Felt the pacing of this issue was much better, especially compared to Part 1 of Crucible. The only thing that felt a bit rushed was the Scorponok/Sunder plan, and Scorpy's death. But, since we (kinda) got to see him and Rodimus duke it out one more time (even if it was one sided), I can live with how he went out.

Going to be waiting over the next few issues to see why the Magnificence chose Rodimus, Rung, Ratchet, and Tailgate to be the representatives. Rodimus makes sense because of all the Chosen One stuff from other G1 stuff, and Rung makes sense because of his alt mode, but Ratchet and Tailgate? Seems odd.

I wonder if the GA secretly had his plants in the Black Block Consortia before they broke off from the Galactic Council? Wouldn't be surprised if that was the case, even if the dialogue doesn't really suggest it.

Now The Warren makes sense to me narratively. At first, it just seemed like an excuse for Roberts to have Rodimus and Co. "die" in space and reach Cyberutopia/Mederi faster. But the time travel aspect never made sense. Why would it matter if the Mutineers reached Cyberutopia/Mederi before the Lost Light even left? But now it makes sense, considering what the Grand Architect says. So yay.

Now we know what Necroworld was a shell for. Now just to figure out what the GA was doing with Luna 1...

I can't even imagine the significance of Rung verbally making the transformation sound effect, but I'd imagine it'll come back in some way... right?

As for "The Beast", I can see it going 50/50 as to whether Megs is actually it. I'd prefer it if he wasn't (and the fusion cannon and hidden faction symbol scream red herring to me), but on the other hand, he did kill Billions (with a capital "B") of people, so if anything, "Beast" is an understatement, and I can live with it if it is him.

So, here's my theory for the identity of the GA (who I think is just possessing Pharma's body):
What if the GA is an Omega Guardian who failed to fully ascend like the rest of his species? And, either because of The Warren preventing him to ascend, or his failed ascension causing him to enter The Warren, he fell forwards through time to the moment when "The Beast" arrives, and then subsequently fell backwards back to his own time, thus giving him the time to prepare for its arrival. And, going back to his failure to fully ascend, that could explain why, when he recruited Scorps and Flame, he was just a big ball of energy/light; he left behind his physical body, but his spirit/energy/whatever didn't make it to the next dimension. And, wait, literally as I'm typing this, I just realized, the giant spark that Skids saw, what if that's the GA? It'd be consistent with the ball that Scorps and Flame saw. And it'd work with him possessing Pharma's body.

I don't know, now it just feels like I'm rambling, but something feels right about that...

 

A Constructed Cold?

 

No, I had that thought myself. However that opens the door to the grand architect being anybody again. At that point all roads then lead back to Shockwave. I'm joking. Sort of.

 

Honestly, Rodimus's speech was so eye rolling. Oh yeah, it's totally awesome and inspiring watching you stand around/get your asses kicked while some story contrivance or dues Machina came in and solved your problems for you. So cool.

 

So we need still need to wrap up Prowl, Fortress Maximus, and Cerebro's plotlines.

And how did Megatron knows that there would be a rift somewhere and get there as soon as possible?

 

In what way? Getaway told the GA Rodimus would show up, and Rodimus did. Was there something more significant about it?

 

I just read the issue. I enjoyed it a lot.

Need to process my thoughts. Some quick reactions:

When we see the Grand Architect's shadowed mouth, and then the blue eyes and helmet outline in the dark (during Sunder's mental attack), I really thought the Grand Architect was Brawn. Shrug.

I really want the Grand Architect to be

Spoiler

Pharma. THE Pharma. Being himself, under no influence.

I enjoy most of Roberts' resolutions to his mysteries. I didn't mind the fakeout of Glitch being Tarn. However, the Grand Architect ALREADY HAD his fakeout reveal. First, Lug thought Flame was the GA, but that was disabused literally one panel later. Then, it was strongly implied that Scorponok was the GA, but we got a twist ending where he is not. THAT'S THE FAKEOUT. If someone is using Pharma's body, or mind-controlling Pharma, or whatever, WHOEVER ENDS UP BEING THE REAL GRAND ARCHITECT will be a revelation after TWO major fakeouts. Why not three fakeouts? WHOEVER is controlling Pharma, what if THAT CHARACTER is also being controlled? I don't know what narrative loops Roberts needs to jump through, but we just don't have time for another fakeout.

