Transformers Optimus Prime and Lost Light Vol 2 Review

Hi, this is John Barber from RDW Publishing.

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Hi, this is John Barber from IDW Publishing.

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time to talk about the comics we are reading

right now here inside the pull bag. Autobot late

August continues here as we talk about Transformers,

as always. This is episode 323 of The Pullback.

I am TF2 and Mike. Joining me is Ryan, the Uneven

Flow, Merkley. Hello, sir. Yo. And we're back

at it with Transformers Optimus Prime and Lost

Light Volume 2 for each respectively. Continuing

on with our IDW Transformers coverage. Quick

recommendations, and I half -jokingly said, but,

but, but, what about geekcastradio .com? And

they had mentioned something about the fact that,

oh, but I want more than just nostalgia. We do

more than just nostalgia, folks. I even mentioned

the pullback, and then they're like, oh, but

I want more than just IDW coverage. IDW is a

great company, they have a great product, they

have great licenses, just because... This person

isn't into the Transformers comics or the TMNT

comics, I'm sorry. However, I pointed out to

this person that the pullback has done far more

than just IDW stuff. We've done Sex Criminals

from Image Comics. We've done a lot of stuff

from Image Comics. Sex Criminals, Adrian's Wall,

Cowl, Kennel Block Blues from Boom Studios, and

a bunch of other stuff. You and I have done Punisher,

we've done Batman comics. My thing is, so first

of all, the IDW stuff, in particular Transformers,

Lost Light, and More Than Meets the Eye, I put

it up against any of the comics from Marvel or

DC or Image. It's really good. And Jason Aaron,

who is one of my favorite writers, regularly

tweets and gushes that James Roberts might be

the best writer in comics right now. Mean he's

right up there with Tom King and some of the

other ones That have been doing a consistently

great job Brian cave on etc. So anyway So there's

that too. I think the IDW stuff could use a spotlight

more people should talk about it and do podcasts

Three how the fuck more do you need to talk about

Batman? So it's funny Mentioned the Facebook

comment and everything else that means quickly

becoming one of the most boring characters to

talk about I love Tom King his run on it is great.

It's been really interesting My problem is Batman

as a character has become boring as hell lately

so you here's Batman and You know, he's out there

you introduce. Okay, here's the world's greatest

assassin Batman beats them Okay, well here's

Kane the world's greatest ninja Batman kicks

his ass too for some reason even though the other

person's supposed to be the world's greatest

whatever that man just beats everybody and annoying

at this point and Kane concentrates on Other

things but so many writers don't there's so much

bad Batman stuff Okay, so right now and I've

said this before I'm barely like right now I

have one Marvel title that I'm reading the new

Tony Stark Iron Man that Dan Slott's doing because

Dan Slott is now on that instead of being spider

-man When it comes to DC right now, I'm trying

to read the Nightwing Rebirth series. I'm not

fully through it. I do have the first volume

of Tom King's series, but my main go -to for

DC right now is either their He -Man and Crossover

things. I haven't read He -Man and Injustice

yet, but it's that and the Batman Beyond Rebirth

series. Those are my DC titles at this point.

I have not... Well, those are just nostalgia,

though. No, they're not. Yeah. No, they're not.

They're all new stories. So, my friend on Facebook

that after I made the initial comment, but, but,

but, what about geekcastradio .com, he said that

I'm not in a head space where I want nostalgia,

I want adult conversations that come with interesting

opinions, insight, and education. I like nostalgia,

that's why I listen to something to wrestle with,

there's Richard. How is talking about Transformers

comics not, like, people need to understand that

the Transformers comics from IDW, They're not

nostalgic. Yes, IDW reprints the old Marvel stuff,

but these are all new, interesting stories. Not

to mention, few of the characters bear any resemblance

to the Generation 1 characters. I mean, basically,

maybe physically, but for example, we'll be talking

about Skids who died a trade ago, but Skids,

for example, bears absolutely no resemblance.

