Transformers Classics Volume 3 Review

Hi, this is Dan Gilbazan, and you're listening

to the Geekcast Radio Network. Stan Bush here,

and you're listening to the latest episode of

All Things Transformers. Welcome to All Things

Transformers, which is crossing over with the

pull bag for Autobotly April 2023. I'm, of course,

TF2 and Mike. Joining me, as always, for these

Autobotly Marvel Universe Transformers things

is Steve Megatron. Hello, sir. Hello. Hello.

Oh, boy. Volume 3. So, yes, we are here. We're

going to get right into it. Volume 3, Collected

Edition, IDW Universe. IDW is the one that collected

it. But it's the Marvel Comics continuing on

from 87 to 88. This is issues 26 to 38. I'm going

to say right now. Issue 38, my favorite. It gets

better, though. So like 38, the rest of it's

going to be kind of up your alley. Let's hope.

I'm going to get this out of the way now so I

don't spend the next however the hell long we're

going to spend talking about this. Five colors,

one page. Use more color! I know they can't now

at this point, but... First up, issue 26, Funeral

for a Friend. Optimus Prime is dead and Ratchet

has spent the last ten days trying to unsuccessfully

repair him. God. Yeah. That one's quite interesting.

Because Ratchet's throwing himself a pity party.

Yes. And I know this wasn't the thing back then

because the character wasn't even really, you

know, I mean, the character was established,

obviously, but the saying and the characterization

did not happen until 2012 or 2013 with Prime.

All as I can, as I'm reading this, all as I keep

hearing Ratchet say, insert character, but I

needed that. Like, all I can hear is Prime Ratchet

and Jeffrey Combs voicing Prime Ratchet. Bulkhead,

I needed that. Bumblebee, I needed that. And

I guess it was a much, and I know it's the way

the light is, but the one panel here as we start

is Ratchet's going through the machinery. Optimus

Prime is pink. Oh, boy. Well, at least it's a

different color, sort of. I mean, it's still

red -ish, but. Yeah, what did you think of this

one? I thought... I liked that Ratchet got everybody

else up and running. Yes. And he tried, and he

tried with Prime. And then I liked seeing the

sickbay. And then it was sad seeing him haul

off Prime, you know, like, well... Nice knowing

you, Prime. And then he's starting to repair

and he goes to the used auto parts. Looks like

A1 Steak Sauce logo. And you see this, you know,

the criminal and then he gets inside Ratchet

and he's like, oh, let's fiddle with this. And,

you know, he's starting to tear out, you know,

parts of Ratchet with a screwdriver. With a freaking

screwdriver, no less. Yeah, I... Orange, you

glad he used a screwdriver? Oh, Lord. I cannot...

So, we all know that, you know, human villains

in Transformers are normally, most of the time,

they're one -dimensional. This whole thing that

gets into this arc about the mechanic and...

All of that, I'm just like... It's another one

of those annoying humans. At least if they'd

gone with, I don't know, somebody better? I don't

know. I can't even totally fathom what they should

have done. Yeah, I can't either. And the funny

thing is, specifically about the character of

the mechanic, as I'm reading this, I'm like...

Okay, so he has his little assistant named Juan.

And my first thought was, wait, Juan, isn't that

the kid that Trax was driving around? No, that

was Raul. But Raul was the kid that was helping,

almost helping the Decepticons with their evil

car wash. Which, isn't there an evil car wash

in this arc somewhere? Oh, yep. Car wash of doom

with Ratbat. Yeah, Ratbat's car. Ratbat! Get

in your damn tape deck, you idiot. Oh, boy. I

know Ratbat's different than whatever, but yeah,

no. As soon as I heard Wanda the mechanic, I'm

like, wait a minute. Does this make tracks? Are

we going to get to see tracks in this? I don't

remember if he does actually appear or not, but

that was the first thing I thought of. But yeah,

humans in... Why is it for the last... I'm going

to say 40 years because we are, you know, X number

of months away from it being 2024 and 40 years

of the cartoon and the franchise and all that.

Why is it that the humans are always the ones

that just, like, are second fiddle to the robots?

Look, it's Transformers. It's supposed to be

the robots, but, like... If you're a good writer,

and I'm not saying Budiansky is not a good writer,

I'm not saying that at all, but if you're a good

writer who is using robots and humans, you would

think that you'd be able to write both equally

well and not have the human characters be the

most despised things. Like, I think most, and

speaking for myself, I'm going to say in a generalized

tone, most of us Transformers fans. Can't stand

humans half the time. It's like we watch it for

the robots, we read it for the robots, give us

the robots. And then we get GB Blackrock and

the mechanic. And Blackrock isn't written badly

at all, but it's like, it's not even because

it was done in the 80s that it was the standard.

I can't believe I'm going to say this. Knight

Rider had better human villains than these Transformers

comics do. And Knight Rider at times is a very,

very cheesy 80s television show. Well, even the

original Transformers was pretty cheesy. Oh,

absolutely. Dr. Archiville and don't even get

me started on Sean Berger. Oh, God. Oh, boy.