My initial reaction is that Pharma being the GA is pretty darn BRILLIANT. He's a character we know. We love to hate him. I can get behind him being the big bad. I just really, really, really want it to REALLY be Pharma. I don't need a whole issue devoted to how Pharma became the Grand Architect (a la Optimus Prime's very-excellent flashback issue regarding Onyx Prime's "origins"), but all I want is SOME kind of halfway decent explanation. Unfortunately, any "halfway decent" explanation I can think of is pretty much a ripoff of that Onyx Prime plot twist.

Also: I don't think Megatron is the big enemy. I think Megatron is the cavalry.

 

When I read that, I wondered if that was the way to say the symbol phonetically like Nautica did.

 

Aye.

The red text is what the hints referred to.

18: Nexus Turns out Cyberutopia is Mederi
19: Simpatico eh... Brainstorm talked to Perceptor
20: 28 II ehhh... A fight in the fuel furnance...?
21: Thermopylae ehhhhhhhh.... something?
22: “Purple?”
23: 12, not 3
24: Back of the neck
25: The future is behind us

You know, I'm not convinced Roberts does hints all that well...

 

Put me down as one of the “there’s more to the GA reveal” crowd. Hell, I didn’t even register that Pharma’s appearance was meant to be the GA reveal – I just assumed Pharma had been with them all along and he killed Scorponok on behalf of the GA. Reading back, I definitely make the connection, but too much doesn’t add up for it to be Pharma (or at least Pharma as we know him).

Also, even if he was Pharma, Sunder’s note that he “buried his own identity” would mean that any trace of his Pharma self no longer exists, and “GA-Pharma” is essentially a new character.

Still though, I’m not convinced he’s Pharma at all – the way the reveal played out in this issue ticked all the boxes of a Roberts Herring. All the hints that might explain Pharma’s identity (the voice modulator, the “irony” comment, etc.) could be double meanings. Furthermore, I find it odd that, judging by Flame’s dialogue, the GA seems to only just now be finalizing his Pharma body, which would indeed be very strange considering he’s supposedly been around for millions of years.

Going off of this, I have a bit of a theory, and it all revolves around the events of Remain in Light (17-21), specifically Tyrest's portal to Cyberutopia and Skids's trip into it. I'm putting this in spoiler tags just because of the length, so if you open it, be ready for a lot of text:

Spoiler

Here's what we know from that story arc:

• Tyrest constructed a space bridge (or at least a device cobbled together from Titan corpses) to what he thought was Cyberutopia, which he supposedly rigged with Aequitas technology to bar anyone who wasn't "free of guilt" from entering.
• We know from Getaway that he and Skids were on Luna-1 under Prowl's orders in order to plant a thought into Tyrest's head, which was that he would resign as Chief Justice. Getaway attributes the failure of the nudge gun shot to Tyrest's madness, which supposedly allowed him to realize the thought as not his own.
• After Skids and Getaway were compromised, Skids was able to escape in a shuttle made of conveniently mode-locked Legislators, after which he homed in on his handlers (Shock and Ore) before turning the nudge gun on himself and erasing his memories. This, of course, led to Skids appearing on the planet where the Lost Light went down.
• The first (and, not counting headless Pharma, only) person to actually go through Tyrest's portal was Skids. On the other side of the portal, Skids sees five multicolored Cybertrons and encounters a spark-like entity that is clearly trying to give him a message, the most important of which being the "Coat of Arms" symbol, which he later translates phonetically to Nautica.
• Immediately after Skids leaves Cyberutopia and before the portal closes, some kind of metallic tendrils reach in to grab Pharma's body and pull it into the portal. I think we can safely assume that this was an intentional act, and that whatever the entity was knew (without actually looking) that Pharma's body was there and specifically reached in to retrieve it.

