This issue was pretty good, though I feel the reversal on Dominus' fate hampered it a bit. Some plots get going, some finally get closure, then OOPS! Still a mystery! Hahahaa... eehh.
And it does sorta feel like the preview spoiled the best parts (which had little to do with the rest of the issue, incidentally)

But everything else =  
Love the Necrobot's space cape and the flowers for everyone a bot killed.

Swerve's recap sure sounded like it assumed I passed on the previous issue. Which I did.

So who's who here?

Windblade and Sky-Byte are obvious, Impactor's conveniently labeled (no "of ____" though?). Pretty sure that's Armada Thrust below Sky-Byte. Dunno about the rest.



Also:

 

I assume the Megatron that died was the one the Rewind killed.

 

But no Megatron died. The hologram on his plinth is still up.

 

I know Mairghread thinks the colonies might have ways of reproducing, and there's the billion dormant sparks. I'm assuming that Windblade's included because she's now on Cybertron and since he has access to public records...

 

This was solid, it wasn't as content packed as other issues but it worked with some plot-points nicely.

 

I did like this issue better than the last 3. I will leave the comedy and art debates up to you all.
I am curious though if you were on a planet with a complete list of everyone alive or otherwise, first, would you not download the list? Valuable intel on enemies that you want to be sure are dead, like I don't know... OVERLORD. Remember how he killed Pipes and REWIND? That's right Chromedome, look him up.
Also that wealth of information should contain a list of the Knights (if they are cybertronian) and also a bunch of old timers who could help them. In fact, this place could be the single most important place in the universe for all Cybertronians and they just went, "Big gulps huh? Well see you later!"

I did like the cameos, and I did like the concept. Megatron is totally going to bring back Bumblebee. In his mind that will be recompense.
He has a briefcase, and now the flowers, and will somehow pluck the essense of Bee. He also has an Autobot revival pod.
Also if he didn't get on board the Rodpod at the end, he is now in a place where he has direct access to the entirety of the universe. He may try to plan his reconciliation from there.
More than likely though he got back on board.

Oh and if he didn't get back on the LL, the DJD will be super pissed.

 

Why should it? Censere's not omniscient, and he never met the Knights of Cybertron before; how would he know who any of them are, or where they are?

 

You know an issue's up to par when the biggest nitpicks are Rodimus shaking his booty and discontinuity over where a name is placed. (

Spoiler

three names from the bottom yet Dominus Ambus is clearly written at the bottom

) That last shot, pretty damn good.

I'm only sad that we're saying goodbye to the "necrobot" so soon, and that he was as mundanely predictable as he was. (And not linked to the institutes like I thought given his design. I guess we're well and done with that plot thread)

This felt like a much better "taking a break" issue than that ridiculous two-parter or Swearth.

You raise a good point, but given the characters who came along (bar one) I can imagine that they simply did not think of it. Both Chromedome and Rewind were understandably over-emotional.

That said, Perceptor was there, and that's just the kind of thing he'd think of. Really all they had to do was have Necrobot say "no, that's not why I do this" and lock them out of his database, but you're right that someone should've said something.

 

It's a Dylan Thomas quote.

"Do not go gentle into that good night
Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

Makes sense that Roberts would use it here, and for the finale, because it fits the story pretty well.

 

You are right he is not omnicent. But that computer database has a list of all cybertronians. This is because they are finite. Now the Knights may be on that monolith, but still all they had to do is look over the list and find some mythological names or old names they don't recognize.

 

Of all Cybertronians Censere knows of, yes. He's never met the Knights or been to Cyberutopia--the exact opposite is stated--so how would he know their names to put on the list? He's the one who wrote up that list himself, not some omnipotent force. Cybertronians are finite, yeah, but that doesn't change the fact that the Knights have been missing since before the 13 tribes and it's not suggested at all that Censere knows who they are or where to find them.

 

Great issue. The art wasn't as good as the DJD spotlight, but it only really took away from the punch of two pages (the page with the "boring planet" exchange and the last page where Megatron looks like he's standing on rather than ankle-deep in the flowers.

Speaking of the flowers, the blue makes for a striking contrast to the seas of red poppies that Europe remembers their Great War's casualties with.

There's enough room off the edge for "Impactor of Vos" or, more likely considering his relationship with Megatron, "Impactor of Tarn."

 

I had first thought that the title referred more literally to the crew of to the ship itself, like a breaking of the Fellowship or some great loss. But knowing now that it's an offhand expression for the end of days, that sets the stage a lot more for the DJD's assault.