We'd be here all day. Hey, folks, go listen to

the TFG1 podcast if you want to hear all that

crap. I will say, though, even though they are

still using just, you know, five of the same

colors, a lot of the colors in this arc, in these

stories, in these issues, they're a lot brighter.

They're not, like, they use, like, yellows and

oranges for backgrounds when most of the, like,

especially with Ratchet, because Ratchet is white

and red. So you have to use a different color.

Like you can't put he's going to turn Batman

Beyond Invisible. You put a white robot next

to a white wall. Kind of thing. Yeah. And and,

you know, of course, we get to see we get to

see Prime in his casket on the arc, literally

on the arc. they're like well it's i don't even

know if it's the arc i think it's just like a

space shuttle it's just not about shuttle but

yeah it's like the one that the the maximals

uh you know tied mechatron to yeah yeah pretty

much it's and but you know again it's it's well

yeah it oh yeah that's easily an autobot shuttle

that's but yeah but it's like it's not the arc

but it's the same kind of design of you know

all of this and oh wow i okay well no for so

i'm looking at this panel like i'm i'm seeing

the full like the optimus laid out in the thing

but in the top left hand corner i'm finally like

really realizing where it says uh elsewhere atop

us starlit blah blah blah It's Omega Supreme

standing next to the shuttle with Optimus Prime

rescue style in his arms. At first, because again,

folks, unless I zoom in on things, I have 2200

vision. I am legally blind. At first, I thought

that was Prime standing there in front of his

own coffin. He's that talented. He can die and

hold himself hostage. Exactly. You know? Oh,

man. Yeah, issue 26 was interesting. I'm kind

of glad it's over. Issue 27 is Trypticon versus

the Dinobots. So they bring Trypticon to Earth?

They bring him somewhere. Yeah, that's what it

is. The Decepticons send him to capture the Ark.

So basically, they send him to Earth. I love

the TFWiki. TFWiki .net, folks. Whoever wrote

this, I forget if it was whoever does these articles.

King of the Hill is the title of the story here.

Trypticon, he's come to Earth to steal all our

propane and all our propane accessories. Yeah,

Trypticon comes to Earth. The Autobots still

need to pick a new leader, since apparently there's

no Matrix. So they pick Grimlock. Me Grimlock

not podcaster, me Grimlock king. Yeah, that I'm

not. thrilled with it showed how bad Grimlock

actually is and why he should never be trusted

yeah yeah poor poor Grimlock he's just and again

I'm sorry I'm not trying to take away from from

the the comics here folks but you have to understand

I was a cartoon kid. This is my first time reading

any of this shit. And I'm not saying shit. I'm

not trying to call it shit, but just in general.

And my first thought was, yeah, Grimlock proved

to be a better leader of the Dinobots when he

got his new brain and actually got some intelligence

versus whatever the hell is going on with him

here. And I know we're going to get a bunch more

Grimlock once Simon Furman takes over because

Simon Furman has a hard -on for the Dinobots.

Like I said, I like Trypticon here. I like him

showing up on Earth. I think that's very cool.

I love the designs. I can't believe I'm actually

saying this. I love the panel where Trypticon

first shows up. It says, Trypticon, the ultimate

Decepticon killing machine. Okay, technically

I know they mean that he is killing four of the

Decepticons, but the way that sounds in my head

is like, oh, he's killing Decepticons. He's killing

his own kind. Oh, great. But the way he looks

here, the way he's drawn, and surprisingly there

are more than five colors in this panel. He's

not bad. He's drawn that way. Wow. You pulled

a Jessica Rabbit out of your hat. That's amazing.

He's not even drawn badly. Yeah, no, I know.

The quote sounded funny. Yeah, I know. Absolutely.

Go ahead. I can't stop laughing. Go ahead. Say

whatever you're going to say. But yeah, then

you see Grimlock trying to assert himself. All

hail Grimlock, leader of the Autobots. Yeah.

And Perceptor's just like, I'm just going with

it. Yeah. We might as well go with it for now

until, you know, two years later when a more,

you know, dynamic hero shows up. Young Autobot

Hot Rod there. But what I do like about this

is that, again, the whole, like, real life of

it being set in... Oregon and Washington and

that kind of thing and all of that. I think that's

really cool. Again, I like it being in the –

I like the Transformers when they're either in

an unknown city that you – like it's not New

York. It's not LA. It's not Boston. It's not

Chicago. It's just whatever standard city that

it looks like a city building or if it's in a

place that you just don't think to – And the

Pacific Northwest has always been what they've

been known for, because that's where the Ark

crashed, whatever else. Yeah, so I like that

part of it for this issue. And generally, I liked

this issue, because it was really cool seeing

Trypticon versus the Dinobots, because normally

you didn't see that in the cartoon, because by

the time Trypticon and Metroplex came around,

it was the two of them fighting each other, and

the Dinobots were God knows where. Up next, we've

got, and we will rate the whole story thing or

all the issues at the end, folks, but issue 28,

Mechanical Difficulties. Oh, boy. So, on this

trade so far, what are you thinking? I'm, I like

it. I just, it's just not, like, I like the stories

so far. We're only three issues in. And I'm liking

the stories. I just wish it was a different art

style. That's my only, like, I may complain about

the five colors, blah, blah, blah. But the stories

themselves, I think they are well -written stories.