For the most part, all of these things appeared to be fairly self-explanatory from the 17-21 arc, aside from the obvious "what the heck was that Cyberutopia stuff" mystery. However, looking back, there are a few things about what we learned that don't totally add up for me:

• According to Getaway, his and Skids's mission from Prowl was to implant a thought into Tyrest's mind in order to make him resign as Chief Justice. From what we know, this mission took place sometime around Chaos, and Prowl likely assigned it around the time of LSOTW. The last time (that we know) that Tyrest was actually active was during the Aequitas trials, after which he stopped associating with the Autobots (aside from overseeing Ultra Magnus, but judging by their exchange in 19 they hadn't actually spoken in quite a while) and disappeared to Luna-1, where he seemed to exclusively focus on amending the Accords and creating the Legislators, as well as dwelling on his theories about constructed cold/forged sparks - something that no one outside of his Luna-1 cadre seemed to know about. My question is why would Prowl suddenly order that Tyrest be forced to resign when he long ago stopped acting as Chief Justice and disappeared?

• Furthermore, Tyrest set up operations on Luna-1, a moon that famously disappeared millions of years ago, long enough that some Cybertronians (Trailbreaker) considered it to be a myth. We know of at least two unsuccessful quests to find the moon, at least one of which (Dominus and Rewind) was before the war... but apparently Prowl, Skids, and Getaway were able to track Tyrest there in a matter of mere years. Putting aside the question of how Tyrest discovered Luna-1 when no one else could, how did Prowl figure out where Luna-1 was? This one could be explained away by just chalking it up to Prowl's typical intel-omniscience, but for Prowl to keep such a massive, ancient mystery (not to mention a major tactical boon) tucked away in his back pocket seems a bit fishy.
  • Further note: I had initially assumed that Prowl's visit to Luna-1 during Titans Return implied that he knew about Luna-1 all along, but that's not necessarily the case. By the time of Sentinel's machinations, Luna-1's existence was already revealed and likely went public, which is how Prowl knew to go to Luna-1 from concluding that Sentinel would go for the dead Titans. Again, if Prowl knew about Luna-1 and the dead Titans beforehand, I find it hard to believe he wouldn't make use of them.

• Notably, Tyrest never explained how he knew where Cyberutopia was, just the implication that it stemmed from his "epiphany" and Primus speaking to him (something we've all chalked up to the whole "drilling a hole directly into his brain" thing). It's evident that his portal definitely went somewhere significant, and now we know that wherever it went was certainly related to the real Cyberutopia via the multicolored Cybertrons. Even without the new confirmation that the Cyberutopia at the end of Tyrest's portal was legit (which brings up a bigger point that I'll address later), how did Tyrest know where Cyberutopia was?

• Finally, this one might be a bit on the reaching side, but I also feel the nature of Skids's escape from Luna-1 following the failed mission leaves room for scrutiny. It always struck me as strange that Skids's method of escape was a shuttle made of mode-locked Legislators, particularly that the Legislators' mode lock only deactivated after Skids warped to the LL and erased his own memory. Of course, the narrative that we've accepted still totally works, but it's worth noting that everything we actually know about Skids's participation in the mission comes from Getaway and from his point of view. While Shock and Ore were working with Prowl, again, they were only identified as handlers by Getaway - the two were, conveniently, dead before (or in Shock's case, immediately after) Skids reached the ship. Going even further, Prowl has never addressed the Luna-1 mission; he's never talked to either Skids or Getaway, and even when he was on Luna-1, he never mentioned any operation against Tyrest. So essentially, everything we know about Skids's immediate backstory regarding the mission against Tyrest comes from Getaway. Could Getaway have lied about the entire mission with Skids, or could he have been wrong?

Now, we've learned quite a bit since Remain in Light, but nothing yet has directly addressed or challenged the things we learned in that story arc, and for the most part, it's barely even been relevant until Tyrest showed up, and now with this issue, suddenly the things that occurred in Remain in Light are becoming a lot more relevant and questionable. Here's the relevant new information:

• The Warren. According to Getaway, Tyrest had initially planned to use the Warren to reach Cyberutopia, but instead settled for a space bridge as he apparently couldn't find an opening. The Warren is something that the GA and his cadre have been using and manipulating for quite a while (Scorponok and Flame used it to retrieve Grimlock from Garrus-9, for example), but Tyrest is the only one outside of the GA's group who seemed to know about it on his own. Furthermore (and likely most importantly), the Warren not only warps space, but also time.

• The Truth About Cyberutopia. There never really was a Cyberutopia, it was just a fiction created by Mederi when the Knights arrived. This, of course, raises immediate questions regarding Tyrest's portal to Cyberutopia and where it actually led to...