resemblance to his generation one character who

by the way basically had no character unless

you count the getting molested by Carly issue

in the in the Marvel US comics which was a little

weird but the anyway No, it's very different

storytelling not to mention all the LGBT themes

and a lot of the other stuff that More than meets

the eye series before 50, I can't remember the

exact number, but anyway, had a pair of issues

dedicated to a very mature discussion on mental

health involving the deteriorating health of

Grimlock at the time. The scavengers essentially

try to take advantage of him and pointing out

how wrong that is. Exactly, and so there's a

ton of stuff like that. There's a lot of real

-world politics in lost light particularly in

the next trade But As soon as I saw that one

line or sorry I meant in the previous trade sorry

the the functionalist universe had Significant

references to fascism and not to mention brexit

Which Roberts of course being British? very familiar

with so yeah it's not just based on it and to

be fair I think any comics if if your criteria

is long -running or something that existed a

long time ago all comics are nostalgia that every

single one of them Batman Batman's older than

the Transformers that's right 80 years next year

I also want to state that even though Transformers,

TMNT, to a lesser extent, the Gem Comics from

IDW, the Back to the Future run we did. Even

though TMNT and Transformers are the two big

mainstays for the podcast, for the five years

we've been online, we've also done a bunch of

other stuff. As I mentioned, stuff from Image,

stuff from Boom. The Boom Studio stuff is continuing,

because next month, you and I are going to do

Lunatic Fringe, WWE Vol. 2. It has been almost

a full year since Joe Reed and I did a TMNT episode.

So there hasn't been a TMNT episode on the pullback

since almost last September. We're gonna be doing

a five issue, first five issue thing. Comicsology

was running a sale at one point or a promotion

where you could get five, I guess, create our

own Brian Michael Bendis titles for free. So

we're gonna be doing that. You know, I'll say

this for DC. They sure do do interesting things

at certain times because we're gonna finally

get around to doing their Kentucky Fried Chicken

comics and no, I'm not kidding. More nostalgia.

Not when, you know, Green Lantern has to go up

against the Colonel. That's not really nostalgia.

That's nostalgia for the Colonel is obviously

a representation of owning slaves and so I'm

sorry Wow Okay, then All right. So today In the

penultimate episode of auto butly august 2018

as I said optimus prime and lost light volume

2 for each Optimus prime So speaking of nostalgia,

so let me just say what I was we were talking

about before and that is Optimus Prime volume

2 works really well It works really well because

I know what happens up to issue 23 The issue

here is that the majority of this trade is set

up for things to come It's retconning stuff that

previously had been shown and kind of merging

everything together So having read that forward

stuff, re -reading, sorry, having read the future

stuff, re -reading this, everything kind of clicks

into place. But when you're reading this on its

own, i .e. when I picked it up or when I read

the issues individually, it's not great. Every

one of these issues contains significant numbers

of flashbacks and past stories. And of the group

of them, We continue on with Jetfires, which,

I'm not gonna lie, it's nice to get some backstory

for Jetfire and have him be more, hey, here's

another character, by the way. There's very little

resemblance to his Generation 1 version, but

it's nice to give him more backstory than just

being a generic scientist. However, again, they're

fairly intrusive. They have a lot less to do

with future events than the flashbacks of Pyra

Magna and Optimus Prime. Particularly Pyras.

All the Onyx Prime stuff is exceptionally important

very soon. And then by the way, the final issue

of this trade, I'm just gonna skip ahead now,

is Alpha Trion telling another story from the

past. And again, This would have been better

served being part of the trade, which is the

next one, which will unveil Onyx Prime and everybody

else. As it sits at the end of this trade, out

of context, it doesn't work. And in its defense,

Lost Light suffers from this with the first issue

of its trade as well. It's an issue of the comic

that should have been in the previous trade.

This is an issue of the comic that should have

been the next one. So lastly, I asked, how the

hell do I evaluate this as a whole? Because these

are good issues telling a really good story,

but it's a story that doesn't snap into place

until another trade or two after this. And it

doesn't work well on its own. And the other problem

I have is the second last issue of this is an

absolute masterpiece and one of the best individual

issues of a Transformers comic I think I've ever

read. That's the life of Sideswipe. And it is...

Sideswipe's... ugh. They try to give Sideswipe

a good send -off, we'll say. Sideswipe was mortally

wounded way back in the Transformers. In the

run -up for Mish... was it before 50? I don't

even remember anymore. We just went through all

that stuff last year and I don't even remember

at this point. Well, it's been a year. I can't

remember every... I read a lot of comics. I know.

I gotta post pictures in my trade room down that

it's done. I have a room and it is just trades.

