Suggestions about IDW mini-series

Discussion in 'Transformers Comics Discussion' started by ThrustJan, Aug 15, 2012.

  1. ThrustJan

    ThrustJan Well-Known Member

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    I'm beginning to buy some IDW comics in regular way and within few weeks I'll regurlarly receive from my comic shop MTMTE series, which is considered one of the best.

    At the moment I want to buy and read also the books about Marvel and some of the IDW mini series and I' interested on these

    1)Megatron origin(background seems interesting)
    2)Hearts of steel(I love steampunk a lot)
    3)All hail Megatron

    In your opinion,are all of these volumes worthy buying?Please no spoiler..
    Then,there are other IDW mini-series volumes about G1 characters that you suggest me?
     
  2. tusko

    tusko Well-Known Member

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    Last stand of the Wreckers.

    Then look here. No promises about spoilers though.
     
  3. Jaicen

    Jaicen Well-Known Member

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    I haven't read the three that you're referring to, however I would recommend picking up the complete Infiltration, Escalation etc... Series, along with the spotlight issues. They're a good read, particularly in TPB.
    All Hail... is a bit of a blind alley in terms of ongoing continuity.

    Definitely pick up Last Stand of the Wreckers though, it's awesome. If you like MTMTE, it's a must buy. I'd recommend jumping into RID too, it's complements MTMTE really nicely.
     
  4. Matty

    Matty @StayingInTheBox Veteran

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    I'd personally say read the entire IDW run. It's got its ups and downs, but when I read them I had a blast doing so. If you're only wanting to read little tidbits ... here's my advice.

    First, read LAST STAND OF THE WRECKERS. Seriously.

    1) It's okay ... 6/10
    2) If you're into steampunk you'll like it, but don't expect a terrific story ... 5/10
    3) Starts out strong and then slowly declines ... 7/10
     
  5. ThrustJan

    ThrustJan Well-Known Member

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    All right,I've added to my list as first.


    Good,for HoS I didn't pretend a masterpiece,just a decent story,I was more intrigued by robot design and atmosphere the fact is I had found few opinions and discussions about it..for "Megatron origin" and "All hail Megatron"there are more news.

    Ok,for other comics info I'll search on iDW topic.
     
  6. Obsidian X

    Obsidian X Dork of the moon

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    So basically you want to read the shittiest G1 Transformers titles IDW have produced? :lol 

    Not that I regret buying them or anything, I want to have as much Transformer fiction as possible but those 3 are not very enjoyable imo.

    So you are buying MTMTE.. Last stand of the wreckers is my absolute favorite piece of Transformer fiction ever and compliments that well (I'd get the hard cover if I were you, for the addtional awesomeness).

    Also the early Furman stuff is really great (in my opinion), Infiltration, Stormbringer, Escalation, Devestation, Revelation, Maximum Dinobots, Spotlight v.1, Spotlight v.2, Spotligth v.3.

    Though I didn't enjoy Mike Costas work I did find most of the stuff in volume 5 and 6 of that (Chaos theory and Police action) pretty entertaining, though I do not know how enjoyable those stories are without reading the previous ongoing volumes and accompanying miniseries. Though Roberts set up some stuff for MTMTE in 2 issues that are included in Chaos Theory so that might be something worth checking up on.
     
  7. Maverick Hunter Christian

    Maverick Hunter Christian Choke on that, causality!

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    Let's be fair now. He could've been expressing interest in Heart of Darkness and the Bumblebee mini. ;) 
     
  8. SuzyPrime

    SuzyPrime The friendly lurker

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    1) On the overall quality scale (1 being least and 5 being best), I'd rate this book as "3". Milne isn't my favorite artist, but he has some enjoyable highlights in this book. Good world building. It lacks cleverness. IMO, the story is too mundane to explain how Megs blossomed into the tyrannical megalomaniac we know and love to hate.

    2) Haven't read it, but I like the idea of dropping TFs into historical fiction.

    3) Overall rating on the series is "2.5". I won't spoil anything for you, but the author McCarthy writes himself into corners and then uses unsatisfying cheats to escape, including one decision near the end of the book that was unnecessarily brutal, IMO. I would describe his writing as "unoriginal" in that he uses a lot of situations and plot devices that have come before. I did enjoy the "coda" stories at the end of the series, though.
     
  9. Murasame

    Murasame 村雨

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    All comics ending with -ion in their names and the Spotlights. Check TFWiki for correct reading order.
     
  10. Jaicen

    Jaicen Well-Known Member

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    Having given this some thought, I would highly recommend tracking down the spotlight issues and reading them in the correct order within the ~ation series.
    I read the main series mostly on its own, then went back for the spotlights, which is a mistake really. They should be taken all together.
     
  11. Obsidian X

    Obsidian X Dork of the moon

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    Oh yeah, those two are so bad my mind blanks them out sometimes.
     