• The Five Cybertrons. We now know what the multicolored Cybertronian-looking planet-things were that Skids saw - copies of Cybertron created by the GA using the Necroworld as a mold in order to create the "God Gun." The other end of Tyrest's portal wasn't Cyberutopia, but in fact one of the Cybertron copies created by the GA. If even the false Cyberutopia was the target, why did the space bridge lead there, and not Mederi?

• Luna-1's Planetary Engines. This one is minor, but I don't think it's irrelevant. During Titans Return, it was revealed that Sentinel Prime/Infinitus already knew about the planetary engines on Luna-1. This is even addressed by Fort Max, who points out that Luna-1 disappeared long before the war, implying they must be as old as Sentinel himself... whom we learned had been around since the 13 Primes era. Importantly, while Sentinel was aware of the existence of the engines, he never implies that he knew their origin. Between this and the "Coat of Arms" symbol, it seems reasonable that these engines likely predate the 13 Tribes and may have been constructed by the Knights of Cybertron during their time, though what they intended to use it for is questionable, since the moon was still in orbit long after they departed.

• The Grand Architect. We now know that the symbol on the back of Luna-1 is a "Coat of Arms" for at least one faction of the Knights of Cybertron, and is presently being used by the Grand Architect to identify himself and his followers. We know that the GA has been active for a significant amount of time - we know he created Necroworld, so his plans stretch back at least as far as the 13 Tribes era, as Censere discovered the planet after the end of the First Civil War. According to the GA himself, it was "millions of years ago" when he went through the Warren to the present day to witness the "monster" that would threaten the universe. The wibble here is that time travel is clearly involved, as the Warren clearly spans both space and time. (And, as we know from Shockwave's escapades, someone from the present day going way back in time and living out another millions of years is not unheard of in this continuity.) Also, the GA has the ability to not only sense when someone is reading his mind, but to telepathically alter Sunder's mind to rob him of his mnemosurgery knowledge, which could very well imply that the GA has a great deal of mnemosurgical ability. Lastly, the GA just so happened to be on Luna-1 at the exact moment Tyrest teleported away, and was able to fully repair his mind as well as body.

SO, what am I getting at with all this? To be honest, I don't exactly have anything concrete with this theory, I'm just following the potential threads of implications by connecting dots from what we learned here to what we know. With everything I've laid out above, I have a few potential theories, or at least speculative musings, on what could be really going on:

• The Grand Architect was the "spark" that Skids encountered on the other side of Tyrest's portal, and took Pharma's body to use as a physical form. We know that the GA created Necroworld and likely created the five Cybertron replicas millions of years ago, so it's not surprising that they were formed and in position around five years before the present day when Skids witnessed them, or that the GA was present there. What is a bit surprising is that the spark appears (it's admittedly difficult to discern meaning from the images) to recognize Skids, and was possibly even expecting him. This on its own may not necessarily imply foreknowledge of the events, but the fact that Pharma's body is specifically retrieved suggests that the GA (or whomever) knew that Pharma's body was there and intentionally got it so that the GA could possess it. After all, if you're a disembodied spark-thing, a freshly-dead body is probably just what you're looking for. Furthermore, the spark communicated to Skids the "coat of arms" symbol, and it was the phonetic recital of the symbol by Nautica that got the GA's attention. Could it be that the GA intentionally gave Skids a message, and has been waiting for him (or someone) to find him?

• Tyrest's "space bridge" to Cyberutopia was actually a portal to the Warren, and sent Skids through time. According to Getaway (take a shot for that at this point), Tyrest intended to use the Warren to reach Cyberutopia, but couldn't find an opening, so he instead decided to salvage space bridge components from dead Titans. We (and Getaway) were left to assume that it was just a simple space bridge, but what if Tyrest used the space bridge tech to, perhaps unwittingly, create a new opening to the Warren? If that were the case, now the question isn't just where Skids was, but when. While it's entirely possible that there was no time travel going on with the portal, consider the possibility that the portal did take Skids to Cyberutopia... or rather Mederi, which as of this issue, has now been transported to the same area of space as the five Cybertrons (for reasons that still aren't clear). If that were true, then the point where Skids goes through the portal and interacts with the spark actually may have yet to happen. Going off of that...

