Heads up: the cover and description of this issue does not mostly match what actually happens in this issue. Spoiler No Megatron in this issue. Instead, the plot mostly centres around the titan, Vilgilem, being awaken. Cosmos appears to inform the team that a titan is coming, and Blaster and his team finds out the titan is heading towards the moon. Lightbright, and titan Lodestar, attempt to resolve the issue. They are unsuccessful. The tether on the moon is falling by Vilgilem, who also reminisce about the past. A nice moment from the issue: A decent issue...if you can get past the cover and solicitation, as well as being find with an issue about titans.
Umm...kind of confused about something. Spoiler If Vigilem takes out the moon, then there's going to be a serious energon crisis right? They've depended on this method of harvesting for a long time. Is that part of Megatron's big plan or did he just lose control of the situation yet again? I'm not quite sure I understand what the hell he's trying to do right now And yeah...I've noticed that so many of the descriptions and covers don't match the issues at all. It's happened quite frequently in this series.
Spoiler It could be possible Megatron is planning all of this. Vigilem could potentially hold the moon as hostage, and only if Sentinel Prime promise more forgings, which includes Titans, will the situtation be resolve, as this will neet Megatron and Vigilem's demands. If it all goes wrong, then yeah, this is Megatron losing the situation again. I will say, the solicitation is technically not lying in one aspect, otherwise this situation would not have happened. Spoiler Megatron is clearly not doing things by the book anymore.
Well...That issue was certainly something. It wasn't bad but wow...The solicitations and the preview pages featuring Slipstream and Cyclonus did not help it. See, I feel myself and a couple of others were probably anticipating another Megatron-Rise issue so not getting any of that was a bummer... BUT This issue wasn't bad apart from, what I think, were a few scenes that wasted pages. I won't discuss any heavy spoilers until more replies to the thread are layed out but I am really glad to see that Lightbright might FINALLY become an actual character. I loved how friendly her relationship with her titan was and also how well they're able to communicate compared to Windblade and Metroplex who struggled every now and then.
I am pretty certain that if you take this and Galaxies that just came out, you will see the answer. Spoiler Megatron is stacking his side with energy and simultaneously denying the Autobots with any hope of response. Simple but effective. The main population will have no source of energon and he will either be able to dictate terms, or be the "savior" who mysteriously has energon coming in from the other planet. I liked this issue. Liked the new characters, liked the pacing. LOVE IT when lesser guys get screen time. Blaster, Huffer, Gears, Cosmos... More please! I like that we with Titans we didn't start with Metroplex and Trypticon.
it’s like the last issue where I thought they’d finally let Orion pax do something since he was on the cover and cast page plus in the description. Yet he didn’t even speak. It’s...kind of frustrating. I feel like I keep going back and forth on this series. This issue was good but I think the entire run lost momentum over the past few issues (for me personally). Struggling to care about these plot threads and characters. I know Galaxies is filling the role right now (if it doesn’t keep getting delayed for MONTHS), but this story would benefit from more Spotlight issues where there’s an actual viewpoint character, focused story, and time to get to know Cybertron.
From what I read, next issue will be focusing on Arcee and Greenlights escaping Cybertron with their kid...IF the solicitations are correct. I'm hoping that gives us some character focus as well as some emotional stakes. At the very least, I will give this issue that- I found myself actually concerned for Lightbright. I was worried she was going to be killed off right then and there when she exchanged goodbyes with her Titan.
Yeah looking forward to that next standalone issue. The other two have been the best parts of the series by far. Spoiler Interesting...Now I’m wondering if he’ll even attempt to keep up the politician charade and blame all of this on the Rise or if he’s just going to take over
I liked the issue. Art was nice too, McGuire-Smith's art is getting alot more refined compared to earlier issues and Bove made it very vibrant. I liked the titan lore but i think Vigilem's dialogue should've been a different text format to make him more otherworldly like Lodestar's text bubbles. Even though I like the Cyclonus pages it felt out of place, should've saved it for another issue because have the issue start and end on the moon would've been more fitting. Malkova's art was also great. I was pleasantly surprised Lightbright was the spotlight of the issue, nice to see her ability as a cityspeaker was carried over from the old continuity.
I’ve been the biggest defender of this comic, but I do fear it’s becoming quite unfocused. When you think about how it was initially billed before launch, with the “first murder on Cybertron in ages” being the precursor to war, that now seems like a total irrelevance. There’s very little through line. Maybe that’s supposed to be intentional - “war is unpredictable” - but it doesn’t feel like a well planned tight narrative to me. I also think that the character selection is a bit odd. No Prime/Pax at all is either odd or refreshing, but then the characters that people seem to like - Cyclonus, Road Rage - haven’t been consistently present. First Cyclonus appearance in a while in this one. From a story perspective, I wonder if it wouldn’t benefit from a tighter focus. With all that said, which is really a macro observation, I did like the issue. I particularly liked the way it showed the interaction between the Titans and regular bots. You also can’t say it wasn’t action packed - it seems we’re about to get a Big Bang. Finally, as others have observed, it’s great that they are showcasing Titans other than the “big 5” - I actually hope this is a mandate from Hasbro as foreshadowing for new Titan toys given that they’ve done them all in the recent past (or will with Skorpy).
