Transformers: Till All Are One Vol. 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

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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 one. 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 TFU Mike.

Joining me are those two FemBots, FemBots, FemBots,

wow. That would give Austin Powers a run for

his money. First up we have... Huh, the Megatron

obsessed wrong prime worship and Heather aka

he prime hashtag Rob is rules optimist rules.

Hello You're so delusional 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 aka

lady rex 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 Gem and

the Holograms. Oh, she totally doesn't. Come

on, don't misrepresent. Yes, she does. All right.

You do realize that this means war, right? She's

going to come after you. It's all right. So today

we are continuing on with the Marigold Scott

written books. This is the third ongoing at the

time that this happened. And I fully believe

they did this on purpose. I know the ongoing

didn't last as long as I thought it 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 not rid X rid whatever

John's book and James's book James's book is

Rodimus and co out in this 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, you

know, all Earthlings love Transformers. Wait,

wait, wait. John got to tell, he 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. It was great. 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. the uh...

under credit we need to take a look at the fact

that you can't be totally i have i have i have

dealt with the not that uh... and it i mean i

think i was hearing you know that the job smacking

table at this point when you said it was all

that crap is it what it's not crackdowns and

excellent writer and i love his stuff but No

he's not. Buster needs to bite him in the tailpipe.

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 in these three?

Ongoings and everybody was like a third ongoing

are they 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 like This is the hair that

broke the camel's back on the under base to be

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

baby. Two, I couldn't run it forever. And three,

there was just so much coming out and we were

so excited for all of it. 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, 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. 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 underbass. It didn't

kill the underbass. 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. No,

I get it. I'm just always going to, like, there's

your podcast, the underbass. And there's the,

I just totally lost. the 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 is it the other

one that was over it was another uk one or no

it was this girl named nel 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

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 Marigold Scott, art

by... I even asked her how to do this. It's a

French. She's like, oh, just put it into Google

Translate and you can hear the... I've been listening

to the audio of how to say her last name for

the last three hours. There you go. Oh, so the

podcast was called Soundwave? Yeah, Sound .Wave.

Sound .Wave. And it was the sauce. I freaking

loved it. That's funny. It filled in once Underbass

ended. It started up just about at that time.

And I was like, how really? Oh, really? Fantastic.

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

started, it was a girl who loved Transformers

and was super hip to it and a guy who knew nothing,

but was into comic books. And so it was her introducing

him and about, he starts off being like, world

is my favorite, just to mess with her. And then

by like, you know, issue six, he's like, no,

for serious, world is my favorite. That's awesome.

That's great. The interesting thing about 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. In this story, these

first four issues, I read this in like a half

an hour when I first read it. Like I was surprised

that I read the entire volume that fast and I

did read every word of it. But it was, it just

went by so quickly. I absolutely love it. Yeah,

I was just gonna say it is a quick read but marigold

scripts tend to be fast Yeah, especially if you're

used to like John and James where they're like

really dense and you got to pay attention to

every little thing Marigold scripts are a lot

faster. They're still full of cool things to

dig into but they're fast What are you gonna

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 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 are you reading one of my 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

transformer 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 because it like like you guys said you

you know you You fall off and you start and you

stop and you this and you that and whatever and

you come back to them 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 ungoings. Oh, no. As much as I love numbered

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 in trade. I

do not very rarely do I read singles anymore?

Gotcha well, I just wondering just because that

would make sense to 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 the - Distant Stars. 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. 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 Announce that they were going to be ending

the series. I was like, uh, 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 this so I I read the four that

we're gonna 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. I, 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

mmm 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 Margaret and besides the

fact it was an all -female cast so I expected

it to be I just life, you know, just Don't oh

speak in Amerigrid. That's what I was gonna say

and I forgot the 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? Yeah, like since it's cinematic.

Yeah, like the way She puts a story together

and the way it's paced feels like you're watching

a movie of it which makes That's what she was

doing before she came into comic books. She was

Transformers Prime, Rescue Bots. I think Rescue

Bots was actually during the same time. But she's

done stuff on the screen, whether it be TV, whatnot,

series. And you're right. It relays well to the

comic. It really kind of does. It's really cool

to see the way... people's different talents

are expressed or different styles are expressed.