• Skids's journey through the portal in MTMTE #21 was longer than we saw, and will become very important. Additionally, reading back through issue 21, we don't actually see Skids hear Rung or return through the portal from his perspective - we see him begin his conversation with the spark, then the comic cuts back to the conflict on Luna-1. It's only then that we see Rung call out for Skids, and he emerges from the portal to rejoin the fight. We assume that Skids came back through the portal after hearing Rung's cries, but Skids doesn't actually acknowledge Rung when he returns. The lack of direct chronological continuity between Skids's encounter with the spark and his emerging from the portal raises a red flag for me, suggesting that Skids did a lot more than just talk to a spark before going back through the portal. This is especially likely now that we know that the Warren (which may be what the portal actually was) moves you through time as well as space. If my previous theory is correct and Skids's experience from #21 hasn't actually happened yet, this opens up the possibility that Skids may reappear and play a key role in the finale, before likely wiping his own memory (again - poetically mirroring his first appearance) and returning to the past to continue with the rest of his life as we've seen it. The spark, then, could be someone from the present (Rung? Nautica?) attempting to communicate with Skids.

• Getaway either lied or was wrong about the Special Ops mission against Tyrest, which was really orchestrated by the Grand Architect - who was also manipulating Getaway all along. This one is, I feel, the most iffy of my theories, mostly because it would be an insane amount of recontextualizing so much of what we've seen throughout the story. Basically, Prowl never sent Getaway and Skids to snipe a thought into Tyrest's head to get him to resign. What actually happened was that Getaway and Skids were not working for Prowl, but for the Grand Architect, and the thought that they implanted in Tyrest wasn't an urge to resign as Chief Justice, but the path to Cyberutopia. Going even further, the entire context in which this assault occurred may be different, as well - instead of occurring after Tyrest's guilt-driven insanity, what if this happened before all that, and the actual thought that was sniped to Tyrest was the "voice of Primus" he thought he heard by drilling into his forehead? If the GA was the one behind Tyrest going holier-than-thou (in more ways than one), that would easily explain how he was able to repair his sanity - just by undoing the damage he caused in the first place.

• As for Getaway's role in this theory, we could say that he was in on it all along and just lied about the mission, but that doesn't really jive with his actions later on. Instead, I think it far more likely that Getaway was manipulated just as much as Tyrest and Skids, and had his memories altered to the "Special Ops mission" cover story (while Skids erased the memories himself with the nudge gun upon escape). Furthermore, his obsessive desire for Primehood and reaching Cyberutopia may have been a plant by the Grand Architect in order to play into his plans from the very beginning. (Skids may have been planned for something similar, but his self-mind wipe via nudge gun erased both his memories and the GA's tampering.)

​

• The Grand Architect is one of the Knights of Cybertron, was responsible for wiping them out at Mederi, and may or may not be a character we've seen before. This theory isn't exactly new or original, but I feel like it has a bit more credence now. We know the GA has been active since before the 13 Tribes and the First Cybertronian Civil War, which likely puts him squarely in the era of the Knights. His use of the Knights' coat of arms makes it extremely likely (if a bit too plainly obvious) that he was one, possibly the last of his kind left. At some point, he was transported through the Warren to the future and witnessed what he thought was a monster that would destroy the universe (Unicron? Megatron? Who knows?), and proceeded to spend the rest of his life planning for the monster's arrival. As for why he wasn't euthanized on Mederi like the rest of the Knights, I suspect that he was the one who led them there in the first place, knowing that there was no Cyberutopia from his Warren journey, with the intent to have them all killed off so that he would have no resistance in executing his plans.

• As for his identity beyond a Knight, his possession of Pharma's corpse may be a clue, and ties back to the concept of "body tourism" from Shadowplay that has yet to really come up again - perhaps he's been taking possession of different bodies for a very long time, keeping his true identity a secret while still interacting with Cybertronians. This may explain his support of Scorponok's experiments to create evolved Cybertronians, a process that would also give the GA access to new bodies to assume. If this was the case, the GA's "true form" could very well be the disembodied spark similar to the one that Skids encountered, which may be a strange physiology unique to the Knights.

​

Really, if there's one central theme of the IDW continuity that has been hammered in over and over again in the last few years, it's that there are no coincidences. If the events of the entire timeline weren't carefully orchestrated and plotted by Shockwave, they were still preordained by some kind of stable time loop from someone else meddling with the past (Elegant Chaos), or by someone else who has been around for a very long time with an extensive master plan calling himself something as self-aggrandizing as the Grand Architect.