 

Oh, nice one! Red for blood, blue/purple for energon.

 

That last page. What it represents, how it felt looking at it juxtaposed with both the ease in which Megatron is assimilating himself into the crew and more obviously the faction symbol at the bottom (and its potential implications) genuinely unnerved me. What was it Prime said in Chaos Theory ? 'Never underestimate the vanity of tyrants.'

Likely wrong. But I saw the worst of what that page could mean and yeah, unsettling.



Art was good. Too manga esque on the whole though . Noses vanishing, stupidly OTT mouths but overall a good show.

 

symbolism!!

 

Man...I don't know...

I want to like this issue, but there's so many things I hate about it. The Necrobot didn't even seem like a big deal, we got basically his entire backstory, purpose, goal, even his name. It really didn't feel like the conclusion to some prevalent mystery. It felt forced.

Same thing goes for Dominus' story. "Oh, he's dead. BUT WAIT!!! HE MIGHT BE ALIVE!!!". Yeah, we knew that. We're back to square one. Nothing changed.

You know what? Add Agent 113 to that list. "Oh, he's dead." Gee, great. Nice. Good job patching up that plot with masking tape and Elmer's glue.

Some of the most cringeworthy dialogue was uttered in this issue.

- "She says I can call her Lotty!"
- A single question mark in a word bubble like this is a Garfield comic.
- "Engage stealth mode."
- "Rewind, my love..." (Jesus H. Christ...)
- "Oh my god! Oh my god!"

It's just.. all of it...



Sakimoto's art seems to have significantly worsened since he did the DJD issue. Characters without faces, characters with faces, albeit the same one as the person next to them, characters getting so close they're almost kissing, characters doing anime-esque poses (Rodimus on the tombstone, Rewind, both talking to Minimus and when he hugs Nightbeat, Mainframe waving his hand through the hologram), it's all just...bad.

I'll be honest: S2 hasn't been as good as S1 was. Bringing in an alternate version of Rewind was a big mistake. It's never really felt as exciting as the S1 stuff. Delphi, Shadowplay, the Scavengers fighting the DJD, Overload, Tyrest, all of that was friggin' gold, and was enhanced further by good character interactions and development. Everything was "big", with high stakes and personal investments. With S2 we don't have that good balance. Other than the time travel stuff, nothing has been as big, so we're just left with too much of a focus on the inter-personal stuff. Which Roberts does well, but isn't the sole reason I liked MTMTE S1. Roberts needs to understand that for everyone who is interested in the inter-personal stuff, there's someone who wants all the action and high-octane derring-do from S1. And it's tragic that he's neglecting that aspect of the series, because he was pretty good at it.

I think I'm done with MTMTE for now. I'll probably give the upcoming Scavenger issue a look, but I'm really not looking forward to anything else.

 

Slightly annoyed by the insane amount of tech the Necrobot apparently has to do his job -quantum teleportation to instantly find any dying Cybertronian and get there? Wow. Being able to capture spark residue and link it to the person responsible for their death - not the actual killer, but even the person who gave the order where applicable? Holy schmoly. Living on an idyllic planet without any defenses that yet somehow still stands, even if it's probably of interest to basically anyone? Uh, okay..

As somebody mentioned earlier, there's worldbuilding that makes the universe seem big, but this issue definitely made it all seem very small. Still, I kind of expected this to happen with the Necrobot, as the answers to the MTMTE mysteries always end up being relatively mundane.   Necrobot seems like a nice guy too, haha.


All in all, quite a touching issue, and thankfully I enjoyed it a LOT more than the last three. Not among the top favorite but I'd have no trouble accepting the quality of this issue as 'the standard'.  


Oh, one last thing: I guess the bots working at the Institute don't tie into the Necrobot thing after all? I remember panels from Shadowplay where they seemed eerily similar.

 

Yeah, this really bugs me about the art. All the gapping mouths. It's like everyone's always shouting.

TBF, that seems like more of the tedious, hobbyist aspect of things. He doesn't do that immediately, it takes time and research. He's been doing this for millions of years and it's the one and only thing he does. Space-googling "who ordered the attack of Polyhex" or reading through a few military reports doesn't seem that outlandish when he has, quite literally, all the free time in the world.

They definitley made it sem like his work is far more... coincidental than it is given his explanations. Really, this actually solves a problem with quantum engines I had: with such boundless power to do so much, how is it just limited to spaceship engines? It isn't, as NecroCensorship here has repurposed it for the much more practical purpose of teleportation. Limited teleportation with a fixed departing location at that, not Skywarp-style teleporting with galactic range.