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. So issue one. Oh, hi, that's me. I've got

it. I have Are you sure about this? I'm 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 of this

podcast All right guys so 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 into 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 obstructive as he can

Meanwhile The can we see the combaticons in there

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. 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, yeah. 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 something.

McAdams. Oh yeah. Sorry, that's McAdams. It's

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

all the things. So I think those kind of chill

this guy out and takes him out outside, but then

a bunch of... Two badge lists 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 badge lists 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 I and

I just 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, you know, 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 nemosurgery people and

Windblade just like, starts yelling at Starscream's

face and he's like, you have to keep this under

wraps or I'll tell what Chromia did. And but

then the little cute, adorable news people show

up and they're like, hey, Mr. Starscream, you

know, 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. Yes I love this first issue

the story is amazing, but I Love Sarah's art

she Duh like when Sarah's art is light and bright

and the box looks shiny as all hell I love that

that first page where you see air razor and Tigatron

at first. I was like wait Oh, that's who that

is and then obviously wind blade and chromia

and Alita One 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. I know I know I know the

only creepy thing that he's got going on in his

life, so you know. Having Obsidian and Strika

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. We kind of got, I remember because 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 one, 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 like 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 Rage of the

Dinobots. I don't think it wasn't Rage. Oh, you're

talking about Marigold or Sarah? Marigold. Yes,

Marigold did Rage of the Dinobots. So she took

a situation with them as well and made them all

characters that had different personalities like

that. And so this is what Marigold 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 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

is enjoying them because of that. And so it's

really cool to see like, oh yeah, I want to have

more blast off. 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. Like, onslaught is this,

you know... 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 like 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 will jack and chromia he's

like no i'm totally gonna 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 her peer pressure though because

he's part of the team i mean it's not 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

shot in the alley. Yeah. Say that, but you can

make the assumption. He was also the guy that

said, hey, we're going to, you know, he was totally

loading that whole situation. He was there to

pad it in that way. I think 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. But yes, it is an act,

but some of it wasn't. Because when we get into

the fourth issue that 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, oh, but I kind of don't want

to do that at the very end. He has what he wants,

but he doesn't want to. 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, 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 wait like when they when

when rat trap brings the Enigma enigma combination

and they combine that's the first time that right?

So because we've been up to our eyeballs and

he was in costas He was he made an appearance

in costas on point. Did he though? Yes, because

I think that was Bruticus anasaur because swindle

was hanging out with menasaur What and to be

fair that's not me figuring it out that was some

that was the wiki being all this is you know

Finally the first appearance of Bruticus. I'm

like wait what? Yeah, he is not like to my knowledge

from as long as I've been reading and I have

not and will not read costas run like I said

I said last week and not trying to consistently

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

you want to read about the combaticons working

for North Korea? It was amazing. Anything's better

than the interview. Okay. Still having been one

of the persons that reviewed it for the first

time on a podcast was 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.

Just don't I just don't care to self -abuse in

the five years that this podcast has been online

All of this transformers com comics coverage

is all enders fault On and on and on and on and

on about how oh my god shockwave This oh my god

that oh my god, whatever. I yeah, I bad It was

Minnesota. I was thinking for some reason, but

maybe it was because Swindle was in there. Swindle

being involved really throws you off and you

think it's Bruticus, but it isn't. It's not.

No, but the fact that... 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 thisweekengeek .net.

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

not my email address He was like, okay do this

start with death of optimus prime Either you

know, basically Robert frosted 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 got to the

cost of stuff Every single thing IDW has done

that actually matters. Oh It does matter that's

where we got Thundercracker and Bob The hell

is wrong 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. Oh 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 and oh, yeah, no that was killed

chaos theory was amazing. It was also not written

by Yeah, no, but you know that it's cool. I guess

the Rodimus story and wheelie story that was

actually not too bad I thought that was good

and the iron hide mini wasn't too bad either

and neither was drift but that also wasn't oh

yeah I yeah I I fully plan on I'm just doing

this picking up stuff out yeah 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

yeah 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 Just

just read the ending maybe the first issue to

kind of hear the state of affairs and then just

read the whole end Here we're not here to review

all of ongoing Let's go back to something good,

which, 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,

I mean, you can probably figure out this 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 page. Actually,

the first page is the guy that got the decepticon

that's bleeding out his head is like all 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 is that thing? 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, dig it away. This

is going to be juicy. All hail Starscream! All

right, so issue number two. In the wake of the

Vagelis officers murdering a Decepticon, Civil

unrest takes to the streets, and it's not just

the septicons. They've gained support from every

newcomer on the planet. An angry mob takes to

the council building where everybody is at, and

it's observed by obsidian and air razor. So Starscream

plans. 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.