 

The series is gonna do the St. Elsewhere thing and reveal at the end that it all took place in the mind of a child. That child's self-insert character is Rung.

 

I have absolutely no idea what is gonna happen next... but I'm very excited to see!

 

Now if were on the thought of who the "real" GA is (now hear me out on my crackpot theory). what if its... Violen Jiger from the zone OVA in japan. A character who is at least implied to have some sort of "magic" including resurrection (and posibly mind control). hes also seen to be very good at getting people to work for him (9 demon generals: black zarak, overlord, etc) which could explain why tyrest and skorponok are working for him. also, hes not cybertronian meaning the magnificence would reply to him. (this is my first post and is also a dumb semi-joke theory that while i do like and hope to be true, is not really meant to be taken seriously)

 

And that child...is a communist

 

Man how did I not make this connection before...

Space bridge technology warps people back and forth.
Tyrest was harvesting titans to try to make a “space bridge” to Cyberutopia.
It’s more theorized now that Tyrests “space bridge” was actually an opening to the Warren.

So is that the “mystery” of space bridge technology solved? That when, say, a titan is warping itself back and forth, it’s really accessing the Warren?

 

Prowl's plot is going to be wrapped up in Unicron most likely

 

Oh no. For those of you who like tearjerker Tumblr feel stuff, I think I've worked out what's going to happen with

Spoiler

Nautica and Skids and Nautica wiping her memories.

and maybe a different reason for #24's clue of "back of the neck", thanks to @Stryker055 .

Spoiler

Skids comes through the Warren from issue #21 as @Stryker055 theorizes.

He meets up with the LLers. He's shocked because
a) they're with Megatron
b) they're also with Misfire, his nemesis  
c) his future self isn't there ("What happened to future Skids?")
d) there's a bunch of people he doesn't recognize...like Nautica.

He introduces himself and joins them in battle. Nautica remembers Skids but not her feelings for him...

...until prolonged proximity to Skids restores them.

Meanwhile, past Skids hits it off with Nautica all over again.

Somewhere along the line they unwittingly reveal to Skids that he dies roughly a year or so after he goes back to the past. So in addition to everything else he's dealing with: he is now aware that a return to the past will mean
a) his certain death
b) the friendship he's about to have with Nautica will only last a short time before that death.

They win the fight...but now it's time for Skids to go back. So - in order to preserve the timeline..."back of the neck", just as he said to Chromedome before in the issue of MTMTE.

They wipe his memory and then send him off....back through the Warren like he came, not remembering the relationship he's about to develop with Nautica.

But Nautica has *her* memories this time around...and she mourns him a second time.

Cue the watery eyes.

 

In OP, Shockwave reveals that he actually makes the Titans move between times.
I don't know if he is using the warrens or not.

 

My best guess for Roberts' "hint" of "Thermopylae" is the Battle of Thermopylae, which was the basis of the movie 300. A seemingly infinite amount of bad guys converges onto Team Rodimus on one of the "pristine" Cybertron copies. Although Team Rodimus is only about a dozen people, they bravely stand together and prepare to fight this infinite horde of enemies.

And...I have a theory about what's really going on with the identity of The Grand Architect. No, my theory isn't perfect, but it's relatively simple, it involves (almost) no time travel, it preserves much of the impact of the reveal of

Spoiler

Pharma

being the Grand Architect, and we don't need too many narrative gymnastics. My theory is:

Spoiler

Flame is the Grand Architect. He's essentially Liam Neeson's "Ducard" character to Pharma's "Ra's Al Ghul."

Flame was already a big-time war criminal way back at the beginning of the war. At the time, Flame's worst enemy was undoubtedly Megatron. And, considering what we've heard about things like the Simanzi Massacre, early-war Megatron was an absolute terror. Through some time-travel mumbo jumbo or perhaps honest-to-goodness "visions" (hey, Optimus Prime has visions all the darn time, and Drift had a vision in LL #1), Flame became absolutely certain that, one day, Megatron is going to emerge from a huge portal, and Megatron will be bringing thousands of gun-shaped battleships. To an Autobot who's currently in a bloody war against Megatron, this vision would undoubtedly be absolutely terrifying.

