Simon Furman November Q&A

Shane's work in AHM is so much more appealing to me than the crap that Furman puts out. Furman is a has-been and I'm tired of him trying to dominate how the various Transformers-verses evolve. Thank god for Shane.

On its own, AHM isn't the worst thing I've ever seen - it's just incredibly frustrating to see the slash-and-burn approach to continuity, particularly one I was enjoying. If it were an alternate universe story, I would have enjoyed it well enough.

I understand that Furman's style is not to your taste, but do you honestly think that McCarthy's stuff is good, or is it just closer to the way you like to see TFs portrayed? IMO it's passable at best, and only because people are so involved with the characters already that they can sort of fill in the blanks.

This, ftw.

Please.

If you like it, great. Personally, for me, it's...


Seriously, if something interesting doesn't happen soon, I'm dropping it, in the middle of an arc or not. And is Shane is writing whatever comes next, I'll skip it.

I very much hope they put Simon back in charge.

Wow. While I have to applaud the man's candor, this Q&A really just confirms how badly Furman was screwing the pooch (figuratively) on his IDW continuity, and let it totally get away from him.

Unfortunately, Furman was treating it like a series he would confidently be writing into perpetuity... that is to say, taking his sweet time developing his storyline, making it ever more convoluted, pretentious and labyrinthine, when he should have been paying more attention to consistency and character development.

In the early days, I would have been counted as one of INFILTRATION's more ardent supporters, but I became steadily more disenchanted with Furman's writing.

By contrast, I am truly amazed at how much my impressions of ALL HAIL MEGATRON have steadily improved with every issue. The first issue was awful, the second passable, and it's recovered in leaps since then. I don't think I've ever reversed my opinion on something so quickly or so radically before, but Shane's treatment of character, mood and detail have impressed me quite a bit.

It bugs me that continuity between Furman and McCarthy's runs wasn't more carefully observed, and I confess that I really did like the basic setting of Infiltration, but at the moment, I'm happy to see where Shane takes this. It's like watching a good TF writer blossom in front of you, and it's kind of exciting.

I do really miss EJ Su though.

zmog

Did you even read the interview?
Or did you just pop in to flame Furman?

I don't mind you liking AHM, but wait until it's relevant to post.
Although I think he may have made a mistake in thinking IDW was his forever, thus maybe planning his story too far ahead, instead of working on each of his mini-series being self-contained, I don't think his story ever crossed the line between 'convoluted' and 'multi-faceted'.
This may just be you wanting a change, which is perfectly understandable, and may not be that Furman is bad.
I just find AHM, with the Autobot 'characterisation', getting increasingly tacky and silly. The characters still feel very flat for me.
I'm kinda miffed that the galactic war with the Decepticons was kinda forgotten during Devastation. Bring back Infiltration units!!!
Who doesn't...
Out of curiosity, why don't you sig this?

sadly my view is like most peoples. I would hope that IDW retroactively claim that AHM is a different continuity. It just doesn't fit with Simon's established work and obviously no effort was made on the contrary. If AHM works for IDW, fine. Pursue it. but not under some ridiculous facade that it is somehow connected with previous IDW fare. Simon may have made the mistake of planning his stories into perpetuity but at least i knew that i enjoyed them. I don't even know how AHM is gonna turn out, with the basic premise as some have pointed out (that somehow claiming Manhattan is claiming the galaxy) is ridiculous. Here's to hoping for Maximum Dinobots and The 13 bringing back the old IDW-verse into form.

AMH isn't bad... isn't that bad anyway but they should have just said from the get go its a reboot, diffrent universe, what ever as frankly they have just made a mess trying so half arse to tie it to the orginal IDW universe.

Well.... I was so disappointed with AHM that I stopped part way through the series. I'm very disappointed that he's not allowed to continue what he started.

If it turns out to be an alternate reality and Furman's stuff is intact, then all is forgiven...

I totally disagree. Crap? I don't think so.

And i don't think Shane's work is crap, it's just different so i don't hate on any of the guys that are working so hard to make a good comic.


Sorry I'm not too updated on TF universe stuff but I always thought AHM was a different universe thing. But now that i know it isn't... everything is so confusing. And the fact that earth is practically "losing" makes me feel a bit weird that it's supposed to tie in with everything. I always thought in a general sense that the Autobots were steadily keeping control. The AHM thing is super radical but still pretty cool