He meets the crowd to announce that he's the

new head of security of this IH, what was it

called? It's Ironhide Security something. Yeah.

Ironhide security, something, yeah, all right,

whatever. So he meets the crowd to announce that

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 compat... 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 Lin

later touched on later. He tries to attack Ironhide,

blast -off 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 asked

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

So meanwhile, the council watches from above

inside the building and search these chambers.

He's like, hey, as the crowd starts to break

up, he asked everybody to leave and ushers them

all out so he can collect his thoughts to make

it 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 Herrera into dealing with the combaticons.

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 tankers. One of

the tankers. We got tall tanker and fat tanker.

Thank you, Margaret Scott. 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

Unslaught, who tells him they totally bought

it. You find out, oh crap, we've been played.

So it was awesome. One of my favorite things

in this issue was seeing air razor 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 And yeah, I just I Just love Starscream

and wind blade in this issue They were really

fun. They did a good job. Yeah Yeah, absolutely

Especially the whole thing. Oh, you know, I'm

sure if I do so. Oh, no, that that's the next

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. She does Priscilla does

the first two issues and She does the second

two and like 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, Pribs, good job. 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 like, 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 iron hides not what

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, jeez, 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, oh, 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 a bunch.

But you know, the mood that that set and how

they darkened that and they made it look like

they did is like. Crisola. You did glorious on

this, making the mood work really, really well

at that point. It really, really worked. I had

to wait on that panel for a minute to go. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, this whole series is I think you

know the Ironhide appreciation series because

he's so good it starts off with his line I think

it's in the first issue where he's Starscreams

like you know people the people who think like

that are you know little people and Ironhide

goes speaking as a little person And then 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 iron hide gets hit in the head

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 be 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 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 right that doesn't 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

cannon now because i think it's hilarious oh

wait are you talking about the page where the

two of them are standing in the The myths of

the... Yeah, in the crowd. Gotcha. I have something

to say about this panel here. Okay. Because Sarah

did it once in the first issue. I'd have to go

back and check to 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. 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. Whoa. It's like the top line of his

visor. Oh, it's just subtle. It's sneaky. And

she just totally hit that. And I just went, hmm.

Sarah. That's mad. That gave me goosebumps. It's

giving me goosebumps right now. Just talking

about it. That was good. Yeah, that's good. That

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

perfect panel. Plus, 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. Think my favorite panel in

this issue outside of that with the coloring

my favorite story part of the of this issue for

the For the paneling again goes the old married

couple now if you'll excuse me I've got a statement

to make there is a line star scream is there

well, I'm sure you'll scream when I cross it

There's not there's not many people anymore Obviously

Chris lot has 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 Lata or impersonate Lata'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 wanna

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

interpreted 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. Issues. I've got

plenty of walls around me. So, you know, hey.

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 and, you know, yeah. So issue three'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

hey 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,

like the first one is just looking straight.

The next one is just kind of looking straight.

The final two in the back are like have their

heads down. And then obviously the Bruticus version,

which is like in shadow has his head hung. I'm

like, damn, that's, that's a statement. That's

a cover that would like, if I had see 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 Well only one that's that's standing

out as different is a Blast off. Yep. Holy biscuit.

I've never noticed that before Good spot. Oh,

yeah, and not only that is 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 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 is that, but imagine

this where blast offs 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. That was easy. Yeah,

it is cool. All right, Amy, take issue three

away. OK, so issue three, following through from

the last issue, Windblade starts to investigate

the combaticons, but Chromia 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, Chromia

works to unscramble the corrupted data, while

new security chief Ironhide starts to train his

recruits, Lasthoff having to go through the process

of proving himself as well as the other recruits.

