And this issue shows why turning this series in an Optimus Prime-focused series was a bad idea. Transformers always work better as a group, playing off each other, moving from one character to the next. More Than meets The Eye suffered when it became too focused on Megatron and this book is best when it ISN'T just about Optimus dealing with the moronic whiny Torchbearers.
Only got around to this and while I don't care for Sideswipe I'd only be so lucky if people went out of their way to do something nice like that for me when I was dying. It really isn't. Even just this last issue was pretty much about Jazz and everyone reacting to what he was doing. Similarly so when the Cybertron ongoing comic was called "Windblade" where it wasn't really just about Windblade as much as it was about Starscream, and to a lesser extent, Chromia. If doing a last act of kindness for your best friend who has no hope of recovering is pointless then I agree that you completely miss the point.
"Optimus Prime" is just a rebrand and probably a rather misleading one. I don't see any shift in focus in writing to this single character... And it's only for the best. I don't think the series focused mainly on OP could work.
Hell, the first 5 issues were each from a different character's perspective; only the 6th was actually from Optimus's.
Oh Gawd this one hit me harder than I thought it would. Give us hope and then pull the rug from under our feet.
I've seen this trick played before in an issue of the Flash, which doesn't surprise me given how many DC-inspired moments I see in a typical Barber script. It was still a strong issue. Sideswipe is my favorite character, but I don't think he went out like a punk at all. He saved Alpha Trion, he survived (initially anyway) multiple grenade explosions and a point blank shot to the head before enduring for days and days in a coma. Ultimately, though, this is the story of a soldier who finally learned it was OK stop fighting. No, the biggest disappointment wasn't his death, it was that Barber never gave him enough focus for the death to mean anything beyond what is contained in this single issue. His friendship with Arcee never even existed on the page until after he was in a coma. Beyond one conversation and a few shared battle panels, anyway. Still, if Barber had put in the work, it would have paid off mightily here. 8/10.
Trite. I'm sorry, i'm not 18 anymore. I've read and watched this story about 40 times by now in various books, stories, movies... Do something original Barber.
Sorry, but this comes nowhere near All Hail Megatron. It was well written though. The content of the dream was actually pretty good. But the whole: "Aah, it was all a dream and in reality he died." isn't the most original or crafty idea to use.
Rather. Are you really trying to pretend the OP comic can hold a candle to one of the handfull of good TF fictions IDW has produced by copy/pasting some dumb gif? I guess that's the last resort if you can't really defend your stance.
I enjoyed it. Predictable? Hardly, exept for the end when the Autobots crashed the party to saved the day. Boring? It had lots of content and plottwists, a fair amount of jokes. Generic? It was very Hollywood yes. But that aspect of it didn't bother me.
Yeah, AHM put me off of IDW for a long time, it was just such hackneyed writing. I didn't pick up a Transformers comic book again until I heard about Last Stand of the Wreckers in 2011. Optimus isn't the best series IDW's put out in their history (I'd say Roche's Wreckers series, the first season of MTMTE, and the Spotlights are my favorites) but with TAAO ending and The Lost Light...doing what it's doing...Optimus is about the best thing we have right now, in terms of art quality and interesting writing, though the ROM crossover is going interesting places.
I don't think a "stance" has to be provided. One persons opinion is AHM was good. Other opinions (mine included here) is that it was not. Moving on!