I'm afraid I have to agree with this. The more we stray away from characters who have been established as our protagonists and antagonists...The more it feels "out of the blue" for lack of a better word. Yes, I do understand that this issue happens as a direct result of Megatron's commands and the Rise's actions that were taken only an issue ago, but we went from nearing a political climax to focusing an entire on Lightbright piloting her mecha, Vigilem reciting a history textbook for pages, and the moon coming under fire only at the end of the issue. Prior to finishing the issue I was thinking about how much I wanted to return to the Autobot perspective because the prospect of an all-out assault on the Rise sounds exciting as hell. I stated it earlier but I feel certain expectations were set due to the false solicitations. That being said, I enjoyed the issue a lot. Lightbright is very likeable and I prefer her design as a cityspeaker over Windblades to be honest. Part of me is now wishing they could swap roles so we'd get to see more of her.
I really forgot how short these issues can be. Wasn't awful, and I came to really like Lightbright. It's funny how a fast a scene of someone acting human(you know what I mean) can make you care about whether they live or die. And yeah, as fun as it can be to go "Oh hey, it's Blaster", it is kind of tiring to see a full cast of new characters aside from Wheeljack involved in this scuffle, when we've barely had Prowl or Chromia developed as of late, especially when they were essentially the mains for the first ten or so issues. I'm thinking Ruckley is preparing for a slaughter, which is why he's introducing these micromasters and old IDW OCs at this point. Doesn't have to worry about killing off his main guys, but still wants some oomph to the deaths he's setting up. At the same time, the introductions of a lot of these characters feel like Ruckley is trying to test the waters a bit and see who he actually enjoys writing, or finds interesting, and who he wants to leave on the cutting room floor. Flamewar and Shadow Striker felt like random additions in their first appearance, and I wonder if he intended to use them much more afterwards, or if he just decided he liked Flamewar and wanted to focus on her more.
I like Lightbright, she was the best part of this issue. Vigilem's also interesting, even if most of his dialogue was just him reciting old literature - it gives some insight into why he's chosen to throw his weight behind the Rise.
I decided to post this here instead of giving it its own thread, but does anyone know what's going on behind the scenes regarding solicitations and the delays here? Some recent issues of the current ongoings have both been delayed, with issue #16 taking nearly two months, #17 a month late, and Galaxies #4 taking three months. Which is a thing that happens for comics, but for issues that are half the size of what they used to be it is crazy frequent compared to how it was during IDW1. In the meantime, entire arcs have being solicited for Galaxies while the issue completing the first arc only just dropped. The comics are ridiculously behind on their release schedule, to the point where it is almost worrying how behind on production the crew behind these books are compared to how it used to be. But speaking of solicitations, low-key conspiracy theory time, what I'm finding more bizarre is the fact that the plots for these last two delayed comics are completely different from the plots teased in the solicitations. It almost comes off as if the content of those issues have been scrapped in favor of the content of the recent issues, which saw events that just so happen to be properly kick-starting the war. I also have to admit, some of the content in these solicitations might come off as more of a natural progression than what we've seen happen. It's not like the #16 and #17 we got are jarring or anything, they are just the issues that also happen to be the issues where Megatron decides crisis actually is the only solution by this point... an issue after he proclaims his unwillingness to resort to crisis while beating the shit out of Shockwave. Anyway I don't exactly think Ruckley was told to speed up the action because sales were bad or anything like that, but it does feel likely that something caused this comic to take a sudden shift from the original plan. I think Ruckley has heard people complaining about the lack of action and has been trying to put more in wherever he can- even changing the direction of his story arcs to match this. Bumblebee randomly beating on Skytread for a second time also comes to mind. Also, the pacing in this comic has always been weird, yeah. But the lack of attention to the murder investigation is WEIRD. It is the opening plot thread and development of this arc has been almost completely halted in favour of what’s going on now. We have a name: Frenzy, but we haven’t even seen this investigation yet. Instead we are being introduced to new characters doing completely different things. I’m not saying I dislike the pacing, although I do think it can be very messy at points, but it also makes me wonder if editorial has been mucking around with the narrative to some extent behind the scenes. Not trying to say that’s a bad thing either! OR that I dislike the direction this comic is going per-se. It is their jobs to ensure the best product is being released. I just get the feeling there is something going on with the creative team that I’m missing.
Yeah could be. It would be naive to think that somebody, either from IDW or Hasbro is NOT watching these forums. This is a big year for Transformers evidently, so maybe they’re being extra particular in how things develop across media.
I've wondered about this ever since that transcript of Brian and the team was Q&A'ed at what I think might have been TFnation? I remember somebody brought up the pacing and he apologized, claiming that he realized comic book writing was very different and that he'd have to change that pace in the future.
That’s very interesting actually. I really ought to listen to some of interviews if just to hear about his process on this book and adapting to mediums.
I mean, the relationship between mentors and their students or whatever does seem somewhat analogous to parent and child, depending on who we're talking about. Wheeljack seems to act more like a teacher to Gears than a parent, for example. Bumblebee's relationship with Rubble seemed to frame him as being like a dad, and his grief over Rubble's death could be compared to a parent losing their child. So I'd say it's fair to refer to Arcee and Greenlight's student as "their kid", depending on what we see of that dynamic.