But they oppress. When Ironhide reports his progress

to the council, Lasthoff 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, and both Chromia and Blassoff

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. Let's

see, 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 a dude 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 yeah yeah i um outside

of the stuff with uh wind blade 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 all right all right

he basically basically scrunches rat traps head

into his bot like oh man scott mcneal where the

hell are you dude because i can hear oh man i

can hear his voice in my head Yeah, the reveal

of swindles body poor swindle like I know the

guy's a schemer and he's a he's a double dealer

and he's a 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 and so we're like, but

we love him Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Yep. Yeah issue

three. I thought it was super fun. I thought

the story really picked up I Can't say and I

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 it honestly

it doesn't matter these three women can do Anything

in transformers is as far in the 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

is just trying to break this code Yeah, after

what day way too well way to no never cross that

out never too many 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. Was gonna

bring that up to 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

across 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 and like We have all done those

exact things. Yeah 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 There's Not

I mean this woman has done some amazing writing

over the years both for television and the comics

and and everything like that and It just keeps

getting better and better Yeah, I Have a question.

I feel like it's missed something and I was wondering

if you guys knew Who hacked chromia's files?

Who corrupted them? They haven't said who it

was that did it. I kind of get the sense because

I wasn't quite sure about that either. I went

to the wiki and it 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. blast off knows about those files too even

though they're chromias that that was where it

yeah yeah because somebody else was clone chroming

through the files no pun intended but I thought

it was blast off because he was trying to save

onslaught Yeah, you know what 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 Yeah, we don't know who he

is yet. At least not in this arc. I don't 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. Because why? It could be, but

we never do find that yeah. I have to DC 537.

I'm thinking about it. I'm going I don't know.

I I 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. DC wants him to find Swindle. And

they can't find Swindle without the files. And

so somebody else, yeah, it's gotta 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 for

Starscream. Sorry, what it never really says

who corrupts them? Yeah, but I also suspect that

it wasn't the combaticons because they want to

find they want the thing and and I kind of get

the Feeling that this what's going on and maybe

this is just a little loss of translation I kind

of got the idea that maybe blast off was monitoring

these files Yeah, and when he sees that somebody

else is active acts access them He waits for

them to crack them before he backs 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,

no, got to get there really fast just in case.

So 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,

you know, Onslaught to use his brain to help

him, you know, 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 a 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 or one had a rocky

beginning because of, you know, 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. But I mean, 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. we wanted to

know about a few things. Should kind of wrap

those up a little bit, not like completely just

gave us a little bit more information about it.

So it's OK, that's where we're at. But again,

coming back to Starscream, you know, 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

swindle, it means that he's gonna get, he's gonna

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.

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 was, whether it's

for 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.

I don't know whether or not she did it or not.

I was like, you know what? I'm just going to

leave that dangling. See what happens. It might

make it. So. I'm going to go. Speaking of brilliant

writing from Mergrid, 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 onslaughts 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 a little nugget.

Yeah. Cause if you've ever, 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 set up

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 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 I there have

been times, right? I struggled where I had to

go back a couple panels like you and we talking

about again and so a non Non entity for so long.

It's easy to blend them all together So and that's

why I latched on to the fact that blast off was

the standout character in these for this first

part of the the ongoing because of the fact that

he has purple eyes just like swindle used to

have purple eyes so if yeah this is 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 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 just a live wire ready to pick up the

hammer and start whacking things. That's all

I've ever seen them as, until blast off. And

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

Off needs his own mini -series 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. Like, it was,

it was Birchum. Bircham, a number of years ago,

when I first started following Josh Bircham 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. But the story moved so quickly that

it moved into a place where everything that was

going on in that script specifically, 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 three was really,

really awesome. Any other final thoughts on issue

three, 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. 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 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, that's not good. I mean,

because it might have been worth it to shoot

her in the head before you leave, because she's

going to fight you one way or the other. If you

don't put her down, you don't keep her under

her leash, she is going to turn around and start

swinging her battle axe, and you're going to

have a problem again. I'm gonna 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. And then, 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 with... We're

not finished with combiner wars. No, no, no,

no, no. They're going to... We just got combiner

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

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

Guys Yeah, yeah, well, you know, maybe that'll

get but 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

could do this. Mm -hmm. 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. I might interrupt

you. 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. We have the first IDW appearance of