  12. Rattrap Primal

    Rattrap Primal Geek Overlord, Botbot Collector

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    Maximum Dinbots, which concluded Furman's regular run

    Last Stand of the Wreckers , a hyperviolent tale using fringe characters
     
  13. mirage4lifeyo

    mirage4lifeyo Well-Known Member

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    I actually think that you will enjoy All Hail Megatron a lot MORE by reading it early on, because the main gripe about it from hardcore followers of the IDW series was that it didn't seem to fit into the continuity at all even though it claimed not to be a reboot. If you come into it cold just accepting the AHM series for what it is and thinking of it only as its own continuity with no knowledge of all the retcons and bludgeoning of earlier continuities it was doing, you will have a better time with it. I personally found some of the character developments and conversations of certain characters like Ironhide, Kup, Sunstreaker, Thundercracker, Jazz to be quite enjoyable but for a bulk of fans that was kinda overwhelmed by their rage over the previous Simon Furman continuity being more or less swept under the rug. As a stand alone, I feel like AHM has a really intriguing middle section that is fun...but it starts very slowly and its ending feels very rushed. Still, for me at least, the pretty good middle section and outstanding artwork are enough to keep it from being in the "OMG this is the worstest thing evar!" camp that many fans put it in.

    And frankly while Simon Furman writes great interlinking plots and stories, he is pretty weak at individual characterization of characters. When Furman is writing lines for, say, Thundercracker and Skywarp, you may as well flip a coin on who says what cuz you will NOT be able to distinguish one's personality from the other. In All Hail Megatron, the action is slower and the plot is disjointed, but the one nice thing McCarthy does is stick pretty close to the toy tech specs and let individual personalities for a lot of the Transformers really start to shine through a bit. When McCarthy Skywarp talks to McCarthy Thundercracker, it becomes an intriguing exchange between two very different and very well defined personalities. Frankly I like that part and wish Furman were stronger at it.
     
  14. Jaicen

    Jaicen Well-Known Member

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    Thy last part is interesting. I just noticed that when starting to read mtmte. If you flip back to the ation series, or even rid its very evident.
     
  15. mirage4lifeyo

    mirage4lifeyo Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, Furman sometimes gives strong characterizations when he decides to go for it (Ratchet in the "ation" series has a pretty cool personality with some depth to it) but his strength is clearly more in constructing interesting plots and long, interlinking epics and story arcs. To me he's kind of a comic book version of George Lucas - when it comes to putting together epic, huge adventures that are vividly imagined and gripping he's quite strong. But when it comes to the issue of writing individual dialogue that makes unique characters and giving them depth and internal conflicts that don't come off as cheesy or cliched...well, in that department, as with George Lucas, he could probably use some help. Heck, he's even similar to Lucas in terms of having different characters rehash the same lines over and over in different situations.
     
  16. Jaicen

    Jaicen Well-Known Member

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    Damn, it's so obvious now someone has pointed it out.
    Furman did do well with the early UK stuff, giving Magnus etc really great strong characters. Did it go wrong when he had to start re-imagining established characters?
     
  17. mirage4lifeyo

    mirage4lifeyo Well-Known Member

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    I think there again, and this is just one person's opinion, that even at that stage he was OK at characterizing a couple particular lead characters who were the epicenter and focus of whatever story arc he was on. For example Ultra Magnus in "Target: 2006" as you mention (or Galvatron, the other "lead" character in that arc). But where other writers like James Roberts and to some extent McCarthy in AHM pass him is on the giving characterization and personalities to other, non-lead characters. And Target: 2006 is a perfect example in the UK comics that Furman wrote. In that story arc, aside from Ultra Magnus you had this HUGE ensemble cast of Autobots - you had Jazz, Hound, Smokescreen, Ironhide, Tracks, Grapple, Bumblebee etc all running around. And if you read it while paying attention to each of those characters' dialogues you notice there's, well, zero characterization whatsoever. Jazz has a lot of lines in that arc as a hostage of Galvatron and there is absolutely NOTHING about anything he says that distinguishes him as Jazz. Ditto Hound - you could swap him out for literally any other character and have that character utter the exact same lines and you'd never notice.

    That's kinda the difference. When you are reading a James Roberts story like in MTME, if a character like Swerve or Skids or Rung so much as utters just one line in a comic, that line is gonna be just *dripping* with distinctive personality and characterization and delivered in such a way that only that particular Transformer could have said it. Look how incredibly distinctive Whirl is in MTME and compare that to Whirl in Furman's "Target: 2006" where you really can't tell him or any of the other Wreckers apart from each other personality or dialogue-wise.

    With Furman, the non-lead characters' dialogue tends to just be there to serve the purpose of moving the story and plot line along - and mind you, that's not a completely bad thing because the story and plot line that Furman is moving along for you is usually a pretty darn awesome one especially in those UK comics.