It is just bookshelves of trades. And by the

way, every bookshelf has Transformers on top

of it. Of course. What I love about Optimus Prime

Volume 2, I love the jazz story. Yes, I was going

to bring that up. I love finally getting the,

not necessarily come up and split, like the whole

thing with jazz. I love that. Love the bumblebee

stuff. I love the sides the side swipe stuff.

I think it's probably the most It's the most

character I can remember side swipe ever getting

yes exactly And it's also the most quote -unquote

humanizing RC has ever been I think and it doesn't

feel out of character no at least the idw rc

not yeah no uh ours again idw rc bears little

to no resemblance to generation one rc uh you

nostalgic pieces oh sorry but but no yeah i loved

all that the Can't talk about the Transformers

comics without bringing up the artwork is Phenomenal

again, and we have a number of different artists

on it. There's Kay Zama who's oh She's she's

good her work on the side swipe issues some of

my favorites So my favorite stuff she's done

and then we just get a ton of other people Casey

Coller did an issue We have Priscilla Tremont

Yeah, Tremantano. Tremantano. There we go. And

then of course we have Olivia Remendelli returns

to do an excellent job on Alpha Trion's story

from the past. I love his work on this. It's

some of his best work and he's another guy like

all of the IDW artists really who has improved

over time. So Priscilla did the number seven

and the annual and the annual yes, he did number

eight eight Kzama did number nine and ten and

Livio did number ten obviously he's in the past

part, but yeah, and then Priscilla John Paul

Bovay Josh Bertram Livio Thomas Deer and Josh

Perez on colors for all of the various things

Tommy Long and Chris Mowry on letters as well.

Yep Yeah, I... It's the story that perplexes

me here with this trade, with the Optimus Prime

series at this point, because I feel so out of

it at times. So you haven't read ahead, just

so people know, by the way. But I have. I've

been reading the individual issues. I started

reading them around the end of this trade, I

think. Okay. What I did was, when I... Comixology

was having an IDW End of the Universe sale up

until July 30th of this year. It was actually

their longest IDW Transformers sale that I can

remember on Comixology. It was like at least

two and a half months worth of sales of the same

sale going through. So I went through and I got

Lost Light Volumes 1 and 2, I got Optimus Prime

Volumes 1 and 2 for doing these specific podcasts.

I have not, up until then, I had not read either

title. I'm catching up. I'm reading it for the

first time now. The only thing I'm doing currently

in conjunction with reading these trades is I'm

reading the six -issue Unicron series. So that's

the only current thing I'm reading for Transformers

right now. Yeah, so you potentially know some

of Hawaii things. Yeah, some. Are the way they

are here, but definitely not all because a lot

of it's in the later stuff of Optimus Prime,

which is Running right now. Yep. So yeah, this

is if I Say anything bad about Robert's stuff

because he's a brilliant writer barber or sorry

barber stuff Well, I hate saying anything bad

about Robert's too, but I hate saying anything

bad about barber. No, you're right. Sorry and

His stuff clicks together. So well, it is a great

story overall but Oof, the sum of its parts is

better than those individual ones. There are

too many working parts here for me. Like I said,

the jazz part I got because we've been dealing

with this whole jazz thing that he killed a cop

on earth years and years and years ago and this

is why Earth hates the Transformers and blah

blah blah blah, amongst other things. I love

that. I love that we finally get, you know, because

the universe is ending, we finally get an answer

or a great story to send Sideswipe off. I thought

that was great. But the lead up, the Pyra Magna

story, not her back, not her flashback, but just

her being here, all of that, like, I am just

so lost. I mean, I understood the story, but

when I was first reading it, I'm like, okay.

So that happened, that happened, and that happened.

Oh, hey, look, there's Shockwave. Yay. Maybe

he's there in another form. Oh, anyway. Maybe

they're gonna call him Long -Armed Prime or something.

Well, you know, anyway, so... Alright, anyway.

So, Onyx Prime returns. Okay. Yes, Onyx Prime.

And he's the big bad of this trade for the most

part. Well, not really since he's only really

mentioned, but he only appears via flashback

and we get his backstory and why all of this

suddenly happens we understand much later on.

Right. But for now... Yeah, this is the most

characterization we've ever gotten for Sideswipe

and Sunstreaker. Like, Sideswipe even points

out Sunstreaker is just, you know, Sunstreaker

is essentially the G1 version of Decepticon Knockout.