I just think that the human characters are...

unneeded but the Transformers stuff between the

characters of the Transformers like you know

Blaster and Bumblebee or Blaster and Goldbug

because doesn't what happens here doesn't Goldbug

get doesn't Bumblebee get killed or get because

he turns into Goldbug yeah during this trade

yeah he kind of got destroyed already by the

earlier stuff and so that's kind of the way so

that's right So he technically already is Goldbug.

And again, I think that's my confusion, is that

his head looks golden, but the rest of his body

is basically the yellow beetle versus the gold

beetle that he would be in the cartoon series.

Again, the color definition is off, but yeah,

between Blaster, Goldbug, wow, Goldblood. Yikes.

Yeah, yeah, that's right. Between that and Grimlock

is like, wait, new orders, Wheeljack is... Grimlock

is pretty much a jerk. Yeah, Grimlock is not

as jerky and as useless as some of the humans,

but he's damn near close. Oh, boy. So yeah, I'm,

so far up until this issue, this issue 28 here,

The first two, I really did enjoy them. I thought

it was fun. This issue here, I feel like it's

all about the mechanic, and it's... I don't know.

It just doesn't... I don't like the mechanic

at all. Yeah, I don't either. I'm happy when

the powers that be relinquish his capabilities.

uh i do find it funny in this issue that that

grimlock makes himself a crown yeah yeah he did

do that didn't he yeah oh which one um the one

on the left i've always liked the way you know

the whatever steel alloy sparkles oh jesus and

then and then uh you know he's already wearing

one and he has two in his hands and then uh blaster

you know we couldn't find the mechanic what you

failed you know and so it's just yeah and so

grimlock doesn't seem very concerned and so they're

going after the mechanic on their own yeah and

yeah it's and i think the thing i don't like

about issue 28 is like we said it's just The

Autobots and the humans. There are no Decepticons

in this issue at all. That changes quickly. Well,

obviously. But that's what I'm saying, though.

The reason why I don't like issue 28 is because,

while I do like the Autobots and I like what's

done with them, as far as what they're going

up against, it's like, why? Just why? Well, we

get the triple changers now. Yup. Triple changers.

And the scraplets and like our own personal cosmic

rust. God, yeah. All we're missing is Bulkhead's

girly scream. Did you just scream like a little

girl? No. Maybe. Scraplets, get those things

away from me. And again, as someone who never

read these before. I never liked the whole thing

with it being Sparkplug Witwicky and Buster Witwicky,

and then come to find out later in this trade,

it's like, oh, it's actually his older son or

younger son. It's Spike's brother. I was like,

oh, okay, that's fine. Oh, shit, what are we

going to do now? But yeah, so we get this issue,

crater critters, and we get the scraplets. We

get Blaster and the humans and everybody else

trying to destroy these cosmic rusting things.

And that last panel of this issue. Man, Goldbug

looks a little bit worse for wear there. I do

like, like you said, the triple changers show

up. Astrotrain, Blitzwing, and Octane. I thought

that was awesome. I thought that's great. And

I love that. Wait, why? Wait a minute. What did

I miss here? Why is Scrooge? Isn't Scrooge dead?

Yeah, he was. Oh, they brought him back. Well,

Ratbat, too, is the leader of the Decepticons.

Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, where is Megatron?

Well, remember, Megatron blew himself up in the

space bridge. That's right. He blew himself up.

Yeah. He went kaboom. Yeah, Megatron, Kaboom,

and Galvatron no more. See, a rat bat is the

leader. A rat bat out of everybody has to, like,

Soundwave would be a better leader. Anybody would

be a better leader. I do wish we did get more,

and I know this couldn't have happened, but more

animation stuff with Astrotrain, Octane, and

Blitzwing, because I do think the three of them

together did work really well. I thought that

was great. On to issue 30. Let's see here. Issue

30. Oh, boy. So we have Autobots, Decepticons,

and Humans in this one. And this is all about

the throttle bots and the cure. Oh, boy. I just

don't care. And they're all, like, rusting out

and getting eaten alive. And triple changers,

blaster, the throttle bots. Yeah, everybody.

Everybody's getting eaten alive by these scraplets.

These scraplets are just, you know. And then

they form their own, like, Scooby -Doo of the

Week monster. Yep, pretty much, yeah. Get on

your phones, scour the internet, and Scooby -Doo

this shit. And apparently water is the cure for

all of the infected Transformers. I think it's

a special type. Oh. Like something from Blackrock.

