginning of wind blades

showing up the first the first volume that we've

reviewed yeah he's been there the whole time

so there's a respecting going on between these

two and the fact that he has to arrest her now

because that's where he is in in his headspace

and she has he's like he doesn't really say much

she just says she takes off her helmet in like

the second to last page and shows the words that

she's scratched on her head and ironhide shows

up says chromia he hasn't really said much but

you see the look on his face where he's just

like he's torn he's like dude you just what yeah

it's like and she just says do your job show

them no one is above the law and it's just like

oh stab in the heart oh yeah And so he arrests

her. But you have this little moment between

the two of them where he says, I hope it was

worth it. And she's smiling because it is. Because

for her, it is. She's doing something to protect

somebody that's what she was there for. Her protection

isn't necessarily physical. She's politically

protecting her. And the next page of the top

panel where you see her being led away and Windblade

being led away the opposite direction and they're

looking back at each other, that's good too.

Yeah, that's very good. I love this first volume.

I thought it was great. Really strong. Yeah,

it was so... After I read it the second time,

like I said, you know... And I finally got it

all, and I'm like, oh, this is really, really

cool. I need to start the next one now, because,

yeah, I really dig this. And like I've said before,

between Sarah, Joanna, and Priscilla, the art

is just so good. Absolutely so good. All right,

so zero to five, what are we going to rate this

thing, Heather? Five. Amy? I was saying the same

thing. Five, absolutely. It's spot on. There

aren't even any teeny little niggles. Things

don't have to be perfect to be perfectly wonderful.

So if that's what you're looking for out of the

five, there's so many moments and things that

are jiving so well. Everything flows so perfectly.

You get so much character development. I just

say, look, it's hitting all of the notes it needs

to be for what I would equate to a five. dollar

or a five -star comic it doesn't have to be perfect

art is never perfect writing is never perfect

there's no such thing as a perfect script so

for me this is a five because it's doing all

those things i get the payoff i'm just like thrilled

to death about each of the characters even the

ones i'm doing the dark things because the emotion

is the integrity of the emotion is there i feel

it because i it they have all of the points getting

in there to make me feel this. And she did her

job. She told a story, one, two, three, four,

got it all together. And I feel like I've got

a satisfying payoff, even though I'm like, okay,

what happens next? I have some, it's a nice little

meal of a story. Yeah, absolutely. It's a rich

feast of a story. That too. yeah so basically

fives all around the story and the art and everything

else the whole book gets a 15 essentially um

yes you know absolutely loved it like i said

i had no trepidations going into this i wasn't

like worried about this this isn't like um ending

a certain other story that we'll get to an issue

in episode 321. This isn't like having a requiem

for a team, you know, not worried about this,

more worried about that. Cause who the hell knows

what's going to happen to those guys. But I,

I absolutely love this. Like this series should

have been longer than 12 issues. It's going to

be great to see us when we get to the whole finale

here to see how the whole. thing wraps up, but

I really think that this series could have gone

on longer just by reading these first four issues.

Yeah. I think there were other reasons why it

ended. It had nothing to do with the story. No,

no, I understand that. I'm just saying that,

you know, just like in all of comics, you know,

not just this specific series, we want to see

it go on as long as possible, as long as the

story makes sense. And with Mergrid, on the writing,

and with these artists on the art, like, these

women can do no wrong. And, I mean, Tom B. Long

and Barber, you know, John Barber, they're always

great. I mean, Tom's been doing letters for this

for all 13 years at this point, I think, for

the most part. He's been doing it for a while,

absolutely. He doesn't get enough credit. No.

Tom is ace. Yes, he is. He's so sneaky. He's

like a ninja in the background making sure everything

works on that side. I think I did, I have to

say. I love you, Tom. There was one error that

I saw on the digital one. It's okay. It was just

a word. It was misspelled. It was an easy thing

to miss, but I saw it. There are plenty of times.

I only bring it up because in the past when sometimes

we brought things up. People change it and fix

it. It's done and dusted and fixed. Yeah. It's,

you know, really easy to, well, I would say easy

because sometimes it's a pain, but, you know,

to find little things like that. Yeah. With all

the eyes that are on it, it's easy to miss something.

Believe me, it always is. Oh, yeah, absolutely.

All right. We're about to get the heck out of

here. Amy, where can the people find you online?