You know, don't tarnish, no, I'm saying with

what I'm about to say, don't tarnish my finish,

you know, that kind of thing. That's what I remember

Sunstreaker being like. Anyway, I was just going

to say that Sunstreaker got a lot of characterization

much earlier. Remember, he was one of the stars

in the Shun series, becoming the first headmaster.

And then he was a big part of All Hail Megatron,

being revealed as one of the Autobot traitors.

This is making my head hurt. And then his semi

-redemption arc during the Kosta years. He's

had a decent amount of focus over the years.

Hasn't been great focus. Yeah Yeah, I don't recommend

reading it either so that's why I said this is

the best Terrible I was going to flat out just

give the rating at this point because I have

very little interest in it. So, I feel real bad.

If I was going to rate Optimus Prime, as in the

series as a whole, at this point, unless they

absolutely don't stick the landing, it's a four

and a half to a five out of five. But this book

as an individual trade, which is how I'm gonna

end up Scoring it is gonna I'm just gonna give

it a two and a half. I and that's almost exclusively

on the strength of side swipe the other issues

just don't do it for me the The flashback sequences

again just don't seem to meld with the tone of

the current ones. I realize what he's trying

to say with regards to the post -war Transformers,

not to mention with the transformation going

on on Earth, but I don't feel like it flowed

the way he had wanted it to. Right. I liked the

sides, like I said, there's three, four things.

Jazz, Bumblebee, Side Swipe, and Alpha Trion.

specifically the Alpha Trion, uh, Livio stuff.

Love that. Um, I think the best comedy moment

in this trade is at the end where they're like,

the Earth representative is the dog! And then

obviously Marissa comes in and, you know. So,

there's that. That is one of the best panels.

of this. Yes, it is. I thought it was funny.

So it's tough. And this is to me, this is the

equivalent of what if I took? What if I took

a middle of third season episode? Of Breaking

Bad and decided to essentially evaluate the entire

series based on that. It doesn't really work

because it's just a part of the story and it's

not meant to be the story so Yeah, reviewing

this sucks. Uh -huh. I Don't want to say if I

was reviewing it based on the rest of the series

I'd give it a four so but again as an individual

series of issues Was only a big fan of a couple

of them and I'm only a fan of sort of half of

the story told in the annual as well So we head

out to deep space with lost light volume if I

was giving sorry I'm losing my mind here Yeah,

you didn't even give a score. I know you're supposed

to know I know right well I still do not like...

I like the flashback and the purpose of its different

artists between the current and the flashback,

but constantly having a flashback still, I still

don't like. Yeah, I don't find it confusing where

it begins or ends, and along with that, I agree.

I like that they changed the artists. Yeah. That's

great that they changed the artists. I still

don't like jumping time from current to past,

current to past, current to past. I don't like

that. Other than that, Three and a half maybe

that's the best I can give it. It's probably

not the worst I could give it but There are the

moments like I just said with jazz with bumblebee

with sideswipe with Buster with Alpha Trion Especially

Livia like Livia needs to get his own like his

his own series nowadays like I know he did the

whole thing with with Flint Dilley and all that

with the ones we covered last year with the Autocracy

trilogy, but I want Livio to have his own stuff

nowadays, too. Okay, so Lost Light Volume 2,

obviously written by James Proverts. Art, we

have lots of artists in here as well. Jack Lawrence

is on main art for 7 and 10 through 12. Priscilla's

on arc for 8 to 9. Additional arc by Alex on

11 and Andrew Griffith on 12. Colors by Joanna.

Additional colors by Priscilla and John Calvo

Bay. Letters by Tommy Long. Story consultant

Rachel Stevens 8 and 9. Why did they need a story

consultant on this? That's a great question.

I have no idea. That's a good... So they had

a consultant on the... episodes on Troja major

yeah and getting into it so the first one is

sort of the denim on to the previous trade which

I've said a few times it should have probably

just been included in the last trade that would

have made more sense but yeah all right the So

first of all I can sum up this trade by saying

fuck you for toying with my emotions James Roberts

I love you don't ever change So we open with

the denouement of the functionalist universe

and that trip for our main characters we Have

the fallout from that we have the fallout from

cyclonus's damage and world telling tailgate

why it was happening we have the horrifying last

few panels where noted piece of crap fangry who

last time I remember fangry being featured he

gets beat up by Grimlock in Marvel US near the

end of that series to Sort of kickoff Autobot

Decepticon Relations going south again, right?