Yeah, yeah. Goldbug arranges for Blackrock to

have water. Yeah, it doesn't exactly explain

what kind of... Is it... Irish is it is it Poland

spring is it is it you know is it Fanta water

maybe maybe it's maybe Coca -Cola can get their

their their water in here somehow I don't know

yeah so far I'm not like I said I was enjoying

these and now I mean other than the inclusion

of the the triple changers like this whole scraplet

thing is just kind of Yeah, I'm not a fan of

the scraplets. This beginning part of the arc

of the storyline, I am not a fan. Yeah, no, not

at all. It gets interesting in the next one,

however. Yes, because next one begins the car

wash of doom. All right, the car wash of doom,

issue 31. Oh, Buster, you moron. Okay, so Shockwave

is back, and he and Ratbat are basically doing

a Megatron Starscream thing, like, who's the

better leader? Got it, got it. Yeah, and that

will be a continuing storyline with Shockwave

and Starscream through pretty much the end of

this Marvel run. Wow. So, just... Don't count

either one of them out. Yeah. And I just can't,

like, Shockwave I could take serious as a leader

because he has an interesting robot mode and

he has an interesting alt mode. Ratbat is a cassette

bat. Like, he does not look like a Decepticon

leader at all. And I'm on the panel where he

says to Shockwave, you must learn how to be more

energy efficient, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And I'm looking at his design and I'm just like,

okay, I know that's technically the design of

the character and that's fine. The colors are

what they are, but he just looks, I don't know,

he looks wrong sitting, just flying next to Shockwave.

I don't know. As you can tell, folks, I go back

and forth on my enjoyment or my utter disdain

for this series. I might as well make a good

attributes and a bad attributes list. Pros and

cons. Cons? Humans. Bad coloring. Not enough

colors. Pros? I like character development between

Goldbug and Blaster and all that. Well, I like

that we got the cone heads in this and we got

the Insecticons and the various other facets

of the Decepticon army. And the funny thing about

this one is it's more about the Decepticons versus

the humans than it is the Autobots, Decepticons,

and humans because you got – and this is the

way the TF wiki lists it, so I don't know if

it's right or wrong. Blue Streak and Bumblebee.

So is he back to being Bumblebee again, or is

it still Goldbug in the book, isn't it? Anyway,

you got two Autobots, and then you got, like,

12 Decepticons, which is normal, I guess. But,

like, yeah, it's a little one -sided. And then

there's the humans and the cliff that they can

all go. Yeah. Anyway. Oh, boy. I am really starting

to like some of the colors that they're using,

so there is that. But, yeah, these human characters,

they're all forgettable. Besides Buster and Sparkplug

and maybe Blackrock, the rest of them are all

just, like, there. Wow. Get used to some of them

because they're not going away. Buster more or

less goes away. Goes away. Yeah. And is eventually

replaced by like Spike. Yeah. Which is more of

what we're used to anyhow. Yeah. And I want to

I don't know if it's is it this issue or. At

some point during 87, 88, prices on comic books

went up, folks. Oh, no. Okay, well, I don't know.

I'm going to have to look at these again. But,

like, I just now noticed that we've gone from

75 cents U .S. to a dollar U .S. on the covers

in the trade air. I'm like, oh, my God, they

went up a quarter. Comic books went up a quarter.

They're $3 .99 now. $399? More like $4, $5, $6,

$7, $8, $9 .99 now. Depends on the issue you're

buying. True. So anything else on this issue

specifically? I mean, I'm not a fan of Buster

and that whole dynamic, but the whole thing with

Blackrock and Ratbat was interesting in the sense

of... Kind of reminded me of Dark of the Moon.

Mm -hmm. Oh, yeah, very much so. Yeah, he's easily

the Patrick Dempsey of the Complex series at

this point. Yeah. So, yeah, I didn't much care

for this issue. Yeah. We get to the next issue,

which is used Autobots. Never buy a used Autobot

without a Carfax history report. Thank you, TFWiki,

for that laugh. Because, yeah, used Autobots.

Oh, boy. So Vortex is attacking the throttle

bots. Yeah, shooting them on the highway. And

then I find it funny that Blaster transforms

and stands on two of the throttle bots and uses

them as skates. Yeah, he's using Chase and Rollbar.

I'm like, wait, what? Wow, that's interesting.

I can tell you're just playing lost. I'm lost,

but man, these stories are just like... Oh, God.

Again, I love Blaster. I think it's hilarious

that he's riding to... First of all, okay, so

I'm at the panel where... Pay attention to where

you're driving, roll bar. Pull over to the left,

fast. This image, like, it's giant -ass blaster

standing on two throttle bots. These robots are,

what, maybe 70, 80, 90, maybe 100 tons of weight

or whatever? Like, how can you, a giant robot

person, cassette deck, which you're on a cassette

deck in your robot mode, but how can you stand,

how can these two autobots handle your weight?

