Ever since the release of "The Death of Optimus Prime", the IDW-verse as really exploded thanks to the combined efforts of John Barber and James Roberts. And now with 2 ongoing series currently going and with Windblade's unexpectedly high sales things just seem to be getting better.

Is this the "golden age" of transformers comics?

P.S. this idea came from a comment made on my "Favorite IDW Artist" thread, so thanks to HeroJr, for making that comment.

 

It's certainly the most interesting time to be a Transformers Comics fan, that's for sure. It's a shining beacon in what's otherwise a quite disappointing media-side of the franchise (well, in my personal opinion anyway. Not a big fan of the Bay films and I ended up hating Prime)

 

Obvi.

Frankly it's probably the Golden Age of toys too, unless you prefer the RotF/Animated/Universe trifecta of 2008-2009.

 

Yes

I do prefer the latter, but these new releases are among the best of lines too.

 

I feel that the comics should have never ceased. Much like Superman/ Batman I think Transformers are in their silver age with some if the best content ever seen in the media. But I still would reserve the term "golden age" for the 80's stuff and G1. But we definitely have a renaissance of the brand going on.

 

DoOP, RID and MTMTE were so good, I started buying comics again after 20 years off of collecting/reading.

 

yes.

not so sure about the toys though, the way hasbro is forcing economy friendly production and the current shell former releases worries me. i hope this doesn't affect the generations line too much.

 

For now yes...

 

It really is the best it ever has been.

Even a brutal comic crossover and rushed toy tie in stuff couldn't kill it as the writers had enough talent to just about keep its head above water in those tough times and give dark cybertron a stunning ending. After surviving that I can't see any obvious reason why it should end any time soon.

 

My only concern is that i'm sure with this kind of publicity, James and John might move on soon which may result in the next writer having to fill some pretty big shoes :<

 

I don't know about that but MTMTE is the best TF comic maybe ever.

 

Yes.

Yes, it is.

 

Absolutely. With Prime done and AoE out this summer, we might have a pretty solid stretch lined up.

 

Golden Age in comic book terms doesn't mean when something is at it's best. It simply means the very first period inn which most of the original ideas and concepts for what would later become iconic characters and concept originated.

So Marvel is the true Golden Age of Transformers.

 

So this is more like the silver age, no?

But yes, TF comics are most definitely at their best at present.

 

I don't see what's so great about them.

Don't get me wrong, there is a lot to like in the current ongoings. But for every one thing they do that seems great and original, it seems like they do five things that are boring and unimaginative.

I think comics in general have progressed and are more sophisticated than they were in the 1980s. But I don't think the TF comics are any great improvement over Marvel UK. For all the praise Roberts gets, he just seems like a Furman 2.0 to me.

And for as many serious complaints as I had with Budiansky's original Marvel run being dry and boring, at least he made an actual effort to have the Cybertronians seem alien. The current IDW writers make them too human. It really bugs me because it's so lazy and unimaginative.

And for as many complaints as everyone had with Dreamwave and their scumbag boss, at least the DW artists made an actual effort to have the characters look like Transformers. But now? It seems like we're back to the Wildman School of people wearing robot suits again, rather than being robots.


Now, I DID love the Death of Optimus issue, and both the RiD & MTMtE ongoings got off to great starts. But now I'm starting to lose interest again. People keep talking about how great they are, but part of me wonders if they are trying to convince themselves. For me, I feel let down by the current comics just as often as I did before at previous publishers.

And again, I really hate how human/not-alien the characters are presented. Like when they'll be sitting around a bar. In chairs. Drinking out of glasses. with a canvas banner hung up over the bar. ARE THESE REALLY ALIEN ROBOTS OR ARE THEY JUST SOME HUMAN COSPLAYERS HANGING OUT IN THE HOTEL BAR AT SOME DUMB COMIC CON?!

The repeated complete lack of imagination really pulls me out of enjoying the comics. Not all the time, but often.

I also don't like the way most of the current artists portray Cybertron. A ball of rock with a few metal cities scattered around. Really? That's what Cybertron is now? All rock?

 

"People wearing robot suits"? I'm genuinely not sure where you're even getting that from, because all the current artists have everyone very robotic-looking, with joints and inhuman proportions and all that.

And I never understood why the concept of a bar and glasses to drink from are "too human"? Transformers are social beings that need to consume fuel to live. Why would they NOT have designated places where they can be social while refueling? Why would they NOT have glasses to drink from if a huge chunk of them have mouths (or hidden intakes that they insert a straw into to drink said fuel)?

When you have a bipedal lifeform that shares many physical traits with humans from the get-go, it stands to reason that there's going to be some similarities regarding how they do things.

The trouble with taking out all or most of the traits that make Transformers similar to humans is that you lose empathy with them along the way at a character level. I can guarantee you that the nitpicky "too human" stuff people usually complain about like using bars/getting drunk, having faces with human expression, having emotion/emotional attachments to others (yes, I've seriously heard people complaining about this), joking with one another, etc. all adds to most readers being able to get attached to these characters. Without them, we'd have a seriously boring series on our hands and I can bet the comics wouldn't be nearly as popular without them.

Human writers will never be able to create TF characters that are alien enough to meet these demands AND gain an audience as big as we have now. And really? Transformers will never be hard sci-fi. The building blocks of the fiction simply don't allow it. In reality, these are characters based off a 80s transforming robot toyline where the robots are very human-like in their bipedal, humanoid design. While the fiction can build off that to allow for non-human traits and cultures, some things are going to stay the same no matter what or else it all falls apart and becomes a boring, standard mecha franchise that countless of other franchises have already done better.

Also, Cybertron looks that way because everything on the planet, bar the few Cybertronian settlements, was completely wiped out. I'm...not sure what you expected other than a wasteland of rocks and scrapmetal?

 

Some similarities are fine, but do they have to be identical? It's so cheap and lazy. Just a heads up, but the Transformers have been bipedal robots since 1984. But even in the 1980s cartoon, they were shown consuming fuel/food in a more unique way. We've moved backwards.

And why do they have to be social in a completely identical way to humans? These are robots who change shape. The lack of imagination being used is freaking depressing.

I don't need hard SF. I don't expect hard SF. But I want more than this. Again, even Budiansky put more effort into presenting Cybertronians as a separate alien culture rather than as humans in robot suits. Hell, even the Bay movies do, and it really pains me to be able to say that.

Even in Furman's War Within at Dreamwave, I feel like the Cybertronian world and culture was presented in a more thought-out way.

Why rocks at all? Since when is Cybertron made of rock? Scrap metal is fine. But why rocks?