So it's interesting that he gets featured again

here. He was in the earlier stuff of Lost Lights

as well Which is this is him getting his revenge

on tailgate burying him for six million years

Yeah, seems a little excessive. Yeah, very excessive

That is a real, yeah. I swear it only goes off

when I podcast. Nobody cares about me any other

time. To be fair, nobody cares about me now.

Oh, stop it. They just randomly text me. So then

we skip to a two parter on Troja Major, which

is more fallout from this time it's back from

more than meets the eye. Yeah, before we get

the Trojan Major, I have to say, issue seven,

you are completely correct. This should have,

like, if this had ended the first trade, we would

have recorded this episode, like, right after

that one, because ending on Tailgate being buried

alive for six million years, holy shit. I have

to say, though, the whole Cyclonus Tailgate thing

was great. Rodimus. Rodimus is easily the best

leader. I love this guy. Well, he's improving

as a leader. He ends up being a fairly good one.

Whatever, I'm skipping ahead. Why am I doing

that? I mean, just his one line. I like how he

knows to motivate Magnus, and he's motivating

Magnus because Magnus legitimately believed Megatron

was turning good. or trying to be a better person

at least and we know that he's not wrong about

it that Megatron was tricked into staying there

but obviously our characters don't so yeah there's

um there's one panel in here it's actually my

current I just switched up my Facebook profile

picture for this because I just love, absolutely

love Roninus where he's like, okay, if you can't

hear me, you better find someone who did hear

me because we're leaving in five minutes. It's

like, I just love that. Yeah, I love the, I love

the Magnus stuff. I love the Cyclonus and Tailgate

stuff in this issue. It's... As someone who had

read all of this, like More Than Meets the Eye,

Lost Light, like I'm reading Lost Light now,

but going through all of More Than Meets the

Eye and we're now finally getting answers that

we so richly deserve. Yeah, which brings me to

the Trojan Major stuff, which is an awful lot

of the overall story regarding the Grand Architect

and that insignia we've been seeing throughout.

more than meets the eye up into lost light and

the basis of the story though is around Nanaka

A being angry at her friend Velocity over Skid's

death and B her sadness over Skid's death and

wanting to bring him back and Roberts just loves

twisting the knife and Anode and Lug, it should

be mentioned by the way, I finally started to

like Anode here and Lug. I found them not annoying

and much better, deeper characters through this,

but they also get through a lot of the backstory

I mentioned. But again, it's around the plot

of wanting to resurrect Skids. And in true Robert's

fashion, it ends horribly. I mean, in the end,

they erase Nautica's feelings for Skids. She

doesn't even care that he's dead or anything.

She hasn't forgotten him, but she doesn't remember

the fact she loved him, even as a close friend

or whatever they were. But that's brutal. And

it should be noted too, I howled with joy at

the final panel of this book because A, the magnificence

has been missing since the Shun series, way back

at the start of IDW. And B, so has the character

holding it. Old Scorpion's been gone for a long

time, and it was nice to see him remembered and

brought back. So that made me ecstatic. And the

rest of this trade are the three issues which

show us what the crew of the Lost Light, the

titular ship led by Captain Getaway, has been

up to with our heroes away. And Jesus Christ,

James, what is wrong with you? Who hurt you as

a child, James? Why would you do this to us?

Like, seriously? We get wanton slaughter of most

of the Lost Light crew. It's brutal. Yeah, it's

very brutal. I understand Getaway's thing of

Megatron is evil. Megatron's at the set. Like,

I get that part of it. But if you look at what

Megatron has done since his trial... and joining

a lot like he's become a lot less Decepticon

like yeah but we we know that as the readers

right because we get to see his motivations we

get to see skids taking him to task for wanting

to leave a planet we get to see him change getaway

and a lot of the other crew here didn't and I

don't think that getaway was wrong originally

The I don't want to call it an issue because

it still sort of makes sense But afterwards he

has become very much the sort of mustache twirling

villain who? He wants to be He wants to be recognized

and he wants to be Remembered and there's nothing

wrong with that. The problem is he'll go to any

length for it and he literally sacrifices a significant

amount of the crew to meet those goals yeah like

getaway is was it like is he originally an Autobot

or a Decepticon i don't remember off the top

of my head i'll get Ghetto is originally an Autobot.

He's... yeah, that's fine. Now that I see the

Autobot symbol on his chest. And he's an MTO.

He was a made -to -order during the war. Okay.