Like, oh. That's, I don't know, that's, my suspension

of disbelief is not being suspended very well.

And yeah, we get to, let's see, oh boy. This

must have brought back memories for you. We get

to big Steve's used cars. Yeah. I wouldn't say

it was like, you know, memories for me. Cause

I didn't remember that it even had that name,

but yeah, I'm saying because of your history,

not because of, but like just seeing the name,

like, Oh, right. I used to work at one of those.

I didn't own one, but I used to work at one.

Oh, boy. Sam, good old big Steve's used cars.

I can just hear you yelling at one of your kids.

Don't touch that car! Where the hell did this

car come from? Basically, you pulling a Bernie

Mac. Mammy. God. Oh, Bernie, we miss you. Oh,

God. Yeah. So, yeah, this comic, man. And wait

a minute. They're in the U .S. car lot. Where

did they get the Department of Defense contract?

Oh, I see. It's a list of the Autobots. Oh, Steve,

you're in trouble now. Big Steve Ludwig. Oh,

boy. He looks like a Ludwig, too. He looks like

a Lugnut. That, too. Yeah, so the rat arrives,

R -A -A -T, folks, to collect the Throttlebots,

and they are intercepted by the Combaticons.

Oh, boy. I wonder how lost people get with reading

IDW. And then what freaks me out even more is

that as we get on to the next issue after this,

it switches over to being like, oh, this is a

part of the UK book. This isn't a part of the

US book. Because in the TF wiki, if I hit, it's

so weird. It freaks me out. If I hit on the TF

wiki, Transformers U .S. number 32, if I hit

that forward arrow, it switches the titles and

U .K. is on top and U .S. is on the bottom. Wait,

what? So, yeah, Steve's used cars. You got anything

else you want to say about your former used car

lot there? No, no. So between used cars and car

washes of doom. And rust, you know, and a mechanic

and, you know, and and like proverbial rust.

Unicron, save us. You're our only hope, please.

And it literally goes all over the place. I know.

That's what makes it like almost unbearable.

Yeah. Again, it goes to prove to you that back

then in those days, it wasn't much better. Well.

In some regards. But my point is that comic books

back then, at least for this series, it seems

more like for the U .S. Transformers run, it

was kind of like trying to do a cartoon of the

month or a cartoon of the week kind of thing

where certain issues, some issues tied back into

other issues, other issues didn't. Some of them

were just villain of the week type things. or

I'll speak for myself, I am at a point in my

life where I can deal with and enjoy certain

Villain of the Week type things, but most of

the time I want a beginning to middle to end

comic series that has continuity throughout.

Now, sometimes continuity gets jumbled and gets

screwed up and whatever else, but at least it's

continuity, and at least it's not like seven

stories in one comic book issue. Or whatever.

Like seven different plots in one. Same thing

with movies and TV shows and cartoons. Like,

you know, you don't need seven different plots.

So how are we going to do Man of Iron? Because

Man of Iron has four parts to one issue here.

We do what the Marvel run has. Yeah, I know.

Did you enjoy this? Was this something you liked?

Do you like having four parts in one issue? Yeah.

I don't know. I'm not trying to derail the podcast

or anything else. I'm just curious because, again,

this is... The Man of Iron issue, the Autobots

travel to England to track down the source of

the coded Cybertronian signal, but the Decepticons

aren't far behind. And literally, there are four

parts. Part one is first encounter. Part two

is kidnap. Part three is you've got friends in

low places. And part four is Battlefield Castle

Stancham. I will say that the coloring is the

best that we've ever had. I agree. 100%. You

know why it's the best we've ever had it? Because

the UK did it? Well, there's that, yes, but also

it's because that over in the UK book, they're

actually using dark colors for backgrounds. They're

not using white, or they're not using yellow.

I mean, they are, but like... The general gist

of the page, the general gist of the outline,

and yeah, the art here is much better. Man, maybe

we should be covering the UK run. Screw this

US crap. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. So

yeah, Man of Iron issue, basically we've got...

Okay, I need to know if Stan Sham is a real castle,

or if it's just fictional to this. The castle

of Stan Sham is medieval castle. Oh, okay, so

it is a real, okay, it is based off of a real

place. Okay, I just look at that name, and I'm

thinking, wait a minute, this was cover dated

for October, November 1987. Stan Sham. No, folks,

Stan Bush is not a sham. Stop it. That's all

I can see in that title is Stan Sham. Stop calling

the man a sham. He ain't no sham. Trust me, I

know. What else do you want to say about this

one? Nothing. These were not my favorite. Yeah.

I do like that we finally get Jazz and Trailbreaker

and... Holy crap, Optimus Prime is alive. Right,

this is the UK book. This is not the US book.

good right but again we we get jazz we get trail

breaker we get blue streak we get you know all

of that i think that's cool i think that's great

again seeing characters that i know and that

i like i think that's that's the the interesting

thing with this this uh this issue and again

the darkness of the backgrounds because most

of this is at night and and even the The lines

on the humans look much better in the UK version

than they do in the US version. Must be a better

colorist. Probably. Most likely. Let me just

double check here. Let's see. Man of Iron Creative.