Brubicus, and it is, uh, glorious, I guess? And

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! Um, couldn't

you have changed move to roll? Come on now. Yeah,

but that's Optimus Prime's game. 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 lost his way yeah so it is what

it is they go on to have to basically stop stop

Bruticus they try to actually reason with blast

off and that doesn't work at all uh Starscream

and Windblade continue their marital counseling

issues as this this chapter goes along um Chromia

yeah Just basically goes off and does her thing

with revealing all like basically just taking

all the blame They eventually do take Rurikus

down they basically separate him I Just the sacrifices

that chromium makes in this the the actions that

iron hide and wind blade take and you know Starscream

is just there in the background as always because

heaven forbid he get anything on his uh wingspan

heaven forbid something Starscream actually has

to take responsibility for something he will

eventually well yeah eventually but not in this

initial part of the story um 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, and I just love the final

page of the final panel of this. Where Windblade

is like... You know, 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 light and she is but it ain't

like 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 down wind 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 as 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 detected

chromia But at the same time she didn't have

anybody else but the price of peace is to allow

her friend now to To take that burden and it

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

else is the fact that she was manipulated. I

mean even in this this issue alone was it in

this issue let last issue no it was in this issue

because she's like look we've got this stuff

going on and he he basically tells her she's

like uh i'm 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 the way where does he say oh it's

like okay so he's basically starscream is getting

on her case for the he would uh the Bruticus

wouldn't even exist if you had done your job.

And she was 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 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 they're so far that she's going to

go. Where's 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 didn't push her. You

pushed 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 aired

there. Starscream, really? You really wanted

this. You want to push it that far. But you 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 in 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

about a lot of Margaret's writing is the fact

that she makes us have a personal connection

because she makes it believable. You know, 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. Like, I

knew going into this, like, 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. 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 I like I said, I read it two different

times before we recorded this and I was like,

okay You know that that works. I get it now.

I fully understand. That's great and Just absolutely

love it Margaret 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, at least on

the Decepticon side, we did with when 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 blast off in his dissenting

comments. And I liked 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 Anslaught 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

Anslaught is that guy and and Last off isn't

no you see the parts that 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. 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, brr. And I was like, ooh, 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 Chromia jumps in the way because

Windblade got knocked down. And that panel is

amazing. Yeah. Which panel? Where she gets knocked

down? The panel where she jumps to save Windblade.

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

is getting his guns down and aiming. And you

see this amazing perspective upshot of Bruticus'

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. OK, 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 Last Office

is off to the side saying, no, no. Yeah. Yeah.

And it causes Bruticus to like, like that little,

where he's just like, like he, he. 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. 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. 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 felt 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 do Hickey on it? Next time

that's all right. I You're right. It adds it

adds another meaning to it Yeah, you recognize

who each one of them is and trying what they're

trying to do so and not only that is it I like

how the bottom panel it's Brutus while they're

trying to figure stuff out Brutus is running

after people. Yeah, so it's like they both they're

multitasking 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

like Let alone four other people's people. It's

heads and one of them is dead. Okay now I think

it just hit my Overworld on that one. So like

so what you're saying is swindle is Jerry Garcia.

He's a deadhead Are you singer of the Grateful

Dead are you kidding me? Oh, OK, sorry. My bad.

You know, you know Swindle would be though. He

would love. Yeah, yeah, he would. He totally.

Yeah. 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

a 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's

it is an ending but it really isn't an ending

it feels like it it feels like this is a really

feels like an ending it feels like these four

issues are just another mini series even though

this isn't ongoing and that's great because we

have a beginning middle and ending at the same

time you know more is coming um 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 gonna 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 gonna discuss it later. You

awesome? Yep, absolutely. There's gonna be more

character development, let's just say that. That's

one thing that all the writers are good at nowadays,

but Marigold, 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, yes, 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 because he's been

the guy that did the fawns and then he did other

things and we loved him because of the character

that he's been since, you know, after Cybertron

got rebooted and the role that he's played in

that. Because he's got a story, but then he got,

you know, knocked out, out of the story, he's

been dead. 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.

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

though. It's funny cause 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 Blast

Off existed. And the fact that Marigold's like,

I'm gonna take the most nobody. 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. Yep 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? Mm

-hmm. 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 mm -hmm and so there's

so many panels and so many things where like

onslaught is like I only trust you blast off

it just needs yes or Wait what or when Starscream

and Windblade are fighting? Like I can't 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

Blinkin strong in this book. It is, yeah. It

is. And holy crap. Yeah, it's... Even just like

where Blasdov goes and he kind of reports back

to Ansel. He's like, hey, I got it on Ironhide's

team. And you've just had 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 blast off 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

you do those guys hugging you would not it seems

like such a not Bruticus 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

nice little moment. I'm sure that laughs Well,

you all, everybody is, well, every one of us

I'm sure has had a crush, but if you really,

really want to have that type of attention from

somebody, and you finally get it, and you're

just like, flip -flopping heart attack, you know?