Thus, Flame started to prepare, confront, and repel what seemed, to him, to be Megatron's grand plan to conquer the universe ~7 million years in the future. This is when he started the "Grand Architect" long scheme. Maybe Flame started off actually doing everything himself, but as time went on, he let other characters play the role of the "Grand Architect," essentially hamming it up as the big bad, while Flame was the REAL brains behind the organization. It's possible that whoever is playing the Grand Architect doesn't even know Flame is the brains behind the operation.

Flame's scheme hit a snag when he was imprisoned in Garrus 9, but after the events of LSotW, Flame could resume his "Grand Architect" scheme once again. During Flame's imprisonment, the "Grand Architect" plan was basically unattended, which explains Worldweepers being left alone and neglected for millions of years while the contents basically rotted.

When the Grand Architect wanted to eliminate all the blacksmiths in LL #9, Flame was leading the raid party, he was giving the orders, and he was very knowledgeable about the Grand Architect's plan. In Issue #21, perhaps Flame realized the Grand Architect finally needed to make an appearance "in the flesh," so he repaired Pharma and basically sold him on being the latest figurehead using some variation of, "Hey, want to boss around Tyrest and kill a lot of people?" Even better, maybe Pharma doesn't even know Flame is the Grand Architect. Flame could have just donned the "bright blue light" persona and told Pharma to play the role of the GA and let Flame handle things.

With Flame as the GA, it would explain why he isn't familiar, at all, with the crew of the Lost Light. When Pharma says "hold fire" to the Black Block Consortia, Flame is looming in the background, literally looking over Pharma's shoulder. Flame was wise to make Pharma play the role of the GA, because Pharma was able to "take the bullet," so to speak, of Sunder's psychic attack. Sunder's psychic powers couldn't figure out any more than what Flame told Pharma: there's a huge enemy, he's about to arrive, we're not ready, etc.

When Pharma actually shows up, he doesn't say he's the GA. He just says things like, "that's for sending Sunder to attack me" and "that's for raising your voice."

I argue that the only time in Issue #21 that the characters were actually talking to Pharma is when we see Pharma's shadowy mouth or shadow. And, of course, when he kills Scorponok.

The GA's "irony" of keeping around Tyrest is that, well, Flame kind of hates Tyrest. Tyrest's trials doomed Flame to imprisonment on Garrus 9. It's ironic that, now, Tyrest is at Flame's mercy. Heck, it's even MORE ironic because Flame's scheme is essentially the same as Tyrest's "duly appointed enforcer of the Tyrest Accord" scheme with the Ultra Magnus armor, and Tyrest is comedically oblivious to Flame using the same trick.

The biggest hole in my theory is LL #15. Flame was there when the GA showed himself to Scorponok and Flame. However, look at Flame's attitude towards Scorponok in LL #14. "We've got to get out of here!" "I suggest we get to the nearest airlock and jump!" He's a little guy bossing around Scorpnok! Using my theory, Flame truly was dying out in space, just like Scorponok. However, Flame used the last bit of his strength to put on a huge light show for Scorponok's benefit. His name IS Flame, after all. Putting on a bright light isn't that farfetched. Perhaps the whole conversation went something like: "I am the Grand Architect. You belong to me now. First things first: If you're to serve me properly, you need to fix your bodies. Take Flame with you, find the nearest Worldsweeper, and get your bodies repaired ASAP! And then start preparing, confronting, and repelling!"

 

Just finished it. Not bad. Not bad at all. It's so weird to actually be given answers in a Lost Light story. Usually it's just more questions.

I was almost shivering with excitement as I turned each page, waiting to find out who the Grand Architect was. Then... Pharma. At first I was disappointed because he seems like such a boring choice. Then I was excited because I remembered what a fun and chaotic villain Pharma was. Then I was skeptical, because there's no way Pharma is the Grand Architect. There's something else at play here.

And are we thinking Unicron is the thing the weapon's going to be used against? I know Roberts said that this story wouldn't tie into the Unicron series, but it really feels like Unicron. Could be a similar approach to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. tying into Infinity War earlier this year, where Thanos loomed as a threat and was basically the whole reason for everything that happened in the season happening, but without Thanos ever actually appearing in the show.

Oh, and when Rodimus said "another sad little trumped-up tyrant who throws a hissy fit whenever the world won't listen". That's an actually reference to The Smiths. Way to live up to the stereotype Roberts.

I like this theory.