Let's see. The script was done by Steve Parkhouse.

The art was done by John Ridgway for parts one

and two and Mike Collins for parts three and

four. The Colors, spelled with a U, that's incorrect,

but that is what it is. It's British. Yes, I

know. Josie Furman, not as in Simon, but spelled

differently, is on one and two. Gina Hart is

on three and four. And then Richard Starkins

does the letters. So, yeah. Yeah, I mean, the

UK stuff for... for this was really, really great.

Now we get back to U .S. and our regularly scheduled

program. Child's Play. Oh, boy. I wonder, who's

Chucky? Buster or Spike? I don't know. Probably

Buster. Just imagine Buster coming back at us.

Then Grimlock and his gold helmet. You know,

sparking orders. Blaster defies Grimlock. Grimlock

leader. Blaster is leader of traitors. Blaster's

in the right, you moron. I know, because he's

a moron. He's like, me Grimlock king. Yeah. We

get Combaticons and Defensor. Which is the first

time I think that we see Defensor. Yeah. Like,

I know we've seen the Protect -a -Bots. Yeah.

Yeah, this is, I'm pretty sure this is his first

appearance here. Yeah. So, yeah, I like that.

But yeah, the, man. And we get, again, this story

just, again, I like seeing Bruticus and Defensor

fight. I less, I like seeing Blaster stepping

in to confront Bruticus himself. I like how Bruticus

examines the child's fallen form and how Blaster

knocks him out with an electrical shock from

a downed power line. Is this the first time we've

seen Hotspot in this series? Or has he been in

here before? I want to say he's been in here

before. Okay. Hmm. Interesting. started Matrix

Induced Vision shared between Optimus Prime and

Buster Witwicky okay that was from the special

teams have arrived second generation or whatever

the hell that was I don't know all these comics

people know that I don't know I'm reading these

for the first time and Yeah, I'm hoping when

we do get to the, like, I think that's going

to be next year's thing at this point, you know,

for us to go through the IDW continuity of this,

because I guarantee you by the end of August,

I'm going to be all marveled out at Transformers.

What else do we want to say about, what is she

wearing me on? uh 35 child's play um i i mean

i like the fight with the combiners uh i can't

wait till grimlock is dethroned yeah uh and then

the the autobot uh you know handcuffs more or

less that the children take off blaster yep i

i loved um And then, you know, Grimlock's sadistic

self with the, you know, the arc shooting at

blast off. Yeah, that was a little humans. Yeah,

that was. Yeah. Come on now. Come on. He doesn't

care, though. No, he doesn't care at all. Grimlock,

you heartless dinosaur. That's right. And. we

get to the next issue, which is the Space Hikers

story. A group of children are caught in the

crossfire of inter -autobot politics. Okay, Skylynx

showing up is cool. Wheeljack is great. Blaster,

always great. Combaticons. Love seeing them.

I like how different the art, like the cover

on this one is like so dark with the little like

Jetson looking space kids and Skylinks looking

like on the cover, like he's going to basically

eat them, which is kind of scary. But then the

first few panels, well, the first panel where

you have Skylinks showing up. It's like all black

and pinkish purple because he's in space and

flying. And we get more of what I liked in the

UK books was basically dark backgrounds and light

color schemes for the characters in the foreground

and stuff. And this to me is where the series

kind of turned with the art because you're not

just seeing the standard yellow, white. backgrounds.

I mean, you still see some of that, but I want

to say 80 % of this is nice and spacey and dark

and cool. I did like the kids getting to play

around in there, and then them having... I find

it funny that they had Blast off. They picked

him up, put him inside, and they're all huge

compared to him. Because mass shifting went to

toy size. Yep. Yeah, absolutely it did. But I

like this issue. I think this issue is fun. I

think seeing Skylynx is really cool. Of course,

he's still his arrogant self that he's ever been.

You know, let him try to follow me through here.

Like, oh, Skylynx. Optimus Prime, will you please

return and just, you know, disintegrate Grimlock

so his crown can just fall down the stairs and

you can just stay. Oh, wait, that's not Optimus

Prime and that's not Grimlock. I'm sorry. That's

Galvatron. All right. Whoops. Wrong scene. First

of all, Grimlock, the Dinobots don't have wheels.

Dinobots rule out. Someone thinks he's a Prime.

He's a... I think it is crap, though, that he

shoves the... makes the humans go out. Yeah,

that's crap. Flushes them out with Blaster. the

other Autobots, you know, see that Skylink saves

them, you know, and is battling Grimlock and

the Dinobots and Blaster, you know, they're like,

all right, we need to, we need a new leader.

