star saber, jfc star saber

 

"PRIMUS HATES YOU!"

 

Spotlight Arcee.

John Barber deserves a pizza for being able work with what that issue gave him so well.

 

Release a series where they deliberately ignored previous stuff because they didn't think we'd care

The fandom never forgets. It mostly got massaged away later but, the fandom never forgets.

 

Holomatter. Specifically the ridiculous extremes it reached under Roberts' pen.

Holomatter can:

-Reasonably recreate a facsimile of any object, organic or mechanical, with such perfection it can duplicate robots such that other robots can't tell the difference. Originally it couldn't get hair right, but this never factored in as a detriment.
-Be projected from anywhere to any place, even across the globe (since Swerve projected a 1:1 scale Earth) and line-of-sight is not required.
-Achieve some level of reasonable solidity, again such that a projection can effectively operate as a normal being. It can at least lift the average weight to size ration of its projection. (i.e. a giant-sized human projection can easily lift real humans in its hands) Roberts did not invent this aspect but he did make it so much worse.
-Change size/density/properties willingly, with no visible detriment.
-Completely rob a Transformers story of Transformers, arguably the worst offense to any concept in the brand.
-Effectively act as a remote body from all of the above. A holomatter avatar can see, touch, communicate, interact, and do virtually everything the real body can do.
-Be used by anyone. Sorry Hound, your gimmick is now standard issue, and far more effective than anything you've ever conjured.

Holomatter ruined IDW for me because it forced me to ask why this wasn't being weaponized. Battles no longer need to be fought with real soldiers, everyone can just project a dummy of themselves onto a battlefield. Infiltration is meaningless, just project yourself into any secure area, regardless of distance or matter in between. Originally introduced under the guise of energy limitations, Swerve managed to live as a Holomatter avatar and project a 1:1 size Earth (fuck that's stupid) with hardly any serious ill-effects. He'd suffered more from lack of maintenance than the strain of using that much Holomatter.

There's no situation Holomatter cannot be used for, if not at least attempted. People have come up with fanon theories on what limits it may have, but simply put it has none. And if was robbed of these limits purely to have a cringey self-indulgent "everyone in shitty human avatars" story that didn't even need to happen and was so uncomfortably embarrassing it made me feel ashamed of what I was reading, like someone was going to walk in and see me reading a Transformers story where they all have human avatars that look nothing like what they ought to and just look like a bunch of Tumblr fanart.   Swearth broke me so, so badly with Holomatter I now actively hate the idea of human hologram drivers, even though it's a really good idea when handled tastefully and reasonably, simply for fear that they will be given some ulterior purpose in the story that destroys the logic of the universe. Why wage wars when you can use holomatter? Why transform when you can use holomatter? Why do anything when you can use Holomatter? Swerve didn't, and aside from succumbing to depression (which had nothing to actually do with the technology) he was just fine. There's no reason the technology can't be plugged into a reactor with monolithic projectors and just create a fantasy realm for anybody with enough juice and programming power since one little guy did the same thing sat in a puddle of his own robo-filth.

 

Emotron Autobot scores very high in this ranking for me.

 

The time where Functionist universe Rung turned giant, punched the moon, and then died, especially because the writing implied any Cybertronian could do that, which fundamentally breaks the lore for me. If all of them could do that, and they've been fighting a war for millions of years, why haven't a bunch of them said "screw it" and turned moon-sized in one last-ditch offensive before their spark finally gives out? They were fighting a war with no end in sight. If you and a lot of other people are going to die anyways, might as well go out in style, right?

 

Man Lost Light really did take a dip in quality for me compared to MTMTE. At least the last issue was mostly good.

 

Let's not forget attention deflectors and personality ticks.

 

-Spotlight Arcee
-Autobot Megatron
-Morally grey Optimus Prime
-Jerkwad Rodimus
-Primus is Rung
-Windblade's depiction
-Drift's depiction
-Star Saber
-Prowl

There are many more, but these are the most notorious ones IMO.

 

Hiring Ruckley.

 

The crap they did to Arcee with her Spotlight

 

I'd certainly like to.

 

Fired Furman prematurely and doing the stupid event books to correspond with the toyline.

 

God I can't believe how dirty they did Hunter. Let's also not forget the straight up retcon of him forcing Sunstreaker to be a Headmaster, ruining the badass and uplifting moment of these two victims who banded together to fight back had. Oh, and then Sunstreaker sold out the Autobots and arrrgh.

That's what happens when you let pissy fans who hate those stinky icky humans call the shots.

 

Rung is Primus! 

 

IDW Spike!

I never bothered reading till the end.
Somebody please tell me he got stepped on. Please.

I'm neutral on Holomatters. Although I really prefer talking car robots. Reminds me of my childhood watching Knight Rider days 

*Waits for a Transformers/Knight Rider crossover 

 

Unfortunately he survived to the end. I choose to believe he would later get crushed by Unicron debris.

 

"Roberts is such a subtle and humble writer!"

*makes self-insert fucking God*

I was neutral on holomatter until I saw how broken and stupid it was.

Juts holograms would be enough. I always said holodrivers would've been a great way to give the robots added screentime and dialogue in the Bay films where CGI was limited, but like you I'd settle for just talking cars.