And his ability... so he's an outlier, although

it doesn't come up a lot. Right. And his ability

is that he's able to kind of... he's got a silver

tongue. He can talk his way into and out of anything.

and we see an awful lot of that because the things

he does are horrible but he's able to convince

other people but he's also able to convince himself

and it's what makes him a little deeper than

just sort of a mustache twirling villain I also

like that again I agree with his initial I mean

I agree with his initial Treatment of Megatron

because he's not wrong. I don't agree because

it's not what I would have done and because I

as a reader Know he's better than than what they

were Pitching him as or what they believed him

to be But I understand where he's coming from.

It's just beyond that. He is gone. He just goes

way over the edge and There's a lot of depth

in these issues. What you said earlier about

James and screwing with all of our emotions and

everything else. I had to actually double check

where I was in this trade because of the fucking

time loop. I thought, I'm like, wait, didn't

I just read this already? I was like, what the...

Which I really like. That was well done. Oh yeah,

it was well done, but as I was reading it, I'm

like, wait a minute, didn't this already happen?

What the? Which is the idea, and it's terrible

that, yeah, that's what they do. Don't worry

though, because the protective bots don't stay

in one. You know, one of them gets murdered and

then everybody, oof, defense or gets taken out.

With the return of star saber to so there's this

whole trade is a lot of the long -running plots

coming back to fruition Yeah, I mean they they

mentioned that star sabers lured back because

of this hatred of cyclonus who Bested them and

took out one of his eyes Not to mention we have

ambulon who Was sawed in half way back in the

fifth trade of more than meets the eye and We

knew he turned into a leg. I I was sure at some

point it was gonna come up again and I wasn't

wrong for once Because it comes up here we get

the payoff of riptide being stupid He's too stupid

to have a nudge gun memory gun used on him Which

was an interesting way to it seems almost kind

of mean but So obviously getaway has kicked off

Rodimus and Megatron and everybody Rodimus gets

a message back to them He's like, you know This

is Rodimus and I am Incredibly pissed off by

the time like this was a pre -recorded message.

This is him live on the thing, right? Because

he's in his classic colors here. He's not in

the purple colors that he's been in. So the first

issue, or sorry, the first issue after the time

loop is Ronimus and the message he sent in 50

of More Than Meets the Eye. It is live. It's

when he discovers Getaway and everybody of Mutant

Need. The next message he sends, the one about

wanting to be melted down, and by the way, it's

a nice reference to Death's Head. Anyway, that

message is when all of the Autobots record their

final message, when they know the DJD is coming.

And they expect to all be killed. Well, the Necrobot

didn't save them, he gets killed by the DJD.

So they saved themselves actually well, technically

it's skids that saves them because of course

he dies giving them the extra power temporarily

which keeps them alive for a bit and then Megatron

took the battlefield and well, he's Megatron

so Yeah He's a very angry transformer and Yeah,

have we ever like okay so they always talk about

the oil reservoir on the lost light like people

have gone down there and this and the other thing

you're gonna ask if we've seen it yeah because

i don't i don't remember that now the only reason

i would remember this specific thing if chrome

dome uh looks into skids memories originally

and tells skids that he won't tell him what they

are for fear of what skids would do in the oil

reservoir. That's where that scene takes place.

It was also used where Red Alert killed himself

or tried to kill himself. Right, I remember that.

But what I'm saying is, up until right now, at

this moment, when I'm going to say what I'm going

to say in about two seconds, have they ever actually

stated that these things are in the reservoir?

No, because they're added. It's a reference to

So it's the Transformers Prime. No, well, it's

their red scraplets the more they eat before

they reproduce So first of all, so first of all

scraplets are from the Marvel US generation one

series Second of sorry the comic series second

of all So one issue that so far has not been

reprinted is the lost light annual And it contains

whorl raising a group of scraplets. These are

the ones placed in the reservoir. Okay. I thought

the annual was in here. No. No it's not. It is

not. Huh. They had the Optimus Prime annual in

the other... Are they going to put the annual

in the next... I don't know. They better since

it becomes fairly important later on. You think?

Yeah. So I would assume so. But yes, at this

point, it is not important. However, yes, the

getaway put Scraplets in there to eat Riptide,

which they failed to do. Yeah. Because Riptide

is just too stupid to be eaten by Scraplets,

apparently. Boy, it's too stupid to forget how

to transform when... The memory gun is used on

him, slash nudge gun, is what it's called. But

anyway. Yeah, so this trade and these series

of issues end with A, the slaughter of a whole

shitload of the crew, but B, they find Getaway

discovers cyber utopia, which is what Rodimus

and Co. have been looking for this entire time.