Yeah, big time. We've needed you here for a long

time. Yeah. Grimlock was less predictable than

a random number generator. Grimlock being anything

but predictable. That's Grimlock. That's what

he is. He don't care, man. He just doesn't fucking

care. And that's not the good sign of a good

leader. Yeah, this issue, again, like I said,

what I liked about it, the darker backgrounds,

and I think this is where the art kind of comes

into it for me. Hoping we kind of stick with

this. Any final thoughts before we get to issue

37? No. Okay. Issue 37, Toy Soldiers. I love

the cover. I think the cover is awesome. Mayhem

Mall. Gotta love it. Oh, wait, no. Maybe not.

Suburban Shootout Mayhem Mall. Oh, boy. Mayhem

at the Mall. Oh, God. So there have been things...

I'm not trying to bring a real world into this,

but I don't... Oh, man. Guns don't solve issues,

folks. That's all I'm going to say. So yeah,

so this one we get... Again, I have to comment

on the quote in the TF wiki. Mommy, I want one

of those giant orange toys! No you don't, kid.

No you don't. Yeah, this I can't say is a...

No. Favorite. No. I like that we see the Predacons

here, and obviously we're talking about the original

G1 characters, folks, not time -traveling beasts

from the future. But... How Buster is the only

one that can... Approach the Grimlock commanded

arc without being molested is beyond me. But,

yeah, so there's Buster, there's Grimlock, there's

all that stuff. And again, the giant robots pouncing

on the little toy robots like the Predacons attempting

to pounce on the little toy throttle bots. I'm

just like, what in the hell? You know, I'm talking

about one of the biggest cases of bullying ever.

I love the newspaper. Robots strike again. Oh,

God. I do love the way that the Predacons do

look, though. Yeah, they certainly add to the

fun factor here. Absolutely, they do. And then

you get Ratbat leading the charge. Yeah. And

then the Autobots are in little toy cars. Yeah.

Which I was like, why? Yeah. And then, you know,

of course, it goes to Ratbat capturing everyone.

Yep, Ratbat gets everybody. And we get to...

My favorite issue, and not just because it's

the last issue, but any thoughts on... Nope.

Okay. So the last issue for this trade is issue

38. Oh, boy. Trial by fire. Let's see. Someone

call the exterminator. Oh, well, that's because

the cover is the giant Scorponok. That makes

sense. Yeah. So this, for me, folks, is basically

like a comic book version of The Rebirth, which

was the end of the Transformers cartoon series.

It pretty much sort of is the same story, except

they move around various things. They start off

with one of the Nebulons, Galen or Galen. He

is the intermediary for the robot known as Cerebros,

who is part of the peace -loving Nebulons versus

Lord Zarek and the Hive and all of that. So basically,

if you've seen Rebirth, you've read this issue

of the comic. You don't necessarily need to read

this, but I did enjoy reading this. Thoughts

from you, sir? I like that they brought in the

headmasters, although there's actually kind of

a point here where they're setting up the. The

headmasters comic. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and again,

I mean, you know, David Wise, you know, because

of budgetary reasons, he got cut from five parts

to three. I think, you know, three parts. fitting

in whatever it was that he fit in there he did

a damn good job so you know it is what it is

and the fact that you basically fit those three

parts into this one issue as far as like the

overall origin of nebulos and and having them

come to earth and all that basically yeah this

this does a really good job and like i said this

is my favorite issue of the entire trade i really

dug this i thought this was really good So, yeah,

absolutely. Gort and Arcana and Duros and Stylar

Man and Crunk. Oh, God, Crunk. No, folks, not

Emperor's New Groove. Think 40 years ago. There

were a couple of characters in here that I did

not get, though. One specifically. Like, everybody

else, I remember them all. But who in the Sam

hell is Grotesque? I'm looking at this thing

right... Oh, he's basically a cross between Ratbat

and a pug. No wonder he's called Grotesque. Yeah,

I'm I'm not exactly sure. I think that there

they might be a part of the there's like the

monster pots or the. Yeah. But yeah, I enjoyed

the fact that we finally got something different.

Yeah. Different bots, different, you know, different

kind of continuity going. Even though it's and

I know it ties into the the headmasters comics.

Right. Yeah. Yeah, so Grotesque, you are correct.

Grotesque and the Monster Bots joined Fortress

Maximus in abandoning Cybertron. So that's what

it is. But seriously, folks, his alt mode looks

like a bat, a lizard, and a Frank the Pug from

MIB got together and had a baby. That's literally

what the alt form looks like. But again, not

trying to crap on this. I really do enjoy this.

I think it's great. I think it's fun. I think

it's interesting. And, yeah, favorite issue of

them all. And I do like that we do get Galen

passing Cerebros on to Spike. I think that's,

you know, once he's at the point of death. he

asks spike to forgive him for his earlier blindness

and all that and everything else. And I think

that's, that's cool. That's, that's interesting.

And yeah, I, I've never not said this to people

that I am absolutely a fan of rebirth. So seeing

it here, I was like, Oh wait, Hey, wait a minute.