You can find me at Twitter at Lady of Rack. What

about you, Heather? You can find me on Twitter

and everywhere as Hahi Prime. You can follow

Nicole at Beatles Diva. Beatles like the bug,

not the band. Oh, wait. Whoops. Hopefully she'll

join us for the next issue. She better, or else.

She's not just a... plain old bumblebee anymore.

She's a gold bug. It's at BeatlesDiva on Twitter

or just Google BeatlesDiva. Beatles like the

band, not the bug. I am at TFG1Mike. You can

follow at ThePullBag on Twitter. Find us on Facebook.

Go to geekcastradio .com. Check out all the other

podcasts that we do. Coming up next time here

in Autobotly August 2018. We are going to be

celebrating 10 years of all things Transformers

with Steve Megatron coming on to review Transformers

vs. G .I. Joe Volume 1 with me. So that's what's

going on next time. And after that, it'll be

Ryan and I talking Lost Light and the Worst Leader

Ever Optimus Prime Volume 1. So there's that.

So that's the next two weeks or so of Autobotly

August. Make your great escape in the comics

and we will catch you next time. Bye -bye. Bye.

It's a pity you Autobots die so easily. Or I

might have a sense of satisfaction now. You got

the touch! You got the power! Arise, Rhymus Prime.

Optimus. Yeah! No! Really? No Prime defense?

Come on. No Prime defense? What? Forever. Why

the hell do they have to give Optimus an ego

problem? It's beyond me naming the book after

him. Oh, brother. Oh, brother. Where art thou?

Well, he's named Unicron, so are you saying that

he's the equivalent of Unicron? Well, Elrond

does perceive him as a god, which he's not. Do

you realize that till all are one... Before that,

of course, was two issues, two miniseries of

Windblade. Are you going to give her a hard time?

No, because she doesn't have a godlike complex.

No, she's just doing what she thinks is right,

and Optimus Prime is doing what he thinks is

right. So there you go, bro. Worst leader ever.

I don't bother defending him because I don't

feel like he needs defending. He is himself,

and it doesn't matter what you think about him.

He's still good. And it doesn't matter what IDW

writes about him, he's still good. He's just

wearing a different hat. So basically what you're

saying is he can take as many faces as he wants.

Oh man, that's dark and weird. no i don't take

other faces i am myself gosh dang it i thought

you were made of sterner stuff and we never i

had i took all these notes and we never even

addressed all the real life parallels that are

in that book what till all in one yeah okay so

for instance this is my list real life parallels

ironhide appointed as a special prosecutor the

racist guy being i'll go back to your own planet

and talking about immigration policy this is

all A police shooting with footage of unarmed

and fleeing guy being shot in the back. And this

is before the current president was in office.

Yeah, I know. I checked. I'm like, this was,

and it was back in 2016. But it was still when

a lot of the police shootings were happening.

And then they even say broken windows and cracked

pavement is going to be punished. And there's

people protesting saying no justice, no peace.

Yeah. There's a lot of real world parallels.

You're right. Like, I see why Merigrid put it

in, but at the same time, I almost... I really

have conflicted feelings about it. Because one

or two feels okay, but more feels a little bit

exploitive. Gotcha. I was like... Because...

It feels like, you know, I'm white, she's white,

we're all white. I'm like... ah but okay but

how many people other than us are going to like

somebody will make that correlation with the

real world parallels but really probably most

people that are reading this are reading this

for the fantasy They're not really... Yes, it's

great. True, but the staying power of any work

is usually because there's some sort of parallel

that they can take out of it, whether it be the

real world now or real world later. I mean, there

are some things that... And so sometimes the

staying power can be both good and bad. I kind

of didn't read it too heavily. I mean, I know

that things like that happen, but it's also very

cliche. A lot of... those things happen whenever

any of that is happening. So I, I didn't, it

wasn't, I guess in a sense, maybe it was a little

stronger than, but she wasn't shouting it. So

it didn't really bother me. And you can analyze

the heck out of it. Yeah. And the thing of it

is, is when I saw those points, cause I, I picked

them out immediately. I'm like, Oh, they, they

did that. Or, Oh, they did that. Or, Oh, they

said this, which is obviously like what. you

know, the real world was doing at the time, and

I'm like, oh, okay, so they're trying to make

the book feel human, which is good, especially

for a book with giant friggin' robots. So, you

know, I think that's why it was done. I don't

necessarily think it was overdone, but I don't

know, to each their own, I guess. Yeah. Be sure

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