Right. So Getaway, best captain, because he actually

made it to the end. Uh, sure. Most of the crew

is dead, but you know, he did pretty well. Uh,

and so, yeah, this is a happy ending. Uh, don't

worry. This all goes really well in the next

few issues. Everything's happy. Nothing bad happens

to anybody else. And yeah, James Roberts certainly

does not make me feel sad or anything again.

ever he's lying folks in case you're wondering

so series is really good and it is it is very

good yes more than meets the eye when it started

tells a very segmented from the rest of the transformers

universe story And I really like it. I like how

a lot of the stuff from the past, individual

lines, that sort of thing, are important and

used much later on. I like the change of... So

one thing I don't think we mentioned... We certainly

mentioned the artist change. Alex Milne did an

awful lot of More Than Meets the Eye. And he

is excellent. One of the best... transformers

artists of all time he's responsible for a lot

of the redesigns which would eventually become

figures because the idw designs are so nice and

he always did a great job and then we changed

to jack laurence for lost light his art has a

different feel and the book has a different feel

and unlike a lot of people i don't necessarily

I don't see the big difference between one and

the other I know there is a switch in tone to

a certain extent yeah I'm okay with that I don't

mind that sort of the world -hopping giant encompassing

stories switched and now those are an optimist

crime and lost light has become the sort of individual

character study yeah I'm okay with that. Yeah,

I am so okay with that. I don't mind that they've

swapped them, so... Yeah. Because Optimus Prime

has to deal with the Council of Worlds and Cybertron

and all these now dead worlds because of where

we are currently, but like... Well, I was gonna

say, yeah, to be blunt... Barber's kind of got

a really tough job because he's got to deal with

Unicron. He's got to wrap all of this stuff up.

He's got to wrap up the entire universe before

Unicron gets there. And I'm not trying to take

anything away from Roberts, but he has his own

story that he had decided on an end five or six

years ago. He already knew how this was going

to turn out. so all he has to do is get to that

point and I say that like it's easy it's definitely

not it's not easy but but I think but I don't

envy what barbers got to do which is why I hate

kind of you know bashing or crapping on any of

his stuff because he's done just an amazing job

on it And I'm getting way off topic, but I'm

yeah, just gushing You know, we're now talking

about both and that's fine. We're still talking

Transformers It's not like we went into oh James

Roberts is now gonna write Breaking Bad comics.

Oh god, that'd be amazing. Oh Except everybody's

dead. So well actually he'd be good at that then

so The Until All Are One is super character driven.

I don't think it's a coincidence that In my opinion,

my two favorite books that were running during

this time were Till I Learned One and Lost Light

slash More Than Meets the Eye because one of

the reasons Transformers has survived this long

is because the characters are interesting and

there's an awful lot you can do with them. And

a lot of them to be blunt are a blank slate because

we didn't get characterization from them in generation

one skits appeared in one one episode of the

cartoons no, sorry three he appeared in three

episodes of the He appeared in three episodes

of the G1 series if I remember right, but he

gets next to no characterization or an awful

lot, so he had so so you get a scenario where

Roberts could just do whatever he wanted with

the guy and He does a great job with it and then

tries to incorporate some of the tech specs and

that kind of thing but really it's a new take

yeah, and it just His character work is brilliant

so is barbers, but barber has an overall plot

to get through that's a that's very convoluted

and He's got to do a lot of world building that

kind of thing. Whereas Scott and Roberts had

the opportunity to Look at individual characters

and ask themselves. How would this character

deal with blank and a lot of the best shows Come

out of that Vince, you know, I love referencing

Breaking Bad. It's good. Hey, let's reference

the shield which you love, too But one of the

great things about the shield is that's what

it was. It was, okay, how would character X,

Dutch, Vic, Acevedo, whoever, react to this happening?