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

He's like, aw. Yeah. I'm having 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? Um, 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. 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, 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. 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 Windblade showing up,

the first volume that we reviewed. Yep. He's

been there the whole time. Oh, yeah. 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 his head space. 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 and says, Chromia, he hasn't really said much,

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

like, he is torn. He's like, dude, you just what?

Yeah. And she's like, and she just says, do your

job. Show them no one is above the law. And it's

just like, oh, stab at 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 that the

next page of the top panel where you see her

being led away and wind blade being led away

the opposite direction They're looking back at

each other. That's good, too. Yeah, that's very

good And I love this this first volume. I thought

it was great. I Really strong. Yeah, it was so

that after I had 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, um, yeah,

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

between Sarah, uh, 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 so it's spot -on

so there aren't even any teeny little niggles

Things don't have to be perfect to be perfectly

wonderful So basically that's what you're looking

for out of the five as like 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 that 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 the things I get the payoff.

I'm just like thrilled to death about each of

the characters, even the ones that are doing

the dark things, because the emotion is the integrity

of the emotion is there. I feel it because 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, OK, what happens next?

I have some. It's a 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 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 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 because who the hell knows

what's gonna happen to those guys but I I absolutely

love this like this series should have been longer

than 12 issues It's gonna 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 i think there

are other reasons why and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and and

and and and and and and and and and and and on

the writing and with these artists on the art

like these women can do no wrong and i mean tom

b long and and barber you know john barber they're

all 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 so He's so sneaky.

He's like a ninja in the background making sure

everything works on you know that side so Yeah,

I think I did I have to say I love you Tom. There

was one error that I saw the digital one. It's

okay It was just a word was misspelled. It was

it was an easy thing to miss but I saw I only

bring it up because in the past when sometimes

we brought things up People change it, fix it,

it's done a dust and fixed. It's really easy

to, well, I would say easy because sometimes

it's a pain, but to find little things like that.

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 Wreck. Woohoo! What about you, Heather?

You can find me on Twitter and everywhere as

hockey prime You can follow 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 Beatles Diva on Twitter or

just Google Beatles Diva Beatles like the band

not the bug I am at see if you and Mike you can

follow at the pull bag on Twitter find us on

Facebook Go to geek cast radio comm check out

all the other podcasts that we do Coming up next

time here in autobot Lee 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 in 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 into 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, Linus Prime!

Optimus! Yeah! No! Really? No Prime Defense?

Come on! No Prime Defense? What? Forever! Why

the hell they have to give Optimus an ego problem

is beyond me naming the book after him. Oh, brother.

Oh, brother. Where art thou? Well, Sade named

Unicron, so are you saying that he's the equivalent

of Unicron? Well, Aleron does perceive him as

a god, which he's not. Do you realize that...

No, she's learned it better. ...till all are

one? Before that, of course, was two issues,

a two mini -series 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. It doesn't

matter what IDW writes about him. He's still

good So basically what you're saying is So basically

what you're saying is he can take as many faces

as he wants 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. Man,

I took all these notes and we never even addressed

all the real life parallels that are in that

book. What, two 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 pervading crap. a police shooting with footage

of unarmed and fleeing guy being shot in the

back. And this is before, 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. So it's, 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 world war, real world parallels. You're

right. Like I see why Marigold 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... 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 yeah, really really guess it's great It's

true. I'm not saying power of any work is usually

because there's some sort of parallel that they

can take out of it Whether it be the world real

world now or real real world later I mean there

there are some things that and so sometimes the

staying power can be both good and bad I I kind

of didn't read it too 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 didn't, it wasn't,

I guess in a sense, maybe it was a little stronger

then, but she wasn't shouting it. So it didn't

really bother me or pick me out of the story.

And you can't analyze the heck out of it. Yeah.

No. 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 freaking robots so you

know i think that's why it was done um i don't

necessarily think it was overdone but i don't

know to each their own i guess yeah You've just

heard the latest episode of The Pull Bag, the

GCRN's first comic review and discussion podcast.

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