I like this. What's going on with this? This

is cool. This is, this is good. This is interesting.

This is fun. I don't know what's going to happen

in issue 39. We'll find out next time here on

the podcast. But, like, this gives me a glimmer

of hope. Sort of, I guess. I don't know. Because

the rest of these issues were just all over the

place. This has a beginning, middle, and end

that makes sense. I don't know. Yeah, I... this

is the only one that I actually liked from this

volume. Beyond that, I kind of was like, you

know, I could do without. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

I could do without. So, yeah. Overall, Do you

want to do this individually by issue, or do

we just want to do an overall rating for the

whole thing? I want to do an overall. Okay. Zero

to five, what are you going to give it? I'm going

to give it a two. I did not care for most of

the stuff in this run. Yeah, these issues, man,

these 11 issues, 10 out of them were just...

Like we've said all over the place for us, I

don't like the human stories at all for the most

part. I like seeing Spike and all of that in

that final issue with Cerebros and all that because

that's what I know from the cartoon. And I was

kind of sort of serious, but I have no plans

on having us do it. But I really think we should

have just switched to the UK comics because seeing

that art in the middle, I'm like, this is like

a million times better than what the US was getting

at the time. So, yeah, I don't know. Would you

give it a two and a half or a two? I'd give it

a two. I'm also going to give it a two. I would

give it lower, but... that final issue just kind

of, like, reminded me of, like, oh. I mean, I

liked some of the characterizations overall.

Yeah. But, yeah. But the whole point of the story

and the art and the whatever, the characterizations

are great. I love Blaster. I love what Goldbug

was doing. I love all that stuff. I love seeing

Sky Lynx. I enjoyed seeing Grimlock, even though

he was a psychopath. But, you know, I enjoy the

character stuff. It's just the way the stories

unfold and the way that they are told, 10 out

of 11 of them are just subpar at best. Maybe

I'm wrong. I don't know. But I, no. So, up next

here in Autobotly April, we're going to get to...

Volume 4 of the Transformers Classics, the U

.S. run. This will be our final issue, final

Autobotly April episode for this year. Autobotly

August will kick off where we continue on Volumes

5 through 7, and we finish off the Marvel U .S.

run. So that will be happening in August. I think

we're going to have to take a quick break and

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Stand by for soundtrack transfer. I am Maggie.

And I am John. And we are trapped, hurtling through

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ship, for reasons we haven't been able to determine,

contains the entire run of the IDW Transformers

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So we figure we may as well read them all in

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Look for us at marriedwcomics .libson .com, at

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It's just youtube .com slash PAW, P -E -A -U

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Thank you all for watching. I hope everybody's

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was that universal greeting again? Never mind,

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Hey guys, it's Rodimus Primal, and be sure to

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till all are one hello all sentient beings want

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folks, we are back here on All Things Transformers

and The Pull Bag. Marvel U .S., you are leaving

me very unimpressed. No response? Really? Nope.

Alright, well, I don't know. At least we only

have one more of these trades until August, so

there's that. And I'm sure you'll feel sort of

the same way with IDW, maybe, I don't know, but...

There might be parts of it I'll like, and I'm

sure I'll like some of the art and some of the

storylines. Yeah. But I was not a huge fan of

their stuff anyway. I started collecting it when

IDW got the license. Right, the IDW 1 .0, yeah.

Yeah, I liked the spotlights, and I liked some

of the 1 .0 stuff. But then when we got down

to it, I just. Hmm. Yeah, it probably went a

little too real world for you, even though it

was just comic characters. And I don't mind it

to some degree, but I don't. Yeah, I just hmm.

Well, because I'm a glutton for punishment and

this is all things Transformers, I'm sure Ryan

and I are going to finish off the. what is technically

the 3 .0 run, the one that you and I started

that we just couldn't finish the 2019 continuity,

the one after Unicron kind of thing. Uh, cause

there, I think there are six volumes. Yeah. Of

four or five and six. So we'll, we'll finish

that off at some point later, whatever. Uh, And

anything else you want to bring up under any

of that before I run through the closing, anything

you want to promote, anything you're doing that

you want to let the people know or any of that

kind of stuff? I mean, I might be interested

when I hear the IDW stuff when it's concerned

with, let's say. the when the beast characters

come right yeah well i'm saying i know that the

beast wars characters like they do the beast

planet oh eucharis yes yes yes i don't know if

we've i don't know when that is i don't remember

if that i i don't remember i don't know yeah

absolutely so uh all right well then that's gonna

do it for this episode of all things transformers

and the pull bag Visit our website, geekcastradio

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For now, I'm TFG1 Mike with... Steve Megatron.

Make your greatest game in the comics and transform

and roll out with us here at the Geekcast Radio

Network. Please, Scooby -Doo this shit. Ugh.

I have to do that for like 20 minutes. Yuck.

Yeah. I wish to speak to my lawyer.