Right. And that's how you tell a lot of the best

character stories is trying to logically figure

out how somebody would react to whatever event

it is. And I don't think it's a coincidence that

those have made some of the best Transformer

comics ever. Yep, like I it's hard for me To

read some of the other stuff like we've only

covered One volume of the Marvel US run that

IDW had reprinted And it was like Steve Steve

and I had done that episode a couple of years

ago and I had a really hard time I'm not good

with old comics. I'm just not I don't know what

it is. I don't know it was the color schemes

that they had to use back then because look at

it this way art colors inks all of that in let's

just use batman for example 80 years have come

a hell of a lot of a long way than black blue

red and white yellow and green but i feel like

even if so i own all the marvel us and the uk

stuff And the UK stuff, which a lot of people

consider the best Transformers storytelling,

TV, movies, comics aside, the UK stuff is really

good when it's on. But it's not on as much as

the IDW stuff has been on. The issue is for every

Time Wars in the UK series, is there are three

or four stories that quite honestly are forgettable

and Furben deserves an awful lot of credit for

taking these characters who had maybe one or

two lines in a tech spec and trying to do things

with them and make them interesting but a lot

of the characterization because the cast is so

large lacks depth Right and it's weird for me

to say that because the cast in these books is

still friggin huge But it feels like almost everybody

is three dimensional or at worst two dimensional

getaway and It's So it's just better. I mean,

there's not another way to put it And I've said

it before, I'll say it again, I know he doesn't

appear in these series, but the character, well,

he sort of doesn't appear. The characterization

that Megatron's been given over the past 50 issues,

well 25, in More Than Meets the Eye, that's my

favorite version of Megatron. And that includes

the excellent VStores version, which I adore.

I know it's not the same character, by the way,

but he shares the same namesake. He, by the way,

is a close number too, because he's fantastic.

But the Megatron, the Autobot story was just

so interesting and added so much nuance to a

guy we thought is just an angry test book. Yeah,

and that's what these comics do and when they're

on that's what they excel at The end so Five

out of five for lost light with a giant middle

finger for murdering so many Yeah, absolutely

See this is what I was trying to say, you know

back when we were doing the stuff for more than

meets the eye last year I can read this stuff

in trade and get it and, you know, not have an

issue, but that whole thing of having to read

single issue month to month and having to, like,

no, it's that instant gratification thing, I

want to read it all, read it all right now, kind

of a thing, and yeah. And I think the one thing

that Roberts really excels at more than a lot

of writers in comics And you could argue television

has this issue, too There's a lot of shock death

in these books, but you genuinely care for at

least some of it Adamizer was a piece of crap

who did some awful things to tailgate and he

went along with an awful lot of getaways, horrible

plans, but seeing him dismembered and murdered

is pretty bad. I mean, that's almost like seeing

a Transformers character cut in half lengthways.

Yeah, well, that was for anyone. Yeah. I mean,

this was just brutal. Yeah, and it's... It's

shocking, but alternatively feels something and

a lot of that is about the absolute depth that

getaways it. Sorry, when I say depth, I mean

how depraved and awful he is. But yeah, we see

the awful things that happen to First Aid and

his group. Thunder Clash gets put into a coma.

I just love how they were able to bring back

the Protective Outs of Defense. I thought that

was like I never expected a combiner to be on.

Rodimus and Bruce, yep. Yeah, although they don't

last real long. No, they don't, but they don't

have, like, are you expecting the protective

bots to be a full -on... No, I was curious if

they were going to return because they and everybody

left to take part in combiner wars because they

needed them there. So Hasbro could sell toys

and Anyway Curse you editorial mandates Still

is terrific and absolutely if a comic game or

piece of media can make me actually feel something

without Without me feeling like it was just an

attempt to manipulate or an attempt to shock

That is very good. Yes So thanks for making me

feel bad James He broke bad on you Last light

volume to absolutely love it continue to love

that series. I'm so happy That they are allowing

James to wrap up his story and I cannot wait

to see where he goes next. Oh, well actually

so in the next issue. Oh, sorry. Oh, he meant

that. Once Unicron destroys everything. Yeah,

so I think we're gonna close out this episode

of The Pull Bag. Where can we find you online,

sir? At Nightbeat on Twitter. I'm at TFG1Mike

on Twitter, you can follow at ThePullBag and

at GeekCastRadio on Twitter as well. Check us

out at GeekCastRadio .com. We have tons of current

podcasts as well as a lot of nostalgia too. Make

your great escape into comics and we will catch

you next time as we wrap up Autobotly August

2018 with myself and the FemBots as we cover

Transformers Till All Are One Volume 3. You've

just heard the latest episode of The Pull Bag,

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